The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1926-07-21
CONTINUED from page one)
PRIMITIVE NATURE
KEPT UNADORNED
AT RAMSEY PARK


met on a curve too sharp to pass, but
no collisions where fatalities or ever
severe injuries have ensued.
There are heights in the park from
which the tourist can view the pros
pect of surrounding countryside fol
20 miles and more. There are valleys
in between where solitude is physical
in it's weight. From these depths as
one looks up or tries with eye to pen
citrate the thick-set grove about, it
seems impossible that hardly half a
mile away there is town with pretty
homes and shops and hustle of the
modern day.
Along these valleys in a channel
chiseled centuries ago through solid
granite rock the two streams, river
and creek, flow to their union just
below the Ramsey Falls.
Redwood, the greater stream, has
cut the deeper channel in the rock.
Ramsey, the smaller streamlet, falls
to meet the rivers at their junction
point, tumbling in wet weather, in a
noisy cascade of rock-lashed foam.
In dryer months the falls are merely
a misty curtain as two streams merge.
Sometimes, in extremely arid years,
the water only trickles through the
rocks.
Below the falls and froth-dashed
meeting place there is a quiet pool,
lake almost, that by its presence
emphasizes contrast with the dash
ing haste above.
1t is contrast, typical, so they
say in Redwood Falls of the park it.
self, place where contrasts form
the base of Natures theme. For
there is contrast, they point out, in
the very proximity of town and will
derness, of the cliffs and dells, of
points of grandeur and Of sudden soil
tude.
There is another contrast, too, one
sees as, passing from the park, a
modern golf course greets the eye at
one side of the road while just below
the table land, in easy reach of i'll
aimed drivers that 60 astray, a pair
of buffalo roams.
There were three buffalo this spring
but one, a calf, died and now the older
bison mates wander in their range
alone.
Dogs from the town burrowed be-
meath the fence that encloses the deer
park and, before they could be caught
again, had killed four of the seven an
imals herded there.
Below the hill from the deer park,
where the Ramsey and Redwood riv
ers widen almost to a lake, there is
a landmark of the days when three
quarters Of century ago the Red
wood country first became frontier.
A log cabin stands there just be-
yond the junction of the streams, a
structure said to be the first home
built by hand of white man in the
county The cabin, so history asserts,
was built by Colonel Samuel McPhail,
a few miles from the present site of
Redwood Falls.
Settlers who followed the pioneer
trail, careless of history and its rel
les, had moved the old cabin aside,
left it vacant for term of years, used
it for time as storehouse and later
kept it as a shelter for their sheep
and hogs.
1t was to this that Redwood coun-
tvs first residence had descended
when its was discovered, restored and
moved to grace the place of honor in
the Ramsey park.
In Redwood Falls they are proud of
their park Thousands OF tourists ev-
cry year, particularly those who trav-
ell from the prairies of the West, to
whom the crags and glens of Mime
sota's Yellowstone are source of
never-ending wonder, praise the beau
ty of the place. But in their pride
the residents of Redwood Falls do
not forget to tell the story of the man
who, more than any other, they say,
is responsible for the preservation of
this bit of wilderness in settled land
1t is a story they tell o. man who
failed, but, failing, won the love and
reverence of his fellow men. They
call him, now that he has gone to an
other city, "the father Of Redwood
Falls parks"
H. M. Hitchcock is the mans name,
a. druggist by profession, almost a
pioneer resident of Redwood county. !
He was man, they say in Redwood |
Falls, who so loved the beauty nature |
had displayed in what is now the |
Ramsey park that he neglected his |
own business, lavished what slender .
means he had to keep the park from
private ownership and paid the cost !
himself of many things which went
% enhance it's charm.
1t was due to his untiring efforts
through the early years, his towns
men say, that the aspect of the place
las stayed unchanged. Il was he who
prevented it when other men would
have cut for firewood .he timber on
he place.
1t was Mr.. Hitchcock who years ago
ed in the movement to have the
Ramsey acreage set aside by the
state. In those days there was in
Minnesota a, profusion of the beauty
A trusty has escaped from the Iowa
prison farm at Fort Madison, evil
IDENTIFY seeking farm relief Omaha
World Herald.
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