USA > Ohio > Columbiana County > Salem in Columbiana County > A souvenir history of ye old town of Salem, Ohio, with some pictures and brief references to ye people and things of ye olden time > Part 6
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Mary Strawn.
pense. After a while they mounted their horses and rode off toward New Lisbon."
So incensed was the populace over this visit, according to the newspapers of their time, that
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an indignation meeting was held on Friday even- ing of the same week, at the Second Baptist church. "According to previous notice," says the Bugle of the 16th, "a large number of the citizens of Salem, without distinction of party or sex, assembled to express their indignation at the outrage and insult which had been com- mitted upon the moral sensibility of the people of Salem, by the recent visit to our town of two slaveholders and one of their emissaries for the purpose of searching out some of their alleged fugitives." A committee on resolutions consist- ing of Jacob Heaton, James Barnaby, Dr. Abel Carey, Jonas D. Cattell and Dr. Joseph Stanton was appointed and at an adjourned meeting, which proved a very enthusiastic one, a lengthy report, full of vehement denunciation of slavery and all its methods, was unanimously adopted. The Friends were in no means unanimous in their approval of the anti-slavery methods used, especially by those of the more radical abolition- ists. Strong opposition developed when a meet- ing was attempted at Columbiana, as is shown by a letter published in the Bugle of February 9th, 1849. The letter is dated Columbiana, 2d month, 2d, 1849, and reads :
"Friends Editors : I undertook to get a meeting at Middleton, for Isaac Trescott and James Barnaby. The citizens are principally Orthodox Friends. There are in the village convenient for the meeting a few workshops, two school houses and one meeting house, but I found them all closed against the abolitionists. The district schoolhouse was built with the un- derstanding that it should be used only for school purposes, and the Friends' meeting house and the schoolhouse are barred against the ad- mission of free thought and free speech ; there is nothing permitted in them but orthodox sec- tarianism. The Friends there do not under- stand the first rudiments of reform. The privil- eged among them can discuss Wilburism and Gurneyism in their meetings to their heart's content, but the slave is not permitted to enter in their assemblies, nor is his prayer for mercy at their hands heeded. William Shaw and El- wood Chapman, two mechanics of Middletown, both members of the society of Friends, would not suffer me to put up notices of the meeting on their shop doors, assigning as a reason that the disunionists are infidels, and they did not think it would be right to encourage anything of the kind. Richard H. Beason, a blacksmith, refused me the same privilege, because the people were opposed to having anti-slavery meetings in the village. I was also informed that Daniel Mercer,
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who is not a member of any denomination, said he would give 25 cents to assist it tarring and feathering Abby Foster if she ever came into the region again, and would be one of a com- pany to do the deed ; and his wife offered to cut open her feather beds to furnish a part of the material. There was, however, one friend of humanity in the village, Isaac James, in whose house a meeting was held on the 27th ult., and which was larger than was expected. None of the old Friends were present, but quite a num- ber of young ones. HIRAM RIGG."
The motto of the Anti-Slavery Bugle was, "No Union With Slaveholders." And so, carry- ing this idea to its utmost though legitimate limit, the school of anti-slavery men and women which was represented by the the paper, at least while Mr. Jones and Miss Hitchcock controlled its columns, laid it liable at times, to the charge of disloyalty to the Union. This tendency is shown by an editorial extract which follows, from the Bugle of August 11, 1848 :
"The editor of the Pittsburg Commercial Journal thus discourses in an article on the Dis- solution of the Union. 'The very idea of a disso- lution of the Union should be spurned as treason; and the madmen who attempt its destruction
Joel McMillan.
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deserve alike our anger and our pity. An attempt by any one portion of the Union to dissolve the compact should and would be suppressed at once.' Such sentiments are not unfrequently met with in political papers, and it appears to be taken for
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Simeon Jennings.
granted by a certain class of persons, not only that the Union should not, but that it cannot be dissolved ; and they talk about compulsion as
though the Federal government had a right to use it against a seceding State. If this position is suceptible of proof, we should like to hear the evidence ; for with our present light we must deny the existence of a particle of authority on the part of the United States government to com- pel an unwilling State to remain in the Union. The powers of the legislative, judicial and ex- ecutive branches of the National government are all clearly defined in the constitution of the United States; and as this government exists only by virtue of delegated authority, it has no power to compel a State either to become a member of or remain in the co-partnership termed the Federal Union, unless it can be clearly shown that such power has been conferred upon it by the States themselves. But there is no such power enumerated in the constitution as belong- ing to either branch of the government. Congress was empowered to declare what States might come into the Union, but not to chain them in eternal fetters as soon as they have entered. By the terms of the contract each State binds itself to submit to all the constitutional requirements of Congress, the judiciary or the executive-to
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yield obedience to each section and article of the constitution. * * We claim then that the Federal Union is not the rat-trap some represent it to be, into which the victim is at liberty to enter or not to enter as he sees fit, but when once in can never escape. It is rather a house the door of which is opened by the pro- prietor to such who knock for admission, as he chooses to receive, and who leaves all his guests at liberty to depart when they will, without troubling him to play the porter."
