The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

26 en oe Pames M. 'Kellar now Boar ay Py vedere, Cal., at the age of 82 years, was one of the original patry that went from Worcester, Mass., in 1849, to develop the iron mines that had recently been discovered in the Lake Superior country. He has two sons and a daughter living, Fred W. Kelley, publisher of the Breeder and Sports- man, San Francisco; James H. Kelley, real estate dealer of Belvedere; and Mrs. S. H. Woodbury, Chicago. Mr. Kelley's party arrived at Mar- quette a few days after Peter White's party had reached there from Mack- inac island. He wads requested by the Marine Review a few weeks ago to Rive' an account of his journey : to od JAMES M. KELLEY, 1859. From a photograph taken in the iron mines from Massachusetts. His account, written in 1909, of what occurred in 1849, is extremely valua- ble. Mr. Kelley's recital is as follows: In 1849 I left Boston where I had been employed in Simmons and Mack- intyre's Church Organ Manufactory and went to Worcester. I: went to work with Freeman Upham in -build- ing a mansion for William A. Draper, a wealthy banker and prominent citi- zen of Worcester. In the winter of 1848 Roper i Graveraet arrived at Worcester with specimens of iron from Lake Superior which were tested at the Washburn Wire Works. Wire was drawn direct from the bloom which was said to be equal to the wire from the best re- fined iron. W. A, Draper, Amos R. Harlow, Mr. Coey, R. J. Graveraet, Waterman A. Fisher and others: in- corporated the company and at once Seema ace 'Dad. to: Tre MarRINE REVIEW ace "petdae! " machinery ready to ship in the spring. Mr. Upham was asked by Draper to go to Lake Superior as superintendent of build- ing, but Upham said he could not go. He had just been married and was elected one of the aldermen of the city. He recommended me to the company saying that I was as com- petent for the pos.tion as himself. May 8th, 1849, I signed an agreement for one year to go to Carp River, Lake Superior, and put up the build- ings. Our machinery was shipped to Buffalo by canal, and about the mid- dle of May our party consisting of Mr. Harlow agent, Coey machinist, Elias Gates engineer, Edward Clark and J. M. Kelley, started for Buffalo by rail. From Albany to Buffalo we made very slow progress, as the road was owned by several different companies and occasionally failed to make con- nections (no through tickets). We change cars, buy tickets, change baggage, at several towns on the way. [he railroad track a part of the way was a strap of iron spiked on wooden stringers. Had to stop over night at Canandaigua. We. leit Harlow and family there to come on later. Finally we arrived at Buffalo, and from there to Detroit by steamer Illinois, a very pleasant trip. We put up at the American Exchange Hotel, Hawly Lyon, proprietor, and waited for our freight to arrive. As Detroit -at that time was in danger of a visitation of the cholera, Mr. Gates and I went by steamer to the Soo where we spent a week or two fighting mosquitoes, fishing, and watching Indians run the rapids. I asked our landlord how the people got their living there. He said with a wink, "In summer we skin strang- ers, in the winter we skin one an- OLner," About the last of June our supplies and machinery arrived and Shelden McKnight, freight agent, had them hauled over the portage (there was no canal then--only a dry ditch, the remains of an abandoned effort to dig a canal)... Our goods were loaded on the schooner Fur Trader, Captain Ripley, and we sailed for Carp River. We had a very pleasant voyage up the lake. July 4th we were passing the Pictured Rocks and we celebrated with the aid of the barrel of "Old Rye" (which Ripley kept on deck with a tin coffee pot and cup) free for all. We had a jolly time. July 7, At Lake Superior, Poneer, | Fe we eased Cin River and an- chored about a mile above, near a rock (which we _ as:sterwards- called Ripley's Rock) in a small bay and landed our freight on the shore, ey. erything, supplies, boiler, engine, portable saw mill, and machinery, We were met here by a party of young men who had come up from Mackinaw with a fine large boat, a most welcome addition to our party, They were Peter White, James Chap- inan, Wayne Graverae: and Henry Davenport, and from the Iron Moun- tains, John Mann, Capt. Moody and Dr. Rodgers. We were now in the_ wilderness, The nearest white people were a JAMES M. KELLEY, From a photograph taken in 1905. few men at the Jackson Iron Works eight or nine miles from the shore, the missions at L'Anse, about forty miles north, and Mr. Williams and family about the same distance south at Grand Island. Our party now consisted of Coey, Gates, Harding (mill man), four Mackinaw boys, Mann, 'Moody, Rodgers, Robert Graveraet and myself. I furnished them with axes, and in a few days made a clearing where now is the city of Marquette. 'At first our accommodations were very crude. Sometitnes we slept on the shore and sometimes in camp. At Dead River we found a very good house made of squared timber of logs with shingled roof. It had been © built and occupied by a New York company who prospected for gold in that vicinity but found nothing