History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio, Part 62

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

USA > Ohio > Lake County > History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio > Part 62
USA > Ohio > Geauga County > History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio > Part 62

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

In the fall of 1825, Timothy M. Burt, from Onondaga, New York, a step-son of R. B. Parkman, built a large tannery near the little stream which runs east of the village, and began business in that line, which he carried on extensively for several years. In 1828 he married Lucy Maria, the youngest daughter of Mrs. Parkman, who is still living, and is the only remaining member of her father's family. Mr. Burt died of consumption, after a long illness, in December, 1834. He was a man of active business habits, and irreproachable in all the relations of life. He was a prominent member of the Presbyterian church. As a citizen, he was universally respected, and his early death, in his thirty-second year, made a void in the community not easily filled. Mrs. Burt has always resided in Parkman.

At the time of General Perkins' purchase of land in Parkman, very few set- tlements had been made in what are known as the east, west, and centre Mid- dlefield roads. Since that time the farms lying on these roads have been pur- chased by settlers and improved, and nearly all of them substantial farms ; farm- buildings have been erected. On these farms, as well as throughout the township, with very few exceptions, the land is owned by those living on them. Although there are some clay soils in the level and eastern portions of the town, the average soil is a sandy loam well adapted to fruit-culture and to grain-raising.

As the town became settled the attention of agriculturists was turned to dairying. At first, as was customary, the cheese was made up at home, and sold by the makers with other farm products. As time passed on, Parkman, like many other towns on the Reserve, developed into a dairy township, and now ranks among the first in the county in the amount and value of its cheese and butter products. In 1863, Messrs. Budlong & Stokes, from New York city, erected a large cheese-factory near the eastern part of the village, and began the manufac- ture of cheese in large quantities. The enterprise was from the first successful, and a great majority of farms in the town contributed to the supply of milk. In 1867 this factory was purchased by Orlando C. Smith, who since that time has conducted the business. The milk from nine hundred cows is here received.

A smaller factory east of the centre, which is owned by a joint-stock company, is also in successful operation.

In the manufacture of maple-sugar, both as to quality and quantity, Parkman surpasses every other town in Geauga County, as the county does every other one in the State, and will compare favorably in this respect with any town in the United States. Among those who are successful sugar-makers, Mr. Nathaniel Moore starfds first, as his farm produces more sugar for the number of trees than any other in the town.

In addition to the maple, chestnut, hickory, and other kinds of timber grow in fair proportion. In the southeastern part of the town once grew large quanti- ties of black walnut, but its value was not appreciated in time to save it. The soil is generally productive; very little waste land will remain when properly drained.

On the south side of Grand river, in section twenty-three, near the Dunn farm, was once an Indian burial-place, from which human bones, arrow-heads, pottery, etc., have been extracted.

The height of the township above the sea-level is thirteen hundred and fifty feet. There are parts near its west line two hundred feet higher. The surface rock along this line is the carboniferous conglomerate, and from its quarries is taken fair building-stone. This line is also the water-shed between the Cuyahoga and Grand rivers, and upon it the characteristic chestnut timber preponderates.

The surface rock in most sections of the township is the carboniferous con- glomerate, but in sections eleven, eighteen, twenty, and seventeen, a sand rock without pebbles overlies the black slate or shale of the coal measures, and in sec- tion five (Bundysburgh) and in sixteen (on the Thupe farm) are quarries of the Berea grit.

J. S. Newberry, State geologist, estimates the thickness of the carboniferous conglomerate at one hundred and seventy-five feet; yet it is entirely worn through by the action of the waters of Grund river, in its course below the village, down stream for a distance of three miles.

A natural lake of considerable size once occupied the site of the mill-pond, near the village, which is shown by the stratification of the rocks of the gulf. In sections eighteen, nineteen, and twenty-three, in the valley of the river, the rocks are plowed and striated in a southeasterly direction, an exhibition of the magnitude and force of those immense fields of ice which, in a former period of the earth's history, but after the close of the carboniferous age, brought down from the northern heights all the clay and gravel which overlies our rocks.

