History of Randolph County, Indiana with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers : to which are appended maps of its several townships, Part 54

Author: Tucker, Ebenezer
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Chicago : A.L. Klingman
Number of Pages: 664

USA > Indiana > Randolph County > History of Randolph County, Indiana with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers : to which are appended maps of its several townships > Part 54

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Rev. Daniel Worth, Wesleyan, West River, born in North Caro- lina in 1795; moved to Sullivan County, Ind., in 1822; Randolph County, Ind., in 1823. He married, first, Elizabeth Swain, and afterward. Huldalı (Swain) Cudi. He had eight children. He was Justice many years, and was Senator and Representative for Randolph County. He was a preacher-first, Methodist Episco- pal, then Wesleyan, and an earnest Abolitionist. He was active, impulsive, firm. He spent years in preaching and lecturing upon temperance and anti-slavery, and it is claimed of him that he did more of that labor during his life than any other man of his time in the State. In his later years, he went as a mission- ary preacher to portions of his native State, North Carolina. There was originally a large native anti-slavery element there, and some of it was yet alive, and Wesleyan missionaries went to that region and formed several Wesleyan churches. Daniel Worth went to preach to these churches. He was arrested and thrown into prison, technically, for having sold or given to some- body there a copy of "Helper's Work," then lately published, on the charge of inciting slaves to insurrection, the penalty for which was death. He finally was bailed out and came away. He died not very long after. His second wife is living still, at Fountain City, Ind. Mr. Worth was active in the work of what, was called the Underground Railroad. He was wonderfully en- ergetic in the work of well-doing, entering into the labors for Christ and humanity with all his might. His first wife. Eliza- beth Swain, was born May 27, 1798, and died May 12, 1858. His second marriage took place May 19, 1859. His imprison- inent lasted four months and six days. The expenses of his prosecution were about $1,000. His death took place in Foun- tain City, Ind., December 12, 1862. The children of Daniel and Elizabeth Worth were these: Emily, born January 1, 1819, died September 27, 1822: Edmund B., born June 7, 1821, died October 22, 1822: Emily (second), born May 6, 1824; Sarah, born January 3, 1827; Rhoda, born October 24, 1829; William, born February 23, 1832; Lydia, born November 1, 1834; Mary K., born February 4, 1839.

. J Rev. Hosea C. Tillson, of Bethel, Wayne Co , Ind., was never a resident of Randolph, but he was a pioneer preacher of moro than fifty years ago, and much of his early work lay among the old-time settlers of Randolph. He read a paper at a preachers' meeting held at Spartansburg, Randolph Co., Ind., February 2, 1882 (by the Disciples), and from that essay we take an abstract containing reminiscences of great interest from an eye witness and actual worker in the enterprise of evangelizing the wilder- ness and plauting the Gospel among the forest pioneers in this region. Mr. Tillson says: "The outfit of a pioneer preacher was a large supply of the love of God shed abroad in his heart by

RESIDENCES AND TANNERY OF C. GUTHEIL SHORT ST. WINCHESTER, RANDOLPH CO. IND.

RES.OF ANDREW J. STAKEBAKE

WINCHESTER, INDIANA

RES. OF DR. CHARLES JAQUA

SOUTH WARD

NOATH WARD

J.T CHENOWETH J.J.BATES JNO.L.STAKEBAKE

SCHOOL BOARD

CENTRAL BUILDING - WINCHESTER PUBLIC SCHOOL BUILDINGS. «

E. H. BUTLER, SUPT.

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HISTORY OF RANDOLPH COUNTY.

the Holy Spirit, a pocket Bible, a hymn book, a horse, a pair of saddle-bags and a large cape overcost to keep warm in winter and to shed rain in summer, tied on behind the saddle when not needed. He took no umbrella, because it could not be used riding through the thick woods."

Mr. T. began to serve in the ministry in 1830. He preached first at Lebanon, Warren Co., Ohio, traveling to Cincinnati and Kentucky, crossing the river again at Aurora, Dearborn Co., Ind., and going thence to Wayne County, preaching and also working at his trade as a cooper.

