We left off last week in this fabulous story authored by “Flip” (Brian Huggenvik), where Daniel Dayton’s son, Aaron is writing a letter from the steamboat named Magenta to his brother Zara, who is contemplating fighting in the Civil War. The last lines of Aaron’s letter to Zara last week were: “If you don’t volunteer you will likely be drafted…” and thus we continue!
Aaron continues: “Whether you go or are sent, there can be but the one result: that is, the almost entire abandonment of all our property. For in times like these when labor is scarce and taxes high, it is absolutely ruinous to go away. I would not feel very anxious about it were it not for father (Daniel Dayton). I can not bear the thought of his being left along in his old age.”
Zara did volunteer with the 2nd Infantry Regiment as a Private towards the end of the war. Both men survived and came home from the war and got back to the business at hand in the Dayton Valley.
Relieved of the treachery of the Civil War, the Dayton Boys got domesticated. It was just 1865 and Zara married Carrie Brow in February and Aaron married Ann Stork in November. Ann died just six months later. Aaron earned a teaching certificate and taught in the Fillmore County School District.
The Dayton family operated the stagecoach stop (Ravine House) until the railroad became the preferred method of transportation. Daniel was still the postmaster and remained on that job for 25 years until the post office was moved to Harmony when the railroad arrived in 1879. He continued to run the store in the Ravine House for the Big Spring area. Daniel also served in the new Minnesota State Legislature, was a clerk on the Harmony Township Board, and was Justice of the Peace.
Photo courtesy of The Fillmore County History Center
The Daytons needed to start a new venture. The new Minnesota Homesteaded Farm Land was cheap and abundant. William Bingham had previously homesteaded the surrounding land and was interested in selling. Zara and Aaron struck a deal to buy 560 acres. They began by clearing trees and grubbing stumps. The year was 1868.
In 1871 Aaron Dayton was elected into the Minnesota State Legislature.
Aaron must have appreciated that fine line of Stork women and in 1873 married his first wife, Ann’s younger sister – Rosalie, (who was a certified teacher). They needed their own place, so he split off 180 acres of the farm and built a house and barn near the creek in the bottom of the valley. Aaron and Rosalie raised two kids on that farm – John and Emily. Zara farmed the remaining 380 acres.
Zara and Carrie had a son, Daniel Jr. in 1865. They lived in the Ravine House with father, Daniel Sr. They expanded the family with another son, Edgar, in 1867, but he died the same year. In 1870 a daughter, De Orra Clair, was born. Their last child, Adah Meribah, was born in 1875, but tragically died two years later. Daniel was a handsome boy and the girls were beautiful. (As today’s photograph exemplifies – beautiful children)!
The census of 1880 recorded 10-year-old De Orra living in the Ravine House with her parents and brother Daniel Jr. and a 21-year-old farm hand, Clayton Sweet Boice, who would later marry De Orra! Daniel Sr. had moved in with Aaron and Rosalie down the valley near the creek.
Zara and Aaron’s oldest sister, Jerusha, who had married William Allen, moved to Carimona to farm. Jerusha died in 1880 at the age of 50. She was now the sixth Dayton to be buried in the Big Spring Cemetery. The others were Meribah, Maria, Ann, Edgar, and Adah.
The 1890s found both Dayton boys, Zara and Aaron, hard-working farmers. They raised beef, cows, pigs, chickens, and even had some sheep. The crops were wheat, oats, barley, flax, and corn. And of course, lots of hay – 60 tons a summer! The hired men would be paid $1.00 a day. The women would prepare a huge feast for the worker men on the day the threshing machine came to their farm.
To be continued next week, so please, stay tuned!
All photographs related to this story by Flip Huggenvik are courtesy of The Fillmore County History Center in Fountain, Minn.