Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2020

A contingent of peasant farmers from Germany left for the New World, including the Lenz and Gerdesmeier families around 1848. When they arrived in America, the authorities asked their name and occupation and decided to combine their name (Lenz) with their occupation (dairy farmer) to become Lenzmeier.

Mary Theresa Elizabeth Gerdesmeier (called Elizabeth) was born April 9, 1835. Elizabeth married Stephan Lenzmeier either in Germany or in East St. Louis, Illinois. In 1860, Elizabeth and Stephan came by steamboat to St. Paul, where they traveled to Scott County and to Marystown.

Twenty-five-year-old Elizabeth, who was either pregnant or carrying a newborn infant along the trip, arrived and registered their homestead in Shakopee. The family, like others in Marystown, spoke German. The church in Marystown had services in German, and then later in German and English. The parish built a school very early, with German as the official language, with English as a second language.

Stephan settled the homestead and brought in crops and did fairly well, with Elizabeth every inch the heroic pioneer woman, keeping people fed and clothed while rearing a big family, including eight boys and finally a baby daughter, Mary, in 1878.

Stephan either went west to Idaho where silver and gold had been discovered, or out to South Dakota under Gen. George Custer to look for gold in the Black Hills. Stephan was 53 years old, while Elizabeth was 38, and stuck at home with the children. Stephan was hoping to get rich quickly, but he didn’t succeed. He reportedly fell ill away from home and had difficulty getting back. He did return, but his health was broken, and he died at 57 of heart failure, just two months after the birth of baby Mary.

It was said that his widow, Elizabeth, was very bitter about his death, blaming him for bringing on his own demise and leaving her to raise their large brood and run the farm, even with an infant at her breast. She reportedly held up the child before his open casket and cried something to the effect of “Here, take her with you, why don’t you! How can you leave me here alone with all this responsibility and this little one, too?”

Elizabeth surveyed her situation. She was a widow at age 43 with assets of a good farm, eight sons, and an infant daughter. Life must go on. Elizabeth learned of a good family in Shakopee who had some marriageable daughters. She made an inevitable logical decision. One Sunday morning, she hitched up a team to the buggy and drove the five miles to the Hubert Roehl farm just west of the town of Shakopee, along the road leading to Jordan.

Hubert was an immigrant from Luxembourg, and owned a long piece of land parallel to the Minnesota River. He also owned an overabundance of daughters!

Elizabeth told Hubert about her big, handsome boys, and suggested that they had a basis for an arrangement. Elizabeth was one smart woman!

And so, it was arranged that her sons would marry Roehl’s girls. And four of them did! The four brothers who married Roehl’s sisters received pieces of good land from their father-in-law’s original claim along the Minnesota River.

And Elizabeth? She was happy. And one smart woman!

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2020

Grace Faribault Manaige was the granddaughter of Oliver Faribault and Wakan Yaŋke Wiŋ (or Woman Who Sits at the High Place). Grace was born at her parents’ log cabin in East Shakopee, the same log cabin which is now in The Landing in Shakopee. Her parents were Charles A. Manaige and Pelagie Eliza Faribault.

Grace’s parents had four children, two sons and two daughters. Isabelle was born in 1871, and married Harvey Randolph Leach in Des Moines, Iowa, and they had 9 children. Melvin was born in 1872 and died April 12, 1931. He married and lived in Brooklyn, New York. Eugene Curtis was born 1874 and died of tuberculosis in 1903. The last child was Grace, who was born in 1876.

Grace grew up with her siblings, Isabelle, Melvin, and Eugene Curtis. They attended public schools in Shakopee.

The family was poor, but they took care of each other and enjoyed living together.

When Grace got older, she was planning to marry. But she took a train to South Dakota to be with her sister during the birth of Isabelle’s child.

It was a difficult delivery; the baby came breech and couldn’t be turned. To save Isabelle, the doctor cut off an extremity of the baby, and the baby died.

When Grace returned home, she broke off the engagement with the man she was to marry.

She said, “I would never go through that for a man!”

And so, Grace stayed at the Faribault cabin, helping cook and clean for the others who lived there.

