May 15, 1815 – Oct. 4, 1850
In Prairie des Français (later called Shakopee) 1839-1850
Compiled and Written by David R. Schleper

Oliver Faribault was born at Prairie du Chien, now in Wisconsin, on May 15, 1815.[1] His father was Jean-Baptiste Faribault, a well-known French-Canadian fur trader with the Northwest and American Fur Companies. His mother was Elizabeth Pelagie Kinzie Haines. (Her name is spelled differently in various documents.) Pelagie was the daughter of a French voyageur and Mdewakanton mother, so Oliver was at least ¼ Dakota.

Oliver’s older siblings were Alexander and Lucie-Anne. His younger siblings were David-Frederick (David), Emilie (Emily), Marie-Louise (Mary Louise), Philippe (Philip) and Frederick-Daniel (Daniel). Among them, only Philip didn’t grow up to adulthood.[2]

In 1804-1805, not far upstream on the Rivière Saint-Pierre (Minnesota River) from present day Carver, the Little Rapids trading post was established. It was first operated by Jean-Baptiste Faribault of the Machilimackinac Fur Company and the Northwest Fur Company and visited by fur traders, Dakota Indians, and Christian missionaries over the next 45 years. The early map indicated that this Indian village was associated with Dakota leader Mazomani.[3]

Jean-Baptiste lived among the Wahpeton community for a few months each year with his Dakota wife, Pelagie. The villagers brought their tanned furs, and their maple sugar to the Trading Post. Faribault would give them glass beads, silver ornaments, tin kettles, iron knives, awl tips, axes, hatchets, and hoes for their summer work. Faribault was there for many years, and he probably enjoyed amicable relations with the community. According to Janet D. Spector, “Faribault probably strengthened his connection to Little Rapids by his marriage to Pelagie Hanse, the twenty-two-year-old widow of a former superintendent of Indian affairs and the mixed-heritage daughter of trader Francois Kinzie.”[4] She and Faribault had several children, including Oliver, and through her, Jean-Baptiste would acquire knowledge about Dakota language and culture, further enhancing his role as cultural middleman at Little Rapids. Oliver spent time at Little Rapids trading post learning the procedures of the fur trade.

In 1819, the Faribault family settled on Pike Island near a new fort, Fort Snelling, at the mouth of the Rivière Saint-Pierre. They were invited to do this by Colonel Henry Leavenworth, who knew that Jean-Baptiste understood the Dakota who lived in the area and could help develop the fur trade in Minnesota. The Dakota were also more likely to trust people who were related to members of their tribe. The family built a log house and farmed. Oliver and his siblings also helped their father with his fur trade business.

In 1826, the family moved off the island and built a home on the river bank in what was to become Mendota, Minnesota and traded with the Dakota.

Although Oliver was friends with the Dakota, and was part Dakota, pioneer life on the frontier was dangerous. When he was only 14 years old, Oliver had to defend his father’s life when Jean-Baptiste was attacked by a Dakota:

“On one occasion for a trivial matter an Indian plunged a knife into [Jean-Baptiste] Faribault’s back, but his vigorous constitution and temperate habits carried him through. The Indian, however, was summarily shot by one of Faribault’s son, Oliver, a boy of fourteen.”[5]

Jean-Baptiste also purchased a female slave, even though slavery had been outlawed in the region for well over a decade by the Missouri Compromise of early 1800s. That slave had a child, Joseph Godfrey, who was enslaved, and who ended up in Shakopee, as a slave to Oliver and Wakan Yanke. Joseph Godfrey escaped from the Faribault Trading Post around 1848.[6]

Working for the American Fur Company, Oliver was busy doing almost every job that could be done on the new frontier. He was a trader, a clerk for the Fur Company, and, along with his brothers, earned money as whiskey smugglers in the 1830s. Fur traders could do this well because they always traveled from one place to another.

Oliver married Wakan Yanke, or Harriet Menary, in a civil or Indian ceremony in 1837. Wakan Yanke was a close relative of Chief Ŝakpe II.

Oliver was at Prairie des Français on a semi-permanent basis starting in 1839, as he was appointed government farmer to the Dakota Indians at Tiŋta-otoŋwe, according to Taliaferro Journal, June 11, 1839.[7] This was probably the year that Tiŋta-otoŋwe moved from the north to the south side of the Watpá Mnísota, also called the Rivière Saint-Pierre. His personal history, his occupations as a farmer and trader, and his dwelling location were not part of the history of the Minnesota valley area. According to a report, he had nine oxen, four cows, three horses, one bull, one cart, one wagon, two yokes, and bows, two single plows and two double plows.[8]

According to Rev. Samuel Pond, the assigned farmers for many of the villages were not very good, and were soon replaced. This might be the case for Oliver. “The first farmer for the Shakopee band got along several years without doing anything for the Indians except that now and then he gave a present to the chief. He used their wagons and carts for his own business, and let their cattle starve to death, and some of the other farmers did not do much better.”[9]

By 1842, Oliver was back at Little Prairie.[10]

On Feb. 11, 1844, Oliver married Wakan Yanke at the St. Francois Xavier Sioux Mission, located at Little Prairie on the St. Pierre River.[11]

In 1844 Oliver moved to Prairie des Français with Wakan Yanke, or Woman Who Sits at the High Place.[12] They lived among the large circle of Wakan Yanke’s Dakota relatives. The Faribault trading post and cabin was surrounded by tipi and tipi tanka, or lodges. Oliver and Wakan Yanke had nine children, and in Prairie des Français (Tiŋta-otoŋwe), the four daughters who lived there included Josephine, Pelagie (Eliza), Sarah-Irene, and Henriette Luce (Harriet).[13]

Pelagie Eliza Faribault Manaige remembers her father conducting a trading post for a few years, and building a warehouse in which he stored furs purchased from the Dakotas. She only faintly remembered her father, as he died in the fall of 1850 of quinsy, when Eliza was 4 ½ years old. Eliza remembered the gaudy trinkets that were available to the Dakota Indians.[14]

