USA > Ohio > Champaign County > History of Champaign County, Ohio, Its People, Industries and Institutions, Volume I > Part 10
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The recorder's records also show that one hundred and forty acres of land were leased during the same period, the leases extending for a total of twenty-seven years. The amount of consideration of these leases was $5,455. During the year following June 30, 1916, a number of oil leases have been made in the Mad River valley, and one well drilled-a dry one.
CHAMPAIGN COUNTY'S INDEBTEDNESS.
The county of Champaign has the right to contract debts and is obligated to pay them just as the humblest citizen of its confines. The county has never had a heavy debt during its whole history and has never had one to exceed two hundred thousand dollars. To trace the history of indebtedness back to 1880 is to follow a maze of figures which are very baffling to the ordinary citizen, but a brief statement is sufficient to explain what it meant by county debt and how it is acquired.
The ordinary expenses of the county, commonly known as "running" expenses, are met month by month and year by year from the ordinary receipts of taxes levied for that purpose. To say that a county is in debt fifty thousand dollars or twice that much, is to assume that it has had an unusual expenditure; such, for instance, as the building of a court house or jail or some extensive improvement demanding the outlay of thousands of dollars. In Ohio, as in most other states, many improvements of a public nature are paid for by an assessment levied against the citizens benefited by the improvement in question. For instance, the building of a ditch or the construction of a road is met wholly or in part by a direct assessment on the property owners affected by the improvement. In the case of some kind of roads (inter-county) the expenses is pro-rated four ways: The state, the county, the township and the abutting property owners. In the case of a road in Concord and salem townships ( Urbana-Sidney road, I. C. H. No. 192, Section "L"), being a concrete road of one mile in length, the cost of construction was $12,386.10. This was pro-rated as follows: State, $6,193.06; county, $3,125.04; townships, $1,840.80; abutting property own- ers, $1,227.20. In other words, in such a road the state pays half of the
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cost of construction, the other half being divided three ways-county, town- ship and property owners. In this case the county would probably have to issue bonds to cover the cost of construction; certainly if the amount were much in excess of this a bond issue would be floated. .
COUNTY'S ANNUAL EXPENDITURES.
The largest debt the county has ever had was at the end of the fiscal year of 1914 when it amounted to $196,237. A large part of this was due to an issuance of bonds to cover the expense of re-dredging Mad river, which was made necessary as a result of the flood of March, 1913. The debt of the county on January 1, 1917, amounted to $48,000. Of this amount $30,000 was flood bonds ; $10,000, hospital bonds; $5,000, St. Paris-Rose- wood highway; $3,000, bridge bonds. During the spring of 1917, bonds were issued for the addition to the court house and for the construction of a laundry building at the Children's Home. The debt of the county from 1880 to January 1, 1917, may be briefly set forth as follows: 1880-$74.305; 1890-$28,170; 1900-$21,981 ; 1910-$118.625; 1914-$196,237; 1915- $73,395; January 1, 1917-$48,000. This debt is known on the auditor's record as the county debt, but there is another debt of the taxpayers which is designated as "school debt." The school debt for the same years follows : 1880-$63,910; 1890-$600; 1900-$62,780; 1910-$28,000; 1914 -- $78,239; January 1, 1916-$258,550.
The county has been spending about half a million dollars a year. This money is spent in a hundred different ways and is paid out in sums ranging from a few cents to several thousand dollars. There are no less than forty- two officials employed by the county and their aggregate salary amounts to thousands of dollars. These salaries range from $4,000, the salary of the common pleas judge, to $720, the salary of the sealer of weights and measures.
To meet the expenses of the county, taxes are levied and in each county in Ohio taxes are divided into five general funds: State, county, school, township and corporation. The state tax is divided into four funds-sink- ing, university, common school and state highway. The county tax is divided into seventeen funds-county, infirmary, children's home, bridge, building, soldiers' relief, mothers' pension, blind, election, county ditch, tuberculosis hospital, infirmary hospital, county roads, county highway, sinking and flood bridge. The township tax is divided into seven funds-general, poor, roads, bridge, cemetery, ditch and miscellaneous. The corporation tax is divided (7)
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into eight funds, general, safety, service, health, library, cemetery, death and sinking. Summing up the different tax funds it may be seen that they are thirty-two in number.
