USA > Indiana > Perry County > Perry County: A History > Part 12
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the English-speaking Methodists, who had built their own frame church in Fifth street, between Taylor and Congress, during the middle 'fifties, the decade of Can- nelton's greatest activity in every line, spiritual no less than temporal.
It is the intention, as developments materialize, in due time to effect a formal union and erect a new house of worship befitting the importance of the Meth- odism as a factor in the community.
Among the numerous English families whom the Cotton Mill and other commercial interests had brought into Cannelton it might naturally be expected that a large proportion were members of the Estab- lished Church, and in their adopted land would wish the same sacred offices-kept up through lineal descent in its American branch, the Episcopal Church, whose Book of Common Prayer distinctly declares that "this Church is far from intending to depart from the Church of England in any essential point of doctrine, discipline or worship; or further than local circum- stances require." Samuel T. Platt, Edward Dale, James Lees, John Sanderson, John Gordon, Thomas Hay, Robert Payne and Edmund Sharples were among the immigrant churchmen and the Episcopalians of American birth included the Carlile, Huckeby, Smith, Talbot, Brazee, Hubbs, Wilber and Wales families.
The earliest service of the historic Church of Wash- ington, Franklin and so many other distinguished Colonial Americans recorded as held in Cannelton was on August 3, 1851, when the Right Reverend Benjamin Bosworth Smith, Bishop of Kentucky, officiated in the Unitarian Church. The Prayer Book offices set forth for the Seventh Sunday after Trinity were then heard for the first time within the walls where they have since been read for well nigh three-score years.
Bishop Smith, a man of apostolic fervour and scholarly erudition, who lived to attain patriarchal age and was for many years Primate (Presiding Bishop) of the American Church, possessed the broadest mis-
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sionary spirit yet could not continue regular work out- side the canonical bounds of his own diocese, so through the efforts of Judge Ballard Smith, who repre- sented Perry County in the Legislature of 1855, Can- nelton as a field for labour was brought before the notice of the Right Reverend George Upfold, D. D., First Bishop of the Diocese of Indiana (Indianapolis) . He visited the place June 17, 1855, and again in the Unitarian Church led Divine Worship as first actual shepherd of the little Episcopalian flock in Cannelton.
Verily the "Mother Church" for Christians of every creed in Cannelton is the time-worn structure once known by no other name than "The Church," and just where the Roman Catholics had organized their local society several years earlier, Bishop Upfold organized in 1857 St. Luke's Parish of the Protestant Episcopal Church. On the First Sunday in Advent, December 2, 1860, he administered the apostolic rite of Confirma- tion to ten candidates, prepared by the Rev. William Louis Githens, who had become the first resident rector during that year. Of this original class Mrs. Christina {Platt) Tichenor is the only survivor (1915), having remained a communicant of the parish for fifty-four years.
The insufficient school facilities of Cannelton in 1855 were painfully evident from the average attendance recorded of only 240 pupils out of 720 enumerated as of school age, a distressing lack of interest largely due to the scattered buildings and the poor sidewalks lead- ing toward them. A lot was given, however, in 1854, by the Coal Company, the half-block now the City Park, between Sixth, Seventh, Clay and Lawrence streets. Its value was $1,000, and the School Board appropriated $800 toward a new building, which Wil- liam P. Beacon took the contract to erect, at $8 per thousand bricks and $2.75 per perch for the stone work. His contract failed, but the building was com- pleted in 1856 by contractors Leonard and Johnson.
Among various teachers, meanwhile, had been the
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Rev. John Laverty, George Crehore, the Rev. S- Hart, Jerome Spillman, Misses Sarah Cotton, Mary Anne James, Sarah Kolb and Anna Dow, utilizing such rooms as were here and there available. Henry N. Wales, with Misses Anna Dow and Isabelle Mckinley took charge of the town schools during the session of 1856-57, with an enrollment of 235, but an average attendance of only 110. The new brick was finished but unfurnished at this time, yet despite the want of equipment, Sumner Clark and Miss Sarah J. Mason conducted an excellent school in its upper rooms in 1857-58, Allen Milton Ferguson teaching the spring term with them. The Rev. Mr. Laverty, Mr. Wales, Misses Kolb, Gest and Dow were then teaching for the town.
