Hardly noticed and little used, Field Park has been a city
park as long as anyone remembers. The southeast corner of Bluff
and West Grand was associated with the Field name before it was
a park, for it was home to the park’s namesake and his family
for many years. One of the many important pioneers to come to
Beloit, he left his imprint on the community in many ways.
Alfred Lorenzo Field was born April 16, 1809, in Colebrook, New
Hampshire, to Peter and Hannah Field. He grew up on the family
farm, but nothing else is known of his early life. He enters
history at Beloit’s beginnings, being present at Dr. Horace
White’s home in Colebrook in October 1836 when the New England
Emigrating Company, the group most responsible for settling
Beloit, was created. As a charter member he was eager to settle
in the west, and came to the new settlement on June 5, 1837.
His arrival was applauded by the early settlers because of the
necessary supplies he brought: In a wagon drawn by four oxen
he transported four barrels of pork, four barrels of flour, seven
bushel of oats, farm tools, other miscellaneous equipment, and
much needed cash. He threw himself into the hard work of creating
a new community, and was available for any and all kinds of labor,
including planting, hoeing, harvesting, cleaning grain, salting
beef, setting fence, and measuring land.
By early 1838 the NE Emigrating Company felt that a sufficient
number of families had settled in Beloit, and having fulfilled
its mission, decided to dissolve. The common property of the
company was divided among the company members according to their
contributions of labor and money, and Field’s investment
credit of $908 was second only to Horace White. Alfred was entitled
to a large share in the company boarding house, 2/3 of the Langdon
claim, a lot on the bluff, and 23 village lots. He also received
wheat, corn and oats at the final distribution.
Sometime before the end of May, 1838, Alfred returned east, and
on May 28th he married Elizabeth Lusk in Enfield, Connecticut,
where she was born August 19, 1814. Their “honeymoon”
was their trip to Beloit, and when they left Enfield, “many
tears were shed by her friends and relatives… over this
long and unknown journey. They said that she was going out of
the world, and the wedding party sang the Christian parting-song
Blest be the Tie that Binds.”
Alfred commenced his long career as a well-known Beloit businessman
when he and his brother-in-law James Lusk founded Field and Lusk,
the second general store in Beloit. For a short while it was
located near the southeast corner of State and St. Paul Streets,
then moved to the southwest corner when a new, larger building
was finished. The new store opened in June of 1838 with a good
assortment of general goods for the village.
Business ventures and starting a family kept the Fields busy
in the early 1840s. They set up housekeeping near the store
in the first framed house built in Beloit. Their first child
Mary was born in March of 1840, but she lived only until July
1841. Alfred was a member of the Beloit Bridge Company, the
firm that constructed the first bridge across the Rock River
at Beloit in 1842. In 1843 Field and Lusk began another business
endeavor: The partnership constructed a mill on the race near
what is now Wisconsin and East Grand. Named for its long-time
operator DeLorma Brooks, the Brooks Mill produced cracked grain
for livestock for many years. In May of 1843 a son, Sylvester
Graham, was born. In 1843 Field was appointed Beloit’s
second postmaster by President John Tyler. For the two years
he was postmaster he operated from his home at State and St.
Paul Streets, and earned $566.55 for his services. In 1845 the
Fields moved to a stone house Alfred built on the south side
of Broad St. near Prospect, and in that same year a second daughter,
again named Mary, was born. Their last child, James, was born
in 1847.
Alfred Field’s name is inseparable from the story of Congregationalism
in Beloit. The Monadnock Congregational Church of Colebrook
gave letters of recommendation and dismissal to Field and others
“to join any church of Christ where God in his providence
shall call them.” He was present in Caleb Blodgett’s
kitchen for the organizational meeting of the First Congregational
Church, December 30, 1838, and with Eliza was one of its charter
members. His father, Peter, who had moved to Beloit, was chosen
as the first deacon of the church. In 1859 when Beloit Congregationalists
wanted to build a church on the city’s west side, Alfred
was one of Second Congregational’s founding members, and
he and Eliza were enrolled as the first and second members of
the new church. Like his father, Alfred was elected the first
deacon; he was also the first clerk and one of the first church
trustees.
Mr. Field was associated with many other activities in Beloit’s
early history: He was an inspector for one of the two original
county school districts created in 1839; was named one of the
original board members of what became the Beloit Seminary; for
a time in the 1850s he was the cashier of the Rock River Bank
in Beloit, Beloit’s first regular bank; and his name appears
along with David Bundy’s in the firm of Bundy and Field,
druggists, located on State near Broad in the 1850s.
In
1856 Alfred and Eliza purchased the property and house at the
southeast corner of West Grand and Bluff. The attractive house
on the property was located on the crest of the hill, and was
affectionately called by Eliza her “Bird’s Nest Cottage.”
The Field Mansion was a well-known landmark for many years.
At age 55 Alfred volunteered for service during the Civil War.
A call went out for 100-day soldiers, and a company was organized
in Beloit that became part of the 40th Wisconsin. Field served
as quartermaster of the 40th, and noted professor James Blaisdell
of Beloit College was the regiment’s chaplain. Alfred’s
son Sylvester also enlisted. They served from May to September
of 1864.
After his military service the only other reference to Alfred
is regarding his death. As he was attempting to board a train
somewhere near Beloit that was apparently moving, he slipped.
He died December 15, 1868, only 59 years old. Eliza lived for
many more years, dividing her time between the Field home and
her daughter Mary’s home in Brooklyn, New York. Eliza Field
passed away in Brooklyn on January 13, 1902.
The Field Mansion continued to be occupied by the Field’s
son Sylvester until 1916 when the city of Beloit purchased the
property for $27,000. For a time the house was home to Beloit’s
newly formed Red Cross chapter; during the Spanish Flu epidemic
it was used for overflow when the city hospitals were full.
Then sometime in the early 1920s the house was removed. The
Field name has been associated with the southeast corner of Bluff
and W. Grand for 150 years, and today is a reminder of one of
Beloit’s significant pioneers.