Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2022

Joel Schroeder Weiser was born on August 13, 1834, in Berks County, Pennsylvania, to Samuel Weiser and Mary Schroeder. Samuel was a miller who owned a small farm near Reading, where the Weisers tilled and lived on the land. When Joel was 15, he traveled to Amity, Pennsylvania, with his mother and worked as a tobacconist, a dealer in tobacco, according to Curt Eriksmoe’s “Civil War veteran helped found and grow Valley City” in Did You Know That.

Joel’s older brother, William, was working on a farm near Danby Station, Illinois, and in 1850, Joel joined him there for a month. The two brothers then journeyed to St. Paul and found temporary employment as settler-colonists on Dakota land. The area of Shakapee City, Minnesota Territory, which was, and is, the traditional home of many of the Mdewakanton Dakota Indians, but through questionable treaties, became open for white settler-colonists.

Joel and William relocated to Shakopee, and with like other settler-colonists who moved there, Joel found plentiful work as a mason and plasterer.

In early May 1854, Joel returned to Pennsylvania to marry Louisa Cleaver. Louisa was the daughter of Jonathan Cleaver and Sarah Gabey. Joel and Louisa wanted to encourage Joel’s parents to move to Shakopee. They felt that Samuel’s health was failing and that encouraging them to move to Shakopee might help, as his father was rapidly deteriorating.

After Joel and Louisa’s wedding on May 10, 1854, the couple went to Niagara Falls for their honeymoon, and Joel’s parents traveled by riverboat up the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to join their two sons and daughter-in-law in Shakopee. However, before arriving, Samuel died aboard the riverboat on May 17, 1854. Since Joel and his mother had always been very close, Mary remained with him and Louisa until her death in Valley City in 1877.

Four children were born in Shakopee, the two oldest later dying the same day of diphtheria.

After receiving his medical degree in 1855, Joel’s other brother, Josiah, also relocated to Shakopee and began treating patients, both settlers and the Dakota in Tínṫa Otuŋwe and the “Shakopee Reservation,” which was actually land owned by the Dakota on the north side of the Minnesota River.

During the first few years in Shakopee, the three Weiser brothers did very well and made many friendships with some other settler-colonists and some Dakota Indians.

Soon after the start of the Civil War in 1862, William enlisted with the Union Army. On October 17, 1862, Dr. Josiah Weiser, was inducted into a local Minnesota army, commanded by General Henry Hastings Sibley, to pursue the Dakota Indians. Finally, on September 31, 1864, Joel enlisted with the Ninth Minnesota Volunteer Infantry and was at once ordered to Memphis to engage in fighting the Confederate forces.

When Joel was mustered in 1864, Louisa had three little girls at home.

For the next 11 months, his unit pursued the Rebels through Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana, often engaging in battle with bushwhackers who shadowed the Union army’s movements. Not only were Joel and his fellow soldiers frequently harassed by bushwhackers, but they also had to contend with heat, humidity, and the ever-present mosquitoes that inflicted half of the soldiers with malaria during the Civil War.

Shortly before the close of the war, Joel came down with a severe case of malaria, which nearly cost him his life and caused his black hair to permanently turn white. Joel returned home to Shakopee to recuperate, was mustered out of the army on August 24, 1865, and discharged in October. He was discharged in 1865 and Joel and Louisa had three more children in Shakopee, according to Find a Grave.

Joel returned to his work as a mason in Shakopee until 1870, when he was offered a contract to do construction work in St. Paul. With the completion of his contract in 1874, he relocated 12 miles east of St. Paul to work on a farm.

After working as a mason and farmer in eastern Minnesota for over twenty years, Joel and his family packed up their belongings and traveled by train to Worthington, a railroad stop located sixty miles west of Fargo, in northern Dakota Territory, not too far from where his older brother, Dr. Josiah Weiser, had been killed 14 years earlier. Joel filed a homestead and tree claim of 320 acres, 4 miles northeast of the railroad stop, and built a log cabin in Worthington, which was the second house built there. Joel would later change the name of Worthington to Valley City, according to a column written by Curt Eriksmoe.

Shortly after Weiser arrived, immigration to Worthington began to pick up, and by 1878, there were about thirty people living there. Weiser built a house and a general store in Worthington, and it has been written that although the store was small, it “carried the largest and most complete stock to be found in [Dakota] Territory at that time.” Along with Weiser’s store and house, the town consisted of 11 other houses and a saloon, according to “Founder of Valley City waged sustained battle to keep his community relevant,” by Curt Eriksmoe in Did You Know That.

On March 8, 1881, Valley City was incorporated, and Weiser was elected mayor. To facilitate education and religion in the town, the first school and church services were held in his house. Later in 1881, he helped establish a Methodist church in Valley City and donated the block of land on which it was built. Two years later, he expanded his store to include a lumberyard and a farm equipment dealership.

From 1878 to 1890, Valley City had grown from a population of thirty to over 1,000. By 1910, Valley City had surpassed Mandan, Wahpeton, Grafton, and Jamestown to become the fifth largest city in North Dakota. Weiser’s eyesight was becoming very poor, and he was forced to turn over his businesses to his son.

Joel Schroeder Weiser died on January 17, 1925, at ninety years old and was buried at Hillside Cemetery in Valley City, North Dakota.

Bibliography

BluMoKitty. “Joel Schroeder Weiser (1834-1925).” Find a Grave, 3 June 2013. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/111756244/joel-schroeder-weiser.

Eriksmoen, Curt. “Civil War veteran helped found and grow Valley City.” Did You Know That, 6 June 2020. https://www.inforum.com/lifestyle/eriksmoen-civil-war-veteran-helped-found-and-grow-valley-city.

Eriksmoen, Curt. “Founder of Valley City waged sustained battle to keep his community relevant.” Did You Know That, 13 June 2020. https://www.inforum.com/lifestyle/eriksmoen-founder-of-valley-city-waged-sustained-battle-to-keep-his-community-relevant.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2023

Jason Andre Cahigas Perkins was born in Shakopee, Minnesota on September 20, 1992. His parents were Herbert A. Perkins (1957-2012) and Jennifer Cahigas Perkins-Boddie, who was born in Bolinao, a municipality in the province of Pangasinan, Philippines.

