The Sesquicentennial Commemoration of the Arrival of Bazel and Martha Harrison

The Sesquicentennial Commemoration of the Arrival of Bazel and Martha Harrison, the first permanent settlers in Kalamazoo County, Michigan

November 5, 1828------------November 5, 1978

"GREETINGS, Alexis, A. Praus, Master of Ceremonies

Hello!  It’s my personal pleasure to welcome you to the 150th anniversary of the arrival of the first permanent settlers on Prairie Ronde and of course in Kalamazoo County.  I’m personally very happy to see so many and I’m sure there are quite a few, if not three-fourths or more in attendance of the Harrison’s.  It’s a pleasure as I said to see you here because it the patience of growing consciousness that our country is having in its origins, its roots and has become very common and in the common heritage that we all share.

Now to open the program I’m going to call on Richard Hudson to give a short invocation.  Now Richard has been of one of the first pioneer settlers in this area and I've also ask him to give his own background of his personal history and its relationship to the Schoolcraft and Kalamazoo County area, Richard Hudson.

OPENING PRAYER by Richard Hudson

 Let us pray. Our heavenly father you come to me with personal hearts and bring forth this day and for the closeness for which our fore-bearers struggled through the wilderness to build their homes in this pioneer prairie country.  We thank thee also for the forms of local government our fore-fathers brought with them to this area in appreciation of the values of churches and schools.  Along with their appreciation of these values we also applaud with them the recognition of the need for continued support of churches and continuing support of education in general and higher education in particular.  We ask humbly of our precious father to please continue to have his guidance and help in meeting adequately our responsibilities.

I personally find this a moving occasion.  My great-great-grandfather came to this prairie in 1829, right behind Mr. Harrison.  He was the first county clerk of this county being named by the territorial governor in 1830.  My roots are in this community.  I’m happy to be here today.  We grew up in Schoolcraft and moved away in 1911 and have very fond recollections of this community and what it stood for though these many years.  It has been a pleasure to be here.

 Alexis Praus: Thank you Richard.  At this point I’m going to call on some people to introduce them.  They are in the order I have seen them so that’s purely accidental, and in any case there are going to be a lot of people I’m going to miss and I’ sorry and it’s not done on purpose of course.

Now the first person I’d like to introduce to you is Graydon Meints, who is President of the Kalamazoo County Historical Society.  Where are you, Graydon?  There he is!  He’s really been the “thought” right behind the whole thing and has really chaired it through.  He doesn’t like to admit it that portion.  I wonder if Harlow Kott is here?  You all know Harlow I’m sure.  There’s Harlow right over there.  There’s Jack and Robert Welborn.  Right over there is Robert and there’s Jack.  Now of course these are high political times and the fact that both of these gentleman are here is indicative of their interest in history and both are very supportive in these types of programs particularly, in restoration and related fields.

 Now Richard Stone, I believe is the President or acting.  They call it Mayor in Schoolcraft.  Is he here?  Perhaps not!  And Mr. Taylor?  Jack Hunt?  Jack Hunt is presently serving the county commission.

 Now we’re going to hear two traditional hymns from the Schoolcraft Methodist Church choir.  This part was under the direction of Cassie Krueger and who is unable to be here today.  They are going to sing two hymns, “There Is a Balm In Gilead and How Happy every Child of Grace”.  These hymns go back to the 1800’s.  Now there’s reason to be the Methodist Church __________.  So now we’re going to hear these hymns by the Schoolcraft Methodist Church.
 (Members of Schoolcraft Methodist Church Choir who participated)

 Jackie Chapin, accompanist on Auto-harp
 Pam Cowgill  Ruth Dean  Henry Linn
 Diana Dean  Rev. John Fisher Lucille Stewart
 James Dean  Mary Horn  Errol Houts Jr.
 Newell Dean  Edith Linn  Gwen Houts

Alexis Praus: Thank you!  It’s a continued pleasure.  Well I wonder what sort of a day it was 150 years ago when are ancestors opened the door to more than making _____ Mary Jane Swartz.  She told me that it was a blustery day and so it is somewhat blustery again just 150 years later.  In any case when the Harrison’s came on this day 150 years ago, they started Kalamazoo County on its road to be become what it is today.  A prosperous and thriving community based on the principles of work, honesty and integrity.  To tell us something about the geography of the area and why the Harrison’s picked this particular spot to settle we have Dr. Charles F. Heller of Western Michigan University to tell us something about the geological history of this area.  Dr. Heller.

