USA > Michigan > Clinton County > History of Shiawassee and Clinton counties, Michigan > Part 33
USA > Michigan > Shiawassee County > History of Shiawassee and Clinton counties, Michigan > Part 33
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COUNTY-SITES AND COUNTY PROPERTY.
given in the records, this court was held at Owosso on the date mentioned, at roomis over the store of Gould, Fish & Co., on the southwest corner of Washington and Exchange Streets.
Section 6 of aet No. 62, approved March 25, 1840, pro- vides that " the Circuit Court shall be held at Shiawassee- town in said county." An aet supplementary to this (ap- proved April 1st, five days later), provides that the aet passed March 25, 1840, " shall in no wise affect or alter the loca- tion of the county-site of said county, nor shall the same be construed as vacating or changing the same, but shall be considered only as authorizing the courts for said county to be held in the village of Shiawasseetown, until the pro- prietors of the present eounty-site, or the county commis- sioners of said county, shall furnish a suitable building at said county-site for the accommodation of said courts, to be approved by the county commissioners or a majority of them.'
On the 7th of October, 1839, the Board of Commission- ers unanimously agreed to accept of a block of land three hundred feet square in the village of Corunna, designated on the recorded plat of that village as the " Public Square," which was offered by the County-Seat Company as a dona- tion to the county of Shiawassee. A contract was made by Stephen Ilawkins with the Board of Commissioners for the erection and completion of a building on the public square for county offices. The sum to be paid for buildings was $382.50. The office building was about twenty by thirty feet in size, situated near the northwest corner of the square, and built of wood. It was moved across the street in 1846, and is now used as a market. In the latter part of 1839 a building belonging to the County-Seat Company was rented by the county commissioners for their sessions, and for purposes of holding court. In April of the next year the following letter was sent to the commissioners :
" CORUNNA, April 17, 1840.
" TO THE HON. COUNTY COMMISSIONERS :
" Gentlemen,-The proprietors of the county-seat of Shia- wassee County do hereby tender to the said commissioners, for the use of the county, the building heretofore used by the county commissioners for county purposes, and which was engaged by them for the purpose of holding the Cir- cuit Court for said county.
" The said building is thirty-six feet in length and twenty feet in width, and will be furnished by the said proprietors, fitted up with convenient and comfortable seats and a proper desk for the judges. It is now lathed and plastered, and fires will be kept up in said building during the session of the court.
" The house now occupied by Alexander MeArthur will be oeeupied during the season of the ensuing term of the Circuit Court as a tavern, and extensive accommodations and supplies will be provided, sufficient for all the persons who may be in attendance on said court. Stables accommodat- ing upward of fifty horses will be prepared, and au abund- ance of provender is already provided. All of which is respectfully submitted.
(Signed) " A. MCARTHUR,
"Agent for the proprietors of the present county- seut of Shiawassee County."
The building spoken of in the above letter was situated on the corner of Fraser Street and Shiawassee Avenue, where Preston & Wheeler's store now stands. The sum paid by the commissioners for the use of the room for the courts was $30 per annum. The house was a wooden building, situated on the east side of Shiawassee Avenue, and oceupied the site where now stands the drug-store of Kil- burn & Shattuck. It was destroyed by fire several years later.
At a meeting of the county commissioners on the 24th of February, 1842, the subject of raising money for the erection of a court-house and jail was brought up and dis- cussed. It was decided to present the question to the peo- ple at the next annual town-meeting, which was done, and the proposition to loan the sum of $4000 for that purpose was defeated.
On the 4th of July, 1842, the Board of Supervisors met and resumed the functions which had for three years previ- ously been vested in the county commissioners. After organ- ization a committee was appointed to examine the title of the county to the parcel of land donated to the county, and known and designated as the " Publie Square."
