History of Indianapolis and Marion County, Indiana, Part 19

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 942

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an admirable canvass against Governor Joseph A. Wright, one of the best " stumpers" in the United States, and by familiarity with public speaking had become a ready, perspicuous, and foreible speaker. The Democrats, however, being greatly in the ma- jority, he was defeated.

He was married in Boone County, Ky., July 27, 1828, to Margaret, daughter of Rev. Jameson Hawkins, one of the earliest of the Baptist preachers of the county, and died May 17, 1854, in his fifty- ninth year. Three children survive him,-Margaret, (Mrs. John C. S. Harrison), Nicholas, and Franeis J. Susannah, the eldest daughter, and wife of Rev. Henry Day, many years pastor of the First Baptist Church, died several years ago. Mr. MeCarty was an example of Christian purity, integrity, and ehar- ity during his whole life. He was generous "as the day," tolerant of offenses that affected only himself, peaceable, frank, and honorable. No man that ever lived in the city was more sincerely or generally loved and honored, and certainly none ever deserved it better. He was always prompt in his aid of be- nevolent efforts, and one of the most active in urging the organization of the Orphans' Home. A meeting of the citizens held on the occasion of his death adopted the following resolution, prepared by a com- mittee consisting of James M. Ray, Robert Hanna, Bethuel F. Morris, Calvin Fletcher, John D. De- frees, John M. Talbott, and Nathan B. Palmer :

" Resolved, That in the departure of our fellow-citizen, Nich- olas McCarty, Esq., we realize the loss of one who, sioce the early days of the city, has deservedly ranked as a most worthy, generous, and valuable man, and who, hy his affectionate heart, clearness of mind, and strict integrity of purpose, had warmly endeared himself to all who knew him. In the im- portant publio trusts committed to him-as commissioner of the canal fund in effecting the first loan of the State, as sena- tor of this county, and in other engagements-he manifested remarkable judiciousness and ability. It was with reluctance he was drawn into the pursuit of official station, and with de- cided preference enjoyed the happiness of en attached circle of family and friends. Ilis hand aod heart were ever at com- mand for the need of the afflicted, and his counsels and sym- pathies were extended where they could be useful with unaf- fected simplicity and modesty."

DANIEL Y ANDES belonged to that elass of men who naturally become pioneers. He was born in Fayette

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County, Pa., in January, 1793, when it was yet a new country, with fertile soil, a hilly but beautiful surface, and underlaid with coal. He was the son of Simon Yandes, whose wife before marriage was Anna Cath- arine Rider, both natives of Germany. His parents lived upon a farm near the Monongahela River west of Uniontown. They had two sons, Daniel and Simon, who received only the limited education usual at that time. Both of the sons worked on the farm. They enlisted in the year 1813 under Gen. Harrison, in the last war with Great Britain, and served six months in Northern Ohio, but were not engaged in battle. The father of Governor Albert G. Porter en- listed in the same company. In 1814, when Wash- ington City was first threatened by the British, they again enlisted, and Daniel Yandes at the age of twenty- one was elected major of the regiment. Before leaving the place of rendezvous the order to march was coun- termanded, and the troops were not again ordered out. In 1815 occurred the most fortunate event of his life, and that was his marriage to Anna Wilson, the oldest daughter of James Wilson and his wife, Mary Rabb. James Wilson was a leading farmer and magistrate of the county. The Wilsons were Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, and the Rabbs Scotch- English Presbyterians, and Anna Wilson was a Presbyterian. Her educational advantages were but moderate as compared with those at present. James Wilson's father, Alexander Wilson, was born in 1727, and removed from Lancaster County, Pa., to Fayette County, where he died in 1815.

