"The BIOGRAPHICAL History of Clark County, Wisconsin"

Compiled by Franklyn Curtiss-Wedge, Chicago and Winona, H. C. Cooper Jr., & Co. in 1918,  pg. 453.

           Josephine Travis                      C. B. Travis                          Hattie E. Travis

C. B. TRAVIS, in speaking of early days in Humbird, says: "I was born the state of New York. When I was 6 months old my father died, and with my grandparents and came to Madison, Wis., with them when was 10 years old. In the fall of 1856 I came to what is now Humbird. At that time this whole country was covered with timber and brush. We had to walk to Pole Grove, Jackson County, for mail, which used to be left at the farm house of Mr. Boss before the post office was started here. I returned to Madison in June, 1857, for the harvest. I traveled back and forth between here and Madison a few years, then entered the normal school at Madison, where I spent four years. I was married in Dane County, then returned to Humbird, where I have since lived. There was one store, built in 1872 by L. D. Wilder, and a blacksmith shop run by Peter Wilson.

The first school was started about 1872 and was taught by my wife, Josephine Travis. During the winter of 1872-73 I taught in another district. When I first came here in 1856-57 I went from Madison to Prairie du Chien by stage, then up the Mississippi River to La Crosse, then by stage to Humbird, through the timber all the way, and most of the supplies were hauled in from La Crosse by team. I toted two winters for James Hewett. D. D. Travis built a sawmill two miles down the west branch of Halls Creek. I helped to hew the logs and made shingles used in the construction of this mill, which was operated by Mr. Travis for three years, then rented to a man by the name of Travis Lower. The land where Humbird now stands, all covered with timber and brush, was owned by Almond Alderman. Jake Humbird built the railroad through here.

On July 4, 1857, the Houghton Brothers, who came from the same place in New York as I did, and myself and others, held a picnic. We worked our way through the brush to the top of the bluff which was selected as the picnic site. We got some ropes from a wagon, went down in the tamarack swamp, cut a liberty pole and hoisted it on top of the bluff, and Charles Miller recited the Declaration of Independence. Game was plentiful and in 1858 1 shot a number of deer and one elk. The first newspaper to be published here was a small sheet containing four leaves about eight by twelve inches in size. It was started in 1872 by John Boyer and sold for 25 cents a year. I was elected justice of the peace in 1878, and have held the office continuously, except one year, for forty years."