Isaac Hoxie’s Cooksville Cemetery Story: “The Home of the Dead”

Isaac A. Hoxie (1825-1903)

Isaac Hoxie (1825-1903) wrote an article about his visit to the Cooksville Cemetery while attending the “Old Folks picnic” in the summer of 1901 in Cooksville. (The Old Folks or Old Settlers’ Reunions would continue for another fifty years.)

Hoxie’s article is a touching remembrance of his family and friends who once settled, lived, died and were buried in the Cooksville cemetery.

Hoxie had come to Cooksville with his parents from Maine in 1846, along with his five sisters and brothers including Benjamin, who would become Cooksville’s prominent architect, builder, carpenter and one of Wisconsin’s important horticulturists.

Benjamin Hoxie House, built c.1852

 Isaac helped his brother Benjamin in their thriving door, sash and shutter manufacturing business in Cooksville in the 1840s-50s, which provided the new settlers in the area with the needed doors, windows and “blinds” for their new homes and commercial buildings.  Later, Isaac went into the newspaper business, establishing and operating a number of local newspapers including Evansville’s first newspaper, the Citizen, in 1866, and later the Evansville Review, as well as the Oconomowoc Local and the Deerfield Enterprise. Eventually, Isaac operated a clothing store and owned several buildings in Evansville.

Hoxie's printing press: oldest in Wisconsin

While in the newspaper business in Evansville, Isaac Hoxie operated the oldest printing press in Wisconsin, a Ramage Printing Press manufactured in Philadelphia in 1851-54. The press, previously used by others in the state, was donated by his son Wilbur to the Wisconsin Historical Society in the 1880s, where it remains. 

After Isaac visited the Cooksville Cemetery that day in 1901, he wrote his article entitled, The Home of the Dead, describing his visit and his thoughts. Here are some of his words:

“While attending the Old Folk’s picnic in Cooksville….I visited the old cemetery where were buried the kindred and loved ones of my family, and noticed the many changes that time has wrought in the years since I made [Cooksville] my home in 1846. Then I was only a boy in my minority. The cemetery was neither located nor platted [then], but the early death of a Mr. Hammond from the state of Maine, who coming west to visit friends, met death early, making it necessary that some suitable location should be made …One after another dropping away still no location was made and graves were dug just the same but with little regard to order... and it was not until Dr. Porter died that a cemetery was permanently located and the ground properly laid out [in 1861].

“It was to the southeastern corner under embowering pines and matted foliage my attention was particularly directed. Here I found an unpretentious slab bearing the chiseled name of my father, Allen Hoxie, who died February 26, 1862, aged 65 years, with this further beautiful inscription: ‘My faith is knowledge now.’ The next grave was that of my mother who died some years later, and bore the simple inscription ‘Our Mother’—Olivia Hoxie, wife of Allen Hoxie, died Sept. 8, 1876, aged 79 years…

Allen Hoxie (1797-1876) tombstone

“Nearly hidden by soughing [moaning] pines and creeping vines were the remains of her [his wife] who plighted her troth, came west, and bore life’s burdens with me from April 14, 1852 to May 22, 1896,—44 short and happy years. We began our new life in Cooksville, and it was fitting that her remains should here find a resting place. She is gone! no longer shrinks from the winter’s winds, or lift[s] her calm, pure forehead to summer’s kisses. But as the ashes of the oak is no epitaph to tell what flock it has sheltered, the dust of her grave is speechless, yet her noble deeds and Christian life are ever bright upon the silent tablet of memory….

“As I stood by the graves of the departed ones, on this beautiful autumn I could scarcely refrain a tear while looking back through the vista of fifty-five years—beautiful years, when I made Cooksville my home, silently exclaiming what marvelous changes God has wrought….

“But I must hasten away to the banqueting hall, for the little village is already astir with teams and gaily dressed people to pay homage to months and years long gone bye.

“In song and story this little nook in the northwestern portion of Rock county has ever borne an honorable record. From its founders, John Cook, the Porter family and a host of others who made our representative hall and temple of justice fervid with eloquence, have lived and whose remains find a resting place here.”  [signed] I. A. Hoxie.