THE PRAIRIE by Dr. Charles Heller

 Well, I guess we really don’t know for sure what kind of weather it was 150 years ago but if it was better than today they had a real royal welcome to Prairie Ronde.

The event that we commemorate here today was very important in it’s own right.  It was the story of a man well along in life, having gathered members of his family, close friends, striking out into the wilderness, in search of a new home.
But also the coming of Bazel and Martha Harrison to Prairie Ronde may be viewed as symbolic of the people of the United States in the early decades of the nineteenth century and their interaction with the land.  I would like to reflect briefly with you today on this symbolic team…first by taking a look at the roots of the people who brought the frontier to this area in the late 1820’s and early 1830’s.  Secondly, by taking a glimpse at the early years of the settlers on the prairie.

 Most of the early settlers on the prairie were born in New York and New England or Pennsylvania.  A minority were born elsewhere.  Some like Bazel Harrison, in the middle Atlantic states, some further south, some in Ohio or Kentucky and a few overseas.  Many like Bazel Harrison had lived in states other than their birth state, especially in Pennsylvania and Ohio before coming to Michigan.

A basic movement was almost always to the west.  Pioneers came west for many reasons.  For some a home, farm and its locality was one of poor soils or steep sloops and after being farmed a while, that land would provide only a marginal living.  For others the home area was fully occupied.  The land worth farming was all taken and expensive to buy.  The vacant land hardly worth farming.  For others, like Bazel Harrison, who worked his way west to Ohio, there was a combination of displeasure with existing conditions and a confidence that good land lay waiting out west.

The pioneers came with a well-defined value structure centered around the principle of self-reliance and self-subsistence.  The highest value for pioneer farmers was to produce on the farm everything needed for a good life.
 This meant abundant, food, clothing, shelter.  It meant that most of the labor, materials and even many implements needed to farm in a general crop and livestock fashion were on the farm or assembled there.  And it meant too, hopefully, surpluses for sale or barter.  First to new settlers then to developing local and regional markets.

The surpluses were from a beginning of a part of the Middle West frontier farmer’s outlook.  They were never satisfied with merely producing enough for themselves.

 We know too that some pioneers had other objectives.  Sometimes viewing a place like Prairie Ronde as an opportunity to make profit through rising land values or sometimes as a place to be and to work for a few years before moving further west.  But Bazel and Martha Harrison symbolized the many, both young and old alike who came to Prairie Ronde with the full intention of making this place home.

Their “remains and their memories” are here with us today.  Despite accounts to the contrary, almost all settlers heading into Indiana and Michigan sought the prairies.  Especially the prairie edges, per se.

The advantages of prairie land for farming were well known ever since the frontier reached the rich prairie areas in central New York and in northern Kentucky in the 1790’s.  Of course vast prairies where man’s farm would be six to eight miles from wood and or stream were not desired.  Those were poorly drained prairie areas.  The small prairies, such as those in Ohio, eastern Indiana and Michigan were lands prized by the pioneers, including Bazel Harrison.

On Prairie Ronde the earliest settlers, following Harrison’s’ example, occupied the edges of the grass land.  The advantage of such a location for a pioneer family were many.  On the grass land the soil is rich in nutrients and could support many years of continuous cropping.  The land could be quickly cultivated and the sod not as tough as that further west could be turned by a team of oxen.  The toil of clearing forest land was avoided and the grazing of cattle and sheep was made easy.  On the other hand the forest provided essential timber for houses, barns, fences, and firewood and dozens of other needs.  The forest provided game for the table and masks for the hogs, particularly important in the earliest years.  The open parts of Prairie Ronde were taken up a little later than the fringes mostly in 1835 or 1836.  Either then or shortly after, the open prairie farmer purchased a 20 or 40-acre wood lot usually located two to four miles from the main farm.  This general location almost always to the west.  And one can visualize the late fall or winter trips, cutting and hauling wood.

The first detailed information on farming in Kalamazoo County comes from the 1837 Michigan state-hood census.  The manuscript census survived for prairie Ronde township and reveals that almost all of the operating farms there were located on or at the edge of the prairie.  They were large and well-developed _____ time only eight and a half years after Bazel Harrison arrival.

This indicates to us that the pioneers were people of some substance.  That they were experienced and hard working farmers and that the prairie was bountiful.

