History of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Part 57

Author: Johnson, Crisfield
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.B. Lippincott & Co.
Number of Pages: 716

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It was at this time, too-that is, about the last of September, 1796-that the location in question re- ceived the name which, with the exception of a single letter, it has ever since borne. Previously it had been spoken of in the minutes of the surveyors as " Cuyahoga," or sometimes as the mouth of the Cuyahoga.

The first mention of the name on record, so far as is known, is in the agreement drawn up by the em- ployes of the company in regard to the settlement of Euclid, mentioned in the general history of the county. That agreement declares itself to have been entered into at a meeting " held at the city of Cleve- land on the 30th day of September, 1296." The name was occasionally spelled without the letter a, even in the old records, but this was through inadvertence. General Moses Cleaveland, who had bestowed his own name on the "city " he had founded, always spelled it with an a, and this example was followed in all written and printed records (except by occasional accident) for fifty years from the time in question.

The "eity " at that time contained two log houses: one had been built the previous spring as the head- quarters of the party which was surveying the Re- serve, and was also occupied as the residence of Job P. Stiles and Tabitha Stiles, his wife, who " kept house" for those of the party who were from time to time at. headquarters.

It was sometimes called " Pease's hotel," from Seth Pease, who was Mr. Porter's principal assistant, and was situated on the low ground under the hill, between Main street and the river. The other, near the june- tion of Main street and the river, was the storehouse of the surveyors, and had also been built by them during the same season. There was also on the ter- ritory now belonging to the city on the west side of the river. a dilapidated, unoccupied log house, which was supposed to have been erected ten years before by the agents of the Northwestern Fur Company, in which to receive provisions brought from Pittsburg, as narrated in the general history.

The map before mentioned, made by Mr. Spafford. is dated October 1, 1796. The area which had been surveyed for the proposed city and was delineated on the map was hounded north by the lake, west by the river, south by a line a little south of Ohio street, and cast by a line a quarter of a mile cast of Erie street, crossing the present Euclid avenue at the junction of Huron street.

The map shows the " Public Square, " now Monu- mental Square, containing ten acres, with Superior street running through it parallel with the lake shore. It had first been named " Broad " street, and that

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224

THE CITY OF CLEVELAND.

name had been written on the map, but had been stricken out and Superior substituted. Parallel with Superior street, Lake street occupied its present course, but extended only from Water street to Erie. Huron street ran as now from the river to a point a quarter of a mile east of Erie, where the city then ended. Ohio street ran from Erie westward only to Miami street, which then extended thus far south. Another street was delineated on the map under the name of Federal street. It ran from Erie eastward to the east- ern limits of the city plat; occupying the ground now embraced in that part of St. Clair street, but extending no farther west than Erie. Bath street ran from Water street westward along the margin of the lake to the mouth of the river, being some twelve rods wide at the eastern end, but gradually narrowing to five or six rods at the western extremity.

These six streets (Bath, Lake, Federal, Superior, IIuron and Ohio) were all that were at first surveyed to run parallel with the lake shore, and generally called "east and west streets."

The "north and south" streets, or more accurately those at right angles with the lake, first surveyed, were Water, Ontario, Miami and Erie. The first still re- tains the same course and extent then given it, run- ning from the foot of Superior street northward to the lake. Ontario ran from the lake sonthward through the Publie Square to Huron street, occupy- ing the same ground as now, except the extension from HInron street to Central Market. Miami street began at Huron, followed its present brief course southward, and also extended on the same line to Ohio street. And finally Erie street, which was the longest in the city, ran from the lake south ward over its pres- ent course to the line of the surveyed tract, which, as before stated, was a little south of Ohio street.

Besides these there were three streets, as they are termed on the map, but usually called lanes in the old records, designed to lead from the low ground along the river to the bluffs above. One running from the junction of Superior and Water streets north westward to what was called the " Lower Landing," was named Union street, or lane, and corresponded to the present southern part of Spring street, Mandrake street then as now extended from Water street south westerly down the hill to the landing, while Vineyard street ran from the junction of Water and Superior street south westerly to the " Upper Landing," it being now called South Water street. Still another lane, called Maiden lane, was surveyed from the middle of Vine- yard street in an easterly course up the hill and thenee to Ontario street, which it reached at a point about half way between the square and Iluron street, but this was soon entirely abandoned.

