USA > Ohio > Henry County > History of Henry and Fulton counties, Ohio : with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 53
USA > Ohio > Fulton County > History of Henry and Fulton counties, Ohio : with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 53
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FULTON COUNTY.
and Benjamin Montgomery took the office and issued regularly, till sold to Henry McElheney, in 1857. In 1855 Hosea Day brought in a competitive press, and issued the Ottokee Observer, superintended by Harry Bayes, and who issued the same to about 1857, when it was sold to S. A. Scofield and taken to Morenci, Mich. In 1857, Henry McElheney, a young lawyer, got> possession of, and run for a few months only, at Ottokee, a Democrat paper called Fulton County Democrat. In the summer of 1863 Harry B. Bayes brought from Bryan, O., a press and established The Monitor, as a competitive paper against the Northwestern Republican, then in the hands of Joseph Cable, at Wauseon, and issued his weekly editions for about eight months, when he sold out to Wauseon parties. Several residents of Ottokee learned the printer's trade at that place, to-wit : Charles B. Carter, Julius D. Carter, Miss Maggie Carter, now the wife of Judge Fallis, of Cadillac, Mich .; James K. Newcomer and John S. Young, now in the Republican office, at Wauseon.
Mills .- The only saw-mill in this township was built about one mile west of Spring Hill, in the year 1853, by Burdick Burtch, and was run by him for a few years, and then sold to Daniel Kahle, and now owned and run by his son, James Kahle. He has added to it a cane-crusher and evaporator, operated by steam. It is the best in the township and gives encouragement to a profit- able branch of agricultural industry-cane growing. About 1857 or '8, a grist- mill was put up at Spring Hill, and did a good business until it was burned down, in 1860. It was rebuilt, but afterwards moved away.
School Sub-divisions .- Soon after the organization of this township, in 1843, it was divided into two school districts, one at Spring Hill and the other at Ottokee. Soon after was organized district number two, called the Waid district, and next in order was district number three, in the northwestern part ; and still later district number five, where all elections are now held. The last district, number six, in the northeast part of the township, was organized about 1864. Since the Spring Hill district, number four, by an act of the Legisla- ture of Ohio, in 1876, was set apart as a special school district, a fine brick school house has been built, suitable for all present needs.
Township Elections. - The first was held at the house of Mortimer D. Hib- bard, August 7, 1843, by order of the commissioners of (then) Lucas county. The officers chosen were Moses Ayers, Alonzo H. Butler and Willard Church, trustees; Joseph Jewell, clerk; William Jewell, treasurer; Elijah Bennett and John G. Tiffany, constables ; overseers of the poor, Elijah Bennett and Newell Newton. On April 1, 1844, the assessor found forty-one persons liable to do military duty. The township levy that year was one mill; road, one mill, which brought into the treasury $43.35 for road purposes. The fees of the township offices that year, 1844, was $2.25 each for trustees; clerk, $4; treasurer, $2; supervisors had no charge.
The first male teacher who taught in Dover had his scholars spell United
60
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HISTORY OF HENRY AND FULTON COUNTIES.
States commencing with You. Dover was soon after fortunate in securing a better grade of teachers. A. J. Canfield, Rev. J. R. Hibbard, Mortimer D. Hib- bard, Michael Handy, and Miss Amelia Hibbard (now Mrs. Darwin Butler) and many others taught as good common schools as was generally found at that day. Wages for males, from $10 to $13 per month and board around, and for females,$6 to $8 and board around This was paid by rate bills.
An item in the early history of the pioneers of Dover worthy of mention is, that they always refused the use of whisky at their raisings. Western Dover claims they have never been cursed with a saloon in that locality yet ; an effort was made some years ago to establish one by Abel Hall, who came into Spring Hill with some molasses, tea, coffee and tobacco, but foremost of all a full bar- rel of whisky. Some women of the town, not being able to locate the whisky as well as they should have done, got an auger and bored through the side of the building and into the molasses barrel, which by morning had emptied itself on the ground, the women supposing all the time that they had struck the whisky barrel. The next day, however, the proprietor had to "pull up stakes" and leave to save the balance of his stock. No effort has since been made to open another saloon at Spring Hill.
