USA > Indiana > Northwestern Indiana from 1800 to 1900; or, A view of our region through the nineteenth century > Part 7
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COUNTY ORGANIZATIONS.
dered an election at that same time to be held in these townships. In the returns of this election, for Ross Township, one Lake County name is found, William B. Crooks, receiving twenty-eight votes for justice of the peace. George Cline in Morgan Town- ship for the same office received twenty-six votes, and in Waverly, Elijah Casteel, eleven. So that, in some sort, civil government commenced in 1835 in what be- came Porter and also Lake County. (In 1837 Will- iam B. Crooks was elected an associate judge for Lake County,)
By an act of the State Legislature it was enacted, that after February 1, 1836, a certain "tract of coun- try" should "constitute the county of Porter," thus defined: "Commencing at the northwest corner of La Porte County, thence running south to the Kan- kakee River, thence west with the bed of said river to the center of range 7, thence north to the State line, thence east to the place of beginning." It is not said, north to Lake Michigan, but to the "State line."
At the same session it was enacted, in the same act, that "all that part of the country that lies north of the Kankakee River and west of the county of Porter within the State of Indiana, shall form and con- stitute a new county" to be called Lake.
As sheriff for Porter County Benjamin Saylor was appointed, and an election for county officers was held February 23, 1836, twenty-six votes were that day cast at the house of William Gossett, fifty-five at the house of Isaac Morgan, twenty-four at the house of Morris Wilson, thirty-five at the house of John Spur- lock, and forty at the house of J. G. Jackson.
Elected as county commissioners were: John Safford, Benjamin N. Spencer, and Noah Fouts ;
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NORTHWESTERN INDIANA.
county clerk, George W. Turner; recorder, Cyrus Spurlock; associate judges, L. G. Jackson and James Blair.
The commissioners met April 12, 1836, and di- vided the county into ten townships. At that term they also ordered elections in each township for jus- tices, and appointed three assessors, one John Adams, was for the attached territory, Ross Township or Lake County.
In June, 1836, the county seat of Porter County was located by three commissioners appointed by tlie State Legislature. They selected a place called Por- tersville at that time, where town lots had been laid off, but where no house had then been built. This paper town was on the "southwest quarter of section 24, township 35 north, range 6 west," owned by Ben- jamin McCarty. This proposed town was represented at that time by the Portersville Land Company, of which Benjamin McCarty, Enoch [S.] McCarty, John Walker, William Walker, James Laughlin, John Say- lor, Abram A. Hall, and J. F. D. Lanier were mem- bers.
"How the land company had its origin is now a matter of conjecture." "Whether the other members of the company bought their shares from Benjamin McCarty, or whether they were a gift to them in order to secure their influence, is not known."* Benjamin McCarty, who had been probate judge in La Porte County, who was afterwards prominent in Lake County, was fortunate in securing land in the cen- ter of the county.
*Rev. Robert Beer in " Porter and Lake," 1882.
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COUNTY ORGANIZATIONS.
In October, 1836, was held the first Porter County court, presiding judge, Samuel C. Sample .* This court was held in the house of John Saylor, in the new county seat, where before the year, 1836, closed, there were, it is said, eight houses, some made of logs and some small frame buildings.
4. Next in the order of organization was the County of Lake, already named by the Legislature, and declared by an act of Legislature January 18, 1837, to be an independent county after February 15, 1837.
Lake County, therefore, commenced its independ- ent, organic existence February 16, 1837. March 8, Henry Wells was commissioned as sheriff, and an election for county officers was held March 28. As illustrating the mail facilities of those days it is on record that "a special messenger, John Russell, was sent to Indianapolis to obtain the appointment of a sheriff and authority to hold an election. He made the trip on foot and outstripped the mail .*
Officers elected March 28, 1837 :-
William Clark and William B. Crooks, associate judges ; Amsi L. Ball, Stephen P. Stringham, Thomas Wiles, commissioners; W. A. W. Holton, recorder ; Solon Robinson, clerk; John Russell, assessor.
The county had been divided into three townships, North, Center, and South, before its organization ; justices of the peace were elected for each township; "In North Township, Peyton Russell ; in Center, Hor- ace Taylor, at Cedar Lake, Milo Robinson; and in the South, F. W. Bryant. At the August election,
*Solon Robinson was a juror.
*Lake County, 1872.