In 1837 in Prairie Ronde there were 67 farms averaging about 130 acres in size.  On the average each farm produced about 200 bushels of corn and about the same quantity of wheat.  Even more oats were produced suggesting an active shipment out of the locality via to the St. Joseph River to the south.

The average farmer had 3 horses, 3 cows and 12 hogs.  Bazel Harrison in 1837 was farming 165 acres.  He claimed $450.00 worth of buildings, 6 horses, 3 cows and 11 young cattle.  Most of his land was in section 2.  Part of it up in the northwestern corner of section 2…. remainder of it in section 4 down the road to the west.  His neighbors at that time included John Smock who farmed 160 acres immediately to Harrison’s east.  To our north here, his son Elias Harrison, with 80 acres to Bazel Harrison’s north, James Fellows who farmed 60 acres further to the north.  Preston McCreary with 40 acres and George Fletcher with 70 acres located to the south and to the west of Bazel Harrison’s home plot.

So we can see than that by no means was this locality around this particular intersection, this locality around this particular intersection, this locality of farmers made up of the biggest landowners or biggest producers in the township in 1837.

As far as we know this section on which we stand, section 12 and some of the surrounding prairie was not yet under cultivation in 1837.  Perhaps because of absentee-owners were holding on looking for a profit on land sales or perhaps for reasons we are simply not aware of.

By the time of the first detailed U.S. census in 1850 Martha and Bazel Harrison were in their middle 70’s.  They were no longer reported as farming.  They still lived together in their home and later moved in with their son John Harrison.
The prairie in 1850 is fully occupied and is one of the two premier farming areas in the county and indeed ranks with any comparable area in the state of Michigan.

 Frontiers passing as the railroads arrived, commercial farming makes its inevitable appearance.  The change begins towards today's conditions.  Bazel Harrison, however will live on and in his later years his presence was realized by all until his death in 1874 was a link to the frontier in this part of the middle west and a link to the days when pioneer and prairie came together in this particular place.  Thank you.

Alexis Praus: Thank you Dr. Heller.  That was a very informative and of course very, very interesting.  Now the media would like to have all the Harrison’s assemble here in front of the podium so they can take their pictures.  So please if you are a descendant of the Harrison’s please be sure to assemble in front of the podium.

 Now we are going to hear about the Harrison family from Leila Brown Carney.
Leila of course is President of the Schoolcraft Historical Society.  She has lived in this area for quite sometime and of course the Carney home right behind the Harrison’s and turns of time.  In any case she is very active in all sorts of community affairs.  She is Vice President of the Ladies library and I don’t think they call it that in Schoolcraft.  It amounts to that she has been very active in the garden club, and too many organizations and associations for me to mention.  In any case, Mrs. Leila Carney.

THE FIRST SETTLER, Mrs. Leila Carney, Schoolcraft Historical Society

 It’s Leila.  If that made any difference.  Bazel Harrison, there’s a question about his name, came up sturdy stock.  His grandparents came from the British Isles in the early 1700’s.  One was welsh and one was Scotch.  William and Benjamin Harrison were 2 of 23 children.  They married a mother-daughter combination so that Williams’ mother-in-law was also his sister-in-law.  Benjamin went on we know as a signer of the Declaration of Independence and later the Governor of Virginia.

 William was no less patriotic.  He fought with Washington in his youth and he had six sons or more but he sent six sons off to fight with Washington in the Revolution at one time.

Bazel was too young to go at that time but he remembers seeing the six sons march off to war and the father admonishing them to be sure and follow Washington.

Bazel’s father was and industrious, honest and willing farmer but he was one of those men that happened in so many big families that never got very far financially in life.  He never owned his own farm.  Bazel was the fourth from the youngest of 16 children.  He was a steady hard working youth but he had only 3 months of formal education, going to what they called the common school.  But he learned to read and write and he always took a great interest in reading.  He fell in love at the age of 19.  He eloped but its an interesting story.  Being a proper young man he went to the parents of his beloved and ask permission to marry the girl.  The father liked the young man Bazel, but the mother objected.  She had better and higher ideas for her daughter.  She wanted her to marry someone that owned property instead of just being a farmer.  So she would not give her consent, but the young lovers went on making plans to get married and the father consented and helped them.

The girl made all of her trousseau by candlelight after her mother had gone to bed.  They almost got there and the girl didn't have any shoes to wear.

