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

W}ITE OAK TOWNSHIPII AND ITS HISTORY

811

the cabin home of Mrs. Dutcher's parents, already established for a
year in what is now Unadilla of Washtenaw county. But that
was only a stopping place. The wagon was next day repaired
and on they went, in a few days, into the forest that one day was
to become Ingham county.
Eventually Daniel Dutcher and his little family came to a halt
on the white oak land, on the southern edge of White Oak Township, just over the line from Stockbridge Township, near Lowe
Lake. That was in the fall, and in December, on the 19th to be
exact, 1835, Abby Dutcher, now Mrs, Clark, of 116 South Francis
street, still living at the home of her son, Will G. Clark, was born.
In this domestic event Ingham county had begun to grow. The
first white child was born within its boundaries.
Hearing today the story of the beginnings of the Dutcher family, in their little clearing made on the government land, claim to
which had been taken at "ten shillings an acre," one is forced to
believe that they had no more vision of the wonderful country
they were building than Moses had of his centuries of coming
fame when he tended the flocks of Jethro; but both, in their simplicity, wrought better than they knew.
RISKED ALL ON TRIP.
As said, Daniel Dutcher and his family arrived on their claim in
early fall and they had nothing but fast disappearing supplies in
their wagon. These had been purchased at Detroit after coming
up the lake from "York state." They had $1,500 when they
started, and they were risking it all on their great venture.
But it was more-much more-than a gambler's chance. The
whole capital was invested in an opportunity of hard work. And
so it proved.
When Abby was born, in December, the first rude cabin was
up. It had no doors and windows, but across one side of the cabin
extended a wide fireplace above which rose a chimney of mud and
sticks. Before their first candles were made, brush, piled high on
the big back log, afforded light for the cabin.
Everything was strange and new, but the outstanding circumstance of the pioneer appears to be, from the stories now told of
him, that he made circumstances bend to his will instead of
bending to circumstances. Pioneer housewives were tenacious,