Time Machine Trip to September 1913

 

Kaukauna Times – September 1913

By Lyle Hansen

September 5, 1913

Mrs. William Falkenberg of Williamsburg, Iowa was in town visiting the home of Gus W. Ristau over the past week. Mrs. Falkenberg was an old-time resident of Kaukauna before the Southside portion came into existence. In those days Indian tribes roamed throughout the Fox River Valley and their hunting grounds were up to the edge of town. It took weeks to go a distance which today can be covered in a matter of days. The road from Milwaukee to Green Bay was no less than a path through the dense forest which covered most of the state and most travel was done on the river.

Mrs. Beckie Baruck, the New York bride who was locked up on a charge by her mother that she had taken a necklace of gold coins from her parents’ home, appeared before the Magistrate. “What do you want me to do with your daughter?” he asked the father. The father took the string of coins and placed it around his daughter’s neck, murmuring a blessing.  She stooped and kissed her fathers’ hands and they all proceeded back to the family home for the wedding.

 

September 12, 1913

The coming engagement of the Edison Talking Picture, at the Kaukauna Opera House, Saturday evening will be the first appearance of the new wonder here. Thomas Edison makes the motion picture talk, each sound appearing to be produced from the actor’s mouth as the words are spoken. 

The hot September days have been the most strenuous times for the iceman, for never in his experience, does he remember when he had to work from nine in the morning to nine at night and still have several ice boxes go empty for several hours.

THE KAUKAUNA TIMES celebrates its thirty-fourth birthday today and launches off into a new year with increased energy, for a new firm name is hoisted to the top of our editorial column, that of the RAUGHT BROS. We say new, for it will be a new firm name to the business world, but as far as Kaukauna's people are concerned, the change will really mean nothing new. Aside from the change in the firm name, through the entry of M. A. Raught into part ownership, there will be no marked change in the business management, the policy of the paper or the promptness with which we will endeavor to serve our patrons.

 

September 19, 1913

An article from the St. Paul Dispatch has reached our desk telling of a 2,000-mile hike being made by Erhard Reichel of Kaukauna. The picture shows Reichel with his two wheeled barrow, his dog, and his violin. Erhard   left   Ironwood, Michigan, June 10 and expects to make the round trip by December. He will have touched Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, and Illinois. He earns his expenses enroute by selling post cards and entertaining on his violin. Erhard will be remembered by many in Kaukauna as the violinist who played at the first moving picture theatre that opened in Kaukauna.

The valuable collection of old letters, documents, relics, etc., which Dr. H. B. Tanner received by his father-in-law James M. Boyd was sold to a man from New York who makes a business of buying antiquities. Along with the collection Dr. Tanner included his entire private library of books which was the finest in Kaukauna. Dr. Tanner saved a few things of historical importance to Kaukauna which he turned over to the Kaukauna library. These items include an autograph letter by Dominick DuCharme, the first white settler who came to Kaukauna in 1790. 

Oneida Indians are in demand by the Northern Land and Timber Co. of this city who are engaged in lumbering in Forest County. Mr. Baken has twenty-four of these expert axe men chopping for him and hopes to get fifty more of them.  He is paying $4.00 a day, which is a good wage.

 

September 26, 1913

Cold? Well, we should snort! Snow on the 20th of September is sure going some. The mercury has dropped to thirty-six degrees above zero between Saturday and Sunday. Although there wasn't much of the white stuff here, points further north received good amounts of it.

The hardest thing for an inexperienced automobile driver to learn is why people can’t keep out of the way. After the killing of 110 persons in Chicago this year by automobiles, the authorities of that city have taken measured resulting in a great decrease of causalities.