USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Cleveland > A history of Cuyahoga County and the City of Cleveland, (Vol. 1) > Part 25
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St. Mary's Catholic Church was organized in 1855 by Father Louis Filiere. In the same year the congregation built a church at Olmsted Falls. Father Filiere remained until 1874, when he was succeeded by Father Edward J. Murphy, and his successor was Father James M. Cullen. The church was built in the north part of the village and was then moved to the south part. Here was erected in addition a stone parsonage and a schoolhouse. John Dalton, Patrick McCarty and Joseph Ward were councilmen in the '70s. The first Congregational Church, and the first in the township, was organized at Olmsted Falls in 1835. It started with quite a membership. Like many in the county it was closely allied with the Presbyterian Church, and changed about. At one time it was allied with the Cleveland Presbytery and afterwards changed back to the Congregational system. The first members were Mary Ann Fitch. Jerusha Loomis, Cynthia House, Catherine Nelson, Abner, Sylvester, and Summer W. Nelson, William Wood and Mary Ann Wood, Rachel Wait, Emeline Spencer, Lydia Cune, Jotham and Anna S. Howe, Harriett Dryden, Ester E. Kennedy. The first regular pastor was Rev. Israel Mattison. Other early pastors have been Revs. James Steel, O. W. White, Z. P. Disbro, R. M. Bosworth, Richard Grogan, John Patchin. A church was built at the Falls in 1848. Hugh Kyle, O. W. Kendall and N. P. Loomis were trustees in the '70s. It was always an event of special interest when Dan Bradley, then a student at Oberlin, came to this church to preach of a Sunday. Many remember the stirring addresses he gave.
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The present pastor of Pilgrim Congregational Church of Cleveland gave promise at that early stage of his pulpit experience of a career of great usefulness.
Quite early in the history of Olmsted a Union school was established at Olmsted Falls. This was an indication of the progressive character of the people. We have referred to the Lyceum organized on the Ridge in 1837. This was the first departure from the one room schools of the pioneers. The consolidation of these district schools under one head was not then thought of. The first agitation for this plan began, so far as this county was concerned, in the '80s in the county teachers' institutes. The condition of the roads at that time did not make the idea so attractive and the gasoline motor was not in existence. At present the schools of Olmsted are consolidated under the township plan. North Olmsted has its separate school district and Olmsted Falls Village and Olmsted Town- ship are united in school management. At present North Olmsted has two school buildings, with an enrollment of 335 pupils, and ten teachers are employed. The superintendent is Ralph Myers. Olmsted Falls and Olmsted Township are accommodated by one large building at the Falls. There are enrolled 369 pupils and there are thirteen teachers. The superintendent is G. C. Imhoff. Among the teachers of an earlier period may be mentioned O. W. Kendall and Charles R. Harding. "Charley" Harding taught for some time in the Union School and was active in the County Teachers' Institute. O. W. Kendall was for many years county school examiner and had probably during his active school life the largest: acquaintance among teachers of any one in the county. His home was near Turkey Foot Grove on the banks of Rocky River, and he lies in a cemetery near that beautiful grove, remembered by a host of warm friends who knew him in his lifetime. We have not the names of many who taught in the district schools of Olmsted. Miss Emma Pillars, now Mrs. Charles S. Whittern of Cleveland, was a teacher in Olmsted just over the line in Lorain County for about ten years, and her teaching experience is typical of that of many teachers in the "Little Red School- house." She taught in several districts, on Butternut Ridge and on the Dutch Road, so called. For several of her first terms she "boarded around." Thus to the salary which the school authorities were able to pay was added her board furnished by the various families in turn. Often the boarding place was a mile or two from the schoolhouse and there were no sidewalks nor paved roads. It should be remembered that in those days. the snows in winter were just as deep and continuous as now and the mud in spring and fall just as deep and tenacious. The snows were wel- come, for with them came the sleigh rides and the jolly parties, long to: be remembered. In the one-room school Miss Pillars taught classes in their A B C lessons and on up to algebra and geography, to which was added in the text books of that time a few pages of astronomy. When asked how she got along boarding around she said: "Oh, when I got to a particularly good place, and was asked to stay longer, which was often the case, I stayed on." In these schools there was no need of a "parent teachers' meeting," which is held to be so beneficial by school superin- tendents of today.
