| Summary: | Mr. and Mrs. Ed Braseth. Asa Sargeant, having been the company's storekeeper for four years, bought out that establishment in partnership with A.H. Morgan, the Frog Point storekeeper. Morgan was the first chairman of the Traill County Commission and also Caledonia's first postmaster. Other early settlers in the town were A. A. Corliss, harness- shop; Michael Madigan, carriage and wagon business; B.C. Taylor, veterinarian; Patrick Kelly, livery stable; Fred Puhler, publisher of the Traill County Times; and Doctor W.P. Cleveland. F.W. Ames opened a law office and Irce C. Miller opened a meat market. Storekeepers included Lewis Olson, H.M. Little, J.P. Clark, A.W. Frendberg, and Charles Paulson. The name "Goose River" was changed to Caledonia in 1875, probably at the suggestion of Asa Sargeant, a native of Caledonia County in Vermont. This was the same year that Caledonia was named the county seat. One reason Caledonia lost the county seat was because the railroad went through Hillsboro instead of Caledonia. Stories are told that James J. Hill, the president of the St. Paul, Minneapolis and Manitoba (later the Great Northern) Railroad, tried to get a room at the "American House" in Caledonia. It was a cold and stormy night and he was driving a team of dogs. The clerk at the hotel said they had no room for him and his "dirty dogs." James Hill had to seek shelter at the home of a widow named Johnson. He vowed then and there that as long as he lived his railroad should never be built to Caledonia. The line to Grand Forks was soon built via Hillsboro. Thereafter, most of the Caledonia businessmen moved either to Hillsboro or to Shelly, the nearest communities on Hill's railroads, and most of the town's buildings eventually were removed or demolished. The county commissioners proceedings of 1878, show that a vote was taken on the removal of the county seat to Mayville. The vote stood 287 "no" and 238 "yes." At this time Traill County was larger and had seven precincts with Mayville in the middle. Later two tiers of townships were cut off the western edge to help form Steele, and Mayville withdrew from the race. Now the competition was clearly between Caledonia and Hillsboro. Caledonia formed a group of citizens called "Tigers of the Jungle." In 1890 there was an election in which Hillsboro won the vote. Tradition has it that the "Tigers of the Jungle" carried arms thereafter and posted guards around the village in an effort to prevent the removal of county records. Having consulted with several law firms the "Tigers" found a legal loophole and went to court, attacking a recently enacted statute dealing with county seat removals as "special legislation" and unconstitutional. Taylor Crum, a well known lawyer, was a member of the "Tigers" staff. Judge William B. McConnell ruled in favor of the "Tigers" but the newly elected county officials, who were the defendants, took the case to the Supreme Court and obtained a reversal. By the next year Caledonia surrendered most, but not all, of the records to Hillsboro. The "Tigers'' threw a guard around the courthouse and jail to forestall removal of the furniture and equipment. Finally most of it found its way to Hillsboro and the furor eventually died down. In 1876 Asa Sargeant and CM. Clark rented the Caledonia flour mill and later purchased the plant. The mill was sold some years later but was re-purchased by Mr. Sargeant and Edward Braseth. Braseth's brother, Ole, ran the mill at Climax and they would trade back and forth. After the county seat was moved to Hillsboro the school was moved from the Mcdonald house to the courthouse. This building was burned in 1909 and a new school was erected the next year. * * * * Alexander Henry visited present Traill County as representative of Northwestern Fur Company to take possession of trade in the region, making him the first white man to set foot in this area. This was in 1789- Burbank Stage Company makes first trip through Red River Valley over old Half-breed Trail in 1859. In May 1859, the first steamboat, the Anson Northrup, appears on the Red River enroute to Pembina. * * * * On October 2, 1863, the first act barring liquor in Traill County is established when the Chippewa tribes of Northern Dakota sign a treaty with the United States Government. George E. Weston, first white settler in Traill County, homesteads at the junction of the Red River and the Goose River in 1870. Walter J.S. Traill, for whom the county was later named, builds the first permanent establishment in Traill County, a trading post of the Hudson Bay Company, at Caledonia in 1870. The first home in Traill County was a sod house, built by three men at Caledonia, in 1870. The first election in the region was held at the American House in Caledonia in 1872. The county was first created by an act of the Territorial Assembly, January 12, 1875. 71 Scanned with a Zeutschel Zeta book scanner at 300 dpi. Edited with Multi-Page TIFF Editor.
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