USA > Michigan > Monroe County > History of Monroe County, Michigan > Part 84
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88 | Part 89 | Part 90 | Part 91 | Part 92 | Part 93 | Part 94 | Part 95 | Part 96 | Part 97 | Part 98 | Part 99 | Part 100 | Part 101 | Part 102 | Part 103 | Part 104 | Part 105 | Part 106 | Part 107 | Part 108 | Part 109 | Part 110 | Part 111 | Part 112 | Part 113 | Part 114 | Part 115 | Part 116 | Part 117 | Part 118 | Part 119
and at one time master of the lodge. He died leaving a widow, one son and one daughter.
JOHN STUMP
Was born in Wurtemburg, Germany, January 1, 1803; came to Monroe county ; settled in Erie. Entered forty acres, for which he holds the patent bearing the signature of Gen. An- drew Jackson, dated October 1, 1835. Married Matilda J. Lefford, born May 19, 1817, who came to Monroe county in 1834, from State of New York; were members of the Presbyterian church. Their children, John J., born No- vember 5, 1835, resides in Monroe county ; Christian H., born April 7, 1838, resides in Tennessee; James H., born August 23, 1840, died June 14, 1872; George G., born July 22, 1842, resides in Ottawa county, Ohio; Hannah E., born January 24, 1856; Henry H., born March 14, 1859; the two last named are resi- dents of Monroe county. George G., James K. and John J. served in the war of the rebel- lion. George was a member of the Eighteenth Michigan Infantry ; he was confined in prison six months and released at the close of the war. James K. was a member of the Eighty- sixth Regiment of Ohio Volunteer Infantry. John J. was a member of the Seventeenth Regiment Michigan Infantry. All were honora- bly discharged at the close of the war.
The wile of John Stump, Clara Newman, traces her ancestry to France, and her parents were engaged in our Revolutionary struggle. Mr. Stump, in 1871, visited Germany, was cordially welcomed by the friends of his youth, but after an absence of fifty years found but eight living. When the family first settled in Monroe county they frequently entertained Indians at their table, and were ever on pleas- ant terms with them
John Stump
CHAPTER XXXVII.
1
THE PRESS OF MONROE.
A HISTORY of the Press of Monroe county must necessarily embrace much concern- ing some of its ablest and most useful men that have been numbered among its residents since the first newspaper was launched upon the sea of fortune.
Early in the summer of 1825, Edward D. Ellis, a young man of about twenty-four years, arrived in Monroe from Buffalo, bringing with him a printing press and type for a newspaper. The arrival of the printing material and the prospect of a newspaper was especially gratify- ing to the inhabitants of the young and growing town, and they gave Mr. Ellis a right cordial welcome. A location was procured for him, and the first number soon appeared under the name of the Monroe Sentinel, it being the second paper started in the then Territory of of Michigan; the only other paper printed in the Territory at that time being the Detroit Free Press. Mr. Ellis was a native of Niles, N. Y. He served an apprenticeship in An- burn, that State. He was a close observer, and kept a daily record of his doings and impres- sions. This habit of journalizing helped him to become one of the ablest and most forcible writers of the west.
The method of printing a newspaper in those early times was by no means what it is at the present day ; the paper having to be printed on a hand press, and the ink applied with hand pads or "beaters." The man who had the nerve to take a newspaper outfit into a country so sparsely settled as was Monroe county at that time, expecting to create and maintain a home and rear a family, might be expected to possess qualities which would make him a valuable addition to such a community. And so it proved with Mr. Ellis.
The Sentinel soon commanded a large pat- ronage, and as Ellis was an ardent Democrat, the dominant party of those days, he was soon brought into prominence. He took an active
interest in all that pertained to the welfare of the growing community, and did much to build up the southern part of the State.
Mr. Ellis was married in Monroe, in 1830, and afterwards the Sentinel was for a long time printed in a building which stood on the ground now occupied by the store of N. N. Kendal, and which served both as a printing office and residence for Mr. Ellis and his young family. He was several times elected to the Territorial and State Legislatures, and was a member of the Constitutional Convention, in which body he took a prominent part, and was the author of the statute then adopted and since remaining a part of our organic law, and which has become a law in several other States : That monies paid as fines in criminal offenses and misdemeanors should be devoted to purchasing and maintaining public libraries in every town and city.
In 1836 Ellis sold his paper in Monroe to Abner Morton & Sons, and removed to Detroit, where he published a paper called the Ameri- can Vineyard. He died in Detroit in 1848, one of the best known and most influential jour- nalists in Michigan.
