Phillip Volkmer and Mary Volkmer, who had previously been residents of the rural section just outside the City of Buffalo, came to Michigan and arrived in the vicinity of Chesaning on the 29th day of March, 1861, bringing with them their three children.
At this period of time, the country around Chesaning was very much a wilderness, there being but very few roads of any consequence at all and no road other than a cut out, running 40 rods east of the Shiawassee River and there meeting with the blazed trail that leads to what is now the present Volkmer residence, the blazed trail continuing from this place easterly to the place known as the Hewitt shanty, on the land now known as the Judd farm and the blazed trail ending after continuing slightly further east to what was then known as the Chase place. This period of time was right at the beginning of Civil War hostilities and one of the sons of the Chase family enlisted in the army and lost his life in service.
Later, during the fall of '62, the trail ending at the Chase place, was continued further east and across the town line of Chesaning and Maple Grove Townships, to what is now known as the Schwanz farm and in the meantime there had settled on this trail between this point and Chesaning, the family of whom the head was Jacob Foess and about the same time during the same year, Abraham Sternaman and his family settled on what is now known as the Rohrback place and built a small one shed roofed log cabin and a small pig sty of logs and in a small clearing around his cabin, he raised sufficient corn to fat the pigs for winters use. Late in the fall of the year, while Sternamen was ill with typhoid fever, a bear came in and stole the pig out of the pen, despite the efforts of Mrs. Sternaman and the children to scare him away.
Late in the fall of 1863, Phillip Volkmer enlisted in Company C, 29th. Michigan, Volunteer Infantry and went into training at Salina, now known as South Saginaw, where he remained until going into actual service in Nashville, Tenn. and served in the U.S. Army until the close of the war.
In the meantime, a considerable settlement had grown up along the trail and in its vicinity, among the settlers being the Ginter family, the Richter family, George Koch; the Patterson family; the Knauff family; the Schwanz family; and the Simons family, who had moved in between the Chase and Hewitt homesteads.
At the end of the hostilities, Phillip Volkmer came home and about this time of his arrival, came Seldon Patterson, also a veteran, who settled on the farm now known as the Frank Hayden place, this being later purchased from Patterson by James Judd, who was also a Civil War Veteran. The Chase family of course, did not share in the general rejoicing at the return of the soldiers, for their son Sabin, had been mortally wounded in action and did not return.
The distinction of being the first white child born on the Volkmer Road, was a female child named Biantha Chase, who was married to Conrad Schwanz and who now resides in the State of Kansas. Sharing with Mrs. Schwanz in this honor, was the daughter of Byron Hewitt, another little girl named Joyce Hewitt, now the wife of Elmer Judd, who still makes her home upon the same place where she was born, on the Volkmer Road.
At the end of the Civil War, the settlers active in making a living for themselves, had succeeded in clearing quite a considerable portion of the land along the Volkmer trail and made it necessary for them to improve the road by road work assessed against the landowners and poll tax assessed against those of 21 years of age or over, the work being done by cutting down the trees and piling up the logs on either side of the highway, where they were later burned in order to dispose of them. Later, the stumpage was removed from the highway and ditches dug on either side to assure drainage, although for many years it would have been practically impossible to have driven a modern motor vehicle on the highway, because of its rough and mirey condition, especially at that section of road where the Ginther School used to stand, at which place a yoke of cattle hitched to a wagon found it necessary to swim in order to get through.
Prospects of a railway for Chesaning in 1866 and the coming of the Allen-Andrus saw mill, located on what is now known as the Hoffman farm, also made an incentive toward building of better roads, all of the lumber from the mill was transported over the road by ox teams and horse, to the railroad station in Chesaning, where the lumber was shipped to its destination.
Although much improvement had been made by way of clearing and work on the road, still in 1867 and for many years later, the territory east of Chesaning still remained a considerable wilderness and when in the '70s, Lauren Conklin moved on to what is now known as the Conklin farm, he found the place an untamed wilderness.
Prior to the building of the Ginter School on the Volkmer Road, the children on this road were obliged to go to what was then known as the Stearns School, then located on what is now known as the L. D. Biship farm, this school being later moved onto the Pietz place, slightly farther east on the north side of the road, and later becoming known as the Frink school. The child population having increased so as to make necessary the building of a school of their own, a little board shanty was erected for a school building, on a piece of land across the road from Moore Ginter's place, where one room classes were taught by one of the Darling girls, who later married one of the members of the Chase family. The new Ginter school was later erected on the place now known as the Levi Snyder farm, where the same continued until but recently, when it was finally disposed of.
During the early stages of the building of the Volkmer Road, in all the low places on the highway, "corduroy", logs laid lengthwise across the trail, was placed in order to from a bottom for the road, this being a distinct improvement over the old roads that they early settlers had traversed when they first settled in the district. As the farms along the highway continued to improve, the road was also improved, until at the present time, this road with a very humble beginning, boasts gravel for its entire length and fast moving automobiles are now traveling at great speed over the place that but a few years ago, was laboriously traversed by the ox team.