Parkman has been in a remarkable manner exempt from sickness ; even in its early settlement the health of the inhabitants appears to have been good. A lot of land containing about two acres, lying just south of the village, was early set apart as a cemetery, and continued to be the only place of interment within the bounds of the township for more than fifty years. The first interment (that of Mrs. Mary Wood) took place in 1817, twelve years from the first settlement. This was the second death of an adult in the town, that of Jacob Gates, the pre- vious year, being the first.

But twice since its first settlement has the town been visited with serious sickness.

In 1825 an epidemic dysentery prevailed, which, in a short time, proved fatal to more than thirty persons, mostly children,-in several instances taking every child in the family.

Again, in 1846, a very wet season having succeeded a very dry one, Parkman suffered in common with other towns in the region from malarial fever. This, although it was so general as to leave few families exempt, proved fatal in but few instances.

A school was established in the town as soon as there were enough children to form one. The first teacher, Joseph Noyes, from Bridgeport, Connecticut, came in 1807, and his school was opened in that year or the next. At what place it was taught cannot now be ascertained. The first school-house was a small log build- ing just east of the village, on land now owned by Orlando C. Smith. It was also used for religious meetings till 1817, at which time the large building in the eastern part of the public square, of which mention has been made, was erected. This was also used both for school and religious worship, and at the time it was built was larger than any building for the same purposes then in Cleveland.

In 1830 the building now in use, the lower part as a town hall, and the upper part for the high school, was first used for school purposes, and this also, for several years before the building of the several churches, supplied the want of them as a place for religious worship.

From 1833 to 1841 an academic school of high grade was sustained. The majority of the teachers were advanced students from Western Reserve College, and one of them was a graduate of Yale. Since the establishment of graded schools, the high school, which is in session the greater part of the year, has taken its place. The district school-houses which dot the country are all neat and taste- ful buildings.

The organization of the several churches and the erection of their houses of worship have already received notice.

Digitized by Google

159

HISTORY OF GEAUGA AND LAKE COUNTIES, OHIO.

The pulpit of the Methodist church has been regularly supplied with preachers appointed by conference. The two organizations, one at the centre and the other at the village, are still maintained, with preaching at both places.

The Presbyterian church in very early times enjoyed the occasional missionary labors of Dr. Cowles, of Austinburgh; of Rev. Nathan Darrow, of Vienna, Trumbull county, and others, and later that of Rev. Ephraim T. Woodruff.

Since the church became Congregational, the pulpit has been occupied by sev- eral clergymen, among them, Rev. Josiah Hopkins, D.D., late of Auburn, New York ; Rev. John Fraser, Rev. William Potter. Since 1872, Rev. E. D. Taylor has been their pastor.

There was for some years a small Episcopal society of some half-dozen families, consisting, among others, of those of Dr. Scott, S. H. Williams, Elijah Ford, Frederick Kirtland, and Augustus Sayles, who maintained the service of that church, but without any distinct organization. They had occasional preaching, and in the absence of a clergyman the service was read by Mr. Kirtland, who was an authorized lay-reader. By death and removal these families no longer remain, and the service, since the death of Mr. Kirtland, in 1854, has not been continued.

The first Sabbath-school was organized in 1821, with twelve scholars; Thomas Wheeler, superintendent. This was broken up, in 1825, by the epidemic dysen- tery and the death of many of the children.

It was reorganized in 1828, in the Presbyterian church, and has since continued. A Sabbath-school is also maintained in each branch of the Methodist church.

Temperance organizations, under various forms, have been maintained since the first rise of the temperance reformation.

STATISTICS FOR 1878.

Whent

242 acres.

3,863 bushels.

Oats ..

530

18,489

Corn ...

492

26,540

Potatoes.

5,635

Orchards ..

288

3,674

Meadow.

1931

2,187 tons.

Butter ..

55,205 pounds.

Cheese.

295,851

Maple-sugar

38,613

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

SAMUEL PARKMAN,

the eldest son of Robert B. Parkman, was born at Aurora, Cayuga county, New York, February 26, 1804. He was an infant three months old when his father first settled in Parkman, and was therefore the first white child ever in the town, -a pioneer of pioneers. He grew up in the forest, and was inured to its labors as well as a partaker of its pleasures. His education had been begun at the schools which were early established in the town, and continued by the diligent and thorough perusal of such books as his father's small but select library afforded, and the instruction of parents who lost no opportunity in filling the minds of their children with useful knowledge. While yet quite young he laid the foundation of a library for himself; and the list of books-Tacitus, Monte- squieu's "Spirit of Laws," Smith's " Wealth of Nations," Junius, Massillon's "Sermons," Goldsmith's and Montgomery's poems-shows a taste for reading rare in the mind of one hardly past boy hood.