 In those days, and this was 1790, girls had to wear some kind of shoes when they got married.  So the day before the marriage was to be, the father came into the room where the mother and daughter were spinning.  He started to kid his daughter about her big feet and he made her blush and he made her mad and one thing and another, and finally he took a shingle and drew a pattern around her foot and threw it out the window so he left the room immediately and went and got the shingle and took it to the cobbler and the cobbler stayed up half the night to make Martha a pair of pumps.  The next day with the father’s consent and with him standing as their witness, they went and were married before the Justice-of-the Peace.

The mother, of course, was angry but she got over that in the meantime.  Bazel was patriotic too.  He voted in all elections.  First for Washington in 1792 and then every election up until 1828 when he was on his way to Michigan and then he missed the last election of his life because he was too ill to get to the village of Schoolcraft.  He was a Democrat up until Lincoln's time, then he turned Republican.  I can mention this because he turned and isn't partisan.
 It’s been told that before he lived in Pennsylvania, and went to Kentucky and then to Ohio.  One of the interesting things that tells something about his fortitude was traveling through Michigan after they decided to leave Ohio, he made up a party of his neighbors.  There were 21 in the party.  Nine adults and twelve children.  They had a great Pennsylvania Wagon. A Pennsylvania wagon was painted blue to be known as a Pennsylvania wagon.  It was very sturdy, quite crude and very very strong. It was pulled by two teams of oxen.  Then there were four Ohio wagons.  Each pulled by one team.  The fourth Ohio wagon was pulled by a team of oxen.  Then they brought three cows and fifty pigs and fifty sheep.  How would you like to cross the St. Joseph River down here and herd fifty pigs and fifty sheep across that?

They had a lot of kids of course.  There were twelve youngsters in the party and they had a lot of dogs to help them, which I imagine they were glad about.

They were greeted up here by Sagamaw and twelve Indians.  Can you imagine twelve Indians all done out in their regalia with paint and everything, appearing at their camp-site.  It’s enough to scare me just to think about it even.

The Indians guided them over here to Harrison Lake because they needed to be by water.  They built a small cabin…18’x 20’.  Seventeen people lived in this little cabin for the whole winter.  Talk about having any privacy.  How would you like that?

During the winter, Bazel went to White Pigeon for supplies two different times.  He took a team of horses and a wagon, went down south and he'd come to the river, this was wintertime remember.  He would swim ahead of his horses and get them through the river.  Then he would build a fire, take off all of his clothes.  Dry his clothes and in the meantime, in 20 degrees or 30 degrees, whatever it was it must have been cold, he'd run around the campfire and exercise to keep warm.  The next spring he and his boys planted 10 acres of corn and ___ acres of buckwheat.  From then on he became a very successful farmer and was known as Judge Harrison.  His native intelligence and good common sense meeting all the requirements of his office.

He _________ justice to the satisfaction of those who appeared before him and he enjoyed much esteem and confidence because of his frank open heartedness and his generous manner.  He was just a natural peacemaker.  He was always hospitable and welcomed all comers.  The Indians admired his tall athletic form and good nature and unsweltering_____ coffee...not much milk, but he liked milk.  He smoked in his youth but gave that up in later life and no liquor.  He had worked in distilleries off and on all his life but he didn’t drink.  He had unusual powers of endurance and he worked his share of the farm work up until he was 85 years old.  He was a strong religious man.  He was a Methodist as you know.

He had daily prayers in his house and his family discipline was strict and rigid.  So kindness rather than severity was his fort.  He was the “Bee-keeper” of James Fenimore Cooper’s “Oak Openings”.

After the book was published, Cooper came to call on him at one time and the Judge chided Cooper.  “Don’t you know a bee never lights on a clover blossom when there is anything sweeter around?”  And there wasn’t any clover here until after the white man came.  Cooper admitted he made a little bit of a mistake.   Bazel loved bees and he is known to have left his work in the fields to follow bees on his farm for the honeycomb life.  And he had a bee room built right into his house.

On his hundredth birthday, a visitor asked him …”Good for another hundred years, Judge?” and he replied: “Well I’m stronger at the beginning of my second century than I was at my first.  Maybe I’ll stick around for another hundred.  I wear out slowly.”  And to another visitor he said, “I’ve out-lived all my aches and pains and I’m waiting for rest now.”
 At the last big meting he attended and it was a pioneer gathering of pioneers in the village of Schoolcraft, he shook hands with many of his old friends and acquaintances and he said, “I’m a 102 years old and thank God I’ve not an enemy in the world!”  Don’t we all wish we could say the same?

