Bio: McCord, Warren E. (1881)
Contact: Janet Schwarze
Email: Posted4u@Charter.net

---Source: 1881 History of Northern Wisconsin, pg. 212-213.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF WARREN E. McCORD

WARREN E. McCORD, firm of Hayward & McCord, Chippewa Falls, is a son of Myron McCord, of Coras, Allegany Co., N. Y., who was extensively engaged in lumbering on the Alleghany River, and was owner of two large steam saw-mills. In 1853, he took his eldest son, Myron, and came to Wisconsin. After looking about him, he decided on settling at Shawano, on the Wolf River, and sent for the remainder of the family. They reached Fond du Lac, the terminus of the Northwestern Railroad, took a steam propeller to Oshkosh and up the Fox and Wolf rivers to New London, where they embarked for Shawano on an open barge, propelled up stream by four men poling on each side, and one to steer. They finished their journey in nine days, camping out nights on the banks of the river, and reached the old Powell Landing in the Autumn of 1854. The Fall of 1857, their .adopted brother, A. J. Hayward, joined them, from the East, and he and his partner bought a piece of pine and delivered their logs, at Fond du Lac, for S2.50 per thousand. When he was fifteen (Myron having given his attention to politics), Warren engaged in the lumber business for himself taking entire charge of the camp. He attended college at Appleton in the Spring, which he continued to do Spring and Falls, and lumbering Winters, until 1866. when having completed a course of study in medicine, he married his present wife, Eleanor C. Wily, who came to Wisconsin with her parents, from Argusville, Schoharie Co., N.Y., and settled at Sharon, but afterwards moved to Shawano. Warren then engaged in the drug business, and also carried on lumbering, until 1872, when he received a proposition from his adopted brother, A. J. Hayward, who had just sold his saw-mill at Winona for $20,000, to go and explore the Duluth district for pine timber, which they accordingly did. After spending six weeks on the St. Louis River, finding a large portion of the best lands unsurveyed and withheld from market for railroad purposes, they returned to Chippewa, and decided to log a piece of timber that Mr. Hayward owned, on the Little Chief, a tributary of the Chippewa, in Town 40, Range 7 west. They started from Winona the 20th of November, with sixty men, ten horse and eight ox teams, in company with Laird & Norton's crew in charge of Silas Braley. Having come on wagons, they changed their loads onto sleds at Campbell's and the Lake House, and from Big Bend up found but very little signs of the present road. They had to let their loads down hill, in places, with two-inch cable, and broke through several streams, there being no bridges above Campbell's. They reached the Kelly place, fourteen miles above Belill's Falls, after having abandoned their loads and walking eight miles after night, and were obliged to light matches sometimes to show them the trail. They found the proprietor, Red John Hall, standing by the side of a barrel of whisky, with a candle in one hand and a tin dipper in the other, treating the crowd. 1 hey had nothing to eat but a pan of baked beans and a pan of stewed apples. All this was perfectly free, as was also the whisky. They reached camp the day following, making thirteen days on the road, and had a successful Winter. The next Summer, he and Mr. Hayward, in company with Messrs. Laird, Norton & Co., of Winona, purchased what was known as the Jackson tract of pine timber, on the Chippewa and Burnett rivers, and in the Spring moved to Chippewa Falls, where he has since resided with his family, consisting of Daisy Gertrude, aged thirteen, a boy who, had he lived, would be eleven, Grace M., aged eight, and Ella, aged six. In company with Mr. Hayward, he has handled about 10,000,000 a year, with no cause to complain of the results. He has gained the confidence of the business men of the valley, and secured a comfortable home.