USA > Indiana > Montgomery County > History of Montgomery county, Indiana; with personal sketches of representative citizens, Volume II > Part 10
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Minnesota to Heaven than from dear old Andover." There are indications that it was Mr. Hovey's original intention to go as chaplain to Fort Brady on the Saulte Ste. Marie; although Indiana was also seriously thought of. He was in suspense.
In college days a classmate, Horace E. Carter, was ill with typhoid fever and died in ten days. Mr. Hovey took constant care of him, and then was too sick to accompany the remains to Peacham, Vermont, where Mr. Carter had lived and was buried. After the funeral, Mr. Carter's widowed mother, accompanied by her daughters Martha and Mary, visited the friend who had so tenderly cared for their deceased relative. The next year, Mr. Hovey had a tract agency in Caledonia county, in which Peacham was located, and found an opportunity to ask Mary Carter to share his fortunes. Her father had been the principal of the Caledonia County Grammar School, and she herself was admirably educated. She accepted the young minister's hand. And when later he wrote saying that he had a pastoral call to Hartford, which place he described as "a pleasant town on the banks of the Connecticut, and quite different from the log huts of Indiana," the young lady replied, "I am reading Flint's Mississippi Valley ; do not let Hartford turn your mind from the path of duty." An interview with Dr. Absalom Peters decided him to devote himself to the work of a home missionary, and he wrote on his thirtieth birthday asking Miss Carter to prepare "for work in the wilderness of Indiana." On the 5th of October, 1831, they were joined in marriage by Dr. Leonard Worcester, and as soon as the farewells were spoken they started on their westward journey.
Mr. Hovey's commission appointed him to "publish the Gospel in Fort Wayne, or such other place or places as shall be fixed on," with four hun- dred dollars as a salary, and seventy dollars as an outfit. According to the diary of the missionary, "Railroads were as yet only a subject of contempla- tion." He and his bride went down Lake Champlain by steamboat, by canal to Troy and thence to Buffalo; and, after a day at Niagara Falls, the "Henry Clay" carried them to Detroit in three days, where they were met by Rev. Noah Wells and Rev. Jeremiah Porter. After a brief conference it was decided that Mr. Porter should go to Fort Brady, whence two years later he was transferred to Fort Dearborn and became the founder of the first church in Chicago. During a delay of three weeks at Detroit, at that time a village of 3.500 inhabitants, Mr. Hovey improved the time by starting the first temper- ance society ever formed in the bounds of Michigan, and in interesting Hon. Lewis Cass in its success. Cass was a New Hampshire man, at that time
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Governor of the territory, and the same year made Secretary of War under Jackson, where he exemplified his temperance sentiments by abolishing grog from the army. Forwarding their baggage with a lot of goods consigned to Judge Hanna of Fort Wayne, the missionary and his bride went by the steamer "Gratiot" to Perrysburg-Toledo being as yet unknown.
After a brief sojourn at a village of Pottawatomies they drove by ox- cart through an almost unbroken forest to the Maumee rapids, whence they were poled by pirogue up to Fort Wayne, where they met a hearty welcome from Judge Hanna. The Fort Wayne church however was supplied, and the Judge remarked: "There is a right smart little town of three hundred in- habitants started at the foot of Lake Michigan. They call it 'Chicago'; bet- ter go there." Instead of doing so they went by canoe down the Wabash to Logansport, where they were met by Rev. Messrs. Martin M. Post and James A. Carnahan. Leaving Mrs. Hovey for a while at Logansport, Messrs. Hovey and Carnahan took to their canoe again and floated down the Wabash to Lafayette, where Mr. Hovey had the joy of preaching his first sermon in Indiana. Part of the time on horseback they "rode and tied."
Fountain county, which was decided on as Mr. Hovey's chosen field of labor, had then ten thousand inhabitants, but no meeting-house, schoolhouse or newspaper. A church organization at Portland had been abandoned; but one was ready to be formed at Covington, of which the missionary took charge, and also of one just formed at Coal Creek. New churches were started at Rob Roy and Newtown. Midway between the two stood the log cabin into which the pioneer couple moved, exactly twelve weeks after bidding adieu to Squire Carter's mansion at Peacham, Vermont. The cabin walls were "chinked and daubed": its one room had a "puncheon" floor; its one window had twelve small panes in the space made by simply removing a log; a loft served for storage; the wide door swung on wooden hinges, and its latch-string was out by day for hospitality, and pulled in by night for secur- ity. In a log stable near by was kept "Barney" a reformed race-horse, who carried his new owner over two thousand miles on errands of mercy and righteousness through Fountain county, occasionally running away, but never letting his master miss an appointment in two years.
