USA > Indiana > Newton County > A standard history of Jasper and Newton counties, Indiana : an authentic narrative of the past, with an extended survey of modern developments in the progress of town and country, Volume I > Part 31
USA > Indiana > Jasper County > A standard history of Jasper and Newton counties, Indiana : an authentic narrative of the past, with an extended survey of modern developments in the progress of town and country, Volume I > Part 31
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40
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stands, was Mr. Board's place. Where J. Shindler lives, was Nat Smith. The Ulyat place was occupied by Samuel Lyons, father of J. B. Lyons, who lived and did blacksmithing for the whole neighborhood. On the east of the Laban Lyons farm was David Weirbaugh. East to the Foresman farm and north, was Mr. Wind- bigler. South of the road where Sant Kemper lives was Matt Karr. North of the river and west of where Brunner lives, was Jabez Wright. East, near the Foresman railroad, was Granny Howard. A schoolhouse stood near here; it was afterward moved to Hickory Branch. North to the Julian road, the first house was a log cabin owned by John Catt. The next was Dr. Maxwell's, the only house left of the town of Julian, now owned by J. D. Rich. John Catt lived at what is known as the Ulrey farm. Next was the Salem school- house. Next east, at the Tom Lowe farm, was a Mr. Lewis. At the Ben Harris farm was a Mr. Mead. North of the schoolhouse, first place, was Calvin Hough. Next, on the east side of the road, was Mr. Pumphrey. On the west side was Abe Lester. Back to Brook and north, where John Pence lives, was Morris Lyons ; north, on the west side of the road, was Andrew Hess ; the last house north until you got to the Beaver timber, and none in sight, and no fences to bother you until you got near Morocco. Not over thirty-five houses in the whole township.
"You can readily see there has been a great change in the past sixty years. Will there be as much in the next ?
"I have gotten this together hurriedly; may have left something out that would interest you and said some things that would be better not said.
"An incident happened on the way out here that has clung to me these sixty years. During that fall occurred the first Republican campaign. I had learned some of the campaign songs, as I have since, and was sitting in the feed-box when an old mossback drove up and, with loud words and big oaths, ordered me to stop my singing. My two older brothers heard the racket and jumped out of the wagon, when the old Dem. took the back track. One verse of the song ran this way: 'Old Bullion had a daughter fair, and Jessie was her name. A Rocky Mountain hunter, a courting her, he came. He wooed her, and he won her, and will make her, by the fates, the lady of the President of these United States.'
"The chorus: 'Then come along, make no delay; come from every nation, and come from every way. Our land is broad enough, so don't be alarmed; for Uncle Sam is rich enough to give us all a farm.'"
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MR. HERSHMAN'S ADDRESS
Although largely personal, Mr. Hershman's address was some- what broader in its scope than that made by Mr. Jones. He said :
"I was born in Benton county, in the latter part of the year 1848, and grew to manhood on the prairie side of White county near the present town of Wolcott.
"I take for granted that what would be true in one of those Grand prairie communities would be similarly true in the others. My earliest recollections are of the log cabin. My first visit to a newly erected frame house made a lasting impression on my child mind. The smell of fresh paint, the new rag carpet on the floor, the big bureau with glass knobs and ornamented with a big ripe tomato on top (for you will remember that tomatoes were once grown for ornaments), made a picture so different from anything that I had ever seen that I have never forgotten it.
FIGHTING A PRAIRIE FIRE SCIENTIFICALLY
"There is one other scene that left an indelible impression on my youthful mind. It was a prairie fire at night. It had been seen all the afternoon coming from toward the west ; at first, perhaps ten or fifteen miles away. It was a calm day and at first only smoke could be seen, which was anxiously watched by the settlers, but as evening came on and darkness set in, the flames began to loom up and assume a fearful aspect, as their long lines came steadily on, destroying everything in the way of their onward sweep. By this time the men and boys were aroused and organized into a fire- fighting squad.