It seems almost impossible to realize that such rank disunion sentiments were entertained by anybody in the loyal town of Salem, as those shown by the reading of the above extract. But it must be remembered that there were men, a few of them here and there in the North, as well as thousands of them in the South, who back in the '40's and '50's, were tainted with the doctrine of States-rights, so-called, which ultimately in 1861 led up to the open rupture which threatened the existence of the Nation. And while it is al- most beyond comprehension that such sentiments should have been entertained in the minds of those who professedly made the freedom from enthrall-
Mrs. Simeon Jennings.
ment of the black race in this country one of their chief objects in life, yet it must be remem- bered that in the North-and especially here in
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Salem-these radical men composed but a few individual cases, who, with their erronious doc- trines, had been forced to hide themselves from the righteous contempt and loyal execration of a truly liberty-loving people long before the culmi- națion of the great struggle ushered in by the Civil war.
The agents of the Anti-Slavery Bugle in Columbiana county and vicinity in 1850 were given as follows: David L. Galbreath and L. Johnson, New Garden; Lot Holmes, Columbiana; David L. Barnes, Berlin; Ruth Cope, Gergetown; Simon Sheets, East Palestine; A. G. Richardson, Achor; Joseph Barnaby, Mount Union. James Barnaby was still in 1850 "publishers' agent." The negro population of Columbiana county in
1850 was given by the Bugle at 417; Jefferson county's at 497.
For a number of years, during the anti- slavery excitement in Salem, the women inter- ested in the furtherance of the work-and the wo- men were as actively interested in the work as the men-held at intervals fairs, usually in Town Hall, at which fancy and general household articles were displayed and offered for sale in booths, the proceeds being applied to helping fugitives along over the underground railroad, and for other expenses incident to the work of the anti-slavery society. The efficient work of the women along these lines in those days was a very protent factor toward the success of the hu- mane work in which so many of Salem's good people were employed.
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Chapter V .- Industrial Salem
Beginnings and Development of the Manufacturing Industries of the Town- Some of the Men and Methods which Laid the Foundation for the City of the Twentieth Century.
As early as 1814 an attempt was made to form a company for manufacturing purposes. In that year a stock company was formed, to be called "The Manufacturing Company of Sa- lem," with an authorized capital stock of $50,000, to be divided into shares of $10 each, "which shall be paid in gold or silver coin, or bank notes equivalent thereto, or labor or materials (at the discretion of the directors) in the following man- ner: One-fourth of each share on the first of June, 1815, and one-fourth more in sixty days from the first installment ; the remainder of said shares to be fully paid in when the directors shall order by giving not less than sixty days public notice." The purpose was to manufac- ture "cotton, wool, ironware, and for merchan- dising." John Street, Nathan Hunt, Jacob
Gaunt, Samuel Davis, David Gaskill, Israel Gaskill and Richard Fawcett were elected a board of directors. A brick building was erected in which to house the enterprise, and prepara- tions made to begin operations in June, 1815; but for some reason the scheme fell through. Isaac Wilson bought the building and lot, and later the site was occupied by the Western Ho- tel. John Stanley erected and set in operation a woolen factory, which was destroyed by fire in 1827. Stanley rebuilt the factory on the present site of the Baptist church, at the intersection of what now are East Main street and Lincoln and McKinley avenues. Robert Campbell bought this concern in 1830, and followed the business of carding and spinning and weaving woolen fabrics. In 1838 Campbell sold out to Zadok
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Wm. W. Heaton.
Street, who having engaged Thomas Pinkham for manager, continued the business until 1849,
when the concern was suspended. In 1839 a woolen factory was built by George Allison in the Western part of town, between what are now West Main and West Green streets, which was purchased that same year by James Brown, who continued to operate it until 1849. Soon after that it was dismantled.
