Game was very plentiful and as we never had enough back home, we did not soon tire of it. My husband once killed a goose and eleven young ones with one shot.
The first year our garden was looking fine when the grasshoppers came in such swarms that they obscured the sun. They swooped on everything in the garden. There was no grain as the squirrels, black birds and gophers had never tasted this delicacy before and followed the sower, taking it as fast as it fell. We planted it three times and we had absolutely no crop of any kind that first year.
We bought four horses later and had them for the summer's work. They came from Illinois and were not used to the excessive cold of Minnesota. That winter it was forty degrees below zero for many successive days. It seems to me we have not had as much cold all this winter as we had in a week then. Christmas time it was very cold. We wanted our mail so one of the men rode one of the horses twelve miles to get it. When he arrived there the horse was very sick. He was dosed up and was seemingly all right. When the man wanted to start for home, he was warned that it would be fatal to take a horse which had been dosed with all kinds of hot stuff out in the terrible cold. He took the risk but the horse fell dead just as he entered the yard. We lost two others in much the same way that winter.
We then bought a yoke of young steers. They were very little broken and the strongest animals I ever saw. Their names were Bright and Bill. Once the whole family was going to a party at New Auburn, a kind of a city. My husband had made an Indian wagon. He held them in the road while we all got in. They started up with such a flourish that everything that could not hold itself on, fell off. The road was full of things we wanted with us. They ran on a keen jump for nine miles until we came to the house where we were going. It was the first house we came to. When they saw the barn, they must have thought it looked like home for they ran in there and brought up against the barn with a bang. As soon as Mr. White could, he jumped out and held them, but their fun was all gone and they stood like lambs.
I never saw anything funnier than those steers and a huge snapping turtle. They found him near the creek when they were feeding. They would come right up to him (they always did everything in concert) then look at him at close range. The turtle would thrust out his head and snap at them; then they would snort wildly and plunge all over the prairie, returning again and again to repeat the performance, which only ended when the turtle disappeared in the brook.
Wolves were very fearless and fierce that winter. They ran in packs. They would look in at our windows. Once we sent a hired boy six miles for twenty-five pounds of pork for working men. When he was near home a pack of wolves followed him, but he escaped by throwing the pork. Mr. Pollock and Mr. White were followed in the same way.
Once one of our friends killed a steer. We were all anxious for amusement so any pretext would bring on a party. All the neighbors had a piece of the meat but we thought the friends who had killed the steer should have a party and have roast beef for us all, so we sent word we were all coming. Mrs. Noble, my neighbor worked all day to make a hoop skirt. She shirred and sewed together a piece of cloth about three yards around. In these shirrings she run rattan—a good heavy piece so it would stand out well. I made a black silk basque and skirt. My finery was all ready to put on. One of the neighbor's girls was to stay with the children. The baby had been quite restless, so according to the custom, I gave her a little laudanum to make her sleep. I did not realize that it was old and so much stronger. Just before going, when I was all dressed, I went to look at the baby. I did not like her looks, so took her up to find her in a stupor. Needless to say there was no party for us that night. It took us all to awaken her and keep her awake. I never gave laudanum after that, though I always had before.
Mrs. Paulina Starkloff—1854.
My name was Paulina Lenschke. I was twelve years old when I came to Minneapolis in 1854. We intended to stay in St. Paul but were told that this was a better place, so came here and bought an acre and a half just where the house now stands, Main Street N. E. The town then was mostly northeast. The St. Charles hotel on Marshall Street, northeast, was just below us and so were most of the stores. Morgan's foundry and Orth's brewery were just on the other side of us. We paid $600.00 in gold for the land and half of it was in my name, as my mother paid $350.00 that I had made myself. I think I was probably the only twelve year old child that came into the state with so much money earned by herself. It was this way.
We went to Australia to dig gold in 1847. We drove an ox team into the interior with other prospectors doing the same until we came to diggings. The men would dig and then "cradle" the soil for the gold. This cradle was just like a baby's cradle only it had a sieve in the bottom. One man would have a very long handled dipper with which he would dip water from a dug well. He only dipped and the other man stirred with a stick and rocked. Most of the soil would wash out but there would always be some "dumplings" caused by the clay hardening and nothing but hard work would break them. The miners would take out the gold which was always round, and dump these hard pieces. After a day's work there would be quite a pile that was never touched by them. I would take a can and knife and go from dump to dump gathering the gold in these dumplings. One day my father went prospecting with a party of men and was never seen again. After months of fruitless search my mother took me and my little tin can of nuggets back to Germany. She sold them for me for $350.00 in gold. Then we came to Minnesota and bought this place.