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[This clipping from an unidentified newspaper, probably the Evansville Review, is part of the Cooksville Archives. The Cooksville Cemetery, the Isaac Hoxie House, and the Benjamin Hoxie House are part of the Cooksville Historic District.  The Cooksville Archives welcomes donations of papers, photographs, objects, etc., related to Cooksville’s history. Larry Reed.]

Cooksville’s Lutheran Church Celebrates 125 Years With a Program and Tour of Cooksville’s 155 Year Old Cemetery

The Cooksville Lutheran Church is celebrating its founding 125 years ago in 1891 with an event planned for Sunday, August 14, 2016. Both the establishment of the Lutheran Church in 1891 and the establishment of the nearby Cooksville Cemetery in 1861 will be commemorated.

The day will include a special church service, a luncheon and a history program followed by a tour of the Cooksville Cemetery.  The program will begin with a church service at 10 a.m., luncheon at 11:15 a.m., a history program at 12 noon, and a guided tour of the cemetery at 12:30 p.m.  Church founders’ graves will be marked, and families of the founders will be available for questions and guidance.  A free-will offering for the lunch will be accepted from attendees. All interested persons are invited to attend any or all of the events

 

Cooksville Lutheran Church, photo 1941

The Cooksville Lutheran Church officially began life as the Norwegian Lutheran Church in 1891, a result of the increased number of immigrant from Norway who settled in the Cooksville area and who had been attending the nearby Stoughton Lutheran Church.

On October 5, 1891, at a meeting in the Cooksville Schoolhouse, the Norwegian settlers in the area decided to organize and erect their own Norwegian Lutheran Church in the village. The constitution of the United Norwegian Lutheran Church was adopted, with the first Cooksville congregation consisting of twelve families. The Reverend Theodor H. Dahl from Stoughton agreed to conduct services in Norwegian every third Sunday at an annual salary of $125.00

A campaign for funds to construct a Lutheran church in Cooksville was successful. The new Norwegian Lutheran church was a small, handsome Gothic Revival church with some Shingle Style details in the tall, graceful bell-tower and steeple, and it was dedicated on December 14, 1892, on South Street next to Cooksville’s existing Cemetery.

Unfortunately, the church was struck by lightning and burned to the ground on September 13, 1896.  The loss, calculated at $2,339.00, was mostly covered by insurance.  The congregation decided to re-build, and a second, similar church building was constructed in the same location in 1897, with more elaborate stained-glass windows.

Cooksville Lutheran Church today

The elegant rural Lutheran Church still stands, with several new additions and a restored bell-tower, a significant part of the history of the Village of Cooksville as well as an important part of present-day life.

The adjacent historic Cooksville Cemetery was established 155 years ago. Many of the original Lutheran Church family members as well as founders of the Village of Cooksville are buried there. The two separate historic properties, the church and the cemetery, adjoin each other on Church Street in the historic Village of Cooksville.

Cooksville Cemetery sign

The old Cemetery in Cooksville, founded in 1861, was historically named “Waucoma Cemetery” after the Village of Waucoma that had been platted next to Cooksville in 1846. The Cemetery replaced the village’s earliest burying ground used in the 1840s and 1850s and located northwest of Cooksville’s General Store.

Polly Woodward headstone, 1851

The Cooksville Cemetery contained 2.5 acres of land purchased from Waucoma’s founder Dr. John Porter for $25. The cemetery expanded to the west in 1947 with about 1.4 acres of land acquired south of the Lutheran Church, and in 1999, it was expanded again with the purchase of two acres of farmland to the east. 

The Cooksville Lutheran Church and the Cooksville Cemetery are both located on Church Street at the southeastern corner of the village. Both the Cemetery and the Lutheran Church are part of the Cooksville Historic District listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1980, which includes most of the small Rock County village.

 

The church will again celebrate its 125^th anniversary in November this year when a commemorative “Lutheran Church Memory Book” will be available.

For more information about the August 14 events at the Cooksville Lutheran Church and the Cemetery, contact Ilene Axford at (608) 873-6914.

