History of Champaign County, Ohio, Its People, Industries and Institutions, Volume I, Part 39

Author: Middleton, Evan P., editor
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Indianapolis, B.F. Bowen
Number of Pages: 1196

USA > Ohio > Champaign County > History of Champaign County, Ohio, Its People, Industries and Institutions, Volume I > Part 39

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PROSECUTING ATTORNEYS.

The office of prosecuting attorney under the old constitution (1805- 1852) was appointive and it was not until after 1852 that the office was filled by election. The records of the common pleas court before 1852 do not in all cases indicate the prosecutor at each session of the court, four sessions usually being held each year. A few of the prosecutors were from Cham- paign county during these forty-seven years, but most of them were from other counties in the district.

The first prosecutor to appear in the common pleas court of Champaign county was Arthur St. Clair, Jr., a son of the former governor of the North- west Territory. St. Clair appeared during 1805 and again in 1807 as prose- cutor, Joshua Collett appearing as prosecutor in 1806. In 1808 Edward W. Pearce, the first lawyer of Urbana, was appointed prosecutor and made his first appearance at the May term and continued in the office until January, 1811, when Henry Bacon succeeded him. Pearce was one of the first settlers in Urbana, a man of high intellectual attainments, versed in the law, but suffered from melancholia. In fact, he was a pronounced hypochondriac and sometime during the winter of 1816 committed suicide in the woods south of Urbana. He was a bachelor and lived in a little cabin on West Water street. Other prosecutors from Champaign county who served in the circuit under the old regime were Moses B. Corwin, John H. James and James Cooley. Samuel V. Baldwin was the last prosecutor before the new constitution went into operation, serving from 1850 to 1852.

PROSECUTORS SINCE 1852.

Since 1852 Champaign county has elected its own prosecutor and many of the strongest lawyers of the local bar have filled the office. The complete list of prosecutors since 1852 follows: Ichabod Corwin. 1852-54; John S. Leedom, 1854-56; Jeremiah Deuel, 1856-58: John S. Leedom, 1858-62; Levi Geiger, 1862-64; David W. Todd, 1864-68; William R. Warnock, 1868-72; George M. Eichelberger. 1872-76: John Frank Gowey, 1876-80; Duncan McDonald, 1880 (died, December 22, 1882) ; Frank Eichelberger. 1882-83;

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E. P. Middleton, 1884-90; Clarence B. Heiserman, 1890-94 (resigned) ; David W. Todd, 1894-95; Sherman S. Deaton, 1895-1901 ; Frank A. Zimmer, 1901-07; George Waite, Sr., 1907-11; Charles H. Duncan, 1911-15; Harold W. Houston, 1915.

COURT LIBRARY.

The beginning of the present court library of the bar of Champaign county dates from the spring of 1905, when the first steps were taken to incor- porate an association such as was contemplated by a recent act of the Legis- lature. Judge Middleton called the preliminary meeting on January 16, 1905, to talk over the matter and the following week the lawyers of the local bar organized themselves as the Champaign County Bar and Law Library Association. They applied for incorporation articles on January 25, 1905. The charter members were E. P. Middleton, Henry F. McCracken, George W. McCracken, H. H. Banta, George M. Eichelberger, Louis D. Johnson,. E. L. Bodey, C. B. Heiserman, Thomas J. Frank, Frank A. Zimmer, Charles H. Duncan, Charles E. Buroker and H. M. Crow.

An initiation fee of five dollars and annual dues of the same amount helped to provide the initial fund for the purchase of books The law allows such an incorporated company as the above to appoint a law librarian whose salary is not to exceed five hundred dollars a year. During the twelve years that the local library has been in operation, the librarian has turned the full amount of his salary into the law library fund. In addition to these two sources, the law library fund is aided by fines from certain criminal cases. Since the library has been in operation there has been collected and expended for books and magazines the sum of eight thousand two hundred and fifty dollars.

The first officers of the library were as follows: T. J. Frank, president ; George W. McCracken, vice-president; L. D. Johnson, treasurer; George Waite, librarian; W. F. Ring, secretary. These five officials, together with C. E. Buroker and C. B. Heiserman, constituted the board of trustees. T. J. Frank continued as president until his death. He was succeeded by Charles E. Buroker. the present incumbent. S. S. Deaton succeeded George W. McCracken as vice-president. W. F. Ring and L. D. Johnson have served as secretary and treasurer, respectively, since the library was started. George Waite, Sr., served as librarian until his death and James F. Wilson, court bailiff, was then appointed as his successor. When Joseph Moses succeeded Wilson as bailiff, he took over his honorary duties as librarian.