After the marriage of Daniel Yandes, he acquired a mill and opened a coal-mine. In 1817 his father died, at the age of eighty-four, and in 1818, when the advantages of the fertile soil of Indiana were heralded in Western Pennsylvania and enthusiasm aroused, he, with his wife, mother, and two children, floated down the Ohio to Cincinnati, and went from thence to Fayette County, Ind., where he opened a farm in the woods near Connersville. In the spring of 1821 he removed to Indianapolis, which had been fixed upon as the seat of government for the State, and resided there until his death in June, 1878, at the age of eighty-five years and five months. His portrait and signature represent him at the age of eighty. His

first residence was a log cabin which he built near the northeast corner of Washington and Illinois Streets. In 1822 he erected and resided in a double log cabin near the southwest corner of Washington and Ala- bama Streets, opposite the Court-House Square. In 1823 he built a new frame residence of three rooms in that locality. About 1831 he erected a two-story brick residence where the Citizens' National Bank now stands, and part of the same building included a store-room where Harrison's Bank now is. In 1837 he was the owner of an acre of ground where the First Presbyterian Church now stands, and where he built a large plain two-story brick residence. Here he lived until it was sold to the above church in 1863, and here his wife died in 1851. After her death he did not marry again.

He came to Indianapolis with about four thousand dollars, and, strange as it may seem, that constituted him the largest capitalist of the incipient metropolis for the next ten years. That amount included the total of his inheritance and of his own acquisitions up to 1821. He was, in common with pioneers gen- erally, a man of rugged health, and hopeful, confiding, and enterprising. He was fond of building mills, manufactories, and introducing other improvements. On his arrival in Indianapolis, with his brother-in-law he erected the saw- and grist-mill on the bayou south- west of the city where the McCarty land now is, the dam being built across White River at the head of the island which was opposite the Old Cemetery. This is said to have been the first mill in the New Purchase.

About 1823 the firm of Yandes & Wilkens estab- lished the first tannery in the county, and continued in that business together about thirty years. The active partner was John Wilkens, a man well known for his uncommon merits. Afterwards Daniel Yan- des continued the same business with his nephew, Lafayette Yandes. After the death of Lafayette he formed another partnership with his nephew, Daniel Yandes, Jr., and James C. Parmerlee in an extensive tannery in Brown County, and in a leather-store at Indianapolis. About the year 1825, Mr. Yandes be- came the partner in a store with Franklin Merrill, brother of Samuel Merrill. Stores in the early history of Indianapolis contained a miscellaneous assortment,

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HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.

more or less extensive, including dry-goods, groceries, queensware, hardware, hats, shoes, etc. About 1831 he became the partner of Edward T. Porter, and the store of Yandes & Porter was in a brick building which preceded that where Harrison's Bank now stands. At nearly the same time he started Joseplı Sloan in business as a merchant at Covington, Ind., and continued his partner for several years. In 1833 he and Samuel Merrill, treasurer of State, dug a race along Fall Creek, and built a grist-mill, a saw-mill, and the first cotton-spinning factory in this region. A few years afterwards he and William Sheets, then late Secretary of State, built on the canal west of the State-House grounds the first paper-mill in the county. About the same time he became the partner of Thomas M. Smith in a store, and about 1838 was the partner of John F. Hill in another store, both of which were on the north side of Wash- ington Street, a little west of Pennsylvania Street. In 1839, under great difficulties, he alone built at La- fayette, Ind., a grist-mill, saw-mill, and paper-mill, and opened with his son James a large storc. While engaged in this enterprise the panic was precipitated upon the country, and Mr. Yandes found himself in- volved heavily in debt, both as principal and indorser, at Indianapolis and Lafayette. While he enjoyed the good-will of his creditors, he did not command their entire confidence as to his solvency, and during the years 1839 to 1844 judgments in Marion County accumulated against him to the amount of over twenty- two thousand dollars, when he sacrificed some of his most valuable property at much less than cost. At the same time he was under protest at the bank at Lafayette. In due time, however, he paid the full amount of his debts, and it is a matter of honest pride that he and his children have always paid in full individual and all other indebtedness. About the ycar 1847 he and Thomas H. Sharpe built the Col- lege Hall, a brick building, which preceded the Fletcher & Sharpe bank and store property, at the corner of Washington and Pennsylvania Streets; and a few ycars afterwards he erected the brick building where Ritzinger's Bank now is. In 1847 he built ten miles of the Madison Railroad, which was completed about September of that ycar, and was the first railroad to

Indianapolis. The same year he joined in building a grist-mill at Franklin. In 1852 he and Alfred Harrison built thirty miles of the eastern end in Indiana of the Bellefontaine Railroad. Previous to this time he had twice ventured successfully in send- ing large cargoes of provisions by flat-boats from In- diana to New Orleans. About the year 1854, during the Kansas excitement, his desire for the freedom of that State impelled him to aid some young men to settle there, whom he accompanied to the West. About 1860 he joined Edward T. Sinker as partner in the Western Machine-Works, where he continued for some years.