Mr. Castle, one of the committee, reported an abstract of title, and stated that he saw no evidence of fraud and eon- sidered the title good, but did not eoneur with the opinions expressed by Sanford M. Green, Esq. Mr. Green presented the following report as containing his individual opinions and views in relation to such title, though drawn up in form as the report of the committee :
" TO THE BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF THE COUNTY OF SIHIAWASSEE :
" The committee appointed by this Board at its last ses- sion to examine the title of this county to a traet or parcel of land described as the ' Publie Square,' in the village of Corunna, respectfully submit the following report : That we have performed the duty imposed upou us by a careful examination of the records in the office of the register of deeds of said county relating to said parcel of land, assisted by the register of deeds and by A. McArthur, Esq., who was present with us at the examination of the records, and gave us all the explanation and information in relation to said title which the nature of the case seemed to require or admit of, and we herewith subiuit a brief abstraet of said title as it appears of reeord.
" In traeing the title by the description contained in the deed presented by the board at its July session, the first in- quiry that seemed to arise was, Where is the village of Co- runna, in which the ' Public Square' in question is located ? For the purpose of ascertaining this part we very naturally applied ourselves to the recorded map or plat of said village, from which we had a right to suppose we should be able to learn the precise location. On an examination of the map, however, we find no description of the section, township, or range in which it is located, nor any description of the ' Public Square' by its boundaries, courses, and extent, nor any designation of the uses or purposes to which it is devoted, excepting what appears from the indorsement on the face of the square itself; and this designation being gen- eral, without limitation, if it amounts to anything, sets apart and devotes said square to the general use of the public,
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HISTORY OF SIHIAWASSEE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
and we find that the public, as defined by Mr. Walker and others, means ' the general body of a nation ;' and this defi- nition we believe to be in accordance with the common and correct use and application of the term when used without limitation, as in this case. Ilence it would seem to follow as a necessary consequence that, if this map amounts to anything in legal contemplation, it vests in the County of Shiawassee the fee of this pareel of land in trust to and for the general and common uses and purposes of the great body of the people of this great nation, and for no other use or purpose whatever. This map appears to have been indorsed upon the face of it with the names of three individuals as trus- tees, but of whom, or of what, does not appear by that map, nor are their names either placed at the bottom of the map, after the manner of a signature, or attached to or connected with any statement in relation to the said map. In order to pursue the examination of the title, it became necessary that we should seek information of the where- abouts of the town of Corunna out of the records. Aecord- ingly, we inquired of Mr. MeArthur, and were verbally in- formed by him that Corunna was located upon the west half of the northeast quarter of section 28, town 7 north, range 3 east, and that Col. Andrew Maek was the original purchaser of said lot from the United States ; and upon the examination of a schedule in the register's office, it appears that said lot was purchased by him, but we find no patent to him from the United States for this land, of record. The first deed of the lot upon the record is a deed from Col. Mack and wife to A. McArthur of an individual fourth part of it.
.
" The rest is a trust-deed executed by Messrs. Maek and MeArthur and their wives to Chauncey Hurlbut, A. D. Fraser, and John Norton, Jr., purporting to vest in them the legal estate, but no interest in the fee of the land, in trust for the benefit of a company or eopartnership firm styled the Shiawassee County-Seat Company, under certain articles of association which are recorded with said trust- deed. These trustees were vested with power to make eon- veyances upon the requisition of the directors of the eou- pany, which requisitions are not required to be recorded ; and in case either or all of said trustees should resign, or ne- glect or refuse to act conformably to the requirements of the directors of this private company, their trusteeship and all powers vested in them by the deed of trust was abso- lutely to cease and be at an end, without any record thereof, or any declaration to that effect by the directors. They were also to exercise their powers subject to and in conformity with the original articles of association, and such alterations or amendments as might at any time be made thereto in the manner therein specified ; none of which al- terations or amendments are required to be made a matter of record. The directors of said company are also subject to change by election, resignation, etc., so that there is not re- quired to be any record evidence of any change that may hereafter take place in the trusteeship, directory, or funda- mental organization and constitution of the company itself.
" It appears, also, that while trustees are thus appointed for the benefit of the individuals composing this company, and a legal title is vested in the trustees to their use, yet by the articles of association the individuals of said company
are expressly declared to have no interest in the lands so conveyed in trust, but the serip, by the ownership of which they became members of the association, is declared to be personal property, and is transferable from hand to hand, like negotiable paper. The trust-deed covers other lands than these upon which the village is said to be located, and provision is made for the purchase of more to be contracted in the same manner, and the trustees are authorized to lay out a town upon the lands referred to in the deed without specifying on what part or parcel of the same.
