USA > Indiana > Grant County > Centennial history of Grant County, Indiana, 1812 to 1912 : compiled from records of the Grant county historical society, archives of the county, data of personal interviews, and other authentic sources of local information > Part 3
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The tract book in the county recorder's office shows the first entry of land to have been made by Martin Boots, October 19, 1825, and an early historian says that he was joined by his wife and daughter in the best year. so there is little question about the identity of the hist settler, even though there may have been "squatters" before hmm who did not go through the formality of entering land. While Goldsmith Gilbert and later, "Che-enm-wah, " the Indian name of Sanmel MeClure, were trad ing post nomenclature, little is known of what happened in the interim from 1812 until Grant county was organized, but in 1903 the writer paid a visit to Mr. Mary Jane Gilbert Edmunds, a daughter of Goldsmith Gilbert, who was an Indian trader in the nineteen years of subsequent history, and who had the distinction of being the first white child born in Delaware county, from which Grant was later detached, and she was a much feted. honored woman, enjoying every comfort in the home of a daughter in Muncie. She gave to him a small pamphlet which contained her life history.
While there are nineteen years about which little is known as settlers were gathering in the wilderness, the cycle of a century since that mem- orable conflict -- the Battle of the Mississinewa has developed a veritable garden spot, and with the timber removed the rose has been made to blossom, and there are fertile farms all along the river. It is a matter of reproach to a prosperous people that the site of this important mil itary engagement has so long been allowed to remain in obscurity. Carlyle says: " History is the essence of innumerable biographies, " and if the future could be accurately foreshadowed, there would then be little need of recording the past-sufficient muito the day being the events thereof, and yet in a measure the past reflects the future. and Colonel Campbell but blazed the trail for a later splendid civilization.
David Branson entered land, August 26. 1826. adjoining the pre- emption of Martin Boots, but the pages of history are silent as to where
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HISTORY OF GRANT COUNTY
either of those pioneers whose names were destined to be linked together in future came from to their wilderness homes. A half dozen names that are now household words were spoken in the wilds of the frontier soon after the coming of Boots and Branson, and yet the dircet family circles of those two men seem to have been broken up entirely. While there are lineal descendants of both, old residents of the county say when asked if they remember them, "Knowed 'em when I see 'em, " and an historian writing in 1877 says: "The early settlers of Grant county have nearly all passed away." While gathering data for this Centennial history, a citizen of Marion who belongs to one of the comparatively carly families of the county, said : "Why did we not have an historical society long ago when the men and women who made local history were living to tell about it ???
Continuing his lament, the aforesaid citizen said: "Of course I'll help you all I can, but a generation ago the citizens of Grant county did not say so much about this Indian business down the river." Within the memory of many of the "sons of their fathers" who perpetuate old families, the recollection of the Miami Indians about the public square in Marion is as but yesterday. The trail was along the Wabash pike into Marion, and near the old Horton homestead-the old log house, a twentieth century memory along Spencer avenne -- the Miamis used to reconnoitre, then ride to the corner of Boots and Franklin, now Fourth streets, then, "Indian fashion," directly east to the alley on the south side of the square, leave their ponies inside of the MeClure barn lot always enclosed as a stockade, and by rear entrance visit the MeClure store, where the Indian tongue was spoken fluently, and older citizens remember seeing papooses strapped to boards along the walls while the squaw bartered for goods or roamed about the town.
The intelligent citizen on the threshold of this second century of local human endeavor enjoys both retrospeet and prospect ; and veca- sionally leaving the beaten highway of modern progress and reading the sign boards now in the distant past-turning aside into the unfrequent byways of wilderness reminiscences, in order to refresh the pure mind by way of remembrance, is wholesome practice. With the advance in agriculture and improved livestock, the son of the soil is apt to forget the landmarks-the primitive American dwelling, and the "elmpecker" variety of swine that "could climb a sapling and drink out of a jug," and when the heads of families today were children they all had break- fast, dinner and supper with the measured regularity of the old Seth Thomas clock on the mantel piece. While three meals are still in vogue in well regulated households, and bread, butter and meat still constitute the daily menu, the order of service is changed and twentieth century style is hunch and six o'clock dinner, and other similar changes have heen woven into the social fabrie of the community.