In 1834 Abner Morton and family came to Monroe from " York State," bringing a print- ing press and newspaper outfit with them, and at once commenced the publication of a paper known as the Monroe Journal, A. Morton & Sons, publishers, and Abner Morton editor. After publishing the Journal a year or two, the Mortons sold it to E. J. Vanburn, who re- moved it to Pontiac, and Abner Morton removed to Detroit to take editorial charge of the Free Press, then a weekly paper published by Sheldon MeKnight, and which was just blossoming into a daily. In February, 1836, the Free Press changed hands, and Mr. Mor- ton returned to Monroe and purchased the Sentinel, changing its name to the Monroe Ad. vocate. Mr. Morton and his sons continued
[491]
492
HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
the publication of the Advocate until 1839, when they sold it to a company consisting of L. S. Humphrey, A. E. Wing, Alpheus Felch, and some others, who conducted it through the "Woodbridge and Reform" campaign, changing its name to the Monroe Times. Dur- ing this campaign the paper was edited by C. C. Jackson, afterwards one of the editors of the Free Press, and later a pay director in the United States navy with the rank of colonel, Mr. Felch being an occasional contributor. After the campaign the Mortons bought the office back for jnst half the sum paid for it. The new firm was E. G. Morton & Co., with Abner Morton as editor. On January 1, 1841, the name was changed back to the Monroe Advocate ; the paper was continued under that name, with Abner Morton as editor, until 1849, when its name was again changed to the Mon- roe Commercial, and E. G. Morton assumed editorial and business control, its politics re- maining the same.
Soon after the last purchase of the paper by the Mortons, a new press was obtained, and A. C. Morton took the old Ellis press to Angola, Indiana, where he published a paper for a time, and subsequently removed it to Sand- wich, Ontario, when he sold it. Abner Morton proved himself an intelligent and able gentle- man, and a very forcible and vigorous writer. He died in Monroe in 1861 or 1862.
The publication of the Commercial was con- tinued by E. G. Morton until 1856, when it. was sold to a syndicate of Republicans, and converted into a Republican paper.
In 1836 an attempt was made to establish a Whig paper in Monroe, it being called the Ga- zette, and edited by a Mr. Hosmer, afterwards for a number of years editor of the Toledo Blade. The paper afterwards passed into the hands of Charles Lauman, but lived only a short time. In 1848 another Whig paper was started by W. H. Briggs & Co., and called the Monroe Sentinel. It was also short-lived. The Monroe Citizen was another that enjoyed a brief career. Immediately after the purchase of the Commercial by the syndicate, it passed into the hands of Thomas S. Clark, and was edited during that memorable Fremont cam- paign by Hon. Isaac P. Christiancy and Edwin Willits. Mr. Christiancy was then an attorney- at-law in Monroe, and Mr. Willits a young lawyer associated with him. Both were able
writers and made a strong editorial team. The paper immediately came to the front as one of the ablest Republican papers of the State. After this campaign Mr. Willits continued as the editor of the paper, and T. S. Clark its publisher, until the early spring of 1860, when M. D. Hamilton assumed editorial control, having formed a business partnership with Mr. Clark under the style of Clark & Hamilton. This was the year that Abraham Lincoln was nominated and elected to the Presidency of the United States. A year later the country was plunged into a civil war, and at the first call to arms, Mr. Clark, who had had military experience in the campaign against Mexico, offered his service to his country and marched to the front as Lieutenant-Colonel of the Sixth Michigan Infantry, Mr. Hamilton purchasing the establishment and continuing the publica- tion of the paper. From this time until Feb- ruary 1, 1888, the Commercial maintained its leading position in Michigan journalism under the guiding hand of M. D. Hamilton and M. D. Hamilton & Sons.
Milo Dwight Hamilton, the eldest son of Samnel W. Hamilton, like many other Michi- gan men, is New England born, having first seen the light of day at Blandford, Hampden county, Massachusetts, October 5, 1828. At the age of seven years his parents sought the Territory of Michigan, settling on a farm two miles from the present village of Homer, and here his boyhood was passed. The country district schools, the village schools of Homer and one term in an academy in the old bank building, were his means of education, and in 1846 he began the world for himself as an apprentice to Seth Lewis, of the Marshal Statesman In 1849 he was foreman of the Liberty Press, a " free soil " paper published at Battle Creek, when the entire plant was de- stroyed by fire. He went to Detroit in the summer of 1850 and was employed on the staff of the Detroit Free Press, then under editorial charge of the famous Wilbur F. Storey. One year later he became commercial reporter on the Detroit Advertiser, under the charge of Rufus Hosmer. In 1856 the Detroit Board of Trade was organized, Mr. Hamilton being one of its organizers and its first secretary, a posi- tion he had as long as he remained in Detroit. In 1858 he became commercial reporter on the Cincinnati Enquirer, and retained that position
.