Faribault had a horse and a cow. The horse and cow lived in a small cow shed just south of the log cabin in Prairie des Français. Father Augustin Ravoux, who for a short time built a chapel near the Springs, refers to borrowing Oliver’s horse. And Rev. Samuel W. Pond once hid his own cow. That caused Faribault’s cow to be killed by a Dakota Indian. Family oral tradition also tells of storing furs in the shed, and of a mixed-blood employee of Faribault’s who guarded the furs kept there.[15]

When Oliver lived in the Faribault Trading Post in 1844, it was in the last decade of the fur trade in the Minnesota Valley before the onslaught of settlers who irrevocably changed the history of the area forever. Rather than being a primitive fur trader in buckskins, beads, and feathers, Oliver was a gentleman who wore silk and sateen sometimes, and a man who provided for his family with the best that was available to him in the 1840s.[16]

Ledgers by Henry Sibley at the Mendota trading headquarters show Oliver’s purchases of food, fabric, clothing, as well as agricultural pursuits, lumber purchases, furnishings for his home, repair done by the fur company’s blacksmith, purchases for his hired men and for Joseph Godfrey, who was enslaved.[17]

Oliver Faribault died Oct. 4, 1850.[18] He contracted quinsy while digging out Faribault Springs. Quinsy is an abscess between the back of the tonsil and the wall of the throat. Quinsy is now rare because most people get effective treatment for tonsillitis early enough to prevent it, but in 1850 quinsy often led to death.

Oliver is buried at Calvary Cemetery, in Faribault, Rice County, Minnesota.[19]

^[1] Find A Grave Memorial #49026654 on Oliver Faribault by Cindy K. Coffin, March 2, 2010.

^[2] Interview of Patricia Jeanine Menaige Cates by David R. Schleper (2016) in Prior Lake, MN.

^[3] Spector, Janet D. (1993). What This Awl Means: Feminist Archaeology at a Wahpeton Dakota Village.  St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press.

^[4] Spector, Janet D. (1993). What This Awl Means: Feminist Archaeology at a Wahpeton Dakota Village.  St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press.

^[5] Curtiss-Wedge, Franklyn (1910). History of Rice and Steele Counties, Minnesota. Chicago, IL: H.C. Cooper, Jr. & Company, p. 84.

^[6] Bachmann, Walt (2013). Northern Slave, Black Dakota: The Life and Times of Joseph Godfrey. Bloomington, MN: Pond-Dakota Press.

^[7] Williams, Richard (2000). Oliver Faribault and Early Settlement at Faribault Springs. HSP Journal: The Journal of La Compagnie des Hivernants de la Rivière Saint-Pierre, p. 11.

^[8] Williams, Richard (2000). Oliver Faribault and Early Settlement at Faribault Springs. HSP Journal: The Journal of La Compagnie des Hivernants de la Rivière Saint-Pierre, p. 12.

^[9] Pond, Samuel William Jr., 1893). Two Volunteer Missionaries Among the Dakotas: Or The Story Of The Labors Of Samuel W. And Gideon H. Pond. Boston: Congregational Sunday-School and Publishing Society.

^[10] Williams, Richard (2000). Oliver Faribault and Early Settlement at Faribault Springs. HSP Journal: The Journal of La Compagnie des Hivernants de la Rivière Saint-Pierre, p. 12.

^[11] Find A Grave Memorial # 49026654 on Oliver Faribault by Cindy K. Coffin, March 2, 2010.

^[12] Hinds, William (1891). A Sketch of Shakopee, Minnesota: Historical and Industrial. Shakopee, MN and Reprinted by the Shakopee Heritage Society, pp. 9-10.

^[13] Interview of Patricia Jeanine Menaige Cates by David R. Schleper (2016) in Prior Lake, MN.

^[14] Winter, Marian B. (2003). A Visit with a Great-Granddaughter of Oliver Faribault. La Compagnie des Hivernants de la Rivière Saint-Pierre (HSP) Journal. From a working scrapbook 3061B in 1930s, and in the Sibley House Museum and the Minnesota Historical Society collections.

^[15] Minnesota History Quarterly, Fall 2015. 64:7

^[16] Williams, Richard (2000). An Analysis of the Purchases of Oliver Faribault, 1842-1846. HSP Journal: The Journal of La Compagnie des Hivernants de la Rivière Saint-Pierre, p. 5-8.

^[17] Williams, Richard (2000). An Analysis of the Purchases of Oliver Faribault, 1842-1846. HSP Journal: The Journal of La Compagnie des Hivernants de la Rivière Saint-Pierre, p. 5-8.

^[18] The Shakopee Argus, Nov. 11, 1880, p. 4, col. 1, obituary.

^[19] Find A Grave Memorial # 49026654 on Oliver Faribault by Cindy K. Coffin, March 2, 2010.

In Prairie des Français on the Rivière Saint-Pierre 1844-1880
by David R. Schleper

Wakan Yanke, or the Woman Who Sits at the High Place, was born in the Minnesota Valley area around 1817 among the large circle of her Dakota relatives. According to some researchers, Wakan Yanke was the daughter of Colonel Menary, a soldier at Fort Snelling, Minnesota, and a “Sioux Indian girl.” Wakan Yanke was a close relative of Chief Ŝakpe II.

According to Patricia Jeanine Arnold Cates, the great great granddaughter of Wakan Yanke, her relative might be a full Dakota Indian.

Wakan Yanke grew up as a Mdewakaŋtoŋwaŋ, or an Eastern Dakota member of the Spirit Lake People. She lived along the Watpá Mnísota (or Minnesota River) Valley. Wakan Yanke played with others, helped her family, and sometimes went hunting or fishing. She played with dolls and toys, and she sometimes played Ta-ka-psi-ca-pi, meaning “ball game” and now called lacrosse.

Wakan Yanke, wore long deerskin or elk skin dresses and moccasins on her feet. She also wore buffalo-hide robes in bad weather. Over time, Wakan Yanke learned how to sew clothing using material from the fort.