"They knew how to fight prairie fires, for they were accustomed to it, and had reduced the system to a science. They did not attempt to beat out the fire by helter-skelter pounding of the leaping mass of flames, by which they would have soon exhausted their strength and accomplished nothing. They met it with a counter fire. That is, they went onto the highest grounds ahead of it, where the grass was short, and started a new fire; one stringing out the fire and others following up, beating it out on the leeward side as soon as started and allowing the windward side to burn back toward the oncoming flames. In this way the fire was headed off and disaster averted.
"I was too small to go out with the men to fight the fire, but I remember standing out in the yard watching the flames as they approached to within less than a mile, lighting up the night and making quite an imposing scene. We could see the men as they
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ran back and forth before it, silhouetting their forms on the back- ground of flame and smoke, like giants of the night engaged in a great battle with the destroying demon to save their homes. And they succeeded.
STOVE, WITHOUT A FIREPLACE
"I began noticing passing events during a period of great evolu- tion in economics. Our mothers were just emerging from the old system of cooking on the fireplace to the more up-to-date method of the new-fangled stove, though no one as yet had thought possible to do without the fireplace as a means of warming the house in cold weather. I think I remember the first stove introduced into our neighborhood. A man had built a new frame house and had ignored the fireplace, to the utter astonishment of the neighbors. But when the house was finished he bought a box-heating stove, with a drum attachment on the top of it to make extra heat. Of course every- one burned wood at that time, and to the people who were accustomed to sitting close to the fire and scorching their faces, while the cold chills raced up and down their backs, the result was marvelous. 'Why,' they said, 'when you enter the house the heat strikes you like the blast from a furnace.' So it was not long until all who could afford it put in stoves for heating, as well as for cooking, and the old fireplace became a thing of the past.
OTHER HOME IMPROVEMENTS
"The use of cotton in factory stuff, as it was called, was becom- ing common, which made the cultivation of flax for its lint non- profitable; also the establishment of woolen mills at Lafayette, Monticello, Yountsville, and other places over the state, did away with much of the hard work with wool. Though I can remember that my mother had a loom and a spinning wheel, I do not remem- ber ever seeing her use them very much. A great many women, however, were still making linsey-woolsey for children's dresses, a kind of stuff made from linen and wool, which was very durable. All the sewing was done by hand, as the sewing machine had not been invented.
"The farmer was laying aside forever the reap-hook and had adopted the more speedy implement of the cradling scythe to cut his grain, and had about quit the use of the flail and horse-threshing floors for the more modern system-a ground-hog threshing machine, which was run by a tread-mill power, and threshed two or three
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hundred bushels a day, running the grain and chaff out together, which had to be separated with a fanning mill.
EARLY SCHOOLS AND TEACHERS
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"A public school system had been adopted and every com- munity of any size had a schoolhouse and received from the State money sufficient for about two months' school. If we had more, it was paid for by private subscription. The teacher boarded around to make the money go further. Methods of instruction were different then. The evolution in education had hardly begun. Spelling, writ- ing and arithmetic, were about all that much attention was given to, and it seemed to me that it was mostly spelling for about three years, as I could spell any word in the speller. That is, when I was looking at it, before I was allowed to have a reader. Books were scarce and high priced; so my first reading book was a McGuffy Second Reader, which had been outgrown by my older brother. I had not much trouble in reading it, for I had already read it through at home.
"As a bunch of boys is in many ways much like a bunch of monkeys, if not kept busy getting their lessons their fertile brains will be busy suggesting pranks to play on their mates, keeping one eye on the teacher to avoid discovery. The teacher, in self-defense, had to bring into requisition the proverbial birch to keep down the spirit of mischief, so that a reasonably good lesson might be learned. I never experienced its application but once, and I have always regretted that I did not ask the teacher what it was for, as I never knew exactly just which of my misdemeanors he considered worthy of the honor. Perhaps it was on general principles. In my first lessons with the pen, I was given a copy of straight marks, and told to make marks just like the pattern. I was kept at it for days and days. I never knew why so long, but it must have been because I couldn't get them straight. I was then given a copy of pothooks, as they were called by the boys. After practicing on them for several days I was given a copy of loops, after which I was permitted to make the letters of the alphabet.
