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 66

Author: Rusler, William, 1851-; American Historical Society (New York)
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Chicago ; New York : The American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 598


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 66


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Some definite, organized effort was necessary in fostering library sentiment, and when in the '80s the Chautauqua movement struck Lima, it attracted the foremost people in the community ; it was a systematic course of study and a library was then a necessity. A representative group of Lima women ready to assume community responsibility was attracted by the Chautauqua : Mrs. C. M. Hughes, Mrs. Angerona Thrift, Mrs. J. F. Brotherton, Mrs. J. R. Hughes, Mrs. James Irvine, Mrs. Mar- garet Rumple, Mrs. S. A. Baxter, Mrs. Frances Mitchell Baxter, Mrs.


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C. S. Brice, Mrs. Elizabeth Freeman, Mrs. Martha J. Ballard, Mrs. J. N. Harrington, and Mrs. H. A. Holdridge. These Chautauqua women began agitating the library question again. At different times there were different groups who agitated the question; sentiment is something that has to be cultivated in any community.


The Chautaqua group agitation resulted in forming another library association with I. S. Motter as its president ; there were various financial schemes and the money was secured for the purchase of more library books, each new association inheriting the old collection of library books. When a fund accrued, the book purchasing committee was Judge Mac- kenzie, Goodrich Nichols and Mrs. Brice. The new library was opened in the Allen County courthouse, but finally from lack of funds it was stranded again. When the library was again resuscitated, its manage- ment was placed in the hands of the Lima Young Men's Christian Asso- ciation, which proved only a temporary arrangement. There is detail


CARNEGIE LIBRARY IN LIMA


and responsibility connected with a circulating library. There was no fund with which to employ a librarian.


In 1900 there was another library community movement, the art, music and literary clubs feeling the need, and combining their efforts; with the ushering in of the new century, the library movement was gaining an impetus in all of the towns; some towns with smaller popula- tion than Lima were establishing libraries; the progressive women of the community were now behind a library movement. Mrs. O. W. Smith of the Woman's Club made a strong library appeal through the local newspapers, the different defunct organizations were awakened, and the appeal as already detailed was made to Andrew Carnegie. The women secured $400 through memberships, and this fund was placed in the hands of H. L. Brice and J. W. Roby who selected the new books, and on July 15, 1901, Miss Medora Freeman was chosen librarian ; on September 1 the library was again open to the public; there were 1,641 books in the aggregate from all sources, and with 782 newly purchased volumes, the remnanants of all the old library efforts and the additional new volumes were removed from the Young Men's Chris-


Vol. 1-33


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tian Association, where the collection has been sheltered last to the Black Block, and by the end of the year there were 2,678 volumes in circulation from the new location. By purchase and donation the number of books was then increased to 3,142 and there were 1,952 different persons taking them, saying nothing about the number of persons who read each volume loaned from there.


While Judge Mackenzie had been the first person to assume responsi- bility for the distribution of books in Lima, the task was too onerous for one having so many business cares; there was only one solution- employ a librarian. Miss Freeman began her duties as a salaried libra- rian, September 1, 1901, and since that time the public has always had access to the library books. Since Miss Freeman, the librarians are: Miss Grace Chapman, Miss Lyle Harter and Miss Martha Gamble. Miss Gamble was employed in the library under Miss Freeman, and has always remained with it. Miss Harter was librarian in 1908, when the Carnegie library was opened to the public ; a second appeal was made to the Carnegie fund, and $5,000 was added to the original grant of $30,000, making $35,000 beside the community investment in the site and the operating expense. Since 1913, Miss Gamble has been librarian ; her assistants are: Miss Veldren Smith and Miss Mildred Downing.