The same year witnessed the founding of the most distinctively high-class educational movement ever undertaken in Cannelton, Franklin Institute, of col- legiate character, whose influence was perceptible for many years although the breaking out of the War Be- tween the States caused its career to be unexpectedly brief.
As principal, the Institute was fortunate in having Professor Paul Schuster, A.M., born March 20, 1825, in the historic city of Strasburg, Alsace-Lorraine. He was educated in Belgium at one of the Jesuit colleges, and-with neither criticism nor comment upon the ethical system of that body-it was through the train- ing there received during his novitiate that he came to America at the age of twenty-four, a fluent master of seven languages, Greek, Latin, French, English, Span- ish, Italian and German.
Soon after reaching Bardstown, Kentucky, where the Jesuits maintained a school noted in its day, he decided that America offered a wide field for individual liberty of development, and in 1849 was released from the temporary vows of a postulant to enter upon his personal career as an educator.
Cincinnati's large foreign element appealed to his
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cosmopolitanism, and his linguistic attainments quick- ly gained for the young scholar that position he was best qualified to fill, the chair of Ancient and Modern Languages in some of the leading seminaries, both male and female. From thence the impetus of the Swiss Colonization Society in 1858 brought him into Perry County and to Cannelton.
But few if any among institutions of Indiana at the time offered a higher standard of instruction than Franklin Institute, whose object-as set forth in its original prospectus-was "to prepare and enable stu- dents to enter the Senior department of Harvard or Yale, or of any of the prominent Southern Universi- ties."
"While the Ancient and Modern Tongues, Mathe- matics, Philosophy and the Natural Sciences are effi- ciently taught," the prospectus read, "more than ordi- nary attention is paid to the English, French and Ger- man Languages and Literature, Elocution and the Art of Composition. The most ample provision is made in the younger classes for laying the foundations of knowledge sound and strong; while, it is confidently believed, few institutions afford to the higher order of students greater facilities for thorough acquaintance with the finished Models of Literature-the sources of History-the principles of writing and speaking the English and also the French and German languages- the nature and rules of legitimate argument-the proofs of Revelation-the life springs of good taste and good conduct.
"Yet the leading and prominent object of the Tuitionary System is to impart the general intellectual culture and activity which alone deserves the name of Education and enable the possessor to secure that higher inprovement which no school can bestow. With a view to this aim at a thorough education, manners and personal habits shall be the objects of unceasing vigilance and care."
The attitude toward co-education displayed an im-
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partiality distinctly ahead of a generation that had not yet come to recognize woman's rightful place in a complete scheme of civilization, since the pamphlet continued: "The experience of several years passed in learning and teaching has convinced the Principal that the meeting of both girls and boys in the same schoolroom while contributing, on the one side, to soften and refine the buoyant spirits of ardent youths, to stimulate their noblest ambition to the utmost exer- tion of all their mental faculties, and to restrain them continually within the strictest limits of gentlemanly deportment; has, on the other side, a no less effective tendency to promote and exalt in young girls those delicate feelings and enlightened sentiments which de- velop so spontaneously their natural graces and virtues; qualifying both sexes at the same time to move with ease, propriety and a benignant influence in any sphere of life which it may be their destiny to occupy."
"The teaching of the Gospel," a concluding para- graph declared, "will be respected and predicated as the only rule of conduct for members of either Chris- tian Society or the Human Family at large; but all Sectarian bias, all spirit of proselytism is emphatically repudiated."
For each five months term the tuition rates ranged from $20 in the collegiate department, through $15 in the academic, down to $12.50 in the primary. Ancient Languages were included in the highest grade, but an extra $5 was the charge for French, German, Spanish or Italian. Nonresident pupils were offered board "in some of the most respectable families of Cannelton at a cost not to exceed, under any circumstances, $3 per week."
A promise was made that within a year the Prin- cipal would receive boarders in his own family at cheaper rates, Professor Schuster having married, September 8, 1858, Amanda, daughter of Henry P. and Mary (Aikens) Brazee, whose homestead "Mulberry
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Park" was beside the Ohio River a mile and a half below Cannelton.