One of his most curious traits was the manifestation of unusual energy and labor for a series of years until an enterprise could be put upon a solid basis, after which he evinced unusual indolence and inattention to details for several years until he became again en- listed in a new enterprise. As a consequence, after new enterprises were fairly started and tested he lost interest in them, and in a few years would usually sell his interest. He was senior partner, and in most cases the capitalist. Although he matured his plans pa- tiently and carefully, he was nevertheless a little too fond of hazard.

If his business career had terminated when seventy- five years of age he would have been a successful business man ; but an undue fondness for enterprise, and a hopeful enthusiasm, together with the fascina- tions of the far West, an over-confidence in others, and the deterioration incident to old age, with his unwil- lingness to be advised, resulted in disaster. He lost a considerable amount in mines in the West, and a large sum in the Brazil Furnace, stripping him in effect of his property when he was past the age of eighty. One of these mines is now more promising.

In politics he was a very decided Whig and Re- publican, but cared little for the distinctions of office. He was, however, the first treasurer of Marion County, and in 1838 Governor Noble, unsolicited, appointed him one of the Board of Internal Improvements to aid in carrying out the extensive system of improve- ments provided for by the Legislature in 1836.

In church matters he was a Lutheran by preference, but there being no church of that denomination at

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Indianapolis in early times, he became a Presbyterian, and was for some years one of the first elders and trustees of the Second Presbyterian Church. From 1823 to 1845, and until the failure of his wife's health, his house was one of the favorite stopping-places of the Presbyterian clergy. Rev. Mr. Proctor, and after- wards Rev. George Bush, were his guests for months. He was liberal to charities and the church, having given away up to 1865 about sixty thousand dollars. It would require at least double that amount, according to the present value of money, to be an equivalent.

Five of his children died young. His daughter, Mary Y. Wheeler, died in 1852, leaving five children, three of whom yet survive. His children yet living are Catharine, the widow of Rev. Elijah T. Fletcher ; Elizabeth Y. Robinson ; Simon, formerly a lawyer ; James W., formerly a merchant ; and George B., now president of the Citizens' National Bank.

Besides the favor extended by the Legislature to the enterprising spirit. of the town in the cheap sale of the steam-mill site, a direct appropriation of four thousand dollars was made to build an official resi- dence for the Governor in the Cirele. This was done on the 26th of January, 1827. A contract for the work, at a cost of six thousand five hundred dollars, was made on the 17th of March, with Austin Bishop, Robert Culbertson, William Smith, and William Speaks, by Samuel Merrill and Benjamin I. Blythe, on the part of the State. It was of brick, about fifty feet square, two stories high, with a sort of Man- sard roof, containing a level space in the centre about fifteen feet square, surrounded by a railing, standing upon a basement some six feet above the ground, with a large hall-door in the middle of each of the four sides, and separated by ten-feet halls crossing each other in the middle into four large rooms in each corner. Its complete exposure on all sides made it an undesirable residence for a family, and it was never occupied except for public offices, chambers of the Supreme Court judges, and in its later days for almost any use that respectable applicants desired it for. As heretofore related, it was sold for old brick and torn down in 1857. School-boys used to make a " circus" of its basement-rooms, and one day, some forty years ago, a wild turkey, scared by hunters

from the noted "turkey-roost" in the sugar grove near the line of Seventh and Illinois Streets, ran into one of these basement-rooms, and was caught there by a school-boy of the period. Another house, built at the same time, was the little brick at the east gate of the Court-House Square, for an office for the clerk of the State Supreme Court. At the preceding ses- sion the Legislature had ordered the State agent to contract with Asahel Dunning for a two-story brick ferry-house near the foot of Washington Street, on the south side. It was built in 1827, partially burned in 1855, repaired, and reoccupied until some half-dozen or so years ago, when it was torn down.