About 1825.Amos Kimberly started a card- ing machine on what is now Ellsworth avenue, the motive power for which was furnished by a large tread wheel worked by oxen. The tread wheel was a very common means of furnishing power in those days, in the absence of water power and before steam had come into general use. Mordecai Morlan bought this mill in 1832 and operated it until about 1839.
John Street operated an extensive tannery on the square now bounded by Depot, West Main, Howard and Dry streets. It is recorded that he sold leather for cash when he could get it; and, as he kept a rather extensive store for those days, he did a large amount of trading, exchanging finished leather and store goods for hides, tan bark and other commodities. John Saxon and Isaac Wilson also operated tanneries, though on a smaller scale.
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Four brothers, sons of Joel Sharp, Sr., who located very early in the century at Salem, as has been related early in this narrative, laid the foun- dation for the largest single industry which the city has long possessed, that of engine building, and for which it has acquired a world wide repu- tation. All the brothers, Thomas, Simeon, Clayton and Joel, were natural mechanics. They, however, first worked at carpentering. Thomas went to Cleveland during the '30's, became mill- wright and machinist, and about 1840 established a sawmill there. His brother, Joel, the youngest son of the family, followed him to Cleveland in 1841, and worked on the sawmill for some time. In 1842 Thomas arranged to return to Salem, while the younger brother went into the plant of the Cuyahoga Furnace Company to learn his trade. Thomas Sharp announced on his return to Salem that he would open a shop for the building of steam engines. The same year, 1842, he turned out his first steam engine. The cast- ings for it were brought to Salem in wagons from a Cleveland foundry, and were deposited in Sharp's little shop on what was and is known as Foundry Hill. In a year or two Thomas was joined by
two of his brothers, Simeon and Clayton, and in 1848 the fourth brother, Joel, returned from Cleveland and entered the firm. Between 1848 and 1850 they took from the Ohio and Pennsyl- vania Railroad projectors the contract for furn- ishing the ties and stringers for eleven miles of the railroad which was then being built between Alliance and Pittsburg, and to fulfill this contract the Sharps built a sawmill, still continuing the eugine works, however. In 1851 Thomas Sharp withdrew from the firm and started a shop on West Main street, which continued to turn out work until, in 1894, it was destroyed by fire. On Thomas Sharp's withdrawal from the original partnership in 1851, two of the remaining broth- ers went into a new organization styled Sharp, Davis & Bonsall, the members of the concern be- ing Simeon and Joel Sharp, Milton Davis and Joel S. Bonsall. The concern became known as the Buckeye Engine Works. The first year the total working force was only twelve men. The new firm quickly achieved fame, however, through the improvements introduced on the early steam engines. April 27, 1865, the works burned to the ground, inflicting a loss on the
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owners of between $50,000 and $75,000, with no in- surance. The plant then was probably the largest in any line of manufacturing in the county. It was quickly rebuilt and business resumed within less than a year. In December, 1871, the concern incorporated as The Buckeye Engine Company, with a capital of $300,000, the following being the officers: President, Joel Sharp; vice-president, Milton Davis; secretary and treasurer, T. C. Boone ; superintendent, Joel S. Bonsall ; assistant superintendent, Simeon Sharp. The establish- ment became in the succeeding 35 years the most widely known of all the metal trades concerns in the county, and in 1906 has an annual output ex- ceeding a half million of dollars, with over $500,- 000 invested.
In 1906 the Buckeye plant is running at full capacity, "single turn " for a greater part of the time, but double turn when orders crowd, as they frequently do.
Milton Davis and Simeon Sharp retired from business in 1892, and D. M. Davis became vice- president of the company. Later, on the death of Col. T. C. Boone, his position as secretary and treasurer was assumed by Stephen B. Richards.
Joel Sharp died July 28, 1898, and Joel S. Bonsall succeeded him in that year as president, C. S. Bonsall becoming superintendent. Joel S. Bon- sall died June 2, 1902, and was succeeded as pre- sident by H. H. Sharp. Now, in 1906, the officers are : H. H. Sharp, president; C. H. Weeks, vice- president; F. A. Pope, secretary and treasurer, and C. S. Bonsall, superintendent. Commencing in 1900 new buildings were erected and a series of improvements inaugurated which almost doubled the capacity of the plant. A new model of gas engine, the manufacture of which was be- gun in 1905, is proving a great success.
