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History of Holabird

The town of Holabird received its name as a result of an early day romance. Henry Wicher, superintendent of the railroad, had recently taken Louise Holabird as his bride, and in her honor had given the town site the family name. The site was favored as a county seat by the land company of the railroad, and their hired forces attempted to persuade the county residents to cast their votes for Holabird in the county seat election. The venture was to fail as the election held on November 4, 1884, saw the town of Highmore gaining a majority of 159 votes.

The first settling in the area was sporadic and not without skullduggery. False claim shacks were erected at strategic spots in an effort to claim the land, but when an investigation proved that no valid claims had been filed, the shacks mysteriously dis-appeared with no complaints filed. The first valid setters arrived in the fall of 1882, having previously stopped in Highmore, with most of the early arrivals coming in the spring of 1883.

Following the legal laying out of a town site, the first building erected was the residence of D. A. W. Perkins. The second building was Wm. Morrison's saloon. These were followed by T. W. McGuire's hardware store, T. W. Hawley's drug store, Fadle and Murphy's general store, C. W. Grassmuch's general store, John Reynold's blacksmith shop, J. H. Queal and Co. lumber yard, George Hirsch's shoe repair, C. E. Parish's two story hotel and the railroad station with L. Noggle as agent. The Holabird Advocate also began publication with A. B. Vines as publisher. Soon the town could boast of having a population of 100 people and was larger in size than Highmore.

Water for the community was furnished by a well dug by the railroad. This served the community for many years, but this writer can remember that in the thirties we had orders not to drink the water from this well. The well still contained water in the thirties and the hoboes riding the rails used to drink from the well. It is not known if they suffered any ill effect, for if they did they were many miles away. In the thirties water for drinking was stored in cisterns and hauled from a well located on Medicine Creek one mile south of town.

A large two story building was erected in 1883, the first building erected specifically for school purposes in the county. As was customary, it also housed all the public gatherings of the community including church services and weekly lyceums. The lyceum programs featured singing, poetry, recitations, debates and an occasional lecture. A Christian College looked over the site in 1885, with the thought of estab-lishing a college in the county. The idea was dropped as the college's requirements of donated land and cash backing were too excessive for the small community.

Holabird began to fail in the late years of the 1880's until finally only the com-bined store and post office remained. The depot was boarded up and trains stopped, except when flagged down. Many blame the decline of Holabird on their loss of the fight for the county seat, but other factors were probably also involved. The town was struck by a tornado in 1885 and several buildings were destroyed. A prairie fire des-troyed a good deal of farm property in 1886, burning approximately a section of land and much grain and buildings. Add to these disasters the fact that many of the early settlers were speculators and not true settlers, and we will probably find that the com-bination of events led to the exodus from Holabird. The population of the county dropped by 500 persons from 1890 to 1895 and many were from the Holabird area. This trend would be reversed in the early 1900's as the permanent settlers began to arrive in the community. These arrivals would require a community more closely located to them than was Highmore.

Just when and how fast the town grew on its second attempt is not known but a few facts are available. John B. Perkin's edition of the History of Hyde County was published in 1908 and he reported that the settlement had a single store, a restaurant and a lumber yard. Perkins also predicted that the town would rise again and on its second attempt would survive for all time. The Hyde County News began publication in 1910, causing the editor of the Highmore Herald to wonder where its customers would come from. This venture failed in 1915. A bank was established and by 1912 had grained sufficient stature to be named a depository for county funds. Just when the other businesses opened their doors is not known but by 1920 there were two grain elevators, two cream stations, the depot had reopened with Charles Hultman as agent, a hotel was operated by Ed Woods, a garage by Vick Larson and Frank Vermillion, a blacksmith shop by Frank Mason and general stores were operated by G. F. Wemmering and C. T. Collier. The town also had a lumber yard and a large dance hall. The dance hall was managed by Clyde Moore and had a pool hall and barber shop in the basement, the latter operated for a time by Ed Single. Clyde Moore, Anna and John Wemmering and John Hardesty worked in the Holabird State Bank.

The school served about eighty students with two years of high school offered and hot lunches prepared by Shorty Laird. The original school burned in the early 1920's and was replaced in 1923 with the large two story brick building still in use today. Three teachers handled the student load of eighty pupils with a teacher for the first four grades, another for the second four grades and the third conducted the two years of high school classes offered. Not all of the students lived in Holabird. Many came in from the neighboring farms which were closely located to the town. Today the school is used as an attendance center for the local grade students of the surrounding ranch community.

The Holabird Community Church was built in 1923 and originally was located east of the Wemmering Store before being moved to its present location. The church was built with donated labor and was served by missionaries sent out by the American Sunday School Union and by neighboring preachers. Though still standing, the building has not seen any use for many, many years.

The Holabird State Bank was robbed on July 26, 1922, when a group of robbers entered the town by car and blew the safe, escaping with $1,000.00 cash and negotiable papers. The robbers cut the telephone lines before making their escape and their trail was finally lost near Kimball, South Dakota. The bank recovered from its loss but was later forced to close its doors on November 26, 1926.

Just how large Holabird became is not known but the community was never incorporated as a municipal area. In the thirties it still had a blacksmith shop, a hotel, a lumber yard, two grain elevators, a cream station, two general stores, a post office, two garages and a dance hall. The Collier Store burned in 1932 but operations were soon resumed in another building. Businesses gradually began to phase themselves out of the community and this was probably brought on by the increased use of the automobile. Distances were no longer as important as they were in earlier days, and travel to another community was no longer a full day's operation. Today there remains in the community a grocery store and post office operated by the Buchholz's, Wescott's Construction Co., the elevator operated by Hyde County Grain and Feed, headquarters of the Dancey Ranch and a few residences, one of which is occupied by Fred and Florence Wemmering, long time residents, who supplied much of the material for this history of Holabird.

It is sad to record the demise of a community, especially when one had lived there and has fond memories to treasure. Seen through the eyes of a child the town had everything - it had a stockyard with swinging gates which was a great place for playing "tag", it had a usually dry creek with a wooden foot bridge across it, it had a store with penny candy, it had a school with a merry-go-round, it had a windmill with a wooden wheel, it had a host of kids to play and explore with, but it did not have prosperity. An unimportant big word to a child, but a word which would lead to its gradual fading away, leaving only memories of better times.

This history was written by Donald Mason and appears in "Hyde Heritage" 1977

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