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Luman A. Fowler was chosen for sheriff and Robert Wilkinson for probate judge .*
In October of this year the first county circuit court was held by Judge Sample and Associate Judge Clark. A log building, designed for a court house, and long afterward used for that and other purposes, was built in the summer of 1837 by Solon Robinson and his brother, Milo Robinson. In 1839 commissioners ap- pointed, as was customary, by the Legislature, located the county seat at Liverpool, on Deep River, in the northwestern part of the county, on section 24, town- ship 36, range 8, about three miles from the county line and four from Lake Michigan. Dr. Calvin Lilley, on the northeast bank of the Red Cedar Lake, and Solon Robinson, at his village, named at first Lake Court House, had both been applicants, along with George Earle, of Liverpool, for the location. There was so much dissatisfaction among the settlers at the idca of having their county seat in a corner of the county, that a new location was ordered.
In the meantime Dr. Lilley died, and his place came into the hands of Judge Benjamin McCarty, who had been successful in giving a county seat lo- cation to Porter County, and was now, with his large family, a resident in Lake. He laid off town lots, called his home town West Point, and was against Solon Robinson a competitor for the new location. But he was not now in the center of the new county, Solon Robinson was; and the commissioners, Jessc Tomlinson and Edward Moore, of Marion County, Henry Barclay, of Pulaski, Joshua Lindsey, of White, and Daniel Doale, of Carroll County, determined
*There were two pioneers named Robert Wilkinson.
T. H. B.
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that this time the location should be in the center of the county. They therefore located the county seat at Lake Court House, which soon after took the nanie of Crown Point. This was in June, 1840. Solon Robinson and Judge William Clark were the pro- prietors of the new town, which was on section 8, township 34, range 8, as near as could well be to the "geographical center of the county." Area of Lake County, according to Solon Robinson, "five hundred and eight sections of land, about four hundred of which are dry tillable ground."*
5. Jasper. This county, but then including the present Newton and Benton counties, was organized in 1838. It contained then an area of thirteen hundred square miles, and the southern part, which in 1840 became Benton County, was said to include some of the best land in Indiana. Then the large sweep of the Grand Prairie came in at Parrish Grove, and in 1848 this was from "Sugar" to that grove almost a perfect wild of very fertile, unbroken prairie .*
In 1838, the Indians roamed over it "almost un- disturbed in all directions," dotted only here and there, was this broad area, "by a solitary cabin."
In January, 1838, the county commissioners, ap- pointed, met at Robert Alexander's in Parrish Grove. They ordered that the courts should afterwards be held at George W. Spitler's, if the voters consented, and for some time at Spitler's home the courts were
*Lake County Claim Register.
*I crossed this prairie region, staid over night in this grove in the fall of 1848, on the way from the Red Cedar Lake to Crawfordsville, and it was a memorable journey. T. H. B.
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held, till of Jasper County proper, Rensselaer became the county seat.
In March, 1839, two townships were marked out by the commissioners, one called Newton, the other Pinkamink, and an election for May I, was ordered, to be held at the house of Joseph D. Yeoman, in New- ton, and at the house of William Donahoe, in Pink- amink.
The first session of the Jasper circuit court was held at Spitler's, now in Newton County, Judge Isaac Naylor presiding ; Joseph A. Wright, afterward Gov- ernor of Indiana, prosecuting attorney; George W. Spitler, clerk; associate judges, James T. Timmons and Matthew Terwilliger. Present as an attorney at this first term of court was Rufus A. Lockwood, after- ward a noted lawyer who established the claim of John C. Fremont to his Mariposa estate receiving for his fee one hundred thousand dollars.
The first county commissioners were, Joseph Smith, Amos White, and Frederick Renoyer. This first court room in George W. Spitler's house is said to have been sixteen feet square, with the ordinary puncheon floor, on which at night the judges, lawyers, and jury all lodged. In February, 1839, was held the first session of the Jasper Probate Court. Record : "Adjourned-there being no business before the court." In April, 1840, a place at first called Newton, afterwards, Rensselaer, became the county seat.
The first marriage was in the Renoyer Settlement, the ceremony being performed by Squire Jones, of Mud Creek, whose home was thirty miles distant, and the license having been obtained at Williamsport, in Warren County, south of what became Benton County, fifty miles from the house of the Renoyers.
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COUNTY ORGANIZATIONS.
The first grist mill was erected in 1840, by James C. Van Rensselaer, which was considered, at that time, the best mill northwest of Logansport. Dr. John Clark is named as the first physician.
Jasper County, in 1840, comprising then the pres- ent counties of Newton, Benton, and Jasper, returned 138 polls, assessed at $20,347. As late as 1850 the State Gazetteer said : "Jasper is the largest county in the State and contains about 975 square miles ; but Beaver Lake, the Kankakee Marshes, and the Grand Prairie, occupy so large a portion of it that its settle- ment and improvement have hitherto proceeded slowly." In 1840 the population was 1,267; in 1850 about 3,000."
