This week we are featuring a memorandum of agreement that was donated by the City of Story City which details the forming of the electric company. The company was originally formed in 1897 when the city of Story City entered into this agreement with Crellin & Lovell, a business out of Des Moines. This agreement also establishes an provision for providing street lighting. "One arc lamp and 20 incandescent lamps which shall be kept lighted according to the Philadelphia Moon Light Schedule." According to the EMF Electrical Year Book, Volume 1 published in 1921, in order to make a contract for street lighting it was necessary to know what hours each night that lighting will be required and the total number of hours of lighting to be furnished each year. This was done by agreeing on a definite schedule. The Philadelphia Moon Light Schedule was one of the four most common at the time. Here is the description of the Moon Light Schedule: This schedule provides no lighting when the moon is expected to be bright. Light lamps one hour after sunset until the 4th night of the new moon, also one hour before moonset; extinguish one hour before sunrise, also one hour after moonrise; provide no light at all on the night before, the night of, and the night after a full moon. This schedule results in considerable economy in lighting costs, but makes no allowance for cloudy nights when the moon is obscured. The first street lights appeared in Story City in August of 1898.
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This week we are featuring a unique advertisement from the Story City Light Department. The ad tells you several options for what one kilowatt hour of electricity will do in your home or on your farm. The Light Plant building was constructed in 1919. Below are photos of the Light Plant from the 1931 Story City Golden Jubilee Book.
In the introduction pages of the 1940 Story City Herald Anniversary Book, the editor P.A. Olson, wrote a short description about the baseball era. “Anyone who reads this Anniversary Number may be struck with the fact that there is quite a lot in it about baseball. You couldn’t write a history of Story City without saying a good deal about the great American game.” Olson included several articles about baseball written by Andrae B. Nordskog, Rasmus C. Severeid (Hank Severeid’s older brother), and W.A. Kelley. The themes of these articles included the success of the Story City team and information about the town’s greatest players. Nordskog, who lived in California in 1940, wrote about his old home town of Story City and how baseball was a red-hot sport. In the 1890s and 1900s Story City’s baseball team was the team to beat. During an eleven year period, the Story City team lost only one game to the Ames college team. Beating the Iowa State College team was a theme in all of the articles on early baseball. Rasmus C. Severeid in his article wrote “how well do I remember the smart geeks down at the I.S.C. more than once nearly bit off one other’s noses in a fit of frenzy over a bad defeat at the hands of the despised ‘Norskies’.” Another theme that spanned all three articles was that Pete Peterson was the best pitcher Story City ever produced. Nordskog, in his article recounts how he taught Peterson his curve ball. Nordskog was pitching in Randall in 1903 when Peterson’s team came to play. Nordskog struck Pete out three times. After the game Pete asked Nordskog to show him how to throw that curve ball. According to Nordskog, he gave Pete the secret for an “out-curve riser” and Pete used it with more success than he did because Pete was much stronger and faster. W.A. Kelley wrote about Pete’s successes in his article. In one season Pete won 25 games, lost one, and two were ties. Of the 25 victories, 11 were shutouts. I have to share one of my favorite descriptions of a player from Ramus C. Severeid’s article, he was writing about Freeman Fuller. “Fuller is the only player I ever saw who could bat a ball gripping the large end of the bat seemingly as well as the small end. No pitcher of those days had anymore show of executing a strike out on him than a dog with tallow legs chasing an asbestos cat thru a prairie fire.” The other theme that was consistent throughout the articles, which were written by former players, was that the “old timers” of the 1890s and early 1900s never lost their love for the game. Kelley and Severeid’s articles were originally written in 1914. They were ready to gather their teammates of 10-20 years ago and show the youngsters of 1914 a thing or two. I hope you have enjoyed this glimpse of early baseball in Story City. These articles were written by players of the era prior to Hank Severeid (Story City’s most famous baseball player.) Hank will be featured in next month’s Herald article. Our last advertisement from the 1940 Herald Anniversary Book featured the Story Theater. In honor of that, our collection item of the week is a program from the Story Theatre from May of 1934. The theater had shows every night of the week in May 1934, a Sunday matinee and evening showings. Please check out the photos below to see what was showing at the Story Theatre 81 years ago this month. Thanks to David and Rosemary Osheim for donating several Story Theatre programs from 1933-1934. These programs belonged to Thelma Wierson, David's mother.
