Page:History of Goodhue County, Minnesota.djvu/517

 IliSTol.'Y OF GOODHUE COUNTY HI of Goodhue and Wabasha, and the north half of the counties of Dodge and Olmsted, extending east to Winona county and west to near the village of Kenyon." Rev. <■'. W. T. Wright was the first preacher appointed to Pine Island circuit. He found within the bounds of his circuit seven local preachers, viz.: Revs. A. E. Standish, of Mazeppa; <'. McMannus and M. Woodly, of Pine Island; J. M. Gates and H. Webb, of Roscoe; N. .Moon, of New Haven; S. A. Wing, south of Oronoco, and R. L. Fraser, of Bear Valley, instead of trying to spread himself over the entire territory, -Mr. Wright preached regularly at Pine Island, Roscoe, Oronoco and Center Grove, and he prepared ;i plan by which the other preaching places were supplied by the Loeal preachers. lie arrived on this new held of labor on Friday, September 18, 1857, and preached a1 Pine Island and near Roscoe the following Sun- day. "The first service was held in a log cabin on the south bank of the Zumbro, opposite the hotel."' Afterwards the dining room of • the hotel and private douses were used until the school house was built, in 1858. When, after several weeks, Mr. Wright finally secured rooms in Pine Island to live in. the moving of his family is thus described by himself years afterwards: "The trip from Red "Wing to Pine Island. November 19 and 20. 1857, over trackless prairie, with a wife not well, and a babe sick, was the most perilous I ever made. The snow was deep, the wind terrible, the cold intense." During the second year of his pastorate a wonderful religious revival swept over the community, resulting in about 130 accessions to the Methodist society. But even at that early date with the opening of spring a large portion of these moved in different directions in search of new homes for themselves. At the annual conference of 1859 Pine Island cir- cuit was divided into three circuits: Greenwood, Oronoco and Pine Island. Rev. G. W. Richardson was appointed to Pine Is- land. He was succeeded in 1860 by Rev. Thos. M. Kirkpatrick, during whose pastorate of two years a parsonage property was bought. In 1862 Rev. Thos. P. Morse was appointed to the charge, and it was during his pastorate, in 1864, that the first church, a brick building, was erected on the lot just east of the present parsonage. In the fall of 1864, Rev. J. W. Powell be- came pastor. In 1865-66 Mr. Powell had as his associate pastor Rev. J. L. Farber. They were succeeded by the following pas- •tors, respectively, appointed in the years indicated : Rev. Boyd Phelps, appointed in 1869; Rev. A. V. Hiscock, in 1870; Rev. W. W. Rork, in 1872; Rev. Chas. T. Barkuloo, in 1875; Rev. John Bernard, in 1877; Rev. B. F. Kephai't, in 1879; Rev. Noah Lath- rop, in 1880; Rev. J. W. Mower, in 1882; Rev. J. Milton Akers. in 1884; Rev. J. W. Raveill, in 1887; Rev. A. J. Roberts, in 1880;