USA > Ohio > Ashland County > History of Ashland County, Ohio > Part 22
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MOHICANVILLE.
Mohicanville was laid out July 2, 1833, by Simeon Beall and Henry Sherrad- den. It is situated in the southwest corner of Mohican township. Population
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is about three hundred. Although small, it has no vacant houses, and is among the busiest towns of its dimensions in the county.
The first sale of lots was made in the summer of 1833. Three additions to the town have since been made.
The water power of the village is the main source of its prosperity. The three principal springs emerge from the summit of the hill on the west side of the town and from their head to the bed of the creek, a distance of about three hundred yards, the fall exceeds one hundred feet, turning three wheels of a combined diameter of sixty-two feet.
The town is healthfully located in the midst of excellent farming lands. It has a fair trade, and is mostly supported by the farmers.
AN INTERESTING TRIO.
Near Nankin, north of Ashland, lives an interesting family of three, maiden sisters, aged respectively ninety-seven, ninety-five and eighty-nine years, making a joint age of two hundred and eighty-one years. Their family name is Coutts, and the ladies are named respectively Katie, Janie and Mary.
There were seven of them-father, mother, two boys and three girls-when they left Alford parish, in the north of Scotland, in 1834, and took ship at Glasgow for America, which they reached after eight weeks at sea.
In time they came to Ashland county, where John Coutts wrestled with the primeval forest to such good purpose that, before he died, he had one hundred and eighty acres under cultivation.
The sons married, the father and mother died, and the Coutts maids became the Three Old Maids. Then their brothers died, but one of them was survived by a son, George Coutts, who latterly has come to run the farm for them. He and his wife and Jimmie live on another part of the farm.
Up to the time of the coming of George Coutts, Aunt Katie ran the farm, plowing, harvesting, milking the cows. Even now she takes a hand at the milking.
If there have ever been any love passages in the lives of the Three Old Maids they came to naught. The neighbors say the suitors were sent about their business with such emphasis that they never came back.
"They're bonny when they're lads," said Aunt Katie, "but no sae gude when grown. They track mud on the carpets."
So the Three Old Maids have lived alone, each contributing her share to an almost perfect life, and no man has ever had the right to say, "It shall be done thus-and-so in this house."
They are Scotch-so very Scotch that, though three-quarters of a century have passed since they saw the land of heather, they still have the burr in their tongues, they still eat porridge, they still cling to the Covenanter's faith and call the church the "kirk."
A short time ago the Cleveland Herald sent a special correspondent to Ashland county to interview this interesting trio, and the Sunday following the paper devoted a full page, with colored illustrations, to the remarkable record of the Coutts sisters, whose long and useful lives have won for them the esteem of everybody who admires the sturdy virtues of the Scotch race.
UNITED BRETHEREN CHURCH,
UNITED BRETHREN CHURCH, ASHLAND
ONGLESATIONAL CHURCH,
ASHLANDLOS
CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH, ASHLAND
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PERRYSVILLE.
Perrysville is the only town in Green township, and was laid out June 15, 1815, and was named Freeport. It was the second town founded in what is now Ashland county. The Coulters being very prominent people there, the town was locally known as Coultersville. Some years after its founding, the name of the town was changed from Freeport to Perrysville, in honor of Commodore Perry's victory over the British on Lake Erie. In 1830, the town contained nine inhabitants, but in 1860 the number had increased to one hundred and thirty-five. A pottery plant was established there a few years since, which has added materially to the business and population of the town. The village is pleasantly situated in the fertile valley of the Blackfork, on the line of the Pennsylvania railroad. The town supported an academy for a number of years, an account of which is given elsewhere in this work.
In the communication to the Perrysville Enterprise newspaper, Mrs. Nancy L. Eddy, daughter of the late Hon. John Coulter, states that the quarter section of land now owned by Thomas Beavers, the quarter section on which Perrysville is built, and the quarter owned by Alonzo Shambaugh were all entered by her father in the fall of 1810. Mr. Coulter soon found that one quarter section of unbroken forest was all he could manage, and sold the Beaver quarter to his father, Judge Thomas Coulter, and the one on which Perrysville stands to his uncle, George Crawford. He kept the Shambaugh place and occupied it as a family home for thirty-five years. The first house built in what is now the town of Perrysville, was the cabin on the Crawford place which stood across the road from where the Sam Trease house now stands.
