Diary of Journey To Grand Traverse County

On the Gross Herzogin von Alderberg, 25 Oct 1854

by Prokop Kyselka

Typed by USGenWeb Assistant, Renee Carson

On October 25, 1854, a group of Bohemian emigrants left their hometown of Andrejov, Bohemia, headed for the New World.

This emigration was brought about by a Brazil nut. A traveler from the Americas had returned to Andrejov and told the residents there about the great New World where you could have all the coconuts you wanted just by picking them and where Brazil nuts grew free for everyone It was the Brazil nut that decided them and sent them packing their little bundles for the long trip across the ocean in a two-mast sailing vessel.

In that group were several names destined to become well known in Traverse City and the Grand Traverse region, among them being Frantisek Kratochvil, Anton Svoboda, Joseph Knizek, Joseph Lada, Alois Kafka, Joseph Wilhelm, Franc Pohoral and Joseph Kyselka.

After almost two months of stormy Atlantic weather, the ship, the Gross Herzogin von Alderberg, landed in New York and for the first time the party found it was going to North, not South America. In New York, the party broke up, a large number of them going to Chicago, reached after a week's train trip.

In the party was the ten-year-old son of Joseph Kyselka, a lad named Prokop, in later years destined to become one of Traverse City's leading businessmen and citizens.

The Kyselka family landed in Chicago on Christmas day with no friends, no money and no work. Three families, the Kyselkas, Wilhelms and Bartaks, moved into a tenement The men finally found work and young Prokop alternately went to school and worked in various factories.

Finally the family scraped together $100.00 and the Bohemian colony sent a committee consisting of Frank Kratochvil, Joseph Shalda and Gotlieb Greilick to Michigan to see what sort of country it was as a prospective home. Joseph Shalda selected Good Harbor, Mr. Greilick choose what is now Greilickville and Mr. Kratochvil preferred Traverse City.

In 1920, a few years before his death, Prokop Kyselka wrote the story of his life, one of the most interesting we have read, so, in the absence of The Observer, who is on vacation, we are going to run serially a portion of Mr. Kyselka's story.

The 24th, day of June 1844, is my birthday. I was born in a small city in Bohemia called Ondrejov (Andrew) on the estate of a well-to-do farmer named John Shalda. For this gentleman my mother and father worked many years.

My mother's maiden name was Barbara Venclik and father's name was Joseph Kyselka.

My parents worked for John Shalda for many years for very poor wages, barely enough to make a poor living. It had been the same with most Bohemians. Under the Austrian government it was serfdom, almost slavery. Everybody belonged to some nobleman and had to do a certain amount of work for him for nothing.

Even the well-to-do farmers had to furnish a man, a span of horses, wagon, plow and drag the year around. So, for laborers like my parents, it was almost impossible to get anything more than a mere living. General dissatisfaction with conditions led to a revolution in 1848 in Austria and the serfdom was abolished. But even under the new rule it was slow improvement. So desire for greater improvement grew from day to day and talk of emigration was heard day and night. Men and women began to meet nights to hear America discussed with its liberty of speech, religion and its easy living.

Through ignorance we were listening to the history of a South American republic, Brazil. We heard of the beauties of this land described as a Garden of Eden where coconuts and Brazil nuts grow in such quantities that anyone could gather all they want free of charge. It was an easy place to make a living.

As a result, a great fever developed, in rich and poor alike, to emigrate to this Promised Land. In one of these meetings the man who was reading the description of this beautiful country had a Brazil nut and he passed it around so all present could feel and see what, in a short time, they could pick off the bushes. This nut made more emigrants than anything that was read or said, although we thought Brazil was in the United States.

In May, in the spring of 1854, there was quite a crowd of Andrejov citizens started on the long journey to a new home, promising to let those who stayed behind know how things were in the new country. They soon wrote us favorable letters from New York and, in October of that fall; another group was getting ready for emigration. My parents were among them.