In 1830, he first preached in Randolph County. He says: " A small settlement had been formed on the Little Mississinewa, four miles north of where Union City now is. My old school- teacher and other friends had moved up there into the woods. James Wickersham, James Skinner and Thomas Wiley were among them. I preached there to twenty persons, which was all there were in the neighborhood." Returning home through New- burg (Spartansburg), he left an appointment to preach there, in June, which he fulfilled. Some of the Friends had moved to Fort Wayne, and he was invited to visit that place, which he accom- plished in August, making a three days' horseback ride through the wilderness, and thence six miles down the river, where the meeting was held in a cabin on the banks of the stream. He says: "On Sunday morning, large canoes came sailing on the river, loaded with people, and landed near, filling the cabin. One woman asked for immersion. Her request was granted, which was supposed to be the first baptism in the waters of the beauti- ful Maumee." Returning, scarce of money, he fed on blackber- ries and baited his horse on the wild grass, and, at other times, he ate black haws, thinking of John the Baptist and his "locusts and wild honey."

He continued his visits to the settlement north of Union City, in 1837, accompanied by the two Harlans, and, in 1838, began to baptize into the faith of Jesus. The settlement had increased and a cabin would not hold the people, and the men made a booth of bushes at the cabin door, with fence rails for seats, while the preachers' horses stood tied to the trees, eating corn brought in their saddle-bags. We quote again, in substance: "The first week in January, 1840, the meeting was held in Thomas Wiley's hewed-log house before his large log-heap fire. Brother Wiley cut the ice & foot thick, and, in a heavy snow storm, we baptized James Wickersham and his wife and some others, and, at night, several more by the light of hickory bark torches, thus getting both my suits of clothes wet, but Sister Wiley had them well dried by morning. In the spring of 1842, we ordained Thomas Wiley and Charles Smith Elders of the church there by the laying on of hands." In 1840, he was called by Jonathan Thomas to preach at his new saw-mill, on Clear Creek, east of Deerfield, at which place he continued to preach for three years with much success. He preached also at Brook's Creek, in Jay County, and at Petersburg and Walnut Corner, Randolph County.

South Salem, Springboro (north of Lynn), etc., were begun about the same time. He states: "We were called to Joel Howe's cabin, in the edge of the big woods west of Spartansburg, in the summer of 1839. An acre was cleared, a loose plank floor was in the cabin, but the cracks were not stopped. A large sycamore gum stood near, with a hole cut in one side for a smoke-house. The first two meetings, not more than eight persons were present, but in the early winter, at the third or fourth appointment, the house was so full of people that we could scarce get in. They had come from the settlements south out of curiosity. But the Lord was there in the power of the Spirit, and tears flowed freely. At night, we preached at Davis' Schoolhouse, south of Spartans- burg, to a crowded house."

Shortly afterward, at the same house, and at Brother Silas Davis' dwelling, two meetings were held at the same hour by Brothers Valentine Harlan and Tillson, and two brethren, John Starling and Nathan Hedgepeth, were baptized at Davis' Spring. "Soon after that, Bethpage Meeting-House was built and a great work spread through all that region. * * * Iam the last one of the pioneer preachers left on the shores of time in these parts, and I am 'only waiting till the shadows are a little longer grown.'" Mr. T. baptized many believers, some years

more than 200. He says in his paper: "The old horse was dead long ago. The old saddie was torn up in 1843 (when I was out with Brother Franklin), but here is the old saddle-bags and Father Harlan's old hymn-book, like the one I had, and here is the old cape overcoat; and last, and best of all, here is the old backwoods preacher in good health and with as warm & heart for the prosperity of Zion as he had fifty years ago."