The principal early settlements were five : the set- tlement at the Rapids of the Iroquois ; the Forks Set- tlement, at the union of the Iroquois and Pinkamink ; the Blue Grass Settlement; the Carpenter Settlement, which became afterward, Remington; and the Saltillo and Davidsonville Settlement. The State road from Williamsport to Winamac went through Saltillo. This settlement was made about 1836. John Gillam and Joseph McJimsey early settlers.
The area of Jasper after Newton was set off was reduced to five hundred and fifty square miles. It was named after Sergeant Jasper, of Marion's Band in the time of the Revolution. Wliat are called by some of the scientific students, ancient river beds, lie between the Kankakee and the Iroquois valleys. These are from three hundred to twelve hundred feet wide, with low ridges of white and yellow sand on each side. Burr oak, white oak, hickory, and other trees are a native growth. White Sulphur springs are near Rensselaer and there is also an artesian well of
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sulphureted water. The land lies over a bed of lime- stone of what the geologists call the Upper Silurian age. From the surface outcrop lime is burned, and lower down good sand rock for building is obtained. Groves of sugar maple where the Indians made sugar were along the Iroquois River.
6. Pulaski. This county was organized by act of the Legislature, February 18, 1839. Governor Wallace appointed George P. Terry for sheriff. At the May election Peter Demoss, John A. Davis, and Jesse Coppick were chosen for commissioners, John Pearson for clerk, and Jolin A. Davis for recorder.
This county was named in honor of Count Pulaski, one of the noble Polanders who aided the Americans in the War of the Revolution, who fell at the assault upon Savannah in 1779. Many are familiar with Long- fellow's poem "Pulaski's Banner." Nanies in our land often come into singular companionship. The place selected for the county seat of Pulaski bears the name Winamac, the name of a Pottawatomie Indian chief, whose place of residence on the Tippecanoe River had been selected for a town by a company of men of whom the following names have been found : John Pearson, Wm. Polk, J. Jackson, John Brown and John B. Niles. Their offer the commissioners accepted and there located the county seat, May 6, 1839. It is said that the wife of chief Winamac was a white woman who had been made a captive in her girlhood.
The bones of Winamac, it is further said, now re- pose beneath the Methodist meeting house in the town which perpetuates his name.
The surface of this county is mainly quite level. Into the southwestern extends an arm of the Grand Prairie.
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COUNTY ORGANIZATIONS.
In the eastern part was originally timber, walnut ash, oak, and other valuable timber growth. Then, going westward, came oak openings. The prairie re- gion, with many "fly meadows," was next. The small prairies were called, Dry, Northwestern, Fox Grape, Pearsons, and Olivers. Deer, other game and fur bearing animals were abundant. Markets were dis- tant. Eastward was the Wabash & Erie Canal, after that was opened up for business and trade, which was the nearest grain and other produce market. The next was Michigan City or Chicago, ninety-two miles distant and rivers and marshes and sand and mud be- tween, and not one "gravel road." Cattle raising, al- most of necessity, became the great occupation. They could transport themselves to market. There was a mill in Carroll County and one at Logansport, in Cass County, to which the early settlers had access.
A record of the first court has not been found.
7. Starke County has an area of three hundred and six square miles. It was named after a general of the Revolution. It was organized by act of the Legislature taking it out from Marshall County. In April, 1850, county commissioners were elected. John W. P. Hopkins, George Esty, William Parker. They met at the house of Mrs. Rachel A. Tillman, on the south bank of Yellow River. Her house was used for county purposes for some years. The next county officers elected were: Sheriff, Jacob I. Wampler ; Auditor, J. G. Black ; Clerk, Stephen Jackson, Senior ; Recorder, Jacob Bozarth; Treasurer, Jacob Tillman ; County Agent, C. S. Tibbits.
May 19, 1851, was held the first term of the Starke Circuit Court. Held at Mrs. Tillman's. Judge E. M. Chamberlain ; associates, Samuel Burk and George
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Milroy. One indictment was found. That was for hog stealing and the defendant was acquitted. Hog stealing in those days was very different from horse stealing.
April 1, 1850, the county seat was located. There was then no town where the place was selected, but town lots were laid out in June and the place was called Knox.