" From the foregoing statement it appears perfectly obvi- ons that within a few days or weeks after the execution of the trust-deed the powers of the trustees may have ceased. The directors of the company may have resigned, and the character of the association may have been entirely changed, while the records cannot afford us any light or evidence in regard to it. Subsequent to the recording of the map, we find a quit-claim deed to the county, executed by an indi- vidual as trustee, purporting to convey the interest of such individual as trustee to the county commissioners for the uses of the county, covering the 'Public Square.' But whether the grantor was the trustee of the proprietors or of the company, or had any power to make such deed at the time it was executed, we have no means of knowing. The deed now tendered to the Board of Supervisors purports to be executed by the trustees of the Shiawassee County-Seat Company, but the same difficulties are found in this deed that attached to the former deed,-the warrants, being made in behalf of men who have no interest in the land, and who have no title of record, and are constantly changing, can be of no value. Moreover, we cannot see what right any indi- vidual can have to convey this ' Publie Square,' as trustees or otherwise, after it has onee been devoted by the record- ing of the map to the whole body of the people at large without any designation of its particular uses. It is proper to observe that there are papers placed upon the records purporting to detail some of the proceedings of this eom- pany and its direetors, ete., but they are not placed there pursuant to any provisions of the articles of association, nor in virtue of any legal or judicial sanction, and cannot, therefore, be any evidence to us of the facts they purport to detail. Some of them are neither fully acknowledged nor . properly witnessed, and we are unable to understand by what authority they are made an ineumbrance upon the records of this county, especially of our records of deeds.
" No one, we think, can fail to have perceived in the de- tails of these transactions that a wide door has been opened for the practice of stupendous frauds without leaving any trace of them upon the records. That such frauds have been practiced by this company we do not undertake to say nor to intimate ; but that an association could be got up in a manner more peculiarly calculated to admit of the com- mission of ruinous frauds upon the community, were they inclined to do so, with a strong probability of escaping the just consequences, we cannot well imagine. When the title to land is involved, and such land may bear but a very small value compared with the improvements that may be made on it, we think the record ought to show the title perfeet, and that the honesty and integrity of no man or set of men, whatever their reputation may be, ought ever to
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COUNTY-SITES AND COUNTY PROPERTY.
be trusted, nor do we think that any honest man ought ever to exact it."
It does not appear, however, that any action was taken, either then or afterwards, as a result of this opinion of Mr. Green.
On the 4th of January, 1847, rooms were rented of E. J. Van Buren for three years, at thirty dollars per year, for county offices. These were in a building north of the Bacon block. In April of the same year the board ordered the Judge of Probate to hold his courts in the office of the Register of Deeds. In the month of April, 1850, the Board of Supervisors resolved " that it is expedient at this time to take the necessary steps for the erection of a court- house at the present county-site of our county." A com- mittee was appointed, consisting of Supervisors Parsons, Holley, Harder, and Cummins. A report was submitted the next day, substantially as follows : A building was to be erected, forty by sixty feet in dimensions, two stories high ; the upper part to be a court-room and two jury- rooms ; the lower part to be divided in the centre length- wise by a hall eight feet wide ; the sides to be divided into six rooms, two of which are to be fitted up for a jail, the others for accommodation. of county officers and a grand- jury room. The walls to be brick, the lower story sixteen inches thick, upper wall twelve inches thick. The com- mittee expressed the opinion that the building could be erected for four thousand five hundred dollars. Resolutions were offered and adopted arranging for raising the amount necessary and for the erection of a court-house. R. W. Holley, L. 11. Parsons, and 'Z. Bunce were appointed a building committee aud authorized to receive plans, adver- tise for proposals, make contracts, and superintend the erec- tion of the court-house. The contract was let to George O. Bachman, to be completed on the 1st of November, 1851. The Board of Supervisors, at the January session in 1852, adopted a resolution " that the chairman of the Board notify the present owners of the court-house here- tofore occupied by the county that they have no further use for the same." This building was purchased soon after by the Baptist Church, and occupied by them as a house of worship. It is now removed a little south of its former location, on the corner of Fraser and Woodworth Streets, and is used as a parsonage by the society. The present court-house was placed in charge of the sheriff on the 6th of January, 1854, and the next day the building com- mittee was discharged.
