"Toast to the Butler Pioneers,"
by Mary Grace "Mayme" (Bryce) Ware, 1937

President of the Alumni Association, Honorable Toastmaster, Members of the Board of Education, Comrades in the Alumni and guests:

"Tell us a story, Grandma, tell us a story about long, long time ago, please, Grandma!"

"Well, if you children will get quiet and settle down, Grandma will try to tell you a story."

Once upon a time in the state of Ohio, there lived a man by the name of John Seward.  He was married, had a wife and several children, some of whom were married and had children of their own, so he was "Grandpa John" and of course his wife was "Grandma."

He was a farmer, industrious and a good manager.  His son, Israel had inherited his father's good traits but he was young and ambitious, so one day he said to his father, "Father, I hear that over west in the new state that was just admitted into the Union last year they are giving land away.  They tell me that a man can get on a horse in the morning and ride around in a circle all day, and the government will give him a grant to all the land within that circle.  I would like to get in on this free or cheap land proposition while I am young."  They all agreed it might be a good plan, so made their preparations to move after harvest.  Grandpa (Col. John Seward, Jr.) and Grandma (Mary Butler Seward), their son Israel, his wife (Margaret Slayback Seward) and baby boy (William A. Seward), 15 months old.

They did not have trucks to load their goods in as we have, but they got their wagons in good repair and covered with nice new white canvas ready for their long journey from their old home in Ohio to their new home somewhere in Illinois.  They did not have hard roads in those days nor hardly any laid out roads, but had to follow Indian trails or buffalo paths, and so, with the poor roads and the slow traveling of the oxen, they made very slow progress, but they kept on bravely traveling west, day by day, across the wilderness of Ohio and Indiana and the vast prairies of Illinois.

One day they came to the top of a high hill, and they stopped to let the oxen rest, and they got out to look around. They looked south and they saw a broad valley.  They looked west and they saw heavy timber.  Then north and saw acre after acre of rolling prairie land and northeast more timber.  And they said, "Right here is where we will settle. Plenty of land, plenty of timber for fuel and it seems plenty of water."

Now do you children know where that hill was?  Well, it was just south of our town, up on the hill where Malinda Jane lives.  There was an old two-story house over northwest of where Malinda lives and they moved into it and lived for several years.

It was in October 1819, 118 years next October when they settled there and they named the hill Seward's Hill and the grove nearby Seward's Grove.

That is where we used to have our picnics, in Seward's Grove.  And when in 1855 the town was laid out they named it Butler because that was the name of the county in Ohio from which they had moved.

They were very busy getting ready for winter, getting up wood and making their house comfortable, and when spring came they were very very busy putting in their crops.  They did not have tractors nor gang plows, nor discs, nor combines like Daddy has, but they did the best they could with the tools they had and were very happy.

They liked it so well here that they wrote back to their relatives telling them what a delightful place to the west, so year by year some of them did come and locate near by and soon the whole settlement was filled with aunts, uncles and cousins and a number of their old neighbors moved here too.

One who came with his family was Mr. George Burnap, who had married a sister of Uncle Israel Seward and these two brothers-in-law began buying stock, as their sons were now old enough to look after the farm work.

As the country was so sparsely settled, it took quite a while to round up their stock and get it together.  Now you think they drove it to Butler and loaded it on the freight train, don't you?  No, they couldn't do that for there was no railroad here then.  The railroad was built in 1854, 35 years after they had settled on Seward's Hill.  Uncle Israel was so pleased to have it, but he could only hear the rumbling of the train through the trees as it went gliding over the track, but he wanted to see it. So he called his sons and they came with their axes and cut down a large number of trees, making a wide open space so he could enjoy watching the trains go by.

So, because they had no railroad, Uncle Israel and George Burnap drove their stock on foot to market in St. Louis - - cattle, hogs, and sometimes turkeys.  When they were taking turkeys they would stop at a grove in the evening and let them fly up in the trees to roost.  In the morning, shoo them down and go on with 200 or 300 of them.

Mr. Burnap and Uncle Israel did right well with their stock buying, so decided to build new homes. Mr. Burnap built the west part of the "ell" of what is now Mrs. Chisholm's home.  He was her grandfather, you know.  And Uncle Israel built where Malinda Jane now lives.  He built a big house, a long house with lots of bedrooms upstairs and long porch along the whole front of the house and around the roof of the porch was a railing so they could sit up there too.

They needed a big house, for there were Grandpa and Grandma, Uncle Israel and his wife, who was called Aunt Peggy (Margaret). They had had 11 children, one died when small, but ten grew to men and women, 2 girls and 8 boys.   Imagine how much noise 8 boys in one house could make.  One of the daughters married a man in St. Louis (Mathew Coudy), the other a carpenter in Butler who afterwards had a store and had the Post Office in his store for several years.  One of the sons went to the war (Civil War) and news came back.  I can remember....I was a little girl... of hearing them say, "Jimmie Seward was such a good boy" and all were so sorry he had to die.  Another son left home while he was young, went to New Orleans where he married and went into business, but afterwards moved to Colorado where he died.

