History of Dearborn County, Indiana : her people, industries and institutions, Part 5

Author: Archibald Shaw
Publication date: 1915
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 1123

USA > Indiana > Dearborn County > History of Dearborn County, Indiana : her people, industries and institutions > Part 5

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Census Decades.

Population.

Increase.

Per Cent. of Increase.

1800

5,641

1810

24,520

18,879

334.7

1820

147,178

122,658

500.2

1830

343,031

195,853

133.I

1840

685,866

342,835

99.9

1850

988,416

302,550

44.1

1860

1,350,428

362,012

36.6

1870

1,680,637

330,209

24.5

1880

1,978,301

297,664

17.7

1890

2,192,404

214,103

10.8

1900

. 2,516,462

324,058

14.8

1910

. 2,700,876

184,414

7.3

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DEARBORN COUNTY, INDIANA.

Statistics are usually very dry and uninteresting, but there are a few figures which are at least instructive if not interesting. For instance, in 1910, 1, 143,835 people of Indiana lived in towns and cities of more than 2,500. There were 822,434 voters, and 580,557 men between the ages of eighteen and forty-four were eligible for military service. An interesting book of statistics from which these figures are taken covering every phase of the growth of the state is found in the biennial report of the state statistician.

The state has increased in wealth as well as population and the total state tax of six thousand forty-three dollars and thirty-six cents of 1816 increased in 1915 to more than six million. In 1816 the only factories in the state were grist or saw-mills; all of the clothing, furniture and most of the farming tools were made by the pioneers themselves. At that time the farmer was his own doctor, his own blacksmith, his own lawyer, his own dentist, and, if he had divine services, he had to be the preacher. But now it is changed. The spin- ning wheel finds its resting place in the attic; a score of occupations have arisen to satisfy the manifold wants of the farmer. Millions of dollars are now in- vested in factories, other millions are invested in steam and electric roads, still other millions in public utility plants of all kinds. The governor now receives a larger salary than did all the state officials put together in 1816, while the county sheriff has a salary which is more than double the compensation first allowed the governor of the state.

Indiana is rich in natural resources. It not only has millions of acres of good farming land, but it has had fine forests in the past. From the timber of its woods have been built the homes for the past one hundred years and, if rightly conserved, there is timber for many years yet to come. The state has beds of coal and quarries of stone which are not surpassed in any state in the Union. For many years natural gas was a boon to Indiana manufacturing, but it was used so extravagantly that it soon became exhausted. Some of the largest factories of their kind in the country are to be found in the Hoosier state. The steel works at Gary employs tens of thousands of men and are constantly increasing in importance. At Elwood is the largest tin plate fac- tory in the world, while Evansville boasts of the largest cigar factory in the world. At South Bend the Studebaker and Oliver manufacturing plants turn out millions of dollars' worth of goods every year. When it is known that over half of the population of the state is now living in towns and cities. it must be readily seen that farming is no longer the sole occupation. A sys- tem of railroads has been built which brings every corner of the state in close touch with Indianapolis. In fact, every county seat but four is in railroad

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DEARBORN COUNTY, INDIANA.

connection with the capital of the state. Every county has its local telephone systems, its rural free deliveries and its good roads unifying the various parts of the county. All of this makes for better civilization and a happier and more contented people.

Indiana prides herself on her educational system. With sixteen thousand public and parochial school teachers, with three state institutions of learning, a score of church schools of all kinds, as well as private institutions of learning,. Indiana stands high in educational circles. The state maintains universities at Bloomington and Lafayette and a normal school at Terre Haute. Many of the churches have schools supported in part of their denominations. The Catholics have the largest Catholic university in the United States at Notre Dame, while St. Mary's of the Woods at Terre Haute is known all over the world. Academies under Catholic supervision are maintained at Indianapolis, Terre Haute, Ft. Wayne, Rensselaer, Jasper and Oldenburg. The Method- ists have institutions at DePauw, Moore's Hill and Upland. The Presby- terian schools are Wabash and Hanover colleges. The Christian church is in control of Butler and Merom colleges. Concordia at Ft. Wayne is one of the largest Lutheran schools in the United States. The Quakers support Earlham College, as well as the academies at Fairmount, Bloomingdale, Plainfield and Spiceland. The Baptists are in charge of Franklin College, while the United Brethren give their allegiance to Indiana Central University at Indianapolis. The Seventh-Day Adventists have a school at Boggstown. The Dunkards at North Manchester and the Mennonites at Goshen maintain schools for their respective churches.

