More LHS Band Memories

Starting in the summer of 1962 and continuing through that fall, the La Farge High School band became road warriors as they marched in 17 different parades throughout western Wisconsin. Part of the abundance of marching was to show off the new LHS band uniforms that had been acquired at the end of the previous school year.  Purchased through a fund raising campaign by the LHS Band Parents, the new uniforms were gray in color, trimmed in purple with a white LF on the front coat panel. For marching in parades, the band members doffed gray hats adorned with a white plume reaching skyward.

            Mr. Marlin Pendleton, the LHS band teacher, wanted to show off the new uniforms and the band’s talents, so every marching invitation was accepted.  The LHS Band marched at the Horse & Colt Show Parade in Viola, the Labor Day Parade in Hillsboro and for Cashton’s Fall Festival.  Besides the schools own homecoming parade, the LHS Band traveled to Barneveld and Ithaca to march in those school’s Homecoming festivities.  

            In August, the band marched in the Rockton Homecoming Parade, or at least tried to.  The parade was part of the Rockton Centennial Celebration that year and lots of floats were entered – too many perhaps.  The band unloaded from the school buses and formed into their marching lines on Lisney Road on the northwest side of the little hamlet.  The LHS Band marched down to Highway 131 and headed south.  When the band was about in front of the old Rockton schoolhouse, it stopped.  And there it stayed, as nothing in the parade was moving.  While the band waited in that spot for some time, Mr. Pendleton decided to have the band play several of the marching musical numbers that it played as it marched.  After a half hour or so, the band began to inch ahead in the route until stopping again before reaching the Rockton Store.  The band played some more numbers as it waited there for some time in front of the store and then the band broke ranks and walked back to the bus.  We learned later that there were so many people in Rockton that day watching the parade that the parade units could not reach the end of the route.  (Wouldn’t you know it; only Rockton could put together a parade that was bigger than the town.)

            Besides the snazzy new uniforms, the LHS Band stood out in other ways as they marched in parades.  Most high school bands of that era played musical marches, many composed by John Phillip Sousa, as they performed in parades.  The LHS Band had played Sousa marches previously as well and continued to do so, but Mr. Pendleton introduced Broadway show tunes set to march music for the band to play.  Using the show tunes for the marching music was new and no other high school bands in the area were doing that.  When the LHS Band belted out “Give My Regards To Broadway” and “Everything’s Coming Up Roses” as they marched along the many parade routes, many a head and ear were turned by the modern show tunes.

            Mr. Pendleton also booked the LHS Band into college homecoming parades that fall.  The LHS Band played in the LaCrosse State Homecoming Parade that year, marching along some of the same route used for the Music Festival held later in the spring.  The band also played in the Platteville State Homecoming Parade, a real source of pride for Mr. Pendleton, as it was his college alma mater.  After we marched in the parade in the morning we went to the football game in the afternoon.  One of the captains of Platteville’s football team was Danny Rabata, a graduate of LHS. As a matter of fact, Dan Rabata led the Pioneers to victory that day with his punishing running from his fullback position.  Just like the old days when Danny played for La Farge!

            The LHS Band’s marching season culminated when they marched for the Music Festival held in LaCrosse in the spring.  The Wildcat band garnered a first-place in the marching competition as well as another first in the concert competition.

            During the 1963-64 school year, the LHS Band continued to expand in size and performances.  To get a sense of that school year, I am going to use the write-up for the 1964 “Memories” yearbook.  It went like this:

            The fifty-one members of the La Farge High School Band had a whirlwind year during 1963 and 64.  During the summer of 1963 the band marched at La Farge for the 4^thof July Parade and later that month at Farm Progress Days in Viroqua.

            In September the band marched in the annual Horse and Colt Show Parade at Viola. In Octoberthey again went to Viola to play during half of the Viola-La Farge football game.  Later in October they had the opportunity to march in the Homecoming Parade at Platteville and the Apple Festival in Gays Mills.

            Here at our own Homecoming, the band presented a show during the halftime of our game.  They used a variety of new drills and formations, which were devised by Mr. Pendleton.