Dakota women, like Wakan Yanke, were in charge of the home. Besides cooking and cleaning, she helped build her family’s house and dragged the heavy posts with her whenever the tribe moved. Later, when she was married, Wakan Yanke became in charge of the log cabin built in Tiŋta-otoŋwe near the springs at Prairie des Français on the Rivière Saint-Pierre. Houses belonged to the women in the Dakota tribes. Wakan Yanke also took part in storytelling, artwork and music, and traditional medicine.

In 1837, she married Oliver Faribault in a civil/Indian ceremony.

Many traders and voyageurs, like Oliver, married into American Indian communities and utilized kinship networks, often trading exclusively within their particular community. “As a result, large communities of individuals of diverse heritage developed, often called ‘mixed-bloods’ or Métis during the period, and many of these individuals maintained ties to both the fur trade and American Indian communities.” Oliver was at least ¼ Dakota, and Wakan Yanke was either full Dakota or half Dakota.

As part of the settlement in an 1837 treaty, each Mdewakanton Dakota village was to receive an assigned farmer to teach them the benefits and techniques of “modern agriculture.” Oliver was assigned to Tiŋta-otoŋwe in the spring of 1839. Wakan Yanke probably stayed at Little Rapids.

Lawrence Taliaferro was a United States Army officer and an Indian agent at Fort Snelling. In Taliaferro Journal, June 11, 1839, he wrote:

“Under terms of the treaty of 1837, each Mdewakanton village was to receive an assigned farmer to teach them modern farming. Oliver’s close relationship with Ŝakpedan, also known as Little Six, led to his being assigned to that position in the spring of 1839.”

In Taliaferro Journal, June 17, 1839, and Aug. 13, 1839:

“Taliaferro recorded that Oliver had nine oxen, four cows, three horses, one bull, one cart, one wagon, two yokes, and bows, two single plows and two double plows.”

It was during this period that Tiŋta-otoŋwe moved from the left bank to the right bank of the Minnesota River. Exact year of the village removal has not been determined.

On Feb. 11, 1844, Oliver married Wakan Yanke, also called Henriette Menegre or Menary, in a religious ceremony (after the 1837 civil/Indian ceremony) at the St. Francois Xavier Sioux Mission, located at Little Prairie on the Rivière Saint-Pierre (St. Peter’s River.) Wakan Yanke spoke Dakota and French, and a bit of English.

Together, they had nine children:

• Gabriel Olivier Faribault (1838-Dec. 1859)
• Olivier Emile (born about 1840)
• Angelique (birthdate unknown)
• Mary Josephine Jessie (born 1842)
• Jane Luce (born 1843)
• Pelagie Eliza (Aug. 27, 1845-Dec. 1, 1937)
• Sarah-Iréne (born 1847-May 23, 1924)
• Henriette Luce (born 1848)
• Lauren Philippe (born 1850)

Gabriel Olivier Faribault, who was born in 1838, probably was with Pelagie’s siblings, as is often done with young Dakota boys, in order to learn the Dakota way of living. He died in December of 1859. Oliver Emile, Angelique, Henriette Luce, and Lauren Philippe all died in infancy or early childhood.

In 1844, Wakan Yanke and Oliver built and established a trading post near three springs, later called Faribault Springs, in the midst of Tiŋta-otoŋwe, a Dakota summer planting village in what was later the east part of Shakopee. The cabin and adjacent warehouse were built on the west side of Faribault Springs, using tamarack logs which were obtained from a swamp nearby.

Oliver Faribault was in his early thirties and Wakan Yanke was about 27 years old when they moved into the area. Mary Josephine Jessie, their daughter, was two years old, and Wakan Yanke was also pregnant with another daughter, Pelagie, who was born in 1845.

Wakan Yanke spent her time as a mother and wife. She took care of Mary Josephine Jessie and Pelagie Eliza, along with Sarah-Iréne and Henriette Luce. Her last child, Lauren Phillippe, died in infancy in 1850. According to purchases in 1845-1846, the log cabin included a cook stove, and from 1842-1845 kitchen utensils included a pitcher, a coffee pot, a wrought iron tea kettle, four tin pans, three tin dishes, a set of blue cups and saucers, a dozen plates, six blue plates, four blue bowls, and a broom.

Oliver died on Oct. 12, 1850, after contracting quinsy while digging out Faribault Springs. Quinsy is an abscess between the back of the tonsil and the wall of the throat. Quinsy is now rare because most people get effective treatment for tonsillitis early enough to prevent it, but in 1850 quinsy often led to death.

The girls were still very young when their father died. Their mother, Wakan-Yanke (Harriet), remained in the home and raised the four girls, Josephine, Pelagie, Sarah, and Harriet. Wakan Yanke preempted a quarter of the land in 1856, but gradually was forced to sell small parcels of it.

Wakan Yanke, also known as Harriet Menegre/Menary Faribault, died of typhoid fever on Nov. 7, 1880. According to the Shakopee Argus, she had been unwell for weeks, but during the past ten days she was apparently improving.

The obituary noted the following:

“Mrs. Harriet Faribault died at her residence in East Shakopee, Monday last. She had been unwell for weeks, but during the past ten days was apparently improving. Except to old settlers she was unknown, of late years never leaving her residence. She was a full-blooded Sioux, but married David Faribault, a Frenchman. He died at Shakopee in 1853. Since then she has lived just at the outside of the city with her daughters. She was probably born at or near this place before visited by white man.”

A few notes about the obituary include that Wakan Yanke was full-blooded Dakota (which is probably true). She did not marry David Faribault, but Oliver Faribault, who was a brother of David. Oliver (and David) were ¼ Dakota, and were also French Canadians who were born in Prairie du Chien, now in Wisconsin. Oliver died Oct. 12, 1850 (not 1853). And the Faribault Post was inside the limits of Shakopee, on the east side just west of Memorial Park.