All those who desired to try their luck sold what they could at a sacrifice price and gave away what they could not sell or take with them. On October 25, 1854, the party was ready to leave. As far as I can remember, these were the families, which bought tickets to New York on the two-masted Herzogin van Aldenburg of Germany.

Anton Wilhelm, Frantisek Kratochvil, Anton Svoboda, Joseph Shalda, Joseph Knizek, Alois Kafka, Joseph Wilhelm, Sr., and Joseph Wilhelm, Jr., Franc Pohoral, Joseph Kyselka (my father), all from Ondrejov, and Franc Lada, Franc Sultz, Podhola and Moravec, all from Lencedle. I don't know the first names of Podhola and Moravec. They were the richest emigrants in the lot.

In the twelve years of my parents' married life to that time they had saved just about enough to get to New York.

At midnight on October 25, we left Andrejov for Prague, a beautiful city in the mountains with the river Vltava flowing through it. In the early days Prague was surrounded by high walls for protection in time of war.

Our preparation to start was very simple. We took little clothing, two feather beds and a very small amount of eatables. We left Ondrejov at midnight to keep crowds of onlookers from demanding where we were going and insisting that we write them about how things were in the New World.

We reached Prague in the night and went on to Bremen with very few stops. The trip to Bremen took three days. Bremen was the first large city we saw since we left Prague. Its streets were laid out irregularly and crooked and its market place was filled with fish.

After two days in Bremen we took a sailboat and were towed down the river to a place called Prague, the ocean port. Here we had to wait for the boat, which was to take us across the ocean.

In Prague we had the pleasure of seeing the skeleton of a big whale and to me it looked as big as a house. It was set up so people could walk inside of it.

Here we also saw our first tide. We went to the docks in the morning and saw a good size fish boat in the mud. We wondered how in the world they would get it in the water. To our surprise the tide came in and floated it and before long it was rocking in the waves.

Bremer Haven is a few miles from Prague to the north, and our boat was anchored halfway between Prague and Bremer Haven. We had to reach it by yawl boats. The day we received orders to board the ship we turned into acrobats, men and women and children. We had to crawl up ladders fastened on the outside of the boat from the yawls. There were 120 of us.

The Herzogin was a two-master about the size of Columbus' Pinta. We all made it to the big boat except one man who fell in the water while climbing the ladder. He was fished out and aside from being wet and roasted by the others he was all right.

The Herzogin was not an up-to-date passenger boat. It cared for very few cabin passengers and the rest of us were put down in the hull. The bunks were in tiers of three, each above the other and the middle of the boat served as kitchen, sitting room and parlor.

The young captain gave orders to lift the anchor and, with a favorable wind, we put out to sea. In two and one half days the land disappeared and we were told we were on the high seas and Europe had gone, for many of us forever. It was the cradle of our childhood.

The first Friday aboard we were treated by our German cook to salted herring. We knew nothing of herring. We did not know that the confounded fish wanted to swim after being eaten. They wanted fresh water and our supply was limited. Some tried ocean water and some tried rum, the fish were so salty, but could not quench their thirst. There were no more salted herring for us after this.

By this time we were well out on the ocean. The boat began to rock more and many of us felt queer about the stomach.

The further we got from Europe the worse it was and all of us fed the fish. Many kept this up for three days but gradually we became used to our situation.

A great storm came up and the sailors covered up the hatchways. This lasted for six hours and then we were allowed some fresh air again.

To pass away the time there was considerable praying and lots of music and dancing. During the big storm we offered prayers to the Virgin Mary to represent us at the throne of God and quiet the storm. Most of those on board were Roman Catholics.

Some would say there is always a calm after a storm and others that our prayers were answered. You may take your choice. But it grew so still our sails weren't even filled.

We had exceptionally warm weather until three days out of New York. Then it was cold. One day we went through a vast amount of sea grass which looked like thousands of acres of prairies. It took us several hours to get through this great sight and into clear water.

As I mentioned before, our principal occupation was dancing and music and I was too young for either so I had to keep out and look on. The time passed fast enough. One day three flying fish landed on our deck and the second mate picked them up. The mate put one on a hook and threw it overboard. He walked aft with the line and before he reached the stern he had a porpoise. It was estimated that it weighed a hundred pounds and we had a feast from it. Thousands and thousands of porpoise followed the boat.