Before he was sixteen he had learned surveying with very little instruction,- by evening study at home,-and soon after he accompanied Mr. Otis Sprague, as his assistant, in making the first survey of Medina county ; camping in the woods, and sharing fully in the discomforts of the expedition.

Having attained his majority, and having chosen surveying as a profession, in November, 1825, he left home for the purpose of establishing himself in that business. His first destination was Steubenville, and from thence, in the same month, he made a journey to Washington on foot, in the hope of obtaining a government contract for surveying. Failing in this, he returned to Steubenville, again on foot, having made thus a pedestrian journey of five hundred and forty miles.

He at once proceeded by way of the Ohio river to Shawneetown, and from thence he made another journey of seventy miles, on foot, to St. Louis, where he remained some months.

In August, 1826, he went on a surveying tour three hundred miles up the Missouri river, to Fort Osage, at which place he was prostrated by fever, and was for some weeks dangerously ill, and destitute of even the commonest com- forts of civilized life, and from which he did not recover sufficient strength to travel till the spring of 1827, when he returned to Fayette county, Missouri. Here he remained two years, engaged in farming, and at the same time held the

office of postmaster at Pettisaw Bluffs, on the Missouri river, two hundred and fifty miles above St. Louis.

Having fully regained his health, in the summer of 1829 he joined the fur company of Smith, Subletz, Jackson & Co. in an expedition to the Rocky moun- tains. This company was a competitor in the fur trade with the Hudson Bay Company, and in this expedition they penetrated to the sources of the Lewis and Clarke rivers.

The expedition was pecuniarily a successful one, and the members of it gained an experience full of pleasure and interest, as well as a large share of hardship and exposure to danger. In his letters home describing this journey, Mr. Park- man says, " I have ascended heights never before trodden by the foot of the white man ; I have traveled twelve hundred miles through the Indian country, forded many large rivers, and ascended many high mountains whose tops were covered with perpetual snow. I have during the summer felt the extremes of heat and cold, of hunger and thirst, having been at one time five days without food."

(This occurred as they reached the borders of Missouri on their return, and the long fast was broken by a meal prepared by the wife of a son of Daniel Boone.)

In a letter to one of his brothers, who was himself an expert hunter, he men- tions having killed sixty-five buffaloes, and relates that at one time having gone on in advance of his companions, on ascending a high bluff he was suddenly con- fronted by a herd of many thousands. In such a dilemma retreat was " the better part of valor."

This long journey was performed on horseback, but the return was made on foot, as the horses were all required to bring in the furs which were the rich re- sults of their months of toil.

On this return on the 4th of July, 1830, the party reached a high point well known to all who have crossed the plains, which in honor of the day they named Independence Rock. In the autumn of this year they reached St. Louis, where Mr. Parkman remained during the winter, busied in arranging the notes and pre- paring maps of the route over which they had passed. At the same time he employed his leisure in gaining a knowledge of the Spanish language, having in contemplation a visit to New Mexico, which he accomplished in the spring of 1831, at which time, having formed a partnership with Peter Smith, the leader of the Rocky Mountain expedition, with the intention of carrying on a trade with New Mexico, the journey was commenced.

The caravan consisted of seventy-three men, with twenty-five wagons, and camp equipage. Their route, the old Santa Fe road, led through the Great American Desert, in crossing which they traveled three days without a drop of water, and without seeing any trace of vegetation ; at the same time encountering a wind from the sand-plains of the south, which he describes as being " as parch- ing as a Sirocco." Here the senior partner, Mr. Smith, having left the caravan in search of water, which was to them in their suffering state the most desirable object on earth, was attacked and killed by the Camanches.

After this disaster the whole charge of the expedition fell to Mr. Parkman, and under his guidance they reached Santa Fe on the 4th of July, 1831. Here he remained a year, with the exception of the time consumed in making a jour- ney across the country to Upper California.