Eventually, the logs of the original house built by Oliver and Wakan Yanke were covered with wood frame siding. The house was lived in by the Faribault family until the 1949 and was moved to Murphy’s Landing in 1969. Now a historic site, the house is used to interpret the fur trading era at The Landing in Shakopee.

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2020

It was the beginning of November 1847. Cordelia Eggleston Pond, along with her husband, Samuel W. Pond and their children, Jennette, age five, Rebecca, age three, and baby Elnathan, just a month old, arrived at Tínṫa Otuŋwe, which Samuel called Prairieville.

They moved into the mission house, which had been built on a gently rising ground, about a half mile south of the Rivière Saint-Pierre (St. Peter’s River) over the last few months. According to Samuel Pond, Jr., the mission house was “about half a mile south of the Minnesota River.”

What was Cordelia Eggleston Pond thinking as she looked at the Faribault Trading Post, the Dakota village of 600 people, and the mission house, right in the middle of it all? There were no white families except for Hazen P. Mooers and for the missionaries who lived 14 miles away at Oak Grove. Around her were 600 men, women, and children of the Eastern Dakota Mdewakaŋtoŋwaŋ, or the Spirit Lake People. As a missionary, Cordelia focused on caring for her children, keeping house, and feeding the family, along with ministering to the Dakota.

Cordelia Eggleston was born Nov. 22, 1815, in the small community of Stafford, just outside of Batavia, New York. Cordelia’s father, Esquire Ebenezer Eggleston, died eight weeks earlier. Her mother was Anna Kingsley Eggleston, who was left a widow with eight children. When Cordelia left home in 1837, she unlikely saw her mother again, as she died in 1843.

Cordelia’s older sister, Julia, married Rev. Jedediah Stevens, and eventually their mission station was at Lake Harriet Mission. Cordelia decided to join them there.

According to Samuel Pond, Jr., “…a sister of Mrs. Stevens, Miss Cordelia Eggleston, then a young lady of twenty-two, had joined the Lake Harriet Mission in the capacity of teacher. She was a great favorite with her sister, Mrs. Stevens, who had long and diligently laid her plan to have her younger sister associated with her at her work in the Indian country, and was much elated with her success.”

“The lady commended herself to all by her amiable character, modest demeanor, and personal attractions….

“During the spring and summer following Mr. Pond’s return to Bde Maka Ska, he saw much of this young teacher and the acquaintance resulted in a marriage engagement after a brief courtship in the beautiful groves bordering the lovely lake,” said Samuel Pond Jr.

On Nov. 22, 1838, Samuel W. Pond married Cordelia Eggleston near the Mission Boarding School near Bde Maka Ska. It was attended by anyone of importance in the territory, including U.S. Army doctor John Emerson, owner of Dred Scott (who was living at Fort Snelling), political, civil, and military, and groomsman, Henry H. Sibley, and Rev. J.D. Stevens, whose wife was a sister of the bride.

In 1847 the family moved to Prairieville. Cordelia and Samuel had four children, Jennette, Rebecca, Elnathan, and Samuel Jr. According to Samuel, “… though we have endeavored to have as little property exposed as possible we are obliged to be continually on the watch. My wife had been only a mile from home in three years, and when the Indians are here, I seldom go out of sight of the house unless I am obliged to do so.”

According to Samuel, “…the young mother (Cordelia), never very strong, gradually failed in health from that time. The oldest girl, Jennette, now eight years of age, was a great comfort and help to her mother, whom she was said to resemble closely in both character and person. She was morbidly conscientious and must have been rather precocious, since she had finished reading the Bible through by course before she was six years of age.”

In the fall of 1851, Samuel obtained from the Board a year’s leave of absence and prepared to visit New England. The journey was a fatiguing one, as much of it was by stage. In Connecticut, kind friends “took charge of the four children, for their mother was rapidly failing, and by the first of February it was evident that the end was near.”

The dying mother, Cordelia, expressed a desire to see all her children once more, knowing that it would be the last time in this world. “To the older ones she gave words of counsel which were carefully heeded and diligently followed. Jennette Clarissa never forgot her mother’s parting words. Mr. Edward Pond went over the icy hill and brought Elnathan Judson from his aunt Jennette’s, to receive his mother’s last kiss and listen to her dying words. She told him to be a good boy and love God. To the youngest, she said, ‘Poor boy! He will not remember his mother!’ and kissed him farewell.”

Before the dawn of the sixth day, Cordelia passed away at the age of 36 years, fourteen of them spent in continuous service of the Dakotas. The tombstone of Cordelia Eggleston Pond is at the Old Judea Cemetery, Washington, Litchfield County, Connecticut.

Samuel, widowed at age 43, was left with four young children. He remarried an old school friend, Rebecca Susan Smith, in Connecticut about two months after Cordelia’s death. They returned to the mission in Shakopee, where Rebecca, Samuel’s second wife, died on July 9, 1891. Samuel joined her in death on Dec. 12, 1891, at the age of 83.

PDF Brochure

April 10, 1808 – Dec. 12, 1891
In Prairieville/Sha K’Pay/Shakopee 1847-1909
by David R. Schleper

Samuel Pond and his brother, Gideon, arrived in 1834 in the area later called Minnesota. He was a missionary, language translator, agricultural instructor, carpenter, farmer, and ongoing advocate for fair treatment of American Indians.

As Samuel got off the steamboat, he asked someone how to say, “What is this?” in Dakota.^[1] As he wrote this down, he walked over to a Dakota and asked, “Ka taku he,” pointing to a horse that was near the steamboat landing.^[2] (This would sound like “gay-dah-koo-hey.”)

“Hé šúŋkawakȟaŋ héčha,” the man responded.

And Samuel Pond quickly wrote down the word for horse, šúŋkawakȟaŋ. And Samuel continued, doing this for years, eventually creating the Pond-Dakota alphabet, which is still used today.

Shortly after, Samuel and his brother began teaching Euro-American farming to Dakota people near Bde Maka Ska (Be-DAY Mah-Kah Ska) in present-day Minneapolis.^[3] The brothers continued to work on the Dakota dictionary. Samuel noted, “The language was a game I went to hunt, and I was as eager in the pursuit of that as the Indians were in pursuit of the deer.”