Alexis Praus:  Thank you Leila.  That was certainly delightful and now we are going to hear about the village.  We are going to hear the Honorable Garry Brown who of course is a Congressman and his speech has nothing to do with politics.  The reason is he is a direct descendant of one of the first settlers of this area.  In matter of fact, he is one of a few families that are living on the same property since the very beginning and the land being taken from the government.  There is no need for me to go to any lengthy introduction.  Garry Brown has always been a great friend and supporter of history and with that I’ll give you, Garry Brown.

THE VILLAGE: Honorable Garry Brown, third district Congressman

 Thank you Alexis.  And let me just say there have to be at least 100 probably who could give a better history and more qualified to give a little talk on the village than I am.  But let me struggle with you, if I may.
 You know, to describe the village, it seems to me that the most imaginative play-wright to not have written a scenario which would match the contradictions, the ironies, the anomalies and the sheer humor of the village’s history.

Although we celebrate Bazel Harrison’s arrival on the prairie 150 years ago this date, it was truly fascinating to me and I was just checking with Mary Jane Swartz about it because it was surprising to her, that in reading the autobiographical notes of my great-grandfather I’ve discovered that he arrived in Schoolcraft on Saturday night November 5, 1831.  So November fifth does have a special significance for not only the prairie Schoolcraft, but for our family.

He mentioned in his auto-biographical notes how that he had spent the evening before at Titus Bronson’s in Kalamazoo or what is now Kalamazoo and talks about where it was located and finally they were able to borrow a couple of horses and come down and arrived here, arrived in Schoolcraft, on that Saturday evening.

At that time the store dwelling of Thaddeus Smith and I quote from those notes, “The frame of a little cabinet makers shop”, end of quote, which had that day been put by a Mr. Edwin Fogg, were the only buildings in what is now the village of Schoolcraft.  That is as of Saturday November 5, 1831.

Steven Vickery completed the survey of the village the next day, November 6th.  For it’s proprietor, Lucius Lyon, who then and I quote, “named it after his friend, Henry R. Schoolcraft, Indian agent and author.”

Great-grandfather Brown then goes on to relate how, and I quote, “a number of valuable and costly buildings were afterwards erected on Eliza Street near Center Street.”  You might say the Michigan and Burdick intersection of Schoolcraft.

But it proved to be a grave mistake, as he continues, as he continues, as the land adjoining the village on the east then held as university land afterwards came into the market was platted and added to the village and the quarter-line between them became the main road north and south, of course today known as Grand St.

In the 1830’s, clearly Schoolcraft was gone and I quote, “The chief part mart of supplies for a large section of the country around.”  Our trade was very large meaning the trade at the general store of which my great-grandfather was a partner.

Great-grandfather Brown relates how the partnership broke up and he turned to farming because whiskey was a favorite staple of the Indians who traded at the store.  But whiskey makes them as he says quote, “Turbulent”, end of quote.

Shortly after one had stabbed to death a settler named Wisner, without any provocation, the general store partnership was dissolved as great-grandfather Brown filed at that time and I quote, “I will never sell another drop to them from this time”, and he didn’t.

To better understand the village and its status in the region at that time it’s well to get another view.  Dr. Nathan M. Thomas in describing his travel to the area says in his own account of his days…and let me read if I may.  He speaks about coming to Schoolcraft.  He says, “I continued on the west side of the prairie until the 21st day of August, 1832 when not only was the Big Island Hotel, though in an unfinished state, doing a prosperous business, but other changes had also occurred indicating that the new village of Schoolcraft was destined to be center of business for Prairie Ronde and the country adjacent to it.  In 1832 and 1833 the improvements in the country did not advance rapidly yet the village of Schoolcraft fully kept pace with Kalamazoo and the population and business of the place increased as fast as could reasonably be anticipated.

One could go on concerning the growth of the village and many items of interesting miscellaneous associated with it.  Others who have made more of a study can do better no doubt and relate things more accurately.  But little things stand out in my nostalgia.  As I have mentioned the planned center of the village designated by Center Street is not the center at all.  And for any of you who have property in the area, I see Gordon Kriekard back here who probably between the two of us, we’ve examined every abstract and title in the area.  It regularly refers a piece of parcel of land, east, west, north, south of the Big Island and I’m sure many have looked at that description and said, “Where is the water?  Where is the water?”  Say nothing about the Island.