            The first appearance on stage was the Mid-Winter Concert on February 13, which took place in our new gymnasium.

            In May the band will enter the Concert and Marching competitions at the Music Festival in LaCrosse

            They will conclude the school year by taking part in the Commencement and Memorial Day exercises.

            All in all this year has been quite an experience for the members of the band.

            It was quite a year for the LHS Band, but it did not end all that well at the Music Festival competitions held in LaCrosse. Mr. Pendleton was always looking to improve the band’s performance by playing in more demanding competitions. For that spring Music Festival held in LaCrosse, the band, for the first time, competed in the Sight-Reading Competition.  In that competition, the band was given two musical numbers to play that they had never seen before.

            Mr. Pendleton talked the band through the first number as we saw the music for the first time.  I remember the piece being some sort of minuet and when the band started playing the number, it was immediate confusion.  Finally after a minute or so of pure musical mayhem, Mr. Pendleton stopped the band and had us start over.  It went a little better after that.  

            The second selection for the Sight Reading Competition was a march and it looked easier than the first number.  The band quickly picked up the march’s tempo and was playing the number pretty well.  However, a certain cornet player sitting in the third section fell behind in the number and struggled to catch up.  When the band reached the final note, all finished together in glorious unison except the struggling cornet player.  Yours truly had one more note to blatt out of his silver cornet, putting a nice closing button onto the tune, when one wasn’t needed.  If looks could kill, Mr. Pendleton’s glare towards me regarding my concluding blunder would have been fatal. 

            Of course, we did not get a first in Sight Reading that morning.  To make matters worse, the judge for the LHS band’s dismal showing was one of Mr. Pendleton’s music professors from Platteville College.  He dutifully laid out our woes in the new musical field of competition and mercifully gave us a second place ranking.  To make matters worse, it wasn’t the last of the second places for the band that day.  To everyone’s shock, the band also received a second in the concert competition.

            The band played more challenging musical numbers than in years past for the Spring Festival Concert competition, but hard and constant practice throughout the year had left everyone in the band feeling that a first place could be achieved.  Perhaps it was the holdover from the earlier Sight Reading Competition that day, but the band did not perform well and had to settle for a second place in Concert competition.  Well, the LHS Band could always be counted on for a first place in the Marching Competition, but there was a little catch to that as well.

            Because Mr. Pendleton had concentrated all of the band’s practices on preparing for Sight Reading and Concert competitions, we had never marched once that spring – no practice whatsoever.  When we assembled on the LaCrosse streets on that May afternoon, it was the first time for some of the band’s newer members to march or play the music for marching.  We had to assemble quickly into our newly formed marching lines and then head down Main Street towards the LaCrosse downtown.  Our odds did not look good, but by the time we had gone a few blocks the percussion section had us strutting our stuff.  When we neared the judge’s stand the LHS Band belted out one of their new show tunes, which brought shouts and applause from the big crowd.  Some things are not easily forgotten and the Wildcat band could march and play anywhere at anytime.

            We did not know our rating when we left LaCrosse that day, but we were not surprised when the band received another first place for the Marching Competition.

            During my senior year at LHS, the band continued to grow with 60 students making up the concert and marching band.  I was elevated to the second chairs section of the cornets.  Dean Steinmetz, Carlyle Stoleson and Brent Waddell comprised the first chair cornets while I joined Nathan Larson and Kevin Alderson in the 2^ndchairs and Phil Muller, April Melvin and Rhonda Jacobson played in the third chairs. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in the band and can’t seem to remember any major screw-ups that I committed that year. I remember that the 2^ndsection had a dynamite counter-melody part in one of our marching numbers that we really enjoyed belting out.  That is if we all had a horn to play.

