atious hunt for the scattered fragments of this newspaper. early files seem to be in existence. Volume 1, No. 31, the earliest number that I have seen, is dated March 27th, 1858, and would bring Vol. 1, No. 1, to the date of August 29th, 1857. There must have been some of the temporary suspensions usual in getting new newspapers under way in those days, as the St. Paul Advertiser of July 18th, 1857, announces the appearance of the first number, which must therefore have been issued about July 10th, 1857. It was a four-page, seven-column, independent paper, run in its first desultory issues by Charles Reynolds. Late in 1858 or early in 1859, it was suspended entirely. H. Ostrander, a practical printer and graduate from the office of the Albany Evening Journal, an indefatigable hustler, came to Hokah, calked the open seams of the stranded Chief, pried it off the bar, and on April 26th, 1859, floated it anew. When he couldn't pay for help, he ran the craft alone. May 23rd, 1865, after about six years of that sort of struggle, the Chief turned up its toes and died.

Along in the seventies, another Hokah Chief with a new volume and number, was started. This on January 18th, 1893, became the present Houston County Chief, which is still going.

THE SOUTHERN MINNESOTA STAR

was the fifty-fourth newspaper in regular course. This is still another of which I can find no copies. It was published at Albert Lea, Freeborn county. The St. Paul Advertiser, in its issue of July 25th, 1857, mentioned the receipt of the first number. The St. Paul Pioneer of November 19th announced its temporary suspension, owing to financial troubles; and the St. Paul Advertiser of May 29th, 1858, said the Star had died, and charged its decease to the town proprietors. The History of Freeborn County says that Swineford and Gray began the Star on July 11th, 1857. The plant was soon sold under foreclosure of mortgage held by George S. Ruble, one of the proprietors of the town of Albert Lea. Concerning the early newspapers published there, Isaac Botsford says in the Freeborn County Eagle of February 18th, 1860: "Swineford and Gray continued the Southern Minnesota Star thirty-nine weeks, then H. F. Gray published one

number, making forty full numbers for the Star." It was independent in politics.

The Freeborn County Standard, in its issue of May 14th, 1868, says: "The Minnesota Star was first issued July 11th, 1857, and ran about eight months, and died for lack of Democratic support. The press and material lay idle about six months. It was then sold under mortgage foreclosure by George S. Ruble, and went to Alfred P. Swineford, one of the former proprietors of the Star. With it he started the Freeborn County Eagle. Isaac Botsford succeeded to this." Mr. Botsford is the man who announced in his prospectus that he would take for subscriptions anything that grew that he could use, and everything that coul1 be made, except counterfeit money.

THE MANTORVILLE EXPRESS.

was the fifty-fifth newspaper. It was begun in Mantorville, Dodge county, July 16th, 1857. The founder of the paper was J. E. Bancroft. It was independent in politics. C. W. Blaisdell bought a press and material for a paper at Wasioja, a few miles from Mantorville, and there was considerable rivalry between him and Bancroft for a start.

Bancroft's outfit was loaded into a lumber wagon, behind a yoke of oxen, and in crossing the Zumbro river, near Oronoco, the wagon capsized, mixing the type into pi, and wetting down the type before it was needed for the press. This gave Blaisdell so much advantage that he thought there was no need for special hurry. Bancroft, however, was a hustler. He had things pretty well advanced when a man from Wasioja came along about half drunk, on the morning of July 15th, and bragged how Wasioja was coming out ahead of Mantorville in a newspaper way. Bancroft pumped him until he found that Blaisdell intended to start his paper on the 17th. Hardly was his informant out of sight on his way to Rochester, when Bancroft enlisted his wife and ail hands for a day and night hustle to get out the Express. Meals were brought to the office, and everybody worked with such small waste of time that, when the Wasioja man came along the next afternoon, the Express was on the street, and he was presented with a copy to take home, with the compliments of Bancroft and

Mantorville. That is how volume one, number one, of the Mantorville Express came to be dated July 16th, and the first issue of the Wasioja Gazette July 17th.

July 31st, 1858, A. LaDue became associated with Bancroft as publisher. February 5th, 1859, LaDue retired. July 30th, 1859, P. C. Compton joined Bancroft, and the paper was enlarged to seven columns. March 24th, 1860, Compton withdrew, and Bancroft ran the paper alone until March, 1866, when he died. His wife went on with the paper, without the lapse of a single issue, but hesitated to let her name appear at the head of the editorial columns until her management had proved a success. July 27th, 1866, a little over four months after the death of Bancroft, the name of his wife, C. E. F. Bancroft, appeared at the head of the paper. She continued to edit and manage it until July 23rd, 1869. Then began a series of editorial changes, of which I have counted sixteen after Bancroft up to November 1st, 1881. The Express survived them all, however, and is still running.

JOHN EARLE BANCROFT.