But of course you then go back into Webster’s Dictionary sometime ago I don’t know if it is still there or not but Webster used to describe an Island not only as a body of land surrounded by water but a wooded area surrounded by a sea of waving prairie grass.  And that is how these parcels of land got their records through by saying…There’s a parcel of land located east of the Big Island.  Meaning east of the wooded area in this sea of waving prairie grass.
 Schoolcraft with all its promises and potential as the central city of the area and I’m sure my thoughts are right on this, had a greater population in 1850 than it did in 1950.  If you wish to travel or tread upon the first concrete paving of what is now U.S. 131 or Grand Street, you will have to visit the barnyard behind what was once a part of the prairie.  The dairy barn on our Brown premises at the edge of Schoolcraft.  It seems the surveyors made a mistake.  The paving had to be torn up and someone decided it would make a well-drained barnyard.  Many and many are the times I cursed that decision.  A jagged, craterous surface as the teamster of steel wheeled, wooden wheeled farm machinery traversed that great barnyard.

With grandfather Brown’s selection as Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture and ex-officio, the Secretary of Michigan Agriculture College is now Michigan State.

Schoolcraft experienced another first.  Michigan Agriculture College at that time had no experimental farm.  So grandfather Brown decided that his son, Lakin, my father and the family farm in Schoolcraft should be the laboratory for some of  the colleges ideas.  The next thing we knew, Mexican migrants were harvesting sugar beets in the fields right behind the barn.  The first time sugar beets had been grown in Michigan and I’m sure the first migrant workers that Schoolcraft had ever seen.  And if I may digress just for a second to tell you a little personal family story.
 This was related to me because I was a little young, because my sister Mollie, my oldest late sister Mollie, was young too.  But the migrant workers that were harvesting the sugar beets, and I do remember a little bit about it because I can remember they would be able to pick a machete and grab a sugar beet and come right down and not leave a touch of green and never take a bit of skin and it was tremendous.  But in any case, they lived up in the upstairs of the horse barn and they had put together their own food and all of that.  And mother thought, considered herself quite a fine cook and she was, thought it would be awfully nice if one day if she made some nice Lemon Meringue pies for them.  With beautiful high meringue and done so carefully on them.  So she had Mollie take these meringue pies out to the workers and it was their noon meal and mother told Mollie to tell them to be sure to return the pie tins to the kitchen door.  So Mollie went out and delivered the pies and Mollie said now mother would like to have you return the pie tins to the door when you are through with them.  However they said it?…You can have them right now.  They took those beautiful meringue pies, dumped them in with the rest of their stew and handed back the pie tins.

Finally no story about the village would be complete without an up-date and its progress under today’s scheme of things.

Although Schoolcraft has its own kind of home grown, home owned congressman who serves on all the committees.  To my knowledge the village has never sought any federal funds for any typical community development, activity or project.  I would conclude by saying, apparently like the pioneers of old who were so self-sufficient as has been mentioned earlier, the village like the pioneers, went it alone in the 1800’s.  The village apparently today, prefers to go it alone in the 1900’s.  Thank you very much.

Alexis Praus: Thank you Garry.  It goes to prove you are never too old to learn something and now I know you can have an island and you don’t have to have water.  Also learned a new recipe for Lemon Meringue pie.  That I’m going to pass by.  In any case the time has come for us to introduce some of the members of the Harrison family and their descendants.

 First I’m going to call on Judy Rossow whose going to talk and perhaps introduce some of the John Harrison descendants.  I believe he was three years old when he came here with his parents.

INTRODUCTION OF HARRISON FAMILY DESCENDANTS: Judy Rossow

I have yet to get my props ready here a little bit.  It was nice to have an opportunity to wear a sunbonnet today because we know how glorious the sun is.  Also it is very windy and they prove to keep your hair out of your eyes and I’m sure many of you wish you had a sunbonnet to do the same thing.

We thought perhaps today it would be fun if you could see some of the popular styles of each generation of the Harrison’s as I remember them or else as people in our family remember them or what we’ve read.  And so this is what we are going to share with you today.

It was particularly interesting to find that as I consulted my historic costume book how my members of my family said, “Oh, no Judy, we didn’t do it that way in Schoolcraft”.  So lets see how your memory serves you too as we go through this.

Of course the records were not clear about the clothing worn by Bazel and Martha or their seventeen children and so we are fortunate to learn and have the knowledge about Bazel Harrison’s character and his personal qualities, his activities, and of course that only serves to what my curiosity is to the others.  And unfortunately no one here actually remembers those times and so we will move on from that part of the family.  But we do know that of the seventeen children of Bazel Harrison, John Harrison was the most important to our part of the family.

