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