History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio, Part 10

Author: Williams Brothers
Publication date: 1879
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 443

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USA > Ohio > Geauga County > History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio > Part 10

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The amusements of these days have also been described. The young people would gather and find pleasure in " twirling the platter" or " holding the button." In some places there was an interdict against tripping the " light fantastic toe." These scruples were not maintained in every place. Old and young would fre- quently gather, and enter into the dance with a freedom which was not to be restrained. We can imagine the grace displayed by the cow-hide boots of the young gentlemen and calf-skin shoes of the young ladies. But these were in keeping with the puncheon floors and rude furniture of the log dwellings of that day.

Sometimes the young people would go several miles to attend an evening party. They went two on a horse, each young gentleman with a lady behind. If the rain overtook them it did not dampen their ardor; though at times the chintz dresses were soiled by the ride, yet a little soap and water would restore them. At barn- and house-raisings all the people within many miles congregated, and the favorite amusements were wrestling and foot-racing. One practice-that of drink -. ing whisky-was almost universal. Nearly every settler kept on hand a plentiful supply. Yet drunkenness was not common. The crime of habitual intemperance, a crime by means of which a man debases his better nature, failed to fasten itself upon the lives of the mass of the people. Instances of excess there were. Even good people, who loved sobriety, would sometimes become intoxicated when min-

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HISTORY OF GEAUGA AND LAKE COUNTIES, OHIO.

gling with their fellows at raisings and other social gatherings. Local temperance societies were organized at an early day, which served to check the tide of intem- perance.

CHAPTER X. THE PRESS.

THE PRESS OF GEAUGA COUNTY .*

THE press, as the chronicler of passing events and the exponent of current sentiments and opinions, writes its own history, which can be found complete only in its pages, and is as voluminous as the files of its daily and weekly issues. Though every paper, especially every one directed by a single mind, must have a certain individuality, recognized by all who habitually read it, and which cannot fail to make its impress upon the community from which it derives its support, it is in this distinctive impersonal character alone that the press is generally known or its influence permanently felt.

The history of the press of Geauga County, in the restricted sense which ad- mits of its being brought within the scope of this volume, may be more briefly written. A few names, dates, and comments showing what papers have been published, and who have conducted them, with their general character, political or otherwise, and times of establishment and discontinuance (if not still in ex- istence), will suffice. Much that might be appropriate under this head is omitted, because noticed in other articles.

The first paper ever published within the present limits of Geauga County was the Chardon Spectator and Geauga Gazette, established probably early in the summer of 1833, Alfred Phelps, Esq., editor and proprietor. Prior to that time, Chardon, though the county-seat of the then undivided county, had been dependent entirely upon Painesville for newspaper facilities, the Telegraph being the leading, and, for several years, the only paper published in that place. Its venerable founder, Mr. Eber D. Howe, in his " Autobiography and Recollections of a Pioneer Printer," recently published, states that local and personal dissen- sions, in which he had been editorially involved, led to the establishment, at Painesville, in September, 1828, of a rival newspaper, and that he soon discovered, as is often the case, that old and trusted friends were engaged in the plot. When the new paper first appeared, it was printed by two young men brought from Buffalo for the purpose, whose names he does not recall. Respecting this enter- prise and its results, he further says,-

" After spending all the time and money which they [the young men above mentioned] could afford, they disappeared. Several other printers that came along were put aboard the leaky ship, to navigate it as best they could. This paper was called the Geauga Gazette, and put on a very respectable appearance.

"The next year our old friend, William L. Perkins, Esq., who had recently come among us as a lawyer, and then in the prime of life, took charge of the editorial department of the paper for about a year, with what success I know not. He was succeeded by Mr. Henry Sexton, who kept the paper going one or two years longer, when it was sold and taken to Chardon, and printed by Alfred Phelps, Esq., for a year or two longer, and finally disappeared from the county."

The Chardon Spectator and Geauga Gazette was a six-column folio of rather more than medium size. Its editor, Mr. Phelps, was a Whig in politics, of rare intelligence and conservative views, a true gentleman of the old school, whose edi- torials were well written, whose literary taste was apparent in his selections, and whose ideal of a model political newspaper was the old National Intelligencer, of which he was ever a careful and appreciative reader. But he was not, as every country editor should be, a practical printer, and, after publishing the paper nearly two years and a half, " at a constant pecuniary loss, besides the loss of his own services, by no means inconsiderable, however inefficient" (as he modestly suggests in his valedictory, Nov. 27, 1835), he was reluctantly compelled to abandon the enterprisc. The establishment was sold to J. I. Browne, Esq., editor of the Toledo Gazette, by whom it was removed to that city.

