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tileage systems and in many of the districts large tile have been used instead of the open ditches. At the present time we have open ditches aggregating approximately forty-three miles and tile drains approximately one hundred and five miles. There is included in drainage districts in the county approximately seventy thousand acres and the total costs of these improvements has been $433,512, to which may be added the engineer's estimate on two other improvements under headway of $38,000. It should be understood that the systems as put in by the county are simply outlet systems. Of course, these systems have tapped the wet areas and in themselves have relieved much of the lands of their surface water, but these lands have required a vast amount of additional tiling in order to receive the benefits afforded by the outlets. This tile has been put in by the individual owners and it would be a conservative estimate to say that the expenditures made by the individual owners have exceeded the cost paid out for the outlets. Again many land holders who were not in drainage districts have been stimulated by the increased price of land and the results they have seen from drainage in these drainage districts to drain portions of their land into natural outlets that already existed and I believe it is fair to say that the sum spent for tiling in this county since the establishment of the first drainage district eight years ago is easily $1,000,000 in addition to the original cost of the outlets provided under the drainage system. This would make a total expenditure of approximately $1,500,000 for drainage purposes in this county in the last eight years. These various drainage projects have resulted in much litigation and much dissatisfaction at the time of the establishment of the different improvements, but I know of no instance where a system has been completed and a land holder has availed himself of the outlet furnished that he is not satisfied with the result and would under no condition allow the improvement to be removed and his land placed in its former condition. The litigation has practically all resulted from the selfishness that seems to exist in most people. The law provides that each piece of land shall pay its proportionate share of the cost of the improvement according to the benefits derived. This assessment is made by disinterested parties. Yet it is almost impossible to find a man whose land has been assessed who does not feel that he has paid more than his proportionate share. This, I assume, results from unconscious selfishness, inherent in mankind, yet being as charitable as possible, I am constrained to believe that many have objected to their assessments, knowing that they were fair, hoping to shift the

burden onto other shoulders, thereby receiving something in addition to what they themselves paid for. The practical man would ask the question, "Has this investment paid?" Those who are familiar with the conditions of this county previous to the installment of these drainage systems may readily satisfy themselves as to whether it has paid or not by driving through the western portion of the county. Farms that fifteen years ago were so wet as to be unprofitable to the owner or the tenants have become the most productive farms in the county and the general appearance is one of extreme prosperity and values of lands have doubled. This increased price of land, of course, is not wholly due to drainage as other conditions have intervened, but without the drainage little advancement in prices would have been had on these wet farms. The writer recalls the experience of one man who owned a wet farm and was struggling from year to year to pay off his debt on the same and support his family. He petitioned with others for the first drainage district in this county and on account of the peculiar location of the district, most of the cost of the improvement was assessed against the lands in the upper end of the district including his land. Many of the residents were fighting the assessment and this man came to Hampton to consult an attorney and in the private office of the attorney he broke down and wept saying that he had petitioned for this district and he did not like to fight the assessment, but he had no idea that it was going to be so heavy and that with the debt already on his farm, he was satisfied that he would lose his farm. He finally concluded, however, that as he had started the machinery in motion to establish this district that he would not complain of his assessment, but would renew his effort to carry the additional load. He took advantage of the outlet furnished him by tiling his land into it, broke up pieces on which he had never received a crop, made other pieces upon which he had expended labor and seed many times without results, safe and profitable farm land. The result was that he began to make money, paid off his ditch assessment, paid off his other debts and in the summer of 1911 built one of the finest farm homes in this county. His experience is indicative of the results that have been obtained by others who have taken advantage of the outlets furnished and brought their lands to a state of efficiency that was impossible before the outlets were made.

In addition to the benefits derived by the individual land holders, the public has received a great benefit in the drainage that has been afforded the public highways. The highways in many instances

crossed low marshy tracts of land that had no outlets and the county or the township was helpless to obtain drainage for the same until these drainage systems were established, but since that time many of these places, which were impassable during wet periods, have been drained into the outlets furnished and some of the best roads in the county may be found in these very places. The public has again received a large benefit from the fact that the valuation of these lands has been so increased that they are now bearing their proper proportion of the burden of taxation.

