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Mountain Memories
Pages 46 - 47
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The Independent Scandanavian Lutheran Church was saved from the fires which devastated the countryside. Built in 1908, the members of the congregation first met in various homes for their worship services.
The congregation became a member of the Augustana Synod in 1914. In 1958 the congregation severed its connections and remained independent until joining the Lutheran - Missouri Synod in 1967. In 1978 the congregation began plans to build a new structure, the dedication services taking place for the newly completed Tabor Lutheran Church on April 29, 1979.
Rev. Bert Schmidt has been the pastor since 1975. ?his photo is courtesy of Ivy Rasmussen-Shreffler.
The town of Mountain and the newly built church were saved from total ruin as were other settlements by means of 'back firing1. A line of fire some distance in advance of the blaze would be set, this being controlled as it was not too large, then burned in the direction of the oncoming fire. Thus a strip of burned over area it died for lack of fuel.
Within a few years the burned over areas provided bounteous crops of blackberries, raspberries and blue berries. The local settlers could often times pick 50 to 75 quarts of blackberries a day within calling distance of their homes.
Game, such as grouse and rabbit beceime more abundant and where there had been nothing but charred remains of woodlands, now there were large sections that took on a prairie like nature. With this phenomena, prairie chicken, in great numbers moved in from the south and became inhabitants of these northern areas.
With the advent of these proliferations, carnivorous fur bearers increased; mink, otter, weasels, fox, and coyotes found fertile ground for depredations. Bear also found more food for sustanence and so increased.
Deer, however/ were not as plentyful as they are today. Deer were usually hunted with dogs with the watchers waiting along the streams at certain area known to ba deer crossings.
Ruffled groups were so numerous that if you walked a half mile through their habitat and failed to flush 15 to 20 birds, you complained that the population was down! In the winter time boys used to walk the logging roads through a swampy area and pick the birds off with a '22' as they fed on popular buds.
Cotton tail rabbits abounded in areas close to clearings, while it helped to have a dog, it was no trick to bag a half dozen rabbits sitting with a 22 from one spot. All this in an hour of hunting!
The swampy areas teamed with snowshoe rabbits and here again it was an easy task to carry home a half dozen in a short while. Snaring rabbits was another means of providing meat for the table. After the snow cover was here to stay for the winter, snares made of picture or stove pipe wire were set out along the rabbit run ways, A dozen snares would net 3 or 4 rabbits per night.