Hayfield got its start as a rebel town-ship

Many, maybe most, residents of Dodge County probably don’t know that Hayfield’s 150th Sesquicentennial Celebration this week is actually noting the founding of Hayfield Township. And that is the result of a group of prominent citizens deciding that they wanted to break away from Vernon Township.
And they did it without notifying Vernon Township officials.
Randy Benson, a member of the Hayfield Township board, knows the story because his great-grandfather Hans C. Boysen was of the men who founded the township.
As Benson tells the story, in 1872 all of what is now Hayfield Township and the City of Hayfield were part of Vernon Township. There was a settlement in what later became Hayfield but it was not incorporated as a village until the railroad came through the area in the mid-1880s.
In early 1872 the leading men of the area decided they wanted to leave Vernon Township and become their own town. Townships, Benson said, are legally referred to as towns by the state. Even today, he said, Hayfield Township receives communications from the state to the Town of Hayfield.
The problem these early leaders had, Benson said, was that there simply were not enough people in the area to vote for a town. The 1870 census showed 18 residents and by 1872 only a couple of families had moved to the area, according to an early history of the town.
To get around this problem, some of those residents hired from 10 to 12 men each to work for them. And because they had come to Hayfield more than 10 days before the town meeting they were eligible to vote.
So with enough residents to organize a town, they called a meeting for March 30, 1872. The meeting was held at the home of a settler, Levi Leighton. It was Benson’s great grandfather, Hans C. Boysen, who called the meeting to order in the morning.
They promptly elected officers including Leighton as chairman of the supervisors, Jens Olson Fossum and Ole Erickson as associate supervisors, Boysen as the town clerk and Leighton as assessor. Boysen and Leighton where elected justices, J.H. Theyly and Hellek Halverson as constables and Leighton as the poundmaster.
At that point Leighton introduced a resolution to organize the town, it was adopted and the town named and recorded.
The Vernon town officials had somehow found out about the action, Benson said, and that same afternoon a large number came from Vernon to oppose the new town. The deed was done, however, and later that afternoon, Leighton, Fossum and Erickson of Hayfield and Vernon Supervisors Ole Anderson, Reier Reirsen and Peter Johnson signed the agreement.
At the same meeting, according to a History of Winona, Olmsted and Dodge Counties, published in 1884, the residents of Hayfield voted to raise $2,000 for roads and bridges and $150 for town officers’ salaries.
Bensen said that his great grandfather immigrated to the area from Denmark, farmed in the township and later went on to become a representative in the Minnesota Legislature.
The Hayfield Township Hall, which is located in the city of Hayfield, will be open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. this Saturday with a display of historical items.