After a brief engagement, Samuel W. Pond married Cordelia Eggleston on Nov. 22, 1838.

In 1847, after accepting the invitation from Ŝakpe II to locate in Tiŋta-otoŋwe, Rev. Samuel W. Pond began preparing for the building on the mission house. Materials were purchased at Point Douglas in Wisconsin. The timbers were framed and the materials were prepared at Fort Snelling, and then, as the ice melted, the timbers were loaded on a barge and brought up the St. Peter’s (Minnesota) River to the location at Tiŋta-otoŋwe, which Samuel W. Pond called Prairieville.

The Mission House was built in the middle of Ŝakpe II’s village of Tiŋta-otoŋwe, where approximately 600 Dakota lived in tipi tanka (or bark lodges). It was a busy place, and Pond decided to surround the Mission House and front garden with a fence of tall stakes to prevent the Dakota from claiming a portion of the crops that Pond’s family planted.

In November of 1847, after working on the Mission House during the spring and summer, Samuel, Cordelia, and their three children moved into their new home. Jeanette was five years old; Rebecca was three, and baby Elnathan was scarcely a month old when they moved in. (Samuel, Jr. was born a few years later.) Elnathan remembered in 1925, “There were no white children excepting my brother, my two sisters, and myself….I recall that white men were a rare sight, and our childish eyes grew round with wonder when we saw one!”

Samuel W. Pond described the site: “The mission house at Shakopee was pleasantly located on gently rising ground, about half a mile south of the Minnesota River. At a distance of twenty rods or so to the West was the house of Oliver Faribault. Between these two dwellings was a ravine through which ran a never failing spring of clear cold water…” Tiŋta-otoŋwe, the village of the Dakotas, was south of the mission house and was nearby. The Mission House was “…sufficiently commodious, carefully and comfortable built, although inexpensive in all its appointments. The walls were carefully filled with moistened clay, making them probably bullet-proof and rendering the house very warm.”

Samuel and his brother Gideon both resigned from the Dakota Mission after the Treaties of 1851 removed all of the Dakota people to the Upper and Lower Sioux Agency reservations in western Minnesota.

Samuel became the founding pastor of the first Presbyterian Church in the rapidly growing city of Shakopee, Minnesota. He served as pastor for thirteen years. Samuel died on Dec. 12, 1891, at the age of 83.

The wood frame Pond Mission House was razed in 1907. The foundation is still there, across the road from Memorial Park in East Shakopee. A historic marker tells about the Mission House and Reverend Samuel W. Pond.

^[1] This is an imaginary response, based on the true story of Samuel W. Pond in Pond, Samuel William (1893). Two volunteer missionaries among the Dakotas: or, The story of the labors of Samuel W. and Gideon H. Pond. Boston, MA: Congregational Sunday-School and Publishing Society.

^[2] The he is a question mark. The Dakota do not have periods and marks like in English. So any time someone ends a sentence in he, the person are either being asked a question or someone is be asking a question.

^[3] Bde Maka Ska (Be-DAY Mah-Kah Ska) used to be called Lake Calhoun, after John C. Calhoun, a proponent of slavery. He was infamously known for calling slavery “a positive good.” The name of the lake was changed back to the Dakota name of Bde Maka Ska in 2017.

Related Articles

• Samuel W. Pond, Jr. and Cordelia Eggleston Pond and Family (1847)

By David Schleper

According to Daniel M. Storer’s diary:

“The night watchman got shot at in the night. He saw a couple of fellows in an alley, and he called to them to halt, and they shot at him and ran. The ball went through his hat.”

(From The Diary of Daniel M. Storer from 1849 to 1905: A Pioneer Builder and Merchant in Shakopee, Minnesota by Shakopee Heritage Society, 2003, p. 197.)

By David Schleper

Professor Thomas Tristram and his bride, Theresa, came to town in the late summer of 1878. He had been in Bloomington, and moved to work in Shakopee. He was one of the most popular teachers in the public school during the year, and was re-employed for the coming year of 1879. The professor and his new pretty wife, Theresa Pearle Tristram, were very popular socially and much sought after.

But then the rumors started. “I told you so!” said one person in Shakopee. “I knew something was wrong!” said another.

And immediately, the professor left town and returned to Ireland.

The Argus newspaper on August 7, 1879 started to investigate. The Argus noted that Reverend William R. Powell had received a letter from Annie Tristram, who claimed that she was the professor’s wife. The letter noted that she had not heard from the professor since 1876 and expressed concern as “he was one of the kindest of husbands…”

Thomas Tristram was born in Ireland in 1843. At the age of 17, he married a lady six years his senior, Annie. Thomas claimed that he had been drunk before the ceremony and kept intoxicated during the service. (Good excuse!) He also claimed that his wife was unchaste before the wedding, and since then had been repeatedly broken her marriage vows. They had four children.

Thomas was not happy, and he escaped by immigrating to the United States…without his wife or his four children.

In the United States, he enlisted as a private in the army for five years at Fort Snelling. While in St. Paul, he met Theresa Pearle and after two years of engagement, they were married in Minneapolis on September 16, 1876.

About two weeks ago, Reverend William R. Powell received a letter from Dr. Knickerbacker of Minneapolis. He included a letter that was sent from Ireland by Annie Tristram, who explained that she had been waiting patiently and trusting in God. She explained that she had been waiting the last three years, taking care of the children, and had been struggling. She heard that Thomas Tristram was in Shakopee, and she needed to find out more.

Upon being confronted with the letter, Thomas Tristram confessed, and then quietly and rapidly left to rejoin his wife in Ireland.

The second wife, Theresa Pearle Tristram, was left to pick up the pieces. According to the Argus, Theresa was “terribly wronged, yet she trusts the man who so wronged her. She has forgiven him…” and refused to prosecute.