It is not certain exactly when the names of Broad and Court were changed respectively to Superior and Ontario, but it would appear as if it was done by Gen- eral Cleaveland's orders before the map left Spafford's hands, as the chirography of the new names is seem- ingly the same as the rest of the writing on the map.

The same map showed a complete division of the eity into lots, though it was not certain that they were all surveyed and marked that autumn. They were numbered from one to two hundred and twenty; the first extending from Lake street to the lake shore on the east side of Water street, and the last running from Miami street, nearly opposite the junction of Ohio, back to the Cuyahoga river. The greater por- tion of the lots were eight rods by forty, containing two acres, but many were larger than that and some were smaller. Number two hundred and twenty, just mentioned, was over a hundred and twenty rods long, while numbers one hundred and twenty-five to one hundred and thirty-three inclusive, lying south of Ohio street, were only about ten rods long. There were, however, only a few lots having less than two aeres each, and it is perhaps largely due to this liberal plan, devised by the projectors of Cleveland, that the city is to this day probably the "roomiest " one of its size in the United States.

While some of the surveyors were laying ont the city proper, others were dividing the suburbs into out-lots. From Erie street east and from Ohio street south the nearest land was divided into lots of ten or twenty acres each, while the remainder of the survey- township of Cleveland, comprising what was subse- quently known as the civil townships of Cleveland and Newburg, was divided into lots of a hundred acres each. The tracts just mentioned (that is, the city lots, the ten and twenty aere lots and the hundred acre lots) together occupied all that part of the pres- ent city east of the Cuyahoga, all of the present town- ship of Newburg and the eastern part of the present township of East Cleveland.

No eivil township had yet been organized in this part of the county in the fall of 1796. The territory of the future city east of the river was nominally comprised in the county of Washington in the North- west Territory, but no aetnal jurisdiction was exer- eised here by the Territorial authorities, and it was not yet quite certain whether the Connectieut Land Company was not vested with all the powers of gov- ernment as well as the title to the land. The land on the west side of the Cuyahoga was nominally in the county of Wayne in the Northwest Territory, but though the pre-emption right to it had been purchased by the Land Company, the right of occupancy had not been bought from the Indians, who were in undis- turbed possession of all that portion of the Reserve.

The surface of the embryo metropolis was moder- ately level on both sides of the river, except that on each side a steep bluff, from fifty to eighty feet high, separated the low flats of the Cuyahoga from the ta- ble-land above. Near the present eastern bonnds of the present city the ground rose into a high ridge which extended nearly north and south a distance of about four miles. From this ridge the stream now called Kingsbury run flowed westward into the Cuy- ahoga through a narrow hollow, bounded by bluffs almost as lofty as those which enclose the river flats.

227

THE FIRST FOUR YEARS.

The larger stream which soon received the name of Mill creek ran in rapid cascades, between rocky and precipitous banks, through the extreme southeastern part of the present city, long known as Newburg, and then, curving southward, emptied into the river in the present township of Independence. Another · brook, ere long known as Doan's creek, from one of the earliest of the pioneers, having begun its course in Warrensville, ran southwestward through the ex- treme eastern part of the present city to the lake, but was not distinguished by the very high banks which marked the other streams.

The soil of the whole tract was a sandy loam, some- times almost pure sand, with occasional sections of clay or gravel. Out of this arose a heavy growth of chestnuts, oaks, elms, maples and becches. their mighty trunks standing far apart, but their wide- spreading boughs shading all the earth with a dense mass of foliage.

The Cuyahoga river emptied into the lake a short distance west of its present month, and still farther west was to be seen the location of a still earlier bed, which was then a stagnant pond. Across the month of the river ran a bar of sand which in spring and fall was torn open by the current of the rushing river, but which in summer came so near the surface that even the light schooners, two or three in num- ber, which then navigated Lake Erie, could not cross it. Once inside, there was a commodious harbor, with room and depth for vessels of the first class.