Three days out of New York it was so cold we did not venture on deck but stayed below. It took us three days after we sighted America before we landed. We had been on the ocean 52 days when we landed in New York.

About this time there was an agent named Sekwence boarded our ship. He had the names of everybody in the party and knew how much money each had. We wondered how he got his information but we found out later that the news had gone ahead of us by steamer.

Our boat had on board several well-to-do families, including the Podholas and Moravecs.

After giving us a hearty reception, Mr. Sekwence offered to take us to a certain hotel which was good, cheap and honest and all on board accepted. We went to the hotel and everything went well until we went to pay our bill and then the rumpus began. The hotelkeeper locked the doors so nobody could get out and then demanded twice as much as was agreed upon at first. As a result there was a general fight. Nobody was killed but there was some bloodshed.

Upon the advice of John Wilhelm, who had been in New York for three years, we saw the police who arrested the landlord. He was fined and had to pay back what he had overcharged and put up a bond for $3,000.00 that he would never overcharge emigrants again. Thus we were welcomed to this great Promised Land of America.

After this, our party scattered. Some stayed in New York and some went to Chicago. My parents decided to go to Chicago so we went as third rate passengers and in one week arrived in Chicago on Christmas Day with no money, no friends.

My father had borrowed twelve dollars from Podhola and thirteen from Moravec. Shortly after we arrived in Chicago they left for Wisconsin and it was agreed that, after they found some farmland, my father would work for them until the debt was paid. So they took our two feather beds with them as security, leaving us without bedding.

The school term was six months in 1855 and the same in 1856.

One day the principal, Mr. Dupee, ordered one of the big boys to bring his writing book to the desk. Instead, the boy opened the stove door and threw it in. Mr. Dupee grabbed his blacksnake whip and went at the youngster and they had it rough and tumble but it came out about even.

Another boy named F. Goodrich had some brimstone in his pocket and one day it caught fire and burned him badly. I never learned whether he died or not.

I was the only Bohemian in the school and in my second year there I picked up enough English so I could translate for my father when he asked for work, how much they would pay and where to go for his pay.

During vacation time I got a job in a rope works on Clark Street. It was the old way of making rope. A man had a lot of hemp tied in front of him and there was a lathe with hooks on it. He started it by putting some hemp on a hook and then telling me to heave. I turned a big wheel by hand and the man handling the hemp kept backing up until he had made a strand 300 feet long. Then he made two more strands and then he braided the three together, making a three-strand rope 275 feet long.

When the wheel did not go fast enough to suit the boss he would holler, "Heave, Johnnie, heave." I heaved on that wheel until everything was soaking wet but my tongue and that was dry as a bone. For this I got 25 cents a day.

The rope company was owned by a German and an Irishman. The German furnished the money and the Irishman drank whiskey. I used to get some for him every day. It happened that the German went away on business and while he was gone the Irishman sold all he could and skipped. The German, when he came back, swore he would find Pat and shoot him but I never heard whether he did.

There were two of us boys in the rope works, Frank Shultz and myself. He was younger but much stronger and when the time came that one of us had to lose his job, I was fired.

Across the street from us was a house in which all seven people who lived there died of Cholera. Chicago was very unsanitary at that time and where there are nice homes there were mud puddles covered with green scum.

About this time our folks took the notion that they wanted to live on some land. So several Bohemian families clubbed together and each gave five dollars and selected a committee to investigate the best place for people with small means to find a farm. We had small means but we had brave hearts, strong hands and will power.

The committee consisted of Frank Kratochvil, Joseph Shalda and Gotleib Greilick. They came north to Michigan and Joseph Shalda selected Good Harbor or North Unity, as it is sometimes called, in Leelanau County. Lots of Bohemians have settled there since, Masopust, Musil, Nemeskal, Pospisil, Viskochil, Svoboda and others.