Thomas Tristram was a villain, a rascal, and a man deserving to spend his remaining years in prison. In the newspaper, the Argus noted that frail, pretty and innocent Theresa, with her broken heart, was thrown upon the cold, heartless world.

(Some information from Argus, August 7, 1879; and The Shakopee Story by Julius A. Coller © 1960 by North Star Pictures, Inc.)

By David Schleper

In September, three men, clad in linen dusters, drew up their beautiful horses in front of John Dean’s blacksmith shop to have them shod.

As the story goes, according to The Shakopee Story by Julius Coller II, the horses were shod backwards; such a request would not have greatly surprised Dean or his helper, who took the men for dudes from Lake Minnetonka. (Lake Minnetonka was a favorite resort for the wealthy and near wealthy Easterners.)

When leaving, the leader tipped the blacksmith very liberally. Because of this, John Dean generally believed that this man was Jesse James.

In any event, it was quite certain that the men were members of the James-Younger gang who a few days later attempted to rob the First National Bank of Northfield. In the street battle, the gang was driven from the town after murdering Joseph Heywood, the acting cashier of the bank.

Luckily, they did not attack the people of Shakopee!

(Some information from The Shakopee Story by Julius Coller, II, copyright 1960.)

[ezcol_1half]

[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]

[/ezcol_1half_end]

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2022

David Lennox How was born in Elbridge, New York on Aug. 23, 1835. When he was twenty years old, David decided to strike out on his own. After two years in Adrian, Michigan, he headed down the Minnesota River to Shakopee in the new state of Minnesota.

On the Antelope, the slender town smokestacks belched smoke. On the decks were a mixture of cargo and passengers, including Indian traders and settlers-colonists. David, age 22, was writing in his diary. “The scenery,” he wrote, “is very beautiful and the foliage more forward than in Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, or Indiana,” noted in The Shakopee Storyby Julius Coller II, pages 619-628.

In 1858, David entered a partnership with Dr. Josiah Schroeder Weiser, owning a drugstore in Shakopee. The old drugstore later became Strunk’s Drug Store. David also worked on several projects, including a Jordan flouring mill, a mill in Chaska, and a large mill in Shakopee.

At age 27, David Lennox How married 18-year-old Mary Margaret Robeson Sherrerd in 1862. Mary was born Feb. 13, 1844 in New Jersey. Her parents were William Maxwell Sherrerd (1805-1868) and Sarah Leeds Sally Bartow (1819-1896). William ran the American Hotel in Shakopee. David and Mary moved into the commodious Sherrerd brick residence on Holmes and Second Street, which is now torn down and is currently the Deco apartments. It was then called the Hows’ residence, and the couple had one child, Jennie Sherrerd How (1864-1935). Mary was pretty, talented, and entertaining. David was always the center of social activities with grace, magnetism, and ready wit. David and Mary were popular at parties and dances.

In 1872, a fire broke out, and J.G. Butterfield lost a drafting set. In one hour, $350 was raised to buy him a new set. The money was given to Butterfield, after a nice speech from David.

On the morning of Sept. 21, 1873, Mary went to visit a friend. When Mr. How telephoned to find out when she would be back, she was not there. Meanwhile, J.G. told his friends in Shakopee that he was going to Vermont, but he didn’t. He wrote his wife a letter saying they would never see each other again. Mary left her husband and child, and J.G. left his wife and five children.

Mr. Butterfield and Mrs. How left the state separately but met in Chicago. Then the new couple went to New York, St. Thomas, Panama, California, and back to Chicago. The people in Shakopee had a field day discussing what may have happened.

After three months, and ten thousand miles by rail and ocean steamer, Mary arrived back in Shakopee. So did J.G. Mary returned to David, and J.G. left Shakopee with his wife and family.

As far as it is known, neither Mary nor David offered any information or explanation. They took up their lives. Parties started up again, and their child, Jennie, married Ernest Lionel Welch (1863-1934) on Dec. 2, 1885 at the Hows’ house.

On Dec. 21, 1893, twenty years later, Mr. How ate breakfast and went upstairs. Moments later a shot was heard. The family rushed upstairs. David was sitting in the chair, grasping a revolver. The discharge from the 38-caliber weapon entered the right temple. He was dead.

David had several business enterprises and may have been overwhelmed and overdrawn on his accounts. The community was shocked. The funeral took place at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church on Sunday, Dec. 24, 1893, and he was buried at Valley Cemetery in Shakopee.

Mary ended up in the cities, and on Feb. 9, 1899, she married Alonzo Phillips (1843-1932), son of John Wesley Phillips and Catherine Enslen. Mary died on Dec. 5, 1928 in St. Paul. Mary was buried in St. Paul. David had a plot at Valley Cemetery for her, but she did not get buried in Shakopee. Eventually, the plot was given to Sarah-Irène Faribault (1853–1924), a nurse and domestic servant at the Hows’ home, and her remains was interred in the plot reserved for Mary Robeson Sherrerd How Phillips.

PDF Brochure

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper in 2021

Axel Jorgenson was born Aksel Jørgensen on December 1, 1818 in Gjerstad in Aust-Agder County in southeast Norway. Axel was the eldest of four sons and a daughter born to Jørgen Akselsen (1783- 1864) and Karen Margrete Nilsdatter (1794-1866).

In Oslo, Norway on April 28, 1850, Axel married a certain Ingeborg Marie, age about 31. Five days later, according to the Carver Historic District, the newlyweds boarded the brig Incognito in Christiania (Oslo) and arrived in New York City on July 13 or 17, 1850 with 132 passengers, by name probably all Norwegians, including steerage passengers Axel Jorgenson and Ingeborg Marie.

After the ship’s arrival in New York Ingeborg Marie is found no more in connection with Axel. Her fate unknown, most likely she died in the first year or two after arriving in America.

Jorgenson probably traveled America’s water routes, eventually making his way to the frontier territory of Minnesota sometime in 1850-1851.

