Backyard Adventures

BACKYARD ADVENTURES 2015 Pike Publishing 27 august 2015 ■ EVENT CALENDAR CONTINUED ON PAGE 28 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 22 the mill, the church and its people: HISTORIC JASPER STORY AND PHOTOS BY FRAN PETIT HEAD FOR THE HILLS TRIATHLON (PATOKA LAKE) August 22 Patoka Lake, Dubois/Orange Counties. 3rd Annual Patoka Lake Triathlon at the beach to raise money for Patoka's Education- al Raptor program. BOSSE FIELD – 100TH ANNIVERSARy OPEN HOUSE August 22 Evansville, Vanderburgh County Open house to commemorate Bosse Field's 100th anniversary. Is the 3rd oldest ballpark in United States. CELESTINE TRACTOR PULL August 23 Celestine, Dubois County Annual event in Celestine. Jasper, Ind., was recently honored as one of America's 25 best small towns. The town has a little more than 15,000 resi- dents, many of which are Catholic, so its early history may come as a surprise. Jasper's earliest settlers were English American Protestants, who moved from Kentucky and Tennessee. Father Joseph Kundek came to Jasper in 1838 when Jasper was a mission parish with only five Catholic families and a total population of about sixty people. Fr. Kundek was the first resident Catholic Priest and spoke German, so he encour- aged many German settlers to move to the area. The first log church was built at Sixth and Newton streets, where services were held once a month. Because of a cultural and language gap between Germans and English speaking people, many of the earliest settlers moved on to other areas. Fr. Kundek started the parishioners clearing land, processing timber and other materials that he used to build the first brick St. Joseph Church beginning in 1840. The parishioners did all the work. Fr. Kundek also started many of the surrounding parishes and towns, and was instrumental in founding St. Meinrad Abbey. Fr. Kundek also assumed the leader- ship position of constructing a brick courthouse when the first log courthouse burned in 1839. He became a member of the Democratic Party and persuaded many to become Democrats. Fr. Kundek died on December 4, 1857, and is buried in St. Joseph Cemetery. Fr. Fidelis Maute became the fourth priest and was responsible for today's beautiful St. Joseph Church, serving as architect, contractor, foreman, laborer, fundraiser and pastor. The church was started in 1867 and completed in 1880. The church has gone through many ad- ditions, adding to the historic beauty. The church has Italian altars, onyx and brass communion railings, and stained glass windows imported from Austria. Jasper continues to prosper. Their English and German heritage brought stability, permanence, hard work, good management and excellent craftsmanship. The Patoka River was important to Jasper's early settlement as transportation and water power for a grist mill. The current Jasper City Mill is a new mill and was completed in 2009. However, it is the third mill built at this location. Andrew Evans came from Scott County, Ky., and built the first gristmill in 1817. It had one level and an undershot water wheel. The Enlow family came from Kentucky and purchased the mill previously built by Evans. The Enlows built their home next to their mill. Their mill became a regional success in the early 1820s. Mrs. Enlow was reported to be the mid- wife at Abraham Lincoln's birth. The village was known as Enlow's Hill until 1830 when the county seat was moved from Portersville. Eighty acres were do- nated by the Enlows for the town site. The town name, "Jasper" was selected from a passage from the Bible in Revelation. Francis Eckert came to Jasper from Pfaffenweiler, Germany and purchased the Enlow's Mill in 1847. Eckert built a new three-story grist and flour mill in 1865 and continued to run it until 1871 when he left it to his sons, Conrad, Jacob and Andrew. The Eckert Brothers grew the business, shipping flatboats full of barrels of flour down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers to New Orleans. The Eckerts started ship- ping their barrels by train in 1879. A few years later, the Eckerts replaced mill stones with roller mills that allowed them to produce 150 to 200 barrels of flour a day. By 1910, the youngest brother, Andrew Eckert had sole ownership of the mill. He continued making flour until 1930. The mill stood until 1964, when a dev- astating flood overtook Jasper, destroying the foundation of the mill. A few months later, the town razed the mill and declared the area to be a city park. The new current Jasper City Mill was opened in 2009 with two millers, Ron Bros- mer and Randi Schroeder. The Jasper City Mill is constructed of poplar. The structure was built with 874 wooden nails and boasts a massive staircase that winds around the interior of three floors. Corn is ground at the mill and sold at the Mill's Country Store. The mill stone area is elevated and visitors can see the mill stones, mill stone case, hook crane and hopper. The miller demonstrates how the corn is placed into the hopper and ground through the mill stones. The exterior allows visitors access to the walking path and park with a view of the Patoka River and the dam next to the Third Avenue Bridge. LABOR DAY CELEBRATION SEPT. 4-7 The 129th Labor Day Celebration will be September 4 through September 7 at the Pike County Fairgrounds in Petersburg, Ind. The four-day festival is chock-full of events (all times are listed in Eastern Standard Time): Friday, September 4, there will be pageants, open karaoke, and the cutest pet and cutest baby contests begin, all starting at 5 p.m. The Labor Day Queen pageant begins at 7 p.m., and there will be a Queen's Tea ceremony at 8:30 p.m., with Annie Simmons and last year's Labor Day queen. On Saturday, a talent show will begin at 10 a.m., and carnival rides open at 10 :30 a.m. Kiddie games start at noon, and the Junior Miss pageant and washer pitch start at 1 p.m. Little Miss and Mister pageants, plus motocross races, start at 3 p.m. On Sunday, the BBQ cookoff starts at 7:30 a.m. Carnival rides open at 10 :30 a.m. From 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. there will be an event opening every hour: first a car show, then a poker run, then a horseshoe pitch. At 2 p.m. there will be a gospel sing, and a speech from Steve Bottoms. A talent show starts at 3 p.m. and the de- molition derby caps off the day at 5 p.m. Monday is the last day of the Labor Day Festival, and it starts with a parade at 9 a.m. Carnival rides open at 10 :30 a.m. NATIONAL PARK SERVICE'S 99TH BIRTHDAy August 25 Lincoln City, Spencer County Free admission to the Lincoln Boyhood Na- tional Memorial. FROG FOLLIES August 28–30 Evansville, Vanderburgh County The largest pre-1949 street rod event in the world is the Frog Follies, hosted each year by the E'ville Iron Street Rods LTD at the Van- derburgh 4-H Center. TOWN-WIDE yARD SALE August 28 Fort Branch, Gibson County Annual townwide yard sale. Fort Branch Community Park and surrounding streets. O L D J A S P E R Completed in 2009, the Jasper City Mill is the third mill to occupy this site. Saint Joseph Parish was founded in 1837 by Father Joseph Kundek, a missionary priest from Croatia.

• Cover