Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I, Part 98

Author: Howe, Henry, 1816-1893
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Cincinnati : Published by the state of Ohio
Number of Pages: 1006

USA > Ohio > Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I > Part 98

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

The following article, " COLUMBUS, ITS PAST AND PRESENT," was contributed for this work by Mr. E. O. Randall, ex-President of the Columbus Board of Trade.

The site of Columbus was originally occupied by the Wyandots and other tribes who had settlements of a straggling, transitory character in the forests upon the banks of the creeks now known as the Darby, Alum, Walnut and Black Lick, and the rivers Scioto and Olentangy. Among other interesting items is the fact, shown by the former existence of mounds, that the Wyandots had a flourishing village within the limits of Franklinton-now West Columbus-and cultivated corn on the low, flat lands of the Scioto. Franklinton was laid out in 1797 by Lucas Sullivan, a young man from Kentucky engaged in surveying lands and

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FRANKLIN COUNTY.

locating land warrants in the Virginia military district west of the Scioto; its settlement immediately ensued, and it became a white man's village.

The county of Franklin, one of the first to be created by the new State legis- lature, was formed in 1803 with Franklinton as the seat of justice. The first official building created was a log-cabin jail. The first court-house was built in 1807, of brick pressed from the clay of a mound that had entombed the bones and beads of chiefs, squaws and pappooses.

The Ohio legislature first convened in 1803, and until 1816 it had no local habitation, but sojourned temporarily at Chillicothe, where it met until 1810, when it wandered to Zanesville for two sessions, thence returning to Chillicothe and there abiding until 1816. In the winter of 1810, while the legislature was in Zanesville, four citizens of Franklinton (viz., Lyne Starling, James Johnson, Alex. Mclaughlin and John Kerr, formed a company to establish the State capitol " on the high bank of the Scioto river opposite Franklinton." The vil- lages of Dublin, Worthington and Delaware were competitors, but the geograph- ical advantages of the Columbus site and the terms offered by them prevailed. Their proposal was to give to the State two separate batches of land of ten acres each-one lot for the State House and one lot for the Penitentiary-the foresighted and impartial founders of the capitol realizing that equal and immediate quarters should be provided alike for the law makers and the law breakers. In addition they agreed to build (at their expense) the capitol and penitentiary and " such other buildings as should be directed by the legislature to be built, not to exceed a total cost of $50,000."

On St. Valentine's Day, 1812, the legislature, then at Zanesville, accepted the proposition and passed a law establishing the capital of Ohio at Columbus. On the 18th of June following, 1812, the same day Congress declared war on Great Britain, Columbus, the site of which was then an unbroken forest, was laid out, and the primeval wilderness and native untrodden soil awoke to its initial real estate boom.

The town was platted with streets running at right angles and nearly due north and south, or east and west. High street was made 100 feet wide; Broad, 120, all others 823, and all alleys 33. The town lots were 62} feet by 187} feet deep. At the time of the first sale of lots there was but one cleared spot, that on the corner of Front and State. Naturally after the platting of the town and its es- tablishment as the capital, improvements and growth advanced rapidly ; immi- grants came and business began to bustle. Among the first settlers, or as early as 1813, were George M'Cormick, Geo. B. Harvey, Jno. Shields, Michael Patton, Alex. Patton, Wm. Altman, John Collett, Wm. M'Elwain, Daniel Kooser, Peter Putnam, Jacob Hare, Christian Keyl, Jarvis, Geo. and Benj. Pike, Wm. Long and Dr. John M. Edmiston.

The association, or as we should now term it "the syndicate," more than ful- filled their obligations. In 1813 a penitentiary was erected, and the north grave- yard, for which one and a half acres were set apart, began to receive tenants. The following year, 1814, the first church was built, the first school opened and the first newspaper was issued. The first church was a cabin, on Spring street, on a lot of Dr. Hoge's, which was used by the Presbyterians. Rev. Dr. Hoge was its pastor. It was not long occupied for that purpose ; that denomination then worshipped in the Franklinton meeting-house until 1818, when the first Presby- terian church was organized in Columbus, and a frame meeting-house erected on Front street, where Dr. Hoge preached until the erection of "the 1st Presbyterian church," about 1825. In 1814 the Methodist church of Columbus was organized ; and the same year they erected a small, hewed log-house, which served the double purpose of school-house and church until about 1824, when a permanent building was erected on the same site.

