USA > Indiana > Cass County > History of Cass County, Indiana, from its earliest settlement to the present time; with Biographical Sketches and Reference to Biographies, Volume I > Part 74
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Soldiers : David Conn, Company K, 99th Indiana, d. 1863; John Conn, 73rd Indiana, d. 1892; John Jamison, Company B, 46th Indiana, d. 1862; Thomas Jamison, Company B, 46th Indiana, d. 1901; Daniel W. Callahan, Company E, 29th Indiana, d. 1862; Thomas Brown, d. 1887; Robert Murray, War of 1812, d. 1872; Samuel McConnell, War of 1812, removed to Mt. Hope; James McGaughey, Company E, 20th Indiana, d. 1862; James Black, Company B, 46th Indiana, d. 1863; John Mehaffie, Company F, 73rd Indiana, d. 1863; Wm. E. Rogers, 85th Indiana, d. 1863; Thos. Hollenback, Company E, 156th Illinois, d. 1875; . Christian Long, d. 1882; Dr. Barzilla Gray, surgeon 4th Ohio, d. 1882; Samuel Dodds, Company B, 128th Indiana; Alex Work, Company I, 2nd Ohio; James McCauley, Company E, 20th Indiana, d. 1862.
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CONCORD CEMETERY
This is a small burial ground in the church yard of the Concord Presbyterian church, and well located, but few interments have been made here, and we are informed none for the past twenty years. The older cemeteries being used because the families in this section first interred their dead in them, and family ties attract the present genera- tion to the burial grounds of their progenitors. On March 26, 1844, Samuel Wilson conveyed the ground to trustees of the church, and the deed acknowledged before William Mitchell, J. P. A church was erected soon after. The first burials: Mary Kerns, March 24, 1847; Dennie M. Pinkerton, 1849; Daniel Pinkerton, 1850. Probably not a dozen other graves are located here.
INDIAN CREEK CHRISTIAN CHURCH CEMETERY
This is a neat little churchyard and burial ground, situated in one corner of the cross roads with a few good monuments. The church owns and controls the grounds (for data see church history).
First burials : Mrs. Irvin, 1857, in unmarked grave. The earliest in- scriptions on markers which were probably removals, are: Joseph St. Clair, April 10, 1840; Edmon Cast, 1860. The only soldier at this time (1907) is Robert Backus, Company A, 3rd New York Cavalry.
UNIVERSALIST CEMETERY
This abandoned, neglected and almost forgotten burial ground is situated in the corner of a field not fenced but uncultivated. It lies in the northeast quarter of section 14, Harrison township, about a mile northwest of Leases Corners. The ground, 4x6 rods, was deeded by Wm. M. Little to the Universalist Society of Harrison township in 1857, and in 1867 Charles Troutman, in deeding the adjoining farm to Rich- ard Winn, excepts this burial ground, and the title so far as we have searched records, still remains in the name of the society. A church was
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erected here, but has long since been removed, and nothing remains to mark the place except three or four sunken graves and as many broken marble slabs lying near by. Upon one an inscription : "- Hendrick- son, died 1859, aged twenty-five years." The other stones are so broken the letters cannot be read.
There were about a half dozen interments made here from 1857 to 1867, but in a few years more they will likely be farmed over and for- gotten unless this record may keep this once hallowed place before the eyes of a curious few who may peruse its pages.
The dead, however, are beyond the power of man to injure or re- ward, to please or displease, and it matters not to the dead what be- comes of this mortal body, when the earthly tabernacle is dissolved and he "has put on immortality" and gone to the "house of God." A "house not made with hands eternal in the heavens," yet there is a sentiment indwelling in the breast of the lowliest, that respects the last resting place of the dead. This body is only a shell, to be sure, like a last year's bird's nest, when the spirit has gone there is orily dross that must moulder to dust, yet it is all we can see, and know, of the departed and · we hold it in sacred remembrance.
ST. ELIZABETH'S CATHOLIC CEMETERY
On January 11, 1859, John Newbraugh conveyed one acre of land in Section 27, Harrison township, to the Catholic church for burial and church purposes. A church building was erected here soon after, but it was torn down when the church was moved to Lucerne a few years ago, but the cemetery is still controlled by the congregation. This is a small burial ground to accommodate the Catholic population of the neighborhood. The first burial was Elizabeth, wife of John Newbraugh, March 18, 1859. We note the following early inscriptions: Nancy, wife of M. Landrigan, June 29, 1845; Dennis Gorman, 1856; Edward Gor- man, 1858.
