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 69
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as the ereeks, but the twentieth century child has no such heritage in his storehouse of recollections.
The story of the writer's childhood of an old brood sow that learned to crawl through the hollow log that led from the woods pasture into the corn field seems incredible, and yet it is written down as a truism- an oft-repeated story. This old elmpeeler was tired of a beechnuts diet and she wanted something different-brood sows always like a variety. Day after day this old mother swine was turned from the corn field into the woods until her secret was discovered, and the hollow log was removed from the fence, and then paterfamilia watched her tactics until she found she had been outwitted and gave up the effort. She crawled through the log two or three times and found herself on the same side of the fence, and went off to root up something more appetizing in the woods. When she found out that her pilgrimage through the tunnel in the shape of the hollow log did not take her where she wanted to go, she accepted the situation with more or less philosophy, and who will say the brood sow did not reason-that she only had intuition? When the neighbors were in for a frolic this hollow Jog found its way into the heap, and fire was the agency that removed it. One day James Seott and Robert Howell were among others who handled the spike in carrying logs, and the writer's father. D. M. V. Whitson, was carrying against one of them and the log was all they could walk with. It was planned that Mr. Scott rest his end of the handspike on a stump and get out of the way so that the log could be thrown on the fire. When asked the distance. he answered: "About a l'eet." Because he used the plural instead of the singular form of the word the risibles of all the men were stirred, and the result was they dropped the log just when they were ready to deposit it in the flames. There was no jag in the clearing, but the men had been drinking from the mouth of a wooden diteh that day, and hilarity was rampant among them. After Robert Howell, always a homespun philosopher, bad explained how all of them escaped injury from the falling log, saying the eye had seen the danger and telegraphed the brain and in turn a message had been transmitted to the feet and the nerves and muscles had performed their offices satisfactorily, they again lifted the log and placed it on the fire. Later, when one youngster studied the nervous system in a common school physiology he rement- bered Robert Howell's explanation of the reflex action. and better under- stood the whole proposition. While Mr. Howell never studied in a university he had been an apt pupil in nature's school, and it was a timely lesson to others.
It was in 1873 that Irvin Whitson, who was then a live year old child on Deer creek in Liberty, wanted to be helpful, and he was sent with the jug to take water to the men in the field. There was a long lane leading from the barn and at that time there was no gate into this particular field, the fence always being let down for the horses. 11 this climbing over place was where the child met with misfortune. He was happy in his errand of bringing liquid coolness, and with tongue out of his mouth refused the proffered help of an older brother, but in putting his leg over the top rail he lost his equilibrium and striking the jug against a rail, it broke, leaving the corn cob stopper in the mouth, and the handle suspended by a string in the child's hand, but nothing daunted he went on and explained that the jug broke all but the hole, which he exhibited, and it was always a companion story to the one told about Lawrence Jay, when his mother first dried apples whole, with the cores removed, and he asked for "hole with apple all around it." In- novent childhood always furnishes amusing incidents.
The difficulties of an immigrant who does not understand the lan-
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guage is well illustrated in the case of Christopher Fisherbuck, who came From Germany the year after the Pennsylvania Railway was built into Grant county. He was expected by his brother, Frederick Fisherbuck, and his sister, Mrs. Amelia Ballenger, and they had watched the arrival of all trains at Upland to welcome him, but he had made the mistake of lav- ing the train at Hartford City, with eleven miles between him and the homes of his relatives in Grant county. While he could not speak a word of English, he found ont his mistake and walked along the track, and at nightfall, having despaired of reaching his friends, he crawled under Jefferson church and spent the hours of darkness rather than make further inquiry of strangers. Jefferson church had been built on land owned by his brother, while his sister lived near, and he had seen the light from the fallow dip left burning in the window. When the half starved immigrant emerged from his hiding next morning, Frederick Fisherbuck was astir and the brothers were soon together. While all the neighbors had been instructed that if they saw a German along the road where they were to send him, the shelter of a church was not a very warm reception, but years afterward it was a Family romance toid with pleasure after all the hardship had been forgotten. The map frequently worshiped in the church that first sheltered him, and for many years regular German preaching service was conducted there, and funeral services in German still occur there.