At 6’3”, Jason graduated from Shakopee High School in 2011. He is a Filipino-African American semi-professional basketball player who played for the Caida Tiles Masters in the PBA Developmental League.

Jason is the youngest of three siblings. His father was African American, while his mother, is a Filipina. He’s been into sports since he was little, playing both football and basketball.

While attending Shakopee High School, Jason suited up for the Sabers boys’ basketball team. He also played tight end (TE) for the school’s varsity football program.

During his senior year, Jason averaged 16.6 points and 4.2 rebounds per game, and signed a letter of intent to play for the Valley City State University in April 2011. He also played AAU ball when he was a teenager, suiting up for a squad called Pump N Run, where he got his moniker Hefty Lefty.

After graduating, Perkins attended Valley City State University to play basketball for the Vikings. Valley City State University is in Valley City, a town of 6,500 people located along the Sheyenne River, is a 45-minute commute from Fargo. Jason played for one year there. In 2012, he decided to go to the Philippines to study upon the prodding’s of his mother, who had always encouraged him to live in her native land.

Jason was initially recruited by former San Beda head coach Frankie Lim to play for the Red Lions, but left following Lim’s resignation. Then he was invited by De La Salle University officials to visit the campus, and soon after, he joined the practice with the Green Archers. He served his one-year residency before finally suiting up for the Green Archers in the 2013 UAAP season. In his rookie season, he averaged 12.7 points per game on 52.8% field goals and 9.6 rebounds per game and was instrumental in La Salle’s title conquest.

Jason played professional basketball for the Phoenix Super LPG Fuel Masters of the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA). The Archers went on to win the championship that season. It was tough being away from family. His father died. But he realized that the move was a good one.

“The style of play here is very physical. The referees let a lot of calls go so it gets very chippy,” Perkins said. “There’s a lot of elbows and punches but I’m used to it now.”

“I had to chase my dream by myself although it was good for me because I learned to grow independent and pay more attention to the blessings I’ve received in life,” he said. “Right now, I major in sports science as well as business management. I also try to travel and experience as much as possible now. I’ve swam with sharks, climbed mountains, tried parasailing. Since I moved here my days pretty much just consist of school, basketball, and trying to experience as much as I can out of life,” said Jason in an article in the Shakopee Valley News, “Chasing his dream: Jason Perkins playing basketball in the Philippines.”

Jason Andre Cahigas Perkins has a wife, Marga, and in August of 2022 had a daughter, Luna Bella Perkins.

“While I’m trying to get involved with business I would like to become a professional basketball player here in the PBA [Philippines Basketball Association], although I have to go to graduate school first because I promised my mother,” he said.

Bibliography

Abeln, Todd. “Chasing his dream: Jason Perkins playing basketball in the Philippines.” Shakopee Valley News, 29 Dec. 2014.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2023

Jane Dillard was born on March 8, 1809, in Virginia, daughter of James Madison Dillard, Sr. (1777-1852) and Jane Elizabeth English (1781-1814).

Jane’s father was born in Culpeper County, Virginia in 1777. He had 16 children by two wives, Jane Elizabeth English and Cynthia Ann Haywood Dillard (1800-1872). James moved west from Culpeper County to the area around Elizabethtown, Hardin County, Kentucky about 1810 with his in-laws, Robert Hamilton English (1757-1826) and Sarah Jane Smith Bellows English (1761-1826) and family.

Jane’s grandfather, William Dillard, was born in 1753 in Culpeper County, and her grandmother was Mary Sarah Norman Dillard (1758-1815). William was a Revolutionary War solder. He enlisted in the Virginia Continental Army at Chesterfield Courthouse September 20, 1780, and subsequently, on September 8, 1781, he was killed in the Battle of Eutaw Springs in South Carolina. That battle was the last major engagement of the war in the Carolinas; both sides claimed victory. William’s brother, Capt. James Dillard, had moved to Laurens County, South Carolina at age 17. He served throughout the Revolutionary War under generals Sumpter and Greene and was with Gen. Sumpter at the Battle of Eutaw Springs, where his brother was killed. Jane Dillard and John Boswell Allen came from Spencer County, Kentucky to Boone County, Indiana.

Jane Dillard married John Allen on November 18, 1829, in Elizabethtown, Hardin County, Kentucky. According to David H. Eggler in an article, “John Boswell Allen and Jane Dillard Allen: Kentucky to Indiana to Shakopee, Minnesota” on September 10, 2019, the record reads, “Allen, John B., and Jane Dillard. Surety James Dillard, girl’s father, who consented in person. Man of age. 18 Nov 1829. C. Lovelace [minister].”

John Boswell Allen was born on February 24, 1806, in Shelby County, Kentucky. His parents were John Allen, Sr. (1769-1837) and Elizabeth Boswell Allen (1768-1820).

John Spencer was the husband of Priscilla Allen and then Nancy Allen, and therefore the brother-in-law of John Boswell Allen. John, his brother George H. Spencer, and his sons John Bruce Spencer and Spier Spencer were all prominent figures in the early history of Minnesota and Shakopee. One article wrote about Spier Spencer: “He was born in Spencer County, Kentucky, January 22, 1827, his father being a prominent slave owner. He lived there until age 14, when his father sold his slaves and moved to Boone County, Indiana, where he remained for eight years.” That relocation, in 1841, was after the move by John Allen. It is conceivable that John Allen, like John Spencer, held slaves in Kentucky before relocating to Boone County, Indiana.

Jane and John moved to Shakopee in 1853. At that time, the place was called Shakapee City, Minnesota Territory, which was the name from 1853-1855. The place was first called Tínṫa Otuŋwe, then Prairie des Français, then in 1851 it was called Holmes Landing, then Sha K’ Pay, Minnesota Territory until the Allens arrived at the territory of Shakapee City. It was not until 1857 that the place was called Shakopee, Minnesota.