While there are not so many technical and trade books and maga- zines as the librarian recognizes the need of, there are now 15,000 vol- umes in the Lima Public Library. There are about 3,000 cards issued on which books are drawn, and many of the current magazines and newspapers are available there. Not as many men frequent the library reading rooms as would only that the Young Men's Christian Associa- tion, Knights of Columbus and many clubs and lodge rooms afford similar advantages. The Carnegie library is the pride of the com- munity with its basement auditorium, and committee rooms. The liter- ary clubs frequently use the auditorium and school teachers and school children make good use of the reading rooms. There are always some men there of evenings. In the period that books were being sent overseas to American soldiers, the Lima library was a receiving station for them; they were sent to Newport News from Lima. Groups of books have been loaned to different schools and to the Lima Telephone Company; many references are looked up for patrons, the librarians knowing the location of books and understanding the index system. Sometimes the inventories reveal that books are missing; careful han- dling is urged on all who borrow books from the library. The librarians repair bindings and send many magazines to the bindery so that patrons may use them later. In 1919, the library was closed one month because of the influenza epidemic; ordinarily the library is open every day except Sundays and legal holidays.


There are seven members of the library board when all positions are filled. The 1920 members : President, John W. Robey, and associated with him: O. B. Selfridge, Mrs. Kent W. Hughes, Mrs. T. K. Jacobs and A. L. White; there were two vacancies on the board. Mr. Robey and Mr. Selfridge, representing the board, placed an order for a copy of this history ; Miss Gamble had said that children were making inquir- ies every day, and she suggested a number of subjects she wanted mentioned; nothing in the library told about the building itself, or many other public buildings. Just a suggestion : when in doubt as to what particular books to read for any given line of information, consult the librarian ; it is the librarian's business to be familiar with books and to know which are the best ones.


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DELPHOS LIBRARY-While there is a Carnegie library in Delphos, it happens to be in Van Wert County; it is located in a small park that was a gift to the community in the early history of the town by Father John Otto Bredeich, who certainly had prophetic vision; it stands in a clump of trees of nature's own planting; it was built in 1912, the com- munity securing a gift of $12,500 from Andrew Carnegie; it was open to the public October 1, 1912, Miss Grace Boardman being the first librarian ; she served for six years, and when she resigned the library was closed for a short time, allowing Miss Marie Rosselit time to qualify as librarian ; she had training in the library at Sidney and in the public library in the University of Michigan. Miss Rosselit is a Delphos young woman. The Delphos library has about 6,000 well selected volumes. John H. Wahmhoff deserves credit for his activity in securing the Del- phos library ; when the library was opened to the public with a program of dedication, E. E. Truesdale of the building committee presented the key to Clarence Marsh of the Delphos City Council, who in turn pre- sented it to Mr. Wahmhoff as president of the board of trustees. It has a small basement auditorium, and the community makes good use of it. There is an excellent museum collection, largely the work of Mr. Wahmhoff. The library slogan is : "Delphos our name, advance- ment our aim," and when Delphos people want information they visit the library. Treasured there is a flag "made by the first settlers," in the early '50s, and some of the best-known women in the community helped to make it. They were: Mrs. Sarah Smith, Mrs. Henry Linde- mann, Mrs. Fred Kollsmith and Mrs. John Cowan. Mrs. Lindemann, who survived the others, had the knowledge that the flag is being preserved in the Delphos library.


It is said The Tale of Woe is found in every library, and that steeplejacks refuse to climb them because of the number of stories; the two Carnegie libraries are the only library buildings in Allen County, and the one in Delphos would not be counted only that legally Delphos belongs to Allen County. The parody on Henry Clay's saying: "I had rather be right than president," has been paraphrased: "I had rather be Harold Bell Wright than president," because as a literary man he has reached the point where the income from his publications exceeds that of the President, and yet not many Lima people are aware of the fact that Mr. Wright was one time a clerk in the Baxter-Trevor book- store; he had not yet become the world-famous writer of fiction. Dr. Shelby Mumaugh gave the information. There never have been such voluminous writers living in Allen County as New England once produced, came the answer to an inquiry about local literary folk.


When Mrs. James Pillars asked Professor John Davison to write a paper on the literature of Allen County and read it before the His- torical Society, he replied: "Why write about what aint?" but his graphic answer caused him to think further about it. After saying that the Hoosier Poet, James Whitcomb Riley, was for three years a resident of Lima while associated with Dr. C. M. Townsend as a patent medi- cine vender, and that the doggerel he recited was composed while he was employed by the medicine man, Professor Davison said that it was while the poet was visiting Donn Piatt at his castle in Logan County that he wrote his famous autumn epic: "When the frost is on the pump- kin, and the fodder's in the shock." It was in the '70s that Mr. Riley was in Lima.


