Sawyer County was organized March 9, 1883. It is comprised of townships 37 to 42, and ranges 5 to 9, inclusive. Of these townships twenty-five are drained by Chippewa waters and five by Namakagon river. The county is heavily timbered with pine, though vast quantities have been taken and marketed. The county seat was located at Hayward in the bill organizing the county. The county officers, appointed by Gov. Rusk, were: Sheriff, A. Blaisdell; clerk, C. H. Clapperton; register of deeds, H. E. Ticknor; treasurer, R. L. McCormack; county judge, H. W. Hart; attorney, H. E. Ticknor; superintendent of schools, Miss M. Mears; surveyor, W. J. Moulton; coroner, E. G. Gregg.

The court house was built in 1885, at a cost of $18,000. The county at its organization assumed the following indebtedness:

     To Ashland county ... $25,000
     To town of Ashland, Ashland county ... 1,870
     To town of Butternut, Ashland county ... 2,050
     To Chippewa county ... 1,900
     To town of Flambeau, Chippewa county (disputed claim) ... 5,000
     To town of Big Bend, Chippewa county ... 3,000
     To town of Sigel, Chippewa county ... 2,000
     Outside indebtedness, total ... $40,820

All this indebtedness, with the exception of the unsettled claim of Flambeau, Chippewa county, has been paid. Since its organization the county has expended $30,000 on roads to Chippewa waters. This, added to the cost of the court house, $18,000, a school house for the town of Hayward, $6,500, town hall for Hayward $5,000, makes a total of expenditures for the county within the past three years of $106,420, a remarkable sum for a new county with so sparse a population to pay, but not so remarkable when we take into account the immense value of its lumber products and standing timber.
Hayward is the only town in the county. Its first board of supervisors were: A. J. Hayward, chairman; Thos. Manwarin and Michael Jordan. A. L. McCormack was first treasurer, and C. C. Claghorn, clerk. The village is situated in sections 21 and 22, township 41, range 9, upon a level pine plateau on the north side of Namakagon river, a tributary of the St. Croix. The village was platted in 1883, but a post office had been established the year before, C. H. Clapperton being the first postmaster. The first marriage in the town of Hayward and county of Sawyer was that of Fred Emmons and Mary Lindmark, in 1883. The first birth was that of a daughter to Al. Blaisdell. The first death was that of Nels J. Eggin. Rev. A. Safford preached the first sermon. Anna Shafer taught the first school. E. G. Gregg opened the first store. H. E. Ticknor was the first lawyer and J. B. Trowbridge the first physician.

The first school house, built at a cost of $5,000, was burned. There was an insurance of $4,500. A new building was erected at a cost of $6,000, with three departments, and with steam heating apparatus. Prof. F. A. Nichols was the principal.

The Congregational church at Hayward in one of the finest church buildings in the Northwest. It is built in the Queen Anne style, with circular seats, the whole finished in exquisite taste. Senator Sawyer, after whom the county was named, contributed a town clock and bell worth $1,000. The Catholics have a church here, and the Lutherans an organization. The Odd Fellows and Knights of Labor have organizations.

The Sawyer County Bank was organized March 3, 1884, with a capital stock of $200,000, divided equally between three stock-holders, R. L. McCormack, A. J. Hayward and E. H. Halbert, the latter being general manager and cashier. The bank deals in real estate, abstracts, insurance and general monetary business. The business transacted for the year ending June 6, 1886, amounted to $3,000,000. The bank building is a substantial brick. The
Hayward Lumber Company has a mill on the Namakagon river. The water power has a fall of eighteen feet and a flowage of about three miles. A sixty foot channel has been left through the flowage for slucing logs. The saw mill has a capacity of 35,000,000 feet per annum. It has a planing mill attached. The company is composed of T. F. Robinson, Weyerhauser & Dinkeman and R. L. McCormack. Mr. Weyerhauser is president of the company. Mr. Weyerhauser is also president of the Rock Island Lumber Company and of Weyerhauser, Dinkeman & Co., of Rock Island, and is a stockholder in
Renwick, Crosset & Co., Cloquet, Minnesota, Shell Lake, Barronett, Masons, White River, and Chippewa Falls Lumber companies, and is president of the Beef Slough Boom and Chippewa and Mississippi Logging companies. Mr. Weyerhauser is the most extensive holder and owner of unoperated pine lands in the West, or probably on the continent. The stockholders of the Hayward Lumber Company are all men of wealth accumulated by their own industry. Mr. R. L. McCormack, the resident stockholder and manager, is admirably adapted for the position he holds. Mr. McCormack was a citizen of Minnesota for fourteen years, and a member of the Minnesota legislature in 1881. He was born in Pennsylvania in 1847.

Dobie & Stratton, contractors for pine stumpage on the Lac Oreilles Indian reservation, reside in Hayward. They cut 28,000,000 feet of logs in the winter of 1885-86.

Malcomb Dobie, of this firm, is a native of Canada. He came to the St. Croix valley in 1864, and was married to Harriet Stratton, at St. Croix Falls, in 1874.

Milton V. Stratton, brother of Mrs. Dobie, was raised at St. Croix Falls, and engaged in business with Mr. Dobie. In 1886, his health failing, he removed to California.