Mr. Hovey felt the responsibility of being the only minister in the county. He gathered churches and Sunday schools, started day schools and temperance societies, scattered good literature abroad, and promoted the first newspaper started in the county seat. He held camp-meetings with good results. The Wabash Presbytery was formed, covering sixteen counties,
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whose four ministers and eight elders met on one occasion at the Hovey cabin and lodged at night on its straw-strewn floor. ` A college classmate, Rev. Caleb Mills, was urged to come West as his associate. Mills reply, dated June 14, 1832, was highly characteristic, but when he finally did come, the next year, the hand of Providence had opened for both men a wider edu- cational field to which they gave their lives, and which was located in Mont- gomery county.
Several men who had been revolving the idea of founding a literary institution of high order for the Wabash valley, met at the "Old Brick House" at Crawfordsville, on November 21, 1832. Rev. John M. Ellis, secretary of the Indiana Education Society, presided; Rev. Edmund Otis Hovey was the secretary ; Rev. James Thomson stated the object of the meeting; Rev .. John Thomson and Rev. James A. Carnahan were also present; and elders Gilli- land, Robinson, McConnell and King. A public meeting of citizens was held that night. The next day the founders inspected and accepted grounds generously donated by Hon. Williamson Dunn. A light snow having fallen, those men of faith knelt on its spotless surface amid the virgin forest and dedicated the spot to the Triune God, being led in prayer by Mr. Ellis.
We are not giving a history of the college, except as touching the career of Mr. Hovey, who from that day till the day of his death was identified with it in various ways. His name headed the list of clerical trustees and remained there for forty-five years. He was on the charter committee and the building committee, and was the man designated to secure the services of Caleb Mills as first instructor. The original suggestion was to found "a classical and English high school, rising into a college." The charter name, however, was "The Wabash Manual Labor College and Teachers' Seminary"; wisely shortened at a later day to its simpler form of "Wabash College."
After a brief period Mr. Hovey bade his parishioners in Fountain county farewell, took an appointment as financial agent for the college, embarked with his wife and infant son at Covington, descended the Wabash to its mouth, and then went up the Ohio to Louisville, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh. Few encouraged him. Dr. Lyman Beecher "frowned on the infant weakling of a college." Swarms of agents were ahead of him at the Presbyterian General Assembly in Philadelphia and the "May anniversaries" in New York. Efforts at Baltimore, Boston, Providence and New Haven were fruitless.
A memorable crisis found Mr. Hovey at the Tontine Hotel in New Haven, "with an empty purse and no hope and every door closed." He wrote to Crawfordsville, resigning all connection with the college, saying that
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he should return to his mission field in Fountain county as soon as he got money enough to do so. He signed this affecting letter, "Yours at the point of desperation." Concerning it President Tuttle has impressively remarked : "If that letter had been sent, the college would have perished. It was not sent and the college lived."
It is due to the memory of Rev. John M. Ellis to relate the fact that he happened in on the discouraged agent just at this time, and made the wise suggestion that, before mailing his letter, he should confer with the faculty of Yale College. President Woolsey has described the interview. The early struggles of Yale were rehearsed and words of encouragement were spoken. Then followed an interview with the faculty of Andover Seminary, who ad- vised an appeal to the rural churches of New England. A circular was printed on behalf of "a region equal to Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island, where the first settlements had been made only twelve years previ- ously, yet where there was now a population of one hundred thousand."
The plan was effective. The first response was from Amesbury Mills, being fifty dollars. Then from Newburyport came four hundred and twenty- five dollars. Other New England towns gave several thousand dollars in all, and the crisis was safely past.
The task of finding a president was even harder than trying to raise money. Dr. Absalom Peters suggested the name of Dr. Elihu W. Baldwin, the most popular pastor in New York City. Bravely the Hoosier agent met the eminent clergyman, saying, "The King's business requires haste. I ask you to be the president of Wabash College." A map of Indiana was spread out, and the claims of the new commonwealth were urged till finally consent was gained, followed by a unanimous election. Thus encouraged the financial problem was successfully solved.