The first newspaper is historic, and worthy a passing notice. It originated in Worthington as the Western Intelligencer, was transplanted to Columbus, when it

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became known as the Western Intelligencer & Columbus Gazette. From it sprung the present widely known and influential Ohio State Journal. It continued to be published weekly, however, as the Columbus Gazette until 1884, when its future fell into the hands of the writer of these lines, who after a praiseworthy effort to revive its pristine glory and power, transferred it to the party led by the apostles of temperance; it then soon disappeared entirely.

The State-house was erected in 1814; the brick of this edifice was partly made from a beautiful mound near by, which has given the name to a street. It stood until destroyed by fire on Sunday morning, April 1, 1852. On the 10th of Feb- ruary, 1816, the town was incorporated as "the borough of Columbus." The first board of councilmen elected were Henry Brown, Michael Patton, Jarvis Pike, Robt. and Jeremiah Armstrong, John Kerr, John Cutler, Caleb Houston and Robt. M'Coy. About the year 1819 the United States or old court-house was erected.

In 1815 was taken the first censns, enumerating the population at 700, with 6 stores, 1 printing office and 4 lawyers. In 1816 a subscription of $200 was raised to remove the stumps from High Street, and the town was incorporated as the borough of Columbus with nine prominent citizens as the first board of coun- cilmen. One of the first acts of the council was to authorize the corporation to issue money in the shape of small bills to the amount of $555.75 in the following quantities and denominations : 120 bills of 75 cents, 464 of 50 cents, 464 of 25 cents, 836 of 12} cents, 212 of 6} cents. In December, 1816, the legislature ar- rived in Columbus and took up its quarters in the old, red brick State-house and began that continuous and monotonous grind of passing laws one winter and remodeling and repealing them the next. In two respects Columbus doth re- semble Rome. The Scioto is as muddy and majestic as the time-honored Tiber, and Ohio's capital " was not built in a day." But the little city grew apace until 1819, when the enterprise and energy that had founded it and made it flourish succumbed to the check of business reaction. A year or two of depression and failure set in. Real estate shrunk and fell, and full city lots were forced on the market as low as eight and ten dollars. In 1824 Columbus was made the county- seat of Franklin county, and ten years later, in 1834, it was incorporated as a city, having at that time 4,000 inhabitants, who elected the first mayor, one John Brooks, there being five candidates and 449 voters. From this time on Columbus rapidly advanced and the era of public improvements began. The canal and national turn-pikes and State plank-roads came along, opening Columbus to the leading cities of this and other States.

On July 4, 1825, was commenced the Ohio canal, 307 miles long, from Cleve- land to Portsmouth, connecting the Lake Erie with the Ohio river. It was fin- ished in 1838. The Columbus outlet known as the " feeder," leading from Co- lumbus to Lockbourne, a distance of eleven miles, was opened in September, 1831, when the first canal boat, Gov. Brown, arrived from Circleville and was received with peals of artillery, martial music and the huzzas of the delighted citizens.

In 1836 the famous National Road-the Via Appia of our capital-a mag- nificent piece of engineering and construction, a graded surface, with a stone bed, reaching from Wheeling, W. Va., to Indianapolis, Iud., passed in its construction through Columbus. In 1840 the population was 6,000, with five ministers to prepare the good people for the finishing touches of twelve distinctive doctors. Then came the age of railways and telegraphs, the latter opening an office in August, 1846. The first railroad begun in Ohio was in 1841, and on February 20, 1850, the first passenger train steamed into Columbus on the Columbus & Xenia. True to its immutable instincts, the legislature without delay got passes and took an excursion.

Aside from what we have recorded, little of conspicuousness occurred except perhaps an occasional invasion of the cholera and periodic amusement epidemic among the people, which usually took the nature of a balloon ascension. Ix

FRANKLIN COUNTY.

January, 1857, was celebrated the opening of the present capitol building, repre- senting fifteen years work, and a cost of $1,359,121. It was a stupendous festival, in which every inch of interior was packed with a seething, panicky, per- spiring mass of humanity squeezed almost to speechlessness. The music could not be heard, and the elaborate menu invariably spilled upon the dress suits of the beaux and the decollete shoulders of the belles. However, it was the greatest ball of the season, inaugurating the greatest State capitol building then in the United States. It occupies just two acres, and is the centre of an area of ten acres. It was built of limestone from Sullivant hill by convict labor.