It is urged that there never have been dreamers in Allen County because its citizens have always been "too busy keeping the wolf from the door" to write fiction or poetry. Allen County people have been


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so busy making a living, that they have had little time for literature. While they have built few air-castles, most of them have been busy with temporal things-have built some splendid castles-every man's home his castle. There are few "dreamers of dreams" in Allen County. While not many people begin new things in their old days, it is possi- ble that Allen County may yet develop a coterie of writers; someone has exclaimed :


"But when old age came creeping on, With all its aches and qualms, King Solomon wrote the Proverbs, And King David wrote the Psalms,"


and mayhap someone will yet take up his goose-quill in Allen County. A little inquiry brought out the following facts: Mrs. B. F. Welty (Cora Miller Welty) wrote Marguerite; it is a story of the Amish community ; Mrs. Welty has written many short stories.


Job Taylor who was a school boy in Lima wrote: "Broken Links," which is a story of the Pennsylvania coal mines.


Chauncey Bogardus wrote a volume of poetry: "Varied Verse," most of which appeared originally in The Republican-Gazette. Mr. Bogar- dus has written many campaign songs, especially in the wet and dry contests ; while he is a printer his friends call him a writer.


The Rev. R. J. Thompson, one-time minister in the Market Street Presbyterian Church, had many short stories published, both in the sacred and secular press.


The Rev. Franklin A. Stiles of the Lima Baptist Church, while not an Allen County product, has written : "Helps to Happiness," which is a volume of poems he characterizes as "a message of sweet and tender love to those weary in body and mind," and it is on sale in the book stores:


Herbert H. Brown of Lima wrote: "The Little Girl I Used to Love," and other poems; he was styled the Lima Lyrist, his poems dealing with love, hope, faith and fidelity-the great elemental traits that concern all of humanity.


N. W. Cunningham of Bluffton, who has traveled in the Orient extensively, has written two volumes covering his observations: "One Hundred and One Days Away," and "Over the Seas with Me." Many Allen County folk have enjoyed the armchair journeys with Mr. Cun- ningham; the prospective world tourist will find these two volumes valuable as handbooks of travel.


There is a booklet, an official souvenir of Lima Municipality, for the benefit of the Fire and Police Reserve Fund collated by Dr. Samuel A. Baxter, and bearing the date 1897, from the press of The Repub- lican-Gazette Company, that contained much valuable information that was utilized in the pages of this history.


It is said that the best genealogical library in the United States is in Boston because of the Pilgrim history there; while popular demand for the knowledge of ancestry was once restricted to the reputedly wealthy, since the middle of the nineteenth century others have inter- ested themselves in it; less affluent families have gone hunting for the blood lines connecting them with early history; the oracle, "Know thy- self," also implies a knowledge of ancestry. The Sons and Daughters of the American Revolution have had trouble with their grandfathers and grandmothers, too, because of insufficient records about them; a livestock specialist must understand science in order to write pedigrees,


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and the genealogist encounters the same difficulties; a good biography means a great deal to a family; there is always someone who cares to know his origin, and who is not afraid of the theory of evolution.


Through an effort to "know himself," Mayor Franklin A. Burkhardt of Lima has performed a priceless service for all who are descended from the original Boucher family; in his genealogy: "The Boucher Family," Mayor Burkhardt not only shows the evolution of the name: Bowsher, Bauscher, Bausher, Bousher, to Boucher, but he has developed the genealogy of the related families-the branches, as: Strawn, Harp- ster, Tedrow, Cryder, Reichelderfer, Critchfield, Stahl, Straw, Brant and other families knowing themselves to be descendants of Daniel Bou- cher of Albany Township, Berks County, Pennsylvania; it also includes notes of some other Boucher families; a brief history of Ohio reunions of the family is included in the genealogy.


