USA > Indiana > Johnson County > History of Johnson County, Indiana > Part 6
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JOHNSON COUNTY, INDIANA.
In the year 1830 a new court house was ordered built. At the January session it is "ordered that Thomas Williams, county agent, advertise that there will be let to the lowest bidder on Tuesday the second day of the next term of this board, the building and enclosing of a brick house for a court house forty feet square, two stories high, with two doors to be covered and a suitable cupola. The foundation to be built one foot with rock." It is further ordered that Isaac Smock, Abraham Lowe and George W. King, Esq, be appointed a committee to procure a suitable plan and draft for the court house. Thomas Williams, county agent, is also ordered to "open a book and keep the same open for the purpose of receiving donations to assist in building a court house in Franklin."
Evidently, the first committee did not look after its task, for at the March session it is ordered that "Patrick Cowan, Mahlon Seybold, Abraham Lowe, Thomas Henderson, Thomas Needham and George W. King be ap- pointed a committee to attend at the court house on Tuesday, the ninth in- stant, and let out to the lowest bidder the building of a brick house in the town of Franklin for a court house to set on the public square to be forty feet square two stories high. The plan of which house shall be agreed on by said committee and said committee is hereby authorized to enter into Articles of Agreement for the building of said house to take good bonds with approved security for the faithful performance of said contract and also authorized to contract for the payment in advance of all moneys now in the hands of the county treasurer or that may be due to the Treasurer from the Collector for the year 1829, also all moneys due the County Agent on lots sold and that may become due so fast as the same can be collected and also promise to make such annual payments as said committee in their discretion may think the county will be able to make."
The board also orders the county treasurer and county agent to hand to George W. King within six days a statement of the amount of moneys in their hands and the amount due them and not paid. Plans had not been . secured, for on the same day the county agent is directed to procure "from Cal Morrow or any other person so soon as possible a plan for the Court House." Even this resource must have failed, for at the November term, Abrahamı Lowe, one of the board, was allowed two dollars for his trip to Indianapolis to get the plans, and Samuel Morrow, of the same city, was allowed five dollars for "drawing the draught of the Johnson County Court House."
The contract was let on March 9, 1830, to Samuel Herriott and John
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Herriott for one thousand four hundred and twenty-seven dollars, and the board made an advance payment to the contractors of five hundred dollars. At the May term following the contractors and the board agree "that the following alteration shall be made in the building of the court house, to-wit, put but one outside door and that to be in the north side of said house also to put the offices at the north side and to make the brick wall of the under story in place of two and a half brick thick but two brick thick and the upper story but one and a half brick thick and to put a brick cornice to said house and the ballance of the contract to remain as it was entered into." No change in the contract price is noted.
More than a year after the board orders still other changes. The con- tractors are ordered to put in sufficient timbers "to make the house sufficient and permanent," extra pay to be given contractors therefor. In July, 1831, the board further orders that "the contractors for building the Court House in Franklin put no partition wall in said house, and that they put a door in the south side of the house in addition to the one in the north side, and that the joists in said house, in the upper story to be but ten inches by three inches and that the windows be made for twenty-four lights 8 by 10 inches."
William Shaffer secured the contract for "the inside work" for the sum of three hundred forty-nine dollars and fifty cents. The building was com- pleted and accepted by the board on May 8. 1832, under the terms of the contract. The "finishing touches" on the work were yet to be done. At the same term, they invite bids on the following work: "Finishing cupola with venetian circular shutters, venetian blinds to be three inches wide; pedestal to cupola to be finished by ceiling with one and one-half inch pop- lar plank with block cornice, two of the shutters to the cupola to be hung on hinges to open and shut, one on the east side, the other on the west side; lay the second floor with one and one-fourth inch poplar plank tongued and grooved; upper loft to be ceiled with five-eighths inch poplar plank, under side dressed."