Axel came to Minnesota territory and took preemption claim as a settler-colonist in Carver County, which allowed squatters to purchase up to 160 acres on Indian land. It gave him a toehold on townsite before claims could be legally settled. He “improved” the land with dwellings, warehouses, and stores, and thus were less liable to be taken over those who came along later. He picked a large parcel of choice land on the north side of the Minnesota River at the junction of the Minnesota River, Carver Creek, and Spring Creek, a site situated some 32 miles upstream from St. Paul.

Jorgenson there built a crude claim shanty house, which he loosely called a hotel, and situated it just above the Minnesota River bank on First Street near Broadway. The claim shanty was a 14’ x 18’ dirt-floored upright board and batten (or log) shanty “hotel” with four large windows. Said to have been called Hotel Luksenborg, it was intended to augment his business of hauling logs, lumber, and supplies to and from St. Paul on a barge in the Minnesota River, and is said to have also served as his home and blacksmith shop, according to Mark W. Olson.

Axel had a barge, an old, dirty, heavy, flat-bottomed boat, which could float downstream, but would have to be propelled with long poles to pull upstream.

Jorgenson seems to have offered prospective settlers free lodging and transportation from St. Paul up the Minnesota River to land around his claim area in return for them helping to propel his barge. It purportedly would take three long days of hard poling work against the river current to reach Jorgenson’s claim in the future Carver County.

Alex moved to Shakopee by December 1863. He worked doing clock and watchmaker repair work. According to a business directory for 1865, Alex was advertised as a watchmaker and jeweler on Holmes Street.

In Shakopee on June 6, 1868 Axel Jorgenson took out a marriage license and married Ellen Marie Oleson, an immigrant from Vadsø in Finnmark County in northern Norway who arrived in America in 1865. The couple lived in Shakopee for the first years of their marriage.

The 1870 United States Census for Shakopee mentions that Axel Jorgenson was a watchmaker and legal citizen of the United States with $2730 in real estate worth and $600 in personal property value, a tidy sum for the period.

Axel is listed in 1870 as being married to Ellen M. Jorgenson, age 30, who is described as a housekeeper and not yet a legal citizen. Both are listed as born in Norway.

In May 1871, Axel had lumber on the ground in Shakopee in preparation for building a one-story building for his jewelry and silversmith business.

In 1874, Axel and Ellen separated, but by 1877 the couple moved to Stockholm Township in Wright County, where they lived for the rest of their lives.

In late 1879 or early 1880 Axel and Ellen adopted a son who they named Axel Peter Jorgenson. Son Axel Peter was born in Stockholm Township on Nov. 9, 1879. The infant’s 29-year-old mother died 24 days after his birth, perhaps from childbirth complications, leaving her widowed husband with two other children to care for, so he let Axel and Ellen adopt the child.

In the 1870s and 1880s, Axel was engaged in cutting and selling lumber in Stockholm Township. Axel was one of many involved in the Minnesota Commission of Fisheries’ task of stocking various species of fish in many Minnesota rivers and lakes. During 1885, Axel stocked 40 carp on Feb. 6; on March 28 he and 13 others stocked 425 carp; and on Nov. 16 he stocked 20 carp.

In December 1886, Axel’s family home in Stockholm Township burned, destroying all his papers, notes, and other valuables.

Axel died in Stockholm Township about 1899. His widowed wife, Ellen Marie, lived in the eastern part of Stockholm Township where she owned a farm and served as postmaster, with her son, his wife, and a granddaughter living with her in 1900. Ellen Marie died on Feb. 10, 1910, at the home of her son Axel in Keystone, Polk County, Minnesota and was buried in the family plot in the Stockholm town cemetery after services at the Stockholm Lutheran Church.

PDF Brochure

By David Schleper

Florence Courtney Melton told the story of her trip from the Ohio to Washington on February 24, 1929. The book was called History of a Pioneer Family. It was later donated to the Garfield County, Washington Historical Museum in Romeroy, Washington.

Florence’s parents were Levis Courtney and Mary Anne Ashbaugh Courtney. Levi and Mary Anne were the parents of six children. All survived to reach maturity except William Laurence who died at age one while they were still in Ohio. Florence Courtney Melton was youngest member of the family. The family lived in Shakopee for six years, starting in 1854.

Levis, Florence’s father, was a chair maker. He became ill with epileptic seizures in 1849 or 1850, and doctors advised him to move to a colder climate. He and his wife and children moved to Shakopee, Minnesota, but his seizures got worse until the entire burden of the family fell on Mary Ann, Florence’s mother.

There was quite a rush for the new territory of Minnesota in 1854. So, the family equipped themselves for the journey west. Florence’s grandma, her uncles Robert and Joseph and their families, and Jane Patterson, Comfort Patton, and Florence’s mother, Mary Anne, and family started overland for the great Northwest. Here is part of the story about moving to Shakopee from 1854 – 1860:

*****

My folks had one team. Mother took a dozen chickens. I think that was all the livestock. The children were not well. Mary had a chill every other day. She was much opposed to leaving her pretty bedroom. She made so much fuss that Aunt Comfort lost patience with her. She said, “You little dunce, if you stayed here you would die.” Mary said, “I don’t care. I would have a nice little room to die in.” When they began traveling they all felt better.

Uncle William Patton was a drinking man. He carried a bottle with him all the time. He ran out before they got to another town to stock up, one time. They thought of Mother’s bottle she always kept to use as medicine. He got very sick and had Aunt Comfort ask for a little whisky for William. He was taken with pain in his stomach. Mother fixed a dose of some whisky about half whisky and half of the hottest colic medicine known. He drank it down without stopping but when he could speak he said, “I was a damn fool to think I could fool Mary.” They never came to Mother again for whisky.

They traveled across Indiana and Illinois and took the boat at Galena, Illinois. They went to St. Paul. They camped until the men located claims. Uncle Robert and Robert Patterson settled in Wisconsin. A distressing accident occurred while they were camped in St. Paul. Robert Patterson’s oldest son went swimming in the Mississippi and sank within a rod from shore in water twenty feet deep. He was about 14 years old. Uncle Robert was an odd fellow. He was soon surrounded by friends. Everything was done for their comfort that could be done. This may have been the cause of their going to Wisconsin.