493
THE PRESS OF MONROE COUNTY.
till 1860. In the latter year he came to Mon- roe to take editorial charge of the Commercial, which was then an old paper, and which had previously been edited by Messrs. Christiancy and Willits. He subsequently became a part owner of the paper, and later its sole proprie- tor, and continued to edit and publish the Commercial until February, 1888.
Mr. Hamilton's politics were Republican, and his paper was one of the representative Repub- lican papers of Southern Michigan. In 1864 he was appointed by Governor Austin Blair one of the commissioners of election to take the vote of the soldiers in the field. He was assigned to the Seventh Michigan Infantry and the First Michigan Sharp-shooters, then with the army of General Grant before Petersburg. In 1870 he was commissioned postmaster of Monroe by General Grant, and held the posi- tion four years. He is a member of the New Jerusalem Church ( Swedenborgian) ; belongs to the Ancient Order United Workmen, Knights of Honor, and Michigan Sanhedrim.
He was married in Detroit in 1852 to Mrs. Eveline S. Rawson. They had one child, Frank D. Hamilton, now of Durand, Florida.
Mr. Hamilton is a graceful and forcible writer, and his work upon the Commercial was always distinguished by a genuine courtesy to his brethern of the press, which made and kept them his friends.
Mr. Hamilton's connection with the Commer- cial covered a period of almost twenty-eight years. When he took charge of the Commercial in 1860 it was a four-page sheet, with a circu- lation of less than five hundred ; a few years later the plant was materially enlarged and im- proved, and the circulation ran up to more than fifteen hundred copies, and weilded a powerful influence in social and political circles, and was looked upon as one of the best conducted Repub- liean papers in the State. In 1885 Messrs. Ham- ilton & Son started a daily edition of the Com- mercial. The daily enjoyed a liberal circula- tion and advertising patronage, but. the field was too limited, and it was discontinued. February 1, 1888, Mr. Hamilton sold the Com- mercial to Mrs. Josie D. Elmer, of Defiance, Ohio, who is still its owner.
But let us go back to the anti-bellum days and trace the ups and downs of other news- paper ventures.
In the fall of 1856, after the sale of the Com-
mercial to the Republicans by Mr. Morton, a Democratic paper called the Northern Press was started by A. C. Salsbury, and edited by E. G. Morton. On the breaking out of the war in 1861, Mr. Salsbury sold the paper to Titus Babcock and went into the army. Mr. Bab- cock, who, by the way, was a Republican, pub- lished the Press about a year as a neutral or- gan, and then removed the plant to Hudson, Lenawee county, where he issued a paper called the Hudson Herald.
In the fall of 1862 E. G. Morton started an- other Democratic paper called the Monroe Monitor. This was continued by Mr. Morton as its editor and publisher until his death, which occurred in 1875, something over thir- teen years, when it passed into the hands of F. B. Lee and J. H. Kurz, who continued its pub- lication until the Morton estate was settled, when it passed into the hands of Mr. Kurz.
The death of Edward G. Morton closed the career of one of the oldest and ablest news- paper men Michigan ever had ; one identified with the press of Monroe, and consequently everything pertaining to Monroe for a period of nearly forty years. He was born in Burl- ington, Vermont, in 1811. Came to Monroe in 1854, and from that time until his death, which occurred December 11, 1875, was, with one or two intervals, continuously in the business, and for nearly thirty-five years of that time was editor and either sole or part owner of the paper he edited. He was repeatedly honored by his party in elections to places of influence and trust. He was elected mayor of the city in 1851; was a member of the House of Repre- sentatives during the sessions of 1849, 1850, 1853, 1863. 1864 and 1865 ; was a member of the constitutional convention in 1857, and rep- resented the county in the State senate during the terms of 1869, 1870, 1871, and 1872. He was a representative Democrat in all the bodies and a leader in his party ; well known and highly esteemed by all. He was recognized as a forcible writer and speaker. He continued to write for his paper almost up to the day of his death.
Next to E. G. Morton as a newspaper man long in service in the city of Monroe comes Mr. J. Henry Kurz.