            It seems that when we marched in the Horse & Colt Show Parade that year, I forgot my horn at home.  When I told Mr. Pendleton about it, I thought that I wouldn’t be allowed to march.  But he would have none of that since I was a row leader in the band formation.  So, I marched without a horn as the La Farge Band marched down Viola’s Main Street.  At one point, the band stopped and played a number.  As everyone in the LHS Band played the marching selection to its best ability, I stood mute at the end of my row.  I stood there in dumbness right next to the crowd on the sidewalk, and I seem to remember when the musical number ended someone in the crowd (with a voice that sounded very similar to my brother, Kent) yelled out, “Where’s your horn, Bradley?”

            I might not have been much of a musician, who was prone to occasional mistakes, but I really did enjoy my time in the La Farge High School Band.  My memories of the experience fondly live on to the present.

Teachers' Honor Roll

There has been a little buzz in the community for the past few months about a Teachers’ Honor Roll that is being planned for the new addition to the Lawton Memorial Library in La Farge.  With construction on that library addition advancing quite rapidly in the past week and as the new building starts to assume its shape, the interest in the honor roll seems to be increasing as well.  Recent donations have increased the number of names on the honor roll to fourteen and another sixteen have also been nominated for the honor.

            The Friends of the Lawton Library came up with the idea of the Teachers’ Honor Roll as a way to honor teachers who had made a difference in their students’ lives.  The honor roll was also devised to raise money for the new addition as the Friends organization was charged with the task of collecting funds to pay for the project.  (That fund-raising is ongoing as the money needed to pay for the completed addition and renovation of La Farge’s library still has not been reached.  There will be more on how you can help with that fund-raising at the end of this pithy little doggerel.)  As it turned out, the idea of a way to honor teachers and raise some money in the process has worked out quite well as attested by thirty teachers being named for inclusion to the honor roll and over $10,000 being raised for the library expansion.

            I am fortunate to be included on this new Teachers’ Honor Roll.  Family, friends and former students backed my inclusion on the list.  It was particularly gratifying to hear from several of my former students, who told me how my being a teacher for them had made a positive impact on their lives.  (One young lady’s glowing words about my presence in the development of her life were so powerful that they brought me to tears.)

            Anyway, all of this teachers’ honor roll discussion and personal inclusion has me thinking some about my career in teaching.  I think that I knew pretty early on in my life that I wanted to be a teacher and I am very sure that some of the teachers that taught me in those formative years had significance in my choice of that career.  Having taught in public schools for over thirty years and then continuing to teach in some capacity or other since my “retirement” in 2002, it seems obvious that I made the correct choice for my career path.  That personal history as a teacher made me think about the role models that must have been before me in my youthful days as I decided to become a teacher.

            Georgia Evans is another teacher that is included on the new Teachers’ Honor Roll.  I actually nominated her for inclusion on the Lawton Library honor roll and subsequent donations from her family, former students and teaching colleagues placed “Miss Evans” on the prestigious list.  I use the term “Miss Evans” because over the years, that is what I always used when addressing her, even when I was a colleague of hers teaching at La Farge Schools.  (Looking back on this, I now understand why many of my former students still have a hard time calling me “Brad” when I admonish them for using “Mr. Steinmetz”.  My deepest apologies to my former students, who have heard this from me, but FINALLY, I understand where you are coming from!)

            I was a member of the first class that Miss Evans taught at La Farge.  We were sixth-graders and Miss Evans, who had taught at country schools for all of her career, came to La Farge, I believe, when the Ottervale School, where she was teaching, closed in 1957.  She came with a certain reputation, as she was a stern taskmaster in the classroom.  I liked schoolwork and even flourished at it a little bit, so Miss Evans’ no-frills style of classroom work did not faze me much.  What did captivate me about our new sixth grade teacher was her performance outside of the classroom, especially during recess and noon hour.  Unlike most of her teaching colleagues of that time and place, Miss Evans was “All-In” when it came to her student’s playground activities.

            As I remember it, the recess and noon hour of that first day of school were very different than previous ones.  Miss Evans was very interested as the boys gathered to play a game of softball.  What we found amusing was that she wanted to participate in the game as well.  So, to placate the new teacher, the boys reluctantly agreed to let her play.  But she also insisted that the girls be allowed to play as well!  Coming from a country school background, Miss Evans was used to both boys and girls playing.  With small enrollments, it was a matter of practicality to have enough to play the game. 