The rest of the party kept together and took up claims nine miles south of Shakopee, county seat of Scott County. It was dense timber. Indians were as numerous as the squirrels. There was a lake about a mile from our claim. Uncle Will and Uncle Joe took claims at the lake. Grandmother stayed with them most of the time.

It was September when they got started to work on their houses. They camped on the ground and the nights were quite cool. A neighbor who lived almost a quarter of a mile away had his cabin built. He offered to let the little girls sleep in his house. Mother used to take one boy with her and the girls. After they were tucked in bed, she would go back to the wagon where the other brother was watching Father. She did this for three weeks. She gave directions about the cabin.

The roof was covered with clapboards with logs to weight them down. There was a big fireplace at one end of the room; a small window by the door. The floor was made of small ash trees hewn on both sides and laid side by side; it was called a puncheon floor. Father took the adz and smoothed it; then went over it with a plane until it was almost as planed boards. Mother always said it was the whitest floor she ever owned.

They had no cook stoves, so she wanted a Dutch oven built of stone or brick out in the yard. There wasn’t a man who could build one, so Mother told them to haul some stones and she would build it herself. Uncle William Patton was always ready to help her. He got the rocks and she bossed the job. They built an oven and they used it as long as they lived in Minnesota (six years). The built some kind of shed for the horses; by that time winter was at hand.

That first winter was very long and lonesome. My father soon found he could not stand the cold weather. He and his brother Jake froze their feet every time they tried to work, but Baxter and Mary played out of doors with “Old Sorrel” and a jumper sleigh. The runners made shafts and cross pieces held it together. A seat was fastened on. They played for hours, many a day, with the thermometer 20° below zero.

The Indians taught the boys how to fish by cutting a hole in the ice and gigging fish. They could get necessary supplies at Shakopee, as it was a trading post established by the fur company. Shakopee is a Sioux Indian name that signifies six. The fur company had built six little cabins, hence the name. (Not the real reason for the name!) There was a company of soldiers who came up on the boat our folks came on; they were stationed at Fort Snelling as protection to the settlers.

The long winter came to an end. All was bustle and stir, clearing land, getting ready to plant a garden. Mother worked with the boys. Either that spring or the next, Baxter thought he could cut down trees equal to any man. He cut off one toe of one foot, and soon after cut three toes from the other foot. One toe hung by a thread of skin, the others were clear gone. Mother raised the scissors to clip it off, but he began to beg for it and cried.

He said, “Don’t take them all away.” She said, “All right, I’ll see if I can mend it.” She fixed some splints and set it; it grew together as good as ever – never a thought of a doctor.

She was the doctor for miles around – put the first clothes on all the little ones who came to the homes of the settlers. Also the Indians soon found they could come to her and she would help if she could. In March of 1856 (I believe) Cotapantopo, the chief of the Shakopee band, brought his squaw and papoose, a boy of two years, to Mother. He was very sick. She knew at a glance he had the mumps so she helped them care for him. They spread their blankets in a corner by the fireplace. They stayed there three days and nights. The old chief would try to get the baby to eat. He would smack his lips, and say, “Chehumpa” (sugar), but the baby’s throat was too badly swollen. Mother fixed some soft food for him. They seemed very grateful, and many a mess of fish and venison were brought to us in return.

When they had been there a short time, in Minnesota, Baxter and Mary grew very enthusiastic about teaching an Indian to speak English. He would say over after them in English after telling them in Sioux. He had played with them for an hour or longer when they ran and put their arms on Old Sorrel and said, “Horse.”

He said in perfect English, “It isn’t a horse at all; it’s a mare.” And then he laughed at them. They never gave any more lessons. The Indians would not speak English unless compelled to. One came once and asked for something to eat. He could not make Mother understand, so he said, “Mrs. Courtney, I wish you would give me a bite to eat, I am very hungry.” They were just like other folks; they would conform to the rules if they gained by it. I think the fall after the mumps episode my brothers and sisters all took the mumps from the papoose.

My mother was topping turnips to bury in the root cellar for stock food through the winter. A band of Indians came along, stopped and began eating turnips. She had a small pile of the most perfect ones for seed. One Indian wouldn’t take any from the large pile. She told him, “NO!” (and) jerked the turnip out of his hand, threw it down.

Father saw there was something wrong. He came to the door of the shop, hand axe in hand. The Indian raised his gun to shoot, but Mother struck the gun down. She called Father to go back in the shop, then turned to the Indians and told them to “pockochee,” which is Sioux for “Go home!” The other Indians took no part in the squabble. Some of the neighbors thought we would be massacred, but no notice was ever taken of it. Mother was kind to the Indians but she was the master; they had to come to her terms.

In looking over the timber on the farm, several sugar maple trees were found, so it was a regular job every spring making maple syrup and sugar.

The severe winters proved too much for Father’s health. They both longed for their Ohio friends. On the thirtieth of September, 1857, I (Florence Courtney Melton) was born. The other children were so near grown that I was hailed with delight. No doubt I was a fund of pleasure during the long cold winter. To illustrate what the winters were like, the thermometer froze up the six winters we lived there, with the exception of one.

Sarah was seventeen the twenty-third of November, 1858. They had a dinner and invited friends. The guests came in sleds and drove over a stake and fence to safety. When she married [Jacob Houk] the eleventh of March, 1859, the same snow was on the ground, and they still drove over the fences, and it snowed so hard the day of the wedding that some of the guests had a narrow escape from being lost.

The family became more dissatisfied with the cold and snow. They had an opportunity to sell the farm, and September 1860 saw us bound for Iowa.

Florence Emily Courtney Melton and her husband James Moran Melton (1849-1895) ended up having three children: Ralph B. Melton (1878-1949), Caroline Elizabeth (1880-1966), and Gertrude Lucile Melton (1884-1971).

And that is the story about Florence Emily Courtney Melton and her family in Shakopee!