“People of Harpers Slough” series continues: John and Bertha Attall

“In the 1930’s my parents bought a building lot from Happy Nipper, and my father, with the help of several friends and relatives, built a simple summer cottage on the banks of Harpers Slough. Our family spent a part of 10 or 12 summers there. Dad commuted to work in Waukon every day. There were some interesting people who made their homes in the area and lived there year-round. Some of them became good friends of our family. Their children were our playmates. These sketches are a compilation of memories of several of us who lived through those ten years together. It was during the Great Depression and times were hard.”

They were a well matched pair, John and Bertha Attall. They exuded a general air of cheerfulness and worked hard at whatever opportunities came their way. When I knew them, they owned a small farm of about 40 acres. Maybe 15 acres was crop land, the rest being rough pasture which extended up the sides of the river bluff flanking their property on the north. There were a few fruit and nut trees and a lot of wild blackberries that grew beyond the potato and corn fields, where the crop land gave way to the rising valley floor.

John helped his son-in-law pull the heavy fishing seines in summer and cut ice in the winter. Prior to moving to the farm they owned a small hotel-boarding house in Waukon Junction. Mrs. Attall managed the hotel while John worked as brakeman on the train, which ran three times a day between Waukon and Dubuque.

Their only child, a daughter named Cora, helped at the hotel and served as Postmistress for the local Post Office. During this time Cora met and married Elvis (Happy) Nipper, who roomed and boarded at the hotel.

The Nipper family of four handsome children were the Attalls’ pride and joy. The two households were mutually supportive of each other. A big vegetable garden, herd of six milk cows and a flock of chickens provided plenty for the needs of the two families with enough left over to sell to neighbors and summer residents. Happy’s commercial fishing gave them fish to eat and the berry bushes and fruit trees yielded their summer bounty.

The Mrs.’ usual garb was a serviceable cotton dress covered by a full-bibbed apron. She wore sensible black oxfords and cotton stockings. When she went berrying or worked in her garden, she wore a homemade sun bonnet, the brim of which was stiffened with wooden slats. Her white hair was parted in the middle and drawn into a tight bun at the back of her neck. John’s white hair was balding. He favored work pants and shirts and wore ankle-high work shoes.

The limestone bluff behind their home was an historic natural landmark, known as Paint Rock. It was so named because one face of it was decorated with early Indian drawings and at the time of the earliest explorations of the Mississippi River, it was used as an identification point. It was mentioned in the journals of Zebulon Pike on April 18, 1806.

Paint Rock, was located in the so called “Neutral Zone,” established by the federal government in 1830 to separate warring Sioux and Sauk-Fox tribes. Early French fur traders, working out of Prairie du Chien, WI, established a crude port, located near what later became Attall’s farm; a steep wagon road led up the valley to the table land above. It was from here that they set out to the West with their trade goods and returned with packs of furs.

This was prime rattlesnake country; the bluffs were full of them. Many a snake wound up in two pieces after Mrs. Attall’s hoe chopped them in half. When the summer got brutally hot the snakes crawled near the river where it was cooler. They also loved the Attalls’ spring house where cans of cream were kept cold. We learned to took carefully before stepping into its shadowy coolness.

In winter the men set trap lines, hunted and made ice. It was also the time of year when “the Mrs.” found respite from her gardening chores and had time to sew clothing and other necessities.

The farm was not electrified until Rural Electrification Authority came through the area years later. Kerosene lamps gave light; the cream separator, butter churn, sewing and washing machines were all operated manually. The house was heated by a coal burning stove. John’s battered pick-up truck carried coal, ice, potatoes, fish, and anything else the family needed. It was a hard life.

There were not many farms along the river because, although it spanned three miles, the valley offered few flat spots where crops could be planted. The Attalls had the only farm between Harpers Ferry and the Junction.

Mrs. Attall had a finely honed sense of right and wrong and did not hesitate to enforce her standards. A Father Horstfield who was staying at the hotel had the bad manners to appear in the dining room nude. Bertha was so incensed that she commenced beating him with a broom until he retreated up the stairs. She shouted after him, “You get dressed, pack your things, and don’t you ever come back here again.”

Some of her chickens were disappearing and she soon deduced that the Indians were helping themselves to them. She confronted Emma Big Bear, who incidentally would have made three of Mrs. Attall, saying, “If you want a chicken, just ask me for one, but don’t you go stealing any more of them.”

John and his Mrs. didn’t approve of Happy’s bootlegging, but suffered his behavior for the sake of family harmony. Happy provided for the needs of his wife and children and was a conscientious, though overly strict, parent to the Attalls’ only grandchildren.

(About the Author: Joan Leschensky Grosshuesch grew up in Waukon. Her maternal great grandparents were early homesteaders in the area. Grosshuesch has made her home in Wisconsin for the last 47 years with her husband Ruben, who is a retired clergyman, in Sheboygan, WI. They are the parents of four adult children. Grosshuesch is the sister of John Leschensky of Waukon. Her parents were Emil and Clarice Dillenberg Leschensky.)