Mr. Tillson's description of the bluff pioneers, who were the agents in God's hand for causing the beginning of the Gospel of the Kingdom in those wildernesses is very quaint and striking:

" Joel Howe, taking his little sorrel mare with rope-rein bridle and sheep-skin saddle, and going to Bethel (eight miles) one Sunday morning dressed in home-spun clothes of flax and tow, with straw hat and feet all bare, was the angel of mercy appointed to be the herald of salvation that should open the gates of the New Jerusalem to that infant community. James Wicker- sham and James Skinner, two poor brethren coming down to Whitewater to buy breadstuff, urged me to come up on the Little Mississinewa and break to their famishing souls the bread of eternal life. Sister Nancy Leabo, at Walnut Corner, whose husband died, leaving her to struggle on in poverty and want, called me there to preach his funeral. Jonathan Thomas, in his shanty built of rough plank, urged me to come and speak the words of heavenly consolation to himself and his neighbors, east of Deerfield. The meetings there were held, first in a Metho- dist brother's cabin, then at the saw-mill, the men seated on the logs in the mill-yard like pigeons in the trees. When preaching on Bear Creek, northwest of Winchester, Brother James Level and wife came on horseback nine miles to meeting on Sunday morning, returning at evening. Souls were 'hungry for the Word' in those times and would endure hardships to reach the spots of blessing, where stood the servants of Christ to feed the eager, waiting crowds with the bread furnished from the Mas- ter's hand." Mr. T. is now (1882) about seventy-eight years old.

CHAPTER XII.

EDUCATION.

GENERAL-ASSOCIATION-SEMINARY-UNION LITERARY INSTITUTE -NORMAL SCHOOLS-INSTITUTES-TEACHERS' ASSOCIATION- FUNDS-SCHOOLS-STATISTICS-PRIVATE SCHOOLS-TRUSTEES- MUSIC-LECTURES-SUNDAY SCHOOLS-LIBRARIES.

GENERAL.

THE pioneers of Randolph were but poorly situated for edu- T cation. Many of them came from North Carolina, where schools were few and far between. Still, even there, especially among the Friends, some schools were to be found, and it was not long after the early settlers had planted themselves in theso woods till they began to provide, as they could, for the enlight- enment of the rising generation. During the second year of their residence in their new homes, the first group of pioneers had erected a building, for the double purpose of the worship of God and the instruction of youth. In fact, these two things have been, in American history, almost inseparably connected. All through the country, both in New England and the Sunny South, as well in the distant West as in the central East, on the rugged hillsides or in the smiling valleys, either the religious meeting was held in the schoolhouse, or the school was "kept" in the church. For it has been constantly a feature of the Christian religion to welcome and to foster knowledge and in- telligence. And not seldom it has happened that the school and the church have waited for neither schoolhouse nor meeting- house. but have established themselves around the very hearths of the settlers. Some wife and mother, more intelligent than the rest, who, in her bright and sunny girlhood beyond the Eastern mountains, had outstripped her rivals in reading and spelling, and who had not forgotten her learning, would "set up a school " in her own cabin and receive the attendance of the children of her neighbors, and, amid her household cares, find time for the

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HISTORY OF RANDOLPH COUNTY.

additional labor incident to the giving of instruction. Rude, in- deed, according to the modern standard, were these backwoods schools. The houses, the fixtures, the books, were all of the simplest, plainest, most inexpensive kind. A pole cabin hastily erected was good enongh for the building. Split saplings, with legs inserted in auger holes at each end, answered for the seats; puncheons were amply sufficient for the floor and the door, and for the writing desks as well, laid against the wall upon pins driven into holes bored in the logs of the cabin; a dirt hearth and clay jambs (or no jambs at all), and a stick and dirt chim- ney, were "just the thing" to hold the piles of wood, and lead off into the upper air the smoke from the huge fires that gave meager warmth to the shivering urchins hovering around them; the light made its struggling way through "sheets of greased paper " pasted over a space made by leaving out a log along the whole side of the house. Great fires were kept up against the rude back walls by wood supplied in abundance from the sur- rounding forest, since the older boys would chop and carry for the purpose all needed fuel from day to day at morning or at noon. Books were few and various. A Dilworth's or a Web- ster's spelling book, a Testament, a Murray's English Reader, or a "Sequel," or possibly some stray history, or question-and-an- swer geography, the Life of Washington or Franklin, or what not, would suffice for a reader; Talbot or Pike, or some still older text-book, on arithmetic, or a slate and pencil itself alone, answered for teaching "figgers," while for writing, an inkstand filled with the juice of pokeberry, or oak bark, or witch hazel boiled with copperas, a goose-quill picked up in the fence corner or plucked from the wing of a goose, a pewter plummet for rul- ing the coarse and heavy paper, and possibly a ruler itself, whit- tled and smoothed from a piece of straight hickory or sugar tree, and in one case in fifty, mayhap, a bona fide pen-knife. These things, some or all of them, made the happy school-boy prouder than a king's son.

