USA > Ohio > Allen County > A standard history of Allen county, Ohio : an authentic narrative of the past, with particular attention to the modern era in the commercial, industrial, educational, civic and social development > Part 41
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In November, 1879, The Democratic Times appeared in Lima, with O. B. Selfridge, Jr., and E. B. Halliday in the role of publishers. Five years later it became a daily newspaper (the statement in conflict with the assertion that March 12, 1887, was the beginning of the Lima daily newspaper). In 1889 The Democratic Times and The Democrat con- solidated, using the name, The Times-Democrat. The Lima Daily News- a non-partisan sheet-appeared in 1897, and it was later combined with The Times-Democrat-The Lima News and Times-Democrat, and today there are two daily newspapers in the community. The morning paper is The Republican-Gazette, while in the evening field is The Lima News and Times-Democrat, both issuing market editions and reaching rural subscribers on the date of publication. While there was street corner talk about local newspaper ownership, the reader is referred to the editorial section of each paper for the desired information.
In 1874 there was a newspaper-The Lima Sun-issued by Dell and Harry, i. e., A. B. Coe and H. L. Nedsker, but it was a short-lived pub- lication. The publishers had secured an army printing press, but in a short time they sold it to a Columbus Grove minister, and a religious sheet was the result. In time John Junkins acquired the property and it became a newspaper again. In 1877 Campbell Brothers acquired it. The records do not show how long The Sun shone in Allen County.
While the sentiment is drifting toward the exclusive use of English, there have been German newspapers in Allen County. In 1877 The Volkblatt was established by A. Zwanzig, but there were only three issues of it. On August 30, 1877, The Courier became in reality the first German newspaper published in Allen County. It was founded by George Feltz and in 1890 he sold it to Adolph Weixelbaum; it became the leading German paper. Mr. Weixelbaum combined it with his Ger- man paper published in Delphos-The Delphos Kleeblatt-the publication bearing the name Lima Courier and Delphos Kleeblatt.
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The Star, Lima's industrial newspaper, published by the South Side Commercial Printing Company, with Clarence Heller as managing editor, is delivered by carrier every Tuesday and Friday, and since it is found on every doorstep most people read it. It is fearless in its editorial policy and is gaining the confidence of the community.
In Delphos The Daily Herald and The Twice-a-Week Courant, with A. J. Laudeck as editor, served the community most acceptably. These publications are independent in their political affiliations. D. H. Tolan and Edward Walkup were formerly Delphos publishers.
Since 1873 there has been a Bluffton News and at once time N. W. Cunningham was its editor. The Bluffton News Publishing Company is B. F. Beery and his son, Clarence Beery. In the 70's S. B. Davis was publisher of The Bluffton Standard. The Spencerville Journal- News is published by Paul Cochran. There was a time when the mechanical part of this paper was accomplished in Delphos, but now it is a home product. Elida. Beaver Dam and Harrod have all had short-lived newspapers-brief existence. It requires both capital and mechanical knowledge to operate a newspaper successfully. Sometimes advance subscriptions have been secured and the paper would suspend when it was out of money. Sometimes the swan song of a newspaper has been "lack of support" and a natural death is all that could be said about it.
When reference is made to newspaper publishers, it is said that Count Coffinberry, who coined the word "Swinonia" in designating Hog Creek, was in his day a prime favorite with all publishers. While he was never a resident of Allen County he was a frequent visitor.
While there is loyal support of local newspapers, the metropolitan papers circulating in Allen County are from Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleve- land, Toledo, Chicago, and some read New York and Boston papers. When the newspaper fails to arrive promptly is when people find out how much it means to them. The newspaper of today is a complicated thing as compared with early issues of the same publication. It has added so many different departments other than the mere publication of news.
The newspaper is an educational influence-one side of the triangle -- the press, the church and the school. When some people have read a thing in the newspaper it is the ultimatum. The prime purpose of the newspaper is the collection and dissemination of news. There is respon- sibility connected with it, and competent performance has been the study of specialists for many years. The dissemination of news is one of the most important functions to civilized society. It is one of the principal factors in human progress.