"In the winter of '60 and '61, our school was taught by a Mr. Mitchell. I thought then that he was the smartest man I had ever seen. His school was not graded, although he had all grades, from the beginning to young men and women trying to finish the com- mon branches. To many of them it was a finish, for before another
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winter had come about half a dozen of them were in the army. Some never returned, and of those who did, I think none ever entered school again. He had dozens of classes in other branches, but none in arithmetic. In this branch everyone worked for himself trying to do all the sums that he could, and those he could not do, he called on the teacher for help; which kept that personage pretty busy, so much so that he did not have much time to spend on the small boys. I was twelve years old, but this was my first winter in arith- metic, and I was given Ray's Third Part to begin on. I had very little instruction, and though I tried hard to master its mysteries, I made about as much progress as I would now, if I should try to learn the Kaiser's favorite language.
"The winter of '61 and '62 I spent in Newton county with my aunt, who lived in the Roberts neighborhood and whose husband was in the army. Owing to the scarcity of teachers on account of the war, as most of the men had enlisted for soldiers and there were not enough lady teachers then to supply the schools, we had none, and I missed that year.
A LITTLE JUDICIAL AND CIVIL HISTORY
"I will go back now beyond my time and relate some things that I have only from tradition or the early records of Newton county. In 1839, when Newton county was part of Jasper, we have an account of the first Probate Court held in the county near Brook, on the Bowers farm. The record says: 'No business appearing, court adjourned.' In the same year, however, court was again called in the same place. This time two cases came up, both for adjustments of estates ; also marriage license granted to James Lacy and Matilda Blue, and the ceremony was performed by Esq. John Lyons.
"In 1853 the commissioners of Jasper county organized the territory of what is now Iroquois, Grant, Jefferson and Washing- ton townships, into a township under the name of Iroquois, and ordered an election of township officers. Three trustees were elected, as the law required at that time. The following year the township was divided in the middle, north and south, the west township taking the name of Washington. Iroquois township retained that organi- zation until 1865, when it was again divided through the middle, east and west, and Grant township was organized. A strip a mile wide on the west of Iroquois township was transferred to Wash- ington.
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MORE ABOUT THE TOWNSHIP SCHOOLS
"The first school of which I have any account that was taught in what is now Iroquois township, was opened in one end of a double log cabin belonging to John Lyons, which stood a little south- east of the railroad crossing on what is now the Hoag farm, but then belonging to John Lyons. The teacher was Joseph Smith, who, a little later, was known as Grandpap Smith. He is supposed to have received his pay from private subscription.
"The first schoolhouse built in this township was made of logs and was erected by John Lyons on his farm on the south side of the river. The year is not definitely known, but was about 1849 or '50. I think Barnett Hawkins was the first teacher at a salary of eighteen dollars per month.
"In 1853 contracts were let for the erection of two frame school buildings, 18 by 24 feet in size. They were to have windows with panes 8 by 10 inches, to be lathed and plastered, and to be completed within one year from the date of letting the contract. One of these houses was erected on the ground now occupied by the public library, the other was located on the south side of the river in the original first district. The following year another contract was let for a schoolhouse, which was afterward known as the Salem school. In 1859 the Hickory Branch schoolhouse was built.
"These four schoolhouses were all the township had until 1869 and '70, when the Duffy and Griggs schoolhouses were built. In 1873 the Foresman schoolhouse was erected.
"In 1858 we find E. B. Jones teaching a term for $61.50; M. S. Mead, for $85; Barnett Hawkins, $75; Delilah Shoenfelt, $50. In June, 1859. the trustee reports funds on hand of $175.40, which he disbursed to the four districts as follows: No. I, $33.65; No. 2, $65.15; No. 3, $44.05; No. 4, $32.55. This distribution must have been based on the enumeration. This year the township had two months and seventeen days of school. Average wages of male teachers, $24 per month. Average wages of female teachers, $13 per month. Pupils enrolled, 101. Average attendance, 60. The private subscriptions amounted to $85. In 1860 the average wages of the teachers had risen to $25; the enrollment to 125; average attendance, 70; amount spent in instruction, $218.19. In 1869 teachers' wages had increased to $30 and $35 per month, with no discrimination against female teachers. Since then the wages have been steadily on the increase.
"Up to the year 1877, we had not more than five months of
.
