Annals of the Early Settlers Association of Cuyahoga County, number I, Part 32

Author: Early Settlers Association of Cuyahoga County
Publication date: 1880-
Publisher: [S.l. : The Association
Number of Pages: 656


USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Annals of the Early Settlers Association of Cuyahoga County, number I > Part 32


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thereof, than that from this fund over a million and seven hundred thousand dollars has been paid to discharge the debt of the city, and over a million still remains in the hands of the commissioners. It is one of the pleasant recollections of the person, who addresses you, that in his official capacity representing this community, he inserted in his own hand-writing in the original bill as it was passed by the House of Representatives of the General Assembly, which was concnrred in by the Senate, and became a law, the honored names of Henry B. Payne, Franklin T. Backus, William Case, Moses Kelly, and William Bingham, who thereby were made the commissioners of said fund. The new city increased rapidly, and at the census of 1860 the enumeration showed a population of 43,838. Under the provisions of the general law, various annexa- tions have since been made at different times. By virtue of an ordinance passed February 16, 1864, a portion of Brooklyn town- ship lying northerly of Walworth Run was brought into the cor- poration, and on February 27, 1867, another portion of Brooklyn township and a part of Newburgh township was annexed. These annexations extended the line of the city westerly of the old limits of the City of Ohio on the lake shore, and included large quantity a of land south of the original City of Ohio, and a part of the 100 acre lots on the north part of Newburgh township, and on December 14, 1869, original lot 333, then being a part of Newburgh township, was annexed. These annexations added a large area to the territory, of the city, but its numbers were not much increased thereby. The stimulus, however, given to manufacturing and other industries during this decade, largely increased the growth of the city, and the census of 1870 showed a population of 92,829. The advan- tages of the school system, the need of protection from fire, police supervision, water, gas and sewage facilities, induced the inhabit- ants immediately outlying the city limits to knock for admission, and in 1872 steps were taken to annex the village of East Cleve- land, and on the 14th of October the proceedings were completed for that purpose ; and by an ordinance of November 19, 1872, still further annexations were made from the townships of Brooklyn, Newburgh, and East Cleveland, and on the 16th of September


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1873, a large part of the remaining portion of Newburgh township was annexed, extending the city line beyond the crossing of the old Newburgh road by the Cleveland & Pittsburgh Road.


Since that time no further annexations have been made, and the census of 1880 showed a population of 159,404. The rate of increase for the last decade was over seven per cent., and the same ratio for the last four years would carry the number beyond 200,000. There are many other matters connected with the corporate growth, which time would fail me to mention. The organization of churches and charitable associations, the schools and library associations. the banking institutions. the fire and police and sewage system, and many other matters would each easily form a subject for a separate paper. In these stages which I have recounted of the city's growth, three figures stand forth prominently as actors, the first president of the village, the first mayor of the city, and the third, a worthy compeer of these two, many times the village president, and the oldest surviving mayor, John W. Allen. Born in Connecticut the same year Ohio became a state, trained to the law, he came here the same year the work on the Ohio canal begun. Early and ardently devoted to the welfare of the place which he had chosen for his home, he was repeatedly elected the presiding officer of the village, sent to the Legislature, was a Senator when the act of incorporation was passed, promoted from thence to Congress, and returning at the end of his four years term of service, and as a sense of the approbation of his constituents he was by them elected mayor of the city. To all public enterprises, and specially to the organization of the railroad companies, whose original charters had been granted when he was a member of the Legislature, he gave his time and money with generous heart and liberal hand. He still remains among us, carrying his more than eighty years, and the younger generation who observe his erect form, his active step and courtly manner, may, as has been said, " form some estimate of the race of whom lie was not the foremost." The first president of the village, also born in Connecticut, at an earlier period, trained to the law, arriving at the village the same year that the county was organized


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then in the first year of his manhood, appointed the first prosecuting attorney of the county, soon sent to the Legislature, a member thereof when the Act incorporating the village was passed. chosen its first president, was always devoted to the city's interests. Chiefly by his influence, Cleveland was selected as the northern terminus of the Ohio canal, he was the acting commissioner during its construction, negotiating the State's loan to pay for its cost, which by his able and honest administration was brought within the original estimate. Public considerations induced his removal to the Capital of the State, but he never forgot the corporation of his own creation. Distinguished as a financier, a legislator, author of the Ohio State Banking System, from which the National Bank System is in great part copied, growing with the growth of the State, and when canals had given way to railroads, becoming the active promoter of these interprises, and especially of the roads leading out of this city, hie stands out as one of the great men of Ohio's first half century.


