First home   Carl de Haas, Richard McMillan’s great-grandfather, emigrated to Calumet, Wisconsin, in 1847. This image of his first homestead comes from Winke fur Auswanderer, his book of advice for emigrants, widely sold in Germany.

Winke für Auswanderer: Hints for Emigrants
VII. Life in America: Weather and Land

Here, late in the pamphlet, Carl explains American weather, including tornadoes and wider-ranging temperatures than emigrants would leave behind in Germany, and explores the details of owning, clearing, and farming the land. It is back-breaking work.

I shall now describe the land whose citizen I shall be until death, if God wills.

Concerning climate conditions, I can report only a little because that would take years of experience. Furthermore, everyone asserts that the weather we have met up to the present is unusual. The extremely rapid change of weather and all that goes with it is characteristic for all America. Six weeks ago, I observed on my thermometer at 6 a.m. 2° below zero (Réaumur scale) and at noon 18° above in the shade; on October 10 at 6 a.m. it was 1° below zero and at noon 18° above in the shade and 23° in the sun. On October 11 at 7 a.m. it was 2.5° below zero, at 9 a.m. 7° above, and at 12 noon 16° in the shade, 23° in the sun. There was a thick layer of ice on the water pail in the morning on these three days, and by noon one could scarcely work because of the heat. As a result of the unusually low temperature during-some summer nights this year, corn and buckwheat were frozen in many places in the middle of the hot season. Although this extreme was unusual even here, a daily difference of 10 degrees in temperature is quite usual.

I have never experienced such beautiful warm October days in Germany as the past ten days have been. The winter cold is rather severe here, but according to what I have heard, not more severe than in Berlin. Furthermore, it does not last long, and mild weather always follows a few cold days. The trees lose their foliage between the middle and end of October and turn green again from early to mid-April. One consequence of the rapid change in temperature seems to be the speed with which organic materials decay. Fallen trees decay relatively fast, and squab and partridge must be fried the same day they are shot, if they are not to spoil. The poisonous products of this rapid decomposition of organic remains, whether they go into the air or the water, cause the violent and in cases very dangerous fever, which one finds everywhere in America. I spoke with several people in Milwaukee who had had bad attacks of the “cold fever.”

Here on the contrary there are few cases of this sickness, and I have not yet met anyone here who has had it. The unusually healthful character of this region is due to its location between lakes. Fresh pure air comes on one side from Lake Winnebago and on the other from Lake Michigan. The west wind, coming from the former, is by far the most frequent and generally the most violent. Every three or four days a storm wind sweeps across the land and takes the infectious products of decay out over the lakes. These frequent winds are probably the main reason that this region is so extraordinary healthful. They are not particularly troublesome, since they usually blow at night. In the. evening, shortly after sundown, the air becomes restless, gradually the movement becomes stronger, and sometimes so violent in the night that it shakes the house. It is rarely so violent, however, that it blows down trees or lifts the house roofs, and when this happens it is only in small areas.

Four years ago one of these hurricanes passed over part of our land and saved us a good deal of work by blowing down one part of the forest. Oak trees four feet in diameter lay with their roots in the air, others broke into many pieces above the roots. The roof was blown off our neighbor’s house, but no other damage was done. Frequently these winds are accompanied by storms, of which we have seen 12 or 16 during our stay here. The storms are sometimes very severe, and lightning flashes come closer together than I have ever seen them in Germany. The lightning flash seems to be wider here, and to travel less distance and slower than in Germany. I have not found that this climate robs faces of their healthy red color, although the native Americans are generally paler; in contrast the Germans, both men and women, look very fresh and healthy.