Thus much in the way of a retrospect of the past. Of Columbus at this writing we speak with pardonable pride. The population in 1850 was 18,000;

Frank Henry Howe, Photo., 1888. THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY.

in 1870, 31,000; in 1880, 52,000; and the centennial year, 1888, from 90,000 to 100,000. It is now increasing at the rate of 5,000 a year. For some years an average of 1,000 buildings per year have been erected. The city to-day has an area of 7,040 acres, or 11 square miles, and a corporated circumference of 18 miles. It extends north and south 6 miles, east and west 3} miles. It has 165 miles of streets ; 109 miles of these are either graveled, bouldered, macadamized or surfaced in asphalt, stone-block or fire-brick. It has 30 miles of street railway, 70 miles of water mains, 75 miles of main and 75 miles of distributing gas pipes. It has 195 acres of parks and public grounds, not including the State fair grounds of some 125 acres. This is the city's size by measurement, but these figures con- vey no idea of its beauty, industry, wealth and influence. That Columbus owes its importance, as it does its existence, to the fact that it is the capital of the third State in the Union, is an erroneous and exploded notion ; and though not in a particularly picturesque locality, Columbus is admirably placed near the geo- graphical centre of the State, in the midst of a magnificent agricultural country, and within two or three hours ride by rail of the inexhaustible coal and iron re- gion of Southeastern Ohio. Its railway and shipping facilities are unsurpassed, for it is the radiating centre of fifteen railroads, thus making it a most advanta- geous point for jobbing and manufacturing. For financial solidity and com- mercial importance it is conspicuous throughout the country. It has seventeen sound and well-managed banks, and its clearing-house transactions the past year (1887) amounted to $112,543,461.

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FRANKLIN COUNTY.

It is now rated as the wealthiest city in the Union, per capita of population. The tax duplicate for this year (1888) will show about $30,000,000 in realty and some $12,000,000 in personalty. This return indicates an actual city wealth up- wards of $100,000,000. The amount of business done in 1887 aggregated $60,- 000,000. Its location, as before indicated, makes Columbus a great lumber, coal and iron market. In the year 1887 2,000,000 tons of the 9,000,000 mined in Ohio were consumed in the city.

It is estimated that the capital invested in business and in manufacturing in Columbus is near two hundred millions of dollars. The three greatest interests are coal, iron and the building of buggies. The greatest is coal ; the capital in- vested in the business is $20,000,000, and that in iron $18,000,000. Twenty-one firms and corporations are in the city engaged as miners and shippers of coal and acting as wholesale dealers, which give employment to at least 10,000 men. It is claimed that coal, iron and lumber can nowhere else be obtained more cheaply than in this city. In the manufacture of buggies and carriages are 18 establishments, employing about 2,500 men and 300 women, and the number sold in the past year amounted to over 20,000, or one for every nine minutes, counting the working hours daily ten in number. But tempering the enterprise, energy and magnitude of the business interests of Columbus is a sort of old-time conservatism. In no city is capital so cautious and so steady. The speculative element is almost en-, tirely eliminated from all transactions. There are no gamblings on "margins" and no bubble real estate " booms " with subsequent shrinkages ; and the city has from foundation to the last finishing touches pursued the even tenor of a moderate way. But it has always progressed, and has safely survived the storm of panics and shocks of depressions better than any city of its magnitude. It is a pleasant reflection that the working people of the city are thrifty and largely own their homes, which are mostly cottages built of brick made from Columbus clay.

Columbus in a marked degree represents the commercial "push " of the pro- gressive West and the culture and refinement of the East. Its public schools are second to none; indeed, it is a school city. The census of 1887 gave 23,440 children within the school age of six to twenty-one; 11,000 of these are registered in the public schools, for which twenty-two spacious and modern-equipped build- ings, representing $1,260,550 in value, are provided. The Roman Catholics, who are numerous, aggressive, influential, and indeed liberal and public-spirited, support a number of parochial schools, colleges, and seminaries, in which they educate their own children. Among their institutions is the "Academy of St. Mary's of the Springs" for the education of young ladies. It was incorporated in 1868, and is in the midst of pleasant surroundings, about two miles east of the city limits; it is under the direction of the Dominican Sisters.

ST. JOSEPH'S CATHEDRAL, on Broad street, in its vastness and splendor reflects great credit upon the enterprise and devotion of the Catholic population. In a vault beneath rests the remains of its founder, Bishop Rosecrans.