Unlike Dover, the township of Olmsted is still in existence. The first break in its political entity was in 1856. Then the Village of Olmsted Falls was formed, but it did not incorporate in its boundaries a very large portion of the territory of the original township. The first officers of the village were: Mayor, Thomas Brown; recorder, William S. Carpen- ter ; councilmen, H. S. Howe, N. P. Loomis, William W. Smith, Thomas Broadwell and George C. Knight. Among the mayors who served in
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the early days are William S. Carpenter, William Giddings, O. W. Kendall, N. P. Loomis, Elisha Fitch, D. H. Cottrell, H. K. Miner, L. B. Adams and Luther Barnum. The present officers of the village are: Mayor, Edgar R. Bayes; clerk, A. L. Hindall; treasurer, G. H. Spaulding ; as- sessor, James McGill ; marshal, A. Brause ; councilmen, J. E. Anton, E. E. Braisch, A. T. Burt, G. M. Hecker, Robert Mckay and R. E. Stinch- comb; board of public affairs, D. E. Bones, W. G. Locke and P. Sim- merer. North Olmsted, a newer incorporation, embraces the territory of the northern part of the township, and has a much larger area than the Falls. It has, as we have said, a separate school district. The present officers of the village are: Mayor, L. M. Coe; clerk, A. C. Reed ; treas- urer, C. A. Beebe ; assessor, Frank Bliss ; councilmen, A. Biddulph, H. K. Bidwell, H. Christenau, A. G. Douglass, A. L. Romp and R. G. Yes- berger. Among those that have served as trustees of the original town- ship are Amos Briggs, Watrous Usher, Hosea Bradford, D. Ross, Tru- man Wolf, A. Stearns, Alva Stearns, Noble Hotchkiss, Lucius Adams, Vespasian Stearns, Elias Frost, Jonas Clisbee, J. Barnum, John Kennedy, J. Carpenter, William Wood, Hiram Frisbee, Hiram B. Gleason, Peter Kidney, Sanford Fitch, Chauncey Fitch, Joseph S. Allen, Oliver Welden, E. Fitch, Caleb Cook, George M. Kellip, H. K. Miner, Norman Dutcher, Alanson Tilly, Samuel Daniels, John Ames, Thomas Brown, Eastman Bradford, James P. Rice, C. R. Vaughn, Lewis Short, Calvin Geer, Luther Barnum, Benoni Bartlett, William J. Camp, D. H. Brainard, James Hickey, William Busby, Clayton Sharp, L. C. Tanney, John Hull and William T. Williams ; clerks, D. J. Stearns, Jonas Clisbee, Orson Spencer, Hiram B. Gleason, Jotham Howe, A. W. Ingalls, Chester Phillips, J. B. Henry, Elliott Stearns, Caleb Cook, G. W. Thompson, A. G. Hollister, N. P. Loomis, James H. Strong, Richard Pollard, O. W. Kendall, J. G. Fitch, Asahel Osborn, R. Pollard and Henry Northrup; treasurers, Isaac Frost, Thomas Briggs, Buel Peck, A. Stearns, John Adams, Nahum Rice, Hiram B. Gleason, Jotham Howe, A. W. Ingalls, Elisha Fitch, William Romp, N. P. Loomis, James H. Strong, Eastman Bradford, C. P. Druden, W. W. Mead and George B. Dryden. W. W. Dryden served in the office of treasurer for a long period. D. J. Stearns, the first clerk of Olmsted, was born in Dover, Vermont, and came to Olmsted in 1815. His grandfather, Eliphalet Stearns, of English birth, was a captain in the Revolutionary war, and his father, Elijah, was a lieutenant in that war. F. J. Bartlett, who was justice of the peace in Olmsted, was a captain in the Civil war. His father and mother were born in England. Mr. Bartlett served as justice of the peace in Strongsville Township twelve years before coming to Olmsted, where he was elected to the same office. For years he was proprietor of Cedar Mills at Cedar Point, the junction of the east and west branches of Rocky River. He served as commander of Olmsted Falls Post No. 634 of the Grand Army of the Republic and was a member of fraternal organizations in other towns. T. E. Miller, a later trustee of the township, was also a member of the school board for sixteen years. Charles F. Stearns, another trustee of later years, lost a son, Louis, in the Civil war. He was the son of Elijah Stearns and one of a family of eleven children. The present officers of the township are: Trustees, R. T. Hall, S. W. Jennings and H. K. Otterson; clerk, L. L. Parch; treasurer, W. G. Locke; assessor, E. R. Lower ; justice of the peace, J. H. Scroggie ; constable, E. N. Taylor.