After the Spectator, no paper was published in Chardon, until the spring of 1840, when (May 23) appeared the first number of the Geauga Freeman, as the county organ of the Whig party, the late Joseph W. White editor and proprietor. This also was a six-column folio, a little larger than its predecessor. The division of the county occurred the same year, since which event it has never been without . a county paper. The year 1840 will always be remembered for the exciting and otherwise very remarkable and unprecedented campaign, which resulted in the election of General Harrison to the presidency. Of all the Whig counties in the State, Geauga, if not the banner county, was among the strongest and most enthu-

siastic for " Tippecanoe and Tyler too." Editorially, Mr. White, though styling himself a " Democratic-Republican," was accepted as, like Mr. Phelps, a Whig. but in other respects very unlike him, as the kind of paper demanded for the cam- paign of 1840, and which Mr. White provided, was unlike the dignified and con- servative Spectator, which answered five years before. In him was presented that strange anomaly in politics, a Whig with Democratic antecedents and proclivities. His life had been a varied and stormy one, and his character, which had doubtless been greatly influenced thereby, was both strong and angular. Born in Fort Duquesne, Pittsburgh, July 3, 1788, his parents with many others having taken refuge in the fort from the Indians, then very numerous and troublesome to the settlers, his boyhood was spent in that city, where he served an apprenticeship at the printing business; and after marrying Miss Polly Reisinger, near Beaver, Pa., Jan. 4, 1810, he soon started with his young bride and her younger sister and husband, Porter Sawyer, also a printer, in midwinter and an open canoe, down the Ohio river, then filled with floating ice, for Marietta, where they arrived in safety, and, going thence to Zanesville, the two young men established at the latter place the Ohio Patriot, of which Mr. White became leading editor. The Patriot sus- tained the War of 1812, and correlative issues, as it was the boast of its editor that he sustained every war in which his country engaged; while its rival, the Ohio Federalist, supported the other side, the latter being edited by Charles Hammond, in later years connected with the Cincinnati Gazette. It is also related of Mr. White that he was a schoolmate of Lewis Cass, and served with him a portion of the closing year of the War of 1812. He was a man of honest motives, but great eccentricity and hard, puritanic notions, and, as may be supposed, was an ardent and aggressive partisan, who was believed to possess just the qualifications required in a conductor of a political paper in 1840. The last of the several newspaper enterprises in which he had embarked at different times was at Medina, from which place he was induced to remove to Chardon, to supply the want, then beginning to be more seriously felt than ever, of a paper at the county-seat. For many years previous to his death, which occurred near Youngstown, Nov. 17, 1869, in his eighty-second year, he considered himself the oldest resident ex-editor and printer in Ohio. The people of the county rallied to the support of the Free- man, making it a success from the outset; but Mr. White, in business as well as in politics, was erratic, fond of change, and it was probably this disposition more than anything else that induced him to dispose of the paper, which he did after publishing it about two years and a half. During the campaign of 1844, his son, Thomas J. White, published at Chardon a small four-column folio, called the Geauga Polk-Eater ; and he himself having experienced another political change, or, as he explained in his salutatory, discovered his recent mistake and returned to his first political love, started on June 26 of the same year a six- column Democratic folio, called The Young Hickory and Spread-Eagle, but, lacking the requisite support, it was soon discontinued, and is by few remembered.

The Geauga Freeman was purchased in November, 1842, by David T. Bruce, who changed its name to the Geauga Republican and Whig. Mr. Bruce was con- nected with the paper for six years, or until infirmity, and especially failing eye- sight, necessitated his retirement. For a year or more, William P. Lindsey was his editorial associate. In 1846 he took into copartnership his two sons, William W. and Eli Bruce, the firm being styled D. T. Bruce & Sons, still retaining the editorship himself, and, at the expiration of the six years, he resigned the paper into the hands of his sons, who, Dec. 25, 1849, changed the name to Geauga Republic. They continued its publication until Jan. 17, 1854, and immediately thereafter removed with their material to Cleveland ( West Side, or " Ohio City"), and established the daily and weekly Express. This was at first a neutral paper, but subsequently removed to the East Side, and converted into a Know-Nothing or American organ, and died with the party whose cause it espoused. From Nov. 12, 1850, until the Republic was discontinued, William W. Bruce only was named as its editor.

