President Taft Visits Shakopee

Written by guest blogger, Charles Pederson

1911 was a quiet year, with low-key world and U.S. events. The Spanish-American War had been over for more than 10 years, and the storm clouds of World War I were likewise years in the future. The Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company (later known as IBM) was incorporated that year. Ground was broken for construction on Fenway Park, the modern baseball stadium for the Boston Red Sox.

A quiet year, but by October 1911, Scott County was abuzz with talk about a coming earth-shaking event. Or at least, there was mild interest. William Howard Taft, once Teddy Roosevelt’s vice president and now himself a candidate for reelection as U.S. president, planned to pass through Minnesota on a reelection campaign tour. One of his planned stops was the railway station in Shakopee, Minnesota.

President Taft speaks at the Shakopee Depot, October 24th, 1911. Photo from the SCHS Collections.

In the spring of 1911, a bitter personal feud between Taft and Roosevelt had culminated in Roosevelt’s challenging Taft for the Republican nomination. Historian Peri Arnold noted that “the resulting campaign . . . was the first in which a sitting President campaigned in state primaries.” Taft won the nomination, though consequently, a resentful Roosevelt started his own new, competing party, the Bull Moose Party.

Because campaigning in individual states had worked well for the primaries, Taft continued the practice into October for the 1911 general election. He included a train journey through southern Minnesota, and on the schedule for October 24 were stops in Shakopee and other nearby towns.

Before the visit, the Scott County Argus reported on the preparations being made. These included, of course, local and state politicians, as well as dozens of sheriff’s deputies who would constitute a protective cordon around the train station and a town band that would serenade the president into and back out of town. An Argus reporter breathlessly explained that “the highest official in the world” would receive the respects of his fellow citizens. “It may well be said, ‘the president’s position is greater than a king’s,’ for he holds the place not by accident of birth but by the suffrage” of U.S. voters.

A few days after the event, on October 27, the Argus reported the results of the visit. A respectably sized crowd of about 2,000 people came from the county and neighboring municipalities to hear the president speak. The speaking platform had been prepared for the august visitor. It was decked out with U.S. flags and with local products, including locally grown corn, Shakopee bricks, and beverages from the Jacob Ries Bottling Works, which produced ginger ale and sparkling water right there in Shakopee.

In Mankato during the same campaign tour, Taft received a raucous welcome, according to the Blue Earth County Historical Society. “People arrived in every kind of vehicle from one-horse chaises to automobiles.” In contrast, the Argus reported that among the Shakopee citizens gathered at the local train station, “there was no show of enthusiasm,” though the crowd did listen carefully to what Taft had to say. After a brief 15-minute speech, according to the Argus, Taft boarded his train and left for other stops in Minnesota.

Crowd gathered to hear President Taft speak in Shakopee on October 24th, 1911. Photo from the SCHS Collections

Taft no doubt had held out great hope for his strategy of barnstorming personal appearances. The effort, however, seems to have fizzled. The very popular Roosevelt and his Bull Moose Party clawed away most of Taft’s Republican support. At least partly because of the split, neither man carried the election. Instead the Democrat, Woodrow Wilson, won by a landslide. His 435 electoral votes crushed Taft’s third-place votes, four each from Vermont and Utah. Shakopee’s voters mirrored the national vote. Out of 450-some voters, almost 290 voted for Wilson and 89 for Roosevelt. Taft trailed third with about 75 votes.

Taft in some ways may have been fortunate not to regain the White House. World War I began only three short years later, and as the editor of the Scott County Argus presciently wrote in 1911, “To be President of the United States for the next four years will be no easy job for there is much to be done and it must be done in the right way.”

Union Hill Baseball

According to a 1996 New Prague Times article “When Union Hill comes up in conversation of area residents several things come to mind. There’s the church, a bar, a few houses and oh yes! The ballpark! Union Hill and baseball have become nearly synonymous” 

Don Giesen was 16 when that first team was formed. He said “It seems we’ve always had a big baseball tradition. The kids used to play ball in cow pastures and backyards”. Don’s uncle and father decided to build a baseball field the field was “tiled, well kept, and in immaculate shape” 

In 1956 Union Hill first fielded a team in the Dakota-Rice-Scott baseball league. That team, The Indians, played their home games in that brand new ballpark, West of County Road 7, across from the bar

As Don Giesen remembers, the original board of directors for the Union Hill ballclub were Frank Giesen, Jake Giesen, Cletus Witt, Bill Giesen and Edward Pint. 

Early star players of Union Hill baseball included Dennis and Pat Sharkey, Jin Walker, Pat Halloran, Tom Ruhland, Albert Ruhland Jr, Don and Bob Giesen, Bill Witt, and Ron and Jerry Pint.

Shakopee in Scott County History

by SCHS Volunteer, Charles Pederson

The name Shakopee has a fascinating place in Scott County history. The city known today by that name was originally incorporated in 1851 by Thomas Holmes, a trader at the site of the present-day city. Holmes named it for the local leader of the Dakota people living at the site. But the history of the name goes much deeper than that.