Only five white families lived in Shakopee, called Holmes Landing in 1851 and twenty white persons in 1852, which was called Sha K’ Pay. Of course, that doesn’t include the six hundred Dakota Indians who had been living here for more than two hundred years. More settler-colonists arrived in 1853 when many of the Dakota were forced to be removed to the Upper Sioux Agency, including the John and Jane Boswell Allen family, according to A 1891 Sketch of Shakopee, Minn: Historical and Industrial by William Hinds.

According to the History of the Minnesota Valley, 1882, John and Jane “kept a boarding-house in what was called the Pennsylvania House. Luther M. Brown describes this house as having two rooms, one above and one below. The lower room had a log fireplace, while the upper one had only the rafters above and one window with five lights of glass. Nevertheless this hotel could accommodate, as it appears, fifteen or more persons, regardless of sex.”

According to David Eggler, John B. Allen subsequently returned to farming. On February 13, 1854, he paid $1500 for eighty acres of government land on the Shakopee-Le Sueur road three miles from Shakopee plus a timbered tract adjacent to Samuel and Andrew Dooley (Scott County Deeds). He bought additional land in 1855.

“On the 1880 plat map his farm was the entire 165 acres of W ½ E ½ section 15, T115 N R23W in the Town of Jackson. He built the first house in Jackson. In later years, while living in Jackson, John and Jane kept Flora, Cora Ann, and Frank Weiser, children of their daughter Mary Elizabeth Allen Weiser, who had died in 1865, and Frances and Martha May Koons, children of their daughter Henrietta Allen Koons, who also died in 1865,” said David H. Eggler in the article “John Boswell Allen and Jane Dillard Allen: Kentucky to Indiana to Shakopee, Minnesota.:

Jane and John had nine children: Henrietta, Lucy Jane, Martha, Mary Elizabeth, Ann Elizabeth, John Alfred, James Peter, Harrison, and Marcena.

Jane Dillard Allen died on September 5, 1885, in Shakopee, and was buried at Valley Cemetery. Eight years later, her husband, John Boswell Allen died.

The funeral of John B. Allen took place on Tuesday, December 26, from the residence of Spier Spencer, according to the Scott County Argus, December 28, 1893. The tombstone inscription says, “Dearest Father we must lay thee In the peaceful grave’s embrace But thy memory will be cherished Till we see thy heavenly face.”

John B. Allen and Jane Dillard Allen are buried in Lot 392, the Allen plot, in Valley Cemetery in Shakopee.

Bibliography

Eggler, David H. “John Boswell Allen and Jane Dillard Allen: Kentucky to Indiana to Shakopee, Minnesota.” Bellefonte Historical and Cultural Association, 10 Sept. 2019. http://www.bellefontearts.org/Eggler_genealogy/Allen_genealogy.pdf.

Hinds, William. A 1891 Sketch of Shakopee, Minn: Historical and Industrial, 1891.

Neill, Edward D. and Charles S. Bryant. History of the Minnesota Valley, 1882.

Scott County Argus, 28 Dec. 1893.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2021

The book They Chose Minnesota, with a chapter on African Americans in Minnesota history, lists the numbers of African American in each county for different years. The list says there were zero African Americans or mulattos in Scott County in 1860.

But it was clear that there were African Americans in Shakopee. A Sketch of Shakopee Minnesota Historical and Industrial, 1891 by William Hinds noted that “Ni**er Jim” built where Michael Berens’s store was.

That Jim is James Thompson, one of the best-known African American residents of early Minnesota, who lived in Shakopee with his family from 1853 until 1860.

James Thompson was born ca. 1799 at the plantation of President James Monroe. James’s mother was African American, and his father was a white man, probably someone related to Monroe.

Highland was a thriving plantation employing the labor of 30-40 enslaved man and women, including James Thompson. Quarters for field hands were at some distance from the main house, while the enslaved domestic people lived closer to their “master.”

James Monroe’s nephew, George Monroe, owned James. George brought his young slave Thompson west from Virginia. George was a gambler, and upon reaching Kentucky, Monroe gave him to sutler John Culbertson in payment for his debts. In 1827, the enslaved James Thompson moved to Fort Snelling with Culbertson. A sutler is a person who followed an army and sold provisions to the soldiers. Culbertson then sold Thompson to William Day, an officer with the First Infantry.

While he was enslaved, Thompson married Marpiyawecasta (later anglicized to Mary), the daughter of the Dakota leader Maḣpiya Wic̣aṡṭa and his wife, Caŋ Paduta Wiŋ of the Bde Maka Ska band who lived on the southern shore in Minneapolis in 1834. Jim Thompson learned the Dakota language from his wife.

James Thompson’s value was not as an interpreter but as a diplomatic and symbolic gesture that bound the mission and the Dakota together. Methodist Rev. Alfred Brunson decided to have Thompson work as an interpreter to help teach the faith to Dakota in Minnesota country in 1837. Brunson purchased Thompson from Day in May 1837 for $1200 and emancipated him. Thompson and Brunson traveled to Fort Snelling, and from there to Kaposia to begin their mission.

The Indian village of Kaposia where Brunson established his mission sat on the west bank of the Mississippi, about ten miles below Fort Snelling, four miles below present-day St. Paul, in what now is South St. Paul (See picture below). With the erection of several log buildings that Thompson helped to construct – a mission house, schoolhouse, and store – the community was ready to begin its work.

By 1839, trouble happened in the mission. Two years after he had established it, Brunson left his post, and so did Jim Thompson. He and his family moved downriver to Pig’s Eye in 1841. Thompson was the community’s first resident of African descent.

During this time Jim worked as a carpenter. A devout Methodist, Thompson donated lands and supplies to build a church in downtown St. Paul in 1849. Jim cut the broad shingles from the cedar swamp below the Wabasha Street bluff. Besides the shingles and his skilled labor, Jim also assembled a quantity of hand-hewn oak timbers, and a town lot to help pay for the bricks.