Advertising is regarded as more than news-it is salesmanship as well, and Allen County buyers are interested in knowing about bargains. Discriminating readers follow the editorials-when there are any-in order to know the policy of a newspaper. Usually they seek to arouse thought and action. Special articles supply a wide range of general information. The first and last purpose of the newspaper, however, is to supply the n-e-w-s from the four corners of the universe. With the newspaper available there is less visiting in the community than when men and women went about to learn what was going on in the world.
Although the daily newspaper represents the best value for the money of any commodity delivered in the home-is the most common commodity that comes into the home-the average individual knows less about its production than anything else so essential to his existence. How many know how the white stock on which it is printed is obtained?
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How many realize the expense connected with it? The low cost of the newspaper cheapens it in the estimation of the subscriber. However, he would not do without it if it cost twice the money.
The working organization of a newspaper naturally separates itself as follows: The business office, closely allied with which is the depart- ment of advertising; the editorial; the news-gathering department, which makes the business office a possibility; the composing room or type- setting department ; the press room where the paper is printed and folded, and the circulation department-none of the other departments effective unless the paper reaches its readers. Each department would be use- less without the other. Sometimes there is an all-round man who can be of service in any department. The smaller papers are not so com- plicated, but on a metropolitan paper each man sticks to his department.
The public is familiar with the business office and with the circu- lation department ; pays the money at one place and receives its paper at the other; and it is the editorial department that is the eternal mys- tery. The primary function of this department is to gather the news. The reporter gets the facts-"the story," as it is universally known in newspaper parlance, and he writes it: The editor censors all "stories," for, after all, he is responsible for what goes into the newspaper. The success of any newspaper hinges upon the ability and fidelity of its reporters. Good editors may be made, but reporters-they are born, and sometimes their birth is unfortunate. In the first place the good reporter must have a "nose for news," and he must have a liberal com- prehension-a sane understanding of things. His faculties must be trained so that he will "scent a story," and he must have the courage to encounter difficulties in obtaining it. He must be trustworthy and con- scientious in using facts after he has obtained them. As a final requisite in this day and age of newspaper-making, the efficient reporter must be able to use a typewriter at the rate of fifty words a minute-other- wise he does not measure up to the demands made upon him.
The editor, to be successful, must have served an apprenticeship as a reporter. He must have better judgment than the average reporter. He must know men and affairs thoroughly. He must be inventive and resourceful. He must have an abundance of executive ability and con- fidence, to say right off the reel what shall be done in emergencies. The atmosphere in the editorial department of all newspapers is heavy with emergencies. The man is lost who hesitates at such times. Above all, the editor must have a grasp of the situation. He must be able, intu- itively, to detect the truth and separate it from nonessential details. It is he who dictates the policy of the paper, unless it is a commercialized sheet and ruled from the business office. It is the editor who directs the trend of the public mind. If he is incompetent, careless or radical, the paper suffers from it; if he is careful, painstaking and honest, the paper will profit from. his qualifications. It is said, however, that the friends of a newspaper man are his greatest liability; his enemies are always his best assets. The foregoing suggests that the very nature of a newspaper man's work isolates him-bars him from many of the pleasures that others enjoy. He dares have no close associates.
The editor dare have no intimate friends. He does not know how soon he will be called upon to publish a story reflecting on them. A good newspaper man is not always popular; in recounting the things that are considered as legitimate news, he sometimes treads on some- body's toes. "To err is human," and sometimes the doings of humanity do not read to their credit-as fights, thefts, divorces, innumerable trans- actions that would embarrass one's friends-and yet "news is news."
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Few men possess the peculiar temperament which fits them for effective reportorial work and, therefore, reporters are-well, a necessity. Long live the competent, conscientious newswriter!