But to call for that co-ed approach at metropolitan La Farge - now this was getting ridiculous!  The guys and the gals of that age simply did not participate together in ball-playing activities (although we did have dandy co-ed participation occasionally in “Cowboys & Indians” and Pump-Pump-Pull-Away).  There were plenty of boys to make up sides for a softball game, but our new teacher insisted, so the girls, with big grins on their faces, joined in the game of kitten ball.

Then Miss Evans insisted that she be the first batter in the noon hour softball game.  What next?  Some of the boys chided their new teacher and asked if the pitcher should roll the ball along the ground so she might be able to hit it.  But Miss Evans said no to that, just pitch it in there as usual.  Then some of those same smart-alek boys said all of the outfielders should move in close because teacher wouldn’t be able to hit it far anyway.

On the first pitch, Miss Evans hit a “Moon Shot” to deep centerfield!  Those called-in outfielders scrambled back to make a play, but by the time the ball got back to the infield, Miss Evans, with those long easy strides of hers, had easily rounded the bases and touched the plate for a home run.  The girls broke out in squeals of glee at their new teacher’s exploit, while most of the boys stared in gaped-mouth silence.  The gender barrier had been smashed for our noon hour softball games.

Miss Evans continued to stretch our educational experience that year.  She took us up to the park for tree identification lessons.  We went to neighboring fields and woods for our Science Class plant ID’s.  In the winter, she led us up onto a neighboring farmer’s hill for sleigh riding during noon hours.  The following spring, she somehow finagled a bus and afternoons away from school for our class to play a softball schedule, playing the country schools around La Farge.  We traveled to play games at Bloomingdale, Elk Run, Fairview, Salem, Buckeye Ridge, Weister Creek and Rockton.  She managed the team to a near perfect record (dang Mary Anne Daines and that team from Potts Corners!) and endeared herself to the entire class, since everyone got to go to the games, whether you played or not.

Miss Evans loved local history and would take the class on history hikes to Seelyburg, her hometown and where she still lived when she taught our class.  I think that I developed my interest in history from her as I listened to her stories of Seelyburg, the old lumbering town on the Kickapoo River.  I also was always impressed with the passion that Miss Evans showed in her teaching.  Her job was important to her and she always strove to be engaged in her teaching and to keep her students engaged as well.  It was where the first seeds were planted in my thinking about becoming a teacher.  I had many more teachers along the way that would influence me towards making a career in education (and hopefully I can relate some of that at another time), but it was Miss Evans who began that process for me.

*                                  *                                  *                                  *

Here is a list of nominated teachers for the Lawton Memorial Library Teachers’ Honor Roll: Kevin Alderson, Bonita Dorschied, Mary Downing, Gerry Drake, Betty Ecklor, Ann Erlandson, Jerry Hesselberg, Laurie Hesselberg, Jeanne Kraus, Bea Lee, Karen Lee, Geneva McGeorge, Al Oaklief, Dave Sarnowski, Robert Sutton, and Mary Warner.  If you would like to contribute to help advance a teacher who made a difference in your life, donations for your favorite teachers can be made at the library, or by mailing your donation to Friends of the Lawton Memorial Library, 118 N. Bird St., La Farge, WI 54639.  Donations can also be made online by going to www.lafargelibrary.org.  Check the Friends of Lawton Library webpage or on Facebook for more information on the teachers already on the honor roll.

            So, as the lady might say, “C’mon people, vote for your favorite teacher and move them on up to the honor roll!” 

Civil War Stories

Carolyn and I recently participated in a bus tour around southern Wisconsin that focused on how the Civil War impacted the state.  Sponsored by the Friends of the Wisconsin Historical Society and arranged by past-president Chuck Hatfield of La Farge, the tour was titled Bringing The Civil War Home To Wisconsin!  The three-day excursion began in Madison then traveled to Beloit, Milton, Kenosha, and Milwaukee before ending at the Wade House grounds in Greenbush near Sheboygan.  Although the tour never came close to the Kickapoo Valley, the area’s history was well represented on the trip.

