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Memories &
Stories Swanson - Stutz Families |
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| Mrs.
Dawson, a lifelong resident of Aurelia, can reach way back into a
storehouse of memories for interesting sidelights on the development of
her hometown. Some incidents she remembers, personally, others come from reminiscences of her grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Charles Stutz, immigrants from Germany who came to Aurelia in 1881 and Mr. and Mrs. Henry Swanson, originally from Sweden who came to Aurelia in 1888. Mrs. Dawson’s reflections are of another era, age of non-automation, an age of mid-wives, a simpler society. For instance, what child of today knows the mysteries of churning butter? Mrs. Dawson remembers being sent to the creamery on Hill and Beech Streets to get butter in a small white crock and being fascinated by the huge churn. “They would pack the butter in the crock; weigh it, and I think it cost 25 cents for two pounds, because I remember losing a quarter once when I was going after butter,”, she recalled. “Also, we could get buttermilk free, just by taking in a bucket with a lid. I kept that little white butter crock for a long time,”, she said. The creamery was later remodeled into a house by William Swanson. Civic leaders in this town celebrating “A century of Friendliness” were as conscious then as now to the needs of the town and when a need existed, they banded together and moved to fulfill that need. For example, in early 1900, the town needed a hotel. The original had burned. So, four businessmen, Mose Mummert, Clarence Morgan, Joe Lockin and Charles Lockin, Sr., formed a company and built a hotel in 1907. When it came time to name the new facility, the four men put their names in a hat and drew…the Lockin name was drawn so it became known as The Lockin Hotel. The hotel is no longer used but it still stands in mute testimony to an earlier dream. The first operator, Mrs. Dawson, thinks, was Mr. Junger, first name not known. In 1913, E. W. Hill and his wife took over. Mrs. Hill ran the hotel, and Mr. Hill was depot agent. Mrs. Dawson said she believes the earliest hotel for the town, was located where the Lockin Insurance is now and was run by her aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Fred Norman. This lifetime citizen of Aurelia had a front row seat on main street of town for many years. She and her first husband, John Mummert, had a hardware store until his death in 1947. Later she married Ward Dawson, also deceased. Other memories include the wooden frame schoolhouse where she graduated with a class of eight in 1914. This school built in 1889 after a fire had destroyed the first school stood on the ground now developed into the city park. She has first hand memories of the slaughter house. The slaughtering house was actually located in the country to provide meat for the butcher shop. Her uncle, Henry Stutz made sausage and bologna and she remembers going to the butcher shop and getting these goodies “hot, right out of the hot water as it was cooking.” Getting a hat was not the simple experience of walking into a shop and trying on various styles until you find the one that suited you. In the earlier days, getting a hat meant going to a millinery shop, and get ting perhaps just the base of o the hat and then choosing your own trimming from a bewildering array of ribbons, flowers and feathers. Horsehair hats were the ultimate in fancy headgear. In may cases, hats were made from “scratch”…beginning with only the barest of a form for a base. “My grandmother, Mrs. Charles Stutz was a midwife who delivered many babies around the area while raising nine children of her own,” Mrs. Dawson marveled, “and she lived to be 91.” Stutz, originally from Germany was a boot maker in Boston before coming to Aurelia. After arrival here he fixed shoes and did a great deal of carpentry work. His sons, Lou, Henry, Will and John had the cement works for many years “down across the tracks.” Several homes in Aurelia were originally built by either grandfather Stutz or his sons. Or if not built by them many contain some of their cement works. There is an interesting story to be told concerning her other grandfather, Henry Swanson. It seems Swanson had an avid aversion to the automobile and would never ride in one unless absolutely forced to. He died in January during a bad winter storm and was taken to his final resting place on a bobsled…a victory in death over the modern mode of travel. (Source: Former Cherokee County Historical Society scrapbook) |