Dakota people have lived in the area of present-day Shakopee for millennia. By the 1800s, Europeans traveling through the area, including French mapmaker Joseph Nicollet, mentioned the Dakota and their leader, Shakopee. Nicollet referred to the “village of the Six” during his travels in the area during the late 1830s. The name Shakopee has appeared in numerous phonetic variations, among them Shakpe, Zhaagobe, and Jack-O-Pa. Although the spelling differs according to the chronicler, historians agree that the term was not a single person’s name but rather a title passed from father to son. 

The First and Second Shakopees

The original Shakopee acquired his title in the early 1800s when his wife gave birth to sextuplets. In the Dakota language, “Shakopee” means “the six.” The original Shakopee died at Fort Snelling around 1830. After the first Shakopee’s death, his son became the second Shakopee and led the people until 1860. 

Shakopee the Third

The best-known of the Shakopee leaders was the third of that title. Eotaka, at age 54, took leadership of his people in 1860, after his father died. Eotaka’s title was slightly altered: “Shakpedan,” which means “Little Six.”

Several years after the so-called U.S.–Dakota War, which had raged along the Minnesota River valley from August to December 1862, Shakopee and another Dakota leader, Medicine Bottle, were arrested near the Canadian border for their alleged role in the conflict. Transported to and held at Fort Snelling, the two men were tried and executed by hanging on November 11, 1865. Shortly before the hangings, the Saint Paul Pioneer Press, though not sorry about the men’s death, stated that “it would have been more creditable if some tangible evidence of their guilt had been obtained. . . . No white man, tried by a jury of his peers, would be executed upon the testimony thus produced.”

Eotaka was the last Dakota leader to be called Shakpe. His name, of course, is commemorated at the Little Six Casino in Prior Lake and in the name of the city of Shakopee.

A Few Early Settlers of Union Hill

The Hauer Family

The Hauer family included five brothers, four of them civil war veterans. They were Andrew, Jacob, Matthias, Nicholas (Klaus) and Nicholas (Nick). The family also had a daughter named Margaret. They moved to the area in 1867

Only Mathias and Nicholas (Klaus) remained in this area after long-term. Andrew moved to Fort Dodge, Iowa and Jacob left and settled near Montgomery. Nicholas (Nick) lived briefly in Iowa before settling in the town of Belle Plaine. In later years he returned to Union Hill and lived with his niece. 

The children belonged to Nicholas and Eva Schlinker Hauer who brought their family from Trier, Germany. They first settled in Michigan, but did not like it and moved to St Paul around 1850. Although they remained in Union Hill, the elder Nicholas Hauer is noted as saying for the rest of his life that he wished he had never left St Paul. 

In August of 1861, Matthias, Jacob and Andrew enlisted in the Union Army to fight in the Civil War The three boys served with the Minnesota Second Infantry Regiment, and all three were discharged at the end of the conflict in 1865. Nicholas (Klaus) joined them in the military in 1864 when he was drafted into the Minnesota Fourth Infantry Regiment. Amazingly, none of the four sons suffered injury during their time in the military. 

In 1865, Matthias  was married to Mary Peters of St. Benedict. They were the first couple to be married in St. John's, and although their marriage took place in Union Hill, they had known each other as children and even been neighbors in Germany. 

Nicholas (Klaus) Hauer lived to be 96. Before he left for the Civil War, he married Gertrude Renneberg at her home in Shakopee. The couple had ten children: eight sons and two daughters. 

The Schoenecker Family

Nicholas Schoenecker is believed to be the first European American settler in the Union Hill area. He arrived from Waxweiler, Germany in 1852 and purchased  section 25 of Belle Plaine Township. This land was still in the family over 100 years later. 

Six years after his arrival in Union Hill, Nicholas briefly returned to Germany after the death of his father. When he returned, he brought back his mother Katherine, his brother Matt Schoenecker, and Matt’s wife Anna Maria. Katherine passed away in 1868 and was the first adult buried in St John’s Cemetery at Union Hill. 

In 1867, Nicholas was elected as spokesman for the community in their attempt to convince the Bishop Grace in St. Paul to assign a permanent priest to the community. 

Matt and Anna Maria lived to celebrate their golden wedding anniversary. They had five sons and five daughters. Nicholas married Katherina Lochen and they raised a family of six boys

The Witt Family

Carl Witt and their four children came from Wangerin, Germany to LaCrosse, Wisconsin in 1857. In 1859 the family relocated to begin farming in the Birch Coulee area of the Minnesota River Valley in Renville County near Morton, Minnesota. Three years later, Mrs. Whitt was killed by a stray bullet during the US Dakota War of 1862. One of their children, Carl Witt Jr. was also wounded After her death, the family packed up their possessions and moved into Fort Ridgley, where a doctor was able to tend to Carl’s wounds. The family remained for a time at Fort Ridgely, before traveling with other families who had lost their homes in the conflict to New Ulm, and later Belle Plaine. 

After a brief stay in Belle Plaine, the Witt family went to stay with Franz Giesen in Union Hill. Carl Witt Sr. later married Mrs. John Giesen, a widow with two children.