Without the note in the book A Sketch of Shakopee Minnesota Historical and Industrial, 1891, people in Shakopee would probably not know about James Thompson being in the area.

The 1857 census listed James Thompson next to William Barnes in the Eagle Creek area. James and Marpiyawecasta’s daughter, Sarah Thompson Barnes, who married William Barnes, and George Thompson were also noted. The half-breed scrip files had two documents signed and notarized in Scott County in 1857.

Though they all list these people as white, this was wrong except for William Barnes. One clinching fact in identifying Thompson is the presence of an eight-year-old boy, Charles St. Clair, in the James Thompson household. At the time of the 1855-56 scrip registration, James filed an affidavit indicating that he has adopted Charles St. Clair. As St. Clair’s guardian, Thompson would also be able to claim 400 acres of free land in his name, according to Walt Bachman in 2006.

In the Scott County census for Shakopee in 1860, James Thompson was listed as living in Shakopee. Thompson was not defined as mulatto (as he was elsewhere). His wife, Marpiyawecasta, who was full-blooded Dakota, was not labeled this in the 1860s census. The two children, Sarah and George, were not listed as mulatto or Dakota. Instead, all four of them were listed as white.

But they were not.

Shakopee can proudly call James Thompson, a slave who used his skills and wits to procure his emancipation through an anti-slavery fundraising endeavor, a free man of color who was an interpreter with the Dakota in Kaposia, a humble man who helped build a church using his own two hands, as one of us!

There is no picture of James Thompson. Thomas M. Newson noted he “had a large, aquiline nose; a high forehead; a small, round eyes; a well-set mouth … Beside he was tall, slender, somewhat angular in his movements, and yet closely knit in his physical organization, showing that the proper care he might have lived at least ten years longer. His complexion was quite light, indicating Anglo Saxon blood; and his whole make-up clearly showed that he was away above the ordinary when a southern slave, and fully equal both to the white or the Indian when a free man. He had played an important part in the history of our city and state, and during the fifty-seven years that he had trod our soil, I find nothing to mar a well-earned and excellent reputation…”

In 1884, James and Marpiyawecasta moved to Nebraska to be closer to their son. Marpiyawecasta Mary Thompson died on October 11, 1884 at her son, George Thompson’s, home at the Santee Reservation in Nebraska. Four days later, at the same place, James Thompson died on October 15, 1884.

Bibliography

Hinds, William. A Sketch of Shakopee Minnesota Historical and Industrial, 1891, 1891.

Holmquist, June Drenning. They Chose Minnesota. Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1988.

Bachman, Walt, 2006.

United States. Bureau of the Census. Eighth Census of the United States, 1860: Minnesota, Scott County, Shakopee. Population schedule. NARA microfilm publication M653, reel 574.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2022

James Joseph Vig was born December 22, 1952, the son of Bernard Howard Vig (1915-1971) and Elizabeth Rose Lizzie Weldon Vig (1918-1985). His grandparents were Ole Ingval Olsen Vig (1885-1964) and Anna Christenson Kristiansdatter (1883-1964); and Charles “Chuck” William Weldon (1874-1936) and Minnie Josephine Hapstiŋna Otherday (1877-1959).

Approximately 42,000 American Indians – one of four eligible Native people compared to about one of twelve non-Natives – served in the armed forces during the war in Vietnam (1964-1975). One of them was James Joseph Vig, who served in the United States Navy during the Vietnam War.

The U.S. Navy participated in a wide variety of roles and missions during the Vietnam War. Navy combat artists recorded many of these activities, typically sharing the same dangers as the sailors and Marines they accompanied. At the peak of American involvement in the Vietnam War, in 1968, there were 38,000 Navy personnel in the Naval Forces Vietnam; this decreased to about 17,000 by the end of 1970. By the end of the war, the Navy played a minimal role in near-shore and in-country activities. The Navy utilized both modernized World War II-era carriers and new super carriers during the Vietnam War according to the Gerald R. Ford Library and Museum.

Twenty-one carriers participated in 86 war cruises. Task forces were deployed to two sectors off the coast of Vietnam – Yankee Station to the north and Dixie Station to the south.

James enjoyed cars and liked rebuilding older ones and working with motors. He also liked to hunt, fish, and collect antiques. He enjoyed spending time at his farm with his animals, especially his dogs and cats. He was a practical joker who liked to tease and have fun. He loved to laugh and always had a smile on his face.

James Joseph Vig, age 63, of Shakopee, a member of the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community, journeyed to the Spirit World on Tuesday, August 30, 2016, at his home.

Jim was survived by his children, Joey, Ricky (fiancée, Callie O’Meara), Juley; siblings, Dolly, Doris (Tim) Guion, John (Kathy), Sandy, Charlie (Donna); nephews, Steve (Tammy) Florez, Jimmy (Jill) Bigley, Bobby (Dulcie) Bigley, Don Matta, David Matta, Ron (Shari) Perrault, Jason (Kevin Head) Vig, John (Tara) Vig, Jr., Scott (Kristin) Vig, Andy (Anna) Vig, Austin Vig, Kevin Vig, Jesse Vig; nieces, Joann (Donnie) Vig Yahnke, Brooklyn Vig, Jamie (Brad) Vig, Lori Otherday, Candace (Jei) Garlitos, Melissa Vig.

Preceded by his parents, Bernard & Elizabeth; brother, Manuel Florez; sister Darlene Matta.

The funeral happened at the Tiowakan Spiritual Center in Prior Lake. Interment with military honors was held at Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community Cemetery, according to the McNearney-Schmidt Funeral and Cremation website.

One friend, Sheree, noted “They say time heals all wounds, I cannot tell. Jim was loved by everyone, not just me. The neatest thing about Jim was that he liked to help people. People from all over, from all walks of life would show up at our doorstep with their stories and he would at least hear them out and always help if he could. He was such a sweetheart and will be missed by many, many people.”

