Heritage

Last week Friday, my Mom, Dad, sister Michelle, and I drove to Hardin, Il. where my great great great grandfather on my mother's side owned an apple orchard at the turn of the century.  Alexis Mottaz (pronounced Motaw) was a very successful apple farmer being the first to introduce the Jonathan Apple to Illinois and winning a silver medal for his apples at the 1904 worlds fair in St. Louis.  We set out with very little information.  All we knew was that the orchard was in a little town on the Illinois River called Hardin and that behind the house there was a hill called Sugarloaf (so named because of its conical shape).  This is the picture of the original orchard we had to go on.

 

This picture has hung in my grandmother's 

home for as long as I can remember.  Sugarloaf is the hill in the background.  At one time is was completely covered in apple trees.  It quickly became the stuff of legends.  You see, the orchard was enormously successful and the Mottazs were very wealthy.  However, my great great grandmother Elizabeth Mottaz married Charles Sagez (pronounced Sa G) and was virtually disowned by the family, Nevada married a steamboat captain and never had children, Sophie had a child out of wedlock, refused the marry the poor father despite his begging (cause she didn't want her children to be raised like Lizzie's kids) and died of tuberculosis just a few years later, George had a daughter but because he stole the premiums he collected in his insurance job the police came to arrest him.  He asked if he could put on a clean shirt, went upstairs in his house and shot himself.  Emma was engaged to be married, but one of her sisters told her he was cheating on her, so she broke it off and died an old maid.  Alexis took to drink, and a combination of spoiling his sons George and Frances, and getting drunk, loaning out money, and forgetting who he loaned it to caused his immense fortune to disappear.  Really rather tragic.  The orchard passed from the hands of the Mottaz's into whose we did not know.

After a little sleuthing in Hardin we discovered where the farm would have been.  Was the house still there?  Did they bulldoze Sugarloaf to make room for a subdivision?  Were there still apples there?  Was it still a working orchard?  Questions ran wildly through our heads.  The driveway was extremely long and narrow.  We passed several houses along the way each one inspiring more questions about what had become of the orchard.  Suddenly we came upon a large red barn, infront of which was this stone: 

Sugarloaf Farm!  Why, that's the name of the hill behind the house!  Is it still there?  Est. in 1940 though? The Orchard was there long before 1940.  What has changed?  What's the same?  Anything.  We drove slowly up the hill, not knowing who or what to expect.  As we came around a curve there was a sign that said, "Trespassers will be shot.  Survivors will be shot again."  Hm, how serious are they about that sign?  As we passed the sign, something else came into view, something amazing and, honestly, rather unexpected.  None of us could hardly believe our eyes.

There it was.  The old house almost exactly as it looked in the old picture grandma had.  Still very stately.  With a few modern convieniences of course and some update to the structure, but my gosh still there.  Standing, clean, well cared for.  It was in this house that my great great grandmother was born and raised.  My grandmother came here as a child to go on a picnic on Sugarloaf.  A fortune was made and lost inside these walls.  The very shape, the course of my upbringing was formulated here.  Many people say I seem like I'm from a generation behind.  This is not surprising as my grandmother was raised by my great great grandmother, Elizabeth Mottaz Sagez.  Elizabeth was raised very Victorian, and therefore so was my grandmother.  A generation behind.  Thus my mother was raised a generation behind, as was I.  I say this simply to note the importance placed on this house.  It is very much where my family sees it's birth.  Next to the house we saw the barn, decrepit, leaning, and ugly, but still there!

We looked at the barn, knocked on the door of the house and waited.  Where was Sugarloaf?  The trees are much bigger now than they were in the picture, obscuring our view.  Where are the apple trees?  Will the new owners let us look around?  Will they let us taste an apple?  Will they let us take home some apple seeds to grow our own trees?  They have taken good care of the home, the barn is still standing at least.  No answer at the door.  We must get in touch with these people, we can't go roaming around without permission.  A chocolate lab runs up to greet us.  He has a tag with a name, Woefel, and a number.  We have no reception out here in the middle of nowhere, so we head back into town to ask at the sheriff's office about the Woefels. 

 Upon stepping into the office, and kind old officer asks us to sit down and let him help us.  We tell him our names, what we are doing there, and who we are trying to contact.  "Do you know the Woefels?"  "Who?  Bernnie!  Well yes!  He's my cousin!"  He quickly puts in a few phone calls, and within minutes we are standing face to face with Bernnie Woefel, the man who now owns our beloved orchard.  We tell him who we are, and what we are doing there.  The first question he asks is, "Do you know why it's called Sugarloaf?"

After a wonderful meal in Hardin we drive back to the Woefel's farm.  Mr. Woefel is extremely kind and offers to drive us to the top of Sugarloaf.  It is still there.  We are all a little torn.  We had hoped to walk to the top of Sugarloaf, but we did not want to offend the kind gentleman, so we graciously accept the ride.  As we come around the old barn Sugarloaf looms into view.

How Brilliant!  A cluster of trees sitting right on top hiding it's wonderful summit that come to a sharp point.  If only we could have traversed it on foot.  However, as the truck climbs the hill, we soon realize that this is far more than just a rise in the land.  This is a huge hill, a regular mountain.  Thank goodness we drove!  No wonder the Mottazs felt it deserved a special name.  Aside from providing the perfect place to grow apple trees it was a unique hill and commanded a fantastic view of the entire countryside.  Standing on top I felt like a king, a nobleman surveying his lands.  This is the pride that the Mottazs felt in their ownership of this land.

The view of this land.  Right here the apple trees would have grown.  The last that were remaining.  No longer.  Washington State stealing the apple business along with the death of the river trade killed the orchard business in Hardin.  Apple trees were no longer a blessing, but a curse for those farmers who were trying to etch out a living raising cattle.  Therefore the last of the trees had been bulldozed under just three years ago.  If only we had made this trip a little sooner.  But that is life, and we settle and we accept the things we cannot change.  How grateful we are for the opportunity just to stand where our ancestors once stood proud.

I will end my little tale of our adventure here.  There is not much more to tell, and certainly no more room to tell it.  If you find the story interesting, just wait a little bit.  My mother is attempting to organize a biographical book about the Mottazs and the Sagezs.  If she indeed completes it, what a story it will tell.  Rock on!