In this connection belongs the aet ordering the first State-House, which passed 10th of February, 1831, upon the recommendation of a committee at the ses- sion of 1829-30. The report estimated the cost at fifty-six thousand dollars, and stated that the unsold land in the donation would be fairly estimated at fifty- eight thousand dollars. James Blake was appointed commissioner to attend to the work and obtain mate- rial (three hundred and sixty perches of stone by the second Monday of May was specified), with an appro- priation of three thousand dollars. He was instructed to offer one hundred and fifty dollars for a plan, embrac- ing halls for the two houses, rooms for Supreme Court and State Library, and twelve rooms for committees, with such others as would be needed, and report to the next Legislature. The cost was limited to forty-five thousand dollars. The commissioner procured a plan from Ithiel Town, a distinguished architect of New York, and I. J. Davis. The Legislature approved Jan. 20, 1832, and appointed Noah Noble (Gov- ernor), Morris Morris (anditor), and Samuel Merrill (treasurer), Feb. 2, 1832, as commissioners to superintend the work, employ architects, and use the material purchased by Mr. Blake. The work was to be finished by November, 1838, and to be examined and approved by a committee of five from each house before acceptance. The contract was made with Mr. Town at fifty-eight thousand dollars. Work began in the spring of 1832. The site, previously a dead level, was plowed and scraped into an elevation in the centre under the survey and supervision of Gen. Thomas A. Morris, then a young West Pointer, after serving a

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faithful term at the printer's " case." The building was so far completed as to be ready for occupancy when the Legislature met on the 7th of December, 1835. The actual cost was sixty thousand dollars, but two thousand dollars in excess of the estimate. It was two hundred feet long by one hundred feet wide, and two stories high. The style was the Doric of the Parthenon, spoiled by a contemptible little dome that was about as suitable in that place as an army-cap on the Apollo Belvidere. The basement was of blue slate from the Bluffs, and soon began de- caying. The whole exterior was stuccoed, and looked well till frost and thaw, damp and heat began to make it peel off, and then it looked worse than a beggar's rags. It was so dilapidated as to be unsafe before it was torn down in 1878. The trees planted in the square made a fine grove there, which was the favorite resort of Sunday-school celebrations of the Fourth of July and the usual out-door place for political meetings.

At the same time the order was made to sell the steam-mill site all the reserved, forfeited, and unsold lots in the town were ordered to be sold. It was done on the 7th and 8th of the following May, when one hundred and fifty-three lots, of which twenty-four were on Washington Street, were offered, with over thirty squares of four acres each. Sales were made of one hundred and six lots at one hundred and eighty dollars an acre, and thirty-eight out-lots and squares at twenty-three dollars an acre. On the 22d of January, 1829, an act extended the time of pay- ment of the deferred installments of the purchase- money of out-lots, and declared inoperative the for- feitures worked under the existing law by delinquent payments. The next legislative order touching the town and the State's property was made on the 9th of February, 1831, when the agent was directed to plat the whole donation outside the town into out-lots and sell them at public auction. The subdivision was made, and the aggregate of lots offered in and out of the town plat was nearly nineteen hundred acres. The divisions ranged from two to fifty acres. The minimum price was ten dollars an acre, but only a portion was sold. It may be noticed here that the order for the clearing of Pogue's Run Valley was

never executed, probably because the fifty-dollar limit was too little. Property-holders, however, gradually cleared it, and improved the health of the place by it. The low, swampy " bottom" and dense woods and underbrush made the very home of malarious disor- ders, and they trooped out in force during the sickly season. There is nothing but two or three shivered stumps left of this dense woods now, except for a short distance above the mouth of the creek and near the Morris Street bridge. Here some old sycamores and elms still remain, but one of them was blown over by the tornado that did such damage to some of the manufacturing establishments on the West Side last summer. All the papaws, black haws, apple haws, ginseng, prickly ash, spice-brush, and hazel-bushes are gone as completely as if such things had never grown there, yet it was a valley prolific of wild fruit, as its clear stream was of good fish.

At the time the order of Jan. 26, 1827, was made for the sale of forfeited and reserved lots certain squares and alleys were vacated. Square 22 was re- served for a State hospital, and square 25 for a State university ; it is now University Park. The " State University" at Bloomington has tried to get possession of this valuable property under cover of a title it has assumed since that dedication was made, but has failed. On the 26th of January, 1832, the agent was em- powered to lease the square to the trustees of Marion County Seminary for thirty years, with the proviso that if it should be needed for a university in that time a half-acre should be sold in fee-simple in either the southwest or southeast corner, where a seminary building was authorized to be erected under the lease. The trustees built the " Old Seminary" in the south- west corner in 1833-34, the most noted local school of the State, and maintained with unvarying success and wide benefit for twenty years. It will be noticed more fully in the department of this work assigned to "Schools." In October, 1827, Miss Matilda Sharpe, the first milliner, came to Indianapolis,- not the least important event of the year.