Such appliances for school improvement seem to the present generation to be worthless, and fit only to be laughed at; yet it is a fact worthy of food for serious reflection that, by those prim- itive methods, the active, entorprising, energetic, successful men and women of the past and the present, the fathers and the grandfathers of the young people of to-day, who possibly despise those rude and ancient times; that by such rough and rugged discipline as this did they gain the knowledge and the training which make them what they are and have been. Some of the most intelligent of the present elder generation never went to school a day in their lives in a schoolhouse that contained a single pane of glass. And the fact is adapted to humble our pride in the gay and costly things which modern extravagance furnishes to assist in "teaching the young idea how to shoot," inasmuch as the products of those meager instrumentalities seem in many respects superior to the results which, coming from our grand and magnificent palaces, sacred to learning and improve- ment, we do now behold. So true it is, though the fact is little realized nor appreciated that education is accomplished, not by teachers nor by books, nor by splendid and costly houses and appliances, but by earnest, persistent personal action, by con- stant, laborious, thorough self-development. The poet says, "Who would be free, themselves must strike the blow," and the same truth holds in all human results. Who would be wise, or great, or good, himself must work out the grand result. God and friends and nature may aid, may furnish power and genius and opportunity, but the work itself can spring alone from the head and heart of him who desires the sublime consummation. At Arba and at Jericho, the first scholars were taught in pole- cabin meeting-houses. In Jackson Township, the first was had in the house of a settler, and taught by his worthy wife. In some places, rough buildings were erected on purpose for schools, while not seldom,' other edifices, as empty dwellings, old field cabins, or even stables themselves, were fitted up, and the chil- dren were gathered therein and taught the rudiments of an En- glish education.

Laughable, indeed, were some of the attempts at school- keeping in those old-time "woods colleges." In many cases, "readin' and spellin' " were the limits of what the school-master

dared to undertake. And the books and the classes -- they were wonderful in their variety. Whatever a pupil brought, that he used; and no high-fangled teacher nor nosing school committee interfered to "shut down" on the pleasure of parents or of pu- pils; but, as in the days of Israel of old, "every one did that which was right in his own eyes." It might chance, indeed, that a presuming youth, fresh from the schools of "Yankee Land," (though such an event was almost never known), would venture, with his armful of books, to enter the school-room door, think- ing that his "Yankee books " would surely "pass muster " " out West." But no; the teacher would examine briefly, and bluntly say, " Them, ar books ain't no use-take 'em home and keep 'em thar."

