3/6/2006:
We have two stories for you today. The first is from the late Bill Shemoory, a newspaperman in Williston. He told a story of a winter day in the 1930s when several boxes of coyote pelts were brought to the Williston post office for shipping. Postal employees rolled the boxes inside to weigh the pelts, when one fell off and burst open. Out jumped thousands of little red fleas that promptly licked their chops and went after everyone in the place. One man was so overcome by the little munchers, he stripped off his clothes and ran down to the basement to shower. It didn’t work. He was still infested and ended up having to bathe in kerosene.
Needless to say, the pelts were immediately shoved back outside. That night, the temperature plunged to 25 below, and in the morning it was said there were so many frozen fleas lying on the loading dock, it looked like red confetti.
For our second story, today is the birthday of Charles Cavileer, who was born in 1818. He was a saddler by trade, and while living in St. Paul, he was also a druggist, a postal worker and the Territorial Librarian. Cavileer was also adventurous, and in 1851, he brought to Pembina the first permanent group of agricultural settlers to what is now North Dakota. Two years later, he became a U.S. Customs inspector and was then appointed postmaster by President Abraham Lincoln.
His written accounts of wildlife and fur trading have since become invaluable records of the rich native heritage that soon disappeared forever.
Despite the Homestead Act of 1862, there were only about 2500 permanent white settlers 1870. The Civil War and resistance from Native Americans discouraged settlement. The town of Cavalier and Cavalier County were both named after Charles Cavileer – but his name is spelled C-A-V-I-L-E-E-R and at some point both the town and county ended up with a different spelling.
Written by Merry Helm