            At the first stop in our state’s capital, we were given a tour of Forest Hills Cemetery.  This facility has an entire section of graves of men who died at nearby Camp Randall while training to go off to war.  Many of the men from Vernon County who served for the Union trained at this large military camp in Madison.  In another section of the cemetery is the “Confederate Rest” where over two hundred men who served the Confederacy are buried.  They were some of the prisoners captured at the battle for Island #10 on the Mississippi River (an early Union victory for control of that river) and brought north to Camp Randall for a short while.  This final resting place for the CSA prisoners is the only Confederate cemetery maintained in the northern states and the Stars & Bars flies over the graves located there on one day each year.

            Later the tour group moved to the State Historical Society Museum on the UW campus.  We were shown Civil War artifacts that are stored in the museum’s archives.  Among the items that we were shown was the Civil War drum of Samuel Arms.  Sam Arms was a 12-year-old slave in Georgia who was unofficially adopted by a Wisconsin infantry company and became their drummer boy throughout the rest of the war.  After the war was concluded, he eventually settled in the Valley area of eastern Vernon County and raised a large family there.  His family has donated the drum to the State Historical Society for display at the museum, which is located on the UW Campus.

            Later, after lunch at the University Club, the tour group was enthralled to hear from General Ulysses S. Grant.  Frank Beaman of Mineral Point, a member of the tour, has been doing first person portrayals of the Civil War general for some time.  His spot-on presentation to us was as President Grant in his later years when he was writing his memoirs near the end of his life.  The first-person account of the famous American leader as he told of his amazing journey in life was very illuminating for us all.

            As our motor coach traveled south on I-94 that afternoon, I gave the first of my in-transit stories about men from Vernon County (then called Bad Ax County) and their role in the war.  I told how in 1861, after the fall of Ft. Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, then Wisconsin Governor Alexander Randall made a call for Wisconsin men to enlist in the Union cause.  In Bad Ax County, that call was answered with a rally on April 24, 1861 in Viroqua.  Funds were immediately collected to organize a fife and drum corps to help rally the recruits and intensify patriotic desires to serve.  Company I was formed by June with Bad Ax County men and that unit arrived in Madison at Camp Randall in July and were mustered into service.  That company would eventually be made a part of the 6^th Regiment, which was part of the famous Iron Brigade – one of the legendary units that fought in the war for the Union army.

            Later, in December of 1861, Vernon County men formed Company C of the 18^th Regiment, known locally as the “Bad Ax Tigers”.  One of the leaders of that unit was Jeremiah Rusk, who had once been the county sheriff.  Rusk demonstrated remarkable leadership skills with the unit and eventually became a general in the army.  He participated in the siege and capture of Vicksburg and was with General Sherman on his “March to the Sea”.  A fellow officer said of General Rusk, “He rode farther into hell than I would care to go, and he was the only man I have ever seen who would take such risks.”  Later Rusk would continue his leadership skills developed in the war by serving Wisconsin as a U.S. Congressman and as Governor from 1882-89.  He was the Secretary of Agriculture in the cabinet of President Benjamin Harrison from 1889-93.

            Returning to the tour, we had supper that night at The Butterfly Club in rural Beloit.  After the meal, Kevin and Patsy Alderson of La Farge talked to the group about their Civil War book, Letters Home To Sarah.  They told the story of Guy Taylor, a Dane County bonus enlistee, who wrote amazing letters home to his wife, Sarah, telling about his observations of the war.  After the war was concluded, the Taylor’s would move to a Town of Clinton farm in Vernon County and then into the village of Cashton.  Kevin and Patsy’s story of how they happened to find the collection of Civil War letters, an amazing story in itself, was also shared with our group.

            The following morning, the tour made a stop at the Milton House Museum in Milton, Wisconsin.  The old roadside inn, built in an interesting hexagonal configuration, has been restored beautifully and includes an original 1850’s - era cabin that served as a summer kitchen for the inn.  That cabin also secretly was an access to a tunnel that led into the basement of the inn, where runaway slaves attempting to become free were hidden.  The Milton House is Wisconsin’s only officially recognized Underground Railroad site.  Our guided tour of the handsomely restored crossroads inn was very interesting. 