Practically all the lawyers of the county seat are members in good stand-

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ing of the library association. The library is now located in the rooms adjoin- ing the office of the common pleas judge, but when the new addition to the court house is completed, it is planned to establish the library in the second story of the addition. The library has four thousand well-selected volumes, including state reports, court decisions, text books and miscellaneous volumes of a legal nature. The best legal magazines are always found in the read- ing room.

The lawyers are unanimous in their praise of the great benefit the library has been to the local bar. It has been used constantly since it was started; and, with the annual increment of seven hundred dollars' worth of books to its already considerable number of volumes, the library promises even far greater value and utility. At its present rate of growth, the local law library will, within the next decade, rank with the best in any of the counties of this size in the state.

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CHAPTER XXII.

CHAMPAIGN COUNTY JOURNALISM.

The history of journalism in Champaign county may be traced back more than a hundred years and during all these years the newspaper has been an active factor in the building up of the county in all lines of endeavor. It is impossible to estimate the benefit of a good newspaper to a community ; the statement so frequently made that our country's civilization is moulded by the press, pulpit and platform indicates in some measure the value placed upon the newspaper.

Men have frequently tried to sum up in a pithy paragraph the function of the newspaper, and perhaps no more apt summary of the place it occupies in our civilization has ever been written than that which came from the hand of Joseph H. Finn, a newspaper man of Chicago. The part of his apostrophe to the newspaper given below was given by him in an address before the Associated Advertising Clubs of the World in the spring of 1915.

I AM THE NEWSPAPER.

Born of the deep. daily need of a nation. I am the Voice of Now-the Incarnate spirit of the Times-Monarch of Things That Are.

My "cold type" burns with the fireblood of human action. I am fed by arteries of wire that girdle the earth. I drink from the cup of every living joy and sorrow. I know not day nor night nor season. I know not death, yet I am born again with every morn-with every noon-with every twilight. I leap into fresh being with every new world's events.

Those who created me cease to be. The brains and heart's blood that nourish me go the way of human dissolution. Yet I live on and on. I am majestic in my strength, sublime in my power, terrible in my potentialitles; yet as democratic as the ragged boy who sells me for a penny.

I am the consort of kings, the partner of capital, the brother of toll, the inspira- tion of the hopeless, the right arm of the needy, the champion of the oppressed, the conscience of the criminal. I am the epitome of the world's comedy and tragedy.

My responsibility is Infinite. I speak and the world stops to listen. I say the word and battle flames her horizon. I counsel peace and the war lords obey. I am greater than any individual, more powerful than any brute. I am the dynamic force of public opinion. Rightly directed, I am the creator of confidence, a builder of happl- ness in living. I am the teacher of patriotism. I am the hands of the clock of time- the clarion voice of civilization. I am the newspaper.

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FILES OF EARLY PAPERS MISSING.

It is impossible to write a detailed history of the press of Champaign county for the reason that the files of all of the early papers of the county have long since disappeared and the only way to write the history of a paper is to have access to the files of the paper itself. There are at least a score of papers which have appeared in Urbana during the past one hundred years concerning which little more is known than their names, and not even that much information has been preserved about the men who started them. A number of papers have been started by men who came from parts unknown and departed to regions of the same kind.

Definite information concerning the papers of Urbana prior to the Civil War is unobtainable. The dates and names of papers which have been seen by the historian are definitely indicated. Fairly complete files of the two leading papers of the county are kept in the county auditor's office. In other cases the names of the papers and their editors or publishers are given on the authority of local parties. One of the best-known of the early news- paper men of the county was Joshua Saxton, who was identified with the newspapers of Urbana from 1837 to 1879, a period of forty-two years. In 1880 he was asked to prepare an article on the newspapers of the county and the historian of the present volume is indebted to him for much of the information herein given concerning the newspapers of the country.

THE FARMERS WATCH TOWER.