There were thousands of acres of land to select from, all timbered with maple, beech, hemlock and basswood. This timber was in the way. The head of each family could preempt 160 acres. A good many took up these claims and went to work, men, women and children, to make their homes in this wilderness.

In order to prove up on their claims they had to do a certain amount of improvements each year and the rest of the time they had to work out to earn the bare necessities of life. It took them years to clear enough land to make a living, but most of them stuck to it and made a success. This land in 1856 could be bought for 50 cents an acre so some took advantage of this and bought 40 or 80 acres.

My parents selected a spot they thought was a very nice location on the plat. They paid taxes on it for several years and finally father went to see it one day and found most of it was in the bay. He was not much of a fisherman so he dropped it.

I knew the original settlers personally but from year to year many more came. After years of hard work they are all doing well. The land is suitable for almost anything, rye, wheat, corn, potatoes, peas, beans and all kinds of vegetables.

Frank Kratochvil and Gotleib Greilick left the North Unity and traveled south toward Traverse City. They were attracted by the beauty of the west shore of West Grand Traverse Bay. It was all beautiful but when they reached what is now Greilickville, Mr. Greilick's heart stopped beating, he was so much taken up with the view. He decided to stop right there and build himself a sawmill, which he did as quickly as he could.

He was a skilled mechanic and could make almost anything out of wood or iron. So here he built a steam sawmill and it was operated for many years and he cut millions of feet of lumber and shipped it to Chicago and Milwaukee. He had his own schooner, the E.C.L.

When Mr. Greilick's four strapping sons grew up they ran the mill while the father built other mills for people. At one of these he was driving piling and he was struck on the head by the falling hammer of the pile driver and killed instantly and Grand Traverse lost one of the best men it ever had. His sons continued to operate the mill as long as there was any timber left in the community.

So, of the three committeemen selected in Chicago, two of them have made their selections, John Shalda at North Unity and Gotleib Greilick on the shores of West Grand Traverse Bay.

This left only Frank Kratochvil of the original three sent out by the Bohemian colony in Chicago to select land upon which our emigrant families could settle and make their homes.

Mr. Frank Kratochvil selected Traverse City at the head of Grand Traverse West Bay because here was a sawmill, operated by Hannah & Lay, in which our emigrant families could settle and make their homes.

Bartak and Wilhelm settled on the south end of Boardman Lake. It was poor land but the men could walk to work in Traverse City and they lived there several years. The Hannah & Lay boarding house was located on the corner of Bay and Union Streets and it accommodated from 75 to 100 men. Tom Cutler had a hotel at the corner of Union and Front Streets.

Outside of Hannah & Lay's three teams there was one ox team in Traverse City, owned by Henry Rutherford. There was no wagon in the city so he did his hauling summer and winter on a sled.

At first the settlers took land near Traverse City because they did not know that the better land was further out but later they corrected this and moved to the good land further from the city.

On November 16, 1856, our family arrived in Traverse City on a boat named the Telegraph. It was a sailboat and it took us six days from Chicago to Traverse City. We stopped at the Beaver Islands from which the Mormons had been driven two years earlier. We finally docked at the west end of Traverse City in what was called Slab City because the houses were all made of slabs.

My father bought 40 acres of land about three miles south of Traverse City, all timber land, for $100.00. It was covered with maple, beech, elm, and basswood, the most beautiful timber which ever grew outdoors. There was also curly birch and birds-eye maple. But we had to chop them down and burn them in piles to clear one or two acres a year so we could plant crops for our living.

Everything grew fine. There were no potato pugs to bother us and the potatoes we grew were Peach Blows and Blue Mashanic. We had a lot of sugar maples and all it was necessary to do, we thought, was to go to a tree, knock a chunk off and you had sugar. But it turned out differently.

A sugar maple is the hardest tree in Michigan and to get syrup and sugar from it is hard work.

