KELSO, Charles G.
Bell Farm Investor
Charles G. Kelso (1852-1923) - one of the early Bell Farm Investors - was born at Sterling, about 14 miles NW of Belleville, Major Bell's home town. He was married to Helen Booth [Willson] Kelso (1861-1929).
At some point they formed a partnership and established the Bell-Kelso Farm in NW Minnesota, near the town of Hallock. (In Hallock, the farm is called the Kelso-Bell Farm.) The Bell-Kelso Farm was large by standards of the day (about 5,000 acres) and was referred to as a "Bonanza Farm" in the American mid-west. It appears that Major Bell conceived the idea for his much larger farm while living in Hallock, and when he returned to Canada around 1881 to establish the Qu'Appelle Valley Farming Company, Charles Kelso took over Bell's share of the Hallock operations, but also became an investor in the new Bell Farm.
SOURCES:
Personal Communication: Frank Korvemaker and Glenn Browne, Hallock, Minnesota, 2011
Personal Communication: Michelle Cabana and Mary Hirsch, descendant of Charles Kelso, 2011
Kelso Burial - Belleville, Ontario - https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/123892992/charles-george_l-kelso
Illinois Statewide Death Index 1916-1950
Major Bell at shooting match - "Kane Weekly Blade, Pennsylvania" - Aug 21, 1879
"St. Paul Daily Globe", June 1881 - https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83025287/1881-06-21/ed-1/seq-2/#words=Kelso
St. Paul Daily Globe, Nov. 1881 - http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/search/pages/results/?state=&dateFilterType=year&year=&date1=01%2F01%2F1860&date2=12%2F31%2F1922&ortext=&andtext=&phrasetext=C.G.L.+Kelso&proxtext=&proxdistance=5&submit=SEARCH
Minneapolis, St. Paul - Sault Ste. Marie Railway Company annual report, 1888 - http://books.google.ca/books?id=UZcbAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA36&dq=%22kelso+%22+%22Hallock+minnesota%22&hl=en&ei=Fe5YTfXqFYGCtge5md2hDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CDkQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=%22kelso%20%22%20%22Hallock%20minnesota%22&f=false
"The Chose Minnesota" by J.D. Holmquist, 1981 - https://books.google.ca/books?id=QWBhzg7AQPwC&pg=PA260&dq=%22kelso+brothers+%22+Hallock+minnesota&hl=en&ei=jvBZTeWpGoLGlQf8ptWVDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCgQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Kelso&f=false
Photo - "Curling in Canada and the United States", 1902-03 - http://www.archive.org/stream/curlingincanadau00kerrrich#page/648/mode/2up/search/kelso
"The Chicago Blue Book" - 1902" - https://archive.org/details/chicagobluebooko1902chic/page/13
Colonel Calvin S Uline bio - https://archive.org/stream/northdakotahisto03loun#page/476/mode/2up
Col Uline photo - http://collections.mnhs.org/cms/largerimage.php?irn=10134830&catirn=10766920
Minnesota State Gazetteer and Business Directory 1880-1881 Kelso & Bell (not in the 1878-1879 directory) - https://archive.org/stream/minnesotanorthso21unse#page/n629/mode/2up
Minnesota State Gazetteer and Business Directory 1882- 1883 Kelso & Bell
- https://archive.org/stream/minnesotanorthso31unse#page/n647/mode/2upCol. Uline's report on the Kelso-Bell Farm - "St Paul Daily Globe" June 21, 1881.
http://www.archive.org/stream/chicagobluebooko1902chic#page/104/mode/2up/search/club
RESEARCH BY:
Michelle Cabana, Saskatoon, Sask.; and Frank Korvemaker, Regina, Sask.