Sylvester
Wilson and his brothers, George, Nick Chris, Davis and Silas, built
a large one-room log house that served as a schoolhouse, church and
amusement hall, and Harmon Curtis was the first schoolteacher. He taught
for three years and had from twelve to fifteen students of all ages
from Wilsonville and neighboring ranches. The desks were homemade benches
and the books were brought in from Sanpete County by horseback. School
did not convene for more than four years.
Wilsonville
did not grow as did the other settlements. It consisted of a few farm
houses and not more than seven or eight families at the most. It has
been a ghost town for many years, the underlying causes being the removal
of the post office and the ending of the school. There remains a little
cemetery of five graves, which, through the courtesy of Sam Aikens,
have received some restoration and a fence.
Colonization
on Ferron Creek, which like that on Cottonwood Creek began as one settlement
and ended up as two, was accomplished in much the same manner and at
about the same time as the foregoing communities. Joseph Swasey came
there with horses in 1875 and Billy Belong, John Leveredge and Jed Pullen
brought in cattle. After the call from the Church, settlers began to
trickle in. Among the first were Nicholes and Helena Larsen, Peter F.
Petersen and wife, Swen and Johannah Larsen and sons. They came from
Ephraim by way of Salina Canyon and arrived in the fall of 1877. The
weather was quite moderate, and besides constructing their dugouts,
a garden spot was chosen and fertilized with material from where the
sheep and cattle had bedded.