The fact may here be stated that, after Dr. Baldwin's death in 1840, Mr. Hovey was again deputed to secure the services of Dr. Charles White, of Owego, New York; and after Dr. White's death, twenty years later, he went on a like errand for Dr. J. F. Tuttle, of New Jersey. Some of the other members of the faculty were gained by his instrumentality. From the first the trustees urged Mr. Hovey himself to take a professorship. In 1834 they offered him the chair of the Natural Sciences, and Mr. Ellis urged it on him, saying "your standing in Indiana, your acquaintance with the business con- cerns of the institution, your familiarity with the minutiae of all its parts at home and abroad, as well as your personal endowments, all render you em-
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phatically the man." Distrusting his gifts, Mr. Hovey at first took the chair of Rhetoric; but in 1836 was led to become the professor of Chemistry, Geology and Mineralogy. This department was divided in 1871, leaving Geology alone to him for the rest of his days. A pioneer college man must do whatever has to be done; from mending a gate to teaching astronomy. Mr. Hovey was accustomed to say, in his old age, that he had taught every- thing in the curriculum except the differential and integral calculus.
From 1833 to 1839 he was the college librarian, during which period he collected and catalogued several thousand volumes. His services as treasurer covered twenty-six years, enabling him to turn over to his successor, Alex- ander Thomson, Esq., the sum of one hundred thousand dollars. He per- sonally superintended the erection of the first frame building, now known as Forest Hall; the original brick building, styled South Hall; the main building, known as Center Hall; and, with General Carrington, the Armory, since turned into the Hovey Museum, and now used as a gymnasium. His early knowledge of farming enabled him to aid the agricultural experiments under- taken during the "manual labor" period. Together with President White he mustered the boys for tree-planting so that a younger growth of elms, maples and beeches might replace the monarchs of the primeval forest as the latter fell to decay. At his suggestion the first college band was formed, under the leadership of Philyer L. Wells; and he himself selected, at the house of Firth, Hall & Pond, in New York city, the bugle, horns, trombones, flutes, clarinets, drums, etc., that were stored in his attic during long vaca- tions.
When the first site of fifteen acres was deemed unsuitable Mr. Hovey, acting for the trustees, bought for six thousand dollars a quarter section from Major Whitlock and sold a hundred acres of it at auction for nine thousand dollars, keeping the remainder as a college reserve. Payment was in "wild- cat" bills, which the hard-money Major refused to accept. Then Mr. Hovey went to Cincinnati, exchanged the bills for specie, took the silver dollars home, by mud-wagon from Indianapolis, in six square boxes, each containing one thousand dollars; had Tom Kelly, a tenant of the college, carry them in a wheelbarrow to Major Whitlock, who counted them, dollar by dollar, and then gave his receipt for the sum.
On one of the lots of the "college reserve" the Hovey house was built in 1837, space for it being cleared from the virgin forest. A number of the big trees were allowed to stand, around some of which wild grapevines twined fantastically burdened with many clusters. This property .remained
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for sixty years in the hands of the family, and was finally sold as an elegible site for a presidential mansion, the original dwelling being removed to a place near the gymnasium to be used by the curator of the college campus.
One night the five year old son of Mr. Hovey awoke his father with the strange cry, "Papa, why does God let Wabash College burn up?"
In Professor Hovey's diary the following record occurs, for the 23rd of September, 1838: "About two o'clock this morning the cry of 'Fire, the College is on fire' was heard, and by half past two the whole roof and fourth story of our beautiful building was in a complete blaze." Only eight rooms were saved; but the library and philosophical apparatus were destroyed. That calamity was on Saturday, and on Monday rooms were rented in Hanna's Building, and by Tuesday recitations were resumed, only a single student hav- ing left by reason of the conflagration. The generous men of Crawfords- . ville rallied to the rescue, saying, "Rebuild and we will help." The friends of President Baldwin in New York urged him to resume his pastorate in that city, but he nobly said: "I will not give up Wabash College; there is only the more work to be done."
