By Mrs. JR MacKenzie
The quotation of Horace Greeley: "Ho! Westward the star of Empire takes its way, "directly had a great magnetism for and made a deep impression upon my father, for in my very early childhood I remember hearing him discuss with my mother the great possibilities of the west, and the advisability of moving the family to North Dakota. Acting upon this impulse he started on a prospecting tour to North Dakota in August 1882, arriving at Jamestown and making that little town his headquarters. So favorable was his impression of the state and its prospects that he decided to send for the family, consisting of my mother, brother and myself. We left our home in Canton, Ohio, then a beautiful little city of 40,000 inhabitants, where I had spent most of my life, and arrived in Jamestown on a bleak November day. We were met at the train by my father and were taken to the Dakota House, one of the pioneer hotels of Jamestown, until a suitable place of residence could be secured. Our residence in Jamestown was to be only temporary however, as my father had already driven over Foster County and had decided to locate in Carrington, which was only a blue print at this time and a town in name only, as the lots were not yet on sale. After seeing us comfortably settled in rooms for the winter and having secured the lots he desired at the opening sale, my father and brother, George started with two other carpenters north to Carrington, the town on paper for the purpose of erecting a building suitable for the mercantile business into which he intended to embark. The Northern Pacific railroad at that time was built as far north as Carrington and they had been able to secure the necessary material. They had only been gone a few days, however, long enough to erect the crudest kind of a shack in which to live, when even though a very little girl and not realizing at all the great change that had come into my life by this transplanting from the beautiful and finished state of Ohio to this seemingly barren, desolate waste and primitive country. I could see in my mother's face a line of sadness and discontent which reached the climax when it was authoratively given out by the railroad officials, that the next train would be the last until spring.
It was January. It didn't take my mother long to decide that it would be impossible for us to remain in Jamestown and my father and brother forty miles north with all communication cut off until spring. Everything was hastily packed and we boarded this last train, which consisted of one freight caboose and several freight cars loaded with supplies. There were ten or twelve passengers, all men with the exception of us, most of them coming up to put the "finishing touches" to some of their plans and expecting to make the return trip. They proved to be a most chivalrous lot of gentlemen such as Mr. C.K. Wing who was one of them, also Mr. F.H. Anson, traveling passenger agent of the Wisconsin Central R.R. His mission up here was to see that all the squatters he had paid to squat on land and hold it for him, were squatting where he told them to, he having taken, or rather laid claim, in this way to every valuable piece of land around Carrington, including the Soliday farm adjoining Carrington on the east, on a portion of which Fairview now stands. But he was a right royal good fellow anyway and we were the best of friends. That was indeed a memorable trip. Everything went lovely until we struck the cut near Pingree where we encountered a perfect mountain of a snowdrift which with the facilities at hand proved to be positively impenetrable. We therefore were forced to go back to Jamestown that night and start again the next morning with the addition of a crew of snow shovelers. As we struck this cut the second time we again came to a stop and there we remained three days and three nights while a fierce blizzard raged without and the thermometer at the lowest point seemingly. These poor men shoveled snow in their desperate efforts to penetrate this drift until their hands and faces were frozen. Then the engine would make an effort to get through and then back up against the train with a terrific bump. Fortunately there were some provisions on the train, such as they were, namely a barrel of prunes, a barrel of crackers and some fresh buffalo meat. My mother played the part of the Good Samaritan and did all she could to provide something for these poor hungry men to eat. Among the few treasures she brought from our Ohio home was a tea set of gold band china, that happened to be on the train, and was unpacked and brought into service; a temporary table was improvised, and as the men cut the buffalo meat into steak she fried it on top of the little heating stove in the corner of the caboose. This constant bumping of the engine against the grain was quite disastrous to the gold band china and when we came to our journey's end only a few pieces remained.
However, after these trying three days and nights, we finally got through the snowdrift, the storm subsided and everything was as calm and serene as a morning in June. We arrived in Carrington about nine o'clock that evening, and as we were not expected we were not met at the train, but alighted some where on the top of a snow bank, about where the section‑house now stands, and of all forlorn looking perspectives! It was a beautiful clear, moonlight night, and there was nothing in sight but banks and banks of snow and the tops of two little miserable shanties, one of which belonged to Messrs. Warring and Harriman, two young real estate men, and the other was our future home, which stood where the Guslander hotel now is. As there were no nameplates on the door we entered the one belonging to the real estate firm first, and found these two young men who had come from homes of plenty in the east, trying to prepare their evening meal which consisted principally of one big biscuit. I guess you would call it a "hoe cake" which they had been trying to bake for the past two hours on the top of the stove. The look of astonishment, yes, well I call it joy, that came into their faces, as they saw us enter and caught sight of a woman and a little girl is never to be forgotten. They proceeded to escort us over to our new home, where we found my father and brother living in just the same way. These same young men made their home with us the rest of the winter, and we found them such perfect gentlemen and so helpful in every way. Of course we had plenty of provisions, but potatoes for instance were frozen as hard as brickbats and we kept them out of doors in a snow bank all winter. All the water we had was melted snow. As there was a stage line established after the trains were abandoned, people, that is, men, kept coming to see this wonderful town all winter, and as there was no other place for them to go "after being deposited on a snow bank", they came to our house. Everything was free for a time until my father saw only bankruptcy ahead. It was very expensive having provisions brought from Jamestown by way of a stage.
He made one trip to Jamestown for provisions and before the week was gone they were also gone. I do not think the "inter state commerce law" regulated the prices on freight at that time, as my father had the stage man bring him a door from Jamestown, which he was very much in need of and for which he taxed him ten dollars freight for bringing. Such were the conditions of the first year in Carrington, that is the winter of 1882‑83. However, we were blessed with health and able to endure.
"In the spring of 1883 settlers began to arrive in great numbers; trains were loaded to full capacity and all manners of vehicles, usually called "prairie schooners" propelled by any kind of four footed beast, from the Texas Steer to the bucking bronco, could be seen on the plains to the south laboriously winding their way into the open lands in Foster County. Those coining in their own conveyances usually brought their entire possessions, together with their families, making wagons their domicile until such time as they could locate a homestead and erect some kind of a building, usually a shack, to house their families and effects." (H A. Soliday)
Some of the very first pioneers in the area rode the train as far as Jamestown, then took horses and wagons north to Foster County. They used various methods to find the land they wanted, as the county had not been surveyed.
Peter Zink tied a rope around the wheel of his wagon. With each revolution of the wheel a mark was made and the revolutions were counted. They had figured so many revolutions to the mile. When John Bort and the Holcomb brothers arrived they came as far as the Zink shack then used a tape measure to where they had decided to settle. They had previously gone through the area and tested the soil by taking scoopfuls of land. When the survey was completed they found that they were east of the town but otherwise were close to being correct.
Many of the settlers came by train. What was it like to ride on these overcrowded cars?
Source: A History of Foster County 1983 Page 35