John E. Bancroft began the Mantorville Express July 16th, 1857, as already stated. He came from Pennsylvaria to Wisconsin and then to Mantorville, the year before starting his paper. He was not a man of strong physique, and the hard, self-sacrificing work of building his newspaper on firm foundations so told on his stock of vitality that he died in the spring of 1866. The editor of another paper, writing of Bancroft, said:

We do not know that he left an enemy in the world, yet he was outspoken against vice, firm in the maintenance of principle, and unsparing in his denunciations of wrong. His character needs not the aid of eulogy, his life was the best eulogium. He lived long enough to secure a permanent and honorable place in the history of our country and state, and a lasting remembrance in the hearts of those who knew him best.

THE WASIOJA GAZETTE

was the fifty-sixth newspaper established in the Territory. The Historical Society does not have any of its issues, nor can I find any elsewhere. July 25th, 1857, the St. Paul Advertiser announced the receipt of its first number, and my account of

the publication of the Mantorville Express fixes the exact date as July 17th. 1857. C. W. Blaisdell was editor and proprietor. Like the Express, the Gazette was independent in politics. The Express of July 24th, 1858, announced S. L. Pierce, a well known attorney, formerly of St. Paul, but now of Redwood Falls, Minn., as associate editor of the Gazette during volume two, then just beginning. The Gazette lived a little over two years, and its place of publication was Wasioja, Dodge county.

About the last of October, 1859, Blaisdell moved his Gazette plant to Rochester, and began the Rochester City News, but finally sold it to U. B. Shaver, who took it to Kasson and started the Dodge County Republican. Mr. Pierce did most of the editorial work on the News while it was running. Blaisdell was a good printer, and after leaving Rochester he went to Chicago, and was for a number of years in charge of the advertising work on the Chicago Times. He retired some years ago and made his home at Los Angeles, California.

SQUIRE L. PIERCE.

S. L. Pierce was born March 6th, 1832, at Trenton, Ohio. He studied law with M. B. Chadwick, and at the age of twentyone was admitted to the bar. He moved to Wasioja in 1856, and lived there and at Mantorville until 1872, when he moved to St. Paul. He practiced law in this city until 1902, and then went to Redwood Falls, where he now lives. He held the office of county attorney of Dodge county for two terms, from 1860.

Mr. Pierce always had a strong bent towards journalism. Besides acting as editor for the Wasioja Gazette and Rochester News, as before stated, he wrote for the Mantorville Express and assisted both Mr. and Mrs. Bancroft in editing and publishing it. While living in Mantorville, he contributed regularly, over the signature of "Occasional," to the Winona Republican.

RED WING SENTINEL, NO. 2,

is the name I have given to the fifty-seventh newspaper begun in Minnesota. The Sentinel No. I was the seventeenth in regular course, and its history has been given among the newspapers

of 1855. After Merritt and Hutchins sold the press and materials of the Sentinel, No. 1, to Alexis Bailly, it went to Hastings, as has been stated. The Gazette was then started by N. V. and C. Bennett, and Merritt went into the hotel business. Tiring of that business, he bought the Gazette, according to the St. Paul Advertiser, about June 1st, 1857, and ran it under that name until about August 1st of that year, as the Advertiser quotes he Gazette as late as July 25th. The issue of August 1st of the Advertiser then makes its first mention of the Sentinel, so that must have been about the time the change was made.

Bennett, in the meantime, formed another alliance with William Colvill, afterward well known as the colonel of the First Minnesota regiment, so that the latter became editor of Sentinel No. 2, as he formerly had been of No. I. Bennett also became its publisher, and, without further ceremony, the volume and numbers of Red Wing Sentinel, No. 1, were picked up and carried on, the same as though there had been no sale of the press and material of the old Sentinel to Bailly, no valedictory of the Sentinel, as noted by the Pioneer and Democrat of May 15th, 1855, and no intervening publication of the Minnesota Gazette to supply its place.

On March 26th, 1859, Merritt sold again, and on April 9th, 1859, E. A. Littlefield and Martin Maginnis, the latter afterward delegate to Congress from Montana, became the publishers, Colvill remaining as editor. On February 4th, 1860, Colvill sold his interest to W. W. Phelps, who had been the member of Congress from the Red Wing district, because, as he said in his retiring editorial, he foresaw a Democratic storm coming in the Charleston convention. In the next issue of the Sentinel, Phelps appeared as editor. On August 15th, 1860, Littlefield dropped out, and Maginnis went on alone as publisher, Phelps remaining as editor.

At a meeting noted for its patriotism, held April 23rd, 1861, in Red Wing, a company called the Goodhue Volunteers was organized, and William Colvill was unanimously elected captain,' and Martin Maginnis first sergeant. The next day the Sentinel, at Vol. 5, No. 39, April 24th, 1861, was discontinued. Its material was sold to James Parker, and made the basis of the Goodhue Volunteer, a patriotic paper which did excellent ser