Second of two parts.

By Ed Shannon, staff writer

Two years before the incorporation of the city in 1878, the citizens of Albert Lea were celebrating the Fourth of July and the centennial of the nation’s independence.

July 4, 1876, was a significant day because it marked the 100th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. This was also the 50th anniversary of the death on July 4, 1826, of one of the document’s authors and signers, President Thomas Jefferson.

However, the euphoria of this celebration was to disrupted within a few days with news about an almost unbelievable military disaster out in what’s now the state of Montana.

The Independence Day festivities in Albert Lea started at sunrise on July 4 with the ringing of church bells and a 13-gun salute to the original colonies. This was followed at 7 a.m. with a 39-gun salute to honor the states which were then a part of the national union.

According to the weekly newspaper, the Freeborn County Standard, a parade formed at the courthouse at “ten and a half o’clock

a.m.&8221;

This parade proceeded north on Broadway Avenue and around the east side of Fountain Lake to a location identified in the Standard as “the Grove,” now known as Pioneer Park.

Leading this parade were the veterans of both the Civil War and the 1862 Sioux Uprising in Minnesota, plus a brass band. (One local volunteer infantry company, Company C, Fifth Minnesota Volunteer Infantry Regiment, had participated in both conflicts under the leadership of Timothy Sheehan, then serving as Freeborn County Sheriff.)

Next in the parade were 39 young girls, each crowned with what the newspaper called a “Goddess of Liberty cap.” They represented the number of states with stars on the national flag in 1876. They were followed by several horse-drawn floats and carriages carrying local dignitaries and members of the centennial committee.

A cornet band in the middle of the parade lineup provided still more music for members of the Old Settlers Association, several groups of fraternal lodge members in uniform, many citizens on foot, and still more carriages. Everyone was going to the program site on the north side of Fountain Lake.

A large platform, plus crude seating for 2,000 people, had been constructed in a clearing of the lakeside grove. Soon, all the seats were filled and still more people stood on the sidelines.

The patriotic program that day consisted of band music, several long speeches, vocal music, a historical reading, a recital of the entire Declaration of Independence, a prayer and benediction.

Other events taking place that day on what was then called Independence Day were picnics, boat races, a pigeon shoot, a baseball tournament, foot races, what was termed “general rambling,” an evening display of fireworks west of the courthouse, several band concerts and dancing.

While Albert Lea and the rest of the nation were enthusiastically saluting the nation’s first century on July 4, a steamboat named the “Far West” was proceeding downstream on the Missouri River. It was loaded with wounded soldiers who had been involved in a major battle with Sioux and Cheyenne Indians on June 25, 1876, near a remote locality known as the Little Bighorn River.

Bismarck, Dakota Territory, was then the end of the line for the Northern Pacific Railroad and the telegraph system. When the “Far West” docked the next morning in the frontier village, a shocked nation then received the news that five entire troops of the famous Seventh Cavalry Regiment under the command of Lt. Col. George A. Custer had been killed by Indian warriors in Montana. The soldiers on the steamboat had been wounded in a nearby conflict on the same day along the Little Bighorn River which became known as the Reno-Benteen Battle.

News that 262 soldiers led by the officer once known as the “boy general” during the Civil War had been killed in what soon became known as “Custer’s Last Stand” may have ranked as a rumor in Albert Lea for a few days. However, the Standard on July 13, 1876, published a short news article which clearly confirmed the still sketchy reports which had created a gloomy climax for the celebration of the nation’s first century of life.