The old store room occupied many years by H. L. Stearns, and the old hotel building lately torn down, were among the first buildings and were probably erected as early as 1814 or 1815.
Five bridges have been built across the Blackfork at Perrysville. The first bridge was made of poles.
The first wedding was that of Harvey Hill and Abigal Coulter, which oc- curred in 1812, the ceremony being performed by the Rev. Mr. Scott, of Mt. Vernon. Mr. and Mrs. Hill were the parents of the late Mrs. Angelina Phillips, who was born in 1817.
The first church organization was the Presbyterian, the elders being Thomas Coulter, George Crawford and John VanHorn.
The first school was taught by Mrs. John Coulter, in her cabin house on the Shambaugh place; her pupils were mostly young men who felt the need of more learning. Mrs. Coulter's maiden name was Elizabeth Rice, sister of Alexander Rice, and she had in early girlhood the advantages of a boarding school educa- tion in Montpelier, Vermont.
The first schoolhouse in Perrysville was a log building with a huge fireplace and stood below the Cardon home.
The ground for the Perrysville cemetery was donated for cemetery purposes by Thomas Coulter, and was deeded "for cemetery purposes forever," so that the land can never be legally used for any other purpose. Additions have been purchased and added to the original plat.
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The first interment in the Perrysville cemetery was that of Solomon Hill and was made in the summer of 1812. The grave is plainly marked by a head- stone, and is near the front entrance to the cemetery.
When Solomon Hill died, the settlers were at a loss to know what to do for a coffin. There were no ready-made caskets then, and there was no lumber from which one could be made. It was hot June weather, no way for embalming the dead, and it would take several days to make a trip to Mt. Vernon and that was the nearest place where boards could be obtained to make a coffin. But the emergency was met by one of the grand old pioneers giving his wagon-bed from which a coffin was made. Giving up a wagon-bed at that time was a. great sacrifice. Every man at that first funeral carried a musket, fearing an attack from the Indians. The funeral procession had to cross the Blackfork in canoes to the place of interment.
Dr. Robert Irvin was the first resident physician of Perrysville.
The second interment in the Perrysville cemetery was that of Mrs. Conine, who died in the block-house, in the autumn of 1812.
PROFESSOR J. C. SAMPLE.
A Pen and Ink Sketch by a Former Pupil.
Garfield is said to have remarked facetiously that a college is a log with a pupil on one end and Mark Hopkins on the other. In little Perrysville,. Ashland county, Ohio, in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, one could have seen an ordinary frame building in a yard adorned with a few evergreens, called "Green Town Academy." The teacher with high massive forehead and coat of many colors, could have been seen there almost any hour of the day with an enthusiasm that made him blink his eyes, snap his fingers, and slap his ankles together, impressing on a few students in each of his many classes, the duty of Mastery, and his own unique personality. He was filled with that kind of fire that would drive worthless students out of the town and draw the worthy one to his most remarkable college. Although Professor J. C. Sample went to public schools but two years in his life, I consider him and Professor M. Soy D. D., of Capitol University, Columbus, Ohio, to be the two greatest teachers I have ever met ;- considering his opportunities, I consider Professor Sample the great- est. A little sketch of his life should be preserved for the pleasure and informa- tion of his many students. Professor J. C. Sample was born in Harmony, Butler county, Pennsylvania, July 9, 1837. He attended the district common schools but two years, spending the greatest part of the first seventeen years of his life in the woolen factory of his father, Robert Sample; he was a born student and thinker. In the fall of 1855 he entered the Presbyterian Academy at North Sewickly, Beaver county, Pennsylvania. In the fall of 1856 he began teaching school and continued until 1860, when he was elected principal of North Sewickly Academy. He remained there until the fall of 1862, when he entered the army, from which in July, 1863, he was honorably discharged. He was called immediately to the principalship of the Sewickly Academy, but did
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not accept, preferring to enter Poland Union Seminary at Poland, Mahoning county, Ohio.
