HUTCHINSON
In
September of 1855 the three Hutchinson brothers, John, Judson and Asa,
began singing their way to Kansas. At Rockford, Illinois they met an old
New England acquaintance, W. W Pendergast who had visited Minnesota and
whose glowing tales of the land of the "Big Woods" west of St.
Anthony persuaded the brothers to go to this new land of promise to establish
a namesake community.
They looked over the countryside and selected claims, each choosing 160
acres of land to his liking. On November 21, six years after the territory
of Minnesota was given Congressional approval, the party traveled. Just
before sundown on Monday, November 19 they reached to the top of a hill.
They saw a sparkling river winding east and south flanked by high bluffs
to the north, beyond which the forest stretched in brooding silence. Open
ground sloped gently from wooded hills to the west down to the edge of
the water, while to the south and southwest spread a carpet of gently-rolling
prairie land. Their journey of exploration was over.
The
next day they looked over the countryside and selected claims, each choosing
160 acres of land to his liking. On November 21, the party traveled back
to Glencoe to establish the Hutchinson Townsite Company. Because of legislative
restrictions on townsite size, it was necessary to register two: Harmony
and Hutchinson. Later the legislature passed an act permitting larger
townsites whereupon the two towns became one.