For more information about Ṡakpe I, Tínṫa Otuŋwe, and the Dakota, Hoċokata Ti [ho-cho-kah-tah-tee] the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community’s (SMSC) cultural center and gathering space, is worth visiting. The public exhibit, “Mdewakanton: Dwellers of the Spirit Lake,” enhance the knowledge and understanding of the Mdewakanton Dakota people and their history. Hoċokata Ti is at 2300 Tiwahe Circle, Shakopee, MN 55379. (952) 233-9151.

Bibliography

“James J. Vig Obituary.” McNearney-Schmidt Funeral and Cremation. https://www.mcnearneyfuneralhome.com/obituaries/James-J-Vig?obId=1152179.

“Taking the Seas: The Rise of the American Aircraft Carrier.” Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum. https://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/exhibits/taking-seas-rise-american-aircraft-carrier.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2020

Daniel M. Storer, a builder and merchant in Sha K’ Pay, Minnesota Territory, wrote in his journal on May 9, 1854, “A black man by the name of Griffin commenced working for me the 9^th.”

James Griffin was born an enslaved person in Prince George’s County, Maryland around 1824. His master did not want to be in the U.S. Navy, so instead, he forced James, who was enslaved, to serve in his place.

So, James Griffin was forced into the Navy for five years. While in the Navy, James learned the carpenter’s trade.

In 1849, James married Mary Brown in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Because of his service in the U.S. Navy, James was given his freedom. He moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with his wife, and he worked as a steamboat builder.

One of the steamboats that James helped build was the Minnesota Belle. When it was ready, James and Mary and their family moved to Minnesota on the Minnesota Belle, and from there, to Sha K’ Pay, Minnesota Territory.

In the winter of 1853, Captain Samuel Humberston built, probably with James’s help, a fine new boat, christened the steamboat the Minnesota Belle. It was loaded full of immigrants, intended mostly for his new town and headed up the Minnesota River on May 3, 1854. A few of the people on the Minnesota Belle during the first voyage were James and Mary Brown Griffin, along with their three children, Richard, Martin, and Estella. To the captain’s great chagrin, Humbertson’s new boat failed to climb the Little Rapids, near Carver, and he abandoned the river, townsite, and all, in disgust.

The Minnesota Belle landed in Sha K’ Pay after they failed to get over the Carver rapids. “The boat was from Pittsburgh, bound for the upper part of the valley, and its being obliged to discharge its large cargo of freight and passengers here established Shakopee’s reputation as the head of navigation. This incident was used to good advantage by citizens to secure new settlers.”

James worked as a carpenter with Daniel Storer and then was a teamster by 1856. He had wagons and teams in Sha K’ Pay, and he helped immigrant families to settle in the territory, including to Buffalo, Minnesota.

“Mr. Griffin (who is an intelligent colored man, much respected by the neighbors) had the honor of bringing the first team into Buffalo; and for a year or two afterwards, ‘Griffin’s team’ was in great demand among all the settlers.”

By the 1860s, James started a stagecoach line. He had a daily stage route between Buffalo and Monticello, and three times a week from Monticello to Minneapolis.

The Griffins made a claim on the shores of Lake Mary, on the outside of Buffalo.

When he was older and retired from the stageline, James became the first janitor at the new Wright County Courthouse.

James Griffin died on June 26, 1891, in Hot Springs, Arkansas of tuberculosis. According to the Wright County Heritage Herald, Winter 1999, “…after several years of employment at the courthouse, he gave it up because of failing health and sometime after that he sold his farm.” He then moved to Hot Springs and died there.

James was buried at the Minneapolis Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery.

Bibliography

Wright County Heritage Herald, Winter 1999.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2022

On a cold stormy night in the last days of January of 1856, James Beach Wakefield, along with Henry P. Constans, Spier Spencer, and Samuel V. Hibler were assembled in a small store by a warm stove in downtown Shakopee. All were poor in purse, but in youth, health and courage, they were rich and hopeful, according to The History of Faribault County, Minnesota: From Its First Settlement to the Close of the Year 1879 by Jacob Armel Kiester.

Settler-colonist James Beach Wakefield was born in Winsted, Connecticut, to Dr. Luman Wakefield and his wife Betsey Rockwell Wakefield. His brother was Dr. John Luman Wakefield. James attended local public schools in Westfield, Massachusetts, and Jonesville, New York, before attending the prestigious Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, where he graduated in 1846.

He studied law in Painesville, Ohio, and was admitted to the bar shortly thereafter. He began practicing law in Delphi, Indiana, in 1852. He then moved to Shakapee City (later Shakopee), in what was then the Territory of Minnesota, in April of 1854. He practiced law for a couple of years and dreamed of getting in on the movement of settler-colonists working on making some money off the rush to settle southern Minnesota after the Dakota and other Indians were forced to give up their land.

January of 1856 was a memorable time in Minnesota for inflated prices of land and of wild speculations. Settler-colonists had been coming into the territory of the Dakota in great numbers. For several years past great improvements had been made and fortunes acquired in a day, by speculators on lands, town-sites and corner lots. The prospects for the year just beginning were very flattering.

Just like Thomas A. Holmes did in 1851, James B. Wakefield and friends decided to strike out somewhere and found a city. The buffalo and elk hunter, the trapper, the Indian and the explorer, had already told their stories, of the beauty and fertility of the Blue Earth valley. Thomas Holmes had talked in glowing language of the forks of the Blue Earth River, as an eligible location for a town.

In fact, a small, rough log cabin, on the north bank of the stream was built by Holmes in 1854 at the two branches of the Blue Earth River in Faribault County. It was very crudely built, quite low and not more than ten by twelve feet in size, and had evidently been built as a mere temporary shelter. He erected this cabin, with the intention of making a claim of the land adjoining, with a view to eventually laying out a town in the vicinity. But in 1854, Holmes decided to focus more on Shakapee City.

And so, in 1856, the group of men from Shakopee decided to go to the headwaters of the Blue Earth River. The winter had been long and cold. It was now the beginning of February, and the snow lay twenty inches deep on the level and great drifts were piled in every direction.