One of the prominent men of the county gives an amusing experience in this respect. His parents had just come to the West from "Old Massachusetts." The boy, perhaps, ten or twelve years old, marched proudly to the sylvaa temple of wis- dom, with his armful of New England books-Colburn's Menta! Arithmetic and Adams' New Arithmetic, those mathematical gems of olden time; Greenleaf's Grammar, Goodrich's Reader (perhaps), Smith's Geography, etc. The teacher, a long, lank, gaunt, ungainly fellow, rapped on the window. The children suddenly ceased playing, and, crying, "It's booke! it's books;" ran pell-mell into the log schoolhouse. School began. The teacher came along, eying askance the formidable pile of books; and fingering the one that lay on top-" Old Zerah Colburn," he opened the volume, and, leating it over awhile, broke out, "Boy, take that ar book home and tell your 'pap' to burn it up. The man what made it did not know what he was about, and couldn't do his own sums." (The work has no answers). Tak- ing up the grammar, he said, "That seems like it mought be a good enough book, but grammar ain't teached here, and you kin take that home too." Next came Adams' New Arithmetic, at that time one of the best text-books on arithmetic in existence. Turning the leaves over one by one, he drawled out, at length, "This is some better; the man knows how to do about half his sums. But see here; take that ar book home too, and tell your 'pap' to send Pike's or Talbot's 'Rethmetic. Them's the kind we use." And so with the rest. He made a clean sweep of the books, and the poor, crest-fallen boy, chagrined beyond measure that his "Yankee books" had thus summarily passed under utter condemnation, went home at night (or perhaps at noon) and made report to his astonished father of the reception which had been accorded to the books he had so proudly lugged to school in the morning.

But there were good teachers even then, and the memory of some is still preserved, and their work remains, and will still grow and increase for ages yet to come. The proverb is, "Good teacher, good school," or again, " Like master, like scholar," and in some cases, even in these rough and unsightly edifices, in spite of every obstacle, and notwithstanding every drawback, teaching work was accomplished, the methods and the results of which would not disgrace the finest and the most costly modern school edifice in the land.

Notwithstanding the wise and substantial foundations laid in the original constitution of Indiana, there appears to have arisen in the commonwealth a kind of jealousy against what were call the rich, for fear they might get more than their share of school advantages; and so, in the constitution of 1851, the county sem. inaries were killed, and the funds which had been previously devoted to their support were transferred to the public common school fund. This would seem to have been unwise, since the nid thereby rendered to the general fund would be almost in- finitesimal, while yet, under the arrangements of the old consti- tution, a seminary might by that means have been kept in effi- cient working order.

Yet so it was, and the seminary, as a county institution, fell under the condemnation of the dear people, and was obliged to cease thereafter forever to be.

ASSOCIATION.

The first association for educational purposes in Randolph County, so far as now known, was formed by a company of en-

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HISTORY OF RANDOLPH COUNTY.

terprising gentlemen of Winchester and vicinity (as appears by the books of the County Recorder) in 1827. Their names were as follows: Thomas Wright, Jr., William Wright, Paul W. Way, Abner Overman, David Heaston, Caleb Odle, Thomas Hanna, Jonathan Hiatt, Jehu Robinson, David Haworth, Aaron Dolby, John Odle, John B. Wright, Jonathan Hiatt, Sr., Albert Banta, James Davis, Jonathan Edwards, William Edwards, John Wright, Jacob Porson, David Wright.

The record is as stated below:

"We, the undersigned, citizens of the State of Indiana and of Randolph County, being aware of the importance of school education, do mutually covenant and agree to and with each other, to form ourselves into a society, under the name of the Winchester School Association, and to elect ont of our body three Trustees to manage the business of the society. August 21, 1827."

Paul W. Way was chosen Secretary, but who were made Trustees does not appear.

This movement would seem creditable on the part of the citi- zens of Winchester. Eight years or less only had elapsed since that town had been staked out in the heavy, unbroken forest, and very few families had yet made their homes in that village in the woods, so that most of the persons named must have re- sided outside the town.

It would have been a matter of interest to have discovered the record of the proceedings of this association, that we might have known, who live in these latter days, what those worthy pioneers were able to accomplish. But no record is known to be extant, and we can only conjecture their action.

Before the new constitution of 1851, the school system of In- diana was chiefly in embryo. Many of the school sections were sold only between 1840 and 1850, and schools were few, and mostly not very efficient. Nearly all the schools were supported (and very poorly, at that) by subscription. Some of these select schools, indeed, were not inefficient; and it is confidently claimed, and probably not without some degree of truth, that the rate of progress in those early places of instruction was far greater than in the ordinary general schools of the present day. The reasons of the fact (if it be one) are not hard to be found.