Public Buildings .- In 1851 the county seat of Fulton county was located in this township, and buildings erected, viz., the court-house and jail. This ·continued to be the seat of justice until the beginning of the year 1872, when .all business was removed to Wauseon, Ottokee having been the county seat about twenty-one years. In March, 1874, the commissioners of this county agreed to transform the old county buildings into an infirmary, and for that purpose, bought additional lands, built a large farm barn and changed and fit- ted the old court-house into quarters for the care of the poor, and about the first of May, 1874, had all things ready for the admission of inmates. The farm and buildings were placed under the superintendency of Oliver B. Verity and his wife. They commenced May 2, 1874, to receive inmates, and in a few weeks the poor and infirm of the townships of the county were all transferred to the " Fulton County Infirmary."
Officers for County .- This township has furnished a goodly number of offi- cers for the county. Mortimer D. Hibbard was from here, the first auditor, and held that office nearly three years ; Jason R. Hibbard, eight years, or four terms; O. A. Cobb, sheriff, four years; Jacob C. Hoffmire, sheriff four years; L. L. Carpenter, treasurer, four years; David Ayers, four years; Joseph Jewell, recorder (died in office); Richard Taylor, four years recorder ; Allen Carmi- chael, prosecuting attorney ; John J. Schnall, surveyor twenty-one years ; Jo- seph Shadle, six years as commissioner ; representative to the Legislature, Amos Hill. She has furnished four infirmary directors: First O. A. Cobb, seven years; Stephen Eldredge, three years; E. H. Patterson, six years, and Lucien H. Guilford, present incumbent. The first superintendent and matron of the infirmary, O. B. Verity and his wife, held their offices for a period of six years.
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FULTON COUNTY.
Post-Offices .- John J. Schnall was the first postmaster when the office was named "Tedrow." In the eastern part Henry Herriman was the first postmas- ter, and the office was named "Essex," and afterwards changed to " Ottokee." "Emery" post-office was established at a very early date with Lucius N. Chat- field postmaster. These three exist at this date. Ilosea Day was the first post- master at Ottokee. This township has an area of thirteen thousand one hun- dred and nineteen acres of land, or about twenty-one sections of land. In 1880 its population was ten hundred and fifty-five all told. The valuation in 1887 of real and personal estates was $242,950, upon which all taxation is based.
CHAPTER XLVI.
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN TOWNSHIP.
P OLITICAL DIVISIONS. - The township of Franklin is quite important from the peculiar construction of its territory being in two surveys; the State of Ohio, and the Territory of Michigan ; also three very important treaty divisions between the Indians and the government of the United States : The first with General Hull, November, 1807, at the city of Detroit, conveying all lands east of a line run due north from the mouth of the Au Glaize one hundred and thirty-two miles; the second treaty at the foot of the Rapids in the Maumee, September, 1817, between the United States, Lewis Cass and Duncan McArthur representing the government, and the Wyandotts, Senecas, Delawares, Shawanese, Pottawotamies, Ottowas and Chippewas, the latter granting to the government their right and title to lands in northwest Ohio, and the northeastern portion of Indiana, south of the boundary line be- tween Ohio and Michigan, and known as the "Fulton line;" the third at Chi- cago, August 29, 1821, between General Cass and the Pottawotamies and their- allies the Ottawas and Chippewas, designating all the territory west of the treaty line made at Detroit, and north of a line due west to Lake Michigan, from the mouth of the Au Glaize, excepting five designated reservations, all having a general center in Franklin township, and all of which is important to the general reader to understand that the old "Fulton line," and the " Michigan meridian," formed part of the boundaries of the three foregoing named Indian. treaties, and as has been remarked, "surely we tread on interesting ground,' for the history of all this surrounding country finds its center here. In the sur- vey of the territory of Michigan, the west line of the Indian treaty, made by Hull at Detroit, 1807, was taken as the meridian line of their survey with their base line about sixty miles north, and extended south on said line to the "Ful-
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HISTORY OF HENRY AND FULTON COUNTIES.
ton line." The Ohio survey numbering east by range from the State line of Indiana, north to the "Fulton line," giving to the center of Franklin two im- portant starting points, two east ranges and one west, and parts of six congres- sional surveys, and the Michigan survey numbering south of base line, ten township surveys, and terminating on the " Fulton line" east and west of mer- ridian, ending with town ten south.