Down the hill were three springs which fed into the small stream. The springs kept the water at a constant temperature. Faribault Springs had watercress, which the Faribault family used and sold to the people in Shakopee.

When Grace was about eighty years old, she didn’t like when people went to her Springs to steal the watercress. Grace took care of the watercress, and gathered it and sold it in Shakopee, including in the Red Owl store.

So, when Grace saw people at the Springs gathering HER watercress, she was not happy. She would start swearing at the people. And Grace took out her pistol, held it out, and said, “Get off my land or you will be dead!”

And they left!

A few years later, Grace wasn’t feeling so well. She ended up at Friendship Manor, which opened its doors to the public on May 1, 1965, as a 76-bed intermediate-care facility, accommodating people who needed minimal assistance. Grace was one of the first residents at the facility which is at 1340 3rd Avenue West in Shakopee.

Grace Faribault Manaige died at Friendship Manor in November of 1966.

She was buried at Valley Cemetery in Shakopee.

By David Schleper

In 1943, Shakopee Avenue stopped about one block west of the farm, and there was just a gravel road leading to the farm. To the north and east of the farm was a sand and clay pit, about 25 feet deep. The clay from this pit once was used by the Schroeder Brick Company for making brick for Shakopee.

Hiliary Drees purchased a farmstead which consisted of approximately 20 acres. He bought the farm from Mr. Turner, who was a rural mail carrier for Shakopee. The location is just north of Pearson Sixth Grade Center, near Prairie Street today.

Hilarius Antonius Drees was born June 4, 1903 in Wanda, Minnesota, and died April 18, 1974 in Shakopee. He married Agnes Nathalia Dorzinski, who was born August 1, 1904 in LeSueur County, and died July 1, 1978 in Shakopee. They married on November 24, 1925. Hiliary was a farmer, but also worked at Rahr Malting, as well as Pullman Club as a waiter. Agnes was a homemaker, but also worked as a clerk at M.J. Berens grocery and dry goods store, and was a waitress at Pullman Club. They had five children.

Because Drees Hog Farm was at the outskirts of Shakopee, there was no city water or sewer. A cow barn stood north of the house, with a chicken coop, outdoor well, smoke house, and outdoor privy making up the rest of the farmstead. The outdoor privy was used until 1951.

Along with the dairy cows and chickens, Hiliary Drees started to raise hogs. He built two hog barns east of the farm house and started his hog operation. At the peak of the hog operation, he raised as many as 300 or 400 hogs a year on 10 acres. The hog pasture went east and about 300 feet north of the house.

In the past, butchering was used using a big black iron kettle to heat the water and a wooden barrel to soak the pig until the hair came loose, noted Margaret Haas of Shakopee.

According to Margaret:

“We cooled the meat and then the hams and some side pork were put in dry salt for a while. Later came the task of smoking them. We would hang them on pipes with wire hooks and then a smoldering fire was built by using hard wood and some apple wood, covering it with damp sawdust.

“We had to watch this fire very closely for sometimes if the wind blew hard it would cause the fire to flare up and one had to add more sawdust. Sometimes one would wake up and see flames coming out of the smokehouse, and then quick steps were taken to add the sawdust.

“The rest of the pork was fried down and put in crock jars. We also butchered beef, so taking parts of beef and pork, we made sausage. We used the pig heads for head cheese, pickled the tongues and hearts, and also used the brains for a special food. We took the tallow and extra fat to make soap.”

LaVina Busacker noted that her father and two brothers butchered two beef animals, and they let their meat age in a sun porch for three weeks, as it was a large, enclosed, and unheated porch. After that, they butchered six hogs:

“That was about three days’ work – to cut up the meat, grind it up for sausage.… The hams and bacon were put in a brine (water with enough salt in it to float an egg). They made head cheese, liverwurst, summer sausage, pork sausage, gritwurst (oatmeal and lard cracklings) and blood sausage.”

At the smoke house, apple and hickory wood would be used to smoke the meat. According to LaVina Busacker, “When we got our smoked hams from the smoke house, we would bury them in the wheat bin as deep as possible, so they would stay cold, since we had no refrigeration in those days.”

Hiliary and Agnes Drees and their family continued the hog operation until 1952. At that time, hog cholera hit the farm. After the quarantine was lifted, Hiliary did not resume hog farming.