The state seeks to take care of all of its unfortunates. Its charitable, benevolent and correctional institutions rank high among similar institutions in the country. Insane asylums are located at Indianapolis, Richmond, Lo- gansport, Evansville and Madison. The State Soldiers' Home is at Lafayette, while the National Soldiers' Home is at Marion.

The Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home at Knightstown, is main- tained for the care and education of the orphan children of Union soldiers and sailors. The state educates and keeps them until they are sixteen years of age if they have not been given homes in families before they reach that age. Institutions for the education of the blind and also the deaf and dumb are located at Indianapolis. The state educates all children so.afflicted and teaches them some useful trade which will enable them to make their own way in the world. The School for Feeble Minded at Ft. Wayne has had more than one thousand children in attendance annually for several years

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DEARBORN COUNTY, INDIANA.

Within the past few years an epileptic village has been established at New Castle, Indiana, for the care of those so afflicted. A prison is located at Michigan City for the incarceration of male criminals convicted by any of the courts of the state of treason, murder in the first or second degree, and of all persons convicted of any felony who at the time of conviction are thirty years of age and over. The Reformatory at Jeffersonville takes care of male criminals between the ages of sixteen and thirty, who are guilty of crimes other than those just mentioned. The female criminals from. the ages of fifteen upwards are kept in the women's prison at Indianapolis. A school for incorrigible boys is maintained at Plainfield. It receives boys be- tween the ages of seven and eighteen, although no boy can be kept after he reaches the age of twenty-one. Each county provides for its own poor and practically every county in the state has a poor farm and many of them have homes for orphaned or indigent children. Each county in the state also maintains a correctional institution known as the jail, in which prisoners are committed while waiting for trial or as punishment for convicted crime.

But Indiana is great not alone in its material prosperity, but also in those things which make for a better appreciation of life. Within the limits of our state have been born men who were destined to become known through- out the nation. Statesmen, ministers, diplomats, educators, artists and literary men of Hoosier birth have given the state a reputation which is envied by our sister states. Indiana has furnished Presidents and Vice-Presidents, distinguished members of the cabinet and diplomats of world-wide fame; her literary men have spread the fame of Indiana from coast to coast. Who has not heard of Wallace, Thompson, Nicholson, Tarkington, Mc- Cutcheon, Bolton, Ade, Stratton-Porter, Riley and hundreds of others who have courted the muses ?

And we would like to be living one hundred years from today and see whether as much progress will have been made in the growth of the state as iu the first one hundred years of its history. In 2015 poverty and crime will be reduced to a minimum. Poor houses will be unknown, orphanages will have vanished and society will have reached the stage where happiness and con- tentment reign supreme. Every loyal Hoosier should feel as our poetess, Sarah T. Bolton, has said :

"The heavens never spanned, The breezes never fanned, A fairer, brighter land Than our Indiana."

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CHAPTER.II.

PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF DEARBORN COUNTY.

LOCATION AND SIZE.

Dearborn county is in the extreme southeastern corner of Indiana, being bounded on the east by Ohio and the Ohio river, and on the south by Ohio county. The extreme length of Dearborn county is about twenty-six miles and breadth about sixteen miles, with an area of approximately three hun- dred and fifteen square miles.

GEOLOGY AND TOPOGRAPHY.

. Dearborn county possesses a very diversified topography and has within its borders an equally diversified soil. The county has some seven miles front on the Ohio river; considerable of its surface is river and creek hills and an extensive portion is upland flats, where originally, in a state of nature, the water stood the most of the year. There are extensive low bottom lands, ter- races higher above the rivers and creeks, steep hillsides, broken uplands and up- land flats. The county contains some of the richest land in the state, and some that might be classed as thin land. Most of the county, however, is made up of warm limestone soil or river bottoms. The upland flats, it has been found, by proper draining and fertilizing, can be developed into very profitable farming land. Picturesque scenery is to be found along the Ohio and the streams that flow into it and on the uplands there are many pleasant vistas that any artist would hail with joy. It is claimed by many that the Ohio river hills are unsurpassed in beauty anywhere on the globe and the traveler who has girded the earth, when he rests his eyes upon such visions of loveliness as can be surveyed from the top of Ludlow's hill, from the residence of Dr. H. H. Sutton, on the hilltop west of Aurora, or from the survey of the Great Miami river from the hilltops at the state line on the lands of Thomas and Joseph Fitch, will readily acknowledge that nowhere in all his travels has he seen anything that equals it in beauty, loveliness or fertility. The roads lead-