Edward Gilley’s Letter of 1845: “The Greatest Wheat Growing Country in the World” by Larry Reed

In 1843, Edward Gilley (1811-1897) arrived in the Cooksville area from his home in Northumberland County, England and settled on 80 acres of land that he immediately purchased and began to farm just east of the newly established Village of Cooksville (1842). In 1845 he wrote a detailed and expressive letter home, very pleased with his decision.

Edward Gilley portrait, c.1890s

Edward had come to America with his brother George Gilley (1819-1888) to begin a new life on the new lands in the Wisconsin Territory that the U.S. government had been selling since 1837. In 1855 a third brother, John Gilley (1817-1856) migrated with his family to Cooksville but he died the following year. All three brothers and several other family members are buried in the old Cooksville Cemetery. A fourth brother, William, remained in England.

A brief biographical sketch of two sentences in the 1879 “History of Rock County, Wisconsin,” describes: “Edward Gilley, retired farmer, Sec.4; P.O. Cooksville; born in Northumberland, England, Feb. 11, 1811; he came to America in 1843, locating in Porter Township, Rock Co., Wis., in May of that year, and purchased of the Government 200 acres of land, on which he has since remained. He married in Porter Township, Rock Co., Wis., April 1, 1854, and his wife died May 28,, 1875.”   In the 1889 “Portrait and Biographical Album of Rock County,” both Edward and George Gilley merited longer biographies as significant early pioneer settlers and farmers in southern Wisconsin.

Edward’s letter home in 1845 to his relatives in England, written 171 years ago, reveals as much about himself as the new land he now owned and farmed.

Edward Gilley Farmstead, east of Cooksville, etching from 1873

The letter written on September 28, 1845, to his sister Anne (or possibly to his half-sister Jane) in Rothbury, England, appears to have been his first letter sent to his family from Wisconsin.  His return address on the letter was “Union [the nearby stagecoach-mail stop], Rock County, Wisconsin Territory, United States, North America.” The envelope had post marks of “Janesville, Wis. Sep 30” and “America-Liverpool Oct. 27, 1845,” and “Morpeth [near Rothbury; no day/month] 1845.”

A transcribed copy of Edward’s letter was recently given to the Cooksville Archives through the combined efforts of Gilley descendents now living in Iowa, North Carolina, Scotland and England. In theisHis letter— a glowing report of his new home on a “smooth prairie” —Edward wrote, “I believe this is going to be the greatest wheat growing country in the world.”

Edward’s sister had apparently written that she was “poorly” and “much fatigued,” and in his letter Edward assured her that “if you were this side of the Atlantic Ocean I could soon put you in to a comfortable way of living. You might make a good living here by keeping a few milk cows.”

Ellen Pratt Gilley (1860-1944), niece of Edward

He boasted about the prices of crops and the rich soil and compared the geography and climate of Wisconsin with that of England. He also mentioned a few set-backs in the challenges he faced living on the new American frontier.

“Butter sells now from 8 pence to 9 pence per lb your money, that is from 16 to 18 cts….There are many a thousand acres that wants nothing more than turning over the sward [the grassy soil surface] and sowing the seed—it will produce from 10 to 12 bolls [about 50-60 bushels] an acre and by cross plowing it will produce 16 or18 bolls per acre.”

Edward continued: “Our cattle costs us nothing to keep them, except mowing hay for the winter feed. About 1 half of the land here where we are is clear of timber [and] it grows abundantly of wild grass and weeds where the soil is very rich, the other half is occupied with oak timber not very great size from 5 to 15 yds apart and the soil in general very good… the melons and cucumbers here are so numerous we feed the hoggs with them, likewise onions, cabbage, pease, beans, potatoes and turnips grow abundantly here without manure—in fact, it lacks nothing here for being a good farming country except coals….”

Then Edward explained how he managed to acquire his rich lands: “Dear Sister, I must now turn to giving you some account of my own transactions since I came to Wisconsin and my circumstances now. First move I made I bought 80 acres land 5s. [about $1.25] per acre and claimed another 80 acres calculating to pay for it as soon as I am able as the 80 bought is mostly timber and marsh with a small stream of water running along one side of it, and the other 80 acres is smooth prairie or plough land so the one will not make a good farm without the other… I have got along pretty well except last year one of my horses happened an accident, she broke one of her hind legs—it was a great hindrance to me in getting along with my improvements not being able to buy another to put in her place for some time.”