Among the new friends raised up for Wabash College in its time of need should be mentioned Mr. and Mrs. Israel Williams, who were inmates of Mr. Hovey's family in 1840-41, with their daughter, who afterward became Mrs. S. S. Thomson. Mr. Williams endowed the professorship bearing his name, and he induced his brother-in-law, Mr. Chauncey Rose, of Terre Haute, to endow the Rose professorship of Geology, whereof Mr. Hovey was the first incumbent. Through the hands of the latter Mr. Rose passed a sum total of eighty thousand dollars for benevolent purposes, though not all this sum was for the college. One day, when putting into his hands fifty thousand dollars he playfully said, "Here Mr. Hovey are two thousand dol- lars more as your commission and for your own use."
The Lord had already guided more than one benefactor to the treasur- er's cottage. There one evening the prudential committee knelt in prayer because debts were due and the treasury empty. A knock at the door brought to them Mr. Jesse J. Brown, of New Albany, with an offering in cash that exactly met their need. An incident comes to mind when at another crisis, Mr. Hovey had been pleading in vain in Brooklyn, till footsore and heartsore he dropped in to the weekly prayer-meeting of the Plymouth church and meekly took a back seat. The topic was "Cheerfulness," and after the open- ing remarks he took occasion to thank the pastor and people for past gener- osity to the college of which Mr. Beecher had long been a trustee. "Come
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to the platform," said Beecher. The final result of the appeal that followed was a gift of ten thousand dollars to found the Beecher professorship.
The hospitality of the Hovey home was abundant. A dozen nephews and nieces were treated like sons and daughters. Several orphans were prac- tically adopted, one of whom afterward was the wife of Professor D. A. Bassett. The house was full of student-boarders, not for gain, but by par- ental urging. Some of them distinguished themselves in public life. All were required by domestic rules to bow daily at the family altar where prayer was wont to be made.
The humble nucleus of the college cabinet was a lot of ores and crystals brought by Mrs. Hovey from Vermont, augmented by tropical shells donated by Mrs. Baldwin, and specimens purchased from Prof. S. Harrison Thomson, in 1841. One day the little son of Prof. Hovey brought to his father what looked like a petrified toad, but which the wiser father identified as a crinoid- the first found of all the many thousand Crawfordsville crinoids that have enriched the museums of this and foreign lands. Corey's Bluff, the best known of the crinoid banks, yet remains in the possession of the family. In 1874, aided by his son and daughter, Dr. Hovey made out a numbered cata- logue of ten thousand specimens for reference, with a written statement that there were in all some twenty-five thousand objects of natural history in the college cabinet. This included several hundred minerals, fossils and shells, and over two thousand botanical specimens indigenous to the region, that had been a memorial gift from his son. The varied cares of a busy professional life left this pioneer geologist scant time for describing or classifying the pro- fusion of fossiliferous riches by which he was embarrassed. A volume might be filled with his correspondence about them with such men as Silliman, Dana, Shepherd, Newberry, James Hall, Cox, Collett, and other scientists. Oc- casional articles from his pen found their way to the newspapers and maga- zines ; but he had little time for the joys of authorship. A few of his sermons were published, and but few were left in manuscript, though he frequently occupied the pulpit, always being heard with attention by his intelligent hearers. It may be said that his sermonic appeals, like his own type of piety, were more intellectual than emotional. At its centennial celebration Dart- mouth College honored him with the degree of Doctor of Divinity. His friends felt that it was merited.
Dr. Hovey passed away after a short illness on the 10th of March, 1877. Mrs. Hovey survived him for several years, ending her useful life July 12, 1886, amid the familiar surroundings of the old home.
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Two children were born to them. One of these, Horace Carter Hovey, was born in Fountain county, January 28, 1833 ; and a sketch of his career ap- pears elsewhere in this volume. Miss Mary Freeman Hovey, the daughter of Professor Hovey, was born at Crawfordsville, September 28, 1838, where she died June 4, 1897. She was a graduate of the Ohio Female College ; for several years was a professor in the Kansas Agricultural College; taught for three or four years in the public schools in New Haven, Connecticut, but was best known by her faithful work as a teacher of young ladies, in her home at Craw- fordsville, where, first and last she had under her care more than two hundred and fifty pupils. There are now living three grandchildren of Professor Hovey, one of them a namesake on whom his mantle has fallen, namely, Ed- mund Otis Hovey, Ph. D., a graduate of Yale University, and for the last twenty years a curator of Geology and Paleontology in the American Mu- seum of Natural History in New York City.
