19th century Horicon — Rescuing cow from a well

It took a lot of muscle to rescue this cow in the Elbow hamlet of Horicon.

“It took about fifteen of us yesterday to get Freeman Duell’s cow out of a well twenty-feet deep,” the Elbow correspondent reported in The Morning Star on Oct. 31, 1890. “It was a new well, just covered up with boards. The cow stepped on the boards and broke through. The cow is alright, with the exception of a few bruises on her back.”

In other 19th century Horicon news collected from area historical newspapers:

• There was a balance between work and play in May 1890.

“Bullhead fishing and house cleaning are all the rage at present,” the Bartonville correspondent reported in The Morning Star on May 5.

• Charles H. McGinley was born at Kingston and lived during his childhood and adolescent years at the Adirondack hamlet of Horicon.

He married Effie Harrison of Hague, and the couple moved to Fortsville, Mich., where he worked as a photographer and operated a retail drug store, while he studied law.

Later in life he moved his law practice to Minden City, Mich, where he was elected to the Michigan state Senate in 1893, and quickly attracted notice in the Republican party.

“Senator McGinley, formerly of Adirondack, this county, now of Minden City, Mich., is being urged by Republicans of his district to run for Congress. The Journal, published in Minden, speaks in very flattering terms of Sen. McGinley,” The Morning Star reported on Feb. 14, 1894.

• “The Pallasades has twenty-eight boarders, and the Lake View House has twenty-six,” the Horicon correspondent reported in The Morning Star on Aug. 16, 1894.
• “William Owens and his sister, Alice, have been engaged as teachers in the Elbow district for thirty-two weeks. Consideration, $528 (the equivalent of $19,443 in 2024 dollars),” the Horicon correspondent reported in The Morning Star on Aug. 16.