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DEARBORN COUNTY, INDIANA.

ing from the river to the higher lands pass along the beds of streams, between the hills, which are often beautifully rounded, while the ridges slope gracefully to the bottoms. The Big bottoms of the Great Miami river are on the eastern side of the county and the Whitewater river flows through the northeast part of the county. Tanner's creek empties into the Ohio about two miles below Lawrenceburg and heads well back in the county. North and South Hogan unite and flow into the Ohio at Aurora. The beautiful Laughery, winding in and out among the hills, flows south through Ripley county and forms the boundary between Dearborn and Ohio counties. The floods back the water from the Ohio up all these streams, the flood of 1884 reaching to Guilford, in Tanner's creek, and to the Ripley county line on Laughery. The streams all have considerable fall and were, in pioneer days, utilized for water power, but as the forests have been cleared away the water supply has become more uncertain and the mills have all been abandoned. The advent of steam and its more certain and more dependable power have also had an effect in driving the water power out of use.

RIVER CHANGES.

The Ohio river. with its periodic rising and falling. its great floods and swift current, at such times has caused great changes along its banks, by the washing away of large tracts and in other places, by filling. The state road from Aurora to Lawrenceburg at one time followed the bank of the Ohio, but the river has crumbled the bank until it has all disappeared, all traces of it being gone and the road long since abandoned. At the mouth of the Big Miami, the river has changed very much. The entrance to the Miami has gradually worked up the Ohio and the Great Miami, that at one time made a horseshoe bend and flowed by the once-busy hamlet of Hardins- burg, now has left that place some two miles to the westward of its bed. The higher flood levels of recent years have caused residents along the banks of the Ohio to abandon their property and seek higher elevations.

ALTITUDES.

The height or elevation of the land of the county above sea level at dif- ferent places is about as follow, taken from surveyors' readings: Lawrence- burg, 500 feet; Guilford, 520 feet; Harmans, 759 feet; Weisburg, 941 feet; Moore's Hill, 1,000 feet and Dillsboro, 785 feet.

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DEARBORN COUNTY, INDIANA.

THE ROCKS.

The stratified rocks of Dearborn county belong to the series formerly known as the blue limestone or Hudson River group, sometimes now called the Cincinnati group. They belong to the lower Silurian strata and the Paleo- zoic age. The strata of the Cincinnati group form the floor of nearly the whole of Dearborn county. The bluish tinge of the rocks is said to be due to the pres- ence of oxide of iron. Exposure to the air changes its color to a stone gray. The rocks of the Dearborn county formation are full of fossils, which can be seen by the most careless observer on the rocks by the wayside. The lime- stone seldom is found in layers of more than from six to eight inches in thick- ness. In the old quarries at Lawrenceburg, some was found of greater thick- ness, but it generally was found to have a clay vein or parting when closely investigated. At the old quarry at St. Leon, earlier writers claimed that the stone would bear hammer dressing on account of its dense nature. On account of the great development of the cement industry, the quarrying of stone has largely ceased, except for construction of highways in surfacing.

This county is very near the center of the Cincinnati dome. The Ohio river has cut a deep gorge through the comparatively soft rocks of this dome -a gorge which in this county averages some three hundred and fifty feet in depth. The smaller streams in this area, then, are compelled to main- tain a pretty rapid course by the steepness of their slopes. At the very edge of the river, where the river channel is deepest, the lowest rocks exposed are the Utica shales. These are soft, blue shales, often soft enough to cut readily with a knife; at other places, where freshly exposed, still somewhat hard. These shales contain many thin beds of limestone (mostly impure) interbedded with the shale. This shale formation forms the bottom layer in nearly every creek bottom as one passes back into the hills away from the river. Thus on Tanner's creek, these shales can be traced in the creek bot- tom beyond Guilford, or about eight miles, in direct line, from the river. On Hogan creek these shales are found at about the same distance from the Ohio; and on Laughery, a larger stream, the shales extend back at least six- teen miles. Down near the river the lower forty feet of the bluffs are made up of this shale.

