Tuscola Memories

A Pioneer Story of the Michigan Thumb Country Fire of 1881

Mother's parents lived in Bay City and Dad's near Metamora on a farm where the young couple went to live till they went in 1880 to 40 acres of timber land Dad owned in Juniata Township, Tuscola County, about one half mile south of Cass River.

The land was crossed by a small creek of very cold water.

The Indians name for it was PINNIWINK and upon its banks were a couple of log shanties into one of which Dad and Mother moved.

There were no sash for glass in the two small windows nor any hinges on the two doors. They hung blankets over the doors and windows to keep out the night flying bugs and birds and the next day Dad walked 7 or 8 miles to Vassar and bought a saw, hammer and nails, hinges for the doors and sash and glass for the windows, which almost exhausted their slender supply of cash.

Dad worked in the woods with other men for a lumberman and Mother cooked for them.

They had a small clearing and in it planted potatoes, sweet corn and garden seeds. They had a cow and calf that pastured through the woods at will, a cat and a dog with some small puppies.

By 1881 they had neighbors across the lumber read east of the house and they had a daughter near mothers' age.

The lumberman had as they said, "timbered off" or cut and sold most of the Oak and Maple and left the Pine and Hemlock standing, and in some places they had actually cut notches in the standing timber to let the hubs of the wagons pass thru.

There were no laid out or surveyed roads in this section at that time, only winding and branching lumber roads. These followed the ridges where ever possible, but the road builders had to cross a swamp, the road was built of what was known as corduroy. The building process was simply to lay logs closely side by side cross wise of the road using ballast and almost anything available, such as convenient stumps, rocks, brush, and so forth, and then to dump dirt over the logs.

Three creeks in the neighborhood flow into the Cass River, which is a tributary of the Saginaw River. These from left to right on a map would be the Houghton, Pinnewink, and Donlley Creeks.

The day of the big fire (as it was, and is locally still called), Dad and a couple of other men had gone some little distance south and west of the shanty and across the Houghton to cut down trees.

The air had been full of the smell of smoke and every one knew the woods were on fire. Mother, at home busy with her work, thought to herself, "My how fast this day had gone, I've scarcely anything done and it's getting dark". She thought Dad would be along any minute. She thought the clock had stopped so she went out and called to the neighbors across the road, in the other log shanty and asked what time it was and said her clock had stopped.

They had experienced forest fires before and told her the clock was right and that the darkness was caused by thick smoke above the trees. Their grown daughter said to mother, "Come on, lets dig a hole and bury our clothers, it's the only way to save them. Every year now for three years I've worked out and bought clothes and every year they've burned when we've had to leave them to run away from fires. I'm sick and tired of it. Come on let's bury them!".

By then Mother was very worried about Dad, and afraid of the fire which they were now beginning to hear.

An undertone of deep voiced roar, a crackling sound, and interspersing that, a swoosh, and bang, a sort of combination of sound created by the rush of the fire. The crackling of burning twigs, underbrush, and pine and hemlock needles, and the explosion of some of the pitch filled trees which upon catching fire, would throw pieces of burning wood for many yards in every direction.

Eighty rods further east lived a family who had a team of horses. They now called to Mother and her neighbors to come and go with them as they were about to leave try to reach and ford the river ahead of the fire to safety on the other bank. Mother and the other girl had been digging a hole in which to bury their clothes, but did not have it finished when the fire was sighted by the girls' father who shouted, "Come on, you've no time to lose if you want to get out alive. There's no use waiting for your man, he's probably gone south to get out of the way of the fire, and anyway, he can't get home now."

Mother was badly frightened, but wanted to wait for Dad. They told her she would be burned alive. They could all begin to feel the heat of the fire and to see the flames. With the noise these were enough to strike terror to a seasoned woodsman's heart, and Mother was only eighteen.

The people up on the hill shouted again for them to come as they were about to leave, so Mother gathered up the puppies into her apron and with the mother dog at her heels they all ran to the wagon and the driver hurried the horses into a run over a lumber road to the north and east to for the river WAHJEMEGA to safety. At one point the woods were burning on both sides of the road, but they urged the horses through. On the other side of the river, people were waiting to meet any one who escaped the fire, with offers of food, shelter, and clothing, and in about three days the fire had burned out and the ground had cooled enough so that they could go back.........

In the mean time Dad and the other men, seeing the fire approaching, started to go back home, but the other two said it couldn't be done, and urged Dad to come with them to the south where they thought they had a better chance to escape. But Dad couldn't think of any way but toward home and Mother, and that is the way her went, and got home about ten minutes after Mother and the neighbors had left.