Many years later, the hog farm is gone, and houses and schools have taken over the area that used to be Drees’ Hog Farm. The original house is still there, on Shakopee Avenue and Prairie Street, right across from Pearson Sixth Grade Center in east Shakopee.

(Some information from Butchering Many Years Ago by LaVina Busacker; A New Type of Living by Margaret Haas, As I Remember Scott County, 1980 by Scott County Senior Citizens, edited by Marcia Spagnolo; and Scott County Historical Society.)

By David Schleper

Joe was orphaned as a child. He worked on road construction crews and for Union Carbide before he became in charge of maintenance for the K-12 Shakopee school. He lived in Shakopee for 66 years. Clifford Thibodeau remembered, “Joe was a great guy! I remember being in 5th grade, if I remember right. Me and some other boys were asking him about his job. I don’t know if he was supposed to, but he showed us areas of the school that may have normally been off limits to students, like the boiler room, and the pretty big basement the school had. In all the years I went to that school, he was always such a good humored guy!”

Barb Stein also remembered Joe. “He was so cool, he would let us play with his retractable key chain, zing, zing, zing, the patience of a saint.” “When we talk about Joe I always smile. I remember when we moved to Shakopee my sophomore year, my parents just had me walk to school and register myself. Joe was out cleaning the sidewalk and could tell I was lost. He took the time to walk me to the office,” said Marilyn Rein.

Joe Jenn recalled growing up in Shakopee. “Shakopee was really a community by itself, cut off by the Minnesota River and the river bottoms. Back in the 1930s, the town was a little Las Vegas. We had 33 beer joints at one time and notorious nightclubs like Rock Springs and the Riviera. People, including gangsters, came here for booze, women, and gambling; the mayor, sheriff, and city councilmen went along with it all.”

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

(Some information from Midwest Highways and Byways by Alice M. Vollmar, Summer 1999.)

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2020

Ruth Gardner (1933)

Ruth Gardner. Or Laura Jensen. Or Ruth Redtke, or Ruth Warner.

She escaped from the State Reformatory for Women in Shakopee on Feb. 20, 1933.

Ruth was 22 years old, 5’6 5/8” and 109 pounds. She has light brown hair, hazel eyes, and a sallow complexion.

Ruth was a clever forger. She operated in Ohio, Michigan, and Minnesota.

She always presented her victims with a fraudulent letter from an insurance company. The forged check was usually for about $70.

If you find Ruth, apprehend and deliver her to an officer of the Minnesota State Reformatory for Women in Shakopee. You will get a $25 reward!

Thumbing a Ride (1948)

On Aug. 21, 1948, at 8 p.m., a woman escaped from the reformatory in Shakopee.

She was working in the fields, made her way to the Holmes Street Bridge, and crossed to the north end.

She started to thumb a ride.

John P. Wermerkirschen pulled up, and the woman got into the car. As he drove, Wermerskirchen asked her name.

“None of your business!” she responded. “What is YOUR name?”

The driver answered, short and sweet, “You’ll be surprised. I am the sheriff.”

Her ride ended shortly after…back to the reformatory!

Lucille Keppen Released from Prison at Age 93 (2007)

“Does it hurt?” Lucille said. “I really want it to hurt because you hurt me so deeply, and I was so good to you.”

Lucille Keppen, age 88, shot Stephen Flesche in 2002.

The inmates nicknamed her “Grandma.”

When she got out at age 93, the first thing she wanted to do was go to Perkins!

Lucille was the oldest prisoner of the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Shakopee.

Teen Murderer Flees Jail to See the Smashing Pumpkins (1998)

Seventeen-year-old Pamela D. Keary really wanted to see the Smashing Pumpkins.

She was serving a 12-year sentence for second-degree murder.

She joined 100,000 fans to see the show at the Hennepin Avenue Block Party.

She was arrested at midnight and removed to the segregated unit.

Compiled and written by David Schleper, 2020

Charles August Manaige was born Dec. 7, 1847 in Madison, Wisconsin. His father, Pierre Manaige, was a native of France, and his mother was a part-Winnebago, or Ho-Chunk Indian.