The drainage of Franklin county is not completed, but most of the larger systems are now in. From this time on the drainage will be practically individual drainage and small tile districts. However, in leaving the subject, I wish to predict that at some future time a joint district will be established by Franklin and Butler counties and the course of the West Fork will be straightened by cutting off its numerous bends and curves reducing its length by approximately one-half and relieving a vast area along its boundary of overflow, which makes the land at the present time unfit for cultivation purposes.

CHAPTER XVIII

WHY DID YOU COME HERE?—THE QUESTION ASKED BY EDITOR RAYMOND ANSWERED BY THE QUERIST-INFLUENCE OF FRIENDS A COGENT AGENCY

Editor Raymond, one day in the year 1907, took up his pencil and while ruminating upon the blessings kind Nature had bestowed upon the people of this community, wrote the caption of an article which read: "Why Did You Come Here?" and then proceeded to answer the question for many a Franklin county settler. Below is given the result, as portrayed by him:

Did you ever stop to reflect upon what directed your steps to Franklin county? We are not addressing those who came here in childhood or youth with their parents, but those of more mature age who came here and made homes. Were you to give it a little thought you will find, the chances are, that you came here because some one you knew was already here—possibly a relative. You did not, back in Wisconsin, Illinois or Ohio, take a map and putting your finger on Franklin county, resolve that you would go there and locate; the chances are that you wrote first to some one already living here with whom you had an acquaintance, and the one addressed assured you that it was a fine country—the finest in the land. So you came to look and you liked it too; you bought a home and in turn were, in due time, the means of bringing another settler from east of the Mississippi. So there is scarcely a man in the county who has been here any length of time who cannot point to some one who came here on his account, either through previous acquaintance or through correspondence. It would make an interesting book if every one would tell just how they were induced to come to Franklin county; through whose influence they came here, or if one may so express it, who they followed here.

To undertake to trace out the thread of these pioneer influences would be an endless and probably impossible task, but we can give what we think are a few of them. We may make errors in trying so

to do, but if so our columns are always open for corrections, and we trust to receive them if we make misstatements.

Probably the greatest number of people who have located in Franklin county during the past fifty years who emigrated from any one locality, have come from Jo Daviess county, Illinois, and Grant and Lafayette counties, Wisconsin. In Reeve and Geneva townships this would include the Clock families, Bobsts, Waddingtons, Tuckers (now gone), Hickses, Runyans, Lukes and others too numerous to mention. In and about Hampton there are the Mallorys, Adamses (two distinct families), Prostors, Webbs, Stonebrakers, Doctor Hutchins, Ed Funk, the Rules, more Lukes, Henry Osborne, George W. Pease, L. C. Chase, the Slees, Robinsons, Dr. H. K. Phelps, N. R. Bourne, the Claypools, and so many more that you would almost need a directory to publish their names. In and around Chapin and Sheffield there are many who came from the same region: The Blackstones, Mitchells, Runtons, Oateys, Atkinsons and numberless others.

As near as we can find out, E. L. Clock, now of Geneva, was the "advance man" of this multitude. He located at old Maysville in 1856 and we find no record of anyone from the vicinity named prior to that date. That he was the first of the Clock family is alone sufficient to account for a large emigration, but until we are convinced to the contrary we shall believe that Mr. Clock was the pioneer, and we are satisfied that if you ask any one of those we have named how they came to locate in Franklin county, they will either name E. L. Clock, or some one who came here directly or indirectly on his account; in all events three or four such questions will end up on him. How Mr. Clock's steps were directed to Franklin county we never heard.

There were no Danes in Franklin county up to about 1870-71. when a man of that nationality came here to Hampton. We are not certain about his name, but think it was Soren Jensen, but he was commonly called "Esquimau." He only remained here a year or two, going to Colorado. If any of his countrymen followed him here we do not know it. In 1872 Charles Krag, of Hampton, and Nels Larsen, of Alexander, came, and others of the same nationality soon followed. We do not know exactly, but we do not think that we hazard any guess when we say that nearly all the Danish people in the county could trace their locating here to one or the other of these men, although they might have to go, in some instances, a roundabout way to do it. Our early Danish settlers came from Cedar

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