Olmsted furnished a large quota of soldiers in the Civil war and has kept alive a Grand Army Post until a few years ago, when from the limited number left it was disbanded. We have not given in these chapters much in regard to the service in the Spanish-American and
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World wars, as that will be given in a general chapter in connection with the military history of the City of Cleveland and the county entire.
One of the beauty spots of Olmsted is Turkey Foot Grove on the banks of Rocky River. This has never been made a public park and is owned by the heirs of Davis Lewis. The Metropolitan Park Board, which has been acquiring property under a most comprehensive plan, which embraces a county boulevard system touching the finest natural scenery acquired for public parks, may some day include this in its holdings.
CHAPTER XV
ROCKPORT
"History is the unfinished drama of which our lives are a part. We cannot understand ourselves except we have some knowledge of history." * * * * * * * *
*
"History is a story of everybody in the past for everybody in the pres- ent, it concerns everybody equally, though it may concern different people at different angles."
H. G. WELLS.
As the founders of Ohio City dreamed of a great lakeport city at the mouth of the old river bed, so the settlers of Rockport looked forward to the founding of a great city at the mouth of Rocky River. The first has come true but not just in the way or under the name emblasoned in their dream, and the second is going forward, but not just in the place they thought of. At least it is true that the settlers cleared the forest for a most enlightened and progressive city, second to none in civic pride and advancement, Lakewood. They did not foresee the railroad that has changed the tide of affairs and made the inland town a possibility.
In the survey of the Western Reserve, Rockport was number 7 of range 14, located in the north part on the lake. It contains twenty-one full sections of a mile square each and four fractional sections, due to the changing line of the lake shore on the north. It has Dover on the west side, Middle- burg on the south, Cleveland, but originally Brooklyn, on the east, and Lake Erie washes its northern boundary line. It is generally level and of good soil and that along the lake, like Dover, particularly well adapted to the raising of fruit. In the early annals it is referred to as inhabited by thrifty, intelligent and prosperous farmers. Detroit street is described as a fine avenue of fine residences, extending from Cleveland to Rocky River, which river is heavily wooded by a dense forest about its mouth.
The old annals of Rockport kept by Henry Alger, one of first white settlers, who came in 1812, gives John Harbertson, or Harberson, an Irish refugee, as the first white settler in the township. Harbertson, with his family came in 1809 and took up land on the east side of the river near its mouth. Apparently he was not the first, for Philo Taylor, who came from New York to Cleveland in 1806, and there met Harmon Canfield and Elisha Whittlesey, agents and owners of land in Rockport, and upon verbal agreement with them as to land in the township, near the mouth of Rocky River, took possession of the same in 1808. He journeyed with his family in an open boat from Cleveland and on the 10th of April of that year entered the mouth of Rocky River and made a landing. He built a log cabin on the east side of the river opposite what was later known as the Patchen House. He cleared land and in a year's time had made great changes. He was working enthusiastically when Mr. Canfield, with whom the verbal agreement for purchase had been made, informed him that he must select another location for a farm, as the owners had decided to lay out a town at the mouth of the river and this land would be included in the town. Taylor was very angry at this turn of affairs and decided to shake
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the dust of number 7 range 14 from his feet altogether. He sold out his improvements to Daniel Miner "launched a curse at the mouth of Rocky River" and moved to Dover. Thus he was only a short time resident but was in reality the first settler. The same year that Harbertson came, 1808, William Conley, who came with him from Ireland, settled in the township. Conley located on what was later called Van Scoter Bottoms. Neither Harbertson nor Conley stayed long in the township as both moved away in 1810, so that the honors of first settlers could not be conferred on them because of permanent residence.