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PHYSICIANS
The history of any locality is not complete without a notice of the doctors, and those who have resided within the confines of Harrison township will be mentioned here in alphabetical order:
Dr. John J. Burton, son of John Burton, a pioneer of Harrison town- ship, where the doctor was born in 1850; educated in the Logansport high school, graduated from the Cincinnati Eclectic Medical Institute, 1876; practiced in Logansport, Royal Center, where he was postmaster, and in 1889 located in Lucerne, where he is still in active practice and also keeps a drug store. He was married to Miss Mary Lumbert of Cass county in 1877. The doctor is widely and favorably known throughout the county and has materially aided the writer in compiling the history of Harrison township.
Dr. Daniel Hess Eckert was born in Ohio, 1828, attended the Cin- cinnati Eclectic Medical College, 1856, and the same year located at Leases Corners in this township, where he has since resided engaged in the practice of his chosen profession until in recent years he has been compelled to retire from active practice, owing to the infirmities of age. He was married and has two sons and one daughter. Dr. Eckert is a typical country doctor and is known to every one in Harrison township, where he has resided for half a century.
Dr. Edwards was an educated physician who came from Cincinnati, Ohio, about 1853, and located about two miles northeast of Lucerne, where he built up quite a practice. He was instrumental in the organi-
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zation and building the Universalist church in that locality. About 1860 he moved west and has been lost to our informant. He was mar- ried and raised an adopted daughter.
Dr. Brazilla Gray moved from Ohio about 1874 and located on a farm about a mile or more northeast of Lucerne, where he continued to reside until his death in 1882, aged sixty-six years. He did not engage in regular practice. He was a surgeon in the Fourth Ohio Regi- ment. He was married and had several children. His remains repose in the Indian Creek Presbyterian cemetery.
Dr. Wilson M. Heward, son of Benj. Heward, a pioneer of Tipton township, where the doctor was born in 1859, attended the public schools and Danville, Indiana, Normal School, and graduated from the Univer- sity of Louisville in 1892, and at once located in Lucerne, where he engaged in active practice for the next two years, and then moved to Grass Creek, Fulton county, where he built up a lucrative practice and held the confidence of the community until his death in 1910. In 1892 he was united in marriage to Alice E. Hammond and had two children.
Dr. Samuel E. Jones is a native of Montgomery county, Indiana, where he was born about 1872, graduated from the Indiana Medical Col- lege, 1906, and moved to Lucerne in 1910, where he has ingratiated him- self into the confidence and esteem of the community as a Christian gentleman, and has bright professional prospects. He has a family of several children.
Dr. Noah J. Larose, the first doctor to locate in the town of Lucerne, about 1885, where he continued in active practice until 1901, when he moved to Greenfield, Indiana, and in 1903 he renounced his profession and joined the Alexander Dowie host at Zion City, Illinois, where he now holds an official position in that erratic religious sect.
Dr. Larose is the son of Joshua Larose, a pioneer of Clay township, where the doctor was born in 1851, educated in the Logansport high school, Akron, Ohio, College, and the Cincinnati Eclectic Medical Col- lege, from which he graduated in 1885. His wife was Miss Rebecca Martin, to whom he was married in 1886, and they have four children. Dr. Larose was seriously injured in one leg by a reaping machine when a boy, and rendered a cripple for life, which was manifest in his limp- ing gait.
Dr. Wm. N. Townsend during the later fifties moved from Royal Center to Leases Corners, and occupied the old steep roof house just south of the corners. About 1860 he moved to Indianapolis, where he has since died. His wife was a Veal, and they had several children.
Dr. D. K. Zartman lived and practiced medicine at Jacktown, or Big Indian, Harrison township, from 1880 to 1882, when he quit the prac- tice and moved to Logansport, where he now lives, engaged in painting and paper-hanging. He is a native of Ohio, where he was born in 1859, came with his parents to Carroll county, Indiana, when a boy, educated in the public schools and at the Cincinnati Eclectic Medical College, 1871. He has been twice married. His .present wife was Naomi Gra- uel of Fulton county, to whom he was married in 1880, and they have three children.
Dr. F. C. Kane practiced in Lucerne from about 1897 to 1899, when he moved to Logansport and later to Michigan.
Dr. Harry Shultz of Logansport opened an office in Lucerne, a few years ago and remained for some time.