Stebbins-Tofsland-Gilley Octagonal Barn, owned by Edward's nephew

 He described his animal stock and his living conditions: “I will also give you a small account of my stock—1 aged work horse, 1 yearling colt which the mare had when or before she died—it is a very fine one now, 3 milk cows, 2 yearling heighers [heifers], 1 calf, 2 yoke of oxen, 1 bull, 2 sows, 10 pigs, 7 shot [young] pigs for pork this fall….and about 2 score hens and chickens together and I have now got my house made pretty comfortable. It contains 3 rooms and a good cellar—building is also rather expensive here, as mechanics wages are high—they charge pretty near 1 dollar a day…”

Edward praised a grain new to him: “There is also another plant called Indian Corn, a very useful thing it is, it is good for either Man or Beast. I like it better than oatmeal made into pottage and it is better than anything else to fatten hoggs with and horses likewise. I think the climate varies a little more here than it does in England. It is a little hotter here in summer and cooler in winter but the air is more clear… Our land is very even with a little decline and well watered.”

But Edward was lonely and needed a helpmate. “And I found when I got settled that I could not get on without a Housekeeper so I got me a wife last January, but she by casting [sic] some clothes in the month of June caught cold which turned to inflammation of the bowels and died in the month of July which causes me to feel very destitute as am living alone with a great deal of care.”

Edward hoped he would have enough money to pay off his additional 80 acres at the Land Office, “and have as much left as will bear my expenses to England and back, I should like to pay you a visit in the Fall and stay all winter and return in April if all go well with us.”

He wrote that his brother George “bought 40 acres of land which is in cultivation and claims another 40…He likes the country very well and has a better prospect than in England but is rather scant of means to build and improve. But if he have his health to put in his crops in the Spring, they will raise considerable of means…”

He hoped he would hear back from his family. “But I must conclude with George joining me in love to you and all inquiring friends, Your affectionate brother, E. Gilley.”

And so ends Edward Gilley’s wonderfully detailed, enthusiastic, newsy letter home to his family and friends in England describing his satisfying, successful life that he began on America’s frontier in the Territory of Wisconsin, United States, North America.

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[Many thanks to Diane Gabrielsen Scholl of Iowa, and all her Gilley relatives including  Janet Hancock of North Carolina, Edward Freeborn of Kent, England, and Julia Carter of Scotland, descendents of the Gilley family and distant cousins, for sharing the transcribed  copy of Gilley’s letter  with me, along with other information.  The “Gilley Family” file is part of the Cooksville Archives maintained in Cooksville, Town of Porter, Rock County, State of Wisconsin, United States, North America, the Earth, the Milky Way, the Universe. The Cooksville Archives is available to interested people by appointment with Larry Reed, (608) 873-5066.]

Cooksville’s Artists and Artisans, Part Four: Dorothy Hansen Kramer Toigo, by Larry Reed

Over the 175 years of its existence, the Village of Cooksville, like every community, had its share of talented artisans, maybe more than most small villages that never had more than 175 residents. Perhaps Cooksville’s “smallness” combined with its special “architectural quaintness” helped attract and create a community supportive of artists, artisans and antiquarians. Its well-cared-for character certainly impressed Wisconsin’s premier architectural historian Richard Perrin to propose in1962 that historic Cooksville would make an excellent place for an “old world Wisconsin” outdoor architectural museum.

Dorothy Kramer (1900-1971)

One of the village’s 20^th-century artists was Dorothy Hansen Kramer Toigo (Sept 21, 1900-Oct. 30, 1971). She was an art and crafts teacher and a life-long practicing artist.  Employed in the WPA arts program in Illinois in the mid-1930s, she also was an art teacher at Ferry Hall, Lake Forest, Illinois, in 1958-59, and at Stoughton, Wisconsin, in 1959-60, and then once again at Ferry Hall from 1960-69. She lived about 45 years in Cooksville, always pursing her various artistic endeavors.

