History of Clarion County, Pennsylvania, 1887
Ruloff Isaac Allen Rulofson Biography
Ruloff Isaac Allen Rulofson was born in Hampton, King's county, New Brunswick, B.N.A., October 18, 1822, and received a substantial education in the city of St. John, in his native province. Following the advice of Greeley, at the age of twenty-one he started west, crossed the St. Croix River, and began life actively as a self made millwright. In the fall of 1843, at Milltown, Me., on the St. Croix River, he built the first successful live gang saw-mill in the United States. He afterwards married Amanda J. Emerson, and continuing his course westward came to Saccarapa, near Portland, Me., thence to Elk county, Pa., bringing with him considerable mill machinery. He remained in Elk county several years, engaging extensively in the lumber business.
In 1858 he came to Strattanville, Clarion county, Pa., near where he had purchased an interest in a large tract of timber land. Here he became the managing member of the firm known as Marvin, Rulofson & Co., and built a large saw-mill, which has been improved and is still in active operation on the Clarion River at the mouth of Mill Creek, also a beautiful residence in Strattanville, in which he lives at present. His time being occupied closely, and being a man of few words, he found it necessary to abridge his name, and instead of writing it as at first given, adopted R. Rulofson as his signature.
In the early part of his life he was in the British volunteer service, and acted as courier through snow seven feet deep during the Aroostook War, and was on the line of duty the day Queen Victoria was crowned.
As a youth he had good habits, was healthy, active, and untiring; an expert fisherman, a skillful hunter, and was very fond of horses. In his twentieth year he was nursed in the arms of a bear, and at another time was buried in the snow in consequence of a deer getting fast in one of his snow shoes. While in Elk county he caught a live, sound buck by the horns, and held him in the water on logs and gravel until a friend went a good distance for a knife. He says, "I dare not let go."
The night of April 16, 1851 was made memorable to him by a perilous trip on the ocean. He with his, wife and three children, at 8 o'clock P.M., on that evening, went on board the steamer Admiral. After leaving the harbor of Portland, Me., the ship was unable to take her course on account of a terrific storm, and was compelled to put to sea for twenty four hours. The fright of that trip baffles description. Many of the seamen became unable for duty; no food was eaten there for forty eight hours. In his own words, "The water, ah, me! it rolled mountains high, often covering the entire vessel."
In 1842 Mr. Rulofson became a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and also a Free and Accepted Mason. He was elected for fifteen successive years District Deputy Grand Master of the I.O.O.F., of Clarion county, but resigned before serving the fifteenth year, in order to have more time to spend with his family, to whom he was affectionately devoted. He served four or five years as Worshipful Master of Clarion Lodge A.Y.M., and received from its members a valuable past-master jewel as a token of the high esteem in which he was held by his brethren. He also received similar tokens from the O.F's. of the county, and from Clarion Lodge I.O.O.F.
Mr. Rulofson's adventures in hunting, fishing, travel, etc., and his services in organized societies are far eclipsed by his brilliant business career. His business transactions have amounted to several million dollars. He has been a lumberman in every sense of the term; he has erected large saw-mills, and managed their operations, cut and transported a great deal of lumber, dealt extensively in timber tracts, and constructed machinery to work as desired. His thorough business qualities, sound judgment and good intentions have won for him the confidence and goodwill of all with whom he has dealt. He has always been liberal, energetic, and courteous.
Source: History of Clarion County; Davis, A. J.; Syracuse, NY; D. Mason and Co., 1887.
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