Until 1809 there was no highway between Cleveland and the Huron River, it was an unbroken wilderness. The Legislature that year made an appropriation to build a road from Cleveland west to that river and ap- pointed Ebenezer Merry, Nathaniel Doan and Lorenzo Carter, to superin- tend the construction. This Legislature met in Chillicothe on December 4, 1809. It was however in 1810, the year Cuyahoga County was formed and which included in its boundaries all of the Huron County of today, that this road legislation was passed. It is interesting to note some of the pro- ceedings of this legislature. The marriage laws were amended so as to require fifteen days public written notice of an intended marriage, under the seal of a justice of the peace, to be posted in the most public place in the township, which was the residence of the woman. The license fee was fixed at seventy-five cents. A law was passed authorizing a lottery for the purpose of raising money to erect a bridge across the Miami River, as well as similar public improvements elsewhere. The salary of members of the Legislature was fixed at $2 per day. Augustus Gilbert, Nathan Perry and Timothy Doan were chosen Common Pleas judges for the court of Cuyahoga County. The salary of the judges is not given in the annals but the presiding judges of this court received $900 per year. This road authorized by this Legislature crossed the Rocky River near its mouth and was the only one west of the Cuyahoga River until 1814 or 1815.
Daniel Miner bought out Philo Taylor's loose property and improve- ments and moved into the log house Taylor built. He came from Homer, New York. Just what relation he had to Granger City for that was to be the name of the town at the mouth of the river, but which was only built on paper, we do not know. In 1812 he began the construction of a mill on what was afterwards called "mill lot" but died before it was completed. That was in 1813. From 1811 Miner had kept a tavern and operated a ferry on the river. In 1812 he bought out Harbertson, who was located on the same side of the river and kept tavern in the old Harbertson house. In 1809 or 1810 the state highway was completed from Cleveland to Rocky River. The first settler to drive over the new roadway was George Peake, a mulatto. He, with his family, made the first drive over this highway in a wagon and located in Rockport on a farm in later years owned by John Barnum. Peake had been a soldier in the British army and was under Wolf at the taking of Quebec. After leaving the army he moved to Maryland and married a white woman, who was reputed to be wealthy. After his marriage he moved with his wife to Pennsylvania where they raised a family of children and when he came to Rockport, they had two grown sons with them, George and Joseph Peake. Two other sons followed soon after, James and Henry Peake. The Peakes brought with them a hand gristmill, which was a great improvement over the stump mortar and spring pole pestle that they found in the wilds. Family relationships cut a great deal of figure in the development of these new communities. In 1811, Dr. John Turner, a brother-in-law of Daniel Miner, came to the township from New York and located on a farm. This proved to be an unfortunate enterprise for the Turners. Two years
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after their arrival, when the doctor and his wife were away, their log house was burned to the ground and their two children perished in the flames. Soon after this tragedy, the family, to get away from the imme- diate reminder of their loss, sold out and moved to Dover. This farm was afterwards the property of Governor Reuben Wood.