Dorothy specialized in ceramics and weaving. She studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago from 1921 to 1924 where she met and soon married Arthur Kramer (1892-1962), an advertising and business teacher. (They also met Elton Breckenridge there who eventually taught at Chicago’s Art Institute and eventually purchased his home in Cooksville in 1952, where he continued his close friendship with the Kramers, helping to decorate some of Dorothy’s pottery; in 1976 “Breck” left the village and his home, “Breckhurst,” with its brick terraces, fountain and statuary  he had created.)

At first, Dorothy Kramer lived part-time in Cooksville in the historic Benjamin Hoxie House, which her father bought for her in 1926; he then also bought the Robertson Blacksmith Shop property next door for her in 1930. She lived there permanently beginning about that year and with her husband Arthur operated a very active pottery studio there from 1952-56.

Dorothy Kramer pottery

In 1953, the Cooksville School’s student journal-newsletter reported that “Arthur Kramer has an interesting hobby of making pottery. He uses some Cooksville clay, taken from the bottom of the Badfish creek. The clay is shaped by turning it on a potter’s wheel. It is fired and glazed in an electric kiln at a temperature of about 1923 degrees F. When the clay is fired, it is a deep buff, but when it is freshly dug, it is gray. Some of the things he makes are pottery mugs, vases, ash trays, bowls, and jam jars.”  Arthur had been commuting to Cooksville from Chicago, where he worked during the week, but spent his weekends setting up his and Dorothy’s artist work spaces.

Apparently, Arthur made his pottery in the Blacksmith Shop-studio, with Dorothy doing the decorating and glazing. But soon, according to a family report, “they couldn’t work together so she started doing it herself. Plates, bowls, cups.”  Arthur also built looms for his creatively active wife who began weaving various items (place mats, napkins). She probably taught her nearby neighbor Marvin to hook rag rugs.

Map of Cooksville by D. Kramer 1955

Together, Dorothy and Marvin Raney operated the “Cooksville House” where they sold their arts and crafts in the mid-1950s, along with weavings and blacksmith-forged and silver items by others. (Marvin was an antique collector and dealer in Cooksville as well as a weaver and owned the Duncan House and “Waucoma Lodge.”). The Cooksville House shop was first located in the old Duncan House barn and then in the Backenstoe-Howard House (“Waucoma Lodge”) in the late-1950s. A note came with each purchased piece stating, “Your gift from Old Cooksville in Wisconsin is a genuine hand-crafted work, created with the same high regard for honest craftsmanship that has distinguished our arts for more than a hundred years…. It comes to you with some of the craftsman’s heart in it, and a little bit of the beauty of the old village.”

Dorothy’s artful pottery had a distinctive style, based on her admiration of the forms and colors of ceramic pottery from thirteenth century Korea. Her green glaze apparently was based on this early Korean pottery, a piece of which was gifted to her by a nephew. Her pottery pieces in that distinguishing style are highly valued. She also produced small, simple pottery pieces that were sold to visitors to old Cooksville—tea cups, coffee cups, saucers, jam pots, ashtrays, decorative square ceramic tiles, many with her charming, simple, hand-painted portraits of Cooksville’s buildings. She also painted at least two primitive maps of Cooksville-Waucoma in 1938 and 1955, which are valuable documents of the co-joined villages.

Hoxie House tile painted by D. Kramer

In 1970 after Art Kramer died, Dorothy married John Toigo in Cooksville. She had met Toigo earlier in Chicago in the 1920s, and they lived briefly in New York City in 1970, returning to Cooksville in 1971, where she died of cancer. She is buried in the Cooksville Cemetery.

Dorothy’s sister, Helen Rose Hansen Naysmith Toigo Bradley (1906–1989), also lived in Cooksville beginning in the 1930s in the Morgan House, first as a summer home, then after 1945 permanently, when she taught in several area schools. Many happy Hansen family reunions took place in Dorothy’s and Helen’s backyards of their historic Cooksville houses. Helen’s son Jim Naysmith now lives in the Morgan House.

[Material for this story came from the Cooksville Archives and from “The History of the Hansens & Salisburys in Europe and America 1020-2010 and beyond,” by Mary E. Osgood and Charles F. Osgood, 2014.]

(COOKSVILLE’S ARTISTS AND ARTISANS: to be continued.)