The first mayor, born in New Hampshire, graduate of an ancient college, trained in the law, came here also in village times. Pos- sessing a finer genins, if not the great executive power of the first president of the village, as lawyer, legislator, and judge, he also gave his time, talents and learning to the city, ardently encouraging and aiding every enterprise for the promotion of its welfare. The impress of his genius is indelibly marked upon the early life of the city. I trust the time may arrive, when the city government shall no longer find its habitation in hired tenements, with its archives in unsafe chambers, but on some suitable site shall build a hall worthy of itself, before its facade in some appropriate spot, where shall be placed in bronze or marble a statue exhibiting to all beholders the stern but noble form of Alfred Kelley, and a correct image of that accomplished gentleman, John Wheelock Willey. I should do injustice to my own feelings, and be untrue to history, if I omitted also the mention of him upon whom their mantle fell. Born within the limits of the original surveyed plat of the city, presumptive heir to great wealth, he was not content to spend his time and money for purposes of selfish


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gratification. Uniting in himself the executive ability of Kelley, and the fine genius of Willey, he ardently devoted his energies to the city of his birth. Serving as councilman, alderman, president of the council, and mayor, he faithfully executed these public trusts, and freely gave his time and means to the promotion of all that tended to increase the prosperity of the city, but when still rising in public esteem, and being marked as a man who could serve the State and Nation as well as the City, struck down in early manhood by the fell destroyer, William Case. The loving memory of a brother, by his noble public gifts, has entwined the name of Case, so worthiily borne by father and sons, with the city's growth, to continue as long as literature shall charm and be a solace of the heart, and science enlarge and strengthen the intellect of man.


In this sketch of the corporate life of the city, one thing above all is evident, that its growth has been largely due to the noble public spirit of its citizens, and therefore the moral of my theme is easy of apprehension. Mere numbers, or extent of boundaries does not constitute the continuing city, or any semblance of the civitas Dei of the saints and sages. The ideal city, besides ad- vantage and beauty of location, must be nobly and wisely governed ; the municipal duties must be accepted and performed as public trusts, and not for private and political gain ; its streets must be well paved and lighted ; it must be furnished with abundant water, and well provided with means for the disposal of its sewage; it must have efficient and capable police and sanitary supervision, and property and life must be secure against violence and accidents of flood and fire ; there must be easy and convenient methods of rapid transit ; there must be a wise adjustment of the municipal burdens, and opportunities offered for the employment of labor, and the ordinary pursuits of trade and commerce; and there must be furnished all the best means for intellectual, moral and esthetic culture. When to these things are added inventions to abate the smoke nuisance, and deaden the noise of solid pavements, the city will undoubtedly furnish the greatest opportunity for human felicity on the face of the globe.


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But this beautiful picture hath its dark side. There is ever to be found inhabiting the city a criminal class, and "the poor ye always have with you." The growing tree absorbs from the earth at the same time its sweetness of fruit, and bitterness of bark, so this corporate growth takes in alike the good and bad. Its forces attract not only the intelligent, active and virtuous, but the ignorant, irresolute and vicious, and these once caught in the whirl of the city's eddy, never escape. Whenever the soil of the earth is broken, noxious weeds grow with more vigor than cul- tivated grains and grasses, so the vices arising from ignorance, intemperance and lust, breed with great rapidity from this human contiguity. When all moral, charitable, and intellectual means have been exercised to instruct and reclaim the vicious, a large residuum will still be left. These means can never be wholly efficient ; the earthly millennium is only a dream of fancy, and whether evil can be wholly eradicated from organized society is an unsolvable problem. After all individual and organized methods of instruction and charity are exhausted, there is still room for the exercise of municipal power. The wisest method in these matters is rigid restrictive regulation. I am aware there is a mawkish sentiment quite prevalent, which protests against this kind of legislation, as giving legality to sin and iniquity, and as interfering with the divine order of punishment ; but the true city will not heed such protest, or yield to a logic, whose major premise is the assertion that God is the author of loathsome contagious disease If our recent city administrations have been smitten with the degeneracy of modern politics, there is hope for the future, as the great body of the citizens still desire good municipal government, and the noble public gifts within the present decade by such men as Stone, Hurlbut, Woods, and others, demonstrate that the public spirit of the present day is not inferior to the past. Let other cities boast of their temples, their triumphal arches, and columns, their towers, their docks, their halls, and great public buildings for exchange and commerce, yet " as one star differeth from another star in glory," may the monuments of Cleveland continue to be the noble endowments of her citizens for the promotion of literature,