The fire was very close now, and Dad seized some big wooden buckets beside the door and began to carry water from the creek, about 150 feet away and dashed it over the shanty.

A small stack of marsh hay standing a little distance away, started to burn. Dad threw Mothers' wash water that stood in tubs at the shanty door over it and covered the side nearest the oncoming fire with wet clothing and blankets which he kept wet by repeated trips to the creek. A mop standing by the door caught fire, Dad soused it in a bucket of water and flung it indoors.

A young man who had started for the ford with the group Mother was with, went back to recover some valuables left behind, saw Dad, and tried to urge him to come out with him to safety. But by now Dad's Irish was up and he was determined to save their home and its hard earned contents so he said, "No. Go on and tell them I'm all right and will stay and save the shanty".

Back and forth he went, the two heavy wooden buckets sloshing water and slowing his steps throughout the muddy, uneven way across the creek flat, then up the hill. Sometimes he stopped for a second to stamp on a glowing ember, or tiny tongue of flame.

Again he would wet a blanket and beat out fire near the shanty, then hastily fling the rest of the water over the building or haystack. Hurrying back to refill the buckets at the creek he saw that the little stream was rapidly filling with the wild birds and animal of the woods, who had forgotten their fear of each other and their enemy, Man, in their greater fear of fire. Turkeys, Partridge, Quail and song birds. There were rabbits and squirrels, foxes, raccoon, deer and many other four-footed denizens of the forest including a black bear followed by two cubs. The mother bears' fur was smoking and Dad dumped a bucket of water on her. He used to say, "I did that in self-defense, just imagine how that old bear would have acted when that fire got down to her hide". The heat grew more intense; the smoke thickened and came closer to the ground. Trees and underbrush, muck. leaves, and trash on the ground were now burning on all sides.

And still Dad carried water, stopping at each trip to the creek now to lie down in the water and mud as his hair, eyebrows and moustache were singed. Breathing became difficult and he coughed almost continually.

Tears streamed from his eyes, not because of his many blisters and burns, but because of the dense smoke. Little by little the heat became less intense; the smoke lifted a little, the shower of burning ember and sparks lessened bit by bit. Tired almost beyond endurance, Dad still staggered back and forth on blistered feet, from creek to shanty and back for more water till he judged the danger past.

Then setting two full buckets of water inside the door, he dropped at full length upon the floor either unconscious or asleep.

He never knew how long he lay in that condition, because when he awakened he could not see, and when Mother and the neighbors returned, they found him singed, blackened, blistered and blinded.

His eyes were swollen shut, and it was many days before he could see, and years before his eyes became strong again.

The land itself was desolate, not a green thing to be seen. Fire still smoldered in spots, either in muck or in fire blackened stumps and stubs of which some were twelve feet high, and the only human habitation as far as the eye could see was the little log shanty Dad had saved. The charred stalks of sweet corn still held their ears, roasted in their husks, and the potatoes were roasted in the ground.

Mother and Dad were the only ones whose clothing had not been burned; the neighbor girl had to start again working hard to earn money for clothes. Then wen it was considered safe, the Red Cross and others came in with wagons piled high with food, clothing, dishes, stoves and bedding. Mother and Dad let all who could find room stay at the shanty till they could either build again or find other homes. Mother often said, "Many people were given more than they had ever had before the fire." They themselves would not accept any thing, because after all, hadn't Dad saved all their things?

The cat and the cow and the calf soon returned home, rather frightened at this strange blackened land, and the mother dog's feet were warn and sore, but the pups were as frisky as ever.

Then came the rains and in a short time grass sprung up to help to cover and after the fires' destruction. Mother and Dad made the best of things and prepared to plough and plant for the coming year.

They gradually brought this first 40 acres under cultivation, and bought the tract of land across the road where they had a comfortable 5 room log house to which they later added two rooms. They bought more land till they owned 200 acres.

Dad helped build laid out roads, and a school house. They raised a boy and two girls and lived to see and improved road built from Muskegon to Port Sanilac, part of which borders the first eighty acres on which they had built an eight room house and a large barn on the banks of the Pinnewink.....

My Mother remembers hearing how the Indians in the area traded babies, one of theirs for Susie. When they figured out the baby they got in trade was a girl, they quickly brought it back, unharmed of course.  Girls weren't a very good trade!!!  

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This page was last updated on March, 2-1999 01:59:54 PST

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