Indeed, there has been a revolution of conditions within the memory of many not yet grown old -- the amals of any comunity record rapid changes, and while not much brown sugar is used on family dinner tables now, the fathers and mothers have not forgotten when it was a luxury. While army overcoats are seldom seen in the twentieth century, time was when all dressed in homespun and before every fireside sat the shoe- maker of the family. The mothers and daughters manufactured the cloth used in the family, and within the memory of many present day shoppers the Marion stores did not handle ready-to-wear garments. Until recent date furnaces and bath rooms had not entered the imagina- tion of many who now regard them as essential to human happiness and comfort, and the change from the tallow dip to present day lighting systems in vogne in many households has been a gigantic stride. There is no longer need of the lighted lantern as a young man escorts a young
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HISTORY OF GRANT COUNTY
woman through the lighted streets of the town, as was the practice of the preceding generation. The corduroy road traversed by the ox team of fifty years ago has been hall forgotten while speeding along antomo- bile thoroughfares, and there is no gainsaying the fact that civilization has kept pace in all of its manifold departments.
The school boy of today has little conception of the life of the pioneers, the well dressed man of affairs no longer reflecting the handiwork of the housewife- tailor-made applying to both men and women's attire. Several years ago Stewart in Jonesboro began catering to masculine requirements and his patronage always reached Marion society the Best tailor in the county. One by one the moorings of the past has been removed until Young America has forgotten them. At the annual meet- ings of the Grant County Octogenarian Club -- the gatherings of men and women who helped make local history, the veil is drawn and younger generations are given glimpses of the long ago. Said an English visitor at one of the meetings: "It has been three hundred years since a pioneer has been seen in England, " and those who held government land grants in Grant county have all been "gathered to their fathers." America is fast taking its place among the older nations-local pioneers rapidly going the way of all the world, and so much unwritten history is being buried with them. They have no "continuing city, " and many look into the future with gladness, although this has been a goodly world to them.
In commenting on the subject, one gentleman who came into Grant county in 1813-came with his clothes on, and has since been actively connected with much of its material advancement, said: "Those who had to do with the settlement of the county did not linger until they heard the telephone bell or saw the electric cars. Men who really made Grant county never saw a steam engine on a railroad track. Men who died only a score of years ago did not dream of some of the realization of present day civilization," and it is a personal regret in many hearts that some of those pioneers did not leave memoirs behind them. They were men of deeds rather than words, and the blossoming rose is a silent tribute to them. They overcame the forest, and the cultivated farm and the populated city is their testimonial. From savagery to civilization is an interesting chapter but most of it will always remain unwritten, although A. D. 1913 seems an opportune time to gather up the broken threads and weave them into continuous narrative, the men and women of the past being the comeeting link with the living present.
While there is detinite record of the life of Adam, the early settler of Grant county left many things open to conjecture. It is a noticeable fact that all of the original land entries were contiguous to the Missis- sinewa river, and there are fresh water springs-living water in many of the hills. Settlements in several localities were almost simultaneous, and there were trails blazed in many directions, the pioneer families carly learning to know each other. The controversy about the location of the seat of government is described by two historians, Center and Mill, and many citizens understand that after honoring the presidents of the United States in chronological order in naming the streets of Marion, the east and west streets then bearing names of well known characters, Boots and Branson perpetuated their own memories by naming streets for them- selves, and today it is said that a letter written anywhere in the world, bearing a Boots or Branson street address would find its way to Marion, those street names not being duplicated, and the history leading up to that time is full of interest.