Such was the locality selected by General Moses Cleaveland, acting in behalf of the Connectiont Land Company, for the principal city of the Western Re- serve. The survey township in which it was situated had been selected as one of six, which were to be sold for the benefit of the company at large, and not to be divided among the stockholders, as was almost all the rest of the Reserve. It had accordingly been divided as before stated, the part nearest the city into the ten and twenty acre lots, and the remainder into hundred acre lots. It was proposed to sell at first only a fourth of the townships, and Augustus Porter, the principal surveyor of the company, submitted a propo- sition as to the manner of making such sale.

In the first place city lots number fifty-eight to sixty-three inclusive, and eighty-one to eighty-seven inclusive, comprising all the lots bordering on the publie square, and one more, were to be reserved for public purposes, as were also " the point of land west of the town" (which we take to be the low peninsula southwest of the viaduct), and some other portions of the flats if thought advisable. Then Mr. Porter pro- posed to begin with lot number one, and offer for sale every fourth number in succession throughout the towns, on these terms.

Each person who would engage to become an actual settler in 1292. might purchase one town lot, one ten or twenty-aere lot, and one hundred-acre lot, or as much less as he might choose; settlement, however, to be imperative in every case. The price of town

lots was to be fifty dollars: that of the ten-acre lots three dollars per aere; that of the twenty-acre lots two dollars per acre, and that of the hundred-acre lots a dollar and a half per acre. The town lots were to be paid for in ready cash: for the larger tracts twenty per cent. was to be paid down, and the rest in three annual instalments, with aunnal interest.

It will be seen that even at that time the projecfors of Cleveland had a pretty good opinion of its future; valuing the almost unbroken forest which constituted the city at twenty-five dollars per acre in cash, while equally good land outside its limits was to be sold for from three dollars down to a dollar and a half per acre, with three years' credit.

This program, which was dated on the 28th of Sep- tember, 1796, seems to have been immediately con- tirmed, at least temporarily, by Gen. Cleaveland; for on the map before mentioned, dated September 30th, the names of six purchasers are written on the lots they had chosen, only every fourth lot being selected, and those around the square being left untaken, Stiles took or proposed to take 53, Baun 65, Shepard 69, Chapman 22, and Landon 16: all being on Superior street, and all except the last on the north side. ex- tending all the way from Water street to Erie street. Messrs. Shepard and Chapman must certainly have had a good deal of faith in Cleveland, if they gave twenty-five dollars an acre for land in the dense forest, over half a mile from the two log houses which then constituted the city.

By the eighteenth of October all the surveyors and their assistants left Cleveland for their homes in the East. They left Mr. and Mrs. Stiles and Mr. Joseph Landon in possession of the city. The two former, as has been said, had previously been merely employees of the land company, but had now deter- mined to become actual settlers. A cabin was built for them by the surveyors before they left, situated on the top of the hill, at the west end of Superior street.

Mr. Landon had also been in the service of the company. Ile, however, remained but a few weeks, and went east before winter set in. Mr. Edward Paine, afterwards known as Gen. Paine, the founder of Painesville, Lake county, then took board with Mr. Stiles, and began trading in a small way with the In- dians (Chippewas, Ottawas, ete.), who eamped at various points on the west side of the Cuyahoga dur- ing the winter, and hunted and trapped on both sides. So far as known, Mr. Paine was the first trader m Cleveland, though it is quite probable that some Frenchman may have erected a rude cabin there long before, where beads, powder and whisky were ex- changed with the Indian for bear-skins and beaver- fur.

These three remained throughout the winter, alone save when some copper-colored warrior brought his store of furs to Mr. Paine, or when his tawny squaws, with their bright-eyed pappooses on their backs, came to gaze with longing eyes on the sparkling beads and brilliant calicoes of the young trader.

226

THE CITY OF CLEVELAND.

