Pioneer history of Ingham County, compiled and arranged by Mrs. Franc L. Adams, secretary of the Ingham County pioneer and historical society.

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PIONEER HISTORY OF INGHAM COUNTY

bore the name John, was last seen in Lansing in 1879. It is Mr.
Calahan's impression that that was the last time that he, too, saw
any of the Indians of the Okemos tribe. The son, Johnny, came
to see the new Capitol.
Mr. Calahan relates that the agricultural methods of the old
days were crude in the extreme. "We planted corn by striking
the ground with an ax and dropping the seed in the opening made
by the blow and then crowding the earth over with our foot. It is
surprising how well corn grew under those methods. As for
raising wheat, we took a heavy drag which was drawn in and out
about the stumps. This tore up the surface and then the seed
was sown broadcast. If we succeeded in making the seed catch,
a pretty good crop often resulted. It had to be reaped by methods
that would permit us to get about the stumps."
DRYER Now, SAYS.
There is considerable dispute in these days as to just how "dry"
the country is, but Mr. Calahan is of the distinct impression
that it is a good deal "dryer" than it was when he first came to
Michigan. He remembers the old hotel at Okemos kept by
Freeman Bray. "The post office was in the hotel," relates Mr.
Calahan, "and I remember never having gone for the mail as a
lad that the old bar room was not filled with men, some dead
drunk, some noisy drunk, and all more or less under the influence
of liquor. On one occasion some of the men seized men and tried
to make me drink, but I wiggled away from them. The hotel at
Okemos was no worse than the rest. It was merely typical of
the taverns of those days, which abounded along every road."
Mr. Calahan remembers Kingsley S. Bingham, the first Republican governor, and also remembers Austin Blair, who followed
next after him. He has a host of other memories, some thin and
shadowy and others that remain very vivid. It is to him a miracle
how Lansing has come from a little group of wilderness houses
about the power site at North Lansing to the city it is today, all
within his lifetime.
Mr. Calahan will be 88 years old April 21, 1923.-Lansing State
Journal.