This wedding was one among many functions of elegant hospitality which the old mansion witnessed in its prime, and was especially remembered because a supposed supernatural apparition, that for years afterward was reputed to haunt the Cannelton and Tell City river road, had been seen for the first time by some of the reception guests driving from Cannel- ton. The imaginary spectre was attributed to some phosphorescent gaseous vapour overhanging a low- lying stretch of road. What ever its nature, it was seen by too many responsible parties for its existence to be flatly denied.
The plan for a boarding school, however, was not carried out, Professor Schuster returning some two years later to Cincinnati where in elevating pursuits was spent the remainder of his earthly life, ending October 9, 1905. While national circumstances for- bade the anticipated destiny of Franklin Institute, the lofty ideals of its founder find fulfilment today in one of Cincinnati's noblest institutions, the Schuster School of Expression, in Kemper Lane, Walnut Hills, where stands an edifice whose classic beauty but re- flects the inspiring personality of its head, Helen Merci Schuster (Mrs. William Warren Martin), the youngest child of Paul and Amanda (Brazee) Schuster. Rank- ing among the Queen City's most gifted dramatic read- ers, Mrs. Schuster-Martin's temperamental enthusiasm gives to her instruction a magnetic quality whose value to pupils is truly inestimable.
Professor Paul Schuster's assistant during the first year of Franklin Institute was J. W. Chaddock, and in the summer of 1859 he obtained the services of a young man just graduated from Genesee College (now Syracuse University), Thomas James de la Hunt, vale- dictorian of his class and also the winner of first honours in oratory.
His birthplace had been the golden vale of Tipper-
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ary, Ireland, though of French parentage, the de la Hunt lineage showing a Huguenot family traced back to the city of Nancy in Lorraine in the Sixteenth Cen- tury. On the maternal line, however, appear such typically Irish names as FitzGerald and Plunkett, so the two strains of blood combined in an ardently vivacious temperament which adopted with patriotic enthusiasm America, Indiana and Perry County as a chosen home for the remainder of his too-brief life.
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CHAPTER XVII.
SECOND RELOCATION OF COUNTY-SEAT.
IN THE Cannelton Reporter for Saturday, January 12, 1856, appeared a lengthy editorial in humourous vein headed "A Trip to Rome and Back," which was the opening gun in a well-planned campaign looking toward a second re-location of the county seat. The discomforts of the frequent journeys which all tax- payers and citizens were called on to make to a point of such inconvenient access as Rome were dwelt upon and a "straw vote" was taken at the top of the lofty ridge from whence Troy Township travelers caught their first glimpse of the big ball then surmounting the cupola of the old court-house.
When counted, the pretended vote was announced. "In favour of removing the county seat, including the entire town of Rome (except the jail) to Cannelton, 12. Opposed to the aforesaid movement, 00." Henry P. Brazee, Jr., a clever young resident attorney of Cannelton, fresh from the lap of his Alma Mater, Indiana University, thereupon burst into classic para- phrase :
"While stands the court-house Rome shall stand, When falls the court-house Rome shall fall, And when Rome falls-Look out for a general scam- pering of office-holders."
During January and February active steps were taken by Cannelton and petitions were circulated all over the county prefatory to the March meeting of the County Commissioners in whom the general law of March, 1855, had vested the conditional power of re- locating county seats. Prior to that time a special
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enactment had been necessary, with special commis- sioners.
On March 3, 1856, a formal petition, signed by some 1,350 legal voters praying for the re-location of the county seat at Cannelton, with a deposit of fifty dol- lars for employment of an architect to prepare plans, specifications and estimates for new county buildings, was duly presented by Charles H. Mason of the Board consisting of Samuel K. Groves, William Hatfield and Wyatt C. Sampson.
After hearing all facts in the case and enduring more or less patiently a heated discussion between the advocates and opponents of the project, the Board : finally refused to grant the petition, taking ground that the county voters numbered 2,100 and hence the required two-thirds had not affixed their signatures. This decision of the Board was by Hatfield and Groves, overruling Sampson, who entered his dissent as pro- testing that the voting population could not exceed 1,800, as the largest vote ever polled in Perry County had been only 1,572, at the election of October, 1854, in a time of intense political excitement. He, therefore, held that the petition had more than a sufficiency of signatures to carry it.
