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Author Archives: Lone Tree Farm on Kanaranzi Creek
Trails to Rails
Overland trails became the routes of railroads that provided critical links between farms and markets. In the 1920s and 1930s, Grandpa George (the son of the homesteaders) shipped cattle to Chicago from a siding called Midland located in Iowa about … Continue reading
Civil War Trails
The trails that our family followed in 1870 weren’t confined to just stream valleys. Their overland route from Waseca to the Kanaranzi Creek was probably laid out 10-15 years earlier, before the Civil War. This map was compiled (Trygg, 1964) … Continue reading
Posted in Family History, Farm History
Tagged Civil War veterans, colonies, GAR, overland trails
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Homesteading on the Kanaranzi
In the spring of 1870, John B. Shurr and his nephew, stood on a hill about one mile south of the State Line and looked out to the east over the valley of the Kanaranzi Creek. The Rock River valley … Continue reading
Posted in Family History, Farm History
Tagged Gilded Age, Homestead Act, land grants, railroads, settlement patterns
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What’s in a Name?
“Runs as the crazy man walks.” That’s what Grandma Daisy Walker Shurr said the word “Kanaranzi” meant. This is what the Creek looked like back in the early Seventies below the hill where our house is located. A friend of … Continue reading
“Sabbath” on the Farm
Voluntary self-isolation during this current COVID-19 crisis can be considered an opportunity to celebrate an extended “Sabbath”. That was the suggestion made by one of our favorite pastors in his virtual sermon this past Palm Sunday. He reminded us that … Continue reading
Posted in Family History
Tagged Apollo 13, Covid-19, Earth Day, Easter Sunday, headstone, Holy Week, Palm Sunday, Viet Nam
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Kanaranzi Creek and Covid-19
The last two years we’ve had record rainfall and Kanaranzi Creek has changed a lot because of it. Although the spring melts have not produced much flooding, the summer “rain bombs” have resulted in bank-full flows sustained over long periods … Continue reading
Posted in Earth Science
Tagged air photos, channel changes, Covid-19, deposition, erosion, scientific process
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Old Books
Winter is a good time to do some reading. Sometimes the books themselves have stories that are just as interesting as those on the pages between their covers. My family has been blessed with school librarians. Our daughter is currently … Continue reading
Rural Fall
We had about two inches of snow the other night, but it blew into drifts. Several weeks ago, we had our first accumulating snow that stayed on the level. I had forgotten how much traffic is recorded in a few … Continue reading
Posted in Earth Science, Life Science
Tagged autumn, coyotes, eagles, fall, snow, tracks, trees
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Snowbound
Earlier this week we were snowbound in Colorado. The first storm dropped about 10 inches on our kids’ home in the mountains west of Boulder. The snow piled up on the trees and then fell a second time when the … Continue reading
Making Winter Wood
Now we’ve had the first frost and the first snow of the season. The leaves are turning yellow and the snow that stuck to tree trunks has melted. It was in times like this current reprieve from impending winter, that … Continue reading
Posted in Family History, Farm History
Tagged buzz saw, cain saw, crosscut saw, wood stove
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Lone Tree Farm on Kanaranzi Creek 