The STATE UNIVERSITY, two and one-half miles north of the State-house, with its handsome grounds of 325 acres and commodious buildings, and excellent equipment and efficient faculty, affords the best opportunity for higher academic and scientific education. The Lutherans maintain a flourishing college-CAPITAL UNIVERSITY-with theological annex. Two medical colleges-the STARLING and the COLUMBUS-mould medical proficients, and each year send at large some fifty each of the devotees of AEsculapius. In connection with these institutions are two well-conducted hospitals. Then there is the usual quota of commercial colleges, kindergartens, private schools, etc.

Literature and the arts are neither primitive nor obscure in the capital city. The good citizens slake their insatiate intellectual thirst at the Pierian founts of the State Library with 52,000 volumes, or the City and School Library with 22,000, and the Law Library with 10,000. The sort of mental pabulum that the Columbusters delight to devour should arouse the admiration and envy of brain-

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FRANKLIN COUNTY.

crammed Boston. The interesting and instructive reports of the city librarian reveal that of the books drawn and read, over sixty per cent. are biography, science, and history, while only thirty-four per cent. are novels and fiction. This is the best intellectual average reported by any miscellaneous circulating library in the country. In Boston, where the cranial gray matter is claimed to be at the highest state of cultivation, the issue of the library shows seventy-four per cent. of fiction.

Columbus is afflicted with the great American contagion and nuisance-the base-ball nine; but the " muses nine " circulate freely in the " best society." Art and music flourish in no mediocre manner. The work accomplished in the art department of the public schools in two late annual national exhibits was accorded a rank second only to the incomparable modern Athens. The Art School, with its ten years of age and experience and success, and its 200 pupils, is one of the best in the West. Professional art is not enormously profitable as yet, but a goodly number of painters haunt the halls of the public buildings, and at times frighten or delight the passer-by with the display in the shop windows of their glowing colors upon the canvas backs. Music, too, indulges copiously in its " voluptuous swells," and has its clubs and societies and concerts to make the welkin ring, and soothe with its charms the unstrung nerves of the busy bur- gesses.

As cities go, Columbus, though owing to the character of its population, which is one-third foreign, can hardly be set down as Puritanic, is nevertheless peaceful and religious. It numbers some fifty churches having buildings of their own, embracing a total membership of 35,000, including Catholics, who reckon by families. The aggregate property owned by these church organizations reaches easily a value of $2,000,000. To offset the religious influences, "the world, the flesh, and the devil" offer some 600 saloons and places where internal fires and eternal damnation are dispensed.

In the matter of public charity the city makes a noble showing. It has a numerous category of benevolent associations, missions, homes, and asylums. In no city is this kind of work better organized, better equipped or executed.

Washington City alone takes precedence of Columbus in the size and number of public institutions, all of which present architecturally attractive buildings that make the State capital the Mecca of thousands of sight-seeing visitors. The State Asylums for the Deaf and Dumb, the Feeble-Minded, the Blind, and the Insane are all vast edifices, palatial in appearance, and models of the best forms of con- struction for the purposes to which they are devoted.

The INSANE ASYLUM, the largest in the world, cost $2,000,000, and accom- modates 1,300 patients. The ASYLUM FOR FEEBLE-MINDED YOUTH employs 150 persons, cares for 800 inmates, at an annual cost to the State of $125,000. The BLIND ASYLUM was erected at a cost of $600,000, and shelters some 300 .pupils, who require the care of about 70 attendants. It costs $50,000 a year to maintain this institution. The DEAF AND DUMB ASYLUM cost $800,000, cares for 500 pupils, and expends $80,000 a year. The Ohio Penitentiary, built by convict labor, at a cost of $800,000, entertains about 1,400 persons, at an annual expense of $250,000. Most of these buildings have picturesque grounds, that add beauty and fresh air to the localities in which they are situated.

In addition to the State institutions, Columbus is embellished by a number of buildings pertaining to the national, county, and municipal government. The GOVERNMENT BUILDING, opposite the State Capitol, recently erected at a cost of $500,000, contains the Post-Office, United States Court-Room, and Pension Office. The United States War Department maintains within the city limits a military post and recruiting station. It is nothing short of an attractive park of eighty acres, artistically laid out, and adorned with shrubbery, shade-trees, grass-lawns, walks, miniature lake, and ample parade-grounds, about which are grouped the barracks, arsenal, hospital, grand-house, and officers' quarters.

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FRANKLIN COUNTY.

