ALPENA! Yes, Alpena, West Virginia! To think of it . . . to know it . . . to leave and come back to it . . . Ah! to live in it . . . that is best of all!
"Time has made a change in the old home place." The words of this old familiar song certainly remind me of the Alpena I have known. Alpena has not always been Alpena. In fact, it was not even named until 1879. But there were people here, lives being lived. Some of those lives were being lived by American Indians. We are sure of this because Mr. E.C. Wyatt found and marked the grave site OT Peter Shaver who was killed by Indians. The grave site can still be seen along the road as you travel from Alpena south to Glady.
Named for Peter Shaver, Shavers Mountain encompasses part of me south and western area known as Alpena. This majestic mountain also protects Alpena somewhat from the violence of wind storms. However, the clouds sometimes find it hard to rise over the mountain to bring us rain. My forefathers crossed Shavers Mountain to reach the area they would call Alpena, but they crossed at a much higher point than me Route 33 we use today.
My grandparents on my mother's side and my great grandparents on my father's side came from Switzerland to America to settle Alpena. My grandma Ratzer delighted in talking and I would sit for hours hearing about Switzerland and how she learned to crochet, knit, tat, cook, etc. in school and how she and grandpa were married and came to Alpena on their honeymoon. After growing up with this living history, I should be an expert on Alpena, but though I listened to me stories, I did not absorb the information.
Physically, Alpena covers much territory, but it has very few citizens. At one time, me families of Alpena were large and me citizens many. However, through the years, family members have left. The post office was moved to Bowden. The school was closed and the children bussed to Harman. When these things leave a community, it becomes history. But the people who lived in Alpena and the events that took place here are very interesting. It is important to keep history alive and the written word seems to be our best record.
Before Alpena, WV was actually settled into a community, there were several people living in the area. The ancestors of E.C. Wyatt were of English descent, some serving as members of Parliament. Sir Francis Wyatt was Governor and Captain of Virginia as early as 1621. The Wyatt's settled on Shaver's Mountain after receiving land grants from the King of England. These land grants included the geographical area that is now Alpena.
E.C. Wyatt reported that he believed Ellis Wyatt to be one of the most industrious of his kinsmen. We are told that he was the first man to build a house on Shaver's Mountain. His house was completed in 1848. Ellis Wyatt was a farmer, merchant, civil engineer, surveyor, constable, deputy sheriff, and a miller. He was the first and only man to vote the democratic ticket in Dry Fork district in the first election after the Civil War. In fact, no democratic ticket had been printed in this district, so one had to be written to accommodate Mr. Wyatt.
In June of 1879, Ellis Wyatt became the first Postmaster of Alpena. He held this position until 1897 when Emil Knutti was named to the post. Mr. Knutti retired in 1940 and Luther Cunningham was Postmaster from February 9, 1940 until November 30, 1940. Mrs. Lorrain D. Stalnaker was named Postmaster December 23, 1942. She resigned April 1, 1943. Adam Thomas Dahmer then served in The post from May 25, 1949 until December 31, 1949. He was succeeded by Robert E. Lee on March 17, 1952 and he served until June 30, 1952. Mrs. Hallie K. Ogden became Postmaster on October 2, 1953 and served until August 19, 1966. Mrs. Dorothy Cunningham served as Acting Postmaster from August 19, 1966 until December 30, 1966 at which time the post office was moved to Bowden.
The area that was to become Alpena was settled by a group of Swiss immigrants who came to America in 1879. They named their now community Alpina after their beloved Swiss Alps and also because the terrain of Shaver's Mountain reminded them of their homeland. They submitted the name Alpina to the authorities in Washington, D.C., but when the official paper came back, the name was spelled Alpena. Nobody has ever been sure why the change was made. Perhaps it was as simple as a typographical error. However, the settlers chose to accept the name as n was written and Alpena was born.
Lorraine Woodford Fest of Buckhannon, formerly of Alpena, searched court-house and government records in Elkins trying to ascertain early ownership of land. What she discovered was that proving ownership is a very complex matter. Many land boundaries were defined by trees which have since fallen or died. Mrs. Fest also discovered the following names in association with Alpena:
Morrall, Tavenor, Wyatt, Collett, Arnold, Taylor, Canfield, White, Hoffman, Harper, Morrison, Haymond, Greynolds, Smith, and Woods.
I have added Flanagans and McBees.
In 1870, prior to the arrival of the Swiss people, Mr. DeWitt Clinton Woodford bought several thousand acres of land. After he married in 1873, he bought more land. We do not have a record of exactly how much he bought or where the land boundaries are.
In 1874, Mr. Charles E. Mylius who was born in Wurtemberg, Germany, bought a tract of land about three miles north of Alpena which was known as the Dan Baker land. Mr. Mylius, along with a Mr. Boggess and a Mr. Cressap "sold" to C.E. Lutz the land which is now Alpena. Mylius, Boggess and Cressap acquired the land from the Wyatt's, but no money ever changed hands. Mr. Lutz then "sold" the land to the people in Switzerland who eventually established Alpena as a community.