The elder Bruce was a man of great intelligence, positive character, and earnest convictions, always forcibly and fearlessly expressed, and, moreover, an intense and uncompromising Whig; and, as his sons were not wholly unlike him, the paper, during the years of overwhelming Whig ascendency in which it flourished, enjoyed in an eminent degree the confidence and support of the people of the county. But the inevitable logic of events not only annihilated all the old issues that had divided parties, and forced the important and soon overshadowing question of slavery to the forefront of national politics, but determined the destiny of the paper and the Whig party as well. The Whig sentiment of the county was of the anti-slavery type represented by Joshua R. Giddings, and which found prac- tical expression first in the Free-Soil, and finally and more effectually in the tri- umphant Republican party. This sentiment was so strong that when, in 1848, Gen- eral Taylor became the Whig candidate for President, the old Whig majority was transferred to the new Free-Soil party. But the paper, though never pro-slavery, still adhered to the Whig organization, and the result was the establishment, a

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* By J. O. Converse.

HISTORY OF GEAUGA AND LAKE COUNTIES, OHIO.

year or more later, of the Free Democrat as the organ of the Free-Soil party. However men may differ as to the wisdom of the course pursued by the Bruces at this critical juncture in the political history of the country, there can be no doubt that it was adopted honestly, and in accordance with their best judgment, in which many anti-slavery Whigs concurred.

As showing a marked difference between the conduct of our county papers then and now, we will here mention that a notable improvement was made by William W. and Eli Bruce, during the last year of the Republic, in the introduc- tion of a local column devoted to home affairs, " which," as the former writes us, " caused some ridicule at first, but was a step in the right direction."

The first number of the Free Democrat, a six-column folio, was issued in De- cember, 1849. A number of prominent citizens were interested in its establish- ment, but only the names of O. P. Brown and M. C. Canfield appeared as editors. Both were able writers, thoroughly imbued with the spirit of the Free-Soil move- ment which had called the paper into existence, and under their conduct it at once took a leading position in the politics of the county. Their connection with it, however, was brief, for, in August following (1850), it passed into the hands of the late Hon. J. F. Asper, whose first number was issued on the 13th of that month. Mr. Asper, who, in after-years, became better known as lieutenant-colonel of the Seventh O. V. I., and finally as member of Congress from Missouri, to which State he removed near the close of the war, had been editorially connected with the Western Reserve Chronicle, and was regarded as a vigorous writer. For a time he was assisted by Dr. B. W. Richmond and Miss Harriet N. Torrey, as corres- ponding editors. In a political sense, the paper prospered under his management, as it had done under that of his predecessors; but, it proving pecuniarily a poor investment, after conducting it nearly twenty months he disposed of his interest to J. S. Wright, who became its editor and proprietor March 23, 1852. Mr. Wright, being a practical printer of large experience, prudent and industrious, by his own labor and personal attention to the business interests of the paper made it for the first time self-sustaining, and thus laid the foundation of whatever pros- perity it has since enjoyed. In January, 1854, he enlarged it to a seven-column folio, and changed its name to Jeffersonian Democrat. A quiet, unambitious man, his native ability was best appreciated by those who most intimately knew him. His selections, as a rule, were excellent, his editorials well considered, and none of his contemporaries were more sincerely devoted to the anti-slavery cause. The public appreciation of his efforts is evidenced by the fact that, during the nearly seven years of his editorship, he was generally chairman of the Republican Central Committee of the county, and twice elected to the office of county treas- urer. He died Aug. 12, 1859, only a few months after resigning his editorial labors, aged forty-eight years. As our immediate predecessor, early and long-time associate and friend, we shall ever gratefully remember him.

The present editor and proprietor of the Genuga Republican, J. O. Converse, having purchased the Jeffersonian Democrat of Mr. Wright, assumed its management January 1, 1859. January 3, 1866, he changed the name to Geauga Democrat, as being more appropriate and expressive of its local character, and finally, January 3, 1872, to the name it now bears, which indicates alike its locality and its politics. January 7, 1874, it was enlarged to a six-column quarto, which it still remains. It is now issued every Wednesday. How well it has been con- ducted during the unusually. long and eventful period (now nearly two decades) it has been in our hands, we leave for others to judge. We can only say that it has been our aim to make it in some measure representative, as before us it always had been, of the loyalty, intelligence, and morality of the people who have so long and so generously supported it.