Included in the 1940 Story City Herald Anniversary Book was an article written in 1906 by Charles Hill Keigley about the old Soper’s Mill. The mill was a pioneer landmark in Story County. Soper’s Mill was located on the south bank of the Skunk River about seven miles south of Story City. There are differing historical accounts as to who originally built a mill on that land. Some believe it was Thomas Hughes that built a saw mill in 1856. In Charles Hill Keigley’s article from 1906, he describes T.K. Soper, who was one of the earliest residents in Story County, as the one who built a saw mill in the 1850s. During the fall of 1859, Soper tore down the saw mill and in its place he began building a grist mill. This grist mill is what became known throughout the county as Soper’s Mill. J.G. Yelton was the first miller to be in charge of the mill. Mr. Yelton ran the mill for nine years and the machinery continued daily to grind out large quantities of buckwheat meal and flour. Grain was brought to the mill by settlers from surrounding counties. It was not uncommon for farmers to come a distance of 30 or 40 miles to Soper’s Mill. In the summer of 1871, the mill changed hands and was conducted by Hipshear & Egelberger. It is said that at this time they equipped the mill with new machinery and began manufacturing a special brand of buckwheat flour which was known as “Soper’s Superlative.” The mill was very successful under Hipshear & Egelberger and was run at its full capacity day and night. In the spring of 1882, Jimmie Noble took possession of the mill and the success of the mill continued. Rye and buckwheat were the principal products at this time. According to Keigley, “We are informed that buckwheat flour was then sold by Mr. Noble for $4.00 per hundredweight, and the daily output then was scarcely equal to the demand.” Noble operated the mill until 1894 when it was purchased by P.J. Swearinger. Swearinger partially reconstructed the old mill but by the 1890s the water supply had given out and there was insufficient power to run the machinery, except at certain seasons. Soper’s Mill fell into disuse in the late 1890s. In the following years the area became popular for fishing, picnics, and celebrations. Today, Soper’s Mill is an access point for canoeing along the Skunk River Greenbelt. We hope you have enjoyed this history of a local pioneer landmark. This week we are featuring an advertisement from the Story Theatre. The historic Story Theatre/Grand Opera House, built in 1913, was part of Story City's Grand Hotel and Auditorium Building. Motion pictures, school plays, graduation exercises, and vaudeville acts were presented in the original theatre. The theatre opened for business on December 18, 1913, with the melodrama stage play "The Two Orphans", complete with an orchestra. The Story Theatre/Grand Opera House has had only 14 owners in its long history, from initial owner Iver Egenes to Lewis and Mae Peterson and sons, Richard and Virgil, who operated the theatre for nearly 40 years from 1947 to 1984. In January of 1980, the hotel and theatre block was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Story Theatre/Grand Opera House is the oldest continually running theatre in Iowa. It celebrated it's 100th anniversary in 2013. Last week the ad we featured from the 1940 Story City Herald Anniversary Number book was a joint ad from the Pioneer Store Co. and the Alsager Bros. Meat Market. This week our collection items are two of the largest and heaviest items we have from these businesses. One is a 1870 safe made by the Diebold Safe & Lock Co. and the other is a large copper vat. The safe is the original safe that had always resided in the S.R. Corneliussen & Co. building, which in 1911 became the Pioneer Store Co., and is currently the location for Reliance State Bank. Due to new banking regulations involving dual control issues that required the purchase of a new safe, and due to minimal vault space, the bank donated the safe to the museum in April of 1999. The safe had always resided inside a vault at the back of the building until 1972. It was then moved to an inner vault of the bank and was used to store currency and coin until April of 1999. More detail photos of the safe can be seen below. Alsager Bros. VatThis large vat was used by the Alsager brothers for rendering lard and boiling sausages. It was found in the basement of what is now Reliance State Bank, which is where the brothers had their meat market. The Alsager Bros. Meat Market was in