9/15/2005
Marilyn Dodgen There is a lot of history within the walls of what is known as the former Torgerson Boarding Home, located on the First Avenue South side of the block, soon to be cleared to make way for the new U.S. Post Office in Humboldt. The original house was built by Ira Welch, M.D., in 1880, who lived with his family in the home and had his office there. He also kept a couple of rooms available for patients in recovery, prior to being able to return to their homes. One of his daughters, Frances (Frankie), married Fred Taft, son of Humboldt's founder, Stephen H. Taft. A second daughter, "Charlie," remained single and became quite a traveler for a single woman in that era. Dr. Welch died in 1903. The desk and several items from his office are on display in the ballroom at the Humboldt County Historical Museum. In 1904, the home was sold to Dr. C.P. Christiansen, an osteopath. He also lived in the house and had his office there until his death in 1929. Not much is known about the next owner, but her name was Mildred Seeley and she operated a hotel there for 11 years. She sold the building to R.A. Skaugstad in 1940, and he changed it to a convalescent home. He was also the local mortician and he and his family of six children, lived in the funeral home. His wife, Albie, died in 1942. His daughter, Phyllis (Mrs. Duke) Edge of Humboldt, remembers having to work there with her siblings, and as teenagers, they really didn't want to be there. The other children were Juane (Jensen, now deceased), Bobbie (Roberta), Garnet, Dean, and Brownie. They carried trays to residents, did dishes and laundry, and helped wherever they were needed. She said that in later years, if someone misbehaved, the family joke was to threaten to send them back to work at the "Con" (convalescent home). For a while there was a nursery upstairs and women came there to have their babies. She said that her own sister, Bobbie, was a patient there for a while when she was recovering from Tuberculosis as a teenager. Two of the nurses she remembers that worked there were Clara Barton and Marie Kelley. Her dad sold the funeral home in 1948 to Harvey and Donna Bogaard and he moved to the house south of the funeral home. Skaugstad sold the business to Myles and Marie Torgerson in 1957. At first they ran it as a nursing home. The family consisted of Dennis, Merrill and twins, Darwin and Marcy. They tried living there, in one room, for several months and realized that wouldn't work, so they moved to a house and eventually re-located in a house down the street to the west of the nursing home. Being young children, they spent their days at the nursing home, where their mother could watch them while she worked, and later, they all pitched in and helped at the nursing home. Being in charge, their mother practically lived there night and day. The daughter, Marcy (Torgerson) Illg, said that new regulations regarding nursing home operation forced her folks to change to a convalescent status, and when more regulations came about, that were demanding expensive changes that were not feasible in their building, they turned it into a boarding house. (Marcy also recalled that when the children were younger, they loved to play "Hide and Seek" in among the machinery on the lot south of the implement building). New regulations necessitated enlarging the facility by adding a room to the west side in the 1970s, to accommodate a living room/TV-room, with a kitchen in back. Marie cooked for the residents, who each had a private bedroom. In the late 1970s, Eric Sime and Bill Merris, as Sime-Merris Rentals, purchased the property and asked that the Torgersons continue to operate the business for them. They rented seven rooms as sleeping rooms, with cooking privileges, plus a TV lounge area. Ownership of the property reverted back to the Torgersons about 10 years later. Miles died in the fall of 1991. Marie sold the property in 1993 to Paul and Marian Lynch, who after brief ownership, sold it to Dennis and Janice Collins, who lived in the house with their family from 1993 to 1998. Marie and Merrill moved to a house near the Humboldt Junior High School. Both Marie and Merrill are now residents of Humboldt Care Center North. Dennis and Janice rented several rooms to single men, and these men continued to live there after the Collins family moved to Minnesota, finally vacating the house in 2003. It has stood empty since that time, and has now been sold and will be demolished probably sometime this fall. Two large houses used to sit to the east of the Torgerson house, owned by Wallace and Florence Hansen, next door, and Lewis and Minnie Hansen on the corner. For many years, the Lewis Hansens rented out rooms in their large home and still had renters when the house was sold. These two houses were demolished to make room for the parking lot when Humboldt Trust Bank built their facility on the corner of Sumner Avenue and 5th Street South, back in the 1960s. As with any town over 125 years of age, the downtown buildings have historic value, and the north side of this block is no exception. Present business owners on this block have refurbished the faces of their buildings in recent years (the most recent being the Humboldt Independent Newspaper), and Bank Iowa (formerly Humboldt Trust & Savings), is completing a major renovation at this time. Pat Baker, a local historian, shared several pictures of that block from the early turn of the century, including one taken a year or more after the International Harvestor building was built. A wide variety of businesses occupied the north side of that block, including the Humboldt Republican and Independent, over the years. Many square dancers have fond memories of dancing in the big hall upstairs over the newspaper office. The newspaper had moved to the building during the Humboldt centennial in 1963. It was a sad day when the wrecking ball began the demolition of the department store built by A.B. White back before 1900, along with the buildings to the east, almost 100 years later. The community has enjoyed using the beautiful Gazebo Park that was created back in 1994, on that corner, watching it take root and mature to what it is today. Now another change will take place and the new Humboldt Post Office will be built on that lot and the Gazebo will be moved and the park re-created out in Worthington Park, along Hwy. 169. A progressive community changes and grows, but let us not forget the business owners, employees and volunteers who contributed to that growth along the way. |
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The Humboldt
Independent • Official paper of Humboldt County
Telephone: (515)
332-2514 |