The above are all the papers ever published in this county, except the Western Reserve Times, afterwards Chardon Times, a well-printed and very readable eight- column folio, established in August, 1872, by the Times Printing Company (Messrs. H. F. Canfield, E. R. Eggleston, and N. H. Bostwick ), and the Geauga Lender, noticed elsewhere, a five-column quarto, also independent, established at Burton, December 18, 1874, by Mr. J. B. Coffin, and still published by him, being issued every Friday. The Times, at the close of its first year, was sold to W. C. Chambers & Son, of the Painesville Journal, and subsequently discontinued.

Various are the reflections suggested, and many the cherished memories revived, by this hurried and imperfect review. Some of the dates given may be inaccurate, as unfortunately no files of all the earlier papers of the county are preserved. How strange that a matter so important should be thus neglected ! It is even more sad to reflect upon the changes wrought by time and death since the first paper was issued in the county. A host of names once familiar in the columns of the county papers are now unheard and forgotten. Of all our editorial predecessors, only two are still living. Alfred Phelps, Joseph W. White, Thomas J. White, David T. Bruce, Eli Bruce, William P. Lindsey, O. P. Brown, M. C. Canfield, J. F. Asper, B. W. Richmond, J. S. Wright, all have ceased from their labors, some of them many years since. William W. Bruce still lingers, a

helpless invalid, but with intellect undimmed and interest unabated, to tell the story of the past. Miss Harriet N. Torrey, no longer known to the reading public, resides in the State of Illinois. As it is ever thus with the world, its activities and associations, surely we who are actors in the fleeting present cannot realize too fully our responsibility, or duty to improve its golden opportunities to honor and bless our kind.

THE PRESS OF LAKE COUNTY.

The Painesville Telegraph was established July 16, 1822, by Eber D. Howe, and was the first paper published in Painesville, and one of the first on the Re- serve. There were but three papers established in " New Connecticut" prior to the starting of the Telegraph, and these were the Cleveland Register, which be- gan an existence in 1817; the Trump of Fame, published at Warren, started in 1812, and soon merged into the Western Reserve Chronicle ; and the Cleveland Herald, which was established in 1819 by Willes & Howe. The latter dissolved his connection with the Herald in 1821, and in 1822 became the founder of the Telegraph. It began with a subscription-list of one hundred and fifty, and the first number contained five advertisements. It was a four-column sheet, and of a very respectable appearance for that period. Mr. Howe admitted James H. Paine to a partnership in May, 1828. Paine retired the following September. June 16, 1829, Madison Kelley was received as a partner and the Telegraph enlarged. November 9, 1830, Mr. Howe again assumed exclusive charge of the paper, and conducted it without change until January 1, 1835, when the paper was enlarged and otherwise improved, and M. G. Lewis admitted as assistant editor. A few weeks later Mr. Howe retired from the paper, and his brother, Asahel Howe, be- came the publisher, with M. G. Lewis as editor. January 1, 1836, it passed into the hands of Howe & Jaques, with the latter as editor. January 1, 1838, Ed- ward Jaques became editor and proprietor. After Mr. Jaques, Mr. Hanna suc- ceeded to the proprietorship; after Hanna came Winchester ; after Winchester, Charles B. Smythe; after Smythe, H. C. Gray, who assumed the management of the paper in 1845. In 1852, Gray sold an interest to Mr. Doolittle, and in 1854 retired from the paper, Mr. John R. French having purchased Mr. Gray's interest. Doolittle & French were the publishers until January 17, 1855, when Doolittle was succeeded by Batchelor, and the paper was continued under the management of French & Batchelor until January 8, 1857, when Batchelor was succeeded by Skinner. The proprietors were French & Skinner until January 1, 1858, when John R. French became sole proprietor. May 13, 1858, L. S. Abbott purchased the sheet, and was succeeded by Mr. H. C. Gray in 1861. February, 1866, John H. Merrill was admitted as a partner, and the paper was thence published by H. C. Gray & Co. until February, 1867, when Gray sold to Bailey. Bailey & Merrill continued the publication until April, 1870, when Bailey sold to Merrill. John H. Merrill was sole proprietor from April till July of 1870, when J. F. Scofield was received as a partner. Merrill & Scofield were publishers until July, 1877, when Merrill sold to Scofield, and J. F. Scofield has since been and now is the editor and proprietor of the Painesville Telegraph. January 2, 1835, the paper was enlarged from four to six columns; in 1852 it was made a seven-column paper; in 1868 it was enlarged to eight columns; and in 1870 to nine columns. It has a large circulation and a liberal advertising patronage, and ranks confessedly among the leading weekly papers of the Reserve.