Mrs. Mary Wade, of the Octogenarian Club, recalls that when her husband, Henry Wade, was a Marion druggist and she lived above the drugstore on the north side of the public square, he used Philadelphia paving brick in front of his store and cobblestone for the gutter. A sidewalk was an innovation in the early fifties-they had located there in 1849-and like Mrs. Samuel Met Ture, who always lived on the public square and liked it because it was so "businessy," Mrs. Wade enjoyed down town living and it was a distinction to have the first pavement in the town. There always has been and always will be opposition to progress, and when it rained John M. Tinney, who was a Marion tailor and a business neighbor to Mr. Wade across the alley east From him. hired an Irishman to throw the cobblestones in front of the Wade drug- store into the street because water stood in front of his place as a result. A great crowd was attracted, Int instead of restraining him by violence, Mr. Wade visited the law office of Thompson and Steele determined to enter suit for damages, and to compel the tailor to replace his gutter. It was a new idea in the village and people must get used to changed conditions gradually. Aron Swayzee, Eugene Norton and James Sweet- ser, who were Mr. Wade's Iisiness contemporaries, were in sympathy with him and yet they visited the law office and prevailed upon him not to enter suit, but to quietly rebuild the gutter and they would see to it that it was not again destroyed. Mr. Wade returned to his home, donned straw hat, overalls and bnekskin mittens and with his own hands replaced the cobblestones, and with even a larger crowd watching him than had seen his neighbor destroy it. About the same time, feeling the need of fire protection, Mr. Wade circulated a subscription paper among Marion business men and seeured enough money to buy the first hook and ladder outfit ever used in the town, and to build a fire house on the rear of the lot now occupied by the Goldthait store.
There was no bank in Marion until in the sixties, and there was little need of one, as the settlers had little money, even paying their taxes with skins of wild animals, for which a bounty was offered by the gov- ernment, and as late as A. D. 1913 County Anditor E. H. Kimball paid bounty money in the Grant county court house -- a lad claiming reward and receiving ten cents in payment as bounty money, although no such
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account was reopened with the county. It is said that David Connor, who was an Indian trader in trading post days, always had money deposited with the county treasurer, and instructed him to buy skins from settlers in lieu of taxes and charge the amount to his account, and when a settler did have a balance on hand he always left it with some Mlarion business man, never receiving the serateh of a pen to show he had such a deposit. Eli Thomas relates that he onee sold a bunch of hogs and, not having immediate use for the money, he wrapped it in a paper and left it with Samuel MeClure, and three weeks later Mr. MeClure re- turned the package intaet-his safe having been Mr. Thomas' safety deposit vault, without a line to show that he had left money there. George Needler, of defferson, relates that his father, James Needler, had escaped taxation for ten years, and when taxes were finally levied against him, the son visited the treasurer with two coon skins and $2 in currency, and although one of the skins was smaller than the other he was credited with a dollar apiece for them, Comer's money being on deposit at the time. There is a different system in the court house HOW.
When Mes. Philadelphia A. Hall first lived on Josina creek in the Indian land she was afraid the Miamis would steal her black-eyed son, Frank Il. Hall, and her little daughter, now Mrs. W. C. Webster, and she removed to Logansport, where J. J. Hall was born. After several years, when she felt less fear of the Indians, she returned to Josina ereck, and the children went to the Indian village school along with the young Miamis. When her children were small, Mrs. Hall always nad bright colored beads and pieces of eloth to give to the Indians in an effort to please them so they would not steal her children from her, but she was always uneasy about them.