In the spring of 1820 the Legislature of Ohio, April I, organized from Indian territory fourteen new counties, among which were Wood, Henry, and Williams, south of the "Fulton line," and which afterwards became in part component parts of Fulton county. All of this township in the Ohio survey, south of the Fulton line, lying west of the west boundary line of Wood county, which afterward, on September 7, 1835, became the west boundary of Lucas county, was in the county of Williams, and not organized for county purposes until April 1, 1824. Prior to this time Williams county had been attached to Wood county for judicial purposes, the county seat being located at Defiance, then a part of Williams county. The commissioners of Williams county, De- cember 6, 1831, at a regular session held at Defiance, the county seat, organ- ized the township of Tiffin, composed of towns five, six, seven, and eight north, range four east, south of "Fulton line," and, March 30, 1835, subdivided Tiffin township, and from towns six, seven, and eight created the new township of Springfield, and, at the same time extended its jurisdiction to the " Harris line," over the disputed strip contiguous on the north, and also included in this extension a strip one mile wide off of the west end of towns nine and ten south, range one east, then being held under the jurisdiction of the Territory of Mich- igan, and in the county of Lenawee, and township of Medina About this date, 1835, the legislative council of the Territory of Michigan organized from the western part of Lenawee county, the county of Hillsdale, and formed the township of Mill Creek from town nine and fractional town ten south, range one west, and a strip one mile wide off of the west side of town nine and frac- tional town ten south, range one east, overlapping the claim of Springfield to the " Fulton line." Thus this tract was claimed by two townships and one State and one territory. Michigan, having the supremacy, by the sympathy of what settlers were then living thereon, exercised full and complete civil juris- diction until December 16, 1836, when the whole strip in dispute became a portion of Ohio, and, notwithstanding the claim of Springfield to said land north, she could not get in edgewise for her civil control. On March 7, 1836, commissioners met, and all of Springfield township north of town six north was organized into Brady township, first called Brady after Captain Brady. This new township included all of towns seven and eight north, range four east, and the strip, one mile wide, off of the west end of towns nine and ten south, range one east, and all of towns nine and fractional ten south, range one west, south of the " Harris line," and wiping out the name of Spring-
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FULTON COUNTY.
field over said territory newly erected into Brady township, and, on June 16, that part north of the " Fulton line," legally became a part of Brady township, destroying entirely the name and civil authority of Mill Creek township, erected at the time of the organization of Hillsdale county, in 1835. Afterwards, March 4, 1839, at a session of the county commissioners of Williams county, all of Brady township north of the " Fulton line," was set off to Mill Creek, or organized into a new township of Mill Creek. In 1843 all of Mill Creek town- ship included in towns nine and ten south, range two west, and one mile, or the west tier of sections of towns nine and ten south, range one west, was set off to a new township called Madison, and on April 1, 1850, the strip one mile wide off of the west end of towns nine and ten south, range one east, and two tiers of sections of towns nine and ten south, range one west, were set off to Fulton county, north of "Fulton line," and attached to Franklin and Gorham town- ships, respectively, adjoining their western border. Sections one and two of town seven north, range four east, and thirty-five and thirty-six of township eight north, range four east, south of the Fulton line, was taken from Brady township and attached to Fulton county and became a part of Franklin on the west.
Organization .- This township at a commissioners' meeting held at Maumee City, March 1, 1841, was organized and called Franklin township, made by taking all of town ten south, range one east, excepting one mile off of the vest end of town ten south, range one east, which was cut off from the township of Gorham, and all of towns eight north, range five east, and one tier of sections off of the north side of town seven north, range five east, from German town- ship, and immediately entered upon its civil jurisdiction as a part of the organ- ization of Fulton county. On the 28th day of February, 1850, the Legisla- ture of Ohio, in creating the new county of Fulton, ran the west boundary line west of the line of old Wood county, and afterwards Lucas county, and adding to the further area of Franklin, from the township of Brady, sections 1 and 2 of town seven north, range four east ; and sections 35 and 36, town eight north, range four east, and the west tier of fractional sections one mile wide off of town ten south, range one east, and two tiers of section, to wit: One and two and fractional sections 11 and 12, off of the west side of town ten south, range one west, of Mill Creek, which thereafter became a part and parcel of Franklin township, which embraces in its area six parts of congressional surveys.
Boundaries .- Franklin township as her boundaries mark at this time con- tains about twenty-eight and one-third full sections of land, or an area of 18,213 acres. Its real and personal value in 1887 was $443,540, as shown upon the present duplicate of the county. This township is in the center tier, upon the extreme western border of Fulton county ; bounded on the north by the township of Gorham ; on the east by the township of Dover; on the south by the township of German, and for nearly one mile at the west end on the
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HISTORY OF HENRY AND FULTON COUNTIES.
south by the Fulton line, and on the west by the townships of Brady south, and Mill Creek north of the old Fulton line of Williams county, O. A trifle over one-half of its present area is upon the disputed strip, as settled by the Congress of the United States, December 16, 1836. It was the tenth town- ship in its organization in the present limits of Fulton county.
