Folklore Pamphlets, 1921-1945

              day forget the continuous explosion of swear words which the old officer emitted on this occasion.
ROLLING STONE COLONY
Land sharks operated along the banks of the Upper Missis¬ sippi as they did elsewhere in the Middle West, promoting paper townsites and relieveing their victims of their money. "'One of the boldest-faced of these swindlers was the so-call¬ ed Rolling Stone colony. In the spring of 1852, some three or four hundred people, chiefly from New York city, came to seek their purchased lands in Rolling Stone. They brought with them beautiful maps and birds-eye views of the place, showing a lecture hall, library and academy. Each colonist was to have a house lot in the town and a farm in the neigh¬ boring country. None had ever had any farming experience. Boarding steamers at Galena, they expected to be put off at the Rolling Stone levee, for the views represented large houses, a hotel, a big warehouse and a fine dock. But the steamboat officers had never heard of such a place. Careful investigation, however, seemed to locate the site three miles above Wabasha, on land belonging to the Sioux Indians. As they insisted on landing they were put off at the log cabin of the only white man within ten miles. They made sod houses for themselves, or dug shelter burrows in the river banks. Sickness came; many died during the summer and autumn, and when winter set in the place was abandoned. The people suffered severely, and the story of Rolling Stone makes a sad chapter in the early history of Minnesota."
ONCE   WAS   ENOUGH
On June 14, 1872, the "D. A. McDonald", a famous boat owned by the Van Sant Navigation Company, on her up- river trip, was near North Mc Gregor, when her boilers ex¬ ploded, killing or drowning eighteen out of twenty-seven men on board—one of the most disasterous explosions ever re¬ corded on the Upper Mississippi. Among those killed was Captain Martin.    Several of the survivors of that disaster had