Because of his known character, he was chosen superintendent of Poland schools where he taught until the fall of 1864, when he resigned and entered Vermillion Institute at Hayesville, Ashland county, Ohio. In the fall of 1865, he was called to take charge of a select school at Perrysville, Ohio, which school he opened the 17th day of September, where he remained until 1869, when he resigned to go with Dr. Dieffendorf to Nebraska City, Nebraska, He there stud- ied and taught with Dr. Dieffendorf for one year in Otto University. He was again recalled to Perrysville, Ashland county, Ohio, where Green Town Acad- emy, in the winter of 1870-71, was born from the select school. The fall of 1873 the presidency of Willamette Valley College, Oregon, was offered to him,
but he refused to accept it. On New Year's day of 1878, he was united in marriage with Miss Elizabeth E. Groff, the daughter of Elias Groff, of near Perrysville, and the same year he refused the chair of Classic Instruction in Buchtel College. He continued his work in Green Town Academy until the fall of 1893, when he resigned in favor of Rev. E. Schultz. Rev. Schultz con- tinued the school for a year and then abandoned it. The Academy building served as a Lutheran Mission until in November of 1895, when it was utterly destroyed by fire. The Professor's home, however, remained a college. Up to the fall of 1908 he has occupied his usual seat on one end of the "John Hopkins' Log," and his children the other.
His last pupil was his youngest daughter, whom he prepared for the fresh- man class of 1908, in Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio.
I said Profesor Sample went to school only two years; I should have said seventy-two. He has been a very careful, industrious student all his life. As a linguist he could teach, and has taught, English; Anglo-Saxon; German ; Dutch; Spanish; French; Greek and Latin. As a historian I have never met his èqual. He is passionately fond of German and English literature and widely acquainted in the original, with English, German, French and Spanish authors. He was as much attached to the study of geology. If you, who happen to be reading these lines, were a student of "Old Green Town," you will remember the shelves on shelves of fossile collecting, that were on view in the library room. The pieces ran into the hundreds, a specially rich and care- fully labeled exhibit of the upper Devonian and Sub-Carbonniferous strata of Ashland and adjoining counties. It was destroyed by the fire along with our library. I can well remember the morning of 1878, when I set on the log with its great teacher, and how with half closed eyes, he described the wonderful gold fields of Alaska and the far north, a quarter of a century before they were discovered. The airships were as real, to him then as they are to us now. When I stop to think of those days, it is with a grateful heart, I thank God that he gave me Professor Sample for my preparatory college instructor. God placed him just where he belonged. Such a man could not work in any high school, nor with any college faculty. He does not believe in any "hop, skip and jump" system of education. "Instruction" and "Education" are very different terms with him. He used to say "If you wish instruction, sit down, I will talk to you ; if you wish education, here are the books .; you must get that yourself. I am
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here only to help you; I can't give you that." It may seem like a slavish method to most teachers to require a student so thoroughly to master his English grammar, that he could recite it like a declamation and get a grade, on review, of ninety-nine and three fourth per cent., but Professor Sample's students could do that, before he was through with them, and they could talk English as correct- ly as the best students of other schools could write it.
"Old Greenleaf !" Do you remember Friday reviews ?- Up to proportion, a half hour of definition ; then the other half, through ? Solutions ? Severer still ! Strange, is it not, that we not only approved, but loved this exceeding severity of class discipline ? Professor Sample would surely have lost one-half of his pupils, had it been abandoned. It was our school distinction. May this not account for another unique fact? During the thirty years of Green Town his- tory, not a single disgraceful incident occurred to mar her memory of the past, and but one case of public discipline.
But with these old memories, thought and pen would wander far a-field, I know not where! Result of it. Out of perhaps three hundred and fifty young men, whose names appear on the class rolls of Professor Sample's "Boys," near- ly, or perhaps altogether one hundred, are now in the professions; more than "the baker's dozen" are, in county offices and in all the professions here in Mansfield now. Between three and four thousand pupils have been taught by this woolen factory boy, who went to the public schools only two years. A descendant of the Scotch Presbyterians, he remained in that church until his marriage with Miss Groff, after which he united with the Lutheran church. He always, in politics, has been a democrat.