Topography .- The general slope of the surface is southwest. The lowest lands are adjacent to and along the Tiffin River (Bean Creek), which marks a southwesterly course across the township, east of the first beach some four or five miles west. Gravel and sand spurs from the sandy plateau of Dover, put out on the extreme eastern border and southeast corner of the township, and are densely covered with timber. This gravel in the east part is available for good roads, and may be used at numerous points in the township. The spurs, however, are soon lost in the lacustrine deposits of the Bean Creek valley. The only water course rising beyond the limits of this county is Bean Creek, from Devil's Lake in the State of Michigan, and flows in a southerly direction through the center of this township and empties its waters and streamlets in the Maumee at Defiance. The streams are of gentle inclination south, and Mill Creek southeast, and empty upon its right bank. The waters of this township pass into Bean Creek, and, with its waters, to the Maumee, thence to Lake Erie.
Water Supply .- Nearly everywhere in this township water can be cheaply obtained by boring from eighty to one hundred feet. This township is famous for its artesian wells, wherein the water of many of them rises and flows to the surface. They, at this day, are eminently numerous in a line of special locality. Geology says " they are found in a belt of country which, in common with the other geological features of the vicinity, has a northeast and southwest trend," which appears true here.
Soil .- Along the valley of Bean Creek is a rich lacustrine deposit, with abundance of gravel closely connected with the Bean Valley, and the whole township presents a very level appearance and rich in fruit raising, for the val- ley does not often fail in that, and less frequent in the production of corn, wheat, oats and potatoes, and all the varieties of agriculture, or to the raising fine cattle, sheep and hogs. The prosperity of agriculture to-day within its bound- aries shows its wealth in all that makes the farm enjoyable.
Timber .- This township, in its early days, was covered with an almost im- penetrable forest of giant growth of the various kinds usually found in the west, with a soil too wet at times. A great part of the timber was black walnut, butternut, white, black and blue ash ; in many parts was very fine poplar or whitewood, trees often from two to five feet across, and from fifty to eighty feet without a limb. A great amount of this timber was cut and burned in log heaps by the early settlers, as there was no demand for it. There was also a great amount of oak of different kinds, which secured for the settlers.
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FULTON COUNTY.
good fencing material, for which it was and is now used largely for that pur- pose. There was beech and maple (both hard and soft), a good supply of basswood, sycamore, red and white elm, black cherry, iron-wood, hickory, dog-wood, cotton-wood and the bean-tree along the creek, with its beautiful flowers, from which Bean Creek derives its name.
Population .- Franklin in 1880, at the last Federal cencus enumerated 1,201, and is fast rising into prominence, and without any village or trading post, is more than keeping equal in the race for prosperity, but was among the first to begin its settlement by the white man, as early as 1833, and in rapid succes- sion thereafter did immigration flow into the valley of the "Bean," and by rea- son of the vast improvements in clearing out Bean Creek, and straightening its zig-zag water-courses, it visibly marks the beginning of a prosperity. Under good management it will be rich in agricultural possibilities, and at no distant day, be equal, if not superior, to any other agricultural district of Fulton county.
Early Pioneers .- It has been said that Joseph Bates came into this terri- tory, then Williams county, on section two, town seven north, range four east, in February, 1833, while others claim not until 1834, and on the farm known to-day as the Shilling farm. In the absence of better proof we will accept of the record as given by A. W. Fisher, in his historical reminiscences of early settlers, wherein he writes to Joseph Bates's daughter, Mrs. Alvord, of Cam- den, Michigan, replying to which she declares that her father came in 1832; from the testimony given by others it will be doing justice to the memory of Joseph Bates to give him the benefit of a medium date, Feb., 1833, which would seem to correspond with the memory of many living witnesses. He be- came engrafted to the soil of Fulton county by reason of changes made in the political divisions and subdivisions of township. He, when coming to the val- ley of the Bean Creek, in February, 1833, was within the limits of Brady township, Williams county, and was then not a resident of Fulton county, nor either of Wood, which held control of all east of Williams until 1835. when Lucas was organized from the western part of Wood, and so controlled the ter- ritory until Feb. 28, 1850, when the county of Fulton was organized, taking in territory from Williams upon which Joseph Bates resided, but he loses the honor of being one of the early pioneers of Williams, and lays claim to the credit of being the first white resident of Fulton county, and also Franklin as she exists to-day. During all this term of years, from 1833 to 1850, a period of seventeen years, Joseph Bates is by all acknowledged to be the first settler in the present area of Franklin township. For quite a period of time he alone endured the hardship of early pioneer life, which never will be sufficiently elu- cidated to the succeeding generations; the severe labor and toil to make for a growing family a home-always the aspiration of the early men and women of the wilderness-living on hominy made from corn pounded in wooden mortars, and such wild meats as might be obtained by the rifle from the woods, caught
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HISTORY OF HENRY AND FULTON COUNTIES.