Some time in the very early '30's, Nicholas Johnson started a foundry and began business in a small way. In 1834 or 1835 Zadok Street bought the little plant, which was located on Dry street, and gave to that locality the name of "Foundry Hill," which it has borne ever since. Mr. Street conducted the business in a modest way for a number of years, and in 1847 the foundry was purchased by Snyder & Woodruff, who began the work of casting stoves. Isaac Snyder was a designer and pattern-maker, and his skill and taste helped to make the wares popular. The
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BUCKEYE ENGRIL
The Buckeye Engine Company's Plant.
.WOOD
RUFF
8
SONS.
A
WOODRUFF'S
S
J. Woodruff & Sons' Trade Mark
establishment was burned in the fall of 1856, but the firm bought a site on lower Depot street, re- built and continued the business of stove-found- ing. In 1871 extensive additions were made to the buildings. In 1868 Messrs. Snyder and Woodruff each took a son into the firm, and the business continued under the name of Snyder, Woodruff & Co. The firm had already become wide- ly known, and its annual sales at that time aggre- gated 5,000 stoves. Fourteen varieties of cooking and twenty varieties of parlor and heating stoves were turned out, and nearly 1,000 tons of iron were consumed yearly in their manufacture. In May, 1871, the Snyders retired from the partner- ship, and the firm became J. Woodruff & Sons, with a capital of $52,500. In 1906 a new line of steel gas ranges and heaters were being manu- factured and proved a decided success. James Woodruff, the head of the company, having died in 1903, the officers of the company now are : J. S. Woodruff, president, treasurer and general manager ; J. G. Woodruff, secretary.
In 1854 Levi A. Dole invented a hub-boxing
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machine. A. R. Silver, who was then foreman of the Woodruff carriage shop, became interested in the invention, and the two men in the fall of the same year rented a part of a little shop on High street, in which a lathe and blacksmith's forge were placed ; and then and there was born what later became the Silver & Deming Manu- facturing Company of Salem. Dole perfected other patents, and the business grew and the firm prospered. In 1856 the firm moved into one wing of the Buckeye company's shop. But two years later they were compelled to seek more room, and bought a warehouse, where W. J. Clark & Company were afterwards located. In 1865 John Deming bought a third interest, and then Dole died in 1866. In that year the firm became Silver & Deming. In 1874 the firm bought the buildings formerly owned and occupied by the Etna Manufacturing Company, the same year be- ing incorporated as the Silver & Deming Manu- facturing Company, with an authorized capital of $150,000. Early in 1890 A. R. Silver and his sons retired, for the purpose of organizing for themselves a new enterprise, and the Demings in the summer of that year reorganized as the Dem-
ing Company. Just prior to the withdrawal of the Silvers from the Silver & Deming Manufac- turing Company, the officers of the latter comp- any were: A. R. Silver, president; John Deming, vice-president ; Walter F. Deming, secretary ; William Silver, treasurer ; E. W. Silver, super- intendent. She original officers of The Deming Company were : John Deming, president ; A. G. Harris, vice-president ; W. L. Deming, secretary; W. F. Deming, treasurer ; Andrew Potter, sup- erintendent. In 1880 the Silver & Deming Manu- facturing Company had commenced the manu- facture of hand and power pumps, and after the reorganization is 1890 The Deming Company continued along the same lines, enlarging the business and making a much larger and heavier line of goods. During 1904-'05 the capacity of the plant was almost doubled by the erection of new buildings and the instalment of a larger amount of new and improved machinery, and in the spring of 1906 the foundry of the old lock works had been leased, which gave the company additional foundry capacity. In all of the de- partments the company now employs about 300 men. The board of directors is composed as fol-
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....
....
THE DEMING COMPANY
The Deming Company Pump Works.
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lows : W. F. Deming, president and treasurer ; W. L. Deming, vice-president and secretary ; F. J. Emery, chief engineer ; J. R. Carey, W. B. Henion (Chicago). J. B. Garber is superintend- ent. In the Centennial year, with its recent en- largement and improvements, the Deming plant is one of the finest, as it certainly is among the largest, of its class of industries in the country, and its products go practically all over the civil- ized world.
When, in 1890, the Silver Manufacturing Company was organized, they located at the foot of Broadway, where large buildings were erected. And during the following sixteen years the company had entered on a large scale, upon the manufacture of specialties such as carriage-maker and blacksmiths' tools, band saws, butchers' tools, "Ohio" hand power feed cutters, "Ohio" self-feed ensilage cutters and blowers, metal bucket chain elevators, feed mills, root cutters, etc. The original officers were : A. R. Silver, president ; H. M. Silver, vice president ; A. O. Silver, secretary ; Wm. Silver, treasurer ; E. W. Silver, superintendent. In 1906 the officers were, E. W. Silver, president ; H. M.