We had the land but no house on it because of coming so late in the year, so we lived with Frank Lada, our neighbor, for several weeks until our own mansion was finished. This was built out of round logs, 20 feet long, 14 feet wide and ten feet high. The space between the logs was chinked with plaster and clay. The roof was covered with split shingles and the gable ends with lumber we carried from Traverse City board by board as there was no other way to get it there.

This building was built with the intention of living there a couple of years but we lived there 14 years instead and Uncle Vencil lived there 11 years after we did and it was still good when he left.

Now, about sugar making. We did not have money enough to buy sap pails and a big boiling pan so we adopted a cheaper plan. We bought a 30-gallon kettle and then we cut basswood trees, cut them in the proper lengths, split the lengths open and hollowed out the centers for sap troughs. These we used to catch sap. This we boiled in the kettle until it made syrup and for sugar we boiled it longer but had to be careful no to let it burn. For vinegar we would boil five gallons of sap to one gallon and then let it stand. It soured and made excellent vinegar.

As I mentioned, we had to fall and burn this beautiful timber to make room for crops. We did not buy much to live on for we had our maple sugar and syrup and for tea we used wintergreen leaves. And there were the pigeons. They were here not only by the thousands but by the millions. They clouded the sun. Everybody got all the pigeons they wanted. They would fly over all day, the first half of the day all being males and the second half all females. The woods were filled with beechnuts and the pigeons loved them. Several years they nested near our house and when you went where they had their nests you could not hear yourself talk because of the noise they made.

This is the way they got the squabs or the pigeons.

They would pick out a tree that had a lot of nests in it and then another and sometimes a third one. They would cut two of them nearly in two and then fall the third tree on them, so that all three would be down. Then they would pick up the squabs, which had fallen from the nests. They would fill their sacks and go home with enough meat to last them a week.

The pigeon hunters would hardly ever shoot one pigeon alone. They would try to have several in a row and one old pioneer, Henry Rutherford, once shot 42 with one shot from a double-barreled shotgun.

In pigeon time the hunters did not pay much attention to hunting deer, bear, wolves, otters, mink, coons, beavers, muskrats, ducks and partridge. Some of these animals were good to eat and some were caught for their hides. In those days nine out of ten customers buying from the store would purchase one half pound of powder, three pounds of shot and one bag of caps.

Boardman River and Boardman Lake were full of fish. Before the dam (near South Union Street Bridge) was started by Hannah & Lay Company in 1867 and finished in 1868, there were pickerel, bass, pike, herring, dogfish and trout. Before the dam was finished the herring went up the river as usual as far as the Hogsback, about three miles south of the south end of Boardman Lake. But then they were stopped by the dam and accumulated just below the dam so people got as many as they wanted with dipnets and whoever liked herring had them fried and smoked for three meals a day. There was no game law then and fish were caught every way, with hook and line, spears and nets. Like pigeons, we got more fish than we could use so, about corn planting time, we would put a fish or two in every hill of corn and it proved to be a great fertilizer. If we skipped a hill you could tell it in the field.

This immigrant was now twelve years old with father, mother and nine-month old brother John settled in the wilderness of Grand Traverse. In 1856 there was no church, no school, I was too small to work and was crazy about guns. So I was allowed to carry a gun.

Now my occupation was gun, spear and fish pole. This lasted about four years steady but by this time I was sixteen so I used to help load boats which came for lumber. I cut out some hunting and fishing and toughened up so I could stand harder work. Loading boats took about three days per week and the captain paid $1.50 without board.

The rest of the times I picked wild strawberries, huckleberries, blackberries and raspberries and sold them to the few families well enough off to buy them. They were Mrs. Perry Hannah and Mrs. McKellop, whose husband was Mr. Hannah's foreman. He used to steal my berries just to make me mad and after he'd had fun enough he would buy them. Tom Cutler was Mr. Hannah's engineer in the sawmill and he was also my customer. Some days I made two dollars picking berries, better than any other work.

Then the war broke out between the North and South and naturally everything went up but money. All men who were fit to go to war went voluntarily or were drafted. Grand Traverse county furnished more than its quota.