"Run upstairs with turned post and square banister; run partitions on second floor of one and one-fourth inch poplar plank and put panel doors, locks and keys agreeable to the draft, also the letting out of the painting of cupola and pedestal, roof of cupola and pedestal to be painted white, venetian blinds to cupola to be green and the painting of the outside brick wall with venetian red and penciled."
The building cost about two thousand dollars and was quite a fine structure for that day. The room in the northeast corner of the second
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floor was assigned to the clerk and recorder. John L. Jones remembers that there were four fire places in the court room on the second floor, one in " each corner of the room. The floor of the lower story was of brick. The judge's bench was made by William Shaffer at a cost of nine dollars. But improvement was the order of the day. In 1835, the board found that the county would have a surplus of five hundred dollars at the end of the year and took steps to alter the court house plan. They decided to have three rooms on the first floor, one for the clerk and recorder, and two for jury rooms, "to be studded, filled in and plastered," and "to take down all peti- tions upstairs and make one room for the circuit court and make a bench and bar."
The heating plant of the court house as well as of the jail must have been unsatisfactory, for at the March term, 1837, E. and J. Herriott are allowed fifty-four dollars and twelve and one-half cents "for stove and pipe and blank book and stationery furnished the clerk's office and kittle furnished the jailor to keep fire in the jail."
At the August term, 1848, of the county board, Peter Shuck and Samuel Eccles were named as a committee to procure plans and specifications for a new court house. At the December term, bids are invited to be filed in the clerk's office by January 15th following. At the time fixed, the matter was continued and new plans ordered. Nothing came of this action, however, and on May 18, 1849, this second court house was destroyed by fire.
Plans were promptly adopted at the next session of the board for the third court house to be erected in the county of Johnson, and bids were ad- vertised for in the Indiana State Sentinel and The Franklin Examiner. At the time fixed, July 4, 1849, the board met and awarded the contract to Edwin May, of Indianapolis, for ten thousand and eighty-four dollars. The new building was to be fifty feet wide by eighty-four feet long, with eighteen- inch limestone foundation and brick above. G. M. Overstreet, lawyer and surveyor, located and gave the levels for the foundation. John Elder pre- pared the plans and his work seems to have been done with great care, as the contract based on the same is very complete in detail.
At this time quite a controversy arose about the location of the new building. By the original plat of the public square, Main street was extended through the same, and the town board, at the instance of many citizens, ordered the marshal to open up Main street through the square. The county board was hastily called together to consider the matter, and after hearing many suggestions as well as certain proposals to locate the court
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house on other lands, a compromise with the town was reached whereby the new court house was to be erected in the middle of the east half of the square, the west line thereof to be ten feet east of Main street.
In August, 1850, the town of Franklin was authorized to maintain a market house at the northwest corner of the public square, and at the same time a new jail was built at the southwest corner. Under these conditions, the public square must have presented a crowded appearance, the effect heightened somewhat by a board fence surrounding all.
For the first time in the county's history, all the officers are ordered to keep their rooms in the new court house. Two "cannon coal stoves of the size used by Mr. Fox" (the treasurer) are ordered for the court room, and five smaller stoves are ordered for the other offices. And the treasurer is ordered to procure a car load of coal for use in the same, the first record we have of the use of this fuel in Johnson county. With all these con- veniences, officers were slow to move in and the board found it necessary in June, 1851, to enter an order "to compel Henry Fox to take possession and use the proper room in the east side of the court house down stairs." At the same term, the clerk is authorized to rent his room in the court house to Finch & Slater for one year at a rental of forty dollars exclusive of, or fifty dollars including fuel, but the tenants shall not be allowed to use a wood stove. It also appears that Hay & Williams rented rooms in the court house for their printing office in 1852. The court room was frequently used for church services.
Again, fire brought to destruction the court house. On the evening of December 12, 1874, fire broke out in the stairway leading to the cupola and completely destroyed the building and many records and papers. The only record destroyed which has interfered with present legal titles was the record then making in the common pleas court. The county has been lucky in passing through two such fires and suffering no greater loss of records.