Some of the first things in Starke County, accord- ing to the records found, were the following:
The first boy born, Tipton Lindsay, 1836. The first burial in the county was of Thomas Robb, who was frozen to death while out hunting and was buried in a canoe. The first church building was erected by the United Brethren in 1853; the second was built by the Methodists in Knox in 1856. The first minis- ters in the county were, "Elder Munson," Methodist; "Elder Ross, United Brethren ; and Rev. James Peele, "Christian." The first physicians, 1851, Dr. Solomon Ward, Dr. Baldwin, Dr. Charles Humphreys. First lawyers, 1852, Judge Willoughby, M. McCormick.
The first paper, the Starke County Press, pub- lished May, 1861, Joseph A. Berry, editor. Demo- cratic ; succeeding editors, James H. Adair, Napoleon Rogers, William Burns, Boyles & Good, and Oliver Musselman. The name Press was changed to Ledger.
8. The last of our eight divisions to become an in- dependent county was Newton. Area about four hun- dred and twenty-five square miles.
In December, 1857, a petition was presented to the Jasper County Board of Commissioners that the area in ranges 8, 9, and 10, from township 26, to the Kan- kakee River, might become a new county. The peti- tion was granted, and Thomas R. Barker was ap-
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COUNTY ORGANIZATIONS.
pointed by the Jasper board as a sheriff, empowered to administer the oath of office to the new county of- ficers April 21, 1860. In December, 1859, a place called Kent had been selected for the new county seat, a place afterward called Kentland, and at this time containing only two buildings. Here the elected of- ficers met to take the oath of office. They were : Will- iam Russell, Michael Coffelt, Thomas R. Barker, commissioners; Zachariah Spitler, clerk; Alexander Sharp, auditor ; Samuel Mccullough, treasurer ; Elijah J. Shriver, sheriff ; A. W. Shideler, surveyor. In 1860 a court house was built costing eighteen hundred dollars. The first term of court was held August 27, 1860. Charles H. Test, judge ; John L. Miller, prose- cuting attorney.
It thus appears that not until 1860 were all the eight counties of North-Western Indiana independent and separate as counties, each with its own civil juris- diction.
The years of organization and commencement of courts, lawyers, judges, juries, and civil cases, were : 1832, 1834, 1836, 1837, 1838, 1839, 1850, and 1860.
The years of settlement commenced: La Porte, 1829; White, 1829; Pulaski, 1830; Newton, 1832; Porter, 1833; Lake, 1834; Jasper, 1834; Starke, 1835.
CHAPTER VII.
OUR LAKES AND STREAMS.
The counties of Lake and Porter, if extending northward to the boundary line of Indiana, have in their limits a good many square miles of the area of Lake Michigan. And when the pioneers came that water was very clear and pure. No sewers from cities, no streams of filth, no decaying garbage, had gone into its waters. But besides quite a share in that great lake, there were in 1830 many small, beautiful lakes, with clear, pure water, the homes in summer, or in the spring and autumn time, of wild fowl, and a con- tinuous home for muskrats, for mink, and some of them for otter. In La Porte County the number of small lakes has been given from fifty up to one hun- dred, but many of these, probably, were properly marshes with some open, or clear water in the center.
In a marsh proper, a prairie marsh, grass grows, sometimes rushes, sometimes even pond lilies ; but the larger marshes in early times usually had in the cen- ter open water where there was no grass, and in this open water one pair or more of wild ducks might generally be found in the springtime.
The more noted and the larger lakes of La Porte County are: Hudson, Pine, Clear, Stone, Fish, and Mud lakes. Fish Lake, in Lincoln Township, has three divisions, Upper Mud, Upper Fish, and Lower Mud. Mud Lake proper is an expansion of the Kan-
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kakee River, as also is English Lake, which is between La Porte and Starke counties.
The streams of La Porte are mostly small, the Lit- tle Kankakee, Mill Creek, these entering the Kan- kakee; Trail Creek, Spring Creek, and many small ones in Cool Spring, Springfield, and Galena town- ships, flowing northward to Lake Michigan.
In describing Lincoln Township General Packard says : "Fish Lake, near the center of Lincoln, is of very peculiar shape. It is divided into four parts con- nected by narrow passages or straits, each of which have received distinctive names. The extreme upper part is called Upper Mud Lake, and is nearly circular in form with the outlet towards the northwest into Upper Fish Lake. This part is much larger, and curves so as almost to double back upon itself and has its outlet towards the southwest into Fish Lake which is almost one mile in length, and is connected by a nar- row passage with Lower Mud Lake. The outlet of the entire body is into the Little Kankakee. Upper Mud Lake is on the south side of section sixteen ; Upper Fish Lake is in sections sixteen and seven- teen ; Fish Lake is mostly in section twenty; Lower Mud Lake is in section twenty and twenty-nine. There are several other smaller lakes in Lincoln, iso- lated and having no outlet."