A daily newspaper is different from the average manufactured prod- uct since it is made outright in virtually eight hours. Under no cir- cumstances can the time be extended more than twenty-four hours, or it would cease to be a daily paper. Every department works at high tension, "Hurry" being the middle name of every employe of the office. There are typewriters clicking in order that the narrative may reach the composing room-typesetting room would be a better name, and why secure advertising matter and write the stories unless the typesetters handle them later? Since the dawn of the twentieth century there have been great strides of advancement in the typesetting department. The linotype machine now does the work of many printers. It is almost human in its capabilities. The type is molded by the machine itself and there is no after-distribution-an operation which once took up much valuable time. Then there is the "Ad Alley," where advertisements are completed when part of the type has been set on the machine. The large, blackface type so much used in advertisements is still set by hand. With all the advantages of the typesetting machines there is still employment for many printers.
While not one newspaper reader in a thousand understands what is meant by stereotyping, each line appearing in a newspaper has under- gone the process. An impression is made of all type on soft paper which is converted into a matrix and the molten lead is spread on it either in flat casts or curved plates. No up-to-date daily newspaper is now printed direct from the type; the latter is used solely for making an impression on the matrix, after which the cast forms the printing surface. The casual visitor at a newspaper plant is well repaid for the time. He goes away with a wholesome respect for the publication. When he sees a modern press in operation and sees the papers that are printed from one continuous roll of white paper-when he sees the completed papers, folded and counted and ready for delivery-well, they usually give him one, showing their appreciation of his visit.
The modern newspaper is the history of yesterday and there is no question about its readers being responsible for its attitude. Their sup- port is what enables it to advocate anything at all. Discerning publishers study the features that attract most readers, and they cater to the wants of the majority in such things. As a story that is told-the editor dic- tates and his words are converted into type almost before the reverbera- tion of his voice dies away. Every day the events of all the world are heralded to the different habitations through the agency of the press associations. There is no other agency to be compared with the news- paper in the spread of good influences in a community. It is a blessed trinity-book, platform and pulpit-and those who read it may control its utterances by the sort of moral sentiment with which they sur- round it.
The newspaper is a great institution-swift winged and everywhere present, flying over the fence from the hand of some belated newsboy, tossed into the counting room or store, shoved under the door of the suburban home, laid on the work bench in the busy shop, delivered by carrier to rural patrons and read wherever it is sold-the newspaper adds character and luster-shapes the family history. It is such an . integral factor in community life and people have become so dependent upon it, that a delayed paper demoralizes the whole household and every family knows the feeling of impatience while awaiting the coming
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of the paper. If you do not understand the strong hold the press has on the community, just answer a few of the inquiries by telephone when subscribers have been overlooked, or the paper is later than usual. Sometimes a mail pouch is carried by-simply an oversight on the part of the railway mail clerk, but it is a real misfortune to those who miss the paper that day. After all, human life is but a book with the passing years for its chapters, and the gliding months are its paragraphs; the days are as the sentences, but the punctuation and the proof-usually others attend to that, while one's doubts are the interrogations, and imi- tation of others the quotation marks, and any attempt at display is a dash-the final period being death-and from the cradle to the grave the greatest influence is the printed page. The newspaper is the most potent agency of education-the advance guard of civilization. "We, the people," are shaping its policy-responsible for it, even though abso- lutely silent about it.
CHAPTER XXX THE ALLEN COUNTY HIGHWAYS-GOOD ROADS
"It's a poor driver that can't hit a stump."
While that assertion once meant something in Allen County, it would require careful watching to see one along a public roadway today. That homely saying belonged to the transition period, when changes were being made in all phases of civilization. In these days when every farm house is within half a mile of an improved highway-a requirement in order to continue the rural mail service-a stump in the road is an incident of the past. Commercial transportation and ordinary highway travel are now so closely allied that there is scarcely a line of demarca- tion between them. Little "trips" that used to require weeks to accom- plish are now reduced to a matter of a few hours. The hard surface roadways and the automobiles have changed the whole economic sit- uation with reference to "Little Journeys in the World."