The base line of Indiana from which point all township measurements begin, and the principal meridian from which all range measurements start, intersect in Orange county, and here is town 1 and range 1 both east
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HISTORY OF GRANT COUNTY
and west, and north and south, from the point of intersection. Reference to the Indiana map will satisfy any who care to investigate it. All townships in Indiana that are in strict conformity with this point of beginning are congressional- six miles square, while other townships are civil and their dimensions regulated by local conditions. The study of the county by townships shows an interesting evolution of names, and the carly records show some names not now included in the list of a baker's dozen -- thirteen townships, according to present surveys. Grant was originally separated from Delaware county. and at the time of its organization the attached portion on the north was called Wabash, and Pleasant and Union townships were the whole county.
The Reserve Boundary crossing Pleasant. Franklin and Liberty town- ships divided the old and the new part of Grant county from the time it was organized in 1831 until in 1847, when the territory west of it came onto the market at two dollars an acre, and now -A. D. 1912, there are farms lying west of the boundary rated at one hundred times the govern- ment value placed upon them. Prior to 1810 the Indians had a claim on 930,000 acres of land lying west of Reserve Boundary. but when the gen- eral government paid them $550,000 they relinquished all claims and seven years later it was open for settlement. Compared with the topography of some of the neighboring counties the townships in Grant are arranged with checker board regularity. There is but one irregularity in the survey, and that is occasioned by the Reserve Boundary, which begins at the Wabash river, crosses the county as aforesaid and in Boone township, Madison county, defleets to the west across Tipton and to the state line. While the Reserve Boundary separates the old and the new parts of Grant county, the western land came into the market before the present generation was buying farms, and nothing is often heard of it. men and women frequently crossing it who do not know of its existence.
The Reserve Boundary does not cross the county in a straight line, but in gles west of south and the only explanation offered is that it gave the white man an opportunity to steal from the Indian. The farmis along one side ruu long, and along the other side of this boundary run short, and many land owners have never reasoned it out-simply know it to be a fact. Ten sections of land were still reserved for Meshingomesia, the last Miami chieftain, and the Indian Village God's Nere where his body reposes is part of that second reservation. When James E. Brock of Battle Ground farm was graduated with his class at Mount Olive in Pleasant, he delivered an original oration that tells the story, and is here- with reproduced :
"Almost one Indred years ago there was situated in a small ravine between the Mississinewa river and where the old town of Jalapa now stands, a cluster of Indian buts and wigwams. This place has come down to us through legion and tradition and is known as the Indian Village. The site of this village was later transferred to the east side of the river. It is here where authentic history begins. Here one lone desolate cabin now remains. It is opposite this cabin where the Indian Village school of Pleasant township now stands. Back of the school stands the Indian Baptist church and the cemetery. It is here where past generations of the Red Men lie mouldering beneath the silent sod. It is where the renmant of the Miamis meet in the old church to worship the Great Spirit. Here is a Mecca for each departing spirit to the happy Imting grounds. It is here where once roamed free as the air the tribes of Me-sin-gha-me-ha. The history of this tribe is never replete without reference to this village and the battle that took place nearby, the Indians led by the followers of Seennsha, the whites by Colonel JJohn B. Camp- bell. The battle was fought opposite the site of Coner's mill in 1812.
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"The Indians were defeated and many were taken prisoners, the vil lage was destroyed and they were compelled to sue for peace, which has since been faithfully kept. But few if any signs of that event now remain. A few of the Indians afterward went beyond the Mississippi, while those that remained settled on the respective estates assigned to them, and many became active and wealthy citizens, but of late years. adversity of some cause of other, has driven many of these simple but kind hearted people to an undesirable fate. The mortality of the tribe seems to tend to extinction in a few years. Back to the scenes of our village, where once the woodbine twineth and the mighty oak and its kindred were truly the 'forest primeval,' here dwelt the Red Man. His greatest love was for his bow and arrow. The squaw, his wife, did all the work. She tilled the soil and built the wigwam, while the children played in the forest. The Indian took special pride in the village of his tribe. The hits were rude in construction and established along the trail. But this is all changed now. The forest primeval' is now blooming fields of grass and grain, while the old trail has given place to the improved country highways. The village also in changed. Instead of being a village of buts and wigwams it is a village of silent graves and o'er these silent graves roam the children of the white man."