OHIO'S LOW TAX RATE.
Ohio enjoys one of the lowest tax rates in the Union and its average tax of less than a dollar and a half on the hundred dollars is considerably less than half of the rate paid by the tax payers of Indiana. The low rate in Ohio has been in effect since Governor Harmon forced the Smith one per cent law through the General Assembly. The tax in Ohio can not legally be more than a dollar and a half on the hundred dollars and in 1916 there were some taxing units in Champaign county with the rate as low as seventy-three cents, there being six of the thirty-seven taxing units with a rate of less than one dollar. Before the present taxing system went into operation Ohio rates were practically twice what they are today, the reduction in the rate being due to the listing of property at its full value. The tax duplicates for 1916 showed a total of $47,146,455 on the duplicate, while the assessment for 1917 shows a substantial increase over this amount.
The county collected tax in 1916 to the amount of $533,715.24; in other words, the county, with the exception of about $20,000 (state tax), spent about half a million during the course of a year. This amount was divided among the different funds as follows: State, $20,423.58; county, $122,- 896.66; township, $61,729.29; schools, $190,113.31; city and village, $78,- 469.84 ; special, $60,082.56; grand total, $533.715.24.
AN INTERESTING COMPARISON.
This seems like a large amount, but in reality it is a very small amount in proportion to the wealth of the county. With debts amounting to $48,000 and wealth amounting to $48,000,000, the county is just in the position of the farmer of the county who has a ten thousand dollar farm and has a mort- gage of ten dollars on it. And yet the county refused to consider the question of building a new court house in the spring of 1917 and made an addition of $4.500 to a court house which was built in 1840. It seems that if the average taxpayer of the county understood conditions he would not object to the expenditure of the money necessary to erect a court house in keeping with the dignity of the county. Counties with considerably less wealth than Champaign have erected court houses within the past ten years.
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SOME WORDS IN CONCLUSION.
The historian has been privileged to examine the records in the court house in the various offices extending over a period of more than a hundred years. They have been kept in a manner which indicates that the officials have usually been competent; there are exceptions. A glance through the records shows that a number of officials in the early history of the county, either willfully or ignorantly, or both, misappropriated public funds. The records show that commissioners, sheriffs, auditors and treasurers have been guilty of malfeasance in office, but nothing has happened to mar the record of the officials in their financial transactions, at least, since the seventies.
A public office is a public trust and should be so considered. The ordinary citizen has an indefinite notion that anyone can fill any county office, no matter what his education may have been, or what previous experience he may have had. One week in any office in the court house will convince the most skeptical person that the task of properly administering the affairs of any office is not the sinecure that many think it is. More than mere honesty is required ; efficiency is just as necessary as honesty. Many an honest man has made a poor official. Some day man will have arrived at a state of political perfection where the problems of civil administration will be reduced to a science, but until that day arrives we will go on in our poor, blundering way. The Millennium will arrive some day in county government-but it is a long way off. Meanwhile, all we can do is to shut our eyes and pick the best men we can for our public offices.
POPULATION STATISTICS.
There is no way of telling how many people were living in Champaign county when it was organized in 1805. The county first figured in the fed- eral census of 1810, but its population of 6,303 in that year included all the inhabitants living within the present limits of the county with all those living in considerably more than half of the present counties of Clark and Logan. It is probable that nearly half of the population returned in 1810 was in that part of the county which was set off in Clark and Logan coun- ties, respectively, in 1817. Taking this fact into consideration will explain the apparent small increase in the population of Champaign between 1810 and 1820. It is certain that the northern half of Clark county, which was a part of Champaign county until 1817, was fairly well settled before it was cut off from the latter county.
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All that we know about the county's population in 1805 is that there were a few hundred settlers and their families scattered up and down the Mad river valley. The number in the territory which later became Cham- paign county in 1800 is, of course, impossible to determine, but it is quite probable that there were only two settlers at that time, Pierre Dugan and William Owen and their families.
The organization of the county was the signal for an influx of settlers, but the great bulk of immigrants did not come until after the danger from the Indians subsided after the War of 1812. They came chiefly from Vir- ginia after they had spent a few years in Kentucky, just as did Simon Kenton; also William Ward, the founder of Urbana. There were, however, numer- ous settlers in the northeastern part of the county who came from the New England states. Vermont contributed no small number, the town of Wood- stock being named for the Woodstock in that state.