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art and science, and for the alleviation of pain and suffering. It is impossible in a sketch like this to mention the many good and true men who have given their services to the city's government; much less to the great body of its citizens. In great events but few prominent actors can be named. In wars only the great commanders are mentioned, but the common soldiers who have equal courage, who


fight the battle and win the victory, from very number have no blazoned chronicle. nor their names written in any history. So in a city's life, the unnumbered multitude are born, marry and are given in marriage, pursne the ordinary avocations of life, and die mourned by friends, and only remembered as the great aggregate


composing the city's life. In their sphere. however, they exercise and perform all the duties and obligations the same as others, and equally contribute to all that upholds society. From this number


I select only one name for mention. Born of a revolutionary sire,


who was here when General Cleaveland and his party arrived on the 22nd day of July, 1796. and became one of the first associate judges of the county. His son came with him, bearing his father's name. and succeeding to his business ; never seeking public promo- tion, devoted to his occupation, fulfilling every obligation, always


enlarging his business to meet the advancing tide of population, retiring only when compelled by age and bodily infirmities, his active career continued through the period of the village and far down into the city life, and he died in good old age, leaving a colossal fortune to his issue and his grandchildren. May we not reasonably indulge the hope that some one of his descendants, possessing as well the maternal as paternal ability, starting on the highest plane of commercial pursuits, increasing his ancestral inheritance manifold, will not be content to leave the name of that ancestor to be borne by some narrow street or alley, but by some noble public benefaction, forever connect with the memory of the City's first half century's life, the commercial ability, worth and integrity of Cleveland's first great merchant : Nathan Perry ?


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The exercises that followed the annual address consisted of brief speeches on call, interspersed with old-time songs, some of which were sung as solos by Mrs. Lohmann, and the others by the Home Amateurs. The songs were rendered in excellent taste and with admirable effect. Mrs. Lohmann was repeatedly encored.


A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE PAST.


BY HON. JOHN A. FOOTE.


MR. PRESIDENT :-


I came fifty years ago to this eity. I spent considerable time up- on the Lake shore during that season, and was specially impressed by the rapidity with which Cleveland was then losing her lands in the Lake. It seemed to me that it was only a question of time when all the present great business part of Cleveland must go, unless this process should be stopped. Sometimes the fall would be very gradual. At other times it would be sudden, and then it would push up a long winrow of mud a considerable distance out in the lake. This process continued until Col. Whittlesey was employed by the city authorities to protect the banks between Seneca and Ontario streets. This he did by driving two parallel rows of piles at the foot of the Lake bank and filling the space between with brush and stones, and perhaps taking up the springs in the banks. This proved to be a perfect success, and hereby came the protection of our whole Lake shore by the Rail Roads, when they came here. Mr. Chas. Whittlesey, I think, is entitled to great credit for his agency in this matter -indeed, even more than has been awarded him by our protected city.