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school in any one year taught with public money, though it was quite common to have two or three months of select or subscription school, as it was called, taught by girls usually of the neighbor- hood. During the administration of Uncle John Foresman as trustee he raised the tuition tax levy enough to enable him to have seven months' terms. Since that time the township has never had less than seven months, and for the past few years we have had eight months, as well as a joint interest in the Brook public school, including the high school, in which nine months is taught.
"Teachers of the township last year received wages ranging from the beginners at $45, to the highest grade teacher who received $66.40 per month. The grade teacher in the town school received from $70 to $80 per month. We have jumped from the first year of record of $54 for public instruction to $3,800 for all expenses of the township schools, and $9,000 for the town schools, with $600 additional for permanent improvement, which makes a grand total of $13,400.
"I have been more or less interested in the public school of this county since 1869, as I began teaching that year, which I continued in the winter's session of three or four months for seven years, when I decided that I could not give it the attention it should have and quit. Since then I have served fifteen years as township trustee and ten years on the school board of Brook and am still a member of the school board.
"I remember very distinctly my first examination for a teacher's license. Mr. O. P. Hervey was school examiner. He was a lawyer and an invalid, suffering with tuberculosis. I went over to the county seat on examination day, found Mr. Hervey in his office, and told him my business. He told me to come in after dinner and he would give me an examination, as there would be others on the same errand. After dinner I went in for the ordeal and found twelve other young fellows ready to join me. I only remember positively one of them, a Mr. C. W. Clifton. He examined us orally. Having one of us stand up at a time he would question us somewhat after the manner of examining a witness, as to our knowledge of subjects, till we got to a point where we did not know anything, when he would allow us to take our seats and recuperate while he took another through a similar grilling. This was the last Saturday in November and darkness came pretty early. He saw that he would have to shorten up somewhere, so after asking one of us a list of questions, he would ask the others how their knowledge of the subject compared with the answer just given. We generally
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said about the same, so he graded us accordingly. I remember in one instance he had examined some one in United States history. The answers had not been as clear as they might have been, but when asked the usual question we all said about the same ; glad to get off so easy, except Mr. Clifton, who had been a sergeant or lieutenant in the army and was, we thought, a little conceited. He said that he considered himself perfect in United States history. I think that the examiner gave him a 100 per cent grade, as he was the only one who got a first class license. There were thirteen of us and I don't know about the luck in odd numbers, but all of us got our licenses but one. Another incident of the day is worth men- tioning here. Our friend, J. B. Lyons, had contracted to teach a school to begin the first Monday in December, and he also wanted a license. True to his nature to economize his time as much as possible and kill two birds with one stone, he loaded his wagon with something, had bad luck on the way, a break down or some- thing of the kind, and didn't get in till the examination was over, but he fared just as well, for Mr. Hervey said that as he had examined him the year before he would grant him a license on the previous examination."
CHAPTER XXIII
MOROCCO AND OTHER TOWNS
DRAWN TO THE RICH FUR COUNTRY-MURPHY LAYS OUT MOROCCO -SLOW GROWTH-INVISIBLE BRANCH BANK OF AMERICA- STRUGGLES TO BECOME COUNTY SEAT-FINAL EXPANSION-THE PRESENT MOROCCO-THE MOROCCO COURIER -- THIE METHODIST, CHRISTIAN, UNITED BRETHREN AND BAPTIST CHURCHES-THE MOROCCO WOMAN'S CLUB-THE LODGES-MOUNT AYR-FIRST CALLED MOUNT AIRY-OTHER RAILROAD TOWNS.
One of the four flourishing and growing incorporated towns in Newton County, Morocco is at the junction of the Chicago & East- ern Illinois and the Chicago, Indiana & Southern (New York . Central) railroads, about two miles west of the geographical center of the county. It is also nearly in the center of Beaver Township and, although it is now surrounded by some of the finest farming land in that portion of the state, at the time of its first settlement it was in the midst of some of the most prolific trapping grounds in the country. The beaver furs sent to that point and sold to the agents of the Northwestern Fur Company for shipment to Detroit were considered as valuable as any collected in the Northwest.