They gathered a few provisions. They gathered flour, pork, beans, some culinary utensils and a ten-gallon keg of a peculiar fluid extract of rye, which latter article had been recommended by solicitous friends, as a valuable medicine in cases of frostbites, snakebites, chills, or general prostration. Well-armed with guns, pistols and plenty of ammunition, James Wakefield and others started for the forks of the Blue Earth, across a trackless region.

After a tedious journey, on February 6, 1956, Samuel Hibler and his group crossed the land where Blue Earth City now stands, and proceeded about a mile further south, to the cabin of Moses Sailor, the first settler. The group stayed overnight with Moses. The following day Wakefield and Spencer started out with the team, on their return to Shakopee, leaving Henry Constans and Samuel Hibler to hold possession of the country. It was decided that Wakefield and Spencer would return to Shakopee to get more supplies. When they got to St. Paul, they discovered that the territorial legislature was in session. Wakefield was able to get the legislature to pass an enabling bill establishing Faribault County and naming the City of Blue Earth its temporary county seat.

On March 7, 1856, James returned with a pocketful of official commissions and accompanied by another new settler, George B. Kingsley. Spier Spencer did not return, but stayed in Shakopee, according to Jacob Armel Kiester.

The weather continued cold – the ice in the streams was breaking up – the waters getting high and traveling was impossible. Day after day even weeks passed, but no one came bringing provisions. No one could go after supplies, and starvation was imminent. They were at last reduced to buckwheat slapjacks, the flour being stirred up with water, and as a rarity occasionally seasoned with ground cinnamon bark. This was the only article of food for some weeks, except that on several occasions some wild game – a squirrel or a rabbit – would be shot.

And to add greatly to their miseries, their stock of tobacco became entirely exhausted – not a crumb left. “Oh, for one chew! Just one smoke!” was the repeated exclamation.

Samuel V. Hibler, the registrar of deeds of the county and one of the original town proprietors, was holding a section adjoining the townsite of Blue Earth City as a claim. He had erected a small cabin and made some other improvements to the land. The land was very valuable, and since Hibler wasn’t on the claim, Theophius Bowen jumped the claim. He wanted to contest Hibler’s right to own the land at the local land office.

The jumping of claims was in those days very unpopular. Many people lost their lives in this territory because of claim jumping. Law and order were not well established and trespassing often resulted by the strong and bloody hand.

On October 15, 1856, according to Kiester, Hibler and several friends proceeded to the house on his claim and ordered Bowen off the premises. A young man, Alfonso Brooks, was in the house. High words followed between Samuel Hibler and Theophius Bowen, and when they got into a scuttle, Brooks tried to interfere. Hibler, who had a stout cane in his hand, struck Brooks over the head. Brooks stooped down to pick up a piece of brick from the small pile in the corner, and as he arose, Hibler struck him again on the head several times.

Alfonso Brooks fell and died in about an hour. His skull was broken.

The complaint was made before the justice of the peace, who issued a warrant for the arrest of Hibler and the other Shakopee settler-colonists. Samuel Hibler got an attorney from Shakopee, Thomas J. Galbraith. Attorney Galbraith moved to discharge the prisoners because they had no jurisdiction over the territory where the offense had been committed.

They were discharged.

Samuel V. Hibler never returned to the county. He went to Shakopee, where he remained for a short time. And then he returned to Pennsylvania, his native state.

As for James Beach Wakefield? He served as a member of the Minnesota State House. In 1864, he married Nannette Reinhart. They were both in their mid-thirties and the marriage produced no children. Nannette died in 1899 after a long illness and was buried at Riverside Cemetery in Blue Earth.

In 1907 James married again and this time he married his sweetheart dating back to the days when he practiced law in Painesville, Ohio. His new bride, Lydia Phelps Noble, died a year later and her mortal remains were returned to Ohio for burial.

Meanwhile, James was living in the Constans Hotel because he could no longer navigate the steep steps of his fine home. Henry Constans, the proprietor of the hotel, was a partner during the early days.

When James Beach Wakefield died on August 25, 1910, he had let it be known that he wanted to be buried with his first love back in Ohio. The interment was in Evergreen Cemetery, Painesville, Ohio at age 85 according to “The Honorable James Beach Wakefield” by A. B. Russ.

At Riverside Cemetery in Blue Earth stands a very large and lovely light gray headstone with Wakefield carved on the stone but only one person is buried there, his first wife, Nanette Reinhart Wakefield.

Bibliography

Kiester, Jacob Armel. The History of Faribault County, Minnesota: From Its First Settlement to the Close of the Year 1879, 1896.

Russ, A. B. “The Honorable James Beach Wakefield.” Faribault County Historical Society. http://www.fchistorical.org/index.php/archives/the-honorable-james-beach-wakefield.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2022

Jamal William Abu-Shamala was born on July 25, 1987, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. His parents were Subhy Mohamed Abu-Shamala, who was born in Palestine, and Carolyn Myrna Allen Abu-Shamala, who was born in Minnesota on November 10, 1947. Jamal’s father moved to Minnesota when he was 21 years old, and shortly after, he married Carolyn.

After 1987, when Jamal was born, Subhy Mohamed and Carolyn divorced, and when Jamal was 13 years old, he moved to Shakopee.

“Winning the state championship in high school was one of my most memorable and biggest accomplishments for me as a basketball player,” said Jamal. “When I moved to Shakopee in the 8^th grade, I saw that we had a lot of talent in my class and I always felt that if we stuck with it and continued to work, we could win state. Winning state was always my biggest goal from that point on followed by playing Division 1 basketball.”

“I started to play varsity my sophomore year and all three years I played varsity we made it to state but my sophomore and junior year we got knocked out in the first round. After losing my junior year, I remember thinking of how disappointed I was after losing and decided to dedicate everything I do to finally win state the next year,” said Jamal in The Daily Gopher onFebruary 8, 2011.