Union Hill and St John's Church

Union Hill 

The community of Union Hill is located partly in Belle Plaine Township in the southern part of Scott County, and partly in Le Sueur County. 

The original European American settlers of Union Hill mostly came from the same area- from within 50 miles between Bonn and Trier in Western Germany near the border of Luxembourg on the west and the Rhine River on the east. They settled in the Union Hill area starting in 1857. g

These immigrants would have considered themselves Prussian, and they spoke a form of low German. In spite of the geographical proximity, there were actually some language discrepancies in Union Hill at its founding. Families from Waxweiler pronounced some words differently than families from Alendorf even though the communities were less than 25 miles apart. 

There was a strong motivation for these immigrants to come to Minnesota. At a time when farming was a key to financial independence, politics at the time rendered land ownership almost impossible for this group of Prussians in Europe. Prussia also demanded military service from men, and some chose to leave to avoid this duty. 

St John’s Church

The cornerstone of the community was St John’s The Evangelist Roman Catholic Church, which the settlement of Union Hill sprang up around. It was constructed in 1867, and the first High Mass was given in July of that year. 

The building of the original church did not come easily. It was described at the time as the “culmination of ten years of struggle” This struggle included a church made of wooden logs that parishioners built in 1860 two miles from the present church, only to be told that it could not be consecrated because of its proximity to St Benedict's Church. 

The 1867 church lasted for 16 years, when it was replaced in 1883 by a larger building, which still serves to this day. 

In 1983, the New Prague Times published a translation of a piece written by Albert and Victorian Rushland, sharing Albert’s memories of St. John’s Parish. The piece was shared in commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the new church. 

Albert remembered that the original church was very difficult to build “The roads were very bad so two or three oxen were coupled together, and so it went through thick and thin” 

The church started its days with a series of pastors from Germany, who stayed as long as they were able, and then returned to their home country. Eventually, father Schnek stayed two years, but “during this period he had the misfortune of having his horses run away from him, when he fell under his wagon and broke his leg”.

The next priest, Father Deusterman, requested 17 dollars a month for his services, to which the author reported replying “Oh ho” incredulously Deusterman also wanted a school for the church, which Albert Ruhland agreed was important. Ruhland went to collect money for the project with him, and described the venture thusly: 

“Ya, I told him, I want to bring you to the best man we have in the parish, A. Lochen. And so we went to Lochen. When we arrived, Mr Lochen asked

 ‘What do you want here?’

‘We want to collect for the new school’

‘So I will give nothing. Let others do for the parish as we have already done, We already have a school’

Then Father Deusterman said ‘I did not come here for a sermon, I can do that myself. If you will not give, I will put you down for zero’. Lochen replied ‘As far as I am concerned you can put me down for two zeros, it is all the same to me. 

I then begged Deusterman to give me his list of parishioners. And so he gave me the list and I went right back to Lochen. He said ‘Oh! What is it now!’. I replied ‘You know this will not do. There should be a school at the parish’. ‘Ya’ he replied. I told him I would give 10 dollars. ‘All right, he said, I will give 10 dollars too’. Then I went to M. Schoenecker, and he gave the same.  Nick Schoenecker also and N, Lenz. Also Schommer, Theo Lochen, R Rech and Kramer. Also Bartel Schoenecker. And so the school was built.” 

This occurred in 1873. The completed school was a two story frame building 20’ by 40’ square. Soon after a teacher’s residence was added. Unfortunately, an 1894 fire destroyed both buildings. They were rebuilt in 1895, and stood until 1920 when they were again destroyed by fire. 

Ruhland’s favorite priest was Father Mathias, who came to the church in 1880. He noted “All that could walked to the church even with terrible weather. The church was always full. And how nice it was on the communion rail. It was gratifying to see everyone trying to make peace with their god. He also met with the children during their first hour of school” 

By 1883 there was a clear need for a larger church, and the community came together to build one. Ruhland noted proudly “The new church upon completion stands there with no debts. All was paid for by donation, with all our hauling and own labor”. 

Upon its dedication Jordan Advocate described the new church as “one of the finest churches in the country” 

Like many other Scott County churches, the parishioners of St Johns celebrated its anniversaries with pomp and flair. 

In 1916, they marked their Golden Jubilee with “religious services, exercises, and meals for all by the ladies of the parish”. The New Prague times assured readers that services and speeches would be conducted in “The English, German, and Bohemian languages”. Afterwards, the Jordan Independent reported that “many visiting priests were present and the home congregation increased by hundreds of visitors”. In the evening there “was a picnic in the nearby grove and young folks presented a drama in the parish hall. On monday there were church services in the morning and a dance in the evening”. 

1940’s Diamond Jubilee was a grand affair. At 10am ceremonies started with an orchestra performance and procession to the church. During the day there were “songs speeches and lunch”, sandwiched by morning and evening sermons. 

The 140th anniversary was marked in 2006. The event coincided with the 90th birthday of Father Elgar, who at the time had been the pastor at St. John’s for 40 years. The event was held in a huge tent set up on the lawn of the church and included a meal, speeches, and “visiting dignitaries”