In this connection, the writer would call attention to the lack of care now taken to preserve the records, especially in the recorder's office. Many of the general indexes and all of the records are kept in the open room, and a bad fire in that office would create endless confusion in titles. This is equally true of many records in the clerk's office. All records having to do with conveyances of land, partition records, and settlements of estates ought always to be kept in fire proof vaults.
The next court house was a temporary frame structure built by the county on the lot where the city building now stands. After much contro-
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versy, the board of commissioners, on March 26, 1879, resolved to erect a new house, the fifth structure of the kind. Four months later, they adopted plans offered by George W. Buenting, architect, and the next day authorized a bond issue of seventy-five thousand dollars, to pay for the building. The contract was duly awarded on September 8, 1879, to Farman & Pierce on their bid of seventy-nine thousand one hundred dollars. The contract was executed on behalf of the county by Peter Demaree, Robert Jennings and Joseph Jenkins, on September 22, 1879. James H. Pudney was made super- intendent of construction. The work of building occupied a little more than two years. The contractors claimed a loss on the work in a large amount, and filed with the auditor on December 10, 1881, a statement show- ing such loss to reach more than twenty thousand dollars, and asking relief of the board. No record is found that their request was favorably con- sidered or acted on.
Other items of expenditure for the new structure were: For furniture, $6,391.00; for heating plant, $8,299.00; for the clock, $3,070.00; for gas service, plant, $757.69.
On August 31, 1882, the board entered an order requiring all county officers to move into the new building by the 5th prox. On the 22nd of the same month, they ordered a telephone placed in the court room, the first record I find of this modern utility in use in the offices of the county. It was ordered installed by the Central Telephone Company. It was not until 1897 that the local company began to give service to the county, the auditor's office being first favored, but a year later six telephones are con- tracted for, at a yearly rental of twenty-four dollars each.
Frank M. Israel was appointed janitor for the court house in 1882 and served many years at a salary of three hundred and sixty-five dollars. Others who have served in the same capacity are Monroe Forsyth, Americus Wright, John F .. Legan and John W. Wishard. The last named will on September 4, 1913, have completed fourteen years of service as janitor. The salary is now fixed at eight hundred dollars.
The repair and maintenance of the court house for the year 1912 cost the county the sum of four thousand one hundred nine dollars and nineteen cents.
THE COUNTY JAIL.
The first county jail was erected in the year 1826, under contract with Samuel Herriott. It was, of course, a rude log structure. At the May term of that year, the board of justices orders that the "contractor for build-
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ing a jail in Franklin in place of putting but one window in each story seven inches by three feet put two windows one in each end seven inches by eighteen inches and in room of making the logs for said jail eighteen feet long they be seventeen feet and in place of sealing the upper loft with three- quarters inch poplar plank it be laid down with hewed timber nine inches thick." Nothing is known of the location of the first jail.
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Seven years later, the board gives notice that it will let out to the lowest bidder the moving of the jail "from the site it now occupies to the southeast corner of lot No. 56, also the fencing off on said lot a stray pen of posts and rails and putting a good and substantial gate to the same." This jail re- mained in use until early in the year 1838, when a prisoner set fire to the building and it was burned to the ground. It is recalled that the prisoner was badly burned by the fire of his own setting, but in the excitement inci- dent to the fire made his escape.
In March, 1838, the board decides to build a new jail on the lot where the second jail stood, and at the May term of that year let the contract to James Rivers and John A. Lash at five hundred dollars. Samuel Herriott is appointed agent to superintend the building. The work was completed by November, and at that time the board resolves that it will issue an order at the next March term to Lash and Rivers for the contract price.
This jail was a secure log building, the walls of three courses of logs, the middle course being vertical and the other two horizontal. The "credit- ors' jail" occupied the second-story room. In the middle of the floor of the creditors' cell was a trap-door, through which criminals by way of a ladder were conducted to their cell on the first floor. The ladder was then re- moved and the trap-door fastened above them.