business in Story City for over 40 years. The third advertisement we will be featuring from the 1940 Story City Herald Anniversary Number book is a joint ad from the Pioneer Store Co. and Alsager Bros. Meat Market. The Pioneer Store was located at 604 Broad St, on the south-east corner of Broad and Penn Ave. Norsemen Reality is located there today. In the early 1900s, this location was owned and operated by S.R. Corneliussen. In 1911, Corneliussen sold his store to A.G. Larson, J.C. Johnson, Martin Jorgenson, Herman Jorgenson, and J.A.B. Larson. The store name was changed to the Pioneer Store Company. As you can see in the photo below, the Alsager Bros. Meat Market occupied the east end of the building at 608 Broad St. Reliance State Bank is located there today. The Alsager Bros. Meat Market was in business until 1946. Alsager’s had a reputation as the best meat market in the county. Even people from Ames would drive to Story City to buy their meat there. Two articles were included in the 1940 Story City Herald Anniversary Book about pioneer women, describing these women as the backbone of pioneer life. Pioneer women led a hard life of long hours, hard work, and few conveniences. One of these articles was written by Nehemias Tjernagel, who was an author, composer, and world traveler. He wrote examples of several local pioneer women, who along with their daily duties would help the sick since medical assistance was not readily available in these early days. These women included Mrs. Kittel Knutson, who freely gave her services to the sick, diagnosing cases as if by intuition. Mrs. Christian Karolussen, an intelligent woman with a helpful spirit, “helped usher into the world many of our present citizens.” Mrs. Haaver Thompson was well known for her hospitable attitude towards children. Besides caring for her own children, she took in several other children who lost their parents. Nehemias also wrote of Charlotte Wier, the wife of Captain Wier, who came to Lafayette Township in 1856. She is remembered for waiting on traveling families for days and days. Sometimes she would take in so many travelers that they would lie strewn around on the floor at night and she would have to step over them in the morning when getting breakfast ready. No one was turned away. Charlotte had “experienced the hardships of travel and knew what a friendly welcome meant.” The other article in the book described a young pioneering couple just starting out. The first year they could not afford to employ a hired man, which meant they milked 14 cows and fed the calves by hand every day. The household facilities were not the best; the living room adjoining the kitchen was used as the family sleeping room. House cleaning included white-washing the walls, scouring the unpainted woodwork, washing windows and bed clothes, emptying, washing and refilling the straw bed ticks, taking up the rag carpet, beating the dust out of it, scrubbing the floor, and putting the carpet down again with fresh straw underneath. If the rag carpet needed to be washed, it was ripped apart and washed on the washboard one strip at a time. It’s hard to imagine this carpet cleaning process with the multiple vacuums and carpet cleaners available today. We hope you have enjoyed this brief overview of the lives of early pioneer women in the area. Last week the ad we featured from the 1940 Story City Herald Anniversary Number book was from the Story City Butter Tub Co. Its only fitting that this week we are featuring a butter tub as our Collection Item of the Week. This butter tub was recently donated by Charlotte Hill. The Hill family owned and operated the Story City Butter Tub Co. for 85 years. The butter tubs were made from sitka spruce wood which came from Washington state by train. These butter tubs were delivered to creameries all around central Iowa, from as far east as Marshalltown and to the north as far as Mason City. One tub held 64 pounds of butter. People who made butter tubs and similar vessels are called coopers. A cooper is someone who makes wooden, staved vessels, bound together with hoops and possessing flat ends or heads. In the photos below you can better see the individual staves that make up this tub. Our Mayor, Mike Jensen, recently shared a story from his childhood with us at our Winter Dinner. He would use the lid from a butter tub as a shield when he was pretend fighting with other neighborhood children. Butter tubs have a variety of uses! |
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