Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2021
Joe was enslaved in the South. He did not know his last name. At some point, Joe moved north and arrived in Eden Prairie. People called him Old Joe.
It is possible that Joe moved north with William Weiser who was a private in the army when he joined the Ninth Pennsylvania on August 15, 1862. William was in the army until August 24, 1865, when he retired as a sergeant. After he retired, and before he headed back near Shakopee, William bought and liberated twelve people who were enslaved. He then moved back to Eden Prairie in 1864, and William brought the freed enslaved people with him to Minnesota, where the twelve African Americans were to work on the farm. According to the Shakopee Tribune in 1919, “All ran away except Dan and another boy.” That “boy” might have been Joe, who lived in Shakopee and Eden Prairie, while Dan Eddings moved across the river and lived and died in Shakopee in 1919.
Joe Graham lived with François Rivière and his family. François was a Franco-Américain, a citizen of the United States who had French Canadian heritage. François was born in 1833. He owned a cooper shop in Shakopee, and Old Joe, who was probably a younger Joe at that time, probably worked in the cooper shop in Shakopee until 1874.
Initially, farm and food products were shipped to Shakopee in barrels. In fact, starting in the early 1800s, goods such as food staples, grain, seed, and animal feed were packed in tins, boxes, and wooden barrels for transportation. Cotton sacks gradually replaced barrels as food containers with the stitching machines made it possible to sew double locking seams strong enough to hold the contents of a bag.
Once the flour bags were invented and spread to Minnesota, François quickly sold his business and bought a 600-acre farmstead. The Red Rock Lake Farm was in Eden Prairie, and the acreage went down to Red Rock Lake, across the river from Shakopee.
The Red Rock Lake Farm was pre-empted in the 1850s by Judge Charles Collins. A cabin structure was built, and watermelons, potatoes, wheat, and corn were planted.
The property was sold many times between 1855 until 1874. Then in 1874, if was sold to François La Rivier, or Frank Rivers, and his family. Joe also moved with the family to the north side of the Minnesota River.
After living and working with Frank Rivers for several years, Joe moved to the Horace Goodrich home.
Joe later went to live with John Goodrich on Staring Lake in Eden Prairie. When Goodrich opened his summer hotel Joe worked around the buildings, caring for the boats, working on the lawn, and helping with the luggage of guests. Joe also worked around the kitchen. Joe drove a surrey with a fringe on top, picking up guests at the Eden Prairie Train Station.
Joseph Graham also drove a carriage for Dr. H.P. Fischer in Shakopee. Dr. Henry P. Fischer was a medical practitioner in Shakopee, and in 1909 he founded the Mudcura Sanitarium.
Joe drove Dr. Fischer around during his house calls from about 1894 until 1900.
Affectionately known as Old Joe, Curt Brown noted that he died of cancer in 1900 according to an old leather ledger that shows early Eden Prairie settlers and their births and deaths.
Helen Holden-Anderson, in a book called Eden Prairie: The First 100 Years, discussed Helen Goodrich Mastin, who was a descendant of John Goodrich.
She heard that the Goodrich family, who owned the hotel, had a small wooden cross over Graham’s grave. They planned to add a fine marker to replace the small cross. But over time, it never happened, and the grass grew up and there was no sign of Joseph Graham’s grave.
Eighty years later, Katherine Case, a longtime president of the Eden Prairie Historical Society, remembered the story, and she remembered from oral history that Jonas Staring, an early settler, had gone to Memphis to buy a horse.
The anecdotal stories said that Joseph Graham was asked to ride north on the train with the horse in a livestock car, and that Jonas Staring would find work in Minnesota.
And so, in 2003, a new gravestone was added on the north side of Eden Prairie Cemetery, 103 years after Joseph Graham, who worked in Shakopee and Eden Prairie, died.
Bibliography
Holden-Anderson, Helen. Eden Prairie: The First 100 Years, 1979.
Shakopee Tribune, 1919.