The first official action taken in reference to the erection of a fire-proof office building for the county was the intro- duction in the Board of Supervisors of the following pre- able and resolution, July 9, 1865, viz. :
" WHEREAS, The county offices now occupied by the County Register aud Treasurer are too small and inconve- nient for said offices, and also unsafe for the records of said offices, it is desirable and proper that suitable offices be erected, detachied from the court-house ; therefore
" Resolved, That the building committee be and is hereby instructed to cause the erection of two fire-proof offices for said offices in the court-house yard, south of the court-
house, at such point as the committee may designate. And it shall be the duty of said committee to procure a suitable design for said offices, and let the contract for the building of the same as they may deem for the best interests of the county. That, for the purpose of accomplishing the above object, said committee are hereby authorized and empow- ered to borrow, not to exceed three thousand dollars, pay- able in not less than two or over five years from date, and to issue bouds of the county for the same, said bonds to be countersigned by the clerk and sealed with the seal of the office."'
The resolution was adopted on the next day. The build- ing was erected in the court-house yard, south of the court- house, and is the same which is now occupied by the Register of Deeds and the Treasurer. The office of the county clerk is in the second story of the court-house. The Judge of l'robate occupies an office in the lower story.
POOR-HOUSE AND POOR-FARM.
The first action of the Board of Commissioners in refer- ence to the county poor was takeu on January 9th, 1839, when Sanford M. Green, Isaac Castle, and Hiram Stowell were appointed to take charge of the poor of the county, their terms of office commencing January 7th of that year. Nothing further appears of record until Dec. 24, 1841, when the distinction between town and county poor was abolished, and the poor became a county charge. The sum of two hundred dollars was appropriated from the incidental fund for their support. On the 24th of February, 1842, the superintendents of the poor were authorized and directed by the Board of Commissioners to purchase a farm, not to exceed one hundred and sixty acres of land, to be used as a poor-farm, " and to make such improvements, by the erection of buildings upon the farm, as the necessity of the case may warrant." No action having been taken by the superintend- ents during the spring, the board, at a meeting July 6th of that year, suspended the resolution relating to the pur- chase of a poor-farm until further action. On the 21st of December, 1843, a committee previously appointed to cou- fer as to the best methods of supporting the poor of the county submitted the following report, which was adopted : " The committee to whom was referred the matter of sup- porting the poor in this county report that it appears, by the superintendents of the poor, the amount expended for their support for the last year is three hundred and fifteen dollars. Your committee are of the opinion that at present no means can be provided which will enable the county to support the paupers therein with less expense than they have been supported for the last year. Considering the num- ber of paupers who have had assistance from the county, it shall be divided into districts so as to accommodate the paupers in procuring physicians employed in each district by the year or otherwise, as the superintendents shall think proper. The plan of dividing the county into districts your committee recommend, as follows: Burns, Vernon, Antrim, and Shiawassee, Ist District ; Caledonia, Venice, and New Haven, 2d District ; Owosso, Bennington, Sciota, and Middlebury, 3d District; Perry and Woodhull, Ith District." At this meeting three hundred dollars was ap- propriated for the use of the poor. There is no further
17
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HISTORY OF SHIAWASSEE COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
record of importance until Jan. 21, 1846, when seven hun- dred and seventy dollars was appropriated for the same purpose.
On the 7th of January, 18.17, the superintendents of the poor were directed by the supervisors to purchase a farm, not to exceed one hundred and sixty acres of land, and to erect suitable buildings thereon, for which purpose the sum of two thousand dollars was to be raised by tax, one-quarter of the amount iu 1848, one-quarter in 1849, and the bal- ance in 1850. On the 13th of October, 1847, eighty acres of land (the south half of the southwest quarter of seetion 32, C'aledonia ) was purchased for a county farm,
At the October session of the next year it was resolved to raise a county tax of two thousand seven hundred and eighty-seven dollars and seventy cents (including five hun- dred dollars appropriated, for the purchasing and fitting up of the poor-farm.
