Page:History of Goodhue County, Minnesota.djvu/1212

 1050 HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY Union Seminary (Ohio) and in Oberlin College (Ohio), taking the scientific course. In December, 1903, he purchased the Can- non Falls "Beacon" and in the spring of 1904 inaugurated the campaign for regulation of railroad rates and traffic practices. He led this fight through the '"Beacon*' and by personal appeal to business organizations throughout the state, and became a recognized authority on this question. The fight which he in- augurated and assisted in conducting accomplished a reduction of rates of thirty per cent on all interstate traffic and the correc- tion of many other abuses. It also resulted in the passage of the de- murrage law, the two-cent passenger rate law. the anti-pass law and other reforms along the same line. Mr.^ Applegate is recog- nized as an editorial leader in the anti-saloon fight for clean politics and independent party action. He is also a strong advo- cate of tariff revision downward and has exerted some influence along this line in the "Beacon." Ee is a strong supporter of the Roosevelt policies and has condemned without qualification the Payne-Aldrich tariff law and the forces and methods that en- acted it. Aside from his interesl in the "Beacon." .Mr. Apple- gate holds stock in the Cannon Falls Creamery Company and is an advocate generally of all thai tends toward the civic and in- dustrial improvement of Cannon Falls. Being of a sociable nature, he lias taken an active part in the Masons, the Samari- tans, the Elks, the Cannon Calls Commercial Club and the State Editorial Association. April 23, 1888, Mr. Applegate was mar- ried to Harriett L. Van Campen, a native of Cannon Falls, daugh- ter of an old pioneer family. Mr. and Mrs. Applegate have three children: Roszella Charlotte, born April -'JO. 1891; John Collins. Jr., born December L0, 1906 and died August 21. 1909, and Mary Adelia. born July 5, 1908. Conrad Schaffer is the son of Adam and Catherine (Steitz) Schaffer. pioneer residents of Minnesota, natives of Germany. who came to America in 18-18 and located in Wisconsin for a short time and then moved to Stillwater. Minn., where they were among the first settlers. Here their son Conrad was born March 13, 1*55. and when he Avas but a child they moved to Xew Trim'. Dakota county. Minnesota, where his parents resided until death called his father in 1895; his mother, who is ninety years of age, now resides with her above named son. It was at the village of New Trier that Mr. Schaffer received his education, in a little log school house. At the age of nineteen he started out to fight life's battle, coming to Welch, Goodhue county, on a farm his father had given, of 160 acres, which was then all timber and wilderness. He set to work and cleared the farm, which is now all under cultivation, and besides all the modern buildings which he erected he also has one of the largest orchards in Goodhue