When they were children they were familiar with Meshingomesia, sitting in front of his cabin with two sqnaws and always a number of dogs around him. They went fishing with the young Indians later, and the country was not so wild as when their mother was afraid for them. After J. J. Hall was a married man he was driving one Sunday with his wife, when he re- marked that they were meeting three squaws. She asked how he knew they were Indians, and he said they walked Indian fashion-one behind another- and when they were face to face he recognized one and spoke to her in the Miami tongue, which he had learned in childhood. The squaw he addressed was of the Winters family, and while he knew the years had changed his own face, he had not seen the woman since they were children, and he thought he was speaking to the mother, when it proved to be the daughter-the girl he had known. While he had greeted her in the Indian tongue, not expecting a reply in English, she exclaimed : "Gee whiz! That you?" and thus were the tongues re- versed when they recognized each other.
While people still cheat in their dealings one with another, the methods have changed -- perhaps scientific trickery now, and customers still beat business men, while the twentieth century business man tinds it to his advantage to be alert. The writer's paternal grandmother one time went into a store with a pillowslip full of feathers packed so tight that the dealer suspected heavier substance than feathers. When he offered to buy the feathers only at a quoted price, she required him to empty the pillow case in her presence, and he admitted he thought she was selling him a stone at the price of feathers. The following is a recent Marion newspaper elipping :
"A certain man in this town tells a story of his experiences when a grocer a quarter of a century ago. Being in the business of course he bonghit produce of various sorts, including butter of as many different Vol. 1-31
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brands and conditions as there were butter-makers. He found butter with too much or not enough salt in it, butter with too many hairs in it, butter with too many insects in it, butter with too much of various things in it, and he had come to expect almost anything in the way of a variation from the standard he had in mind. One day when he at- tempted to divide for a customer a quantity that he had just bought the knife struck an obstacle. There was a hump of butter a little bit the toughest that he had ever come in contact with. Ile investigated and found a stone weighing just half a pound. How that stone got into that butter of course he could not know, but there it was. When the woman from whom he bought that butter came into the store to make a purchase some time afterwards he put that same stone in the seales before her eyes, weighed it in with the purchase, charged for it-and got his pay without a word. This was an exceptional case, of course, and there are transactions that in principle are not far removed from it, but they are not so numerous as they once were."
Grant county farmers in institute assembled have frequently been regaled with stories of unscrupulous stock dealers who manage to Water the animals before weighing them, and the knowing glances aiways indicate that persons in the audience know parallel stories. When the historian was a child they used to talk about the mud aconnudating on a hog's tail when it was driven to the scales- that long ago people did not haul fat hogs to market. The writer has seen boys practice making such mod balls because the mud was weighed with the hog, and it was all a joke at the time. A man who prided himself on never buying "watered" stock helped drive a bunch of calves from the pasture, thinking he was safe in paying the price, as it was a bright morning and they had not been given water. Unfortunately he did not know the location of a cement water tank tilled from a wind pump, and when the farmer invited him to note the adjustment of the farm scales th . calves were behind the barn consuming several gallons of water. . At so much a pound as they were driven immediately on the scales, and later he saw how much the water line was lowered in the tank. A little salt scattered the day before farm animals are to be marketed usually brings a better price in the end than the farmer paid for it by the barrel. While the ealves in question may have been salted, the buyer knew they had been watered, and that he had water cheaper at home than he paid for it.
Edwin Caldwell, the well known publie accountant, tells of the cap- ture of a wolf in Liberty in November, 1858, at a point in the woods now marked by the Wells school house. While he was only a child he remembers that his father and other farmers were greatly annoyed by the wolves taking their poultry, pigs, lambs and sometimes a call would be killed by them. Train Caldwell, Joshua Freeman and R. J. Gannit were neighboring settlers, and at the instance of Mr. Freeman, who had been a great trapper always, they made up a purse and sent to Fort Wayne for a wolf trap Mr. Freeman knew about, thinking they would rid the community of wolves and save their domestic animals from them. As a sidelight to this story by Mr. Caklwell, the historian re- members another of almost the same locality as related by Mrs. C'atha- rine Fite at the time her husband, Stephen D. Fite, was superintending the building of The Octogenarian-the log cabin in Matter Park. Th ir first Indian abode was at Independence, not far from the site of this wolf hunt in 1858, and moving into the cabin before it was daubed, Mrs. Fite would not lie next to the eraeks in the logs where the wolves would come up and look in at them, but she slept in front on the rude bed he had constructed on the wall, a facsimile of which he later constructed in
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The Octogenarian. At the time all the settlers were annoyed by the hungry wolves in packs in the woods. A woll' was vieions when driven by hunger, and the settlers made constant war on them.