DRAWN TO THE RICH FUR COUNTRY
John Day, of South Bend, Indiana, was in the employ of that company for many years and was well known to all the hunters and trappers of the Beaver Lake and Kankakee River regions which yielded so much of the fur supply brought to the locality afterward laid out as Morocco. John Murphy, a Virginian and a typical pio- neer of Ohio and Indiana, appeared in that region in 1838, took up land and cultivated it, brought supplies for the trappers from Chicago and otherwise made himself useful. When he located a few miles south of Beaver Lake there were only about a dozen families in what is now Newton County, most of them on the Iroquois River a short distance south of him. The Kenoyer and Myers settlements
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had just been commenced, on the northern and southern banks of that stream.
After several years, during which the region south of Beaver Lake continued to more than hold its own as a center of trade, there was much talk of railroad connections from the east which should pass through the west-central portions of what was then Jasper County, traverse the rich prairies of Illinois and reach the main trunk of the Mississippi Valley.
MURPHY LAYS OUT MOROCCO
John Murphy shared in all the general expectations of benefits to be thus derived, in a special and personal manner. On January
THE MOROCCO HIGH SCHOOL
18, 1851, he therefore laid out the town of Morocco on a portion of his farm, in section 21, town 29, range 9. Several years afterward there was a probability that the so-called Continental Railroad would, at least, pass quite near Morocco; but, as events proved, the town was to wait for nearly forty years before it was favored with rail connections. The Grand Prairie region south of the Iroquois, with Kentland and Goodland, was to be developed by railroad advantages for a generation before the territory north of it was thus favored.
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SLOW GROWTH
As a town, Morocco grew slowly. Its first merchant was Elijah Whitson and in April, 1853, when John Ade came from Buncum, Illinois, to establish a branch store for Ayers & Company, of that place, Morocco proper had less than a dozen buildings on its site. In the following year the Continental Railroad was projected a few miles north of Morocco along the shores of Beaver Lake, but it never progressed beyond a little grading in Jackson and Beaver townships.
INVISIBLE BRANCH BANK OF AMERICA
In the fall of 1854 a branch of the Bank of America was also established at Morocco, in a very figurative sense; and it was a wild-cat concern to the limit. All that was required by law was to deposit with the secretary of state bonds of any state in the Union to secure the circulation, and then the speculator was at liberty to launch out upon the world. The object of the projectors of this bank was to locate as far from the centers of business as possible, so as to reduce the necessity for redeeming its circulation to the lowest possible amount.
The first intimation the citizens of the little burg had of the distinction thus thrust upon them, was the sight of a large bill issued by the bank in question. John Ade was temporarily in Cin- cinnati, Ohio, at that time, and saw the bill. On his return by way of Rensselaer, he learned, on inquiring, that such a bank had been established, and the proprietor tried to persuade Mr. Ade to act as cashier. Mr. Murphy was finally prevailed upon to attend to the redemption of any bills that found their way to this neck of the woods, but could be induced only to accept the guardianship of $100 in gold at a time. A great many stories in regard to this bank have circulated in the papers, which are simple fabrications or wide exaggerations, but Mr. Ade furnishes one which has the merit of being true, and exhibits a part of the capital on which the bank did business : "In the summer of 1854, during the existence of the noted free-banking laws of Indiana, in what was then the county of Jasper, which embraced at that time all the territory now included in the counties of Jasper and Newton, three banks were organized, two of which were located in Rensselaer, the county seat, and one in. Morocco, at a point some twenty miles from Rensselaer, almost due west. The country between the two points being very sparsely Vol. I-22
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settled at that time, and, although it has since become one of the finest farming regions in the State, at that time it was almost unknown, except what reputation it had acquired in the adjoining counties by reason of the breaking-up of a gang of counterfeiters on Bogus Island, a short time previous, and which was not cal- culated to invite timid strangers to spend their time in looking for its good qualities.
"At that time, Bradford, a station on the New Albany & Salem Railroad, was the nearest railroad point to Rensselaer, and then the two points were connected by a stage route which made daily trips and which ran so far as to connect with the trains, which at that time went north late in the afternoon, so the trip from Bradford to Rensselaer had nearly all of it to be made after night, and to a person acquainted with the country at that time, was not very invit- ing, to say the least.
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