Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-03-01
OLE BULLS COLONY.
Reported Last Of the Norwegians Died
Recently in Pennsylvania.


Recently in Pennsylvania.
From the Philadelphia Record.
Back of the recent death from starvation
and exposure of the old hermit. August
Swanson, lies a story such as one might
find in an old book hidden away in a
pioneers garnet. The story has to do with
the pathetic tale of Ole Bull and his colony
of Norwegians, whose history is such an
interesting chapter in the archives of Potter
county. Pa.
Two woodsmen. eager for a short cut out
of the Kettle creek region, had cut across
a virgin forest region, and In the very
midst of this his shack" was found. The
woodsmen ran across the track OF cata-
mount, deep in the ravine. 1t was a fresh
track-so fresh. indeed. that the soft, ragged
edges of the claws prints had not yet set
tied down. The men determined to follow
the tracks, and had gone hardly fourth
of a mile when they almost stumbled upon
a bark and log shack half hidden under
a ledge of rocks. and when the men pushed
open the door of the howell they found the
shriveled frozen form of old August Swan
son. lying in front Of pile of stones rudeiy
constructed into fireplace. He had ap-
parently been dead for several days, for
the wood mice had gnawed his ears and
fingers, and the half-open eyes, peering
from out the bony sockets, looked almost
mutely appealing for help. The old man
had broken his board bed to pieces and
burned it up. Half a chair lay nearby,
and little pile Of white ashes on big fat
stone showed where the last spark glim-
mered and then went out, leaving the SICK
and helpless man to die.
The woodsmen determined that he should
be given decent burial They had heard the
story of the old hermit who lived some
where in the trackless wilds of the Kettle
creek region, and they concluded that this
must be the man. One of the men remained
on guard while the other trudged five miles
away to the village Of New Bergen, where
the news of the discovery was announced.
A coffin was secured, and that evening the
body was laid In a grave dug near his
''dugout'' and suitably marked. Next
spring the place will be further and more
substantially Unidentified
Old Swanson was one Of the original col
ony of Norwegians who came into the
wilds of Potter county under the leadership
of Ole Bull, the famous violinist, and there
be gan digging and chopping and hewing
out a settlement. In the first few months
they built log houses and called the two
villages Oleona and New Bergen. Swanson
was leader. He was bosom friend Of
Ole Bull, and when at the end Of the first
year all their fond hopes were dashed to
the ground by the discovery that they had
paid their money for land whose title was
swept from their grasp. and realized the
fact that they were facing starvation,
Swanson was not one of the men who
joined in the cry of treachery against Ole
Bull. The latter, even then, was on
tour of the cities-earning money with his
violin to keep the colonists from want. For
months Swanson was one of the few col
onists who remained loyal to their leader,
and when. the next spring, nearly all the
Norwegians went out into Michigan to re-
coonize Swanson declared that he was
going to remain in the Potter county for
ests.
There was one interval of ten years that
Swanson YEAS not seen by anybody. Then.
he came to the little store at New Bergen
and begged some clothes. After that for
several years he made almost monthly
visits to the little settlement; but at last
months ran into years, and seven of these
passed before he again came out into CIV
ilization. The people In that section would
have believed that he had died had it not
been for the fact that occasionally hunters
would report having seen him.
Invariably the old man asked for
matches, and once, when accosted by
woodsmen. begged for an ak. saying that
he had worn his almost to the hilt in the
years that he had used it. The woodsmen
gave him and he disappeared In the
woods, chuckling like a boy over a new
toy He subsisted nuts, roots and the
meat of wild animals which he trapped and
shared Occasionally he would creep up to
a farmhouse In an out-of-the-way district
and there beg for a ham or some salt meat
He always showed the training of a gentle
man, and had about him reflection of the
quaint manner Of Ole Bull