At the August term, 1850, the county board decides to build a new jail on "the south end of the Public Square west of Main Street," and in January following let the contract to John Craig and Joseph Paris at four thousand eight hundred dollars. The jailor's house was to be eighteen by forty feet, the jail to be eighteen feet square, outside measurement. The structure was to be of brick, two stories high, heated by a hot air furnace of brick built into the structure.
From this jail, on the evening of October 31, 1867, the mob of Pleasant township citizens took John Patterson and Henry Hatchell and hung them to a beech tree in Lysander Adam's woods, an account of which is given in another connection.After this deed of violence, the grand jury condemned the jail as unsafe and action was at once taken to build a stronger and safer
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prison. To this end, the county acquired title to lot 54 of the original plat, paying J: O. Martin one thousand six hundred dollars therefor. Isaac Hodgson was employed to draw plans and specifications and the contract was duly let to Farman & Company, and B. F. Haugh & Company at the sum of thirty-nine thousand nine hundred dollars. This building is still in use.
The cost to the county for 1912 of boarding prisoners in the county jail was five hundred ninety-six dollars and eighty-five cents; all other jail expense, four hundred thirty-four dollars and nine cents.
THE POOR ASYLUM.
The problem of the proper care and custody of dependent poor has been a vexatious one from the beginning of the history of the county. Overseers of the poor for the various townships were appointed by the board of county justices as early as 1826, whose duty it was to care for the poor in their respective jurisdictions. By the act of 1831, the overseers of the poor were required to cause all poor persons who were a public charge to be "farmed out" on contracts on the first Monday of May annually. Poor children were apprenticed, males until the age of twenty-one and females until the age of eighteen. The "Hoosier Schoolmaster" fell in love with a girl apprentice, whose lot was no more unhappy than many such an one bound out under this law.
This "farming out" was in most cases done at public auction, a ceremony much resembling the slave auctions of the South, with this difference, if a slave was very old and feeble, he sold at a low figure, while a pauper of the same class sold at a high figure. A characteristic record of the time is the following :
"Comes now the overseers of the poor of Clark township and files the following report, to-wit: We, the undersigned overseers of the poor of Clark Township , in the County of Johnson do certify that on the 13th day of the present month, May, after due notice having been given, we farmed out Mar- garet Alvers, a pauper, at public outcry to Andrew J. Parr, he being the lowest bidder for the sum of thirty-nine (39) cents per week making together the sum of $20.28 for one year."
In the same month, an insane pauper was farmed out at auction in Blue River township at one hundred dollars per year. One such record shows a farming out at the very low figure of eight dollars per year, this pauper evi- dently being almost able to earn her "keep"; another, of a mother and child, at one dollar per week.
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The experiment of a county poor farm was tried out at a very early day, with varying success. At the May session, 1835, the board concludes "that the county will be able to spare about two hundred dollars next March to make a payment on a farm and with safety may say that two hundred dollars a year may be paid after that without raising the rate on polls and property." The board therefore appoints Joseph Young, John Smiley and John P. Banta a committee to contract for a suitable farm of not less than one quarter section at a price not to exceed one thousand three hundred dol- lars. This committee reports in January following the purchase of the west half of the southeast quarter and the east half of the southwest quarter in section 16, in township 12 north, range 4 east, from David McAlpin for nine hundred dollars. Of this, Samuel Herriott makes a donation of one hundred dollars.
John Foster, president of the board, is appointed "director" of the asylum and is authorized to rent the same to a tenant who will take care of and maintain any paupers who may become a county charge. William Burkhart became such tenant and so far as the record discloses took care of but one pauper, for which he was allowed one hundred and twelve dollars, from which amount sixty-five dollars was deducted as the rent of the farm due the county, for the year 1836.
William C. Jones, one of the county commissioners, became superin- tendent in November, 1837, but the management of the county farm had been so costly and troublesome that in January, 1838, it was ordered sold. The farm was sold in May of the same year to James R. Alexander for one thou- sand two hundred dollars. The old system proving even more burdensome as the population rapidly increased, it was soon found necessary to establish a second county farm.