In Porter County are some sixteen small lakes, the more noted ones being Flint Lake, Clear Lake, Mud Lake, Lake Eliza, Long Lake, Quinn Lake, Bull's Eye Lake, and Sager's Lake. The streams are: The Calumet coming from La Porte County and flow- ing across into Lake, Fort Creek, Fish Creek, Coffee Creek, and Salt Creek, flowing northward; Wolf
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Creek, Sandy Hook Creek, and Crooked Creek, flow- ing into the Kankakee.
In Lake County are not many lakes. Berry Lake, Lake George, and part of Wolf Lake, are in the north- west ; part of Long Lake is in the northeast ; the Red Cedar Lake, the most noted one and the most beauti- ful one, six miles southwest from Crown Point ; Fancher Lake, Lake Seven, and Lemon Lake, are the other lakes of this county. "Cedar Lake" is the name commonly given to the lake named above, called in this work Red Cedar Lake, to distinguish it from a lake in Starke County called Cedar Lake. But to avoid the confusion of similar names the Starke County lake has of late been called Bass Lake. Both these lakes are pleasure resorts. On the Lake County Cedar Lake, also called "The Lake of the Red Cedars," is Monon Park, which may need some fur- ther mention. The streams of Lake County are: The noted Calumet, Deep River, Turkey Creek, and Deer Creek, whose waters reach Lake Michigan ; and Eagle Creek, Cedar Creek, and West Creek, Stoney Creek, Spring Run, and Willow Brook, also a little stream fed by springs, Plum Brook, the waters of which reach the Kankakee River, and so pass on to the Missis- sippi.
Passing across the Kankakee the principal lakes of Newton County are or were: Beaver Lake, Little Lake, and Mud Lake.
Beaver Lake covered nearly one township, num- bered 30 in range 9. It was found to be shallow and was drained several years ago by a deep ditch some six miles in length taking the water into the Kan- kakee River. Twelve feet was, in places, the depth of the lake. The boys and men obtained quantities of
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OUR LAKES AND STREAMS.
fish when it was drained. The great ditches on each side of the Kankakee River have changed very much the natural water beds and courses.
One of the streams is Beaver Creek. Not far away is the belt of woodland known as Beaver Woods. These names indicate the existence here once of beaver, and here was quite a favorite Indian resort. Jasper County has few if any real lakes. It has one considerable stream called Carpenter's Creek, also Curtis Creek. The Iroquois, with its tributary, the Pinkamink, is its river, and this flows across Newton County into Illinois. It now runs into the Kanka- kee ; but according to the earlier geographies the Kan- kakee discharged its waters into the Iroquois.
Pulaski County seems not to be a region of lakes, but it has for its large streams the beautiful Tippe- canoe River and the large Monon Creek.
White County also has few or no proper lakes, but its streams are many. Besides the Tippecanoe, there are the Big Monon, the Little Monon, Moot's Creek, Pike Creek, Honey Creek, Big Creek, and Little Mound Creek.
Starke County has one quite noted lake formerly called Cedar Lake; for the last few years it is called Bass Lake. It is in length, lying nearly northeast and southwest, about two and a half miles and about one mile and a half across its southwestern expanse. Its shape is quite different from the Red Cedar Lake of Lake County, although like that lake it has abounded in fish and is something of a pleasure resort.
The other lakes of Starke County are: Koontz Lake, in the northeast, about three-quarters of a mile in length, Lake Rothermel and Hartz Lake in the southwest corner of the county, one on section 35,
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one on 36, and Round Lake three miles northwest of Bass or Cedar Lake.
The streams of Starke are now for the most part turned into ditches. Their beauty of course is spoiled.
So far as beauty is concerned, these large and small ditches which have cut up the entire Indiana part of the Kankakee Valley region, have spoiled what was once, in its natural water ways, attractive and picturesque. Although not like mountain streams and rivulets, the water in our streams was usually clear, their natural courses were winding, giving the curved lines of beauty, and the green herbage that fringed them was abundant. Now, nearly all is changed by the spade and the dredging machine of man's invention. The water in springtime runs off in straight lines, man's object being to get it from the land into the river and ocean as quickly as possible. He wants the use of all the land surface. And so thousands and thousands of acres where once the wild fowls had their resorts and where muskrats and mink and otter had their homes, are now pasture land and oat fields, and corn fields, and the ditches mar the landscape's beauty.
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