There seems to be no question that the first paper in Champaign county made its bow to the public in 1812. Howe is authority for the state- ment that the name of this paper was the Watch Tower, and that it first appeared on July 4, 1812. Saxton states that its name was the Farmer's Watch Tower, but he does not attempt to give a definite date in 1812 for its initial appearance. The proprietors of the infant sheet were Moses Corwin, a young lawyer, and one Blackburn, who was to furnish the practical knowledge necessary to run the paper. He performed the triplicate duties of type-setter, proof-reader and pressman. The absence of any copies of the paper render it impossible to give the successive changes in ownership, but it seems that Blackburn soon retired in favor of Allen M. Poff, but how long Corwin and Poff continued their partnership history does not record. Tradition is responsible for placing their little printing shop in a log cabin at the corner of Church and Walnut streets.

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THE SPIRIT OF LIBERTY.

Sometime before the twenties Poff became the sole owner of the Watch Tower, and he evidently tried to improve its wavering fortunes by rechris- tening it. At least he appears as sponsor for a sheet known as the Spirit of Liberty and it was undoubtedly the legitimate successor of the first sheet. Changes of newspaper names and editors follow in such confusion up to 1837 that it is impossible to trace them with any degree of certainty.

MANY PAPERS OF MANY NAMES BY MANY MEN.

The period between 1820 and 1840 is filled with the births and deaths of a group of papers which were evidently the product of the political con- ditions of the times. So many years have elapsed since that time and so little contemporary evidence has been preserved as to local conditions that the historian can only inferentially explain the rise and fall of the many newspapers of the period.

The Spirit of Liberty soon succumbed and it was presumably succeeded by the Farmers Friend, the title of the new paper indicating that its editor intended to rely on the farmers of the county for most of his support. Saxton states that the Friend was established by Daniel S. Bell in 1824 but the records of the commissioners for 1820, (Journal No. 2, p. 26.) have a reference to the Farmers Friend, thus clearly establishing its existence four years before the date assigned to it by Saxton. The farmers did not seem to furnish the support for the paper that the editor had figured upon; that is, if the change in name of his paper is any indication of the worth of their support. Bell sought to gain a wider patronage by having a more comprehensive title for his paper, and accordingly one week his subscribers were startled to see in bold glaring type across the head of his paper the new title of Ohioan and Mad River Journal.

The Mad River Courant appeared before 1825 under the proprietorship of Martin L. Lewis. It may have been the immediate successor of Poff's Spirit of Liberty. Shortly after the paper was started Dr. Evan Banes became associated with Lewis in the ownership of the paper. There is an indication that a paper by the name of The Urbana News-Letter was in existence prior to 1825 and that it was consolidated with the Mad River Courant in the spring of 1825. The appearance of a paper bearing the long and illuminating title of The Urbana News-Letter and Mad River Courant

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in May, 1826, points to a consolidation of two papers bearing these two respective titles. A copy of this paper, dated May 26, 1826, (Vol. I, No. 4) is in the collection of newspapers of the Springfield Historical Society. The title is set in two lines at the head of the sheet, the titles being united by the word and, thus indicating apparently that the paper was a consolidation of two previously existing papers.

A paper bearing the curious title of Country Collustrator was estab- lished in June, 1831, by Robert Barr and Dr. Wilson Everett. A copy of this paper dated August 11, 1831, (Vol. I, No. 8) is in the collection of W. F. Ring of Urbana, and, dating back, supposing that the paper was issued regularly each week, its initial issue appeared on Thursday, June 23, 1831. Sometime before the eighth number had appeared Barr had dis- posed of his interest in the paper to Dr. Evan Banes, who previously had been connected with the Mad River Courant.

FURTHER CONFUSION IN RECORD.

The newspaper confusion is further increased by the appearance of a paper about 1830 entitled Country Collustrator and Mad River Courant. A copy of this paper, dated November 1, 1834 (Vol. IV, No. 20, Whole No. 176.) from the collection of W. F. Ring, was owned and edited at that time by Alexander T. Hayes. It is probable that Banes & Lewis had charge of the paper when it started its career as a union of the two previously existing papers.

The Urbana Record appears on the hazy newspaper horizon sometime in the early thirties. Hays & Raymond are credited with being its progeni- tors, but they soon turned it over to the tender mercies of James H. Bacon, who guided its uncertain career for a while and then quietly laid it to rest. Bacon was a lawyer and this may account for his connection with it, and · also his desire to let it die.

