in the Evart Review
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in the Evart Review |
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The Evart Review began in October 1872, more than a year and a half
after Evart was organized. What we know of the early times comes mostly
from interviews and letters from those early settlers as elderly
correspondents. Explanations of locations are in parentheses within the
article. Evart Review January 30, 1931 Editor of Review: Dear Sir: I see it quite the thing for old timers to get a little publicity, the Nobel Prize will no doubt be given to some resident of Evart in the near future. Well, I 'll start my yarn. My people lived in Howard City. My father came to Evart in March 1871, and my mother decided I was to follow him, so I set out with a man to walk. We made Big Rapids the first day and Hersey the next. My Uncle lived in Hersey and I remained there until May first, then came by stage to Evart, which at the time consisted of a large board shanty just back of where the elevator (Credit Union) now stands. In the front part of the building was Blodgett & Kennedy's store and in the rear a hotel run by Mrs. W.W. Quigley who boarded the crew of the Blodgett & Kennedy mill which stood just below the shanty on the river bank. My first room was in an old lumber camp, just west of the present stock yards on Twin Creek. I was twelve years old. Father was quite displeased to think I came up here so he got a job for me carrying water on the railroad grade at the point where the oil tanks are now located near Riverside Park. There was no bridge across the river then and the spring from which water was carried was on the other side of the river. I carried two pails at a time, walking timbers which had been placed across the river. I was soon promoted to engineer on a one horse dump cart. That job finished, I was placed in charge of ten horses at Winsor (where the Evart Airport is now), which by the way was quite a town, consisting of the R.R. store which still stands near the Nelson farm, a saloon, hotel and one house. That winter father was a foreman for Blodgett & Kennedy in a lumber camp four miles south of town and I started for school at 5 o'clock in the morning, riding in on the first load of logs to come each day. The schoolhouse was where the present building now stands (Middle School). The next winter I was at school in Hersey, and was one of the four largest boys to attend. Here is where I came near being a millionaire, as the other three boys were John W. Blodgett, Delos Diggins, and Abb Garrish, who all became millionaires. I also attended school in an old store building on the site of the Methodist Church in Evart (the northwest corner of Main & Fourth Streets.) Mrs. C.H. Rose (Emma Lancashire), Elmer Birdsall, and Maggie McFarlane (Mrs Birdsall) were among my schoolmates. I often compare the view of the country between Evart and Hersey in 1871 and the present time - the towering pine forests of those days and the brush and stumps of today. Almost the first person I became acquainted with was a little girl named Hattie Morgan, now Mrs. Hattie DeShetler and to a host of friends and young people "Aunt Hattie" Mrs DeShetler is the oldest living settler and I am the next. Evart was surveyed and platted in the spring of 1871 by George Reed and my father, Charles Mills. F.A. Mills Return to Evart Review newspaper articles |