Next above the Utica shales in these counties comes the Lorraine lime- stone. In Dearborn county about one-half the surface is underlain with this rock. In this part of the county it is merely a matter of courtesy to call this formation a limestone. A typical section of it shows a good deal more shale

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than limestone, and what there is of the latter is usually so impure that it is of no practical use, either for building stone or lime. There are occasional thin layers of hard, crystalline limestone which are put to use as road mate- rial, but they do not form one per cent. of this entire formation. This rock extends up the creek to a distance of sixteen to eighteen miles on Tanner's and Hogan, and on Laughery beyond this county and twelve miles into Ripley. Between the latter creek and Hogan this rock is the capping layer of all the hills; but between Hogan and Tanner's creek the divide is capped with the limestones of the Hudson river group. These, like the Lorraine group, are mostly shale and impure limestone, soft, easily weathered and of little prac- tical use. In the northwest corner of Dearborn county, the surface formation is glacial in origin and conceals the rocks.

The topography of this county is entirely a product of the softness of the rock and the proximity of the river. The latter has a deep gorge, and the creeks from the back county have had to maintain steep courses in cutting down to the river level. Thus Tanner's creek in sixteen miles falls four hun- dred feet; Hogan creek in the same distance falls four hundred and twenty- five feet, or falls of about twenty-five feet per mile. Even a small stream with such a fall is capable of carrying large loads and of digging out a deep gorge. Then the smaller streams which flow into the creeks named above have even steeper slopes, and of course are able to work with amazing power. It comes as a surprise to see for the first time what enormous blocks of stone one of these hill torrents can carry ; but after seeing that, one is not sur- prised that the country should be so rough.

The general expression of the topography here is of long, high ridges, with deep gorges between. Only the upper third of the ridges, in most places, is gently sloping enough for cultivation, and even that, in many places, is too steep for plowed soil to stick. Near the Ohio, and on the lower courses of the larger creeks, the hills are steeper than in the back country, at least for the lower half of the ridges; and in most places no attempt is made to cultivate these slopes.

MINERALS.

No metals, in sufficient quantities to be valuable for mining, have ever been found within the confines of Dearborn county. Occasionally it is claimed there is a thin vein of bog iron found, but the stratum is generally too light and confined to too narrow limits to be of value. Salt was found in pio- neer days near the state line on Double Lick run, and it is said that section

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25, township 6. range I, was at one time set aside as a salt reservation. There is more or less drift on the highlands. Northwest of Manchester the limestone is overland with unstratified blue clay. containing pebbles and boulders, many of which bear glacial scratches. It is the impervious nature of this clay that has given to these localities the name of "crawfish" flats. Years ago, below Weis- burg, a piece of native copper was found said to weigh twenty-six ounces, which must have been brought in the drift from the copper regions of Lake Superior. The Greendale ridge is composed of gravel, probably brought down from the north during the glacial period.

Along the banks of Laughery, near Hartford, there is a remarkable ac- cumulation of drift. Between the bottoms and the hilltop, the deposit is about two hundred feet high, with a surface divided by narrow dells. An out- crop through the soil shows nothing but cemented gravel. In times past it was thought lead could be found there, but, after time and labor had been given it, the work was abandoned. In regard to gold-bearing drift, we cannot do better than quote a paper by the late George Sutton, M. D., on the "Gold Bearing Drift of Indiana," read before the American Association for the Advancement of Science at Cincinnati in August, 1881 :

