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| | | 14 : MARINE REVIEW. [December 12, was untimely it was Houghton's. He was in the full flush of manhood. He had achieved much and was bound to achieve more. When he died Gov. Cass said the state had better have lost ten millions of dollars. The wind was freshening at dusk when Dr. Houghton decided to make Eagle harbor and told his man, Peter, to embark with him in the canoe. Peter was a half breed and born to his calling, which was to navigate the treacherous father of lakes in a birch bark canoe. He demurred at the suggestion, and when Dr. Houghton insisted frankly stated that it was not safe. "Tut, tut, Peter," replied Dr. Houghton, "we can get into the harbor all right." Peter shipped the canoe and the two started out. Night fell upon them and the sea rose. The Indian battled with it bravely and silently, but little progress was made. Dr, Houghton finally saw that it was impossible to make headway and ordered Peter to put back. But it was too late. A giant wave capsized the frail canoe. Seizing the canoe with one hand, the Indian caught Houghton with the other. - "Take care of yourself, Peter," sang Houghton cheerily, "I can take care of myself." "Let me go, I say," he added a moment later when he saw that the Indian had not released his hold. Peter reluctantly let him go and after a long struggle succeeded in grasping the branches of an overhanging tree. This was the night of Oct. 18, 1845.* The body of Dr. Houghton was not found until the fol- lowing spring. The field notes, found in his clothing, are almost price- less possessions today. The fact that Dr. Houghton made no mention of iron in his report is significant in that it shows conclusively that the Indians could have had no traditions concerning it. This is important because it brings the dis- covery Of iron within the memory of men now living and relieves it of conjecture and surmise. Of copper it is impossible to determine who first discovered it. There was a people who antedate the present race of Indians that knew of its existence and had uses for it. These people lived and died long before Columbus discovered America, and while the Indians have neither legend nor tradition concerning them the fact that they lived is proved in the mute testimony of nature. Lying about some of the cop- per mines were stone hammers; underpinning masses of native copper were wooden props in such a state of decay that centuries must have been required in the process; but, above all, out of the thrown up earth of these early mines, trees had grown, had fallen and decayed and had grown again, marking the centuries with the rings upon them. Of this crude but indus- trious race the Indians had no knowledge. But with iron the story is different. It is only a little while ago. Iron was first discovered by William A. Burt, United States deputy surveyor, and party, who were engaged in surveying the upper peninsula. In the party were William Ives, compass-man; Jacob Houghton, barometer- man; H. Mellen, R. S. Mellen, James King and two Indians named John Taylor and Michael Doner. While running the east line of township 47 north, range 27 west, they observed on Sept. 19, 1844, by means of the solar compass the most remarkable variations in the direction of the needle, These fluctuations greatly excited Mr. Burt, who was the inventor of the solar compass, and when the compass indicated a variation of 87° he could contain himself no longer. "Boys," said he, "look around and see what you can find." Each member of the party began an independent search and found outcroppings of iron ore in great abundance. In fact they could not fail to find it for a mere rip in the sod revealed the ore. Mr. Burt was well advanced in life and was much more interested in the performance of his compass than he was in the deposits of ore themselves. "How could they survey this country without my compass," he ex- claimed, and after the manner of an old man, he repeated the remark a score of times. It is worthy of note that no member of this party of surveyors made any effort to profit by the discovery. It does not seem to have occurred to any of them to preempt one of the locations. They noted in their report and on their maps that iron existed--and that was all. The cause of this indifference doubtless lay in the knowledge of the almost insuper- 'able obstacles which would have to be overcome before the iron could reach its market. However, it is strange that none of them recognized the fact that time was the only asset required to make them wealthy. The work which William Ives did upon this survey was unusually faithful and historically important. "He performed it with the utmost care and diligence, and indeed overcame many physical obstacles which would have daunted a less courageous spirit. At one time, being wounded badly in one foot, the party had to leave him at the mouth of Carp river. The next day Ives appeared among them at what is now Negaunee, having trav- ersed the entire distance upon a pair of improvised crutches. Any one who has traveled over the face of this tremendously convulsed country will appreciate the heroism of this performance. The point at which the ore was indicated by the magnetic needle was not the point at which the ore was first actually mined, because the ore *This occurrence is related as told by J. M. Stiles of Marquette last summer. first mined was not magnetic. It is a further singular circumstance