On July 30, 1842, the commissioners purchased ninety-six acres in the northwest corner of section I about one mile north of Trafalgar on the Three Notch road, and in March of the following year entered an order re- quiring all owners of the poor to remove the "regular paupers" to the county asylum. Samuel Hall was made superintendent, and Peter Vandiver, Sr., a director to look after the better discipline on the farm.
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The contract made with Mary and James Burkhart at the February term, 1848, is fairly representative of the character of the contracts entered into as to this farm. They agree to take charge of the farm and keep the three paupers entrusted to their care for the sum of eighty-seven and one-half cents each, per week, the farm to be rented free. In the year following, James
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Brady, superintendent, is allowed the following bill: For keeping three paupers regular, $34.00; for keeping Mrs. L. 13 weeks, $13.00; for building smoke house, $5.00; for putting up fencing, $10.00, making in all the sum of $62.00. This farm was sold on June 6, 1860.
In the meantime, the county had taken title to the northwest quarter of section 22, township 12, range 4 east, by deed from Andrew Lewis bearing date of March 5, 1856, at a consideration of five thousand six hundred dollars. In 1863, the commissioners sold one hundred ten acres off the west side of said quarter section to John Keaton for three thousand eight hundred and fifty dollars. On the 21st day of March, 1876, the county acquired title to 53.37 acres between the Hopewell and Trafalgar roads, at a consideration of $5,070. The acreage of the present county farm is, therefore, 103.337 acres, represent- ing an investment of six thousand eight hundred and twenty dollars.
At the March term, 1856, the commissioners let the contract to High & Compton to erect a poor asylum on their new farm one mile west of Franklin. The building was to be of brick thirty-six by seventy-two, to cost one thou- sand five hundred dollars. Many improvements have been added since, but the buildings are now unfitted for such use. According to a recent report of the board of state charities, the county ought to provide better means for the segregation of the sexes, and erect a better dormitory.
Of the superintendents serving during the past thirty years, Capt. Will- iam A. Owens and David Swift served the longest. Swift served from 1889 to 1899 at an average salary of six hundred and forty dollars, the "running expense" amounting to an average of seven hundred and fifty dollars. On December 8, 1898, the commissioners let the contract to the lowest bidder, and contracted with John S. Buckner at $240.00. His report for the year ending March 4, 1901, shows receipts of $326.80 and expenses as follows : Supplies, $1,669.41 ; employes, $586.51 ; repairs, $184.64; and incidentals, $75.65; a net charge to the county of $2,189.41 ; his last report showed net charge of $1,179.28.
Jacob Levan was next appointed superintendent, serving from July 3, 1905, to August 7, 1911, at a salary ranging from seven hundred dollars to eight hundred dollars. Harvey M. Kephart followed Levan and is the pres- ent keeper at a salary of eight hundred dollars, but his resignation is on file to take effect September 1, 1913, and Mory Verlryck is named as his suc- cessor at a nine hundred dollar salary.
The total expense for county poor for the year 1912, including main-
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tenance, superintendent's salary, medical attendance and repairs, was two thousand seven hundred and fifty dollars.
THE ORPHAN ASYLUM.
On the petition of Mrs. A. B. Colton, Mrs. George Matthews and Mrs. John C. Wood, the board of commissioners in 1884 took up the question of a county institution for orphan children. One and one-half acres of ground was purchased of W. D. Covert at Hopewell on August 5, 1884, for nine hun- dred dollars. Emmeline Bridges was appointed matron January 2, 1885, and was to receive thirty cents per day for each inmate.
She was succeeded on September 12, 1889, by Abby Mozingo, and the latter by Elizabeth Berryman on February 19, 1891. Upon her death, her daughter, Mollie Berryman, was chosen matron, but served only three months. Margaret Bergen was appointed matron, March 24, 1894, at a salary of forty dollars per month, and served a little more than five years.
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