When the wolf trap finally came it had a long chain with several hooks on the end, similar to the Griffin wolf trap now on exhibit at the Octogenarian Museum, and the hooks were designed to entangle the wolf when attempting to escape with the trap fastened to it. I'nder. standing the requirements in order to trap a wolf, Mr. Freeman placed the monster trap by the carcass of a sheep the wolves had already killed, knowing they would come again. That night all the settlers who knew about it were alert for any noise in the woods. Mr. Caldwell remembers sleeping in the trundle bed, and asking his father to awaken him when there was a wolf, but two or there nights went by before the pack re- turned-wolves were always cautious. The settlers had scoured the woods with torches, guns and dogs in an effort to frighten them and sometimes they would not be seen for several days at a time. One night his father heard the howl of a wolf-thought it must be the leader of the pack from the noisy demonstration -- and the neighbors soon joined him in the woods, where about the largest wolf they had ever seen way struggling with the trap that had caught by a hook to a sapling. It was a strong trap, with teeth in the jaws, and thinking the wolf would not regain his freedom, they all went home to breakfast. While the tele- phone bell was not heard in that community until forty years later, the news of the wolf in a trap spread with surprising rapidity, and that day the settlers from far and near visited the wild animal in captivity.
The wolf was large and such a vicious Fellow there was no chance of caging him, and removing the trap, which was seenrely fastened to one of his legs, and thinking he might gnaw off his foot, they were afraid to leave him another night, and Mr. Caldwell remembers the steady aim of his father who had carried a gun to the woods, and the bullet ended the life of the captive. Its howling all day long had com pletely frightened the pack out of the community, and wolves were never seen there again. While he was only a child, Mr. Caldwell re- members the incident as if it had been but yesterday, but the Twentieth century child will think of it as an impossibility in this civilized com- munity. Wild animals in town -- why, T. W. Overman remembers the story as told by his father, David Overman, that one time he had accom- panied his father, Jolm A. Overman, to town, and there was a wolf in a trap back of George White's store, where the barrimer photograph gallery is located, on Fourth street. The wolf trap was built of rails, drawn in at the top, and the carcass of a sheep had been used to entice the wolf to the spot so near human haunts. The boy saw the hunter pinion the ani- mal's head in such a way that he reached in with a knife and em its throat-a savage beast at his merey.
Asher J. Bond, of Marion, recalls that when he was a little boy and before the Civil war, he was on a visit at the home of his grandfather, Moses Bond, in Washington, and that his grandmother was afraid the Indians would steal him. While there his father, Joseph Bond, R. T. St. John and William Brandon were getting ready to go turkey hunting in the woods, and after their bullets were molded and all was in readi- ness, his grandmother reminded Mr. Brandon, whose pipe was in his mouth, that he had better light it from the hearth coals-everybody had undying embers on the cabin hearth that long ago. He, however, struck a match, saying he was no longer dependent upon live coals on the hearth, and it was something novel to the curious boy. The man had a cluster of matches not split quite across, and there was brimstone on
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one end of them. When he lighted one to show them, it did not flash like the modern brimstone match, but it was better than a coal of fire or than striking two flints together to seenre a light. There was a six foot fire place, and there were splinters on the mantel, but Mr. Brandon was proof against them-he had matches. That long ago it was a case of borrow lire if the embers died out on the hearth, and today matches are in frequent requisition-could not get along without them.