Charles and his family came to Minnesota in the early 1840s. His father was an interpreter for the government, sent to avoid bloodshed and disputes in the territory. The Winnebagos first settled at what is now Long Prairie in Todd County. Charlie remembered that he never had seen a white man, except his father, until he was about six years old. Charlie spent his childhood with other Winnebago children, sharing games such as ball play and becoming proficient as a hunter with bow and arrow.

On Jan. 25, 1846, wearing high-heeled boots to give him the required height, Charles enlisted in the U.S. Army. He served as a private in Company F, First Regiment, Minnesota Heavy Artillery under the command of Captain Hugh J. Owens. Eight months later, on Sept. 27, 1865, Charles was honorably discharged in Nashville, Tennessee.

After the war, Charlie farmed near St. Clair and later operated a butcher shop. He also spent some time at Mankato.

As a young man, he visited the Shakopee vicinity frequently, and on July 30, 1870, Charles A. Manaige married Pelagie Eliza Faribault.

They lived in Shakopee for the rest of their lives.

“Charles A. Manaige and his wife, Eliza Faribault Manaige lived across the street from the Mill Pond, a famous gambling place on First Avenue in the 1920s. Charles was Ho-Chunk Indian, and Eliza was part Dakota. And they were not too thrilled about what happened across the street. You see that big building over there,” said Charles’s granddaughter, Florence Kelm, as she pointed to the sprawling Mill Pond across the road. “That is a tavern, and at night it gets very noisy, and people came outside and make nuisances of themselves.

“People used to come over on our land and lie on the grass. They broke bottles against our trees and threw things at our house. They called us ‘Indians’ and did many things to taunt us. We are Indians, you know, that is, we have Indian blood.

“Grandfather went to the village authorities, and asked if we couldn’t have some protection, as there were little children at his house … but because we were Indians—we didn’t get any help!”

Florence remembered Charles put a fence up, but “the people broke it down each time he put it up.”

Charles decided, “So, I will take the law into my own hands! I am not going to have those drunken bums lying on my green, green grass; I’m not going to have those drunken bums leaning against my beautiful trees; I’m not going to have them polluting the pure water of our creek. They are going to keep off our property!”

And so, Charles used to sit under the tree with a shotgun across his knees and threaten anyone who came near from the tavern side of the property!

Charles Manaige worked for a number of years in Shakopee as a painter and paperhanger and also served in the police force.

A familiar figure, Charlie was endeared to young and old. The old veteran, riding in his horse-drawn carriage, made daily trips from his home at the east part of the city to do the family shopping. No matter the weather, Charlie still would visit downtown Shakopee. Not so many years back, Charlie could be seen morning, noon, and later afternoon, with his grandchildren seated beside him in the carriage, going and coming from the grade school. The duty was one of his greatest pleasures, and the pleasure was vividly recorded on his beaming face.

Charles and Pelagie had four children, two sons and two daughters. Isabelle was born in 1871 and married Harvey Randolph Leach in Des Moines, Iowa. They had nine children. Melvin was born in 1872 and died April 12, 1931. He married and lived in Brooklyn, New York. Eugene Curtis was born 1874 and died of tuberculosis in 1903. Grace was born in 1876 and died at Friendship Manor in November 1966.

Charles, at 82 years old, became the Paul Revere of Shakopee in December 1929. He was driving in town in his horse and buggy when he heard the opening volley of shots happening at the First National Bank. Hightailing the old mare up the main street in Shakopee, he gave the alarm. He kept shouting, “Hey…the bank is being held up. Everybody, get out your guns.” Charlie was in grave danger of being hit by the barrage of bullets that swept the main street, but he still continued his heroic dash.

Two months before he died, Pelagie died. Since that time, Charlie had a severe cold, which developed into pneumonia. For several days he was confined to his bed at home, and as his condition became critical, he was moved to the Veteran’s Hospital in Minneapolis, where he died.

Charles A. Manaige, Shakopee’s 91-year-old Civil War veteran, the sole surviving member of General Shield’s Post of the Grand Army of the Republic, died in January 1938. His funeral was at St. Mary’s Catholic Church, with Fr. Michael McRaith officiating. Interment was at the Valley Cemetery beside his wife, Pelagie Faribault Manaige. Most businesses were closed during the funeral as Shakopee saluted the old soldier.