TOWNS AND VILLAGES
Harrison township is a farming district and is not noted for its great cities, yet it had three village or cross roads stores. Probably the
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most ancient of these was known by the euphonious and high-sounding (or rather low) name of Hell's Half Acre, located on the northeast cor- ner of section 23. This, however, was only a local name and it was known on the Bourse in Paris! as Fitch, and later Leases Corners. "Fitch" postoffice was established here about 1850, but was discontinued about 1865, and George Lease about this time located here and kept a store for many years. He died in Missouri twenty years ago, and there has been a country store kept at this point ever since, Willard Jones being the present merchant. Formerly there was a cooper shop and blacksmith shop. At present Dr. Eckert, retired, lives in the village. A school house and Zion church just west of the corners and a half dozen houses constitute the village.
JACK TOWN, OR BIG INDIAN
located in the northwest part of the township on Indian Creek, in the later sixties, and for twenty-five years thereafter, had a postoffice, a store and a blacksmith shop, and cooper shop, but all have disappeared since the railroad was built through the township and Lucerne began to de- velop.
LUCERNE
This is regarded as the capital of Harrison. It is a flourishing little town of 270 souls, situated near the center of the township on the Van- dalia Railroad, nine miles north of Logansport. The town was originally called "Altoner," in honor of Mr. Al. Toner, who was instrumental in building the railroad. The postoffice established soon after was called "Nebo." This caused confusion and about 1891 both the town and postoffice were named Lucerne, by which latter term it is now known, and the former names are almost forgotten.
The original plat of Altoner was laid out by Edward Freshour, September 29, 1883, the railroad being completed the month previous .. This plat consisted of twenty-four lots, situated on the south edge of section 15 and north part of section 22, with Freshour, the main street, running east and west, and Hill and Fitch street paralleling it, and Osmer street running north and south. Since then additions have been made by Julia Freshour, Rosa Backus, Wm. Backus and Wm. W. Ste- vens, the last March 21, 1892.
The first merchant and postmaster was Amos Sweigart, who originally came from Nebraska and settled in Lucerne, then called Altoner, in Oc- tober, 1883, soon after the town was platted. He remained several years then moved to Halifax, Pennsylvania, where he now resides, we suppose retired and living on the fortune amassed as Lucerne's first merchant. Samuel Sweigart, a brother, came at the same time and was the first . carpenter who erected the first buildings in the town in the fall of 1883. He is still a resident of the town. Wm. Kirtland was the first black- smith. He is now following his trade in New Mexico.
The present business interests are represented by three general stores, kept by Sher & Ordman, Mr. Helmie and J. E. Todd; hardware and agricultural implements, by Addis A. Freshour; hotel conducted by Mr. IIelmie; livery stable by Guy Thompson, and two restaurants by Hilkert & Sheets. James Huff is the tonsorial artist and Bernard Clem- ens and Sam. Mellinger operate blacksmith and repair shops, the latter having been in business for over twenty years. E. E. Ely operates a large sawmill and rip saw, and is doing a good business, buying timber from a wide territory around Lucerne, and ships hardwood products of his mill all over the United States. This mill has been three times
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burned down in the last twenty-two years that Mr. Ely has operated it, but each time he builded greater.
There was a handle factory operated for several years by George Jamison and later by Frank Reese, but it was burned down in 1911 and was never rebuilt. The elevator and depot was also burned and each of these structures have been replaced by handsome and commodious buildings. The elevator is owned and operated by O. Gandy & Co., and furnishes a first-class market for all 'kinds of grain, and ships over 175,000 bushels annually.
The Lucerne Bank was opened for business August 13, 1912, with a capital stock of $25,000. The officers are: President, Willard Winn; vice president, S. M. Grable; cashier, Everett Gragg. The deposits at this time amount to $55,000. The stock is held by local men. A com- pany has recently been organized to establish a canning factory, which they expect to have in operation at the opening of the canning industry. Morris Winn is president and Everett Gragg, secretary of the company. A telephone exchange enables the farmers of the township to communi- cate with each other and with any section of the county. A magnificent high school building and three churches provide for the intellectual and spiritual needs of the town and two physicians look after the health of the community. Joseph E. Todd is the postmaster and daily sends out mail by three rural carriers to every farm house in the township. Thus this prosperous little village of Lucerne supplies every want of the town and country, a ready market for all farm products, and stocks of all classes of necessary goods of the household, and is a great convenience to the entire township and is a great advancement over pioneer days, when a farmer would have to travel all day over mud roads to market his grain or to purchase the most trivial article or to summon a doctor.
LODGES AND SOCIETIES .
