employ of Judd, Walker & Co. The next three years he spent at Osceola,
Wisconsin. In 1849 he engaged in logging and continued in that
business for many years. In 1856 he settled on and improved a farm in
Sunrise. In 1868 he removed to Taylor's Falls and formed a partnership
with L. K. Stannard in the mercantile and lumbering business. Mr.
Ellison was a representative in the eighth legislature, and served as
county commissioner eight years. In late years he has been interested
in a saw, planing and flour mill at Stillwater. He is a stockholder
and director in the First National Bank at Stillwater and owns large
tracts of pine lands. He has applied himself closely to business, is
energetic, cautious and thoroughly reliable. Mr. Ellison is unmarried.
WYOMING
Includes township 33, range 21. The eastern half is well timbered, the
west has oak openings. Sunrise river flows in a northerly direction
through the township, and with its tributaries and numerous lakes
supplies it abundantly with water. There are some wild meadows and
tamarack swamps. Green lake, in the eastern part of the township, is a
picturesque sheet of water, five miles in length by one and a half
broad, with sloping timbered shores and cedar points projecting into
the lake, in one place forming a natural roadway nearly across, which
is connected with the mainland opposite by a bridge.
[Illustration: SMITH ELLISON.]
A colony from Eastern Pennsylvania settled the western part of the
township in 1855. The colony was composed of L. O. Tombler, Dr. John
W. Comfort, E. K. Benton, and some others, in all ten families. The
eastern part had been previously settled by Swedes. The township was
organized in 1858. The supervisors were J. W. Comfort, L. O. Tombler
and Fred Tepel. A post office was established at Wyoming with J. Engle
as postmaster. The Catholics and Methodists erected churches in 1864.
The St. Paul & Duluth railroad was completed in 1868, and in 1879 the
branch road to Taylor's Falls. The township was settled rapidly after
the completion of the railroad. At the junction of the two roads there
is a good depot, two stores and a fine hotel, the latter kept by L. O.
Tombler.
WYOMING VILLAGE
Was surveyed and platted by Ben. W. Brunson in 1869, in portions of
sections 17, 19 and 20, township 33, range 21; proprietors, Western
Land Association, L. Mendenhall, agent.
DEER GARDEN VILLAGE
Was surveyed and platted by Alex. Cairns, October, 1856, in sections 1
and 12, township 33, range 21; proprietor, Erastus S. Edgerton.
LUCIUS O. TOMBLER was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in 1823. His
ancestors were Moravians, who, driven from Germany in the eighteenth
century, came to America, and founded the colony of Bethlehem, a
colony famed for its thrift, advancement in educational matters, and
high morality. Mr. Tombler and his wife, Christiana Brown, to whom he
was married in 1845, were educated in the Moravian schools. They came
with the colony from Bethlehem to Wyoming in 1855, and built a two
story log hotel on the St. Paul and Lake Superior stage road, which
was long noted as a rest for the weary traveler and a home for the
invalid. Mr. Tombler was an energetic, worthy man, genial in his
manners, a good farmer, a good landlord, and an accomplished musician
besides. Mrs. Tombler possessed superior endowments as a landlady, and
the house soon gained widespread popularity with the traveling public.
The first hotel was burned in 1876, but the year following a more
commodious building was erected on the grounds, which, with its modern
improvements within, and its park-like surroundings, is more popular
with the traveling public than its predecessor. The Tombler family
consists of Charles A., the father of Lucius O., born in 1800, but
still hale and vigorous, in the possession of all his faculties, two
sons, Maurice and Milton, and one daughter, Laura. Charles A., the
grandfather, has received the thirty-third degree Scottish Masonic
rite.
DR. JOHN WOOLMAN COMFORT was born in Bucks county, Pennsylvania, in