The only detailed census reports for the county that the historian has been able to acquire, begin with 1850, and these immediately follow. Earlier returns of the county from the national census statistical returns enable us to determine the number of people in the county from 1810 to 1850: For 1810, 6,303; 1820, 8,479; 1830, 12,131, and for 1840, 16,721. Hence, in forty years, the population of the county increased 11,254, which is 1,831 greater than the increase between 1850 and 1890. Here again, however, the setting off of Clark and Logan counties must be taken into consideration.
For the net three decades, the authorities differ as to the population of the county. One gives the population in 1850, 19,782; in 1860, 22,698; and in 1870, 24,188; another set of figures, which are given in the table following, do not agree with these totals.
It will be noticed in the following census report that the population of Christiansburg and Thackery, in Jackson township; Rosewood and Carys- ville, in Adams township; Mingo, in Wayne township; Kingston, in Salem township; Westville and Terre Haute, in Mad River township; and Eris, in Concord township, are not listed separately. The population of these towns is included in that of the townships in which they are respectively located.
1850.
1800
1870.
1890.
1890.
1900.
1910
Adama township
1.123
1.203
1.238
1.445
1.401
1.406
1.293
Concord township
1,010
1,008
1,035
1.157
1,139
1.053
903
Goshen township
1.943
1,856
1.085
2.597
1,987
1.111
1.038
Mechanicsburg
682
735
940
1.450
1,617
1.448
Harrison township
968
1,070
944
974
777
744
649
Springhill
172
158
157
127
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CHAMPAIGN COUNTY, OHIO.
Jackson township
1.735
1.771
1.831
1,968
1,827
1,851
1,758
Johnson township
1.573
2.021
2,297
2,445
1.427
1.243
1.122
St. Paris
550
920
1.145
1,222
1.201
Millerstown
520
Mad River township
1.908
2,008
1.803
2,000
2,026
1,782
1,608
Rush township
1.400
1.522
1.750
2.152
848
800
923
North Lewisburg
302
379
733
1.151
866
816
793
Woodstock
205
300
310
325
310
Salem township
1,634
1,001
1.974
2,106
1,875
1,788
1,784
Kennard
70
1,588
1,240
1.074
962
Mutual
-..
1,600
1,827
1.514
1,362
1,208
1.184
Urbana
2,020
3.420
4.276
6,252
6,510
6,808
7,739
Wayne township
1,429
1,570
1,720
1.599
1,389
1,345
1.272
Cable
131
Middletown
126
--
--
---
Totals
19.782
25.919
26.103
31,397
26,980
26,642
28,351
SOME INTERESTING FACTS.
A glance at the census totals from 1850 to 1910 reveals some interest- ing facts. The greatest number of residents Champaign county ever had was 31.397 in 1880; an increase of 5,294 over the number in 1870. From 1880 to the present there has been a steady decline of approximately three hundred each decade. It is noticeable that the population of the cities and villages has not decreased so markedly as that of the rural districts. More- over, there seems to be a centralization of population in Urbana for it has steadily increased until its inhabitants numbered 7,739 in 1910. Obviously, Champaign county, like many others in the county, illustrates the movement of the rural population to the urban centers.
The population of Champaign county is almost wholly American; an unusual fact since Urbana is an industrial center of considerable importance. Evidently the county is out of the path of the flotsam and jetsam of immi- gration. Even though there are a few foreign-born citizens in the county, yet it can be said there is not a hyphenated American within its borders. All of those who left their old homes across the Atlantic for the greater opportunity and freedom in the largest republic in the world are desirable and industrious citizens-assets to the community.
The decrease in the county's population is not a disaster, even though the thinkers of a century ago preached such doctrine. In one sense it is a
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Union township
1,645
1.681
1.000
174
163
134
Urbana township
1,394
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CHAMPAIGN COUNTY, OHIO.
mark of progress; for, as a rule, a high increase in population is accompan- ied by a proportionately high death rate and an inversely proportional lower- ing of the standard of living. There is an adaptation going on in Cham- paign county, which, if nothing untoward happens, will result in the highest welfare for all.
