The US city named after a Cavanman
Minnesota has appeared in the news in recent times for all the wrong reasons. Nobody could forget the barbaric death of a man named George Floyd in Minneapolis as seen on televisions around the world. The state of Minnesota is the 22nd most populous state in the United States. Its cities include Minneapolis, Saint Paul, Rochester, Duluth and Dawson. When the current pandemic ends, tourists will be glad to know that Minnesota is ranked third for its natural environment. Minnesota’s prairielands, like Cavan, are celebrated for their lakes. Then to the South, Bluff County is the ideal spot for cross country skiing and water sports. William Dawson, the first Irishman to be elected Mayor of Saint Paul, a twin city of Minneapolis, was born in Co Cavan on October 1, 1825. The City of Dawson, Minnesota is named in his honour.
In an article by Bob Jensen, Society President of the Maplewood Area Historical Society, I discovered more information on William Dawson who arrived in Saint Paul in 1861. On October 30, 1863, Dawson was appointed treasurer of the newly formed St Paul Library Association. Mr Jensen recalled that William Dawson was the founder of Gladstone, an area near St Paul, which he named after the English Prime minister. Today, the place is known as Frost Avenue and English Street.
In 1886, he bought and made development plans for 574 acres of land ‘in New Canada Township for his Gladstone Land Company’. Another achievement was his encouragement of the St Paul and Duluth Railroad to build Gladstone Station. The New Canada Township, known as Little Canada in the Minneapolis-St Paul suburb, was founded in 1844 by a Canadian escaping the floods in Winnipeg. Although in the United States, Little Canada still holds on to its French-Canadian traditions.
In ‘The Story of the St Paul Globe’ Herbert Y. Weber records the history of St Paul’s official newspaper ‘The Globe’, which in 1881 came under the joint ownership of a ‘stock company’ made up of William Dawson, Henry H. Sibley, Patrick H. Kelly, Albert Scheffer, Reuben B. Galusha and Ansel Oppenheim. Weber informs us that, ‘Sibley, Kelly, Scheffer, and Dawson were St Paul businessmen and Democratic politicians’.
According to the publication, ‘Souvenir Book, St Paul Police Benevolent Association, 1904’, Mayor Maxfield became ill in his last term. William Dawson was made ‘acting Mayor’. When Maxfield’s term ended, Dawson was elected Mayor from 1878 to 1881. Dawson’s previous ‘municipal honours’ included having been president of the council from 1865 to 1868, and again from 1875 to 1878. Dawson was later succeeded by Edmund Rice whose daughter was to marry his son, William Dawson jnr.
Bank of Minnesota
Dawson was the ‘organiser’ and President of the Bank of Minnesota. For many years he was a successful banker. However, five years before his death on February 19, 1901, the bank collapsed leaving William Dawson to die penniless. The reason for the bank's failure is documented online at https://maplewoodmn.gov from where we learn that Dawson had borrowed heavily from the bank during the panic of 1893. His plans for Gladstone had not been successful and the lots he had hoped to sell achieved less than expected. Dawson had ploughed his finances into the unprofitable St Paul Plow Works, which was destroyed in a fire in November 1892. The insurance company added additional pain to the situation when they only offered to pay a fraction of what the business was valued at.
By 1896, Dawson was no longer able to meet loan repayments and the Bank of Minnesota declared itself bankrupt. The law saw the matter differently and had him ‘indicted for illegal borrowing and embezzlement in 1897’.
The City of Dawson remains a lasting tribute to William Dawson’s contribution to public life in Minnesota. In addition to the City, a two-acre park in St Paul was named after him too.
DOGGY TALE
On November 10, 1860, the Cavan Observer reported on the story of a missing dog. Samuel Pickins had summoned Judith Young for keeping his dog in ‘her possession’, which he emphasised was his property, and that he knew her to have stolen the animal. The newspaper stated, that Pickins had testified ‘to the effect that he missed the dog, when about five months old, in June last, and gave information of the loss to the police’.
The dog had vanished until ‘recently’ when he discovered the dog with Judith Young who told him she got it from a man about Arvagh. Her son argued that their dog was got as a pup from a man called Lacky, a cartmaker from Cavan town. Sure, the dog in his mother’s possession was not near as old as what Pickins maintained, the younger Young asserted.
Lacky, the cart-maker told the court that the ‘dog strolled into his shop in June or July’ of 1859, and that ‘his son asked Young did he want a pup?’ Thomas Darby then gave evidence that Samuel Pickins once lodged with him and that the pup was a nuisance about the house. Mrs Pickins, he said, had had her fill of it and got rid of it to some unknown person. Mrs Pickins denied doing any such thing.
Mr Young, it was decided was a ‘respectable’ man, and though that may be the case, the dog clearly belonged to Samuel Pickins and should be returned immediately. Pickins was unexpectedly asked if he might compensate the Young’s for keeping his dog in food for the 12 months it spent with them. His reply was not published.