Edmunds County Tribune -

From the Ipswich Tribune, Thursday, August 13, 1931 edition

ipswich

By Hon J. W. Parmley

Ipswich South Dakota, the County Seat of Edmunds County, is situated on the Pacific Coast line of the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railway, 733 miles west of Chicago and 1,455 miles east of Seattle. It was established in October 1883, and in less than a month became a town of over a thousand, when the railroad built west from Aberdeen, S.D., and established the town in the center of a triangle formed by three towns, Freeport, Georgetown and Edmunds. These were a mushroom growth, having sprung into being in the spring of 1883, with the great waves of settlers taking land under the Pre-esemption, Homestead and Timber Culture provisions Each town had hopes of becoming the county seat and western railroad terminus, but, the buildings all being of lumber, it look less than a month to move all to the railroad town in Ipswich.

The Superintendent of the Hastings and Dakota Division of the “Milwaukee Road”, Charles H. Prior, of Minneapolis, Minnesota, being a native of Ipswich, England, named the town after that of his nativity. Mr. Prior owned the land on which the town was platted and from the sale of town lots, realized about $100,000.00. Those were boom times and speculation was rife. People did not stop to consider that with towns every twelve or fifteen miles, agriculture in a new country could not support cities of metropolitan size. The country was and is dependent on stock raising and agriculture for support. At times milling and creamery industries were started but large central plants easily accessible by rail or truck have made the smaller ones unprofitable.

The surrounding country is part of the great plain between the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, an important section of the Louisiana Purchase shown on the soil survey maps as the most fertile soil of the continent. It is a black loam formed by aeons of vegetable decay, underlaid by boulder clay of the Glacial Drift in which there are accasional deposits of sand, gravel and granite boulders of superior quality. The greatest artesian basin of the world underlies the area thus furnishing the purest of flowing water.

Ipswich citizens have given freely of their time, talents and money in the promotion of public enterprises. Its business houses are all of brick or stone and it has four splendid churches, Masonic Temple, accredited High School, Parochial School and a Public Library. The Library is an outstanding structure of native granite built and donated to the city by the heirs of the late Marcus P. Beebe, pioneer of the city and nationally known for his vision and work for the public good. A magnificent stone arch spans the Yellowstone Trail, U.S. Highway No. 12, built by the American Legion, Lions Club and other organizations, as a Memorial to those sacrificed in the World War and those who promoted this great highway. In 1912, the citizens of Ipswich decided to start a campaign for better roads and organized to that end for building a highway from Mobridge to Aberdeen. This was named the Parmley Highway, but demand coming from the east and west for extensions, it was changed to The Yellowstone Trail, and organization perfected from the Fall of St. Anthony at Minneapolis to Yellowstone National Park. Later extension was made east to Plymouth Rock and west to Puget Sound at Seattle. It is now paved or graveled from the Atlantic to Montana and much of it paved or highly improved from the east line of Montana to the Pacific. This movement met with such signal success that in 1929 the citizens organized a great highway north and south from Canada to the Panama Canal, giving it the name, C to C. This highway extending in almost a direct line from Bowsman, Manitoba, south to Loredo and thence southeast to Mexico City, has become know as the Main Street of the America’s. Extensions north to the rich mines of Manitoba in the Flin Flon Country and thence to Hudsons Bay and a branch to Alaska are under consideration. This highway crosses the Turtle Mountains at the International Boundary and leading citizens of the Dominion of Canada and the United States are promoting a flower garden of fifteen hundred to two thousand acres in the “mountains” which are really only very fertile hills about six hundred feet higher than the level prairie surrounding, to be know as The International peace garden in commoration of the unity and good will existing for one hundred seventeen years between these two nations under the Treaty of Ghent which provided that the boundary should not be fortified. Further, it will be a beautiful object lesson to nations of the world as to how needless are soldiers, guns and battleships when nations agree to settle all questions by diplomacy arbitration or some way other than by war. The Canadian Government and North Dakota have agreed on the necessary acreage at the crossing of the C and C where it enters the Forest and Game Reserve in Manitoba.

Ipswich is known far and near as the Zinnia City for the reason that the Federation of Woman’s Clubs has for years planted Zinnias on the vacant lots. In later years Gladiolus, Dahlias and Hollyhocks have been added. All these flowers have a profusion of blossoms and the city presents an unique and beautiful appearance because of this now thoroughly established custom. It is also known as “The Home of the Yellowstone Trail,” Home of the C and C Trail and “The Biggest Little City in the Northwest.” It has had the record more that a quarter of a century is sending more boys and girls to college than any town or city in proportion to population in South Dakota.