BIRTH AND DEATH STATISTICS FOR 1916.
The statutes of Ohio provide for the registration of all births and deaths in each county in the state; the county auditor receiving the returns of the officials designated to collect the data. The law provides that the town- ship, village, town and city clerks shall serve as local registers, and that they shall receive twenty-five cents for each birth or death reported (Section 230, General Code). The county is divided into special registration districts, Champaign county being divided into eight. The expense entailed in gath- ering these returns is a most judicious outlay, and each administrative unit in the United States should have such vital data at its disposal. The present situation in regard to the military registration emphasizes the need of such law in each state.
The complete report of the registers for the period beginning January 1, 1916, and closing December 31, 1916, follows :
Local Register.
District.
Deaths. Births. Expense.
E. C. Mohr
Spring Hill (village) Adams aud Har.
rison tps. 27
38
$ 17.25
J. D. O'Gara
Urbana (city), Concord. Mad River.
Salem and Urbana tps. 213
217
108.25
T. B. Ware.
Mechanicsburg ( village) Goshen tp .__ 52
44
24.00
John Myers and
Harry Barley St. Paris (village), Jackson and Johnson tps
31
30
16.75
E. C. Gifford
Woodstock (village), Rush tp., ex-
cept N. Lewisburg
30
28
14.50
HI. A. Sceva
Mutual (village). Union tp.
12
18
7.50
Ralph L .. Stout
North Lewisburg
13
16
7.25
W. E. LaRue.
Wayne tp.
14
25
9.75
Total
405 448
$213.25
There is a preponderance of births over deaths in the county of forty- three, a percentage excess of 10.6. There are two districts, the ones in which T. B. Ware and E. C. Gifford are registers, where deaths exceed births. Using the 1910 census return for the county, which was 26,351,
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CHAMPAIGN COUNTY, OHIO.
the per cent. increase by births was 1.5, and the per cent. decrease by deaths was 1.7.
SCHOOL POPULATION OF URBANA IN 1865.
In the spring of 1865 the regular town assessor, John S. Thomas, took the school enumeration of all the children between the ages of five and twenty-one; and at the same time compiled a complete and accurate census of the town. He published this in the Urbana Citizen and Gasette, Septem- ber 1, 1865. These are the statistics which he submitted:
White youth between five and twenty-one years :
Males
693
Females
681
Total 1,374
Colored youth between five and twenty-one years :
Males
69
Females
72
Total 141
Total white and colored, school age .. 1,515
Total number of white residents of Urbana 3,668
Total number of colored residents of Urbana 396
Total population of city. 4,064
Total population of city in 1860. 3,429
Increase in five years
635
This was an increase of 18.5 per cent.
SCHOOL POPULATION OF URBANA IN 1917.
W. H. McGown, the school enumerator, found the school population of Urbana, May 1, 1917. to be as follows:
Between six and twenty-one years: Males
781
Females
802
Total boys and girls of school age ... 1,583
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Grouped by ages there were:
Between ages six and eight 281
Between eight and .fourteen. 672
Between fourteen and sixteen 198
Between sixteen and twenty-one. 432
Total
1,583
This number is thirty less than was reported May 1, 1916, and only sixty-eight more than the city had in 1865. Thirty children were in the children's home, but they were not included in the city enumeration; of the thirty there were, grouped by age: Between six and eight, 8; between eight and fourteen, .22; total, 30.
Making general statements is dangerous if one's data does not cover a sufficient number of cases of a long period of time. This fact vitiates to some extent any general observations which can be made concerning Urbana's school population. If the years 1865 and 1917 are typical ones, then we can indulge ourselves in some rambling generalizations.
It is obvious that there are fewer children in Urbana in 1917 than in 1865; and, if this be true for many years, the city has depended for its growth in population upon acquisitions from the rural districts and other cities and towns. Since the school population of 1917 is 1,583 and that of 1865 was 1,515; the gain of the former over the latter is only sixty-eight, a per cent. increase of 4.5. The population of Urbana in 1865 was 4,064, and in 1910, 7,729; this shows a gain of 3.675, or a per cent. increase of 90. In other words, the school population of Urbana in 1865 was 37.5 per cent. of the whole, while that in 1917 is only 20.4 per cent. of the whole, almost half of that in 1865.