Painesville Republican .- The first number of this paper bears date November 21, 1836, and was issued by Horace Steele, Sr., a veteran editor, formerly from Vermont, but more recently from Buffalo, New York. The paper was a six- column four-page weekly, Democratic in sentiment, and was one of the first of its class on the Reserve. At the expiration of the second volume the subscription- list had swelled to eight hundred names. After the expiration of four years, Mr. Steele rented the office to J. F. Scofield for one year. He then sold the office, and the publication of the paper was discontinued.

Grand River Record .- December 11, 1852, this paper, also Democratic in sentiment, made its first appearance. This was a seven-column weekly, J. F. Scofield editor and proprietor. At the expiration of one year the office was dis- posed of to Messrs. A. H. Balsley & Co., of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who re- moved the same to other and, it is presumed, more lucrative fields of labor.

Painesville Advertiser .- The first number of this sheet was issued by M. R. Doolittle in June, 1855. It was a small issue, being but about half its present size, and was published monthly, for advertising purposes. The September fol- lowing it was enlarged to twenty-two by thirty-two inches, and issued weekly. December 1, 1859, a consolidation was effected with the Press, a seven-column weekly, and the Press and Advertiser, under the management of John R. French, at present sergeant-at-arms of the United States Senate, was published for one year, when it was merged into the Telegraph. January 1, 1868, M. R. Doolittle revived the Advertiser, and, with an entirely new outfit, continued its publication until October 1, 1870, when the present proprietor, Mr. E. W. Clark, came into

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HISTORY OF GEAUGA AND LAKE COUNTIES, OHIO.

possession of the paper. Mr. Clark has conducted the paper continuously until the present time, with the exception of the year 1873, when S. C. Durban was in charge. The Advertiser is conducted with ability, and enjoys a liberal and con- stantly-increasing patronage. It is an acknowledged force among the newspapers of this portion of the Reserve.

The Northern Ohio Journal was established in the summer of 1871 by its present proprietors, Messrs. W. C. Chambers & Son, as a paper which should be independent of parties in politics, and " isms" in its religious and social depart- ments. It was among the first papers in the country to advocate what afterwards came to be known as the " Greenback" idea, and in the presidential campaign of 1876 labored for the election of Peter Cooper, the candidate and champion of that principle. In 1872 it also organized and led the independent opposition to the re-election of James A. Garfield, which, two years later, almost succeeded in effecting his defeat at the polls. In 1877, when the Democratic party adopted a platform embodying the principles of financial reform, for which it had so long been battling, the Journal supported the candidates of that party, and since then has been the recognized Democratic organ of that portion of the congressional district embraced in the three counties of Lake, Geauga, and Ashtabula. It is among the largest papers in the State, and has always displayed much enterprise in its local and general news departments. Its editor is a writer of more than average ability, and his editorials evince a warm devotion to the financial theories he has espoused.

THE PRESS OF MADISON .*

The newspaper history of Madison township may be summed up as follows : In the year 1871, Ferdinand Lee started an amateur monthly journal in North Madison, called the Star. This he published for one year, and meeting with satis- factory success, was induced to undertake the publication.of a paper at Madison Village. Accordingly his father, Daniel Lee, and himself issued the Independent Press, the first number bearing date January 3, 1872. As the paper did not meet with the success its proprietors were led to expect, it sought to extend its circula- tion by representing the dairy interest. Accordingly its name was changed to the Dairy Gazette. This change gained considerable patronage; but, as it necessi- tated an expense proportionately much greater, the project was, after the expi- ration of six months, abandoned, the name of the paper changed to the Madison Gazette, and its character changed to that of a local paper. From this time for- ward it was made to pay its way, and was conducted with reasonable success until the early fall of 1876, when the office and fixtures were removed to Jefferson, Ohio, and the Jefferson Gazette established by Messrs. D. Lee & Son. Shortly after this Ralph R. Montgomery, a young man from the west, began the publica- tion of another paper, also named The Madison Gazette. This was conducted for something like eighteen months, when, not receiving a patronage sufficient to warrant its further continuance, suspended, and removed the presses and material to Jamestown, Pennsylvania. Madison does not seem to be a particularly lucra- tive field for the journalist ; the superior excellence of the newspapers published on either side of it renders it extremely difficult for any other paper to get a foothold.

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History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio, Part 10

Author: Williams Brothers Publication date: 1879 Publisher: Number of Pages: 443

Author: Williams Brothers
Publication date: 1879
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 443