Meanwhile, after the surveyors returned home, Mr. Seth Pease made another map of the city, substan- tially the same as the one before described. The terms of sale proposed by Mr. Porter were in substance confirmed by the company. The directors and stock- holders also donated to Mrs. Stiles one city lot, one ten-acre lot and one one hundred-acre lot in the city and township of Cleveland, doubtless because she was the first woman who became a resident there. At the same time they gave a one-hundred-acre lot in the same township to Mrs. Anna, wife of Elijah Gun. Mr. and Mrs. Gun had had charge of the company's stores at Conneaut during the preceding summer, but intended to move to Cleveland. Another gift of a hundred-acre Jot was made to James Kingsbury and wife, the first emigrants to the Western Reserve en- tirely unconnected with the company, who had first located at Conneaut, but also proposed to make Cleve- land their home. Finally the directors and stock- holders gave a city lot to Nathaniel Doan, who had acted as blacksmith for the company, shoeing the pack-horses of the surveyors the preceding summer, on condition that he should reside and keep up a blacksmith shop upon it.

In the spring of 1792, Mr. Paine left Cleveland, and soon after made a permanent location at Paines- ville. In the month of May, Mr. and Mrs. Gun came from Conneaut, being the second family resident in Cleveland. It was not until the first day of June, that the advance guard of the surveying party for 1797 reached Cleveland. They were in charge of Mr. Pease, who had been employed as the principal sur- veyor for that year. On the third of June the re- mainder of the party arrived, with Rev. Seth Hart, the superintendent. One of the men, David Eldridge, was drowned in crossing Grand river, and the body brought to Cleveland. On the morning of the fourth the north parts of lots ninety-seven and ninety-eight was selected as a burial ground, a rude coffin was made and the first funeral in Cleveland was attended by the comrades of the deceased, while Mr. Hart read the appropriate service according to the rites of the Episcopal church. The location of this original ceme- tery was on the east side of Ontario street, its north line being just north of Prospect street.

The lately lonesome wilderness now presented a busy scene. Knowing by experience the tediousness of living on meat and bread throughout the season, nearly all the men set to work and cleared a piece of land for a garden, on the top of the bank, near the west end of Superior street, fenced it, and planted it with various kinds of vegetables. Then there was a rapid outfitting of parties, under the several survey- ors, who went forth to run the lines of townships in various parts of the Reserve. Superintendent Hart, with Dr. Shepard and a few others, kept headquarters at Cleveland.

Soon after the arrival of the surveyors (or according to one account, a little before that event), Mr. Lorenzo Carter, well known to all the early settlers as Major

Carter, made his home in Cleveland with his family. He came from Rutland, Vermont, but had stayed during the previous winter in Canada. One of his sons was Alonzo Carter, then seven years old, who died but a few years since. Mr. Carter was an ex- pert hunter and an energetic pioneer, with plenty of assurance, and over the Indians he soon gained an influence unequaled by any other white man in the vicinity. Ile built a log cabin on the flat, a few rods from the river, and near Union, now Spring street.

About the same time came Mr. Carter's brother-in- law, Ezekiel Hawley, who also located in Cleveland with his family. His daughter Fanny, then five years old, now Mrs. Theodore Miles, of the eighteenth ward, is the oldest surviving resident of Cleveland.

The next family was that of James Kingsbury, who had resided at Conneaut during the winter, but who removed to Cleveland in June. They at first occu- pied the dilapidated log house west of the river, which had formerly been occupied by agents of the North- western Fur Company as a store-house. Mr. Kings- bury, however, soon erected a cabin where the Case block now stands, into which he moved his family.

It did not take long to build a house in those days. A number of logs, sixteen or eighteen feet long, were ent in the forest. These were drawn together by a yoke of oxen, large notches were made near the ends, so that they would match together. The neighbors (in this case probably the surveyors) were invited to the raising; the logs were speedily placed on each other; a roof of split " shakes " was placed on the top; a chimney of crossed sticks and mud was speedily built; a hole was cut for a door (the place of which was perhaps supplied by a blanket), and the mansion was considered complete. Some of the more aristo- cratic citizens might have a window with four lights of glass, and a "puncheon " or split-log floor; but these were luxuries of pioneer life.

The first wedding in Cleveland, which was also the first m Cuyahoga county, has already been mentioned in the general history, but so pleasantly momentous an event will bear brief repetition. The parties were Miss Chloe Inches, Mrs. Carter's hired girl, and Mr. William Clements, who had followed his love from Canada, and who bore her back to His Majesty's do- minions after the ceremony, which took place in the month of July.