The earth here consists generally of a gray-brown to coal- black surface soil, with clay or clay-like sand beneath, which covers the rocks to a depth of 15 to 50 feet. Only in very few places, which are considered rarities, does the rock appear. The layer of black surface soil makes a gradual transition into the clay or sand; it is nowhere 15 feet deep, as the books say, and is seldom more than five feet deep. It is the product of the rapid decay of vegetation, which has been growing and passing for thousands of years. It grew undisturbed by man as well as by the violence of the subterranean fire which raised so many barren rocky ranges to the light in Europe. As far as I know, one finds no volcanic phenomena in all of Wisconsin. The larger and smaller rubble in the soil shows by its rounded shape that it was carried along by streams. These rolling-stones, the smallest of which is about the size of a hen’s egg, consist most frequently of granite, gneiss or limestone of different varieties, and lie everywhere in greater or smaller numbers on the surface or so near it, that they must be cleared away to prepare the land for cultivation. If they are present in not too great numbers, they furnish a convenient material for building cellars, wells, foundations, etc. If they are too numerous, their removal is a troublesome task, which should be kept in mind at the purchase of such land. With the largest rocks, which several yoke of oxen cannot pull away, one digs holes and buries them in the earth so that plow and harrow pass over them.

There are sometimes trees growing on such land, so close together that one cannot see more than 15 to 30 paces away, or there may be grass, sedge, or other cereals growing there. In the former case, the land is called woods, or dense bush, In the second case, if the ground is wet and swampy even in summer it is called marsh land. If the ground is dry in the summer, the land is called prairie. On the edges of prairies there are areas, where grass and weeds grow, but also trees, far enough apart to give a view of the prairie even at a distance. These are called openings. Such openings also occur not infrequently in dense forests, especially along the banks of rivers. The humus soil of the dense bush is generally the deepest and most fertile if its trees are deciduous. Coniferous woods are not used for farming. If one lives near such a woods, which is not yet sold, one takes tamarack trunks (a sort of evergreen) for the construction of the house, stalls and fences. The underbrush in the dense woods is burned off, the greater part of the trees are chopped down, and usually burned also, if they are not used for logs or rails. The biggest trees are usually left standing for the time being, but are notched all around a few inches deep, so that they soon die and fall of their own accord, especially if they have also been burned at the roots. Usually one leaves a few shade trees, such as maple and hickory. One plows and harrows around these, as around the remaining stumps, which are cleared away in the course of years. Thus one can have very fertile soil in this manner.

But in spite of the fertility of the land, the immigrant will rarely feel at home in the dense woods. I traveled from Calumet back to Milwaukee on a straight road which went mostly through dense forest. In the middle of it I met a family from Cologne, who had arrived this spring and had claimed a piece of land. There were a number of children who ran about, playing happily, but all were too young and weak to do any hard work. The poor man, all alone, was to clear fields and meadows out of this land covered with oaks two or three feet in diameter, and with a network of innumerable roots. He was supposed to clear away the forest, where with great labor he had just cleared enough space for his house and yard. He had only one neighbor, an hour away, and the church was eight English miles from his farm. He did not look happy, his money was gone, but fortunately not his courage. It will be hard for this man, but he will make his way. Ask him after three or four years whether he regrets his journey to the New World.

Prairie soil is usually too damp for farming, but if it is dry, it is usually very fertile. Nevertheless, even if that is the case, I do not advise the immigrant to buy only prairie, for although the wood supply in America is still unlimited and one may simply take wood from any land that is still unsold and uncleared, it is still desirable to have the necessary wood supply on one’s own property, especially in order to avoid the difficult transportation from far away points. Wood is the farmers only building material and fuel. It is not as if there were no other, for there are lots of stones and plenty of clay. Coal has been found nearly everywhere in America where they have looked for it, but the American prefers to use his axe rather than a stonecutter’s chisel. He would rather chop down his big trees and put them together roughly chopped, carefully joined only at the ends, to make a log house, than to split them and bake laboriously formed bricks in their flame. He hollows out a tree-trunk to make a drinking trough for cattle. He makes sleds and carts from logs, and for wheels he uses two large disks cut from a sturdy log.

Openings are the areas most to be recommended to immigrants. They can easily be cleared of trees and bushes; the ground is not hard to turn over for there are not too many large roots. Since they usually have grass, they can easily be converted into meadow-land. In our settlement there is charming variety in the alternation of prairie, openings, and dense woods so that we have an appropriate amount of all three on our piece of land, as I have already mentioned.