In the autumn of 1832 he visited the city of Chihuahua (Mexico) on business, and found himself on his arrival in the midst of a revolution, headed by Santa Anna, which proved both disastrous to his enterprise, and was not without per- sonal danger. By good fortune he escaped, and in 1833 he reached the city of Mexico. Here he made the acquaintance of a party of English gentlemen, who were owners of silver mines, who proffered him the post of superintendent of a silver mine in the city of Guanajuato, which he accepted, and which ultimately led to his appointment as superintendent of the silver mines of the State, which, with the addition of the buying and assaying of silver ore, was his employment for the remainder of his life.

Here his wanderings ceased and his domestic life began. In 1835 he married Antonia de la Vega, a Mexican lady of Spanish descent, who survives him. He never returned to Ohio; his purpose to do so was delayed from year to year till the death of nearly all the members of his father's family would have made the return a sorrowful one.

His only visit to the United States was made in 1862, at which time he made a journey to California, where his step-sister, Mrs. Alonzo Delano, resided. At that time no railroad across the continent annihilated the distance, and he re- turned by the Pacific ocean to Mexico. When he first went to Guanajuato there was in the city but one American except himself, but some years before his death a good number had made it their place of residence, to all of whom he was well known. His intelligence, probity, generosity, and hospitality gave him a high place in their regard, and many a friendless countryman has been placed by him

Digitized by Google

160

HISTORY OF GEAUGA AND LAKE COUNTIES, OHIO.

on the road to independence, while others have been taken to his home in sick- ness, and either nursed back to health or soothed in their last moments by words of friendly sympathy.

In the midst of an active life he still kept the love of literature which his early years foreshadowed ; and although for more than forty years he lived in the midst of a foreign population, and spoke a foreign language, his love for his native land never waned, and his delight in the productions of her authors never decreased.

His decease took place at Guanajuato, May 2, 1873. His memory is revered in his family as that of a tender husband and a careful and loving father. He had a family of twelve children, of whom seven, three sons and four daughters, survive him.

ALONZO HOSMER

was born in Middle Haddon, Middlesex county, Connecticut, February 9, 1778. His father, Zachariah Hosmer, was a soldier in the war of the Revolution. In 1812 he came to Ohio with his uncle, Lewis Smith, and settled in Parkman. Here he began at that early age the life of industry which distinguished him ever after. He lived for some time in the family of Mr. Parkman, and was wont in after-life often to refer to the incidents of that time. He was then "just at the age 'twixt boy and youth," when the excitements of pioneer life, the contests with the wild beasts which abounded in the forests, as well as the social enjoyments peculiar to the time, would make the deepest impression. During a residence in Parkman as boy and man of more than sixty years, he was noted for those qualities which form the staple of American character. With industry, energy, sobriety, perseverance, and self-reliance, he laid the foundation of a prosperous life, and built upon it a stable superstructure.

As an illustration of some of these characteristics we may cite the fact that when about eighteen years of age he built a bridge across a small stream west of the village with no instrument but his axe, which he used in felling the trees and cutting them into logs of the right length, which he carried on his back and adjusted to their place, and by this means earned the materials for a new coat.

Before he became of age, in the winter of 1819, he, with a brother, contracted to clear a piece of land, and while doing it they occupied a room in a log house, living mainly on johnny-cake, which they baked in the evening after their day's work was finished, and sleeping at night on the bare floor of their room, keeping themselves warm by a fire in the large fireplace.

Soon after this he purchased a farm in the northeast part of the town, on the Mesopotamia road, built a log house, and began in earnest the work of bringing it under cultivation. In 1822 he was married, at Stafford, Genesee county, New York, to Miss Asenath Biddlecomb, daughter of Daniel Biddlecomb. She was a woman every way fitted to be the wife of a pioneer, and one who fully sustained her portion of the labor, as well as shared the pleasures of those early times, and of the years that followed till her death, in 1863. She was surely entitled to the commendation of Napoleon, as she was the mother of twelve children, all but one of whom survived her and lived to adult age, and who hold her memory in tender reverence.

Mr. Hosmer may be called the representative farmer of Parkman; and as he honored his calling, so his calling honored him, and his original acres were in- creased from time to time, till at his death they numbered more than three hun- dred and fifty lying nearly in a solid body.

