History of Trempealeau County Wisconsin, 1917

"History of Trempealeau County Wisconsin, 1917":

Chapter 8:

Dodge

-As transcribed from pages 87 - 88

Dodge was settled in the middle fifties from Trempealeau, Trempealeau Prairie and the Tamarack Valley. The portion first settled was that lying tributary to Tamarack Valley and that lying in the Trempealeau River flats and small cooleys adjacent to West Prairie. In 1855 Martin Whistler crossed Whistler Pass and settled in the Pine Creek Valley, and within a year Ichabod Wood had settled in section 14. Other early English and American settlers in the vicinity of Whistler Pass were John L. Sanderson, Almon A. Johnson, Joseph Utter and Charles Keith. The first Polish settler in Dodge was Michael Chisin, of Winona, who, in the spring of 1862, settled on the abandoned claim of John Banner.

It was probably about 1862 when the Polish people began to settle in Pine Creek. They were induced to locate here by John Schmangle, a man who spoke English, German and Polish. The first six families were those of Paul Libera, Paul Leishman, Paul Rudnick, Joseph Zabrinsky, Anton Zabrinsky and Felix Kamarowski. These Polish families were living in the valley when Mathias Brom, a native of Bohemia, settled there in 1863.



In 1863 there were no improved roads into Pine Creek. The market points were Trempealeau Village and Fountain City all the year around, and Winona when the river was frozen. With no improved road over the ridge communication with Arcadia was most difficult.

A mill was built on Pine Creek in the sixties. It was washed out by a flood in 1872 and was not rebuilt.

The first German settler in the Trempealeau Valley in Dodge township was George F. Staflin, who settled in section 11, east of the present village, on March 10, 1857. About the same time came Casper Walwand, the first settler in the immediate vicinity of the present village.

Above Dodge one of the first settlers was John Latsch, afterward a prominent wholesale grocer of Winona. He came here in 1856 and settled near a creek at the mouth of the valley that now bears his name. In 1865 Frank Pellowski settled in the same valley, and in the next five years there arrived so many settlers from Hungary that the valley came to be called Hungary Valley. The name of Latsch Valley is being gradually resumed, especially for that part of the valley near its mouth.

HISTORY OF TREMPEALEAU COUNTY WISCONSIN
Compiled by
FRANKLYN CURTISS-WEDGE

Edited by
EBEN DOUGLAS PIERCE, M.D.

ILLUSTRATED
Chicago and Winona
H. C. COOPER, JR., & CO.
1917

Marcin Reszka

In 1855 the first Polish settlers came to Winona, Minnesota. Records of most of the original Polish settlers at Winona show that they were citizens of Prussia or Germany and many of them had served in the German army. Some could speak German better than Polish. These first Polish families were an advance party for many more Polish people to come later. The new families wrote letters to their Polish friends in Europe to tell them what a fine place Winona with its surrounding farm area was. The poles took up residence in the east end of Winona. Their letters were well received in Europe, with the result that many more Polish people became interested in Winona.
Newspapers also promoted settlement in the Minnesota Territory and over one thousand steamboat arrivals in St. Paul, filled with settlers. On May 11, 1858 Minnesota becomes the thirty-second state admitted to the Union of the United States of America.

In 1857 an estimated twenty-five more Polish settlers, some of them with their families, came to Winona following the route through New York and St. Louis. When the 1857 group came to Winona they also settled in the east end, building shelters on the open prairie. Their little east end group settlement was called "Warsaw" by themselves and by other Winona settlers.

Martin Reszka was among another group of Kashubian Poles to come to America, and settle in the Mississippi Valley in 1859. Martin left his village of Dywan, Lipusz Parish and travelled to the Port of Hamburg. Martin with his wife Eva Nosinska, a six month old baby and their three children, boarded the Donau, on its way to America. The Donau arrived in New York on August 25, 1859. Other Kazubian passengers were Franz Pelowski, Joseph Kukowski, Joseph Ganski, J. Czapiewski, and Peter Pelowski among others. Martin and these immigrants are listed as farmers on the ships list and their families followed a similar history, settling the same areas of the upper Midwest as did many Kaszubian Poles who followed them.

Ships list Donau:
1859 -Franz Pelowski, Wentki, Lewandowsky, Lorbietzky, Reschke, Weiher, Rekowska, Zolowski, Kruszicki, Kaldunski, Rollbieki, Kukowski, Peter Pelowski, Zowitz, Czapiewski, Perschik, Ganski

Martin arrived in Winona for the 1860 census, and they where recorded as living in the third ward, house 653, 616th family. Later on in November of that year, Martin applied for citizenship in the United States.

Martin was a day laborer, probably employed in one of the many lumber mills in town, which served as way for immigrants to save money to buy land after several years in Trempealeau County, Wisconsin. Contact Larry Reski for a complete history.

Kaszubian Poles to Pine Creek, Trempealeau County, Wisconsin

Poland to Pine Creek is dedicated to family research of Kaszubian Poles who came to Pine Creek, Wisconsin between 1860 and 1880. The Kaszubian Poles are a distinct ethnic group living south west of Gdansk, Poland. The Families who came to the United States were from the Parishes of Ugoszcz, Brusy, Wiele, and Lipusz. They first came to Winona, Minnesota , before settling across the Mississippi river in Dodge Township , Trempealeau County, Wisconsin.