While the Legislature, as above related, was dis- posing of unsold lots, erecting buildings, and forward- ing the improvement of the place, the citizens were not inactive in their own moral and social interests,

James Me Ray

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though it was late before their enterprise turned to points of business advantage, and with no great good fortune to encourage them when they did turn. In April, 1825, the Indianapolis Bible Society was formed, and is still living in the Indianapolis Female Bible Society, a most active and beneficent agency among the soldiers during the civil war. Mrs. Mar- garet Givan was the first president, and the wife of Professor George Bush, pastor of the First Presbyte- rian Church, and since then known all over the literary world for eminence in oriental scholarship, was one of its most active promoters. On the 13th of November, 1825, the Marion County Bible Society was formed, with Bethuel F. Morris as president and James M. Ray as secretary. It may be noted here that Mr. Ray was secretary of pretty much every organiza- tion ever formed during the first thirty years of the city's existence. Whether town-meeting or bank directory, fire company or missionary society, James M. Ray was invariably made its business manager or secretary. It is to his undying honor that he always served and was never paid. He was born in the first year of this century, in New Jersey, and learned the trade of making coach lace, came West to Kentucky when a young lad, and worked there with his family ; came later to Lawrenceburg, in this State, and came here in the summer or fall of 1821. His intelligence, activity, and integrity put him at once among the fore- most men of the settlement. Quiet, unobtrusive, vigi- lant, never idle, never careless, his word was as good as any other man's oath, and his aid in any good work as confidently expected as the continuance of his cx- istence. It would be impossible to gather up here all the associations of which he was secretary at one time or another in more than fifty years of active life in the settlement and city, but it is really no exagger- ation to say that the first generation of settlers trusted him with every work of that kind that they had to do. He was the first county clerk, as already noted, and served till he was made cashier of the old State Bank in 1834. He continued in that position as long as the bank lived, and then went into its successor, the " Bank of the State." He was Governor Mor- ton's most trusted agent during the war, and managed all the external finances of the State during that

momentous period. Financial disaster overtook him in some unfortunate mining operations to which he had given his means largely, and several years of his later life were passed in an easy but well-paid position in the Treasury Department at Washington. During the last year or so he returned to his old home, and died here Feb. 22, 1881.

The Indianapolis Tract Society was another kindred organization made during the same year, 1825; and on September 3d the first agricultural society was formed by the late Calvin Fletcher, Henry Bradley, Henry Brenton, and others. The following year an artillery company was formed under Capt. James Blake, upon the reception of a six-pounder iron gun sent here by the government. It blew off William Warren's hand while firing a salute to the " Bloody Three Hundred" in 1832, when mustering to march away to the Black Hawk war. It afterwards blow off one of Andrew Smith's hands. Mr. Smith is still living in the county, a hale and venerable gentleman, far beyond the scriptural limit of life, after many years of service in important county offices. On the 20th of June, 1826, the first fire company was formed, with John Hawkins as president and James M. Ray as secretary. Its implements were buckets and lad- ders, and its alarm general yelling and the ringing of church and tavern bells. It was incorporated in 1830, and continued in existence till the formation of the " Marion Fire-Engine Company" in 1835, when the old company was absorbed into the new one. In July, 1828, the Indianapolis Library Society was formed, the library being made up of donations. It lasted half a dozen years or so. A musical association called the Handelian Society was formed in the spring of 1828. In August a cavalry company was formed by Capt. David Buchanan. On the 24th of April, 1829, the Methodist Sunday-school was colo- Dized from the Union School on the completion of the old church on the southwest corner of Circle and Meridian Streets. It began with cleven teachers and forty-six scholars, and in a year had twenty-seven teachers and one hundred and forty-six scholars. In November, 1829, the Colonization Society was organ- ized, with Judge Isaac Blackford as president. On the 11th of December, 1830, the Indiana Historical

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History of Indianapolis and Marion County, Indiana, Part 19

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890 Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co. Number of Pages: 942

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 942