“The one thing that sticks out to me about the team my senior year was how close we were and how much we enjoyed hanging out together. We all worked really well together and had one common goal. We had a scare the first round of state, but we ended up pulling out the win and we didn’t look back from there. I gained so much confidence from winning the state championship and really cherish the memory of that season.”

Jamal Abu-Shamala, class of 2005, led the Shakopee boys’ basketball team to the Class AAA State Championship during his senior year. Abu-Shamala was named team MVP in 2005, was nominated for the state’s Mr. Basketball award, and finished his career with 1,254 points, according to Pat Minelli in the Shakopee Valley News on September 25, 2015, where Jamal joined the Shakopee Hall of Fame. Jamal scored 24 points and had 13 rebounds in a victory over Richfield in the Class 3A championship game in 2005.

After graduating from Shakopee, Abu-Shamala went on to receive his bachelor’s degree from the University of Minnesota, where he walked on to the Golden Gophers men’s basketball team and played all four years. During that time, Abu-Shamala was named the university’s male student athlete of the year in 2009. Still, there was one other major concern: paying for tuition and housing. Abu-Shamala came from a single-parent home with his mother, and she was struggling to make ends meet because of an injury that wouldn’t allow her to work. Putting Abu-Shamala through college would be a difficult task.

In fourth grade, Abu-Shamala met Mark Stensrude through the United Way’s Big Brother program. Over the years, Stensrude turned into a father-like figure for Abu-Shamala. Stensrude offered to pay for the then-18-year-old’s college expenses. Abu-Shamala was reluctant to put the financial burden of his college tuition on his surrogate family, but finally accepted the offer when the Stensrudes convinced him it was something they truly wanted to do for him.

“Every step of the way he’s been there, guiding me and providing whatever I needed to achieve what I wanted to achieve,” he said. “It’s like they are my second family. They come to every game.”

As a college freshman, Jamal started ten games and was key in helping Minnesota rebound from a dismal start to advance to the postseason. The coaching staff offered him a scholarship the second semester of his freshman year. For Abu-Shamala, it was one of his proudest moments. “That was one of my biggest accomplishments,” he said. “That’s pretty high on the list, next to winning a state championship. Getting that was one of the greatest moments of my life.”

“After my sophomore year I had the offer to play with the Jordanian National Team after some of the people that represented basketball in Jordan were watching a game on ESPN and saw me playing. They recognized my name and knew it was from Middle Eastern origin and contacted me about playing with the National Team the following season. I decided not to go that summer because of the coaching change but stayed in contact with them and kept it as an option for my future,” he said in The Daily Gopher on February 8, 2011. “My father is Palestinian and was born and raised in Palestine, so I was able to play for Jordan because roughly 65-75 percent of Jordan is Palestinian and there is no Palestinian state.”

“There were so many experiences that I could list but I would have to say the most valuable to me were meeting family I had never met, learning about different cultures, making great relationships with teammates and being able to travel the world at such a young age … I was able to travel to China, Taiwan, Turkey, France, Italy, and Qatar and learn so much about the world.”

After two summers on the Jordanian National Team, Jamal found out that Palestine had a national team. “So I’m playing my first tournament with Palestine in the Arab Games in Doha in December 2011. I was very proud the first time I played with Palestine and now that we’ve had some success, I’m even more proud.”

Most of the guys speak great English and the others speak some, but we are all able to communicate well. I don’t speak much Arabic, but I am taking classes and trying to learn it, according to Palestine Square.

“My father is from Gaza and my mother is American born and raised. I was given the opportunity through my former job to go to Gaza on a medical mission trip a couple years ago with an organization called the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund to perform surgeries on children in need. It was the first and only time I have been to Gaza and it was an amazing experience both personally and professionally,” said Jamal in an article on October 17, 2015 from Palestine Square.

“I met many relatives on my father’s side of the family and was able to connect so many pieces of my background.” Jamal married Jilly E. Bean, and they have a daughter, Reiss Lena Abu- Shamala.

According to an article by Zach Eisendrath published on January 31, 2008 in Minnesota Daily, better than his three-point shooting or grades in the classroom may be Abu-Shamala’s character. Travis Busch said there is much more to Abu-Shamala than what the average fan sees from him on the court.

“He’ll do anything for you. He’s one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met. He really thinks about others,” he said. “I give him a hard time because he is such a good guy and there is nothing you can say bad about him.”

Bibliography

Bouarrouj, Khelil. “Palestinian National Basketball Team, Interview with Jamal Abu-Shamala.” Palestine Square, 17 Oct. 2015.

Eisendrath, Zach. “Road to Williams not an easy one for guard.” The Minnesota Daily, 31 Jan. 2008. https://mndaily.com/uncategorized/road-williams-not-easy-one-guard/01/31/2008/snoadmin/.

GopherNation. “TDG Interview with former Golden Gopher, Jamal Abu-Shamala.” The Daily Gopher, 8 Feb. 2011. https://www.thedailygopher.com/2011/2/8/1980117/tdg-interview-with-former-golden-gopher-jamal-abu-shamala.

Minelli, Pat. Shakopee Valley News, 25 Sept. 2015.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2020

Jacob Jacques Franz Ries, Sr. was born on December 6, 1830, in Septfontaines, Canton de Capellen, Luxembourg, son of Jean Nicholas Ries and Katherina Kiefer.

When he was 18 years of age both his parents died. Jacob Ries was given both literary and musical education in his native country and in 1854 came to America. He lived three years in New York, mainly engaged in carpenter work; then made a visit of six months to his native land, and in the spring of 1857 settled in Shakopee, which was his place of residence except for a time spent at his farm in Spring Lake.

In 1857, Jacob married Josephine Mamer in Shakopee. She was born on June 24, 1836, daughter of Jacobus Mamer and Anne Elisabeth Brandenbourg. They went on to raise a family of 14 children.

Jacob Ries from Luxembourg and E.A. O’Leary from Ireland opened the Bottling Company on the river (north of Holmes and First Street) in 1872. O’Leary sold out one year later.