"Along the valley of Laughery creek, a stream which enters the Ohio river a few miles below the mouth of the Miami, may be seen deposits of this auriferous drift. They are not stratified like the terrace formations seen along our rivers, but lie in irregular accumulations along the valley. At the bottom of the small streams that have cut across this drift are seen deposits of black sand, already alluded to, which principally consist of magnetic iron ore. It is in this sand that gold is found. Seven miles from the mouth of Laughery may be seen a deposit of this drift about a mile and a half in length, nearly a half mile in width, and about a hundred feet in thickness. Some portions of this Laughery drift are so rich in gold that it is seen with the unaided eye and almost pays a fair remuneration for washing for it. My attention was directed a few weeks since, by the owner of the farm on which this drift is found, to a small excavation which had been made in washing for gold. It was by measurement six feet long, five feet broad and about two feet deep. He in- formed me that from this place eight dollars worth of gold had been obtained and that a man had washed from the drift on his farm gold to the value of six- teen dollars and fifty cents. The gold is found in the form of dust, flattened scales and small nuggets. Only that which could be seen with the unaided eye was saved."

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DEARBORN COUNTY, INDIANA.

LAND SLIPS.

A common phenomenon among the river hills is the land slip, especially cn the steeper places. When the frost is coming out of the ground in the early spring the clay underneath generally becomes saturated with water, and from its nature is too slippery to support the weight of the soil above it. Part of the hillside slips by its own weight and a bench is formed upon which material ac- cumulates. On this account, a greater depth of soil is found upon these benches than elsewhere on the side of the hills.

THE SOILS IN DETAIL.

In this county there are not many distinct types of soil. In the first place, there is little variety in the underlying rocks and there could, there- fore, be little variety in the soils resulting from their decay. In order of area covered, these soils can be classified to follow: (1) Limestone up- land, which occupies at least two-thirds of the area of these counties; (2) the Miami clay loam, which occupies nearly one-third the area ; (3)! Waverley clay loam, the bottom soil along the Ohio river and. creeks; (4)' Waverley gravel, the terrace soils.

THE LIMESTONE UPLAND SOIL.

This soil may be divided into two general groups, depending upon whether the rocks from which it was derived were limestone chiefly or shale. In the first class comes most of the soil mapped as limestone upland. It is the great upland soil in this county, formed by the decay of the Hudson river and Lorraine limestones and shales. It is yellow to brown in color. markedly darker than the Miami soils to the west. It is principally a slope soil, and in nearly every locality is much mixed with flat fragments and plates of limestone. In many places these fragments are so numerous and large as seriously to interfere with plowing. Often they are gathered to- gether and built into fences. Near the Miami areas there is often a mixture of that soil and the limestone soil. Where pure this soil is fertile and loamy. On the steeper slopes it is usually sown to grass, wheat or rye, since these crops assist in holding the soil on the hills. Where the slopes are gentle, or in small bottoms, corn is grown successfully. This soil is excellent for small fruits, berries, etc., and for orchards. It is an excellent soil for most

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farming purposes. Being shallow, it is, however, subject to drought, with late maturing crops. There is a strong tendency to wash, and every community contains abandoned fields where the forces of erosion overcame the rate of decay of the rock. The small bottoms along the creeks in this region are peculiar in their formation. At least fifty per cent. of the bottom material consists of flat plates of rock, tilted at an angle of about thirty degrees, with soil between the plates. As a result, the plowing of these small bottoms is almost as difficult as hillside plowing.

The most fertile soils in this county are undoubtedly the shale soils, or the limestone upland soils on the lower portions of the slopes. When freshly cleared, these soils resulting from the decay of the shales have no superior in fertility in the state. They are dark brown or black, from the high per- centage of humus which they contain, but after being cropped for three or four years they become somewhat lighter in color. It is often mixed with fragments of limestone from the slopes above. It is a loose soil, from one to four feet in depth, deeper at the foot of the slopes. It is in this soil that the tobacco of Dearborn county is raised-the most profitable crop that can be raised in Indiana soil, but exhausting to the ground. This soil raises excellent corn, or anything else that requires a strong soil. Wherever it is possible to retain this soil, it does not seem to diminish in fertility, but its situation is bad, being subject to erosion, soil creep and freezing and thaw- ing. Unless exceptionally well cared for within five or six years after clear- ing practically all of the soil is gone, washed into the creeks and carried down into the river.

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History of Dearborn County, Indiana : her people, industries and institutions, Part 5

Author: Archibald Shaw Publication date: 1915 Publisher: Number of Pages: 1123

Author: Archibald Shaw
Publication date: 1915
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 1123