Lucerne Lodge No. 680, I. O. O. F. was instituted in 1891 with five charter members. The first officers were: W. P. Baker, N. G .; G. N. Brush, V. G .; E. E. Ely, sec'y. The present officers are: Charles Hall, N. G .; Dr. S. C. Jones, V. G .; Everett Gragg, sec'y. The lodge pur- chased an old building which they occupied as a lodge room until 1911, when a commodious two story frame building was erected and fitted up. Hope Rebekah Lodge No. 589 was organized in 1901, with Mary Need- ham, N. G., and Mrs. Etta Backus, sec'y.
KNIGHTS OF MACCABEES
Lucerne Lodge No. 75, K. O. T. M. was organized April, 1894, and the Ladies of the Maccabees in June, 1900.
GRAND ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC
Lucerne Post No. 591 G. A. R. was organized in 1893, with fourteen charter members and held regular meetings for some years but, the majority of the members have answered the last tattoo and gone to their reward and not enough of the old soldiers are left in this neighborhood to officer the lodge and this G. A. R. post has disbanded.
GOOD TEMPLARS
In the summer of 1868 a lodge of Good Templars was instituted at Zion church east of Lucerne, and for a time flourished and did a noble work in that community but it finally disbanded.
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ABRAHAM SKINNER SCHOOL FUND
Abraham Skinner an influential pioneer who settled in sections 25 and 26, about 1836, willed eighty acres of his farm to Harrison town- ship as a permanent fund, the interest on which should be used to aid and maintain the schools of the township. The township trustee is the custodian of this fund and gives bond for the faithful performance of the trust. It is known as the Skinner fund. The land was sold many years ago and the proceeds invested permanently and now amounts to about $2,500. Mr. Skinner was a leading spirit in all educational enter- prises. It is related that at a school meeting in an early day when they were contemplating building a new schoolhouse that one man stated that he would give as much as any other person present. Mr. Skinner arose and offered to give $50 and a week's work. At that time this was con- sidered as a very large offering, beyond all expectation and the party making the first proposal skulked out and left the meeting. Mr. Skinner was an ardent Democrat and had a brother living in Ohio that was as strong a Republican, and each were positive men of strong convictions, bordering on obstinacy; that on one occasion, his brother visited him, driving through in a buggy, while out unhitching the horse the two brothers became involved in a heated controversy about politics and each became so embittered that the visiting brother hitched up his horse, and drove away, never even going into the house, and the brothers never met thereafter.
ACCIDENTS
Ira Powell, son of Benjamin Powell, a lad five years old, was acci- dentally cut in the thigh by a scythe in the hands of an older boy, and bled to death within an hour, before medical aid could be summoned. This was in 1842.
Robert Wilson, a young man, brother of Mrs. Thomas Jamison, while out in the woods cutting timber, March 5, 1889, had the sad misfortune to be instantly killed by a limb of a falling tree.
Harrison township has been a peace loving community and has been remarkably free from any serious infractions of the law, never having had a murder committed within its borders. Her early settlers were imbued with the Christian spirit and not only did they establish and maintain churches, but were accustomed to hold great revival camp meetings in the Foglesong neighborhood, in the northern part of the township. In 1845 there was a great camp meeting held on the William Jamison farm, then owned by William Mitchell, in section 35, at which Henry Ward Beecher was the principal speaker, and unusually large crowds were in attendance.
Major S. L. McFaddin was brought up in the northwest corner of Harrison township, and it was here that he saw his first ground-hog. Here it was that by diligently watching the ground-hog's hole year after year he discovered the habits of the woodchuck. If the ground-hog saw his shadow on February 2nd, he would return to his hole and winter would last six weeks longer, but if it was cloudy and the ground-hog saw not his shadow, then the winter was over. Wils Berry, the local artist, has immortalized this anecdote by painting the Major in his lonely vigil sitting beside a ground-hog hole dozing, while his ground-hogship emerges and escapes into the forest.
The Major relates many amusing incidents of pioneer life; the early singing master with his tuning fork beating time; Charles McGowan was one of these pioneer singing teachers, and had marked peculiarities, which cannot be related here; how he would make comical gestures and
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flourishes as he beat time to the singing of the old buck-wheat notes from the old "Missouri Harmony." After the Major's return from the Mex- ican war he often referred to the field of Buena-Vista as the field of bis-cuits.
There was an Indian village on Indian creek in the northwestern part of Harrison township until their final removal west in 1838. They were generally peaceable, but would occasionally make a raid on a settler's hen roost, or suddenly open a cabin door and utter an unearthly war "whoop" to frighten the women and keep them indoors, while they helped themselves to chickens or other articles desired.