While the Turners lived in Rockport the new comers were Jeremiah Van Scoter, John Pitts, Datus Kelly, and Chester Dean. The Van Scoters on the river bottoms, which afterwards bore their name. Van Scoter was a resident long enough to give a name to Van Scoter Bottoms and then moved away. Mr. kelly occupied the place afterwards owned by George Merwin. Into this new country came men of far sighted vision. In the rather dramatic discovery of Berea grit and the development of the stone industry by John Baldwin in Middleburg, we have given an illustra- tion. In the character of Datus Kelly we find another, who saw into the future as did John Baldwin. Datus Kelly had prospected about an island in Lake Erie and found it formed of limestone of a superior quality and in 1834 he and his brother Irad bought it for a very nominal sum. This island has ever since borne the name of Kelly's Island and the outcome of the limestone quarries has been enormous. Like the rest the peopling of the township began by little settlements in various parts. Sometimes one large family would constitute a settlement. In June, 1812, Nathan Alger, with his wife and sons, Henry, Herman, Nathan, Jr., and Thaddeus P., came from Litchfield County, Connecticut, and settled on sections 12 and 13. Two days later, lead by that afflatus, that has drawn men even beyond the prospect of material gain, Benjamin Robinson came also. His pioneer experience began with the fulfillment of his fond hopes, for he married the daughter of Nathan Alger and took up a farm and founded a home. This location was at once named the Alger Settlement. Nathan Alger, the head of this little colony in the wilds of Rockport, only lived a year after coming to the township, dying in 1813. This was the first death in the township. We should also mention as coming to the Alger Settlement in 1812, Dyer Nichols and Horace B. Alger. In 1814 Samuel Dean settled in the town- ship with his wife and two sons, Joseph and Aaron. This settler remained in the old home until his death in 1840 at the age of eighty-five years. Another son, Chester Dean, a pioneer, died in 1856. It seemed rather necessary in subduing the wilderness and its wild inhabitants, that the pioneers found, that some should not be altogether devoted to clearing and tilling the soil, or even to starting the necessary first industries. The roving life of the hunter and trapper brought a modicum, at least, of the family food supply and thinned the woods of the dangers that infested them. Now Benjamin Robinson, of whom we have spoken as a member of the Alger Settlement, was more given to a roving life than to the indus- try that the pioneers looked upon as their greatest virtue. He was a great hunter, he prided himself on his Indian habits, he lacked the thrift of others about him. In later life he became industrious but it was too late as he died in poverty. Henry Alger, a married son of Nathan, who came early to the township, has left a sketch of his pioneer experience in which he gives interesting details. He relates that when they came in June, 1812, he had only an old watch, an ax, some shoemaker's tools and shop furni- ture, a bed, and seven cents in cash. He had borrowed ten dollars to pay his way to Rockport and felt that he must immediately get to work. He put up a log cabin, requiring no cash in that direction. This was furnished with a "Catamount" bedstead, a shoemaker's bench, and two stools. With this he and his wife commenced housekeeping. The only kitchen ware they had was a broken iron tea kettle, which young Alger found on the lake beach. In that fall he went to a farm thirty miles east of Painesville
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and threshed wheat for Ebenezer Merry, getting in payment every tenth bushel. This work was done with the flail and the hand winnow. In 1813, he went to Cleveland for salt. We have referred to the scarcity and high price of that necessity in pioneer days. For fifty-six pounds he worked nine days for S. S. Baldwin and then carried it home on his back, walking the entire distance. It was probably true of all pioneers but it can truly be said of this one that he "earned his salt." With the same currency Mr. Alger bought flour for the family. For one hundred pounds of flour he chopped down an acre of timber for Captain Hoadley, of Columbia and carried that home, as he did the salt from Cleveland, a distance of ten miles.
This little glimpse of the hardships of pioneer life will show also of what stuff the builders of the civilization of the new communities were made. Mingled with this hard toil at the first there was a romance and a glamor that appealed to many.
"We will give the names of our fearless race To each bright river whose course we trace ; We will leave our memory with mounts and floods, And the path of our daring, in boundless woods ; And our works on many a lake's green shore, Where the Indians' graves lay alone, before.
All, all our own, shall the forests be, As to the bound of the roe-buck free ! None shall say, 'Hither, no further pass.' We will track each step through the deep morass ; We will chase the deer in his speed and might, And bring proud spoils to the hearth at night.
We will rear new homes under trees that glow As if gems were the fruitage of every bough ; O'er our log walls we will train the vine, And sit in its shadow at day's decline; And watch our herds as they range at will, And hark to the drone of the busy mill."