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By David Schleper

According to Mary Cavanaugh DuBois, “Everyone in the community knew ‘Indian Minnie,’ who made beautiful beaded articles. The purses mother had her make were not leather, but made from rubber inner tubes. They had beaded handles and rubber streamers decorated with beads. The price was $1.00 each.”

Minnie Josephine Otherday was born in a tipi on July 24, 1877 on the north side of the Minnesota River in Tiŋta-otoŋwe. Her parents were Jim and Lucy Otherday. Her grandmother was the sister of Chief Ŝakpe II, whom the city of Shakopee was named.

According to Diane Sexton, “My grandma had a pair of baby booties and a pillow made by Minnie, they always fascinated me as a young girl. She later donated them to the historical society.” Marcia Wagner remembered, “When I was a girl Indian Minnie lived on the Indian Road, on the Eden Prairie side. I used to take a walk and visit her. She was a very nice lady. Went to school with her granddaughter Darlene. I grew up in Eden Prairie on Spring Road, so Indian Road was just like a hop and a skip away.”

In the 1980 McDevitt family history book, there is mention of Minnie:

“Because the homestead only consisted of fifty acres, his father rented land at a number of places and also purchased some land at two different sites adjoining the city of Shakopee. These tracts of land that his father had purchased are now a part of the city of Shakopee and many homes have already been built on this land…To get to one of the rented fields, they had to drive across the old bridge at Shakopee onto the Indian Road, where they would see Indian Minnie sewing under a shade tree and the young Indian boys running and hiding behind trees, aiming and shooting their Fourth of July guns.”

(Some information from online discussion on If You Grew Up In Shakopee…)

Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2020

Bror Folke Persson (Pearson) was born on a farm in southern Sweden July 30, 1906. Bror Folke, meaning “brother of the people,” was a particularly apt name for a man who devoted his life to his family, parents, and communities. He was kind and had a good sense of humor.

Dr. Pearson immigrated to America in 1919, and became a doctor for 42 years in Shakopee, starting in 1934. Dr. Pearson used to come directly to homes any time of the day or night, whenever called. He delivered more than 2,500 babies in Shakopee.

Gwen Johnson Humphrey remembered when Dr. Pearson “brought [me] into the world, then in the next few years brought four of my six brothers also. He was always at our house it seemed tending to either one or all seven and never left without giving someone a shot, Through measles, German measles, chickenpox, [tonsillectomies], stitches and owies he was always there.”

In 1939, Dr. Pearson, a local priest, and the editor of the local paper visited the convent of Franciscan nursing nuns and asked them to take over the decrepit county poor house and run it as a hospital and a home for the elderly.

By 1952, the little hospital was no longer big enough, and Dr. Pearson led the effort to build a new hospital with 120 beds, an emergency room, and a full services laboratory.

Dr. Pearson married Elizabeth Stephens in 1935, and after 40 years, Beth died in 1976. They had three daughters and a son. Pearson retired from his Shakopee practice in 1976, the same year Beth passed away.

Dr. Pearson received the 18th annual Franciscan International Award. The honor goes to someone whose humanitarian efforts and singular devotion to others live up to the ideals of St. Francis. Other recipients have included Dr. Billy Graham, Dr. Charles Mayo of the Mayo Clinic, and Harry Reasoner, nationally known ABC Television news anchorman. In 1976, it went to a little-known doctor from a small Minnesota town.

In 1980, he wed Dr. Dora Zaeske, and they were together for 22 years, traveling the world and working as humanitarians.

Dr. Pearson worked as a physician in locations in South America, the West Indies, and Taiwan, and a Navajo Reservation in Ganado, Arizona. He also led an effort to sponsor a leprosarium in Zambia, Africa.

In 1970, a new elementary school in Shakopee, B.F. Pearson Elementary School, was named after him. It is located at 917 Dakota Street South.

In 1995, Central became the fifth- and sixth-grade building, with Sweeney and Pearson elementaries serving grades kindergarten through fourth. As the number of students grew, the five other elementary schools in Shakopee continued, while in 2011, the school was converted to Shakopee’s Pearson Sixth Grade Center, which opened in 2012.