Among the volunteers who I remember went were Ike Winnie, James Nickerson, Matt Hopper, and Mat Glendenning and many others I can't recall. Mr. Hopper had a brother, John. They were both quick as cats and both upwards of six feet, both fine men. They had a widowed mother so they decided that only one should go to war and the other stay at home and take care of their mother. They both wanted to go but they decided it Solomon's way, by drawing straws. Matt drew the long one and went to war and John stayed home.

John was a greater hunter and fisherman. Just a few weeks after Matt left he went duck hunting in Cedar Lake, about three miles north of Traverse City and just west of Norris Brothers' Grist Mill.

John was in a rowboat. Seeing some ducks ahead of him he rowed to shore and threw the rope of his boat over a stump. His gun laid on the edge of the boat and he reached for the barrel and pulled it toward him. The gun went off and shot him in the chest. He called for help and some of the Norris and Greilicks heard him. They carried him to Greilickville and hurried him to Traverse City in a rowboat but he died about half way to town and his poor widowed mother was left without a son at home. Matt went through the war without a scratch and later lived in Manistee.

As there was call for several million men to go to the war for the North, it naturally hampered all industry. Men were scarce, wages went up and everything else went up too. Before the war common wages were eight dollars per month and board. At the beginning of the war wages went to thirty-five or forty dollars a month and everybody who had to hire help took what they could get. Good workmen got as much as poor workmen and when I asked Mr. Hannah how this was he said good workmen had to make up for the poor workmen and that's the way it has been up to date.

I went to work in Charles Kelly's lumber camp. Mr. Kelly was foreman for Mr. Hannah. Hannah & Lay operated seven camps that year on the Boardman River. I worked with Frenchmen imported from Canada. There were nearly a hundred brought in and Hannah & Lay were glad to get them.

I weighed about 150 pounds and my French partner about the same. We chopped and sawed logs, averaging about 75 a day. The other gang, two Norwegians who looked like bears, each weighed about 200 pounds. They averaged about 125 logs a day. They beat us by fifty logs but the pay was the same. You see how the good man had to make up for the poor one.

The next summer I started to work in the sawmill, but I could not stand all of the jobs because of not being strong enough. But my foreman, Mr. Cuyler Germaine, was good to me and gave me jobs I could stand. As I was getting stronger all the time I could soon stand any job there was to do. I worked three summers in the mill and in 1865, last year of the war I was getting $45.00 per month and board and lodging in the big boarding house on the corner of Union and Bay Streets.

Living at the same boarding house were Joseph Greilick, the boss filler who filled the big circular saws for the mill and John Greilick, head sawyer, on the gang saws. William, youngest of the Greilick brothers, lived at home. Bill is still a bachelor. He told me he conferred with St. Peter on Brockway Hill about getting married and St. Peter said: "Bill, a man who gets married does well, but the one who don't does better."

Among my chums were Jake Brakel, Jacob Ramstine and a man named Link and I learned many things from them. Jake Brakel got tired of millwork and bought a farm on Silver Lake, Link and Ramstine disappeared.

Here is 1865 and the end of the war. All the living have returned to the mills and the farms and the racks are filled again so all goods, as well as labor went down.

I had a notion for cabinet work. I was then 21 so I gave up the job for which I was getting $45.00 a month and board and hired out to Victor Petertyl for $10.00 and board. He was located across the corner from where the Park Place now stands. My first work was to plane boards with a jackplane for fences that Mr. Petertyl made for Morgan Bates, editor of the Grand Traverse Herald. This fence cost Mr. Bates $300.00. I got my diploma and my walking papers in 1868. We had to do all sorts of things with lumber, door and window frames, large, small and

extension tables, altars for societies, coffins, large and small, cheap and high price. He had about three month's work ahead all the time so he took a partner, Mr. John Shadek, an excellent and quick workman. Then next thing that happened was that the stork brought my master a little girl by the name of Anna and I acted as godfather at the baptism

About this time Mr. Petertyl's brother's daughter came over from the old country with another girl. The first was named Victoria Petertyl and the other Joseffa Smolar. They were both seventeen.

