Thomas McALLEN

   General Notes:

Taken from a newpaper article.
In the year 1877, Thomas McAllan moved with his family into an old abandoned camp. He was Mountain, Winconsin's first settler. The old camp was located about fifty miles north of Oconto, on the banks of South Branch. It became a stopping place for the river drivers. Life was anything but easy for this early pioneer. Twice a year he walked to Oconto by way of the old North Branch rooad for supplies. These were hauled up by a hired team.
Mail was a rarity, the closet post office was Oconto. Across from where the Luthern church now stands, was an old hollow pine stump. There the supply team drivers put their mail, and there they picked up outgoing letters. That old hollow stump was Mountain's first post office.
The mother and children were alone most of the time. Their meager supplies were enlarged by venison and other game, left by the friendly Menominees (Indian tribe). The Indian hunting trail were near by there on its way from McComb Lake. The Indians were fond of hunting by moonlight and often floated down the river in their canoes and dugouts.
There in the log cabin in 1886 was born a little baby girl, whom they names Alice, now Mrs. Walter Kingston. She was the first white child born in this town.
One day in February when Mr. McAllen returned from his work he found his cabin burned. The mother and children were huddled miserably in an old barn, trying to keep warm. Supplies were gone, home was gone, bedding, clothing, everything the family owned. But they were soon put in the wagon and hauled to Foley's, the closest neighbor, miles farther down on the river. Later a new cabin was built.
Fate was sometimes kind, too. Once when kerosene had soaked their flour enroute from Oconto, a kind providence stepped in. One of the supply teams driven by a neighboring teamster, took the wrong road. He spent the night there and in the morning left a sack of flour for the family.
The first school was held in an old part of an old camp, located across the road from what later was the Bartz homestead. It was taught by Ella Mentor, a girl from Omaha. There were six pupils, Charlie, William, John, Lizzie McAllen and Edward and George Rabe.
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Taken from a newspaper article from approximately 1958.
Tom McAllan, settled there about a mile west of the present community on the North Branch of the Oconto River, The year was 1877, just 20 years before the coming of the railroad.
McAllan's children boosted the tiny population as the years grew, but it was his first child, Alice, who made significant history--she was the community's first white child born there. She was born in Mountain's first permanent home, a soft of "stopping place" for travelers and then the community's only business enterprise.
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   Marriage Information:

Thomas married Alice T RUTHERFORD on 1 Oct 1870 in Frederickton, New Brunswick. (Alice T RUTHERFORD was born on 5 Jul 1849 in Jedborough, Scotland and died on 2 Dec 1906 in Mountain, Oconto, WI.)