Uncle Israel always wanted to give or help his boys so each could have a farm.  But one son said, "No farm for me! I want to be a merchant", so his father helped him buy a store.  So that left five boys who wanted to be farmers.  Shall I tell you where those farms were?  One was where Mr. Cline lives, one the Frisbie Hoes farm, one where the Henry boys own, one the Garrett farm where Mr. Orpin lives and one where Mrs. Ida Brown lives.  So Mr. and Mrs. Seward could sit on their porch and see the farms where their five boys lived.  Now, wasn't that nice.

There were children in all those homes.  So, of course these children must have schooling.  They did not have then what we call the Public School System, so when you sent a child to school the parents had to pay the teacher out of his own pocket.  They called these subscription schools.  In 1849 they built the first school house out of logs on some of the Seward land west of Butler.  Uncle Perry Williamson taught some year in that school house.  One of the first teachers was Miss Mary Burnap, granddaughter of Mr. John Seward.  After she had taught a year or two, she did just like Mary Louise.  She got married, so they had to find another teacher, so her sister, Miss Camilla Burnap (Jenkins) taught.  Then she married Mr. Jenkins and they lived and raised their family in the house her father had built.  They had two sons and five daughters so you may be sure there was always something doing in that house with all those young folks.  It was the dandiest home in which to have parties, for Aunt Camilla always loved having the young folks come to her home.  Several of her daughters were teachers, two of them taught in the Butler School and their Granddaughters taught here too.  Miss Camilla (Birdie) Jenkins and Miss Margaret Chisholm (Gaylor).  We do not have Seward descendants on our teaching force today, but our graduate today is a great great great grandson of John Seward and one of John Seward's great great granddaughters is married to a man who is president of our school board and perhaps in a few years one of their daughters who are great great great granddaughters may be teaching in our school.

When there were too many children to be accommodated in the log school house, a frame school house was built on the same site on which our present school house stands.  In 1857, John McGowan (husband of Israel's daughter Cornelia) built his house.   First one room, then years afterward another room was added.

But I want to tell you about a term of school in this one room.  They only had five months of school as the children were needed at home.  I have an old schedule giving the names and attendance of those who went to this school taught by Mr. Charlie Parks, 75 years ago.  There were 45 boys and 37 girls, a total of 82 in a one room taught by one teacher.  For these five months he received $150.  I find among this long list of names only one whom I know to be living and that is Mrs. Cannon, who was then Illinois Berry, aged 5.

They held Sunday school in this school house.  In August, 1858, a minister from Hillsboro and an officer in the church, Dr. Washburn (Hattie Turner's grandfather) came over and organized a church and later a church was built and on July 3, 1864 the Presbyterian Church was dedicated.

Among the first or charter members of this church were Mr. and Mrs. Israel Seward, their son, William, who was the baby boy when they moved here.  Mrs. Martha Burnap, sister to Uncle Israel; Mrs. Mary McReynolds, great grandmother to Mrs. Grotts; Mrs. Minerva Steese (or Steele or Steere), grandmother of Mrs. John L. Dryer; Mrs. Sarah Ware, grandmother of George V. Ware and my father, Mr. Bryce, who had moved here from Ohio in 1856.

Mrs. Israel Seward, whose name was Margaret, was always called Aunt Peggy.  She was truly a pioneer woman.  Busy as she must have been with her large family, she made a home where she entertained not only her friends and neighbors, but the strangers who came within their gates.   Travelers passing through the country were made welcome.  Abraham Lincoln, when he was carrying the mail from Vandalia to Springfield, often ate a meal or spent a night at her home.  Mr. Israel Seward and his two sons, William and George, at different times carried the mail from Hillsboro to Jacksonville.  But then went on horseback, not in a car like our mail carrier now drives.  But they did not have so much mail in those days.

Aunt Peggy always wore a white cap, only on Sundays she put on a black silk one.  In pioneer days there were not as very many doctors and a trained nurse had never been heard of. The neighbors helped each other in times of sickness.  Once when Aunt Peggy was sent for, to visit a family who were sick, she went to the chicken house, caught a chicken, chopped off its head, dipped it into a pail of hot water and started for the home where there was sickness, plucking the feathers from the chicken, scattering them on the way in haste, to have it ready to prepare broth for the sick and cook the rest for the family.  She was always full of cheer and scattered sunshine all along her life's pathway. The keynote of her life was kindness.

<Note: "Aunt Peggy" was the first woman member of the Hillsboro Presbyterian Church when it was formed in March 1828. Her husband, Israel, joined the church the following July 1829. - M. Grotts>

Now I can see that the littlest of you are getting sleepy, so Grandma must quit, but before you go to sleepy eye town, let us give a toast to the pioneers.

So here's to the Pioneers, who founded our town, who built and established our churches and schools, who were honest, upright honorable, Christian men and women, and who made of our community, a community known far and wide for its friendly neighborliness.

And now shall we close our eyes for a minute while we say our goodnight prayer.

Our dear Father, we do so thank Thee that Thou didst lead these pioneers to the top of this hill, and we thank Thee for their true-hearted lives and we pray Thee to help each one of us to do our part in carrying on the task which they began, that of making Butler the best and the happiest place in all the world to live.  Help us to be good children.  In Jesus name.