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(Transcribed by Peggy Barriskill Perazzo, December 2005)

"Recollections of A Busy Life,"
By Eli Fayette Ruggles

H. L. Ruggles & Co., Publishers, (published circa 1904)

Chapter XIII.

Off for Houghton Lake.

Just before going we were invited to Mr. Parkhurst's to tea, and of course
we accepted the invitation. Returned home about 8 p.m., and what does all
this mean? Our house alive from top to bottom with men, women and children;
and it was truly a great surprise. A good many said, "We shall miss you and
your family greatly in the church and Sabbath school." I have been some
years before presented with a ten-dollar bible from the Sabbath school.
This evening they presented me with Webster's Unabridged Dictionary. Truly,
the work in the Sabbath school has been a grand success, of which any man
might well be proud. The school has more than doubled in numbers and also
in interest. The school has never been as large since I left it. But
Decatur has been my financial ruin. I came to Decatur a conqueror in all
the business affairs of life that I have had to meet. I go out defeated at
as many points and to a great degree disheartened and discouraged.

But off for Houghton Lake is now the order, and at the depot we wave a
good-bye to Decatur people and away we go. Mr. Edee, wife and daughter are
with us. At Farwell two span of horses take us and goods for two-days'
sleigh ride to Houghton Lake, J. W. Young and man going with the teams.

On the way we looked back as did the Israelites on their bondage, and
having passed the Red Sea they sang their song of deliverance; and we were
all happy in body and mind, for we had just been having a grand revival,
and to us winter was as pleasant as May.

Arriving at Houghton Lake, we drove up in front of decidedly the largest
log house I ever saw. It was truly a hotel, and the first inhabitants to
greet us was a string of eight cats sunning themselves on a rail. Our
coming was not very welcome, for there were others that wanted the same chance.

Next day at night Mr. Hall came (the owner) and contracts were signed, and
we were in for work and lots of it. But the sound of the churchgoing bell
this lake and its shores never hears, nor sighed at the sound of a knell,
nor smiled when the Sabbath appeared.

But the first Sunday we started a Sunday school and the next a mid-week
prayer meeting, and then we found there were lamps that had been hidden
under a bushel, because of the over-powering presence of great sinners.
Everyone treated us civilly and with respect, but when in their own company
it was swearing, smoking, chewing, drinking. The beautiful lake was just in
front of the farm, only the road between; and such great, nice fish I never
saw before or since. And the venison, too, reminded me of earliest Hartford
days. The farm was a two hundred acre sea of stumps. The barn was low but
warm. But the housekeeping. An inventory is made of the barrels of flour,
pork, crackers, etc., sugar by the barrel. When these are gone I drive to
Roscommon, twenty-five miles and get a load of groceries and grain for
horses. When the autumn is past I settle and pay in hay what is not paid in
boarding men. Myrtie taught this district school when fourteen years of
age. Thousands of stumps were pulled and burned. Bought mowing machine and
horse rake.

Mr. Hall's horses ran at large ever summer, and it was provoking to find
that horses had broken over the fence and were in the growing crops. One
day Will and Mr. Edee were driving horses out of the growing oats when all
at once one horse had a broken leg. Maybe he broke his leg by running, who
knows? Edee was lucky at fishing or after a deer, and a good worker, but
the natives did like to worry him in every way possible.

Ran two logging jobs two winters and made some money at it. Mr. Hall came
and settled with me the first year, and kept promising to settle after
that, but never came. Will went to Ann Arbor to school. The last year here
Harry taught school. But most of the time the boys are at home and the
girls are getting larger and life at Houghton Lake begins to have serious
objections.

The men who come and go are having their influence - tempting in every way
possible to get the boys to take a drink - just a little, just a taste;
offers of cigars to smoke. Swearing was common talk. Viola was, at the end
of four years, breaking down under the nervous strain, and I began to lay
plans to get away and save the children and wife. I could meet all these
ills without harm, but the rest could not.

I went to Cadillac and bought a small house and lot, and Viola and the
girls and Harry were moved to Cadillac and the children entered the school.
Will and self stayed longer at the farm to sell and finish up. I should
have stated that I had been unable to see Mr. Hall and could get no
settlement, and there was a thousand dollars my due. Then I learned that
Mr. Hall had swindled a Mr. Thompson of Chicago out of fifty thousand
dollars on a sale of pine lands, and Hall had made an assignment of all he
had to the Hall Lumber Company, and I could get nothing. So good-bye to the
most we had earned at the Houghton Lake farm. One day a telegram came from
Cadillac saying diphtheria, signed Viola.

That forty-five mile ride seemed a long one to Will and I. I thought it was
Lena that was sick, for she was not as rugged as was Iva, and we were in
suspense till I drove up near the house and Viola came to the door, saying
"Iva is better."

Well, that was a joyful relief, for it might have been death instead of
life. An allopathic doctor had said he could not save her, and Viola called
a homoeopath, and in a few hours she was improving.

Settled up all business at Houghton Lake and joined family at Cadillac.
Raised the little house, filled the lot, built an upright in front,
painted, set shade trees, kept a good garden. Traded for forty acres one
mile out from town and fooled away lots of time on that. Found that I could
not live at that poor dying rate, and went to Chicago to see what I could
find. Found D. S. Baldwin living at Ridgeland, a western suburb of Chicago,
and carpenter work was in good demand, and I bought a hammer, square, saw,
chisels and a set of bits and then said, "I am a carpenter." Found work and
did my best to earn my wages, and didn't get discharged very often.