No fewer than ten papers have been enumerated thus far, and Saxton is authority for the statement that Urbana had no paper at all from 1831 to 1838, his connection with the newspaper history of the country dating from the latter year. However, he is mistaken, since it is certain that the Country Collustrator and Mad River Courant was running in November, 1834. There is also the evidence of John A. Corwin to the effect that he and Decatur Talbott, the latter a practical printer, started a small paper in the thirties bearing the inspiring title of The Rattler. This sheet seemed to be born only to die and it soon rattled out of existence. The absence

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of a regularly printed sheet during this decade ( 1830-1840) led to the estab- lishment of a stinging sheet bearing the name of The Wasp. This was a curious paper started by some of the young men of Urbana and, strange to say, appeared entirely in long-hand. It satirized the follies of the day and appeared to have been especially concerned with setting forth the hirsute adornment of one Samuel Miller, a young fop of the town, who wore his hair in a queue. Miller's capetial appendage came in for some keen sar- casm, so keen, in fact, that he was moved to cut off the "skillet-handle." as The Wasp chose to designate his queue. History does not record when The Wasp closed its career, but tradition is responsible for the statement that when Miller de-queued himself the paper at once suspended.

THE WESTERN CITIZEN AND URBANA GAZETTE.

The early newspapers of United States delighted in long names and Urbana papers of the anti-bellum days bear striking witness to this fact. In the spring of 1838, there came to Urbana a man who was destined to establish the first permanent newspaper in the city. For some time prior to 1838 the city had been without a paper and upon the representation of a number of citizens that he could depend upon a subscription of five hun- dred Joshua Saxton came to Urbana and started the Western Citizen and Urbana Gasette in April, 1838. From the day it was started until Decem- ber, 1879, Saxton continued as editor and either sole owner or part owner of the paper. No other man in this county has ever had such a long con- nection with a local paper and but few men in the state have had a longer connection with one paper.

The Western Citizen and Urbana Gazette has continued publication from the day it was started in 1838 down to the present time and with only a slight change in name. Becoming a Whig paper when that party came into existence, it transferred its allegiance to the Republican party in 1856, and for the past sixty-one years has given its support to that party. Sometime between 1845 and 1849 the heading of the paper was changed to the Urbana Citizen and Gasette. On June 7, 1850, the paper carried a notice to the effect that John D. Burnett, a lawyer of Urbana, had bought an interest in the paper. He remained with it until February 10, 1852, when he sold his interest in the paper to Saxton. William A. Brand, a son-in- law of Saxton, returned from a three-years service in the Civil War in the spring of 1865, and the paper in its issue of July 6, of that year, states that Brand had purchased a half interest in it. Brand sold his interest in the

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paper on February 1, 1879, to Charles T. Jamieson, of Batavia, Ohio, and in the following December Saxton disposed of his interest to Jamieson. The plant cost Jamieson about twelve thousand dollars.

Jamieson was a graduate of the University of Wooster, had been admit- ted to the bar in 1877 and previous to acquiring a half interest in the paper, had been superintendent of the Cincinnati & Eastern Telegraph Company and later paymaster on the Cincinnati & Eastern railroad. With no previous newspaper experience he quickly grasped the details of the profession and soon had the paper in such a prosperous condition that he felt justified in establishing a daily edition. The first issues of the Urbana Daily Citizen made its appearance on Monday evening, March 5, 1883, and has continued regular publication since that time.

FURTHER CHANGES IN OWNERSHIP.

Jamieson sold the paper on September 15, 1888, to Zachary T. Lewis, but the new owner was a financier rather than a newspaper man and his connection with it was of short duration. The connection of Lewis with Urbana is better remembered because of his banking career than his jour- nalistic effort. In another chapter the spectacular career of Lewis is given more extended notice. In this connection it is sufficient to state that he was in the newspaper business in Urbana for about three years. About the time that he came here, or rather in the summer of 1888, Dr. P. R. Bennett had started a newspaper known as the Herald, issuing both a daily and weekly edition. It was evident that the town could not support two dailies and Lewis promptly bought out Bennett and consolidated the two papers. Lewis then proceeded to obtain the services of George A. Talbott, later treasurer of the county and now mayor of the city of Urbana, as manager, and Joseph P. Smith, later state librarian of Ohio, as editor of the paper. Talbott and Smith were excellent newspaper men, Talbott having been connected with the paper for fourteen years previous. Smith came to the county in 1888 from Adams county with the reputation of being a forceful newspaper writer. That he had real ability is evidenced by the fact that he became the trusted friend and adviser of Governor Mckinley. The career of Smith is set forth in the chapter on "Citizens of a Past Generation."