It was shown in Cannelton's favour that out of these 1,572 votes 1,019 had been cast in precincts west of an imaginary line bisecting the county north and south, leaving only 553 in the eastern, or Rome's half of the county. Cannelton was practically as near this merid- ian as Rome and based her claim on business conveni- ence rather than geographical position, since the actual centre of the county would have to be found in the forest some few miles west of Leopold, a site wholly beyond the bounds of serious consideration.
By curious paradox, Troy, which had herself lost the county seat to Rome in 1818, now fought vigourously to retain it there, against removing it to Cannelton, sixteen miles nearer. Such action was explained by a sentiment of revenge following the defeated scheme
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for creating a new county out of portions of Perry and Spencer with Troy as its logical centre, which had been voted down in 1852 by a majority which the Trojans attributed largely to Cannelton.
Rome's opposition was anticipated from the first, no one expecting her citizens to yield voluntarily their pecuniary advantages of residence at the seat of office, but the objections of Troy to a measure calculated to advance her own local interest could not be viewed otherwise than as an exhibition of vindictive antagon- ism, and bitter denunciations were publicly exchanged in course of the contest. An appeal to the Common Pleas Court was taken but not argued, wiser heads concluding that the subject should remain for a time in abeyance.
During the spring of 1858 another re-location peti- tion was circulated, to which 1451 signatures were ob- tained, a number greater than two-thirds of the voters even assuming as correct the exaggerated basis of 2,100 fixed by the Commissioners at the former at- tempt, and an overwhelming majority out of the 1,793 votes cast by Perry County in the presidential election of 1856.
The American Cannel Coal Company pledged a donation of sufficient ground for the erection of all buildings required, and, looking thereto, prayed the vacating of certain portions of Richardson (Eighth) street and Seventh street in Cannelton, by a petition presented June 7 to the Board of Commissioners- William Hatfield, William Elder and James Hardin-at their regular session in Rome. But William S. Lamb -a citizen of Rome objected to granting this peti- tion-concerning Cannelton exclusively-and although no grounds for objection were alleged the Board held themselves technically bound by the letter of the law and refused to vacate the streets.
Such action made it plain that recourse must be had to higher power outside the county if Cannelton hoped for a fair hearing, and the next step was planned with
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a diplomacy purchased through the experience of de- feat. Whatever arbitrary decisions the Commission- ers might hand down as a Board they could not hope to silence the voice of the people at a general election, so Hamilton Smith, president of the American Cannel Coal Company, a man of superior foresight, was nomi- nated for Representative, Saturday, June 12, 1858, by the Democratic county convention held at Alexander Portwood's in Anderson Township. The Republicans placed no candidate in nomination, regarding local issues as paramount to partisanship, but Dr. George Burton Thompson, one of Rome's lifelong Democrats, came out in opposition to Mr. Smith, showing that the fight was to the death with the citizens of his town.
At the September meeting of the Commissioners, Robert Boyd, of Cannelton, owning property adjacent to the streets asked to be vacated, entered through his attorney, Joshua B. Huckeby, a protest against the refusal of the Board in June. William Hatfield was absent on account of illness, and the other two mem- bers, James Hardin and William Elder, quibbled over the alleged technicality that Boyd had not been a signer to the original petition praying vacation of the public streets. Hardin held this to be essential but Elder differed materially from him, so there was no alternative but to pass the whole matter until the next meeting of the Board in December. The Rome people publicly declared their insistence upon every right the law could give them, and that the county seat should never be removed save under strictest statutory in- terpretation.
While Cannelton's astute politicians persistently an- nounced that re-location was not a figure in the autumn campaign, it was nevertheless a deeply underlying issue and was universally recognized as such. For reasons best known to himself and his followers, Doctor Thompson withdrew from the canvass one week before election day, so on October 12, Hamilton Smith received 1,222 out of 1,694 ballots that were
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cast. John C. Shoemaker's majority for joint-Senator was 219 over his opponent, David T. Laird, of Rock- port.
Governor Willard having called a special session of General Assembly for consideration of important mat- ters, the Legislature convened on November 20. On Monday, December 13, Hamilton Smith introduced House Bill No. 26, supplementary to Act approved March 2, 1855, providing for re-location of county seats, public highways, etc. His bill provided for re- location of county seats where lands and court-houses had been donated and petitions filed.