Rufus Wright, a soldier of the War of 1812, came from Stillwater, New York, in 1816. He bought three quarters of an acre of land on the west side of Rocky River near its mouth, of Gideon Granger, for which he paid $300. This astonishing price for so small a tract of land at that period of this history is accounted for. He was locating in the heart of a great city of the future as he supposed. Gideon Granger figures in many parts of the Western Reserve as an original purchaser. This was to be the climax of his western adventures. Granger City, at the mouth of Rocky River was to be one of the great ports of Lake Erie. He had enlisted in the enterprise a number of influential men. Joseph Larwill, of Wooster, Ohio, came and bought a mill lot on the east side of the river in 1815, and a tract of land across on the west side, near its mouth. Here, with Gideon Granger, John Beyer and Calvin Pease, he laid out with an elaborate survey, Granger City. The sale of lots was widely advertised for a particular day and when that day arrived, a large crowd was in attendance and the excitement ran high. It is recorded that lots, in those days of financial limitations, were sold as high as $60 each. Larwill and Company saw a fortune in their mind's eye. The building of the city began. The first cabin was built by Charles Miles in the year of the sale, 1815. The next year John Dowling, George Reynolds and Captain Foster
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built on city lots. The city did not materialize very rapidly and Miles sold out to John James, from Boston, Massachusetts, and located on a farm, which farm of productive excellence was afterwards the property of Gov- ernor Reuben Wood. Others held on to the upbuilding of Granger City. John James opened a store and tavern, resolved to stay "till death do us part," which he did for he remained there until his death. Rufus Wright, the first comer, built a tavern. Among those who came in 1816 were Asahel Porter, Eleazer Waterman, Josephus B. Lizer and Henry Canfield. Canfield came from Trumbull County, the home of his father, who had bought much land in Rockport. He built and opened a store. One day a lady came to the store, who was visiting a sister in the neighborhood. She was a dashing, attractive girl, had ridden on horseback from Connecticut to Royalton, Ohio. It was a case of love at first sight. The lure of Granger City was wiped out and Canfield married and moved onto a Rockport farm. The old building was after- wards known as Canfield's old store. He lived for a time with his bride on the Rockport farm and then they moved back to Trumbull County. Granger City must have an industrial growth and in 1817 one Fluke, a German potter, came from Wooster and began making earthenware. Shortly after Henry Clark came to the city and opened another tavern. A man by the name of Scott came from Painesville and formed a partner- ship with Larwill in the building of a mill on Rocky River. They had gotten up the frame of a dam when winter set in. In the spring the floods swept everything away, and Larwill abandoned the Granger City idea in disgust. The city struggled along for a while but was soon abandoned, leaving only a few scattered, deserted cabins. Rufus Wright built a frame tavern of considerable size, but this was not dependent upon Granger City for its patronage. This was operated by the Wright family for some time, from 1816 till 1853, when it was sold to Silver- thorn. It was then remodeled and enlarged, but some of the old building was preserved in the structure. A part of the old building was moved away and known as the Patchen House, or it may be that this was used as a residence and that the tavern south of the Patchen House, kept by the widow of John Williams, was confused with this. Wright built half of a bridge across the river at this point and also operated a ferry. He helped to cut the first road west of the river. We have gone ahead a little in our settlement chronology in giving the history of Granger City. In 1812, when Wright came, Henry Clark, John James, Charles Miles and Joseph Sizer arrived. Clark and James kept tavern on the west side of the river. The first tavern opened, however, was by Daniel Miner, the license for the same being issued by the Court of Common Pleas, in March, 1811, and renewed, as shown by the records, in 1812. Miner's tavern was a log cabin 18 by 24 feet on the east side of the river. After Miner died, Moses Eldred ran the place for a short time and then it was operated by his widow. Joseph Dean and his son, Samuel, who settled in the township in 1814, built the first tannery in the township on north ridge. This later was in the possession of Lucius Dean. Joseph Larwill, who came in 1815, who was the active founder of Granger City, built a mill when the city was in progress, but this burned before it was ever used. It is a singular fatality that a mill built on the same site by Erastus and Charles Johnson was also burned to the ground. In 1817 Datus Kelly built a sawmill in section 16 on a creek that crosses north ridge. In 1818 James Nicholas came to Rockport. At the age of twenty he traveled, in 1803, from Barnstable County, Connecticut, to Trumbull County, Ohio, making the trip on foot. After a stay of fifteen years there, during which time he had surrounded himself with a family, he
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