Civilization's greatest debt to the automobile industry is good roads. The automobile has made good roads, and at the same time the better public thoroughfares are making better automobiles a possibility. One does not progress without the other, and every owner or driver of a motor car is vitally interested in the good roads question. Every auto- mobile manufacturer is equally interested in the highways of the whole country. As the miles of improved roadways are multiplied, in the same ratio is the increase in the sales, life and value of motor cars. Each year the cities, counties, states and the nation combine forces in an effort to improve the transcontinental highways, and the whole world is interested in the methods of travel. The newspapers are now empha- sizing the good roads question. A billion dollars has been appropriated for good roads in the United States and that fact is of vital interest to Allen County. There are more than 8,000 automobiles owned in the county and sometimes people make long journeys in them.
The utility of the automobile is often attacked by enemies of the industry who class it as a luxury. The automobile has come to be a necessity. With the motor vehicle those living in the country market their produce quicker and cheaper, give their children better school advantages and are in closer touch with the whole community. Those living in the cities have God's out-of-doors brought closer to them and are able to procure life's necessities, and with automobiles and improved highways come health, happiness and better living conditions. On sober second thought almost any person would class the automobile as a necessity. Webster defines luxury "anything which pleases the senses and is also costly or difficult to obtain; an expensive rarity."
The automobile has increased the size of the neighborhood for many families, and a stranger may find his way along Allen County highways without the formality of asking questions. The experienced chauffeur reads the roadway signs at a glance.and the traveler is no longer warned by the farmers that he will be unable to see the towns because of the houses in them. Puns have always been perpetrated upon travelers who asked questions. What the high-tension chauffeur dreads to encounter today is the horse-drawn vehicle, or the electric car driven by a woman ; there is no way of anticipating either of them. It is the verdict of those used to the road that an automobile is shown more courtesy at night
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DRUGS, NEM
CABINET
.. .....
WHEN THERE WERE NO AUTOMOBILES IN LIMA
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HISTORY OF ALLEN COUNTY
than in daytime by horse-drawn vehicles; the shadow of the car seems to create more uncertainty than the daylight honk, and an automobile may pass a carriage at night with little difficulty. "Safety first" controls the driver of horses under cover of darkness; in daylight he takes his chances in the middle of the road, and the automobile may do the same in passing him. While there are laws of the road, some drivers are laws unto themselves.
Before a recent meeting of the Allen County Historical Society, Mayor Frank A. Burkhardt of Lima read a paper, "Trails, Traces and Tracks," and it is herewith reproduced, only omitting a few duplicate features already incorporated in other chapters. Mayor Burkhardt says: The building of roadways may have been a successful art to the mound- builders, but to the American Indians it was most certainly a lost art. A century ago Northwestern Ohio was a trackless wilderness, save where the military traces of Harmar, St. Clair, Wayne and Hull left evidence of the crude choppings necessary for the forced military move- ments of former years. Allen County was then in the heart of the most exclusive and most valued hunting grounds of the Shawnees, as well as the Ottawas and the Wyandottes.
The present site of Lima was near where the tribes limited their zones in hunting craft. It was here they had hoped to remain stead- fastly, after being dislodged from Pennsylvania and southern Ohio by campaigns of defeat. The Hull trail, chopped out by the pioneer woods- men in advance of the army of 1812, was the nearest approach to a highway at that time; the closest point was near the present town of Huntsville. The Wayne trace along the Auglaize was crudely improved and was used as a mail route about this time; this is the historic trace of Allen County. The successful and strategic maneuvers of Wayne that misled the Indians occurred on this section of the trace. Along the north boundary of the county was a trail road of ancient origin. It is today adopted in part by the Lincoln highway from a point near Gomer to Fort Wayne, Indiana. This trail is known as the Ridge road, and while there is evident trace of glacial formation, it is doubtless to the buffalo that early trod this ridge that credit can well be given for its course of primeval adoption. The Indians followed in the tracks of the Buffalo which, by preservative instinct selected the ridges and lower courses of the hills. These were not only the driest and firmest, but were windswept and thus freest of snow and leaves. Then, too, there was less danger of fire, and the elevation afforded safety in outlook and freedom in signaling.
