A man named Booth Perry first settled on Newfield before there was even a Newfield to speak of. Perry Settled in the area in 1856 or 1857, however, between the years of 1855 and 1858, the area was considered to be a portion of Stony Creek. In 1857, the name of Stony Creek township was changed to Benona, and in 1858 the township of Greenwood was organized out of Benona. But it wouldn’t be until 1866 that we see Newfield emerge, when it was formally organized out of Greenwood. Newfield, by the way, was very nearly not selected as the name for the township at all. Page’s History of Oceana County recounts the tale:
The origin of the name is explained by that pioneer settler, Joseph W. Sweet, as follows: A number of the settlers chanced to be in his house, and a proper name for the shortly to be organized town was discussed. Elbridge Green wished it to be called Greenfield; Alex McLaren proposed Sweet-town, which was modestly declined on the part of Mr. Sweet, who, in turn, suggested Perrytown, in honor of old Booth Perry, the first settler in the town, but at last the name of ‘Newfield’ prevailed and was inserted in the petition. The meeting occurred in the summer of 1865.
It would seem that each of the old settlers was quite conscientious, wanting to name the new township in somebody else’s honor, rather than their own. The Elbridge Green that was mentioned, by the way, is not the namesake for our own Elbridge township. That title goes to a man named Elbridge Farmer.
As we said, Perry settled in Newfield sometime around 1856 or 1857. He located on sections 12 and 13 but eventually sold his lands to Elbridge Green and returned east. Upon doing so, he managed to convince Alex McLaren and Patrick McFarland to locate out in Newfield, both of whom arrived in February 1858, landing in what Page’s History calls “the McLaren neighborhood.” They paid 75 cents per acre. The aforementioned settler, Joseph W. Sweet, arrived the next year and settled in Hesperia. Hartwick and Tuller confirm in their book that Mr. Sweet was actually the first person to settle on the Oceana side of Hesperia. Page goes on to mention about every pioneer who settled the area between 1860 and 1868. One of the names in that long list is Dr. H. C. Hawley, who arrived in April of 1862 and located on section 34.
There are quite a few interesting stories recorded from the early days of Newfield. Some number of months ago I wrote about the death of one Mr. Barber, who was given what was supposed to be a medication called quinine from his sister-in-law. Not long after taking the medication, Mr. Barber passed away in a fit of convulsions. It was Dr. Hawley who successfully identified the substance he had taken as strychnine. But Mr. Barber was not the first death in the township. That honor goes to Patrick McFarland. Since McFarland’s wishes were to be buried in a Catholic cemetery, his body was “conveyed through the woods” some sixty miles by a team of oxen led by J. W. Sweet. There once was a man named Mr. Brewer too who served as school assessor and mysteriously vanished one day. As Page puts it, “the old man, who was regarded as eccentric,” vanished in the woods one day and “was never afterward seen in Newfield.”
Lastly, Page mentions the names of some Newfield men who fell in service of our country during the Civil War. There were Ezra Roger and Christian Straight of the Third Michigan Infantry and one William Drake.