On the way out of the museum, I noticed a wall that listed the names of the many contributors to the museum.  In one square were the names of Walter and Joan Steinmetz – long time residents of the city of Milton.  Walter, the son of Bill and Almeda Steinmetz, grew up in the La Farge area and had passed away only two days prior to our visit to the Milton House.

            As we drove east towards Kenosha later that morning, I shared another Civil War story from Vernon County.  I told the story of Isaac Richard (Dick) Lawton, who had left his farm, located along the Kickapoo south of La Farge and had enlisted for service to the Union on February 5, 1865.  Dick Lawton soon became very ill in the army and rheumatic seizures had rendered his legs useless.  According to the Lawton family history, U.S. Army doctors contacted Melissa Lawton, Dick’s wife, for her consent to amputate both of her husband’s legs.  Instead, she told the doctors to send her husband home – “We’ll care for him here”, was her reply.  When her husband arrived home in late May of 1865, Melissa could do little for her invalid husband except provide him the comfort of home and family. 

Later, some Winnebago Indians, who returned to the Kickapoo Valley and their former homes each year, came to the Lawton farm to set up their camp for the summer.  They went to the house to visit their old friends and noticed Dick’s sorrowful condition.  The Winnebago immediately set out to help Melissa with his care. “At once full of sympathy, they made valuable suggestions as to treatment, and offered some of their remedies gathered from Mother Nature and proven through many years of experience.  Before long Dick took a turn for the better.  The patient and loving ministrations of his wife, seconded by the virtues of the Indian remedies, paid off tremendously and in a surprisingly short time Dick was back on his feet.”  The story is told in the family history of how the help from his Winnebago friends probably saved Dick Lawton’s life.

Canoeing The Kickapoo

The month of June has been a tough one for visitors to the northern Kickapoo Valley who are looking to do some canoeing on the river.  There has been so much rain over the past two months that has saturated the ground in these parts, that any rain amount in the last few weeks has regularly sent area creeks to bank full status.  So, Weister Creek, Otter Creek, Bear Creek and the other area tributaries empty their full loads of water into the Kickapoo and soon the river is bank full or even out of its banks.  With so much rain in June, the Kickapoo has been high all month and not much good for canoeing.

            I happened to notice a group of campers at La Farge’s Village Park on a recent Saturday morning.  All of the vehicles at the campsites seemed to have two or more kayaks or canoes piled on top.  With the heavy rain of Friday evening continuing into that Saturday morning, canoeing or kayaking on the Kickapoo became a risky venture and that group stayed in camp throughout the morning.  (Later on that Saturday, in the evening, fifteen canoes were stranded in the high waters between Bridges 6 & 7 north of Rockton.  Eventually, those people needed rescue from the high waters by local emergency personnel.)

            Today, canoeing the Kickapoo has become a recreational summer staple for locals and visitors alike. But when I was growing up in La Farge a half of a century ago, it was unheard of to attempt to canoe on the Kickapoo River.   What has brought about this transformation in the recreational use of the river?  What is different about the Kickapoo today that affords thousands of recreational and sport canoeists to travel on its silt-laden waters?  Let’s go back and take a look.

            Several years back I was sitting at the Rockton Bar with Roy Stone.  Roy had dropped in for a bottle of “medicine” and I was there for lunch and to find out what was happening in the world.  There were maybe twenty young folk, clad in t-shirts, bathing suits and flip-flops getting ready to take off on an afternoon canoe adventure.  As we watched the group prepare for their afternoon of paddling the Kickapoo, Roy offered a story about an experience that he had on the river when he was a young lad.