Pearson Sixth Grade Center served all public school sixth graders in Shakopee which included about 650 students. About 43% of the students were people of color.

In 2018, the school was closed for budget reasons. The sixth graders were moved to the two middle schools with other seventh and eighth graders.

In 2020, Pearson Sixth Grade Center became the Pearson Early Learning Center.

After a brief illness, Dr. Bror Folke Pearson passed away Aug. 24, 2004, at Sunrise of Mercer Island, Washington, at age 98.

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Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2020

Dan Eddings was born enslaved, probably in Kentucky around 1852.

So how did Dan Eddings move?

Elnathan Judson Pond married Wilhelmine Minnie Catharina Elisabeth Markus in Shakopee on June 24, 1879. Minnie was born Oct. 21, 1862, daughter of William (1823-1895) and. Wilhelmina (1832-1908) Markus. Elnathan and Minnie had six children. Elnathan’s younger brother, Samuel William Pond, Jr. married Irene Goodrich Boyden. The two couples started housekeeping at the mission farm. Later, Elnathan and Minnie moved across the road to a 170-acre farm. This farm is now part of The Landing in Shakopee, according to Pond Grist Mill Is Start of Something Big by Ginger Timmons, Scott County Historical Society, Shakopee Valley News, Aug. 30, 1972.

Elnathan and Samuel, Jr., sons of Rev. Samuel Pond, Sr. and Cordelia Eggleston Pond, built the Pond Grist Mill in 1875. The mill was built for supplementary income. Elnathan and Wilhelmine’s seven-room, two-story frame house, complete with summer kitchen and woodshed, stood about a block east of the mill. The families moved the big barn from the

The Shakopee Tribunealso discusses “our sole citizen of color.” According to the article, Dan was “quite harmless, although possessing only indistinct ideas of the philosophy of meum and tuum, especially when in the vicinity of a hen roost.” Meum et tuum means mine and thine and is used to express rights of property. In other words, he was a lady’s man. “In earlier days, before race prejudice had spread through the north, Dan often was present at social functions, and there may be those still living who have stepped off a quadrille with him.”

William Weiser, meanwhile, was back with his wife until she died, and then he married Kate Love McCallum. They have nine children before Kate died in 1901. William was a school teacher and brick mason, and died in Everett, Washington in 1919.

Dan spent his post-slave life living and working in Shakopee. In the Aug. 29, 1919 Scott County Argus, Dan “had spent his entire life here, and was well known among the farming community, having worked on many of the farms hereabouts.” He often worked at Lawrence Stemmer’s farm in east Shakopee. (“Threshers in Shakopee ca. 1910” by Shakopee Heritage Society)

J.A. Reitz, a Shakopee photographer, took a picture of Dan in 1915. It was a studio portrait, where Eddings was sitting on a wicker chair covered with a fur pelt. He was wearing a button-down shirt, vest, jacket, and trousers. On the back of the photograph is written “Ni**er—Dan Eddings 1915.” Dan Eddings continued working at various farms until 1919, when he became sick with cancer. He was taken to the county poor house five weeks before he died. The Aug. 29, 1919 Shakopee Tribunenoted, “Dan Eddings, better known to Shakopee as ‘Ni**er Dan,’ died at the county poorhouse Wednesday morning, and was buried that evening.” The Scott County Argusadded, “Dan Eddings, the only local negro resident in this community, died Wednesday morning at 9:45 o’clock at the county poor house where he was taken about five weeks ago. The cause of death was cancer of the stomach.”

Dan Eddings was buried at Valley Cemetery in Shakopee. Valley Cemetery was a public cemetery with no church affiliation. Many of the early families are buried there. The area where he was buried is directly across from pine trees. Valley Cemetery made a note in the remarks: “Known as Ni**er Dan.”

Dan, who was enslaved, worked for years at various farms in Shakopee, and died of cancer, was buried in the potter’s section, a place for the burial of unknown or indigent people. The term is of Biblical origin, referring to a ground where clay was dug for pottery, later bought by the high priests of Jerusalem for the burial of strangers, criminals and the poor.

Dan Eddings does not have a tombstone.

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