In a quiet, unostentatious but eminently effectual manner, John Henry Kurz has prob- ably wielded as great an influence upon the
494
HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
newspaper fortunes of Monroe City as any man connected with the profession, unless, possibly, it be Mr. Morton, and for length of service he ranks next to Mr. Morton.
His father, Henry Kurz, was a Bavarian, who moved to Monroe county early in the his- tory of the State, settling first in La Salle town- ship, removing thence to Raisinville and finally to this city, where he died at a ripe old age a few years since.
J. Henry Kurz was born in Monroe county December 7, 1843. His boyhood was spent in the city ; his education acquired in the Trinity Church School. At the age of fourteen he en- tered the Commercial office, under Thomas S. Clark, to learn the printer's trade. He worked at the case here till 1863, when he spent some years in traveling, working upon various news- papers in Detroit, Michigan, St. Louis, Mis- souri, and at several cities in Illinois. Return- ing to Monroe in 1868, he entered the employ of M. D. Hamilton and worked upon the Com- mercial for some time, and later upon the Monitor, under E. G. Morton ; in 1872 he pur- chased an interest in the Monitor, the firm then being Morton, Lee & Kurz. In 1876 he pur- chased the entire stock of the Monitor and be- came its sole proprietor. Mr. Morton having died in 1875, and Mr. Lee being retained by Mr. Kurz as editor. In 1880 the Monitor plant was sold to the Democrat Printing and Pub- lishing Company, of which corporation Mr. Kurz became the secretary and treasurer, which position he still holds.
He was married July 18, 1873, to Miss Lydia Mohr, of Monroe. Three children are the re- sults of this union : Martha, born 1874 ; Henry .. , born 1876, and Edward C., born 1879. He has represented his ward, the second, upon the board of aldermen, and was noted as being one of the best informed and conservative members of that body ; a careful student of municipal law, and a persistent champion of every meas- ure calculated to benefit the city.
For a number of years he was the assistant chief engineer of the fire department, and in May, 1889, was unanimously clected its chief engineer. A newspaper career of over thirty years, the better part of which has been in Monroe, and his efficient public services have made him universally known and as univer- sally esteemed.
In February, 1880, a stock company com-
posed of leading Democrats of the city, was organized and incorporated. The Monitor was purchased, additional material supplied, a sur- plus cash capital in bank, and the Monroe Democrat, an eight-page, forty-eight-column paper, made its appearance on March 17th fol- lowing. The company put the entire control of the affairs of the office in the hands of D. R. Crampton as editor and business manager, and J. H. Kurz as secretary and treasurer. The Democrat took rank from the first among the ablest weekly Democratic papers of the State, which position it continues to maintain ; and its circulation reaching the highest figure of any paper ever published in Monroe county ; and that, in active competition with nearly a dozen dailies from Detroit, Toledo and Chicago, and more than twice that number of weeklies.
In 1858 a German paper was started in Monroe called the Unabharngige, with Dr. Edward Dorsch as editor. This paper was continued only a few months, and on its ruins, in 1859, the Staats Zeitung was started, with Dr. Dorsch in the editorial chair. This paper lived a year or more, meeting with phenomenal success for the times, but it was stranded by bad financial management and its publication discontinued. Dr. Dorsch was for very many years known as one of the most successful phy- sicians of Monroe, and his reputation as a writer of verse and prose, and as a scientist, became familiar in this country and Europe.
In 1874 a monthly paper for children, called the Little Diamond, was started. It was pub- lished by two young men from Toledo, Ohio, and edited by the Misses Whelpley. The com- position and press-work was done at the Com- mercial office. Notwithstanding its publishers had great hopes of its becoming a leader of juvenile literature, it soon ceased to sparkle.
In October, 1877, the daily Itemizer made its appearance. It made a great hit as a lively society paper, but a libel suit ended its career.
In 1878 George A. Cowan, a bright and spir- ited writer, established the Monroe Ledger, the organ of the Greenback party of the county, but after struggling hard for a year or more, it sank beneath the newspaper horizon never again to come to the surface. Mr. Cowan worked his paper upon a home-made hand- press constructed almost entirely of wood, which his colored assistant dubbed " the half medium cider press." Every impression was
495
THE PRESS OF MONROE COUNTY.
registered by the most terrible creaking noise imaginable, as if the spirit of Franklin was entering its protest against such a contrivance in this day and generation. It is reported to have become the victim of a chattel mortgage.
