This small community wasn’t called Ruch until 1895, over 45 years after the first homesteaders staked their claims. Logtown had been abandoned for years. Casper “Cap” Ruch opened a general store a short way down the Jacksonville-Crescent City Road – today’s Hwy 238 – and applied to run a post office in “Ruch.”
Cap was born in 1865, the fifth of seven children of Swiss immigrants. The family arrived at Humbug Creek about 1870. His father Fridolin committed suicide by drinking strychnine, one week after paying $1600 ($38,000 in 2021) in gold coin for a mining claim. At the coroner’s inquest the next day, Cap’s mother Anna testified that Fridolin had been having “spells” and was “not acting right.” Ten days later the despondent woman drowned herself in a mining pond on Humbug Creek, taking toddler Wilhelm with her.
William and Louisa Ray lived nearby and took young Cap into their home. James McDonough (misspelled McDonald in this 1910 map) owned the land east of the sprawling Ray farm.
Cap purchased 10 acres from McDonough in 1895 and set up a store and blacksmith shop. His application to run a post office proposed to call the place “Ruch.” The Ruch General Store became the social hub of the neighborhood previously known as Uniontown – the next stop on the History Trail.