At the June session of the supervisors, in 1858, the committee on public buildings reported the dwelling on the poor-farm as being in a very unsuitable condition for the accommodation of the poor. After careful examina- tion, fifteen hundred dollars was appropriated for the erec- tion of buildings convenient for the purpose. These build- ings-completed in January, 1859-are the same which are still in use.
By the last report of the superintendents of the poor (for the year ending Sept. 1, 1879) it is shown that the expenses on the farm for that year were $2060.39; that there was expended for support of insane persons at Detroit, Pontiac, and Kalamazoo, $1854.62; that the value of pro- ducts raised on the farm was $1059.97 (estimated) ; that the number of persons receiving support at the county- house was 32.
CHAPTER XXV.
THE PRESS-THE PROFESSIONS-CIVIL LIST.
Newspapers in the County-The Legal Profession-Early Lawyers- The Present Bar of Shiawassee-The Medical Profession-Early Physicians-Shiawassee County Medical Association-Howco- pathy-Shiawassee Civil List.
THE result of much patient inquiry and research is the disclosure of the fact that there is probably no person now living in Shiawassee County who is able to give with anything like certainty the date of the establishment of the pioneer newspaper of the county, or its early changes of proprietorship. It has, however, been ascertained be- yond reasonable doubt that the first public journal in Shia- wassee was published at Owosso by Edward L. Ament ; that this journal was in existence iu the early part of the year 1839, and that its name was the Shiawassee Express und Clinton Advocate, having a circulation in both Shia- wassee and Clinton,-the latter county being at that time still attached to and a part of the former.
The Owosso Argus was also established by E. L. Ament, in 1841. Dr. C. P. Parkill, of Owosso, who was in carly life a printer by trade, recollects that in that year he worked on the Argus in Owosso, and that Mr. Ament
was then its proprietor. A proof of the existence at that time of both the papers above mentioned is found in the record of the Board of Supervisors, under date of June 22, 1841, at which time it was by the board " Re- solved that the foregoing preamble be published in the Owosso Argus, and Shiawassee Express and Clinton Advo- cate." But on the other hand, a copy of the Owosso Argus, dated Sept. 20, 1848, and which has been examined by the writer, bears the number 47, of Volume V., which would place the first issue of the paper at about Nov. 1, 1843. Yet it is proved to have been in existence at least two years before that time, both by the testimony of Dr. Parkill and by the record of the supervisors. This being the case, the facts only are given as above, without any attempt to account for the apparent contradiction. Nor can anything further be stated as to the continuance of the Shiawassce Express und Clinton Avocate after the date at which it is found mentioned in the record above referred to.
The Argus, however, continued to be published at Owosso by Mr. Ament until his death in December, 1847, when it was published by Ephraim HI. Gould, who was a son of Daniel Gould, of Owosso, and who had previously been a compositor on the paper under the proprietorship of Mr. Ament. Iu the summer of 1848, Mr. Gould was suc- ceeded as publisher of the Argus by M. IT. Clark, who changed the name of the paper to that of Owosso Argus and Shiawassee Democrat. In the latter part of the year 1849, he removed the paper to Corunna, and continued to publish it there as the Shiawassee Democrat, until 1856, when he removed to Omaha, Neb.
The Owosso American was commenced iu the summer of 1854 by C. C. & O. R. Goodell, the office of publication being in the south part of the National Hotel at Owosso. In the following year the paper was sold to Charles E. Shat- tuck, who remained its proprietor until the winter of 1856- 57, when it passed into the possession of Ephraim HI. Gould, from whom in 1858 it was purchased by John N. Ingersoll, who changed its name to that of Owosso Amer- ican and Peninsular State Times, and continued its pub- lication under that title at Owosso till May, 1862, when Mr. Ingersoll removed it to Corunna, and having merged iu it the Corunna Democrat, which he had purchased a short time before, changed its name to that of the Shia- wassee American, under which name it is still published. After its removal to Coruuna it was increased in size from a seven-column to a nine-columu folio. Mr. Ingersoll con- tinued to be its sole proprietor until May 26, 1880, when Mr. George W. Owen, the publisher of the Shiawussce Republican, merged his paper in the American, and became a partner with Mr. Ingersoll in the publication of the latter. The American is Republican in its politics.
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