SAGINAW COUNTY. - 339 



The crmnty was organized in pursuance of an act of the Legislative Council 

 of the Territory which took effect from and after the second Monday of 

 February, 1835 



Saginaw is an Indian name derived from Sac-e-nong, or Sac town. The 

 county seat is Sai^inaw. 



Jacob Smith, known among the Indians as Wah-be-Sins, an Indian trader 

 in the Saginaw valh-y both before and after the war of 181:^, was the first 

 white pioneer of this county. 



Judge Albert Miller, in his reminisences of the Saginaw Valley (Pioneer 

 Collections, vol. 7, pages 228 to 3U4) says: "The first white person that 

 visited this valley (unless it may have been the Jesuits) found several clus- 

 ters of apple trees growing at different points near the banks of the rivers 

 which yearly produced large crops of fruit. It is sixty years (in ]884) since 

 those trees were first known t<» the whites and some of them at that time 

 indicated an age of sixty years or more. Their origin was generally conceded 

 to have been from seeds of fruit brought by the Indians fr >m Canada on their 

 returns from their annnal tr ps to receive annuities from the British govern- 

 ment. 



"One clump of these trees, consisting of four or five in number, was 

 situated at Carrollton, near the bank of the river, another group was situated 

 on the farm now owned by A. B. Paine, a short distance above the crossing of 

 the Jackson, Lansing and Saginaw railroad, others on the Tittabawassee 

 river above the last mentioned point. One of the trees still standing on 

 Paine's farm has a peculiar formation; it has four or five large trunks pro- 

 ceeding from one root, and has always been a pndific bearer. One year, 

 when owned by the late James Frazer, in pioneer days, it bore one hundred 

 and eleven bushels of choice fruit, and each white family then residing in the 

 Saginaw valley was presented with a bag of apples by Mr. Frazer. Some of 

 the old Indian apple trees referred to died many years ago. 



"In the course of time Major Mosley became the owner of the Carrollton 

 farm, upon which the apple trees stood, and had a tenant named Ensign, 

 whom he suspected to be inimical to his interests, and in 1838 the highly 

 prized apple trees presented a sickly appearance, showing a rapid decline, 

 which soon proved fatal. Judge Davenport, a neighbor of Moseley's, who 

 was something of a wag in his day, t^ Id the Major that Mrs. Ensign had 

 poured hot water on the ronts of his apple trees, which caused their destruc- 

 tion, which he (Moseley) verily believed, and he was greatly incensed at the 

 act of vandalism. But it was not hot water that killed the trees, hut cold 

 water which flowed over the banks of the Saginaw river, clearly indicating 

 that the last half century has produced a great change in the level of the 

 surface of the great lakes." 



The following account of these old Indian trees is contributed to the trans- 

 actions of the Michigan State Pomological Society for 1880, by Eobert Ure, 

 of Saginaw county, through E. F. Guild, of East Saginaw : — 



"I do not know that there were any Indian apple trees on Green Point, 

 but clumps and clusters of wild plum trees were found along the Tittaba- 

 wassee, above its junction with the Saginaw, and almost every fall canoe 

 loads of red and yellow plums could be gathered, and the supply was always 

 more than equal to the demand. The firs- apple tree to be met with, passing 

 up the river, was near the Briggs house, of which I can say but very little. 

 The first of any importance were on the James Frazer farm ; not only be- 