REFERENCE BIOGRAPHIES
Biographical sketches of the following pioneers and citizens of Har- rison township have been written and may be found in Helms' history of Cass county, published in 1886 and will not be reproduced here :
Thomas Backus, born 1832, died about 1889; George W. Blackburn, d. 1911; Dr. F. G. Buck, b. 1849; Levi Burton, b. 1826, d. about 1905; Hezekiah Cast, b. 1825; d. about 1880; John G. Castle, b. 1807; d. about 1890; William Donovan, b. 1826, d. 1899; Daniel Foglesong, b. 1823, d. 1909; Isaac Grant, b. 1828, d. 1907; John Herd, b. 1838, d. 1912; Isaac King, b. 1817, d. 1904; Frederick Kling, b. 1830, d. about 1880; John Morphet, b. 1831, d. 1900; William Morrison, b. 1826, still living; Robert Murray, b. 1826, d. about 1892; Hiram Seward, b. 1841, still living ; William Shadinger, b. 1835; William Stevens, b. 1838, still living; John T. Walker, b. 1841, d. 1912; John H. Weyand, b. 1836, d. 1903; Ed. Whitefield, b. 1849, d. 1904; Joel C. Wickard, b. 1832, d. 1900; Thomas Wilson, b. 1838, d. about 1890; William Winn, b. 1835, d. 1905; Rich- ard Winn, b. 1836, still living; Jacob Yantis, b. 1817, d. 1899.
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CHAPTER XLVIII JACKSON TOWNSHIP
LOCATION-AREA-TOPOGRAPHY-FIRST SETTLERS-RICHARD HOWARD- ORGANIZATION - MILLS - SCHOOLS - TRUSTEES - CHURCHES CEMETERIES - PHYSICIANS - ROADS - GALVESTON - LODGES LINCOLN-INCIDENTS AND FATALITIES-BIOGRAPHIES.
Jackson township is situated in the southeastern corner of the county, is six miles long and five miles in width, embracing an area of thirty square miles, or nineteen thousand, two hundred acres; the greater part of which lies in congressional township 25 north, range 3 east. The township is watered and drained by Deer creek, which flows from east to west through its entire width, with the south branch extending from near the southeast corner and emptying into the main stream west of the center of the township. These are creeks of considerable size and in an early day afforded water power to run mills. Jackson township is marked by no striking topographical features, the general surface being level except in the southern portion it is somewhat undulating and along the water courses. Originally it was covered with a growth of heavy timber consisting of black walnut, poplar, oak, ash, beech, maple, elm, etc., and a dense undergrowth of small bushes and vines along the creeks, all of which has yielded to the woodman's ax, and only here and there are left a grove of native timber. Where, seventy five years ago, all was an impenetratable forest, the only occupants being wild animals, reptiles, and Indians, today is occupied by as fine and well improved farms as can be seen under the sun, which produce luxuriant crops of all agricultural products adapted to a temperate climate, with herds of the finest stock of horses, cattle, sheep and hogs.
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FIRST SETTLERS
Jackson, like the townships to the west, formed a part of the great Miami Indian reservation and was not thrown open to settlement until other parts of the country were occupied and improved. The first white man to settle in Jackson township was James Dixon, in April, 1841. He located in the southeast quarter of Section 13, on what has since been known as the Sprinkle farm, on the north side of Deer creek.
The following November, Richard Gaiter Howard, who had pre- viously lived in Noble and Harrison townships, settled is Section 16. Howard was a great hunter and as the deep forests were advantageous to his calling he hesitated not to sell his claims in the older townships and settle in the new.
Probably Mr. Howard was the greatest hunter and trapper Cass county ever produced. He was an energetic and thrifty man and pur- chased three of the best farms in Jackson township and paid for the same by furs and peltries, which he caught in the wilds of Jackson and sur-
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rounding country. Although a rough backwoods hunter, yet he was a devoted Christian, being at first associated with the Christian or Dis- ciples church but later with the Universalists. The first religious meet- ing in the township was held at the house of Mr. Howard. He lived to a ripe old age and died at the home of his son, Nelson, east of Lincoln in 1882. He was the son of John and Margaret (Gaiter) Howard, and was born in Kentucky in 1803; moved with his parents to Ohio where they died, when in 1831, Richard located in Cass county and became the Daniel Boone of this county. He was married in Ohio November 7, 1824, to Mary Charles, a daughter of James and Ann Charles, who came from Ireland. He was the father of the following children: Nelson Fisher, born 1825, died 1883; Andrew Charles, born 1828, died 1899; John Tipton, 1830-1888; Margaret Jane and Marie Ann, twins, born 1813, the former, the wife of Henry A. Bickell, now a resident of Jackson town- ship, and the latter living in Kansas; and Jerusha, born 1838, died 1874.
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