Another interesting comparison is that of per cent. of boys and girls in the school population. In 1865 there were 1.2 per cent. more boys than girls, and in 1917 there were 2.7 per cent. more girls than boys.
CHAPTER IV.
PUBLIC BUILDINGS OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
COURT HOUSES.
Champaign county has had three court houses on three different sites and all three buildings were erected within the first thirty-five years of the county's history. As has been stated the seat of justice for the county was temporarily located at Springfield in 1805 and it was not until 1807 that it was removed to Urbana. Although a public square had been provided and the donor of the site had given one hundred and six lots to be sold, the pro- ceeds from which were to be used in the construction of county buildings, yet no building was provided in the way of a court house or jail until in 1807.
FIRST COURT HOUSE.
The first commissioners' records are missing and it is not possible to trace in detail the history of the first and second court houses. The first temple of justice in Urbana was a log house, situated on lot No. 174, on East Court street, the same site being now occupied by a building used by McConnell & Pence for a livery stable. After the second court house was erected in the public square the log court house was sold to Duncan McDonald who converted it into a dwelling.
During the War of 1812, the old log court house was used as an army hospital and many of Hull's soldiers died in it. In fact, there were so many sick and wounded soldiers in the court house at one time during the war that it became necessary to fit up the upper part of the jail for court purposes. The courts continued to be held in the jail until the new court house in the public square was completed sometime in the latter part of 1817.
SECOND COURT HOUSE.
The second court house of the county was a brick structure, two stories in height, and stood in the center of the public square. Owing to the absence
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of documentary evidence it is impossible to give the cost of the court house, its dimensions, or even the exact date of its completion. Traditionary evi- dence supplies some facts concerning this ancient temple of justice and a summary of different descriptions of this building which have been handed down presents a fair view of it.
The entrance faced the south and on that side was the only outside door to the building. On entering the building the clerk's and recorder's offices were on either side of a narrow hall which led directly from the entrance into a large room which occupied considerably more than half of the north part of the lower floor. This large room was the court room and for many years was the only public hall in the village. It was used for church services, as a school room, for political meetings and for every conceivable kind of public gathering. In the second story was to be found the remaining county offices. while for many years the Masonic lodge had its quarters in one of the rooms of the second story. There was no fence around the building and the one door to the building always being open, there was a constant temptation to the boys of the village to slip in and ring the bell which hung in the belfry.
THE OLD COURT HOUSE' BELL.
The old court house bell deserves a paragraph. It was an institution and served an important place in the life of the early history of the town. A large club was kept in the belfry to be used in giving the alarm of fire or to toll the deaths of the villagers. It announced the opening of court, called the children to school, and summoned the worshippers to church. When "Old Squire" Thomas died the bell was made to spread the sad news through- out the community, and according to the best accounts, this was the last time the bell was used for such a purpose. When the court house was torn down in 1840 the bell was broken.
It was found when the old brick court house in the square was being dis- mantled in 1840, that it was an exceptionally well-constructed building. The late J. W. Ogden is responsible for the statement that when one section of the walls was pushed over that the whole wall remained intact. This may seem surprising in view of the fact that in those days most of the mortar was composed of equal portions of sand, lime and clay. Judge William Pat- rick had the unique distinction of carrying the first hod of brick that went into the construction of the court house, which stood in the public square, and when this same building was razed in 1840 he carried the first hod of brick away.
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CHAMPAIGN COUNTY, OHIO.
THE THIRD COURT HOUSE.
The third court house in Champaign county is a part of the present building. The first mention in the records of the third building is found in the commissioners' minutes of March 17, 1837. at which time it was "Unanimously resolved by the commissioners in full board that in our opinion a new court house with fireproof offices ought to be built on the ground in Urbana purchased for that purpose [lots 16 and 17 had been purchased in 1830] and that we will commence making arrangements for the building of the same by making contracts for the material necessary to complete said building and also a draft of the most convenient court house that we may be able to obtain. And we hereby direct the auditor to give notice in the Urbana Record that we will meet at our office in said town on the 15th day of April next for the purpose of receiving proposals and entering into contract for the delivery of 200,000 bricks for said building."
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