John and his wife Eliza lived after the era of pinafores and sun-bonnets and I’m sure we could safely say that the colors I’m wearing today are a bit bright for that period but at least it will serve to remind us that we are learning or studying about people many, many years ago too.

It was John who built the house near Harrison Lake and I found at periods that in his house there were several rooms that were set aside for very special interests in that family.  One room was in the front and it had all of Eliza’s plants and flowers.  It was just a special room just for that purpose.

And another room was upstairs and was called the “Bee” room and which we of course know as the special interest of Bazel who Leila told us about and during his last years did live with Eliza and John Harrison.

The chimney of that house became defective over the years and later caused a fire which destroyed the home and the house on that property was re-built on the same foundation which still stands today.

John and Eliza had six children: Martha, Esther, John, Ella, and Owen and William Whipple Harrison.  We soon learn a little about William’s family but I’m sure there must be descendants from some of the other children in that generation of the family.  So lets try and find you now in the crowd or sea of people.  Is there any one here who is a descendant from Martha Harrison?  O.K.  What about Esther?  See any body?  James Harrison, son of John and Eliza?  What about Ella?  O.K.  I know we have some from Owen’s family.  Elsie, where are you?  Elsie would you like to introduce your family?  Have then all raise their hands.  O.K.  Wonderful! Thank you and we saw them raise their hands over there in that section.

One son of John S. Harrison was William Whipple who married Margaret Harrison and it was fun to listen to the stories of this generation.  While I learned Margaret Harrison was a very ambitious and busy person who liked to help other people in particular.  This must explain why she was always remembered wearing a plain straight skirt and was never without her apron which must have some relation there with her busy-ness and her apron keeping busy.

William was a very sociable person and enjoyed having guests with whom to discuss the current events of the day, particularly politics.  Incidentally and in fact the story is told that his wife was sure that if there were no guests to visit with he would run out to the road and haul in the first passer-by to share the meal with.

William and Margaret had three children: Carrie who died young.  Frank whose son Vernon Harrison is here with us today.  Vernon would you introduce your family to us?  Thank you.  The third child of William and Margaret was Nella Harrison and Nella spent a great deal of her life teaching in the Schoolcraft schools.  For this reason, we thought we might choose the costume to typify a teacher in the mid-1900’s.  Glad she has a smile on her face.  A smiling teacher too.  Nella may not teach in the schools anymore but she sure does teach her great-grandchildren all about the good old days, and it’s just like “Little House on the Prairie”.  It certainly helps them wish that they lived back then too.
 Grandma is sitting in the front so please come and visit her.  She would love to see you afterwards.  Nella married Heber Nesbitt and they had two children, Ward and Theo.  Ward’s family includes four children and four grandchildren and he’s here today.  Want to raise your hand?  There we go.
Very Good.  Nellie, one of his daughters is here, Nellie?  Diana introduce your family. O.K.  Also, Tom and Ken.

Theo’s generation contributed to the era of the flapper when the Charleston was, oh dear, when the flapper was popular and everyone hummed the “Varsity Drag”.  I was sure that the flapper had fringes but mother said no…not in Schoolcraft so we got corrected on that too.

Theo and her husband Lloyd Hamilton had one daughter and my name is Judy as you already know.

My mother’s skirts were short but during my time the skirts were even shorter and we went from the mini to the maxi and now we are back down to pinafores and sunbonnets…standing here with my daughter Nita.  I’m married to Jerry Rossow.  Jerry wave your hand.  You have a lot to put up with and Nita has a brother J.W.  O.K.

As you can see we have lost our Harrison name but we still find it fun to trace back to the earliest generation and learn more about the people and their clothing, their families and their professions.  It has been an interesting time for us and please be sure to share them with us later this afternoon.

Alexis Praus: Thank you Judy.  I knew we were going to hear about the Harrison’s but I had no idea about the style show and the quick change here.  I was beginning to wonder how many dresses that lady really had on.
 And now with another lady who was going to be here today, Mrs. Evelyn Hart who was going to speak about the descendants of Dr. Bazel Harrison but unfortunately she is ill and unable to come so in her place is Mary Jane Swartz to say a few words from the notes that Mrs. Hart provided us.

