Gary and Nancy traveled to SD on our way south for the winter. We planned a stop at Aberdeen to find Ordway and the land where Amos and Amanda Cornwall settled when they left the Albion Academy in 1878. Professor Cornwall was the Prinicpal of the Academy for 20 years. His wife was the former Amanda Luse, a student and then a teacher at the Academy. At the site of the town we found a water treatment plant for the city of Aberdeen. We drove 2 miles east and 2 miles north to take a picture of the stream that flowed near Section 12 where Amos owned 3 160-acre parcels.
The next day we drove to the Spearfish-Deadwood area to meet with Hank Frawley. His grandfather attended the Albion Academy and the UW-Madison campus and became a lawyer. He moved to Deadwood where he was a successful lawyer. He also began acquiring land so he could have a ranch. Hank took us on a history tour of the Frawley Ranches Historic Site.
We saw the Centennial School, the 1880 one-room school, and his current home which was the original stagecoach stop for the Deadwood-Spearfish route. We also saw the Upper Ranch where Hank grew up, the Lower Ranch where his uncle lived and the Anderson Ranch which was his great-grandparents’ dairy operation. Their milk, butter and cheese went to Deadwood and was sold directly off the wagon – no retail outlet needed then!
Interior of 1880 Centennial School
Centennial School playground
Thank you, Mr. Frawley, for a wonderful afternoon touring the ranch! What a great history lesson.
Albion Academy Historical Society 