Ries moved the factory to Third and Holmes Street in 1880. It moved there to avoid the flood plain. A factory of brick was erected and had all the facilities for manufacturing carbonate and fermented beverages. It became Jacob Ries Bottling Works, or Rock Spring, which operated from 1872 to 1975.

The Rock Spring Bottling Works building was on the southwest corner of Holmes Street and Third Street. There was a small building housing the well between the bottling building and the alley. Elmer Dahl, who owned the bakery, lived in the white house across the alley. The Rock Spring office was west of the bottling building. Directly north of the bottling building across Third Street was the parking lot. To the west of the parking lot were the warehouses. Warehouse #3 is now where the Masjid Al-Amin Samaha Islamic Center has been since 2016. Before that it was Eastman’s Drug Store and then the Auction Center before being a mosque in 2016. The old Ries homestead was on the south side of the bottling plant.

Rock Spring was very popular, and the trains stopped two or three times a day for loading and unloading the pop. A garage was established on Lewis Street. In the rear door off the alley was a receiving depot for boxes of liquor.

According to Joe Jenn, “There was also a bottling works in town; they’d deliver bottles of pop to St. Paul and return with bottles of whiskey.”

Jacob Ries passed away on May 17, 1911, in Eagle Creek, Minnesota. His descendants continued to operate the bottling works.

The Jacob Ries Bottling Works operated for over 100 years. The family-owned operation was famous for its sparkling water and ginger ale. Eventually the family sold their “secret recipe” to the Pepsi Company in 1975. The building was torn down in 1977.

The building is gone but the memories of the clacking pop bottles on the bottling line, the smell of the soda flavors wafting into the street when passing by, and their wonderful soda are still talked about by the older locals. After every day, after school, every child used to stand by the windows, watching the bottles go by, full of soft drinks.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2023

Ione Anne Krell was born July 16, 1917, on a homestead near White Lake, South Dakota to Nicolum “Nick” Frank Krell (1877-1963) and Anna Gardner Krell (1882-1956) – the seventh of eight children.

Ione came to Minneapolis to study cosmetology and arrived in Shakopee in 1938 employed at the Modern Beauty Shop.

In 1945 Ione married William A. Engel. William (Bill) was born on May 26, 1888, in Shakopee, son of Dominick Engel (1849-1919) and Elizabeth Channaux (1858-1941). Bill’s first marriage was to Agnes Demers (1891-1940) in 1910. Bill married Ione in 1945, and together they operated Engel’s Bar at what now is the site of Turtle’s on First Avenue and Lewis Street.

After Bill’s death in 1955, Ione and daughter Barbara remained in Shakopee. In 1957 Ione married John A. Theis. John Alois Theis was born on June 6, 1913, in Marystown, son of Charles Carl Theis (1866-1930) and Mary Caroline Pieper (1870-1943). John’s first marriage was to Mary Adele Simones (1916-1955).

Ione and John’s son, Theodore “Ted” John Theis was born in 1958.

Ione was a caring and generous mother and grandmother to many step-grandchildren. Ione enjoyed all forms of artistic endeavor – painting, sculpting, sewing, needlework.

In 1992, Ione placed second at the state Senior Dining Applemania Contest in Duluth, according to an article by Susan Vieth in the Shakopee Valley News, November 19, 1992, entitled “’Apple Annie’ is a winner for Theis.”

Ione took a dried apple with a whimsical face for its head, and a wired body dressed in clothes that she designed and sewed herself. She entered it at the Shakopee Senior Dining site, at that time at 200 Levee Drive in Shakopee. After it won, it placed first in the region-wide contest, and then finally second in the state.

Ione had been making the dolls for twenty years. In the article in the Shakopee Valley News: “We had a lot of apple trees in our backyard. So I used those. I found that Golden Delicious make good apple heads, but I’ve used all kinds.” The apples are allowed to dry for about a month. During the process, the skin of the apple puckers and creates what appears to be a wrinkled face. Ione sews the clothes, such as bloomers, skirts, and dust caps for women, or a suit and hat for a man.

According to the article, “After the dolls are dressed, Theis positions them in a variety of settings. For instance, the Apple Annie she entered in the contest is sitting in a chair holding a basket of miniature apples. Other apple dolls have been set in front of spinning wheels, in rocking chairs, or, in one case, as a couple holding hands.”

Ione served her community in leadership for the Girl Scouts and later for the Shakopee Senior Citizens Club. Ione was an active member of St. Mark’s Catholic Church for many years – music was a passion and she participated in the church choir as well as a local women’s choral group, the Harmonettes, later named New Jubilee Singers. With this group, she performed at the Chanhassen Dinner Theatre and traveled abroad twice. A highlight was singing mass at the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, and the Alleluia in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Joy Robbins recalled that Ione was a “friend to me through many years in and out of Harmonettes and New Jubilee Singers, and I appreciated her honesty, exuberance, good cheer, kind heart, clear eye, steadfast support, wise advice, and STYLE! A beautiful lady and person, Ione loved a good time and has probably already established a heavenly ‘Hat, prop, and wine’ wall in case there’s a need for costumes and a bit of frivolity!”

Rose Doherty recalled the time Ione moved to All Saints in 2014. She was “always willing to join in activities; she played cards, Farkle, Wii Bowling, created greeting cards and always won first place at costume parties. Once she dressed up as a limping vagrant with whiskers, old hat and sagging trousers. No one recognized her and only after getting really close, face to face, did anyone realize it was Ione!”

Ione Anne Engel Theis died on November 28, 2016, at All Saints Senior Living Facility. A mass of Christian burial happened on Friday, December 16 at The Parish of Saints Joachim and Anne (St. Mark), and she interment was at the Shakopee Catholic Cemetery.

“What an incredible lady. She had such a bright mind, with so many wonderful talents that she lovingly shared with others. I loved her little smile, her gracious ways and her spunk!” said Dixie Schmit.

Bibliography

Vieth, Susan. “’Apple Annie’ is a winner for Theis.” Shakopee Valley News, 19 Nov. 1992.