But I found a man here, that I was even more interested in than in any of the surroundings of the place. That man was the late Sherlock G. Andrews- a man standing at the head of the legal profession, and equally high in the estimation of the community. When quite a young man he had come to the town where I then lived to attend an academy, he must have staid there some two or three years and boarded at the house next to ours. Here it seemed


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to me that he was so full of fun that he would spend his life in indulging that trait. A fellow boarder by the name of Bush, as Mr. Andrews told me, was reading a book and marking his progress by a book-mark in the book. This mark Andrews would occasion- ally turn back, Bush not discovering it, read on by the mark. When he had finished it, Andrews asked Bush, how he liked the book. Bush replied, very well, but that there was a good deal of sameness in it. This love of fun, this humor stood by him to the last. One of the last times I listened to an argument from him, he was defending Physicians in a suit for malpractice. He showed how powerless human remedies and skill were in the presence of a fatal disease. But he says, how do the schools of Physicians testify about this? The Allopathist says, of course he died ; he was treated by an Homœopathist ; no remedies were administered. The Homeopathist says of the regular treatment, of course he died, he was drugged to death. But Dr. Seelye, a Hydropathist, says, of course he died ; he should have been treated as we make candles ; a wick should have been run through him and we should dip him. In another suit Mr. Andrews was arguing the case of a clergyman, who had brought suit for slander, because he had been called a thief. The counsel opposed had charged that the suit was brought for money, that the clergyman preached for money and that there was not much in religion any way. As near as I now recollect, in reply Mr. Andrews told the jury, that whether the man was correct who could see no evidence of a designer in the Universe; or that man "to whom the heavens declared the glory of God and the firmament showed his handywork," it was not for them to decide. But presenting in a masterly manner the evidence of a God from design, he added. " If chance can do all this, I fear that she may some day erect her judgment seat and bring you and me before her and decide our destinies for eternity." But even in this case he could not get through without his mirth. A witness had testified against the minister. On cross examination, the witness said, that he was a materialist .. In commenting on this testimony Mr. Andrews said, he understood that theory to be, that the soul was a kind of gizzard stuck in near the back bone. A handsome


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sum was obtained by the minister both in the Common Pleas and Supreme Court. After Mr. Andrews left the academy, we met again at college, and in this city we were partners from the time I came here to reside until he went on to the bench some fifteen years. I ought to protract these reminiscences, but my time will not permit. I trust this brief allusion to our former vice-president has not been without interest.


REMARKS


BY HON. R. P. SPALDING.


MR. PRESIDENT :-


In the Spring of the year eighteen hundred and twenty-three (1823), and just after I had commenced " house-keeping" in Warren, the Seat of Justice of Trumbull county, I visited the Hon. George Tod, President Judge of the Common Pleas, at his resid- ence on " Brier Hill " in the vicinity of Youngstown. He lived in a log house, upon a tract of land of one hundred and sixty acres, which he had contracted to purchase of Gen. Simon Perkins. at three dollars an acre, but which he was unable to pay for, as he had a wife and six children to support, while his salary was no more than eleven hundred dollars. But there was no limit to the hospitality of the family.


I spent the night at the house, as I frequently did. In the course of the evening, the Judge and his daughters (one of whom was afterwards Mrs. Grace T. Perkins, mother of the lady who has just now entertained us so highly), sang several songs for my amusement, and, at last, the Judge said to me, with somewhat of a boastful air : " Mr. Spalding, all my children are singers ; they can all sing well. Where is David ? Do some of you call David."


Very soon a young man, some fifteen or sixteen years of age, dressed in a suit of home-spun, with a broad-brimmed felt hat on his head, entered the room, and, bowing respectfully to the Judge, asked him what he wished him to do. "My son," said he, " I have been singing, and your sisters have been singing for Mr. Spalding, 5


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and I have told him that all my children are singers ; now I want you to show him how well you can sing."


The young man, without moving a muscle of his face by way of evincing emotion, immediately struck up the old tune of MEAR with the words :


" Old Grimes is dead, That good old soul, We ne'er shall see him more, He used to wear His long-tailed coat All buttoned up before."


Again he bowed, and left the room, when his father said to me with much apparent feeling, " Mr. Spalding, there is more in that boy than comes to the surface. Oh, if it could only be developed."


Said I, "Why do you not, then, send him to school, and thus give him a chance for development ?" The reply was, " I am so poor, I cannot afford to do it."


"Send him up to Warren," I said to the Judge, " and so long as I have anything to eat. he shall share it with me."


The offer was accepted, with a stipulation by Judge Tod that he should feel at liberty to send me occasionally from the products of his farm such articles, as would be useful to my family.