By way of an introductory, Mr. Burkhardt says: "This volume is dedicated to our God-fearing ancestors, the knowledge and memory of whose toils and privations may better fit us to inherit the fruits of their love and labor; may these footprints garnered from their sturdy lives grace the treasure places of their posterity." The author says, further : "A desire for personal enlightenment regarding the advent and career of our family in America, led the writer to institute an inquiring search among near relatives which soon led to the realization that our people were vaguely informed in the matter of our family ties and genealogy." Mr. Burkhardt has had inquiry from a number of librarians who realize the importance of genealogies in public libraries; when families become widely separated, it is possible that some wanderer may learn his own identity from consulting a genealogy in a library. Some of the cuts appearing in this volume are from the Boucher Genealogy. In the volume Mr. Burkhardt shows his own relation to the Bouchers.


It is urged by some that the evident lack of literary talent as a written asset in Allen County has been offset in the work of the platform speakers; there have been political spellbinders and pulpiteers who were strong in platform orations ; through three generations the Allen County bar has furnished platform speakers, and Professor J. S. Davison still fills lecture engagements from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rocky Moun- tains; in his travels among strangers the professor has been mistaken for both John L. Sullivan and William Howard Taft, although his lec- tures are educational in their nature.


ALLEN COUNTY HISTORIES-Bulwer Lytton says: "There is no past so long as books shall live," and Dean Swift exclaims: "Books the children of the brain." In the pages of a well-written history, it is possible to live one's life all over again; the past becomes the present in the preservation of many things of interest to the future citizen.


While the idealist is never at his best in the field of realism, the student of economic conditions in Allen County knows that the increase and advance along the line of achievement has been much greater since Henry Howe's second tour of Ohio, than what he records between the '40s and '80s when he traversed the country. While other and more recent volumes of Ohio History are on the shelves of the public library, none are so well known to the public as Howe's History.


In the preface to his second History of Ohio, Mr. Howe, who was a native of Connecticut, living finally in Columbus, writes: "We don't know what is before us." He then details something of his adventures traveling on horseback throughout the state in 1846, and again in 1886, adding this comment : "Not a human being in any land that I know of has done a like thing." While some have regarded Howe's History in


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the same light as they think of garden seeds, because for so many years free copies of it were distributed by the members of the Ohio Assembly, the state having acquired the ownership of the plates from which it was printed, it has always been near the hearts of those fortunate enough to own a copy of it. The thing that has endeared Howe's History to the people is the number of now imperishable personal incidents in it.


D. H. Tolan from whom much Allen County information has been gained, knew Henry Howe in Carrollton in 1846, and he watched him sketch a picture from the street corner that later appeared in the Ohio History. It is elsewhere related in this volume, that when Mr. Howe visited Lima in 1846, he sketched a picture from the lawn at Blue Bird Hill which was incorporated in the history. Mr. Tolan met Mr. Howe again in Allen County forty years later. Mr. Howe himself says that in the time intervening between his two pilgrimages over Ohio, the population had more than doubled itself, while no arithmetical calcu- lation could estimate its advance in material resources and intelligence.


What this veteran historian, Henry Howe, says of Ohio as a whole applies admirably to Allen County, but almost as much time has elapsed since he said it as had elapsed between the time of his two visits; were he to return to earth and tour the state again, he would find the strides in advance had been greater since his second visit to Allen County ; the age of electricity dawned since then, and any Rip Van Winkle would have difficulty adjusting himself today. The log-rolling and the wool- picking social epoch is so far in the dim distance of the past, that many either never have heard, or have forgotten those stories and incidents of the long ago. The one who writes the line saw Mrs. Henry Howe in Columbus, when she. was a woman eighty-eight years old; she survived her husband by several years. She said her husband was always a stu- dent of history. The Howe History is in the Lima library.


In northwestern Ohio there is quite a group of local writers who have "gotten" between lids, and mention is made of Horace S. Knapp, who wrote the Allen County data in The World Atlas; it appeared in 1875, and is illustrated with maps; there are farm pictures in it, the art conforming to the period, before the development of the accurate photograph. Mr. Knapps' most important work was "A History of the Maumee Valley," which is standard and treats both the romance and historical development of the locality, including Allen County. While writing the Maumee Valley sketch, Mr. Knapp came into the office of The Delphos Herald when Mr. Tolan was its editor; he tarried to write down some memoranda.


