Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 3.djvu/229

 a determined effort to save the prohibitory law. Their devotion to the party was stronger than their hostility to saloons and for the first time in the history of the State saloons were established wherever a majority of the voters could be induced to consent.

An act was passed providing for the appointment of commissioners to revise and codify the laws of the State. The Commission consisted of John Y. Stone, Charles Baker, Emil McClain, H. S. Wilson and H. F. Dale.

The year 1895 brought bountiful crops throughout the State but prices were very low, leaving no profit to farmers and consequent business depression to almost every branch of industry except money loaning.

Through the efforts of Mrs. Abbie Gardner Sharp and Senator A. B. Funk of Dickinson County, the General Assembly of 1894 appropriated $5,000 to be used in the erection of a monument to the memory of the victims of the Spirit Lake massacre of 1857, and the members of the Relief Expedition under Major Williams who marched to the scene of the tragedy to rescue the survivors and bury the dead. The Commissioners appointed by Governor Jackson to superintend the erection of the monument were Ex-Governor Cyrus C. Carpenter, Hon. John F. Duncombe and Hon. Roderick A. Smith who were members of the Relief Expedition; Abbie Gardner Sharp, the sole surviving woman captive; and Hon. Charles Aldrich, Curator of the Historical Department. The monument is of Minnesota granite with bronze tablets bearing a brief history of the affair and the names of the victims of the massacre, the captives, the two men who perished from hardships and exposure on the Relief Expedition, as well as a complete roll of the officers and men of the command.

The monument stands upon ground formerly belonging to Rowland Gardner, one of the victims of the massacre, and near his cabin, which has been preserved. It was dedicated July 25th, 1895, when Ex-Governor Cyrus C. Carpenter, chairman of the Commission, presented the