Down by the "Clearfork" he lives in his large library of well selected books, digging deeper and deeper into the wonderful mysteries of God.
It will not be long until he will sit at the feet of the Great Teacher, before whom we must all finally appear.
HAYESVILLE.
Hayesville is situated near the center of Vermillion township. The origi- nal proprietors of the town of Hayesville were Rev. John Cox and Linus Hayes. As the Loudonville and Ashland and Wooster and Mansfield roads crossed at this point, Mr. Cox concluded that it might be the site of a future town.
The town of Hayesville was laid out in the fall of 1830, and the town plat recorded in Mansfield, October 26, 1830. The first public sale of lots occurred on the 18th of November of the same year.
The postoffice at Hays X-Roads was established January 18, 1827, and Mr. Cox appointed postmaster. This office he held until July 1, 1841, when, for political reasons alone, which then existed, but do not now, he was removed, and Mr. D. K. Hull appointed in his place. When the postoffice was established, it was supplied several years by a weekly mail carried on horseback by John Willson.
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About 1823 or 1824 a very small cabin and black-smith shop were erected, which were the first buildings in the place.
Hayesville is situated on the east half of the southeast quarter of section 15, township 21, of reserve 15, formerly known by the name of Hayes X-Roads, being the lands of Messrs. J. Cox and L. Hayes. The principal or main street is laid out on the road leading from Wooster to Mansfield, with one row of nineteen lots on each side-each lot sixty feet front by one hundred and twenty feet back. The road leading from Loudonville to Ashland crosses the above named road at right angles, with twenty lots to the east and eighteen lots to the west.
Dr. Harrison Armstrong located in Hayesville in 1832, and was the first regular physician of the place .. He soon won confidence and for a period of twenty years had a large practice. Dr. David Armstrong, also of Hayesville, possessed many characteristics of his ancestry, both in sense, wit and humor. As a physician and business man he stood deservedly high among his fellowmen, and his death was much mourned.
At an early day educational interests were manifested by the citizens of Vermillion township, schools were established and the youth were taught the rudiments of education .. Later select schools were formed for the benefit of those thought to be beyond the tuition of the common school teacher. In 1844- 45, an academy was founded and a charter for the same was obtained from the Ohio legislature, and the name "Vermillion Institute" was bestowed upon the institution.
The old Vermillion Institute at Hayesville is now conducted as a high school under the common school laws of Ohio, and is in charge of Professor D. K. Andrews, a former Richland county boy.
Vermillion Institute was the outcome of a feeling for higher education of the people of the township. The funds to erect suitable buildings were raised by a joint stock company-The site-two acres of land, was donated by W. W. Scott. The corner stone laid in 1845, on Fourth of July-The Rev. Lewis Granger delivered an oration and the school was christened Vermillion Institute. After five years the management passed into the hands of the Wooster Presby- terian.
The people of Hayesville like those of many other small towns live in the glory of the past-we are still proud of the reputation of Vermillion Institute. In its most prosperous years when such institutions were few and far between, its catalogues show that it was unusually well known and that its reputation was more than state-wide. This was particularly the case when that noted educator and distinguished scholar, Rev. Sanders Diefendorf L. L. D. was at its head, under whose skillful management and well earned reputation as a teacher it had from two hundred to three hundred and fifty students en- rolled. Many of these ambitious students could be cited by name who have since won high places in the missionary fields, in the pulpit, at the bar, in the medical profession and have become useful and influential citizens in every walk of life, and it is proved by the many letters received by the present citi- zens of our village and the visits from "the old students" that Vermillion Institute and Dr. Diefendorf are still cherished in the memories of those who
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are now far away-and all give credit and regard to the days spent here, for good influences, for scholarship and the brotherly love kindled among the students.
SAVANNAH.
Savannah, Ashland county, was founded by the Rev. John Haney and was laid out in December, 1818. Being at the crossing of two important public roads, the town soon took root and grew into quite an active business place, and when the evolution-fever for the dismemberment of old counties and the forma- tion of new ones raged in Ohio in the '40s, Savannah was a candidate to become a county seat town. But the lines being run from north to south, instead of from the east to the west, the town of Ashland carried off the honors. And Savannah's commercial hopes were not realized, and for a few years affairs seemed as though the little village might not be able to keep its place upon the map.