After the Monitor passed into the hands of the Democrat Company, Fred. B. Lee estab- lished the Monroe Index. This was in the fall of 1881. It was a sprightly sheet at first, but inertia soon overtook it and its grave was an early one. The material went to Lansing to start a Greenback paper.
The newspaper ventures of Monroe county have not been entirely confined to the city of Monroe. As the western part of the county became prosperous and populous the thriving towns of Dundee and Petersburgh came to think a newspaper in their midst was essential to the business interests of those towns. In answer to this demand, in 1872 John Cheever established a paper called the Enterprise, in Dundee. After about a year he sold to L. B. Smith ; the latter, after three months' experi- ence sold to W. W. Cook, who, in 1875, re- moved the office to Leslie and established the Local, and run it for a number of years. In May, 1876, H. Egabroad started the Dundee Reporter. In August, 1882, he sold to J. E. Carr, who still condnets the paper, making it a faithful mirror of the transactions of the enter- prising town in which it is located. In 1881 Francis Brooks commenced the publication of the Dundee Ledger. In 1883 be sold the sub- scription list to Mr. Carr and removed the plant to some other town. The Reporter has proved a success.
Petersburgh has also had considerable news- paper experience. Its first paper was estab- lished in 1871 by Henry F. Gage & Company, and called The Avalanche. It survived a year and a half, when it was cleaned out by fire. In 1876 J. W. Seeley started the River Raisin Clarion. This paper went the way country papers usually go - by chattel mortgage - in less than six months. In 1881 I. D. Boardman, the " boy soldier," launched the Petersburg Bulletin, which still enjoys a liberal patronage. In 1883 the Weekly Journal was started, but in about four months it was burned out, and re- established in 1884 by O. C. Bacon & Brother, who ran it two years and sold to E. A. Gilbert, who still runs it. The papers, like that of Dundee, are mainly devoted to the local affairs
of the town, and like all papers of their class, are doing a good work in educating, helping and encouraging the communities in which they are published.
DARIUS RALPH CRAMPTON.
The biographies of several of the gentlemen who have in the past been editorially connected with the press in Monroe, are elsewhere given ; but the history of the press of Monroe City would be incomplete without some further mention of the subject of this sketch, who has brought to a profitable and successful issue the latest attempt in the journalistic field-the Monroe Democrat.
Mr. Crampton, in the quality of his nature, betrays the strain of Latin blood inherited from his mother, while the paternal Anglo- Saxon characteristic is shown in his hatred of sham, and his persistence in any cause which his judgment commends as correct. His life has been a varied one, and the holiday element greatly lacking. His father, William C. Cramp- ton, was educated as a Connectiont clergyman, and was of a race of Presbyterian clergymen, a brother, R. S. Crampton, having at one time had charge of the Presbyterian church of Mon- roe. His mother was born at Havre, France. D. R. Crampton was born at Louisville, Ken - tucky, August 20, 1844. While but a small child his parents removed to Michigan, settling at first in Detroit, and later in St. Clair. The Crampton family consisted of five sons and seven daughters. The children availed them- selves of such facilities for education as a rather peripatetic life afforded them, though at that period the educational advantages of Michigan were not what they are now.
At the age of fourteen D. R. was the pos- sessor of a limited education and an unlimited appetite, and felt the necessity of finding some niche in the world where he could procure a living for himself. He went to the Lake Supe- rior region, then an almost unbroken wilder- ness, and labored for three years. In some of his journeys he passed two hundred miles to the northward of the lake, penetrating a region that is yet almost a terra incognito. At the age of seventeen a shattered thigh put an end for a time to his labor and brought him back to St. Clair. Here, while the result of his accident
496
HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
was yet unhealed, and he was hobbling about on crutches, he entered the office of the St. Clair Chief as " devil," earning the munificent sum of thirty-six dollar's per year. At the termination of the year the salary failed to materialize. The political pot was seething and bubbling, the war begun, when young Crampton, by a combination of circumstances, found himself the publisher of the St. Clair Republican. Hard work during the day failed to keep the paper going and was supplemented by hours of night work. It was the era of that poetical but exceedingly unsatisfactory illuminator, the tallow dip, and its steady use began to tell on the young man's eyesight. Another disadvantage beset him. Coming to- ward manhood, he realized the scantiness of his early education, and hours that nature required for rest were taken for study. Dis- satisfied with himself he gave up the Republican and coming to Detroit took cases upon the Detroit Free Press. In the early years of the war the oil excitement broke out in Canada and he went to Oil Springs, and " got out " the first newspaper in the country devoted to the crude oil interest - the Oil Springs Chronicle.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.