Mary Jane Swartz: It’s perfectly marvelous to see so many Harrison’s here today and it’s the first time and probably the last time I’ll be considered a Harrison.  I’m very pleased to read a few of the lines that were written by Mrs. Hart.  She says “I am the great-great grand daughter of Judge Bazel Harrison and a great-grand daughter of his son Bazel Jr. who was born in Frankfort, Kentucky on March 31, 1814 and accompanied his father, family and friends to Michigan in the fall of 1827 or 1828.  He was one of the boys who was herding the pigs across the river.  He attended a medical school but was not graduated.  He became known as Dr. Bazel Harrison.  (She has a picture here for all of the Harrison’s and friends to see.  I’d like to show it to you at a later time)

He was married to Almira Abbey, May 12, 1838.  They had a family of eight children three of whom, Cynthia, Christina, and Bazel 3rd, were struck by lightning and died instantly.  Of course we know Dr. Bazel lived right here at this next corner.

Mary and Harriet completed the family.  Dr. Bazel was a prosperous farmer, a Republican, a member of the Methodist-Episcopal Church.

Harriet the second among the eight children was my grandma and she was married in Prairie Ronde in 1863 to Martin VanDuzen an industrious farmer who owned 420 acres of land with a fine residence and farm building.  He was next to the oldest of among five children.

My mother was born in Prairie Ronde in 1871 and died in 1937.  In 1903 she was married to Alvin Rosen who was a contractor and built houses in Battle Creek.

I, Evelyn, was born there in a house my father built.  The only child of this union, and when my Grandfather Martin VanDuzen died he left land to each of his three children….160 acres…one mile west of Schoolcraft Cemetery.  Left to my Uncle Jessie, later known as the Ballinger place…160…eleven miles north of this.  My mother…40 acres and the home later known as the Broughton home in Schoolcraft.

When the house on my mothers’ farm burned, we returned to Schoolcraft so my father could build a new one there.  And we lived on the farm until I was four years old when my father bought the property on the north end of Grand Street and built a bungalow so I could attend the Schoolcraft school.  It is an Antique shop now.

My uncle Alonzo VanDuzer was married briefly but had no children.  (She mentions several others in the family)  In 1942 I was married to Joe Anderson Hart of Burlington, North Carolina.  He died in 1961.  We had no children so this leaves my cousin Freda VanDuzer and I the last of this branch of the family.

Written by Evelyn Rosen Hart and she was going to show you the sheep (pictures) her grandfather raised and if you would like to see them later, Harrison clan, I’d be happy to share with you.  Thank you.

Alexis Praus: We are very grateful for you taking over for Mrs. Hart.  Now before we go to the benediction to close this program, I want to point out to you the Harrison graves are where the shorter flags are located just straight ahead of me and a little to the left.  Also I’d like to call your attention to the marker that has been erected by the committee right at the corner here at the intersection.  So please be sure to read it.  Also I’d like to tell you who the members of the Kalamazoo County Sesquicentennial Committee were: Graydon Meints, chairman.  There was Leila Carney, Richard Phillips, Alexis Praus, James Rix, Harold T. Smith and of course Mary Swartz.  And with that I’d like to remind you once more if you are a Harrison be sure to be here at the podium so your picture can be taken at the close of the program.  Now for the Benediction, I’m going to call on the Rev. Fisher who is the Pastor of the Schoolcraft Methodist Church.

BENEDICTION by Rev. John Fisher

 Please receive the Benediction taken from the book of numbers.  The Lord bless you and keep you.  The Lord maketh his face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you.  The Lord lifts his countenance upon you and gives you peace.  Amen."

The marker placed at the corner of 10th Street and U Avenue reads as follows:
 

BAZEL AND MARTHA HARRISON

"Bazel and Martha Harrison are buried in the Harrison cemetery south of this marker.  He led a Party of 21 who were the first permanent settlers on Prairie Ronde Kalamazoo County, where they arrived on November 5, 1828.  One thousand people attended his funeral on September 1, 1874 because he was admired, esteemed, respected and loved by all who knew him.  Martha Stillwell Harrison died on June 7, 1857.  As his wife of 67 years she shared all of his early hardships and later ease, successes and failures, joys and sorrows and was the mother of 17 children.

 

KALAMAZOO COUNTY SESQUICENTENNIAL COMMITTEE

November 5, 1828 - November 5, 1978"

This web page is authored by Scott Duncan.  All information listed without a reference should be verified.  Any additions, questions, or comments should be sent to:

 

 

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