The " BARRACKS," as the place is called, is the favorite resort of the citizens, who, of evenings, drive or walk thither to listen to the military music and witness the evolutions of the soldiers, who are mostly beardless recruits in their teens and newly donned trappings.

The other "grateful breathing spots " of the city are the FRANKLIN PARK of ninety acres, the GOODALE of forty-four, and the CITY of twenty-three, all well cared for and much enjoyed by the nature-loving people. The COUNTY COURT- HOUSE, completed in 1887, at a cost of $400,000, is one of the most magnificent buildings of its kind in any State. In architecture, elegance of finish, and

THE FRANKLIN COUNTY COURT-HOUSE, COLUMBUS.

spaciousness, in convenience and perfection for the admission of light and ventila- tion it would be difficult to find its superior. It is justly the pride of the city and county. It was dedicated July 13, 1887, the dedicatory address being by Hon. Henry C. Noble, President of the Court-House Commission. The CITY-HALL BUILDING, in which the municipal offices are quartered, is a massive, striking structure, to say the least. The CITY JAIL, a lately built and a large, Bastile- appearing structure, with all the modern conveniences, is highly spoken of by those who have stopped there. The rooms are airy, the bill-of-fare, if not contain- ing all the delicacies of the season, is wholesome and inexpensive to the guests. The hotel is complete ; for though there are no liquors allowed on the premises, there are excellent " bar attachments." The UNION DEPOT is one of the largest and best arranged in the West, and 100 passenger trains come and go each day. The railroads, of course, run their tracks where they please-across strects and thoroughfares, without regard to the comfort or cost to the city ; but, as railroads go, they are cousiderate, and when they run over a street-car, a cab, or a citizen they usually express regret. The new BOARD OF TRADE BUILDING, now in process of erection, will be one of the architectural features of the city, and one of the chief adornments of the Capitol Square. It is built by the leading organiza- tion of the city-the Board of Trade, organized a few years ago, and comprising in its membership over 500 of its leading business-men of the city. It is the avowed mission of the Board of Trade to stimulate the motive and suggest the means for the development and improvement of Columbus ; and much of the progress and growth made by the city in the past few years is due to the weight and wisdom of this organization. This Board of Trade does not deal in wheat and corn that never grew, nor in stocks that are floated in water.

Finally, Columbus is not merely wealthy and wise, as we have indicated, but she is healthy. Her climate is what the geographers call "salubrious." She is admirably located for good drainage, as the land slopes on the east and on the west to streams of water, thus giving her sewage very easy outlet. The city is clean ; good water is supplied by a reservoir at the junction of the Scioto and the Whet-

FRANKLIN COUNTY.

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stone. The death-rate is phenomenally low, being but 10 53-100 to the 1,000; twice this ratio-20 to the 1,000-is not regarded as excessive in our cities. These are the facts, figures, and features that pertain to the mind, body, and estate of the good capital of Ohio-an honor to the State and the pride of her people.

TILE DRAINAGE IN OHIO.

Drainage is all important to the welfare of an agricultural region, alike vital to the fertility of its soil and the health of its inhabitants.

A large tract of the Northwestern Ohio long known as "the Black Swamp Re-

Appelcitate Til;

ARKE

THE APPLE DALE TILE WORKS.

[The Apple Dale Tile Works, the property of Mr. S. J. Woolley, is one of the pioneer tile factories of Ohio. It is near the village of Hilliards, about thirteen miles northwest of Columbus, in Franklin county.]

gion," covering the area of several counties, has been reclaimed by a system of open ditches and converted into an area of surprising fertility ; of this we give de- tails elsewhere. We here present an article from FRANK HENRY HOWE upon the Tile Drainage of the State. The magnitude of this industry and its value to the commonwealth is such that by so doing we think we do a public service and enhance the value of this work.

Although drain tile was made by hand in Rome, and in France some two centuries since, Ohio was one of the first States in the Union to develop to any extent this valuable industry.

About the year 1810 drain tile was made at Netherby, in Northumberland, England. It was called horseshoe tile, being shaped like a horseshoc, instead of cylindrical, and was laid with the opening at the bottom. This was then con- sidered the ne plus ultra of drain tile, and for thirty years there was no improve- ment on this pattern.

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Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I, Part 98

Author: Howe, Henry, 1816-1893 Publication date: 1907 Publisher: Cincinnati : Published by the state of Ohio Number of Pages: 1006

Author: Howe, Henry, 1816-1893
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Cincinnati : Published by the state of Ohio
Number of Pages: 1006