that the knowledge of the discovery, made by the surveyors, while duly recorded in their reports, seems not to have been known by anyone who could profit by the information. They related the discovery to the Indians whom they met, but it seems not to have reached the ears of any white man. Among those to whom they made mention of the existence of iron was Louis Nolan, a half breed, living at Sault Ste, Marie, and an old Indian chief named Manjekijik, whose wigwam was at the mouth of the Carp river. In the spring of 1845 P. M. Everett of Jackson, Mich., excited by the reports of the existence of copper and silver in the Lake Superior region, made a journey into that country accompanied by four men. When he reached Sault St. Marie he met Louis Nolan, who related to-him the dis- covery of the iron deposits by the surveyors and volunteered to show him the way. Everett had not heard of iron, but he accepted the offer of Nolan and employed him as guide. Nolan was a physical giant, as hard as a rock, and proved an invaluable servant. He escorted the party as far as Teal lake, but was unable to locate the iron deposits. Everett then started for Copper Harbor, but on the journey thither fortunately fell in with Manjekijik, the old Indian chief, to whom they related their fruitless search, He at once undertook to show them the deposits and piloted them directly to the Jackson mountain and then to the Cleveland moun- tain, These terms, Jackson and Cleveland, are used because it was by these names that the deposits were later known. . Manjekijik's superstition regarding the deposits was such that he would not approach them directly, so that the actual discovery of the Jackson deposit was made by two members of Mr. Everett's party--S. T. Carr and E. S. Rockwell. In reward for the services of the Indian on this occasion the officers of the Jackson company subsequently gave him a written stipula- tion of which the following is a copy: River du Mort, May 30, 1846. , This may certify that in consideration of the services rendered by Manjekijik, a Chippeway Indian, in hunting ores of location No. 593 of the Jackson Mining Co., that he is entitled to twelve undivided one-hun- dredths part of the interest of said mining company in said location No. 'A. V. BERRY, Superintendent. F. W. KIRTLAND, Secretary. This agreement on the part of the company was never fulfilled and Manjekijik finally died in poverty. The white man's trail is frequently one of perfidy. However, it is true that none of the original members of the Jackson Mining Co. got anything out of their holdings and Man- jekijik therefore fared upon an equal basis with them. But this is over- stepping the development of the story. Everett's party had a number of permits in their possession, issued by the secretary of war, to preempt mineral locations, and one of them, made out to James Ganson, was used upon the Jackson location. The party then gathered up a little of the ore and returned to Jackson, Mich., with it. The following spring another expedition was fitted out by the Everett party, consisting of F. W. Kirtland, E. S. Rockwell, W. H. Mun- roe and A. V. Berry, to visit the Jackson location. They built a house upon it and returned to the mouth of' the Carp river with 300 Ibs. of ore upon their backs. Some of the party remained behind to keep possession of the location, but Berry journeyed on to the Sault with the ore. At the Sault he met J. Lang Cassels of Cleveland, a noted mineralogist, who had been sent into the peninsula by a number of Cleveland gentlemen to report upon its mineral resources. These gentlemen were anxious to develop the mines should any of promise be found. Berry, learning that the men whom Cassels represented were of the highest integrity, made known the Cleveland location to him, on condition that expenses of keeping pos- session and making roads should be borne jointly. Dr. Cassels took Berry's canoe, visited the location and secured it by a permit. Berry proceeded to Jackson with his ore, where he made two attempts to smelt it in a cupola furnace and failed. Some of the ore was then taken to Mr. Olds of Cucush Prairie, who succeeded in making a fine bar of iron from it in a blacksmith's fire, the first iron ever made from Lake Superior ore. In the summer of 1847 the Jackson company constructed a forge on Carp river about three miles from the mine and on Feb. 10, 1848, the first iron ever made in the Lake Superior region was made in this forge by Ariel N. Barney. A month later the forge went out of commission, being carried away by a freshet. Mr. Everett returned in the summer of 1848, repaired the dam and resumed the manufacture of blooms, The first iron made was sold to E. B. Ward, who used it in the walking beam of the steamer Ocean. The forge had four fires, from each of which a lump was taken every six hours, which was placed under the hammer and forged into blooms 4 in. square and 2 ft. in length. The daily product was about six tons, requiring two teams of six horses each to convey the blooms to Marquette, which lay ten miles away. The roads were of unvarying horror and break-downs were frequent. The same difficulty which at- tended the getting of the blooms to port attended the getting of supplies to the forge--the ore and charcoal. After struggling with insufficient power, for sometimes the Carp river ran pretty low, with the frightful grades and the unspeakably bad roads the forge met the death to which it was born.