Monday, October 29, 2018

Our Past Is Present October 29, 2018


October 29, 2018
            This is “Our Past Is Present” from the Geary County Historical Society.
            Today’s story is titled “The Swedes – From Quarries To Farms” and is some of the information included in Mary Kay Munson’s article found in the book Set in Stone. Mary Kay wrote that “Early Swedes who came to Kansas after the Civil War used Junction City as an outfitting point for those traveling to west.  Some of them, however, either stayed or came back to what was then Davis County just as it is believed Carl August and Emilie Monson did. Monson was spelled M-o-n-s-o-n.
            Whatever their original destination, the family group showed up in Junction City in 1869  and stayed.  The Monsons may have lived in some of the housing provided for arriving Swedes until they could get a house of their own.  Records show they purchased land in 1872 near the current Spring Valley Historic Site at the corner of what is now K-18 and Spring Valley Road. 
            Family members recalled that there were no trees west of Junction City when the Monsons moved there. So Emilie went to the river and transplanted six cottonwood and walnut trees along the creek near the Spring Valley home.  Carl worked as a quarryman and built buildings with stone through the end of the 19th century. 
            Caroline Peterson, Emilie Monson’s sister who had traveled with the Monson’s to the area, met Harry Wilson, a Norwegian immigrant who came to work on the MKT Railroad the same year the Monson’s arrived.  Harry also worked as a law enforcement officer in Junction City.  They eventually moved to South Dakota and made their home on a farm in that state.    
            As with most of the Swedish immigrants who came to America during this era, the Monson’s eventually Anglo-sized the spelling of their name and today Carl and Emilie’s proud Geary County descendants spell their name “M-u-n-s-o-n.”
            And that is today’s story on “Our Past Is Present” from the Geary County Historical Society.



No comments:

Post a Comment