I have read that the town of Helvetia was caused much hardship by the same land agent Mr. Lutz. In March 1879, even though the people of Helvetia petitioned the government against it, Mr. Lutz was appointed the official agent in charge of persuading settlers to come to West Virginia.
Mr. Christian Hertig told us of reading the wonderful advertisement in Switzerland which so enticingly said, "Come to West Virginia!" The ad went on to say that West Virginia was in America and that Randolph County was inviting immigrants, especially to the Dry Fork District. 'This is," the ad stated, "a land flowing with milk and honey and is already a prospering place."
This invitation, however, was limited to those who had good health and were able to endure hardships during the first five years. Another condition imposed upon the Swiss was that they were required to have in their possession about two hundred dollars after their arrival in West Virginia. (Actually, these two conditions should have sent up the warning flags, but they did not.)
The advertisement also stated, "Dry Fork District has many assets to recommend it . . . no hail nor hurricanes . . . communications by roads and post office with the outside world . . . land not too steep nor stony . . . no insects or animals to fear . . . (I can plainly remember when I was small the panthers and wild cats screaming which made a person's hair stand on end.) . . . excellent soil . . . timber varied and abundant." The land, according to the ad, could be obtained with perfect and clear titles for just three to five dollars per acre. The ad also led me Swiss to believe that the land they were coming to had a working sawmill and that a school would soon be ready. Provisions were reportedly cheap. A good cow could be bought for twenty-five dollars, a horse for sixty, and a sheep for two dollars.
Several people read this advertisement and were soon- making arrangements to come to Dry Fork District. Among them were: Hertig's who operated a grist mill and a bakery in Switzerland; the Joseph Schmidlen's who owned a silk mill (Joseph had a degree in interior decorating and used the silk made in his father's mill for his decorating in Basel, Switzerland); Jakob Knutti's who were a cheese making farm family from Niedfluh and my great-grandfather's family; Jacob and Mary Moser Ratzer who were my grandparents on my mother's side of the family. Jacob was from Lucerne and Mary from Berne. Coming to West Virginia was their honeymoon trip. Others we have heard of were: Agricole, Freydig, VonAllman (of the VonAllman photography studios), Geisberger and Fridley.
These hardy people came on two different ships, the Utopia and the Queen. They landed in New York then boarded a train which brought them to Grafton, WV. From there they traveled by wagon and horses to Philippi and then to the Goddin House near where Elkins is now located.'
It was interesting to discover that the wagon driver was a black man called "Black Charley". After hearing accounts from several sources, I realized that "Black Charley' was the same man I had heard of all of my life as "Charley Tack". Now I find that his real name was Charley Tolliver and he, along with his wife, came to Alpena with the wife of Charles Mylius. Mrs. Mylius' father was a slave owner and this couple stayed on with her and came here.
The next day the immigrants arrived at Shavers Fork River near the Rodman Raines place which is located on Old Route 33 on the east side of Kelly Mountain. Here they learned that they would have to ford the river not once, but seven times before getting to the part of the Seneca Trail that would see them travel up and over Shaver's Mountain. This mountain is very steep so some of the people had to walk up the mountain to help the horses. They then had to tie logs to the wagons and walk down the other side to keep the wagons from going too fast. This night they stayed at Jasper Tipplett's, located near present-day Faulkner.
After crossing Shaver's Mountain, they arrived at what is now the Cunningham driveway on the Glady Road. They were getting excited as they were nearing their new homes. After traveling about a mile further and crossing the Collett Run, the wagoneer Black Charley told them that they had reached the end of the line. He also said that the long log building they saw before them was to be their new home . . . one building for all of them.
Such disappointment! According to Christian Hertig, the building was about forty feet long and stood near where the abandoned Alpena school house is now. There were no windows in this building and no partitions inside, so each family hung blankets between them and the next family for the only available privacy. There were doorways every ten or twelve feet. There were no floors and the building had a clapboard roof. When asked if the building was warm, Mr. Hertig replied, "Why, you could throw a dog through the cracks." The building was "junked" (chunked), mud stuffed between the logs to plug the cracks.
Of course, you have surmised that there was no sawmill, no post office, and no road. The land was very stony and steep. There were lots of wild animals and many insects. There 38 was abundant timber, but without the promised sawmill, it was of little use to the settlers. They did discover an asset in the soil. It was excellent and they eventually raised wonderful crops.
Some families who had the money went back to Switzerland. Others moved to places where they could obtain work. Those who stayed took the only jobs they could find such as cleaning toilets.
The Wyatt's, to whom most of the land belonged, were kind to the settlers. They went so far as to let the settlers sleep in their beds while they went to the barn to sleep. But, since me Wyatts had not received any money for the land from the land speculator, they made the Swiss settlers pay for land they believed they already owned.