Long before the time of Wayne and Harrison this narrow and devious trail was worn deep by prehistoric movements that kept clear of the impassable Black Swamp of this region. Its swerving course was unknown to General Wayne or he would not have adopted it because of the necessary heavy chopping in order to properly widen it for military movements. To properly approach the opening of trails and traces of the early settlers of the county, it is necessary to refer to great roads that first linked the Ohio country with Philadelphia and Baltimore. The Forbes road, completed in 1758 to Pittsburgh, was not only the means by which the troops and supplies were landed in the Ohio territory in the successful vanquishing of the hostile Indians, but it became the mightiest thoroughfare on the continent for pioneer trade movement and provided a channel of transportation for the settlers of an inland empire. In 1816 it is recorded that more than 15,000 settlers' wagons were counted as they passed over a bridge near Pittsburg on
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the way to Ohio. Some of the early settlers of Allen County were in this throng.
It is told that at places along the road logs were dragged behind the wagons to make safe the dangerous descent of hills, and at other places the men who generally walked, would hold onto either side of the wagons by means of stays to prevent upsets. One of the most typical instances of the persevering and toilsome attitude of those sturdy pioneers is in that of a woman who led a cow from eastern Pennsyl- vania to Ohio, a distance of over 400 miles. The settlers in transit camped along the roadside, taking what provisions the hunting enroute would not afford. Many writers and sightseers ventured on those trips
Stage
Coach
ECHALL.PHOTO.S-AU
THE CONESTOGA MODE OF TRAVEL
and they recorded the hardships and experiences of those nation makers. One poet in glowing vision wrote:
"I hear the tread of pioneers, Of nations yet to be ; The first low wash of waves where soon Shall roll a human sea. The rudiments of empire here Are plastic yet and warm; The chaos of a mighty world Is rounding into form."
The French traders had established posts at Wapakoneta, St. Marys and Loramie between 1698 and 1770. At the latter place is where the Indian supplies were stored for various raids upon the early Ohio set- tlers. When General St. Clair was sent by President Washington to punish the Indians it was from this locality that the Indian trails turned out the wily denizens of the forest that made the expedition a failure. In 1791 General St. Clair, with the largest army that ever moved into
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the Indian country, was defeated in a most disastrous way at Fort Recovery. Historian Williamson recites that 200 Indians left Wapa- koneta the night before the battle and threw their balance into the fight at a critical moment. The squaws and children of the tribes were secreted along the Auglaize in anticipation of possible disaster. When the success of the fight was announced by a runner they went to the field and helped to scalp the victims.
In 1794 stern retribution followed as General Wayne, in a masterful way, maneuvered his forces, and, by constructing forts, he pushed along the Auglaize and forever settled the question of the mastery of this ter- ritory. The treaty at the Rapids of the Maumee in 1817 was a signal for the settlers to take courage and possess the rich lands of the Shaw- nees. At this time the nearest settlements were at Urbana and at Piqua- the former on the Hull trail and the latter on the Wayne trace. After the Shawnees had been allotted the Hog Creek Reservation of twenty- five square miles, which contained two villages, the site of which is in Shawnee Township, also the 100 square miles reserved at Wapakoneta, it was then that the first roadway was constructed over which came the first permanent settlers of Allen County. This road was surveyed and laid out by the sturdy and intrepid chief Quilna. This trail was eagerly sought by the early settlers. Its course was not governed by . section lines or points of the compass. Well does the writer remember viewing with childish fear and wonder the course of this trail through the great woods on the Isaac Bowsher farm near the site of the Shawnee village. The historic trail, long abandoned, could be traced plainly by the void of trees. It avenued through the maze of mighty oaks and elmis that lined either side with artly stretches of tentacled branches that arched over the mystic way of the past.
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