William Silver.
Silver, vice president ; A. O. Silver, treasurer ; T. E. Webb, secretary. In 1905 a new machine shop was built, and the capital stock increased
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-
ERIE RAILROAD
PENNA ' RAILROAD
M.N.CO
The Silver Manufacturing Company's Plant.
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from $150,000 to $160,000. New lines of manu- facture were added, including an extra large alfalfa cutter.
It is worthy of note that, during the past fifteen or twenty years, out of the Demings' and Silvers' plants a number of others, in the same or similar lines, have grown in this and other States.
Among the early manufacturing establish- ments was the Eagle Foundry, located on Ells- worth street-now Ellsworth avenue-by H. Kidd and G. Allison. In 1864 it passed into the hands of R. H. Garrigues, who converted it into a machine shop, and for some years manufac- tured horse powers and threshing machines. His son, Norman B. Garrigues, continued the business for some time after the death of the father, the shop later passing into the hands of The Sheehan Manufacturing Company, whose chief product was riveting machines, although some other novelties were made. About the close of the century the works were closed down, a portion of the machinery having been removed to Ravenna, where the business was to be con- tinued.
John Deming
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VICTOR CAS
QUEENS
VICTOR STOVE CO.
SALEM.O
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The Victor Gas Queen
In 1868 a stove foundry was established on Depot street by Henry King, Furman Gee and Henry Schaffer, under the firm name of King, Gee & Company. In May, 1869, the company incorporated as the Victor Stove Company, with nine members. The smaller interests were soon taken over by Daniel Koll and Furman Gee, who continued the business until 1879, when it passed into the hands of Daniel Koll & Sons, in the mean- time having been incorporated as the Victor Stove Company. Daniel Koll was treasurer of the company from 1869 to 1880, and president and treasurer from 1880 to. 1890. From 1890 to 1895 Joseph Koll was president, and G. W. Tolerton assumed that office in 1895. W. H. Koll has been secretary since 1870, and secretary and treasurer since 1888. Now (in 1906) the officers are : I. G. Tolerton, president ; W. H. Koll, secretary and treasurer, and Charles Sweney, assistant superintendent. The output is about 10,000 annually of ranges, heating stoves, cook and gas stoves. In the early sum- mer of 1906, a new three-story building, 50 by 80 feet, is being erected, to be used as ware-room, nickel-plating department and shipping room.
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Some fine new patterns of stoves have been added to the product of the concern.
In 1867 a third company, under the name of Baxter, Boyle & Company, built the Perry Stove Works, and in 1870 incorporated as the Perry Stove Company, with $60,000 capital. In August, 1872, the plant was practically destroyed by fire, but was rebuilt the same year. About 1881 the company, receiving a liberal offer from Mansfield, removed the plant to that city.
As early as 1872 decorative cornices, vases, busts, and metal statuary were made in Salem by Kittredge, Clark & Company, which firm laid the foundation for the large business in later years of the W. H. Mullins Company. In the spring of 1872 Kittredge, Clark & Company es- tablished a plant for the manufacture of galva- nized iron cornices and ornamental architectural novelties, on Depot street, in the building occupied some years previously by the Salem Manufactur- ing Company. The business prospered, and a few years later the company absorbed the Na- tional Ornamental Company, of Toledo, moving the Toledo works to Salem. So prominent was the company in the trade at this time, that it
received a large contract for the decorative feat- ures of the buildings at the Philadelphia Centen- nial Exposition in 1876. The Kittredge Cornice and Ornamental Company succeeded the original firm, and, in April, 1878, Thompson, Boyle & Company, then as Thompson & Bakewell, the business was carried on until February, 1882. At that time W. H. Mullins of Salem purchased the Thompson interest, and the firm name be- came Bakewell & Mullins. Mr. Mullins bought out his partner in February, 1890, and continued the business in his own name, entering al- most exclusively into the manufacture of statuary. Later the lines of manufacture were extended so as to include sheet metal architectural ornaments, boats and launches. January 15, 1905, the con- cern was incorporated as The W. H. Mullins Company ; the officers are, W. H. Mullins, presi- dent ; R. J. Thompson, vice-president ; C. C. Gibson, secretary ; W. P. Carpenter, treasurer ; W. C. Hare, general superintendent.
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