COUNTY SEMINARY.

One thing was provided for under the old constitution, in- «leed, and, to a great extent, carried out, in the establishment of county seminaries, which might well have been suffered to re- main, even to the present day. Almost every young man, and young woman as well, of that former time, who, later in life, has approved himself as a man of mark, was helped to start in the race of usefulness and renown in those same despised and re- jected county seminaries. And, had they been continued and maintained in their true spirit, and according to the ideal of their establishment, they would have stood to-day, in general efficiency for the improvement of the whole community, far above anything which the modern graded school or high school of the villages and cities has been able to accomplish. But in the con- vention of 1850, stinginess, or, to express the thing still more exactly, penny-wisdom and pound-foolishness, prevailed, and the seminaries were slaughtered.

The poor man cut off his own nose to spite his face, and, for fear some rich man's son might chance to go to school at the seminary, the poor cut themselves off from every possible oppor- tunity of higher education which had been within their reach. Rich men, indeed, could do without the seminaries, since they could send their children far away, if need be; but the poor man could not. Their opportunity must be near at hand, or it can avail them nothing. And thus it would have been.

The county seminary, established by public aid, and fostered and strengthened by privato as well as public favor and support, would have been, as it were, a means of higher education, con- stantly within the reach of every youth who should have the least desire to break forth from the dungeons of ignorance into the light and freedom of wisdom and intelligence; and the poor would have availed themselves of the opportunity far oftener than the rich.

But so it was. Demagogism prevailed, and the hen that laid the golden egg was killed, and, as in the old Grecian fable, nothing was found to reward the slaughterers for their murder- ous deed; so in this case no good was accomplished for the com- mon schools to warrant the wholesale and remorseless extinction of the obnoxious county seminaries.

The same spirit that killed the seminaries ruled for a long time, and checked and choked the rising desire for learning; so that, for years, aided by the preposterous decision of the Su- preme Court, communities were forbidden to tax themselves for the education of their own children. The idea that people can empower their trustees to levy taxes at discretion, under a con- stitution that forbids them to do the same thing themselves, is ridiculous enough. But such was the spirit of the time in high places. And while money could be spent in all manner of non- sense, none could be expended in raising the public mind out of darkness into light, and in chasing away the evils and curses at- tending ever upon ignorance and vice. I venture an opinion that it is as unconstitutional to-day to empower Trustees or Commissioners to use their discretion in taxation as it is or was for the people at large to be allowed to do the same thing. But the old-fogy decisions of a dark age could not kill, though they did seriously check, the rising spirit of knowledge, nor wholly restrain the advancing public sentiment of the era; and so the body of the people pay ungrudgingly enormous taxes for the sup- port of schools for the whole people. Though the methods of application may be, perhaps, susceptible of improvement, yet the public mind of the time feels an eagerness for knowledge and a determination to raise high the standard of intelligence. Es- pecially are the poor beginning to see that, if the rich are will- ing to tax themselves for the elevation of the masses it is not for them, the poor, to complain or object, since the measure is simply and almost wholly for the special benefit of the poor themselves. It has been claimed for years. that, notwithstanding the ancient drawbacks, Indiana has the best school system in the United States. This boast may be founded on fact, or it may not. One thing, at least, is true, that her schools of to-day are immeasur- ably superior to those of fifty or even thirty years ago. Some- where in this volume may be found a racy sketch of a " woods school " in Randolph County, taught by no less a personage than Hon. N. Cadwallader, late Senator, and banker of Union City, Ind., said school taught by our worthy fellow-citizen in the year of grace 1845, only thirty-five years ago. But the skotch is so rich that it will bear reproducing, and we will tell the story again, partly in his own words:

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History of Randolph County, Indiana with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers : to which are appended maps of its several townships, Part 54

Author: Tucker, Ebenezer Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Chicago : A.L. Klingman Number of Pages: 664

Author: Tucker, Ebenezer
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Chicago : A.L. Klingman
Number of Pages: 664