In his speech he explained that the measure, while in form of a general law, was for a specific purpose affecting Perry County only and was virtually an emergency case. He proceeded to set forth how dur- ing the year the large number of foreign immigrants settling in the county had built up a new community, so that the conveyances of property had multiplied to an extraordinary degree. Within a few months the examination and recording of some thirteen or four- teen hundred deeds to lots in Tell City alone would become necessary, and with the county seat at a dis- tance of twenty miles from the centre of population the almost unanimous wish of the people favoured re- location of the court-house at Cannelton. More than two-thirds of the voters had thus petitioned, but since existing laws would not permit such a change he be- sought all reasonable expedition in passing the bill as introduced. After reference to a committee of five the bill was reported favourably December 22, passed and signed by Governor Willard, the news reaching Cannel- ton on Christmas Eve.
A public meeting was held Monday evening, De- cember 26, in the brick schoolhouse in Sixth Street, Joshua B. Huckeby being chosen chairman and Paul Schuster, secretary. An address by Hamilton Smith then presented the exact status of the situation. Through his efforts and the special exertions of his
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brother, Judge Ballard Smith, the bill, which had passed the Legislature, made it necessary for the Can- nelton people to build fire-proof offices, a good jail, and 'to fit up the contemplated court-house for the purpose.' On behalf of the Coal Company he agreed to erect four fire-proof offices in exchange for a former donation made for the purpose of facilitating re-location, a transaction already foreseen and provided for by the enactment. For building the jail and repairing the in- tended court-house the act required a cash deposit of $3,500 in the hands of the County Treasurer before the next regular meeting of the Commissioners. It, therefore, behooved the citizens to busy themselves without delay in raising this amount, toward which end committees were appointed for each of the six wards, their instructions being to deposit the money with the County Treasurer in sums of $100 as fast as collected.
Subscriptions at first came in slowly and an appar- ent indifference seemed to exist among sundry citizens at the very moment when the coveted prize was within their grasp. A delegation from Rome, William S. Lamb, George Burton Thompson and George Perry De Weese, betook themselves to Indianapolis for strenuous lobby work before the regular session of the Legislature. Their scheme was to procure amend- ments to the act, raising the cash donation to $6,000 and requiring a revision of all signatures on the peti- tion. Furthermore, they re-opened the once-tried question of organizing a new county, which, if done, would forever settle adversely any claim of Cannelton for the court-house by placing it on the very boundary line between the old and new counties. Some influ- ential aid was enlisted in this desperate move to defeat re-location, and to the women of Cannelton must be accredited the final checkmate ensuring victory.
Signed "Many Ladies" a call was published for a meeting at the home of Mrs. Paul Schuster (Amanda Brazee) on Monday, January 17, 1859, for discussing
(11)
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plans to raise funds toward the aid of re-location, and the result was a three days' Fair, held January 24, 25 and 26 in Mozart Hall. This entertainment was typical of many in its period. Monday evening, a lottery with many valuable prizes, a post-office, a wheel of fortune revealing the future, fancy tables for needlework, ice cream and confectionery, besides an elaborate supper of substantials and delicacies. Tuesday evening the Fair continued, with a special concert programme at nine o'clock, and a noted professional fortune-teller, Madame L'Estrange. On Wednesday night a ball, with supper, brought the series to a gay climax and the net result of $610.47 was turned over to the re-location fund, with feminine compliments. Spurred to final effort, the balance of the amount was raised by the men inside a fortnight.
Rome's opposition, however, had not spent itself. On Monday, March 8, 1859, the Cannelton committee, John James Key, William P. Beacon and Joseph M. Gest, made the final payment to the County Treasurer, who certified the fact before the Commissioners then in regular session. Judge Ballard Smith then moved that bids for building jail and re-modeling court-house be opened for consideration, which was assented to by the Board although actively contested by Rome's coun- sel, James C. Veatch, of Rockport. While the Com- missioners' action virtually settled, so far as in their power, the legality of the re-location enactment, an appeal was taken by the opposition, Elijah B. Huckeby and George P. De Weese giving bond in the sum of $6,000, with ample security, to prosecute the appeal before the May Circuit Court. Thus again, was the will of the majority thwarted for a time by a few stubbornly unyielding opponents holding with bull-dog tenacity to their cause.
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