The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1907-10-18
EARLY HISTORY y

IOf Mobiles County's infant Day
I And the Men Who
Made It.
From the mass he has collected TO-
the history of Mobiles county, which
lis to be issued 10 book form, A. P
Rose furnishes US the following brie
outline of the organic history OF tbs
county. The sources Of information
Tor this sketch are the state and coun
ty records, early newspaper files and
Interviews with early settlers. H.
has not yet proceeded far enough
with his work to verify all the dates
and figures given, but, in the main,
the statements made are undoubtedly
correct:
While there was not permanent
settler in Mobiles county, prior to the
spring of 1867, we must 80 back ten
years before that date to witness the
| creation of our county. The creation
cf county by the legislature does
no. organize it, and in the case of
Mobiles county,it was thirteen years
after the first event before a county
government was put in operation.
But we must go back of ths date o.
the creation of the county many years
to get thorough understanding of
tho organic history of the county.
Immediately after Minnesota be-
came territory in the year 1849 the
Legislature met and divided the terri
tory into nine counties, as follows:
Benton, Dakota, Itasca, Cass, Pembi'
ma, Ramesy, Washington, Chicago
and W. asha. Locally our interest
may be confined to two of these, Wa
basha and Dakota, which was includ-
ed all OF the southern part of the ter
ritory. The former included all that
part of Minnesota "lying east of the
line running due south from point
on the Mississippi river known as
Medicine Battle village, at Pine Bend
to the Iowa line" Dakota county,
created October ~, 1849, was de-
scribed as call of that portion of the
said territory vest of the Mississippi
and lying west Of the county of Wa
basha aud south ola line beginning
at the mouth OF the Crow river and up
said river and the north branch there
of toits source, aud thence due west
to the Missouri river:' Thus we find
that under the original division OF
counties the land now included with
in the present Mobiles county was part
Of Dakota county. But in the whole
mammoth county of Dakota at that
date there were not enough settlers
to perfect an organization, and the act
further provided that the county
should be declared ''organized only
for the purpose of appointment of
justices of the peace, constables and
such other judicial and ministerial Of
fcers as may be especially provided
for" For judicirl purposes the coun-
ty was attached to Ramsey county.
During the next few years the terri
toriallegislature made several changes
in county boundaries which affected
the future county or Mobiles. With
out going into the details of these
acts we will state that r.; an act passed
March 5th, 1858, Blue Earth county
was created, including all of south.
western Minnesota. Brown county
was created by act Feb. 20, 1856, in
Guiding the present county of Mobiles
and much Of southwestern Minnesota.
We then remained a part of Brown
county until May %, 1857, when an
act was approved creating numerous
counties in the southwestern part of
the territory. This action was brought
about largely because 2f the railroad
agitation of that period. 1t was pro-
posed to construct railroad thru
southwestern Minnesota as we'll as
in many other parts of the territory.
Immediately thereafter came the pan.
ic; railroad building did not mater
ialize; the unpopulated counties ere.
ated remained unpopulated. The
counties of southwestern Minnesota
that came into existence under the
act above referred to were Martin,
Jackson, Mobiles, Pipestone, Big Sioux
Cottonwood, Murray, Rock and Mid