It was the musnal thing for a township graduate to deliver an original production, and when the county historian was making a Santa Claus tour at the 1912 ynletide advertising for the Boston store, he found Miss Clara Mellwayne teaching the Indian Village school where only a few years before young Broek had graduated, and where the children could visit the grave of Meshingomesia, or from their play ground look across and see his old home on the Stuber T'arm and the battle field along the Mississinewa-and yet those children did not know more about the beginning of things in that locality a century gone by than school children everywhere-school text books were silent. At the Indian vil lage as in all other country schools, Santa Claus left meagre data on the black board that will be remembered by the rising generation-the boys and girls who were school children one hundred years after the Battle of the Mississinewa.
After rapidly rehearsing the Christmas story, Santa Clans taught local history most effectively, saying: "The winter of 1812 was much colder than 1912 has been, and there was suffering among the soldiers who were engaged in battle in the wilderness so near the spot we now call our homes. where we are so comfortable and happy. One hundred years ago there was no local civilization no homes, no schools, no churches. and there were no enltivated farms, but all was one vast wilder- ness. There were no white families at all, and only Indians roamed the forests," and with rapt attention the half frightened children listened to the details to be given later about the Battle of Mississinewa. The apparition before them was in the guise of Santa Claus, but the hieroglyphics left on the blackboard were of historie vale to them, and one little girl wrote in her Santa Claus letter: "I was seared so bad when you came that ! 'pernear fell out of my seat," and whether or not it was effective advertising, the men and women of the future will remember more of detail about the battle a century before that time than their parents could have told them. and the century milestone at hand, the recital in some of the schools beginning ; "One hundred years ago today." It was seed sown on excellent soil- the pure mind of a child.
What 1816 means to Indiana, 1831 means to Grant county. John Fiske truthfully said: "On the earth there will never be a higher creature than man," and some of the stalwart characters were early identified with local history. The patent medicine advertisements used
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HISTORY OF GRANT COUNTY
to read : Imagine a wilderness infested by dangerous wild animals -- swamps reeking with malaria and the deadly black fever, mosquitoes by the countless billions to harass you day and night, every foot of your road hiding death in some form. from the poisonous insect to the deadly serpent-these are the conditions encountered by the settler, and yet with all his advantages the twentieth century descendant of the pioneer must take his chances with railway disasters, ocean horrors, automobile catastrophes and aeroplane casualties, in this land of opportunity wrested Trom savagery by such a splendid ancestry.
The memory of "the oldest inhabitant" is always taxed with a great many things, but the records show that John Smith and Mary Ann Thomas, who were married September 8, 1831, were the first couple assuming marital obligations in Grant county, only one month after its organization. Cupid had been busy, however, and several weddings had occurred while the bridegroom must visit Muncie to procure the necessary license. While the Malott and Adamson families have claimed the first births in the territory now known as Grant county, and while the late Moses Adamson, who was born November 6, 1829, was introduced at Old Folks' meetings as the oldest living native for a few years, the whole story was changed when Mrs. Martha Renbarger Wilson of Monroe enrolled as an Octogenarian. The 1877 . Atlas says: "On July 17 1827. a son, Robert, was born to Reason and Sarah Malott," and "On July 14. 1828, a son, Samuel, was born to David and Dinah Adamson." but Mrs. Wilson's record was: "On June 24. 1827. a daughter, Martha. was born to llemy and Elizabeth Hatfield Renbarger." three weeks and two days earlier than the birth in the Matott family. The Ron bargers came by raft rather by a dug-out log down h. Mi. sissine wa. locating below the present site of Marion in the vreunty of 1 .. Country Club, and whenever there are visiting relatives at the Renbaigne family reunions, they are taken to the Renbarger graves down the river. There are a few Marion citizens who remember when only the Ren bargers and Connors lived below town along the Mississinewa.
