Webster City freeman. [volume] (Webster City, Hamilton County, Iowa) 1884-1946, 1913-07-08

that year. except in the election OIL
sheriff. The contest was again
opened in 1874 and after a spirited
contest, resulted in the loss Of one
more officer to the republicans. For
the Office of recorder, H. c. Johnson,
the regular nominee of the republi-
can party being defeated by ]. v.
| Kearns, the nominee of the anti
monopoly party, while the vote on
supervisor between j. w. Lee, re-
publican, and J. D. Maxwell, anti
monopoly, was quite close but in
favor of Lee. This was followed the
next fall (1S75) by contest for the
Office of sheriff that was decidedly
warm and amusing and is we'll re-
membered by all.
ELECTING A SHERIFF.
F. A. Harris was made the repub-
lican nominee. The democrats NOM
mated J. A. Snodgrass. The anti
monopoly party seems to have died
and in place of its nominee Nels
| Olmstead and J. VanBramer each
| ran Independent. All of these can
| didates were reputable citizens and
| good men, but if the stories that
| were put into circulation during the
| campaign were to be half believed,
the people had stumbled upon the
four boss villains of the county and
were running them for sheriff. If
We remember rightly each candidate
was sure OF his election and the
friends Of each were willing to bet
odds on the success OF their man.
The vote was something of a sur
prise to everybody as it resulted as
follows: Harris, 4S2; VanBramer.
294; Olmstead, 2S1, Snodgrass, 1856.
RAISING FUNDS FOR A NEW
COURTHOUSE.
By the middle of the year 1874
it became clear that two railroad
projects mentioned in our last chap
ter were dead past all hope Of res
direction and the county still had
the swamp land upon its hands. For
some years now there had been more
or less agitation of the question of
building courthouse. The old
courthouse was now too small to ac-
commodate the public. The county
had no safe Jail and was compelled
to send its prisoners to Waterloo so
there were no two opinions about
the needs Of the county so far as a |
new court house and Jail" were con-
cerned. But there was a great deal
of disagreement about how costly a !
house should be built, and where
the money was to come from to pay
for it. Times were then very hard,
and growing worse, and the idea of
adding to the burden, a tax large
enough to build such house as was
desired, was not pleasant one. So
the swamp lands that had been vot-
ed away so often and still remained
were again made the subject OF a
conflict of ballots. The board of SUI
pervisors submitted to the people a
proposition to appropriate of the
swamp land fund $4,000 with
which to build courthouse and jail |
and the proposition was carried by
about two hundred majority. The
election took place in the fall Of
1874. During all of the year Of
1875 efforts were made to secure a |
contractor who would take the lands
and build such house as was de-
manded. Plans and Specifications
were on file, but no bidders could be
found unless some cash could be Sc
cured. The lands were on the mar
ket and some of them were sold
when it was finally agreed to re-
duce the price from five dollars per
acre to four dollars and citizens were
asked to come in and take one or
more forties to help raise cash
enough to secure a bidder. The pro-
ject Of putting up $4,000 house
was given up and the plans modi-
fed so as to reduce the cost to $685.
900. After this, enough lands were
disposed of to secure the letting Of
the contract
w. II. Frasier has accepted a posi-
ton with the Standard Oil Company
oit