Obviously, Alpena was finally settled and those who could, remained. They began to clear land and, by trial and error, raise some crops. They were hungry pan of the time as they could only raise a few things that first year. We are told that the children would talk among themselves about what they had for dinner or supper stretching the truth to include such things as steak and mashed potatoes. The truth was that most of them ate the same fare: cornbread, beans, etc.
The hardy people who were able to stay here in Alpena (some had no choice due to a lack of money) began to build as they cleared land. They soon learned how to do many, many things they had never even known about in Switzerland. Right after they arrived here, they had to begin to think of how they would be able to have food for the winter. They pried up clods of earth and planted a whole handful of corn under it Potatoes did pretty well planted that way, but the trees were still so thick that the corn couldn't get enough light to grow. It was almost a total failure. The settlers survived and soon learned to grow their own vegetables, spin the wool from the sheep they raised, weave the wool into material for clothing and yam to knit into mittens, sweaters and socks. They raised wheat for flour and corn for cornmeal. The vegetables and fruits they were able to raise were dried. I've helped string beans and apple schnitz (quartered apples) on twine strings many times. This was the only means of preserving food that they were aware of at that time. The Schmidlen family told us that they even discovered a way to have dried milk by boiling it down.
Grocery stores were nonexistent around Alpena and me settlers had to walk to Beverly when they needed anything. The only doctor was located in Pickens, WV. Pickens is, at times, difficult to reach today, but back then there were more obstacles man a narrow road and snow. Mike Mylius fell off a roof and broke his arm. His brother, Charles, set his arm and then headed for Pickens. They got 9S far as the Shavers Fork of Cheat at Bowden. The river was flooding and they could not cross. Mr. Mylius brought his son back home. Mike got gangrene in his arm and his farmer eventually had to cut it off. He used no anesthesia and no medical instruments. Mike recovered and his wound healed. He became adept at performing daily tasks with just that one arm. For example, my brother John got his head stuck in a rail fence while ho was playing. My sisters Ginny and Mary Margaret and my brother "Tink" were playing with him but did not know what to do to help him. Mike happened along and being a forest ranger, he always had a hatchet at the ready. Using his one arm, he chopped the rail right above John's neck and freed him without a scratch. John probably put his head in sideways, turned his head upright, and then thought he couldn't get out.
The men took turns trekking to Beverly to get supplies. All of the women were out of table salt and it was Uncle Jake Knutti's turn to go for supplies. When he reached the store he asked for "sautz". He meant salt, but could not pronounce it correctly because of his accent. The people at me store tried in vain to figure out what he needed. Eventually, they gave him 25 pounds and he headed home. When he arrived, they opened me bag to find the store had sent 25 pounds of Epsom Salts. They sure couldn't cook with that Of course, it was more healthy to not use salt
John W. Ray, Ted's brother, brought groceries from Keyser, WV by wagon. he spent many days and nights under that wagon waiting out storms. When my Great Uncle Arnold Cunningham opened a store in the Ratzer house, John Ray delivered groceries to him.
Not too long after the Swiss got settled, a man rode through the settlement he had a hen tied by her feet on one side of his saddle and on the other he had a coffee can with about twelve chicks in it. Grandma Ratzer decided she wanted those chicks, so she put the man up for the night and gave him food. In return, he gave her the chicks. She raised them on oatmeal she ground with her fingers. I believe they all lived.
All of the ladies of this time were accustomed to wearing corsets. To pay for the farm, Grandma Ratzer sold her corsets to another Swiss lady, Eugene Weerley, which left her without a corset. As Grandpa Ratzer butchered hogs, he kept the ribs and filed the sharp ends down. Grandma Ratzer then made a corset from these ribs. (I wonder how she stood it! )
Grandma Ratzer bought the big house with her oldest son Fred's insurance money. He had gone to the dentist to get his teeth pulled. They used Novocain on him and he died. Apparently, he had an allergic reaction to the drug. From the S1000.00 insurance money his mother received, she paid his funeral expenses and bought the house.
The settlers did not have any vinegar which they felt they needed, so being the industrious people that they were, they decided to make some. They boiled rhubarb leaves and water and set it aside. Luckily, after a small taste, they decided it was not good enough. Had they drunk me mixture, it would have killed them because it was poisonous.
There have been many people from Alpena who have led successful lives. Mr. Willis Hertig became a teacher, a principal and retired as Superintendent of Schools in Cabell County. Mr. Willis Hertig Jr. was a Professor at West Virginia University and served as Secretary of Agriculture for the state of West Virginia. He has retired and returned to live in Alpena. There have been many other Alpena residents who have chosen education as a career including Ms. Loraine Woodford Fest and Ms. Virginia Knutti Schmidlen. Alpena has also provided many members of the health field. Dr. Thomas Cox recently retired after serving the Elkins area for many years as a dentist. Flora Knutti See, Ada Hertig Daniels, Inez Woodford and Maxine Cunningham have all served in the nursing field. There are many other Alpena residents who have become successful professionals, too many to mention! All in all, Alpena has shown itself very proud.
Allegheny Regional Family History Society
Post Office Box 1804
Elkins, West Virginia 26241
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