Meanwhile the surveys were steadily progressing, notwithstanding sickness among the surveyors, which was much greater than the year before. On the 20th of August Surveyor Warren began to survey three highways into the country, and also to mark the lines of the ten acre lots before mentioned. First he began at the east end of Huron street on the east boundary of the city plat, and ran thence "north eighty-two degrees east" (very near due east) to the west side of the hundred acre lots, setting a post every ten chains or forty rods. This showed the north bounds of a road, and the posts also designated the corners of the ten acre lots which were intended to be forty rods

227

THE FIRST FOUR YEARS.

square. Measuring off a road six rods wide, Mr. War- ren ran back along its south side, setting posts oppo- site the others.

This, it will be understood, was to be a road, not a street, being entirely outside the "eity" limits. At the time of survey it was designated as "Central high- way." But as it soon became the main means of com- munication with the settlements in Euclid it received the name of Enelid road; then it was extended to the Publie Square, as will be mentioned at the proper time, and became Enclid street, and at length, bor- dered with palatial residences. it has assumed the more sonorous title of Euclid avenue.

The next day Mr. Warren began at the south end of Erie street, on the south boundary of the city, and ran south, seventy-four degrees east, one hundred and thirty-one chains (a little over a mile and a half) to the west boundary of the hundred-acre lots; running back on a line due cast, and marking the lot-corners on both sides as before. This road was then called the South highway. Later it was continued, bearing to the right, to the town of Kinsman, on the eastern border of the Reserve, and was then known as Kins- man street; still later that portion of the original "South highway," this side of Willson avenue, has been extended in a straight line nearly to the city limits, and has received the appellation of Woodland avenue.

Finally Mr. Warren went to the end of Federal (now a part of St. Clair) street, and ran thenee north fifty-eight degrees cast to the hundred acre lots, making the road six rods wide, and marking the cor- ners as before. This was to be the North highway, but has long been known as St. Clair street. Lines were then run midway between those roads to mark the back end of the lots. Though called ten-acre lots, there was really no uniformity. The frontage of the lots were all the same, twenty rods, but their depth increased as the roads diverged, so that those adjoining the city were less than ten acres, and the farthest ones were more. It was understood that this would make the value of these out-lots about equal.

We have spoken in the general history of the county, of the prevalence of fever and ague and bilious fever among the surveyors throughout the Re- serve in 1797. These diseases were equally common among the citizens. Nearly every person in the little settlement was stricken down. Mr. Kingsbury de- termined to find a more healthy location for his family. Following the South highway to the end, and thence continuing about two miles farther in nearly the same direction, he reached the ridge before men- tioned as running along the present border of the eity. Finding there good soil and an apparently healthy location, he purchased a large tract of land, erected the inevitable log house-litted up, however, with more than usnal comfort-and by the middle of December was established in his new home. He was the first settler on the ridge.

His first grist-mill was a white oak stump-as was

common with the pioneers throughout the Reserve- hollowed out by fire on top so as to hold a goodly allowance of corn, which was then pounded with a heavy oaken mortar, suspended by a spring-pole or sweep above this simple "mill." The stump was preserved by Mr. Kingsbury and his children until about twenty years ago, when, already rotted to a mere shell, it completely succumbed to the power of decay.

In the autumn of 1:97 the surveyors completed their work so that the land could be divided among the stockholders of the company, and returned home. In January, 1798, the partition was accordingly made. Six survey-townships, of which Cleveland, then in- eluding Newburg, was one, were reserved for direct sale by the company.

Meanwhile Cleveland, with the rest of the Reserve cast of the Cuyahoga, had in 1197 become nominally a part of Jefferson county, but no civil authorities were appointed for this almost unknown corner, The tract west of the river remained a portion of Wayne county, with the Indians still in actual possession.

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History of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Part 57

Author: Johnson, Crisfield Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Philadelphia : J.B. Lippincott & Co. Number of Pages: 716

Author: Johnson, Crisfield
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.B. Lippincott & Co.
Number of Pages: 716