Then came a great time. I came home from Masonic Lodge one night and found three couples and six quart bottles of Hostetter Bitters. There was nothing stronger to be bought then. The first couple to take the floor was Anton Novotny and Fanje Hypsova. Next came E. P. Wilhelm and Joseffa Smolar and then John Wilhelm and Victoria Petertyl.

I had never seen this ceremony before but the justice of the peace asked them each questions and they answered and then he pronounced them man and wife and told them to remember the ceremony. It was a short one but it would take them a long time to get out of it.

I must go back two years and say that my mother's brother was on his way to America and one hot day in June, 1866, surprised us by the arrival of him and his wife, and with them their adopted daughter, Tonicka, then fourteen years of age. She put a kiss on my face I never did wipe off. It was put there forever and I am now 76 years of age and I still have it in memory.

After two years I found so many chicken hawks flying about my dove I was afraid one of them might catch her. Sunday, October 11, one of the most beautiful days the sun ever shined upon, was Tonicka's sixteenth birthday. I had no present and nothing but a five dollar bill. So I proposed to Tonicka that we go to Rev. Hatch, who knew how to make one out of two. So we went to Rev. Hatch, the Congregational minister who knew his business thoroughly. My Tonicka could not speak English so I had to be the interpreter. I paid every cent I had in the world and Rev. Hatch gave us each a contract and it was the best bargain I ever made. These certificates were witnessed by Mrs. Hatch and their son, Reuben.

I now had my diploma as a carpenter and cabinetmaker and I picked up all kinds of jobs, building and repairing houses. I built a small house for Trojanek in Slab City and I overhauled one for Joseph Zoulek on the Peninsula and for Frank Campbell on Silver Lake.

Then I hired out to Joseph Greilick for his factory at two dollars a day. I had to furnish my own tools, board myself and do everything that was necessary. So it happened that while I was working on the Front Street House, Mr. Friedrich, proprietor, Perry Hannah came to see me and asked me what I would sell myself for a year. Mr. Hannah was always joking when he talked with me so I did not know what he was driving at.

Most of Traverse City, all the bass in Long Lake and the only general store in town at that time belonged to Hannah & Lay. Mr. Hannah, who always called me Proper, said: "Proper, Mr. Smith Barnes and I have talked about you a great deal and we want you to work for us. As long as you were working for Mr. Petertyl we did not say anything. I wish you would go see Mr. Barnes. Maybe you could make a deal with him. Good day, Proper."

So I went to see Mr. Barnes one night and asked him what I would do for him and how would I come out financially. Mr. Barnes told me he would start me in the store at $50.00 per month and all the things I bought I could get at ten per cent discount.

They had four stoves in the store, one in the hardware, Mr. John Perry, foreman: one in the office, Mr. Grant and Mr. Holdsworth, bookkeepers; one in the dry goods, Mr. E. P. Wilhelm, foreman; one in the grocery, Capt. Matteson, foreman. There was a box by each of these stoves that held enough wood to last for a day and I was to keep these boxes filled. There were 32 lamps to fill and trim. After this was done I spent the rest of the day in groceries under Capt. Matteson.

Aside from this, Mr. Barnes had two coal stoves in this home and I filled them every day, and Sunday I took care of the ashes and for this job I got $40.00 extra per year.

I worked at this job for three years and then was put in the grocery department as a clerk. For three years, in addition to my work at the store and for Mr. Barnes, I worked in the flour mill nights, carrying bags of wheat up thirteen steps to the hopper. The wheat weighed 120 pounds and I weighed 150. Mr. Chantler was the miller.

I was 24 at the time and nothing was too hard.

I worked 16 years for Hannah & Lay in their store and each year I got a raise and my last paycheck was for $100.00 per month. I consider Mr. Barnes was one of my very best friends and Mr. Hannah, too, was always friendly.

While in the east, in 1868, Mr. Barnes brought back several young men to work for the company. As near as I can remember, they were James W. Milliken, Charles K. Buck, Frank Hamilton, Mr. Atwood and H. P. Daw.

