West Branch Times, West Branch, Iowa, Thursday, August 3, 1933
Transcribed by Sharon Elijah, May 10, 2018
J. H. MORTON HAS GAVEL FROM WOOD OF FIRST COURTHOUSE
An echo out of the past will reverberate each time Judge O. C. Brown calls “Order in the Court!” and emphasizes it with a staccato rap of the black walnut gavel which J. H. Morton of this place is sending the magistrate for use in his duties at Douglass, Wyo.
In the far west halls of justice the little gavel may remember its first use as a part of the old courthouse at Rochester, Iowa, in 1837, when that river village was the county seat of Cedar county. Picturesque in its sandy soil, with a few ancient house reminiscent sunning, there is little about Rochester today to suggest the thriving county seat of nearly a century ago; yet it is said that this was the center of local activities and had a promising future in those early days.
Traffic on the Cedar river, a century ago, made Rochester a logical business point. Colonel Davenport had a trading post nearby, where he dealt with the Indians, and the river port was the doorway to the prairie country to the west, heading toward Iowa City, the nearest big settlement at that time.
At the second session of the Wisconsin territorial legislature which convened at Burlington in 1837 the original Dubuque county was divided into eleven counties and Cedar was one of them. Rochester was, by Territorial Legislature of Wisconsin, designated as the seat of justice for Cedar county in 1837, and Judge Irwin was appointed by the President of the United States, holding his first court in that year. He was succeeded by Judge Williams. The first sheriff was James W. Tallman.
Court was held in a small plain building near the river’s edge. Not much room was required to accommodate the crowds attending the sessions; but as the county became settled there grew a strong sentiment in favor of moving the county seat, and in 1839 a petition was presented to the territorial legislature asking a law enabling a relocation of the seat of justice of Cedar county, which petition was heeded and a law enacted. Henry W. Higgins of Scott county, John G. McDonald of Jackson county and John Egner of Johnson county were appointed commissioners of relocation, and after much controversy they selected the geographical center of the county and named it in honor of General Tipton of Indiana. The stake was driven in March, 1840, locating the site of the courthouse, a two story building finished in 1846. In 1857 the present courthouse was begun and finished two years later at a cost of $45,000. Its predecessor was moved to Cedar street and used for mercantile purposes.
In the meantime the building which had served as the first court house of Cedar county, at Rochester, was converted into a dwelling, and served for many years as a home for the ferryman, on the banks of the stream. He plied his craft to and fro across the treacherous Cedar for many years, selling his boat to A. C. Gruwell in 1880 when the bridge had been completed, spanning the water. The ferry was then intended to continue its business at Gray’s Ford.
Ferryman Reed used the old courthouse as a home for many years. In time it fell into disrepair, and now nothing remains but the foundation and some scattered timbers. J. H. Morton, who was born near Rochester and grew up imbued with village traditions salvaged a window frame, and from it had made the mallet which will be a tangible reminder of the “glory that was.”
Milt Randall took the pieces of native black walnut, seasoned a hundred years, carefully shaped them and with beautiful precision produced a perfectly proportioned gavel, on one side of which is carved the date 1837, and on the opposite side, 1933.
Mr. Morton is sending the gavel to Judge Brown, who was his playmate in the sandy streets of Rochester, and whose father was one of the very first settlers, living there during the days when it was the county seat. The western jurist will find the gift a handful of memories.