Mrs. Wilson always came to the meetings of the Octogenarian Club. and she and her brother, Charles Renbarger, who was the baby when the Renbarger family came to the county a few months before she was born, were frequently there together Both died in 1912. and bone will dispute Mrs. Wilson's claim to being the first child born of white parents, and in the Octogenarian museum in Matter park is the knife box made for her when she was "Martha Renbarger," by a man to whom she carried water. She took it there herself, and in the Mem- ory Row is a red velvet rose from her old homestead in Monroe. While she lived she never missed Old Folk's Day. Her death occurred November 7, 1912, she having spent eighty-five years, four months and thirteen days in the county, having been born four years before it way organized, and when she was asked to contribute to the fund from which the log cabin in Matter park was built, she said: "I give $1 in the name of James M. Wilson, and I am glad to do it."
The book maker's art has made great advancement since the pro- ecedings of the first commissioners court-the beginning of things in Grant county, became a matter of record, and the original volume did not come from the Royeroffers. Those interested in enrios should ask to see it in the office of the county auditor. It is withont index and contains twenty-four pages. It looks like an old time copy book, and bears the imprint, August 5. 1831. from which time the organization of Grant county is properly counted. At this meeting the county was divided into three districts, and the commissioners were Jeremiah Sut ton. Reason Malott and David Adamson, and the same arrangement exists when this Centennial record is made except the names Oscar M
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HISTORY OF GRANT COUNTY
Brumfiel, Isaiah Wall and Thomas J. Lucas. The division of the county into districts seems to be all that was accomplished at the first session of commissioner's court more than four score years ago. On the second day Nathan Branson was appointed county agent, and Wabash terri- tory was eut off from its jurisdiction. The townships of Pleasant, Center and Union then conformed to the commissioner's districts.
There were many quaint entries in the proceedings of this carly court, for instance a five-dollar tavern license was levied in the county and for a few years the county commissioners have not even granted license to saloons. The county seat taverns, and the Robert MeCormick and Black Horse taverns along the Mississinewa where business would allow of it, were assessed $7 as an annual license fee. It was also ordered that a book be procured from the bindery in Indianapolis in which to keep the records of the court, and within the covers of this ponderous volmune is where the band-made original reposes. Charles W. Ewing, who assisted the commissioners as a special representative of the state, was paid $2 for recording the proceedings of the com- missioners, and there is little doubi of the fact that he made this unique little volume now so carefully preserved in the archives of the county. Citizens of all the towns know what it means to subscribe bonus money, and it is related that the early settlers had to put up a cash subsidy to locate the seat of justice where it is today.
Eli Thomas of the Octogenarian Club relates that his father, Jesse Thomas, who had land on the north side of the river, sold a yoke of oxen for $40, donating the amount to the commission to secure the location of the county seat on the Boots-Branson tract, and when in 1836 Jonesboro was laid out it was a rival for county honors until after Marion subscribed $5,000 to the building of the Strawtown road. now the Marion and Liberty pike, which opened up southwestern Grant county to Marion, effectually stopping the controversy. Mr. Ewing. of Cass county, and William Edwards and William Hunt, of Randolph county, who composed the commission appointed by the state to organ ize the county, were to be paid out of the first funds accumulating in the treasury. Mr. Ewing receiving in all $Is while the others cach received #27, and there is no record showing how much time was de- voted to the matter. The historian of Center deals with the Boots- Branson land donation in another article, and to avoid repetition its de- tails are omitted in this connection.
The Branson family burial ground was along the river bank near their home, and because the spot was unmarked and had become a commons with no reference to its original purpose, Nathan Coggeshall, Lewis Foster and David Overman, all of them one time enterprising citizens of Marion, met and drafted a petition to which they secured a great many signatures, asking the county commissioners to protect the spot from the encroachments of the public by erecting a marker and enclosing the same with an iron fence. These men had all known the Branson family in life and did not wish to see them forgotten in death. The sum of $200 was expended in that way. The action of the water has changed the channel of the river at this point, and some are of the opinion that the Branson graves have been washed away, but the marker is near the site.
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