While writing reminiscences recently, il. 1. Story- why reveal a man's secret who writes under a nom de plume-went back to the time when the Pan Handle Railroad was built to Jonesboro in 1868, and after recalling that Thatt Brothers and Gideon Eviston used to drive the omnibus to all trains, he adds :
"It was always an interesting story to tell about the coming of this first railroad. Cyrus Pemberton, living on what is now West Fifth street, had a particularly interesting story to tell, which ran something like as follows :
"The railroad had been constructed to the town, the rails had been laid and spiked, but as yet no engine had ventured upon them. That day a show- a menagerie-had visited the town and the people turned out to see the elephants and lions and tigers, ote. After the show was over all turned into bed and the town was wrapped in slumber. Sud- denly all were roused by unearthy shrieks and sounds. Pemberton sprang from bed, donned his clothes, and by that time had formed a clear judgment from circumstantial evidence that lions and tigers had broken loose from the menagerie. He grabbed his gun and went forth as a brave man, which he was, to bring down the wild game of the jungle. Before he had treed game the terrible sounds again broke forth and the roar was different from what he supposed those beasts could produce. lle pressed his way toward the source of the noise and heard them snorting and hissing and even lighting the dark clouds with lurid flame. Un- daunted, he still pushed forward till he came to a monster, and behold, it was the first engine that had come over the new railroad in the dead of night, and given its shrill whistle to announce to the citizens that the iron horse had arrived.
"When Walker Winslow, of stage coach fame, used to get $4 from each passenger from Marion to Anderson-it was before the advent of the railroad train, price was never the question -- it was whether or not the passenger could be accommodated. Ile had three rockaway pattern coaches, and he made three round trips a week, receiving $300 a year from the government for carrying the mail. The writer remembers see- ing the stage go through Jonesboro, four horses in a brisk trot and it was communication with the world beyond -- brought tidings from afar. Mr. Winslow operated the stage under heavy expenses-required sixteen hvad of horses, stage teams-and when he needed funds for operating he borrowed $500 from Jason Willson, with Adam Wolfe as his security, Mr. Wolfe being interested in quick communication with the outside world and having business interests in Marion, then thirty miles from a railroad. Some of Walker Winslow's old patrons by stage from Marion to Anderson were spared until Noah Clodfelter's dreams were realized- interurban electric transportation-and among his frequent passengers were Mrs. Mary Cary Dodds and Mrs. Queen Butler Spencer, who would ride beside him and sing while crossing the country. JJudge JJohn Brownlee frequently engaged passage with him, then walked where the roads were worst with never a word of complaint about it, and what. seems one of the eternal mysteries-early road builders made plank roads right over gravel banks-had not yet learned to utilize gravel as road material, and while plank roads were not wide enough for teams to pass
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on them-the stage did not often have to give part of the road -- no one else was traveling 'in them days.' "
Quoting again from 11. 1. Story :
" A backward look over four decades gives a view of the rapid changes of time. Forty two years ago the writer came to Jonesboro- a lad four- teen years old. The town of that day is very unlike the town of the present. That generation is gone. Occasionally an old resident can be found, but the number of strangers outnumbers them.
"John R. Kirkwood was postmaster forty years ago, having succeeded Elias Coleman. The postoffice was not far from its present location, though it has occupied various places since. Mail was delivered by omnibus from the Panhandle railroad at Harrisburg now Gas City and by stage from Muncie and from Anderson. The last named was delivered by H. Walker Winslow, of Fairmount, from before the Civil war till the building of the C. W. & M. Railroad. Residents of both town and country knew well the time mails were due to arrive and gathered at the postoffice to be present when the mail 'was opened.' The postmaster valled aloud the name of the person addressed on each letter or paper, who, if he were in the crowd, would call out ' Here, and the letter or paper would be passed in the direction of his voice, till it came into the hands of the person to whom it was addressed. Such mail as was not then delivered because of the absence of the addressee was placed on file in alphabetical order till called for. At one town of this time the writer distinctly remembers that the postmaster used the living room for him self and wife as the postoffice into which the publie would come; the mail pouch was emptied upon the dining table and the mail handed to such as were present, and the remainder was laid upon the bed to await call. And as this was a town of about eight hundred population the little dwelling thus used as a postoffice was much crowded at mail time."
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