The first work for the immigrant who is buying uncultivated land is as follows. The place must be cleared where house and barns are to stand; the wood is used as fuel. Then a suitable piece of rich land must be chosen, cleared, and turned over with a special plow for that purpose. If the land is prairie, two yoke of oxen usually suffice. In the openings, one needs three yoke and in the dense forests usually more. Neighbors usually help each other at the breaking of land, and each brings his oxen. One can almost always hire oxen (except in harvest time). One yoke costs four shillings a day (i.e., 21 1/4 Silbergroschen.) The plow for breaking land has, like almost all American plows, no wheels, and is made of cast iron except for the foremost point which is forged, and the wooden handle. It cuts a rectangular clod about 9 inches and 3 inches foot deep and throws it over the side. It cuts smaller one-inch tree roots and all roots of bushes very easily when properly drawn. The one who guides the plow has a difficult task. He must help with his feet when the clods are stubborn, and not infrequently gets dangerous blows from the elastic roots. One can have his land cleared for $3 to $10 per acre, depending on the degree of difficulty of the task. A farmhand is paid 6 to 8 shillings per day and board.

Almost without exception winter wheat is planted in freshly broken ground, because it is by far the most successful. The land is broken between May and July, harrowed between mid-August and mid-September, sowed immediately after and then harrowed in a double furrow. If the land was broken early, buckwheat can be grown on it before sowing the winter wheat. The latter is cut down in early September, the wheat is sown without first plowing and harrowing, and the land is thoroughly harrowed after sowing. It is not necessary to fertilize the soil.

When the immigrant has cleared and broken the land, the most suitable of the trees which have been chopped down should be split with iron wedges (a wedge costs $1) into pieces 12 feet long and 4 to 6 inches in width and depth, which need be done however with no special care. These pieces, called rails, are used to fence the house, yard and cultivated land. This fencing is done in the following manner: the thickest rails are laid together on the ground in a zig-zag pattern, so that the straight lines which would join their corners are about five feet apart; over this first row of rails a second row is laid, and a third, etc, until the fence has the height of four feet prescribed by law. At the corners the rails lie like the fingers when the hands are folded. Fences built in this manner stand by their own weight and often remain without props; to increase their strength, however, props are usually placed at the corners. These are wooden poles which are driven into the ground on both sides of the fence-corners and crossed. The last rails are then placed over them.

Rail-splitting is difficult work, but many men have a curious skill in this line. If men are hired to do the splitting, the price is $6.50 to $7.50 per thousand rails. Six to seven thousand rails are needed to fence 80 acres. If the cultivated land adjoins a neighbor’s, each party builds half of the common fence. If land is thus fenced in keeping with the legal requirements, any damage caused by other people’s cattle must be made good to the land-owner; there is the further advantage that game and predatory animals cannot harm the fields and farmyard. Fences of paling, such as one usually finds in Germany, would not find firm anchorage in America’s loose soil.

Concerning the appearance of various minerals, I cannot give a sure and thorough report from my very few observations, nor can I report on the plants and animals; I intend, however, to present my more mature observations to my friends at some later time. I shall only note briefly the following at present.

The tree which forms by far the larger part of the forests is the oak, in its several varieties; the black oak is particularly common. Oaks are used for logs (for house, stalls and barns) for fence rails and for fuel. Besides these, beech, poplars and a number of other trees are found here, of which there are at least related varieties growing in Germany. On the other hand, many other species are peculiar to America. Fir trees are numerous in many parts of Wisconsin, and most boards and posts are cut from them. I have already mentioned the tamarack. The cedar grows here with thick, high trunks from which shingles are made and used to roof houses. The sugar maple is common here; it is tapped early in the spring, as the birch is in Germany, and from the sap the yellow moist sugar is made which is used here generally. The hickory, which is very like the walnut, has such hard, tough and flexible wood that it is used for handles of all sorts of instruments, for yoke-pieces, hinges and hundreds of other things. The hickory is quite common here in the settlement.

VI. Citizenship and home      Top of File      VIII. Crops and people