The triangular combination-Lewis, Talbott and Smith-lasted until December 1, 1891. Lewis had been having some financial troubles and was perfectly willing to sell the paper if he could find a buyer. On that date H. R. Snyder bought the plant for sixteen thousand dollars and at

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once formed a partnership with Jonathan Burgess, the latter acting as business manager while Snyder occupied the editor's chair. The firm of Snyder & Burgess was maintained until September, 1893. Meantime things had been happening in the political world.

RIVAL REPUBLICAN PAPER APPEARS.

Politics will lead a man to do strange things; hence the rise of another Republican paper in the spring of 1891 in Urbana, and not only a weekly, but a daily also. Early in 1891 George A. Talbott, H. H. Williams, Mar- tin B. Saxbe and Howard Pennock formed a company and started the publi- cation of the Champion Republican, a weekly, and the Urbana Daily Times. The two Republican papers bid for the patronage of the county and both of them found that the effort to maintain their existence was going to overtax their resources. The Republican and the Daily Times continued to come from the press until the summer of 1892, although the plants of the two Republican papers were consolidated in September, 1892. For about two years and a half thereafter the ownership of the papers is followed only with extreme difficulty. Even the editorial page, where one usually looks to identify the paper with someone or something, leaves the delver into journalistic facts in a state of uncertainty.

A definite date which stands for a definite turning point in the history of the Republican press may be set down as May 24, 1896. On that date there was a consolidation, an amalgamation and a reincorporation of the two plants. The new company, known as the Urbana Publishing Company, was capitalized at forty-two thousand dollars. The incorporators were H. R. Snyder, Jonathan Burgess, George A. Talbott, Howard Pennock and Sherman S. Deaton. When Pennock received an appointment in Washington, D. C., Judge C. B. Heiserman succeeded Pennock on the board of direc- tors. Snyder was the editor, Burgess the business manager, Frank B. Patrick the city editor, and Frank F. Frazier foreman. The new firm held forth on the second floor of the First National Bank building on North Main street.

CONDITIONS THAT SPOKE. FOR THEMSELVES.

The history of the Citizen during the past twenty-one years has not been a flowery bed of roses. Its editors have often been sorely pressed and its owners financially distressed. To the careful observer who stands apart from the passing throng and views the two leading papers of the county,

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there is nothing but wonderment as to why a Democratic paper in a strong Republican county has twice the circulation of the paper representing the political party in power. Other things being equal, the average man will take the paper reflecting his own political views-but it is not so in Cham- paign county. The historian is forced to explain the disparity in the cir- culation of the two papers by assuming that the Democrat paper is the best news and advertising medium.

A newspaper is as whimsical a creature as a woman, and needs to be handled with all the deference used towards the fair sex. Horace Greeley said that a newspaper had to be coddled and petted and apparently the Repub- lican paper of Urbana has lacked this necessary caressing. The owner- ship of the Citizen has been hidden under an elusive "company" title for the past two decades, although for several years the editor of the paper has been nominal director of its political policies.

In order to follow the devious path of the Urbana Citizen it is neces- sary at this point to pick up the story of the Democratic paper of Urbana, and also to bring in the brief careers of other local papers. The historian does not place the blame for the tangled and mangled history of these papers at the door of the newspaper men themselves; the blame lies with the politicians. But it is all a part of local history and let the tale be told. The reader is taken back in years to the middle of the forties for the begin- ning of the first Democratic paper.

THE WESTERN DOMINION.

The first effort to establish a purely Democratic newspaper in Cham- paign county was made during the campaign of 1844, when Judge John Taylor, a disciple of Andrew Jackson, launched a paper bearing the enig- matical title of Western Dominion. A Democratic newspaper in a Repub- lican county (Whig up to 1856) must have considerable virility to maintain itself and during the early history of the Democratic press of the county its editors met with many reverses. Judge Taylor was a better lawyer than a newspaper man and as a result he was soon found devoting most of his time to the profession for which he was originally trained. He either sold the paper, or gave it away, to a man of the name of Reed and the latter in turn transferred it by sale or gift to D. M. Fleming. Since all of these editors have long since disappeared, together with the files of the paper which they published, it is impossible to trace the shifting ownership of the sheet.

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History of Champaign County, Ohio, Its People, Industries and Institutions, Volume I, Part 39

Author: Middleton, Evan P., editor Publication date: 1917 Publisher: Indianapolis, B.F. Bowen Number of Pages: 1196

Author: Middleton, Evan P., editor
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Indianapolis, B.F. Bowen
Number of Pages: 1196