His increasing family in a few years made the log house too small for occu- pation, and it was replaced by a commodious frame one more suitable to their wants.

Mr. Hosmer was the first farmer in Parkman who kept a sufficient number of cows to render cheese-making an important part of farm-products, and his success gave the first impetus to a business which has now become the rule rather than the exception.

He was universally respected as a citizen, and his death, which took place December 28, 1876, broke one of the few remaining links which join the present with the past. At the time of his death but three persons remained who were inhabitants of the town when he first entered it in 1812.

He had been for many years a member of the Masonic fraternity, and was buried with the ceremonies of the order on the last day of the Centennial year.

In 1870 he married Mrs. Elizabeth Cooper, who survives him. His children have settled in several of the western States, except two sons, John P. and Charles, who remain in Parkman and follow their father's useful and honorable occupa- tion. His youngest son, Charles H. Hosmer, owns the homestead, which will doubtless remain in the family for another generation. Two other sons-Alonzo, who was a member of the Forty-first Regiment, and was wounded at Shiloh, Chickamauga, and New Hope Church, and Sylvester Perry in the navy-rendered faithful service to the country in the war of the Rebellion.

In politics Mr. Hosmer was a Republican ; in his religious opinions he was a Universalist.

SHERBURN H. WILLIAMS,

was born at Salem, Connecticut, May 16, 1794, married to Harriet Delano at Aurora, New York, December 28, 1820, and died at Parkman, Geauga County, November 23, 1835, aged forty-one years. Any sketch of Parkman that should fail to make more than a passing notice of this gentleman would be defective. The hand which performs that task has undoubtedly performed it faithfully and well, and this may be superfluous.

Leaving his Connecticut home, where his opportunities were limited, he went early to Aurora, New York, where he made the acquaintance of his wife. Im- mediately on their marriage they left for Parkman, where they made their only home, and where he engaged at once as a merchant, which he pursued with skill, diligence, and success to the day of his early death.

Though of slight education, he was a man of great personal advantages, supe- rior mental faculties, and much general intelligence. In person, manners, and address he is remembered as unequaled by those familiar with the courtly man- ners of the old school whose style was not his. He was the gentleman born, and remained such all his life, alike 'by habit and instinct. His polish was not the daintiness of effeminacy ; his mind was vigorous, his will strong, his opinions pronounced, his habit active, and his life industrious. With his address and ability, his success in business, he made himself widely known, and was a man of deserved influence. Vigilant in business, punctual to all his engagements, he was careful of his own interests, and incurred the usual penalty of success in trade, -that of being charged in the vulgar mind with strictness and exaction against others. ' In his dealings he was inflexibly just; in his neighborhood and to the needy liberal and kind. Among his friends and associates known and loved for his frankness, warmth, and manliness of character.

For the most of his business life he was a partner with his elder brother, who came to Parkman later, and who was the busy out-door manager of their exten- sive and successful enterprises. The affection which always subsisted between these two remarkable men was touching and well known. The firm was known as that of R. & S. H. Williams ; its transactions extensive, the younger being the centre and soul of the house. Though unambitious of place, he accepted the com- mand of a regiment of militia, and was known as Colonel Williams. This was at a time when such positions were not without honor.

His death was sudden, to his own circle irreparable, to his township and section a great loss, and widely regretted. His wife, Harriet, was a rare, lovable, supe- rior, almost a remarkable, woman. Her mental endowments were much above the average; her acquisitions, especially from reading, were really extensive. In refinement, breeding, and lady-like deportment, she was without a superior. In address and powers of pleasing, she was rarely equaled. Few of her sex were ever more liberally endowed with the excellences which go to form the ideal woman than this rarely-gifted lady. One who came to know her well could easily imagine the sway which some of the well-endowed French women may have ex- ercised in their circles. In her home, the gentle loving idol, and greatest there; in society, the sought and loved, elegant, gentle, refined, never dreaming of ruling where her wish was law. Rich in good deeds of charity and benevolence, and yet withal full of strength, nobleness, and capable of acts of heroic devotion and self-sacrifice, she ruled by serving.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio, Part 62

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

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