In 1880, there was a Historical Sketch of Allen County in which Dr. G. W. Hill of Ashland wrote the Shawnee story; it had no local editorial representation.


In 1885, there was published A History of Allen County that was widely distributed, and while it had no local editorial supervision, it has been highly prized by many who regard it as an authority.


In 1906, there appeared A History of Allen County by Professor Charles C. Miller, who was at the time connected with the Lima public schools ; he was not a permanent citizen of Allen County ; he was assisted by Dr. Samuel A. Baxter, who contributed a number of reminiscent chapters. Many Allen County families own it.


In the public library in Lima are copies of all the Allen County publications, and of the different Ohio histories; these books are also found in many private libraries.


The Book of Ohio, wholly pictorial, and Picturesque Northwestern Ohio, and the Battle Grounds of the Maumee Valley (pictorial) are found in some private libraries.


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Northwest Ohio, by Nevin O. Winter, includes twenty counties, and in it the Allen County chapter is written by Ezekiel Owen. Mr. Winter has written many historical books, and some of them have been trans- lated into the languages of the countries described in them. He has written the initial chapters in this Allen County History. He was recently the travelogue speaker at a dinner given by the men of Christ Episcopal Church in Lima, speaking of his own observations while visiting Russia.


There is a Portrait and Biographical Record of Allen and Van Wert Counties for which there was good Allen County patronage; it has no local editorial representation, and does not purport to be a history.


The present publication : "A Standard History of Allen County," might well have been styled Centennial, and beginning with the four- teenth chapter it is written with the thought of covering the develop- ment of a century. N. O. Winter writes the preliminary chapters, and the history of Allen County proper is under the editorial supervision of William Rusler, "The Sage of Shawnee," who has directed the pub- lishers' representative, Rolland Lewis Whitson, in assembling historic data for it. Mr. Rusler had long wanted to have a comprehensive His- tory of Allen County. Now that this volume has made its advent in the world of books, it is hoped that those who are bent on research may be able to find in it all they had hoped for-that it may "fill a long felt want" in the community. Mention is already made of it in the Foreword. The men securing local orders for the history were: F. H. Moore, Roy Ferguson and W. A. High. It is only through the patronage plan that such an enterprise is a financial possibility.


The Lima business man who refused to buy a dictionary, saying he already knew where all of his customers lived, had confused it with a directory ; the first Allen County Directory was issued in the '70s by Hazelton Brothers. It was from the bindery of Gale Sherman. O. B. Selfridge published directories later, and Attorney F. E. Mead has made a collection of Allen County directories since 1891, although some other collector has secured his 1918 copy. Ezekiel Owen has a copy of the 1876 directory, and F. E. Harmon of the 1878 issue; when the first directories were issued, Allen County citizens were suspicious; it was so soon after the Civil war, and they were afraid to give out informa- tion; there were no daily papers educating them in such things. Mr. Mead has frequent use for his back number directories ; sometimes legal questions are settled by reference to them. Who's Who in Allen County in those old directories presents a different list from the one found in a recent directory.


It is said that books "go under the hammer first" when adversity overtakes a family; sometimes a county history is sold at auction, and there is always someone who wants it; men say they wanted the county history in a division of property because the family story is in it, but someone else secured it-usually the oldest brother. It has been charged that no one is mentioned in county histories only those who buy them; who wants "something for nothing"? The biography volume in this edition is in the interest of subscribers wholly, but the history is written without knowledge of who are the patrons; the men and the women who developed the community are part of its history; they are men- tioned as far as it has been possible to gain information about them, and their relation to the community. Some people are not sufficiently public spirited to be entitled to mention in the annals of the community ; they are not even mentioned in the newspapers.


While tarrying in Allen County the publishers' representative employed a newspaper outlet to induce its readers to supply historical


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data, and it was "bread on the waters," many stories thus secured that had not been found on the printed page at all. People are not always certain of themselves, and sometimes give out the wrong information. The librarian often has to play the role of interpreter when patrons are seeking information in reference to volumes; just as the tree is known by its fruit, library patrons are judged by the books they read; as a rule, the older patrons of the library ask for the classics; they read the standard novels, and literature that has stood the test of time.




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