In this manner DAVID Top left his father's log-cabin at Brier Hill, and entered upon a course of study that, within ten years, enabled him to pay up his father's contract with General Perkins, and made him the proprietor of the valuable coal mines that lay buried in that tract of land, and ultimately gave to the country the patriotic war Governor of Ohio in 1861-2.


So much for the encouragement of our young men of slender means ! ! ! -


But I come to the stand, mainly for the purpose of tracing the history of one of the religious institutions of our city :


On the 9th day of November 1816, sundry persons, who lived in the village of Cleaveland and its vicinity, met at the house of Phinehas Shephard for the purpose of nominating officers for a Protestant Episcopal Church in said Cleaveland.


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The minutes of that meeting read as follows :


" TIMOTHY DOAN was chosen Moderator and Charles Gear, Clerk.


Phinehas Shephard, Abraham Scott, Wardens.


Timothy Doan, Abraham Hickox, Vestrymen.


Jonathan Pelton,


Dennis Cooper, Reading Clerk.


Adjourned till Easter Monday next.


Charles Gear, Clerk."


On the 2d day of March 1817 at a Vestry Meeting, " especially warned," and held at the "Court House in the village and town of Cleaveland," present, the Rev. Roger Searl, Rector of St. Peter's Church of Plymouth, Conn., Timothy Doan, Phinehas Shephard, Jonathan Pelton, Parker Pelton, Abraham Scott, Abraham Hickox, Charles Gear, Dennis .Cooper, John Wilcox, ALFRED KELLEY, IRAD KELLEY, T. M. KELLEY, NOBLE H. MERWIN, DAVID LONG, D. C. HENDERSON, PHILO SCOVILL and others, it was resolved, that the persons present were attached to the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States, and they did, thereby, unite themselves into a Congregation, by the name of "TRINITY PARISH OF CLEAVE- LAND, OHIO," for the worship and services of Almighty God, according to the forms and regulations of said Church."


This was the first organized Religious Society in the city of Cleveland.


Afterwards, on Easter Monday, April 7th, 1817. at a meeting of "which the Rev. Roger Searl is recorded as the President " Ex- Officio," and David Long as Clerk, the following elections were made for the year :


Timothy Doan, Phinehas Shephard, S Wardens.


Jonathan Pelton, Noble H. Merwin, Alfred Kelley, Dennis Cooper, Charles Gear,


Vestrymen,


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Wm. Ingersoll, Dennis Cooper and Abraham Scott were chosen Laymen, for the purpose of " Reading Service."


From this time and for three years ensuing, Trinity Parish had but little more than a name to live. The village had only a poplu- ation of two hundred and fifty. The Church had no house in which to meet, and was too poor to pay a settled minister. The good Mr. Searl visited the parish at intervals, and administered the Holy Ordinance. For the most part, they were obliged to rely upon their Lay Readers.


At length, on the 15th of May 1820, at a vestry meeting held at the house of Noble H. Merwin in the village of Cleaveland, at which the Rev. Mr. Searl presided, the following appointments were made, to wit :


JOSIAH BARBER, Clerk, pro tem. GEO. L. CHAPMAN, Clerk. JOSIAH BARBER, Treasurer.


PHINEHAS SHEPHARD,


JOSIAH BARBER, Wardens.


1 TIMOTHY DOAN, DR. DAVID LONG, JOHN CLARK, ASA FOOTE,


Vestrymen.


WM. INGERSOL,


JAMES SEARS, ABRAHAM HICKOX,


JOSIAH BARBER was appointed Lay Reader.


On motion, it was resolved, "That it is expedient in future to have the Clerical and other public services of the Episcopal Church in Trinity Parish, heretofore, located in Cleaveland, held in Brooklyn ordinarily, and occasionally in Cleaveland and Euclid, as circum- stances may seem to require."


And thus matters continued until the Fall of the year eighteen hundred and twenty-six, when the Rev. Silas C. Freeman, of Virginia, was induced to become the Rector of Trinity Parish on a salary of $500 per annum, with the understanding that the Church at Norwalk should employ him one-third or one-half of the time, paying their proportion of the five hundred dollars.




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