I will name all I can think of who were working in this big store in the four wooden buildings on the north side of the Boardman river facing the bay,  just behind the present big brick building.

The men working in the Hannah & Lay store when I did were John Perry, hardware; Louis Miller, shoes; Geulick E. P. Wilhelm, dry goods; Ike Winnie, John Wilhelm, Emil Hanslovsky, Harry Holdsworth, groceries; Fred Hedden, hardware; Louis Hanson, helper; E. H. Pope, dry goods; William Grand, office; Mr. Holdsworth, bookkeeper; Henry Campbell, groceries; Capt. Matteson, groceries; Ed DeNeven, hardware; C. A. Crawford, office; Smith Barnes, general manager.

At this time mywife stayed on the farm with my Uncle F. Benclik, as we had no money, and I boarded with F. Pohoral. We saved up a little money and then rented a house from Steve McGarry, but it was not waterproof and when it rained we had to catch water in pans and kettles and pails. We paid three dollars a month and we had six chairs, a bed and a stove.

After three months we had a chance to buy a better house for $50.00. Half the roof was covered with shingles and half with grooved boards, which did not leak. This was a big sum of money but we never regretted it. We were so satisfied with it that millionaires in their palaces could not have had better times.

This house was ours and all paid for. It was near the bay and there was a lot of driftwood so we gathered more wood than we could burn.

In the time of year when the wild pigeons were flying I used to get up before I went to work and get so many we had some left over for our neighbors.

When I was learning the cabinet trade my boss gave me some lumber to make whatever I wanted to so I made me a cabinet makers bench and when we started housekeeping we used it for a table.

We were so close to the bay that when the wind blew ever so lightly we could hear the splashing of the waves on the beach and it acted as a song to put us to sleep.

We lived in this house nearly three years and Sundays we usually went out to one of the old folks' farm three miles south and brought back all we could carry of eggs, butter and vegetables.

Our first child, Frank, was born in this house July 16, 1870.

Traverse City started to grow and there was a demand for building lots so Mr. Hannah had a part of the south side laid out in lots 25 by 164 feet. He started to sell them for $100.00 each but you had to buy two lots so the buildings would not be crowded. These lands was then covered with pine forest so Mr. Hannnah had Gus Brown, a foreman, cut the logs and roll them into the river. You could buy the lots but had to dig up the stumps.

We bought two lots on the southeast corner of Eighth and Union streets and we had a house built 24 by 32 feet with an upstairs big enough for our living and some room to rent. We turned the rent money to finish the rest of the rooms and we rented until our family was big enough to use all of it.

With our rent and what I earned we accumulated $50.00, which we let out at interest. I also took out some life insurance, a thousand dollars, on a 20-year endowment. In order to pay the premium, $56.35 a year, I put away a twelfth of every month so I always had the money to pay.

Then trouble started. Frank was taken sick and was attended by Dr. Sifton and it turned out to be appendicitis. He was sick for three months and in taking care of him nights and working daytimes I injured my health so I asked for two months' vacation. My brother John was in New Mexico about 22 miles west of Santa Fe where he worked as a carpenter in the mines so I went out there for two months and stayed six months.

So, on February 21, 1881, I left Traverse on my western trip.

(Editor's note: Mr. Kyselka spent the next half year wandering through New Mexico and Colorado with his brother, working at carpentry work here and there, returning to Traverse City in August 1881, much improved in health. Shortly after his return he entered the grocery business with C. I. Buck on the southwest corner of Front and Cass streets, a business he continued until his death. The story of his life completely skips this period and does not pick up again until July 25, 1911, when he and Mrs. Kyselka made a trip back to their native Bohemia.)

Note from County Host of Grand Traverse County MIGenWeb, Brenda

The copy of this diary was found in the vertical files at the Traverse City Public Library [now known as Traverse District Area Library].  Frank Kratochvil is my great-grandfather.Brenda K. Wolfgram Moore

Grand Traverse County MIGENWEB

This page created 12 Jan 1998-Updated 24Sept2003