But in 1849, the Rev. Alexander Scott opened a school in Savannah, which in time became an academy and which has ever since been greatly the life of the town and the pride of the beautiful country surrounding it. Of the six insti- tutions of that kind founded in Ashland county during the academy founding era of fifty years ago, the Savannah academy is the only one in existence today- a verification of the fittest.
In the spring of 1854, the Rev. Alexander Scott was called to the pastorate of the Presbyterian church at Savannah, and soon after his settlement there, it occurred to him that the interests of both the church and the community would be greatly promoted by the founding of an academy there. There were a large number of young people within the bounds of the congregation that seemed desirous of securing a better education than could be obtained at a common school. Some of these were going to neighboring institutions. Others desired to go but could not afford the expense. With a view of meeting this want, on the 17th of September, 1856, the Rev. Mr. Scott opened a classical school under the name of the "Savannah Male and Female Academy." Sixteen pupils were enrolled the first day, which number was increased to twenty-five before the close of the term, and to about one hundred before the end of the year. The second year, having secured more commodious accommodations, the school became still more prosperous. On Thanksgiving day, 1858, preliminary steps were taken to form an academy association with a board of trustees, which was successfully accomplished within a few weeks, and the institution has been successfully con- ducted ever since.
The Rev. Mr. Scott the founder of the academy is now eighty-eight years of age resides in the village and looks back with satisfaction to the work he founded and that the institution is prosperous today.
Savannah is built upon a lovely elevation, the base of which to the south and west is washed by the clear waters of the Vermillion river, or rather the headwaters thereof, just after being loosened from the Vermillion lakes, whose
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clear waters glisten in the sunshine south and east of the village, and where the moonbeams glimmer in sheens of beauty. These lakes are situated just north of the dividing ridge which traverses Ohio from the northeast to the southwest and forms the water shed of the state.
These Vermillion lakes are locally known as the Mc Williams and the McLain lakes. The Mc Williams lake is the larger of the two and is much deeper. There is a grove near each lake, and they are quite popular resorts for campers during the hot season.
The town is situated upon a beautiful plateau, and the houses of the village are of modern architecture, are kept well painted and the streets are clean and shady, evincing civic pride and betterment that is commendable everywhere. The lakes and lovely landscapes make a charming background to the village picture.
The first instance in which the population of Savannah was taken separate from that of Clear Creek township was in 1860, when it was three hundred and sixty, but it has increased some since. The first settler in the town was Joseph Fast. The first schoolhouse in the place was a small log building, erected on the northeast corner of the town plat. There are three churches in the village -Methodist, Presbyterian and United Presbyterian. While the most of the buildings in the place are modern and up-to-date, there is one old building yet standing as a relic of the past. It is a rambling old structure, two stories in height and perhaps sixty feet front, and stands on the west side of Main street south of the academy building. It was built for a hotel and was called the "Tallchill."
The Savannah academy has been, since its founding, christian, but not denominational. The ground, upon which the academy buildings stand, was donated for that purpose by the Rev. John Haney, the founder of the village. Daniel D. Templeton was the first president of the board of trustees.
The inhabitants of the country around and about Savannah are largely of the sturdy Scotch or descendants of the same.
Calling at the academy at a recitation hour, upon being ushered in, we were kindly greeted and confronted a sea of up-turned handsome and intellectual faces of a score of lady pupils, and later had the pleasure of meeting the princi- pal of the school, the Rev. W. J. Machwart, who, with the Rev. H. F. Kerr, his able assistant, keep the institution up to its former high standard.
JEROMEVILLE.
Jeromeville is in Mohican township, situated where the Mansfield-Wooster old-time stage road crosses the Jeromefork of the Mohican river. The town was laid out February 14, 1815, by Christian Deardorf and William Vaughn, who had purchased the land from John Baptiste Jerome a short time before, and the town was named Jeromeville in honor of Jerome. It is surrounded by fine farming lands, and no better soil for fertility can be found in the state than those along the branches of the Mohican. The climate is a healthful one, the scenery of the hills and valleys enhancing and romantic and many legends are
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