Oldest House in Murray County

        The oldest house in Murray County, the house that has been occupied continuously since the day the logs were put in place eighty-one years ago is on the farm now owned and occupied by John J. Harmsen and farnily.

        The log house (it was larger than the log and sod cabin of the early days) was built out of the best logs available in Bear Lake timber by John H. Low in 1866.

        There was more than one room in the house and the logs are still in a perfect state of preservation. They have long since been covered with siding and no one would suspect that the fine home today is built of logs.

        The old house came in mighty handy for the stork. In the late fall of 1880 the William Foster family of Winona County was driving through in a covered wagon to the sod house just across the line in Pipestone county which Mr. Foster had built in the summer months. lt was October 24 when they came to the John Low place and asked to stay all night. During the night the stork came and left a boy who is now Bill Foster of Lake Wilson. The weather was bad: snowy and cold, and John Low, with the friendly spirit of the pioneer, said to Mr. Foster, "You go on, the family is not able to travel." Foster went on and Mrs. Foster and children stayed at the Low home until spring. That's hospitality.

        The old place has seen many changes. lt was built on the prairie just outside of the woods as a safety or protective measure against Indian attacks.

        While the Indians had made no hostile advances since 1862 there were always that dread and fear and always those folks who loved to spread rumors. Indians from the Dakotas came to the lake in good sized numbers and John told us of getting up in the morning and seeing fifty tepees standing between the house and the lake. The farm yard and the small pasture were fenced with all wooden fences. Logs were split into three inch thick posts. With a small adze, good sized holes, three in each post, were made. After they were put in the ground, saplings

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        were thrust into the hole from both sides. No nails or wire were used in the construction of the fence. There is only one place that antedates the Low home in Murray County. That is the Koch cabin at Teepotah. This place was built in 1861 but was in a state of decay for many years and was kept more as a relic than for dwelling purposes.

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Women Cleaned Up the Town in the Good Old Days

        The women took it on themselves in the old days to clean up the towns and villages, not in a moral sense but by keeping the sidewalks clean. Every woman wore long skirts and when we say long, we mean just that. No righteous woman would ever think of going down the village streets unless the hem of her skirt swept the dust from the streets and wooden sidewalks. Some were even so timid that they sewed heavy iron washers in the hem of the skirt to keep it down. Everything was left to the imagination. One fellow told the writer that he never knew his wife had ankles until they were married. There has been a noticeable change in recent years.

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In the Days When We Were Cave Dwellers

        Through some queer freak of nature the western part of the county was in the tornado belt in the 1890's. Tornadoes would hit this section sometimes three or four times a year. Fortunately they were small, but they were powerful enough to level big barns, churches, etc., scattering the debris for miles. They generally came from the southwest and when the sky got that greenish grey tint, we all hustled to the "cyclone" cellars. For we were cave dwellers; nearly every farmer had one close by the house. These caves, or cellars, were five to six feet deep and covered with sod or had just a plain dirt roof, level with the top of the ground. Most of the cellars had two doors, and we'd all bustle to the caves and pull the doors behind us. There were little ventilators in the roof so there was no danger of suffocation. We stayed there until the storm passed. A change in the "cyclone" weather saw the caves being used for root houses; now they are only a memory.

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