in the intervals of labor, and often without milk or butter, or any of the arti- cles of luxury.
Joseph Bates, in a very early day, ran a hotel called "J. Bates's Inn." In 1861 he sold his possession to William Ayers and moved to Iowa, where he died, August 1, 1866, at the advanced age of seventy-nine years. In the sum- mer and winter of 1830 and 1831, Joseph Bates with his gun, dogs, bear and wolf traps, came from the East to Hardin county, O., where he hunted and trapped until the coming spring, and during this time lived on muskrats and other game caught in traps or shot. He sold his furs and skins, the product of his fall and winter labor, and came to then Williams county, and purchased the southeast quarter of section two, town seven north, range four east, now Frank- lin township, and had of that winter's labor $130 left. He went back to his home and in the winter of 1833, started with his family for his new purchase in Williams county, cutting his own road through an unbroken forest from Ot- tawa to Defiance. When arriving at his new home he lived three days in a wagon, until he could erect a cabin with simply his own and family's help. There was no neighbor nearer than twelve miles. He then cleared some land and raised that year the first grain in Franklin township, or the western part of Fulton county. A large part of his life here was spent in hunting and trap- ping, of which he was ever fond. On the 20th of March, 1845, his wife died, and the following year he married the widow of Joseph Borton, sister to Ben- jamin, Nathan, John and Job Borton, all well known through the county.
Joseph Bates was born in Vermont in the year 1787, but at the age of man- hood he went to Canada, where he married Harriet Dodge, by whom he had eight children, four sons and four daughters, who came with him to Williams county (that part now Fulton). Truman, who moved with the Packards in 1840 to Missouri; Thomas, who died on the isthmus on his way to California, in 1849; Joseph, who died in 1867, in Iowa, and James who now resides in Boon county, Iowa. The daughters, Harriet, who married Theron Landon ; Belinda, who married Warren Hancock; Mary, who married Cyrus Barrett, and Elizabeth, who married Hiram Alvord, now of Reading, Mich. Mr. Bates moved from Canada to New York and from there to Richland county, O., where he settled in his early life. No ordinary set of men and women could do what the pioneers of this county have done. It was the bravest and best who dared to push out from home and friends and all the enjoyments of civil life, to seek a home in this great Northwest, long believed by the eastern world unfit for the homes of civilized men and women. In those days heroes slept in every primitive cabin, whose deeds were worthy of fame, but unrecorded ; the memory rests only with the living, and sleeps with the dead.
After a space of nearly two years John Shaffer and Adam Poorman entered the Bean Creek valley, near where Samuel B. Darby lived and kept a store, March, 1835. They got to Bean Creek just at dark, John Shaffer settling on
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FULTON COUNTY.
section thirty-two, town eight north, range five cast, and Adam Poorman on section five, town seven north, range five east; when arriving on the banks of the Bean they encamped over night, there being a heavy, cold snow upon the ground, about four inches deep. Each spent the night as best he could, and as only pioneers knew how. At daylight next morning they felled two trees across the creek, cut poles and split what they could and made a bridge across the turbid Bean, then swollen, and moved over with their goods and families, as their land lay upon the north side of the creek. They encamped on a piece of rising ground for the night, after crossing, and the next morning were sur- rounded with water from one to five feet in depth, the melting snow and rain making quite a flood. When the water went down they put up a cabin for each family. John Shaffer had quite a family of boys ; Samuel, the oldest, thirteen or fourteen years of age, Amos, David, Joshua and Riley. His house was ever the traveler's home, and he the newcomer's friend. In 1851. John Shaffer sold out his farm to Lyman Morrison and moved into Fulton township, this county, and from there in 1858 or 1859, moved into Montcalm county, Mich., where he died many years ago. There is but one of the Shaffer fam- ily in this county now, Joshua Shaffer, who is a resident of Pike township, having a fine farm.
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