            Although he didn’t give an exact date, Roy’s adventure on the Kickapoo probably happened in the 1930’s.  He and a friend hatched up an idea to get a boat and go fishing on the river for some big trout.  Roy said that they knew the best fishing holes on the river were far off the highway, so drifting down the Kickapoo on a summer afternoon was the trick to reaching those big Rainbows.  Roy’s friend had a small flat-bottomed duck boat of sorts with a couple oars.  They figured it would be dandy for making the trip.  They would float down to La Farge, fishing along the way, fill up their gunnysacks with big trout and then catch a ride with someone coming back upriver their way.  Roy talked his Mom into making a lunch for the trip and the two Rockton boys were off on their fishing adventure on the Kickapoo.

            They put in below the Rockton mill and headed down river.  They immediately came to a fallen tree blocking the river and had to portage around it.  They no more got there little boat back into the water then they came to another blockage and had to do another portage.  And so it went for several hours as the boys did more carrying their boat than paddling it.  At some of the smaller obstructions, they tried to maneuver their little boat through the trash and snags.  More than once, their boat ended bottom side up in the water, dumping the passengers into the muddy waters.  Their lunches were lost and the fishing was forgotten.

By the time they reached the Star Valley flats, the two teenage boys were soaked and beaten and hadn’t achieved the halfway point in their trip.  They pulled and pushed their boat over and through numerous snags and fallen trees as they tried to float the meanders on the flat.  The banks were so steep in that section of the river, that the boys eschewed portages and virtually walked their boat down the clogged river.  Roy said it seemed like they pulled their boat for miles through water too shallow to float the little craft.  By the time they reached Bacon’s Bridge (the Reserve’s Covered Bridge today), they had all of the river that they could take and hauled their boat out.  Far from the village that was their original ending point, the boys sat glumly, beaten by the snarls of the Kickapoo.  Wet, tired, muddy, and forlorn, the two must have been a pair to behold.

Suddenly a Model – A pickup came putting down off Norris Ridge to the south and crossed the bridge.  It was a neighbor heading back up river.  He stopped and asked the boys what they had been up to.  When he heard their story of woe, he smiled and told them to get in.  The back of the Ford was full of ground feed, so the boat would have to wait for another time, so off they went, back home to Rockton.

Roy never did know how the boat was returned, nor did he care.  When I asked if they had caught any fish, he guffawed as only Roy could do and said they hardly had time to get a line in the water.  “We never caught a dang one,” is how I remember Roy telling it.  As we watched that day in Rockton as the young folk headed out to canoe the Kickapoo, he still remembered that awful afternoon on the Kickapoo from over seventy years before and wondered why anyone would want to canoe that river.

I grew up in La Farge nearly twenty years after Roy’s little adventure, but I remember no canoeing on the river of any kind.  It’s not as if we didn’t hangout on the river.  As a kid, we fished off the old dam at Seelyburg and dropped our worms by the power plant there.  We skated on Darrell Hollenbeck’s Slough next to the river in the wintertime.  I speared carp in that slough a couple of times – a Rite of Spring on the Kickapoo carried over from the old days.  My friends and I were in the Boy Scouts, so we did lots of outdoors stuff and activities, but we steered clear of canoeing on the Kickapoo River.

It wasn’t like we were adverse to the activity.  When Scout Master Harry Lounsbury took us up to Camp Decorah on the Black River, we learned canoeing skills on the lake at the camp and then took our canoes out for an afternoon trip on the river. It was great fun.  But we didn’t canoe the Kickapoo because, as Roy and his friend found out, it wouldn’t be great fun.

In Scouts we even built our own canoe! It was a project that the scout troop tackled in the garage of assistant Scout Master Arnie Widstrand.  We worked on assembling the wood strut frame and covering it with canvas as a winter project.  We admired our canoe in the spring, but didn’t take it out on the Kickapoo.  Harry loved to fish at Petenwell Flowage on the Wisconsin River over by Mauston and it seems to me that we took the canoe over there to use.  I don’t know what happened to that canoe – hope Royce Gudgeon didn’t take it out on the Kickapoo.

Kevin Alderson and his group of friends came through La Farge’s Scouting program soon after.  They also built a canoe, but I’ll have to tell of the fate of that craft in the next entry.  We’ll continue this paddle through the past about canoeing the Kickapoo next time.