And yet I knew what a pleasant feeling comes over a man to be told, "I
guess we haven't work for you any further." But I was soon at it again for
another man. sent for my family and we were soon living at Oak Park, in a
house on South Kenilworth avenue, where we lived three years, and the
children in school with good surroundings, and every Sabbath good church
privileges. I soon bought a cow and later had four cows. Lived one year on
South Grove. Had good wages and plenty of work, especially, to do a full
day's work and milk and care for four or five cows and sell the milk to my
neighbors.

Sold the property in Cadillac to Mr. Edee. Bought two lots at an auction
sale of lots on Wenonah avenue, south of Madison street.

Rent was very high because of the Chicago Exposition, and we determined to
get under a roof of our own. You recollect that I said I was a carpenter.
So, of course, I could build my own house. The first of May came and the
house we occupied was wanted that day. Our goods were stored in the
basement for a few days. That night came the heaviest fall of rain we ever
had since I came to Oak Park. That basement was filled with water. Most of
our best things were spoiled. I had but part of the house up and half
roofed, but the goods had to be taken out of that basement or all would
spoil. The prairie was so soft that the team could not get to our
half-house, so were unloaded nearly a block away (no paved streets at that
time). But the sidewalks were all built in this new subdivision, so we
wheeled and carried goods on the cement pavement and piled them in part of
the to-be-house. We all said - and still say - that we never enjoyed life
better than when building up this, our new home, in this very primitive way.

Willie Lincoln found employment with the C. & N. W. R. R. Co., then later
received his diploma from the Medical College in Chicago as M.D. Harry
worked for Mr. Weed in the grocery when not in school. Then for a Mr. Clark
in the laundry business. Then in school at Evanston College. Then began
soliciting for a printing firm in Chicago. But he can tell his own story.

I worked at carpenter work for about five years, when I increased the
number of cows and bought milk, and that took all my time.

One day I received a telegram that Brother Freman was very sick. Crossed
the lake to Benton Harbor; then Lewis went with me to Hartford. Freman was
conscious most of the time and was glad to see us, but said he could not
stay here long. He mind was with his boyhood days, and he would talk and
sing songs of the long ago. We returned home, but ten days later a telegram
told of his departure.

Then Lewis and I attended the funeral and Freman was laid to rest in a new
cemetery on the hill south of Hartford. Two years before this I received a
letter telling of the death of Fernando in California. Then one year later
came a letter telling of the death of Lyman.

Westley was at this time sick at D.S.B.'s in Oak Park and doctoring in
Chicago. He improved some and Westley and wife returned to Iowa City, but
soon began to fail rapidly, and D. S. went and helped to bring him again to
his house on a cot, and here he kept failing till life went out, and that
was the fourth brother that had gone to the spirit world in the past three
years, leaving Lewis and I of the seven brothers.

Brother Westley was laid to rest on the bank of the Desplaines River in the
Forest Home Cemetery.

In the spring of 1901 I found that some of the nails in the roof near the
chimney were rusting off and shingles getting loose, so I went on to the
roof with shingle, hammer and nails to repair around the chimney. Just
before finishing there came a quick spring shower, and soon the roof was
thoroughly wet. I finished the repairs and stepped on the short ladder that
I had placed the foot of in the gutter. The ladder slipped off the wet
roof, taking both feet from under me, and threw me back on the ladder, and
then shot off that roof in an instant, and I stopped only when I arrived at
the earth again. The concussion was sufficient to spurt blood from mouth
and nose, and ankles, hips and shoulders all had a great strain, and a
continued lameness in both hips is the only reason I offer for having time
to write this, my thoughts of my busy life.

Review.

I have written but a small part of what I have experienced in my journey of
life. And now, as I look back, I cannot say that it is a misspent life or a
failure, for much has been accomplished and much good done, and I can truly
say the world is the better for my having lived in it. One writer has said
that he is a philanthropist who causes two spears of grass to grow where
but one grew before.

Many acres have been cleared, many miles of road built, many acres of grain
gone to help feed the world. Many houses and barns built by the labor of my
hands. A family of children have been reared that are now hewing their own
way in life.

But the mistakes of my life have been many. The failures, to judge right,
have been more. And were I to again start in life without these years of
experience to guide me, I should be again making mistakes. As I now see it,
it was a mistake when father and my older brothers, in moving from Ohio,
did not stop near Kalamazoo, buying a part prairie and part timber, and
hitch on the plow and at the start have a cleared farm of rich soil,
instead of plunging into the great unbroken forest of Hartford, where it
took half a lifetime to get a start.

Those great walnut, whitewood and ash trees may have looked grand and
beautiful, but they were of no value at that time. One walnut measured nine
feet in diameter at the stump. There are walnut rails on that old farm
to-day, split out of walnut logs that in later years were worth ninety
dollars per thousand feet. The stumps from those trees were in after years
blown out of the ground with dynamite and brought more money than was paid
for the tree. Beautiful carved wood gun stocks, etc., were made of those
stump roots.

One mistake was when I sold the old farm where I had lived twenty-four
years, and the time came to move out, and I came to the clock and opened
the door, and stopped the pendulum - it seemed like an electric shock, and
it came to me as an omen of ill. Years later, when it seemed that fates
were against me, I wished that I had allowed the clock to keep on ticking
and I had kept it company. Had we remained there we could easily have added
the Carey farm, making 230 acres. The War of the Rebellion came on at that
time, and for several years prices for all farm produce were very high, and
just at that time we were in Decatur buying our living at those high
prices. At this time, when I realized my financial loss, was when I prayed
most earnestly that God would yet enable me to give to my children a good
education, and to be self-supporting, which prayer has been granted, and
for which I praise His all glorious name to-day.

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