In the front wall of Center church, in Crawfordsville, a memorial win- dow has been placed in honor of Professor Hovey; and a granite monument marks his resting-place in the beautiful Oak Hill cemetery. But his most en- during monument is found in the noble work he did for religion and educa- tion. Montgomery county never had a more public-spirited citizen, though he never sought or held office outside the college and the church. This sketch of his career may be fittingly closed by condensing the just tribute paid to him in the funeral discourse preached over his remains by the late President Tuttle :
"Honored by his Alma Mater with her highest degree; honored as a preacher of the Word by his brethren in the ministry; honored by the com- munity as an old Roman of the noblest type; honored by the church which he helped to found, and in which for thirty-eight years he was a pillar ; honored as a founder, a trustee and a professor of Wabash College; honored with many other great trusts, all who knew him were witnesses that the consum- mate formula describing his life among men was: 'Faithful in the Lord.' His last years were singularly beautiful ; as when maples in autumn are cov- ered with dying leaves they are also lit up by supernal beauty. He moved among us tender, simple and loving as a child, trusting and joyful as a saint, fond of earth and most tenderly held by its ties, yet with lifted eye and shining face, and his head wearing the crown of glory which the loving God had given him."
The privileged by-standers heard his expiring cry voice his ruling passion, "God bless Wabash College," after which simply came the parting prayer, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."
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DAVID CHARLES SMITH.
Few can draw rules for their own guidance from the pages of Plutarch, but all are benefited by the delineation of those traits of character which find scope and exercise in the common walks of life. The unostentatious routine of private life, although in the aggregate more important for the welfare of the community than any meteoric public career, cannot, from its very nature, figure in the public annals, though each locality's history should contain the names of those individuals who contribute to the success of the material affairs of a community and to its public stability; men who lead wholesome and exemplary lives which might be profitably studied by the on- coming generation. In such class must consistently appear the name of David Charles Smith, well known and progressive business man of Craw- fordsville, and one of Montgomery county's most representative citizens, a man who leads a plain, industrious life, endeavoring to deal honestly with his fellow men and contribute somewhat to the general public good in an unobtrusive manner, for being a man who thinks along progressive lines, he naturally desires to see his community advance along material and civic lines, and, although a very busy man, he has never neglected his duty as a citi- zen, but has been one of the men who could be relied upon in the promul- gation of such enterprises as make for the general good.
Mr. Smith was born on October 22, 1843, in Perrysville, Indiana, and he is a son of John Frederick and Lydia Ann (Watt) Smith. The father was born in Frederick county, Virginia, in September, 1812, and was a son of David and Susan (Hunsicker) Smith. David Smith was a native of Virginia and there he continued to reside until 1832, when he made the journey to Indiana on horseback, and here bought a farm and returned home, bringing his family here in the fall of 1833, making this trip in wagons, which required some time, owing to the fact that the only roads in many places were unbroken trails, and it was exceedingly rough going all the way. Upon reaching Brownsburg, Mr. Smith was compelled to leave his wife and one daughter, in order to have horses enough to draw the wagons on to where he desired to settle. John F. Smith, the oldest son, drove the six- horse team. The place where they located was on a farm two and one-half miles south of Perrysville, and there, by hard work a good farm was de- veloped from the wilderness and a comfortable home established, and there David Smith and wife spent the rest of their lives.
John F. Smith spent his boyhood days in Virginia, where he received a
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good, common school education, and among other things he learned survey- ing, and after coming to Indiana he followed this vocation in the summer and taught school in the winter, continuing thus for two years, then estab- lished a general store at Perrysville, which he conducted with great success for a period of about thirty-three years, enjoying an extensive trade with the people of that section for miles around. During this time he was also interested in the milling business, and he shipped large quantities of grain to New Orleans in flat-boats, Mr. Smithi often going along on the boat and returning on horseback. He also sold agricultural implements for many years, and was a general business man, very successful in whatever he turned his attention to and one of the leading citizens of Perrysville in every respect. That town in those days was a great shipping point. Our subject has seen as many as five boats unloading there simultaneously. Hogs in large num- bers were also butchered there and shipped to New Orleans, finding a ready market there. These various lines of business Mr. Smith carried on until 1885, when, having accumulated a competency, he retired. His death oc- curred in 1892, after a very active, successful, noble and praiseworthy life. He was one of the best known and most highly esteemed citizens of his county. Politically, he was a Whig and later a Republican, and in religious matters a Methodist.
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