USA > Ohio > Union County > History of Union County, Ohio; its people, industries and institutions > Part 7
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).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88 | Part 89 | Part 90 | Part 91 | Part 92 | Part 93 | Part 94 | Part 95 | Part 96 | Part 97 | Part 98 | Part 99 | Part 100 | Part 101 | Part 102 | Part 103 | Part 104 | Part 105 | Part 106 | Part 107
Union county was formed from Franklin, Delaware, Logan and Madi- son in 1820. Extensive limestone quarries are also valuable. The Ewing brothers made the first white settlement in 1798. Col. James Curry, a mem- ber of the State Legislature, was the chief instigator in the progress of this section. He located within its limits and remained until his death, which oc- curred in 1834. Marysville is the county seat.
Van Wert county was formed from the old Indian Territory April 1, 1820. Van Wert, the county seat, was founded by James W. Riley in 1837. An Indian town had formerly occupied its site. Captain Riley was the first white man who settled in the county, arriving in 1821. He founded Will- shire in 1822.
Vinton county was organized in 1850. It is drained by Raccoon and Salt creeks. The surface is undulating or hilly. Bituminous coal and iron ore are found. McArthur is the county seat.
Washington county was formed by proclamation of Governor St. Clair July 27, 1788, and was the first county founded within the limits of Ohio. The surface is broken with extensive tracts of level, fertile land. It was the first county settled in the state under the auspices of the Ohio Company. A detachment of United States troops, under command of Major John Doughty, built Fort Harmar in 1785 and it was the first military post estab- lished in Ohio by Americans, with the exception of Fort Laurens, which was erected in 1778. It was occupied by United States troops until 1790,
79
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
when they were ordered to Connecticut. A company under Captain Haskell remained. In 1785 the directors of the Ohio Company began practical opera- tions and settlement went forward rapidly. Campus Martius, a stockade fort, was completed in 1791. This formed a sturdy stronghold during the war. During the Indian war there was much suffering in the county. Many settlers were killed and captured. Marietta is the county seat and the oldest town in Ohio. Marietta College was chartered in 1835. Herman Blenner- hassett, whose unfortunate association with Aaron Burr proved fatal to him- self. was a resident of Marietta in 1796.
Warren county was formed May 1, 1803, from Hamilton. The soil is very fertile and considerable water power is furnished by its streams. Mr. Bedell made the first settlement in 1795. Lebanon is the county seat. Henry Taylor settled in this vicinity in 1796. Union Village is a settlement of Shakers. They came here about 1805.
Wayne county was proclaimed by Governor St. Clair, August 15, 1796, and was the sixth county in the Northwest Territory. The settlement of this section has already been briefly delineated. Wooster is the county seat. It was laid out during the fall of 1808, by John Beaver, William Henry and Joseph H. Larwell, owners of the land. Its site is three hundred and thirty- seven feet above Lake Erie. The first mill was built by Joseph Stibbs in 1809, on Apple creek. In 1812 a block-house was erected in Wooster.
Wood county was formed from the old Indian Territory in 1820. The soil is rich and large crops are produced. The county is situated within the Maumee valley. It was the arena of brilliant military exploits during early times. Bowling Green is the county seat.
Williams county was formed April 1, 1820, from the old Indian Terri- tory. Bryan is the county seat. It was laid out in 1840.
Wyandot county was formed February 3. 1845, from Marion, Hardin. Hancock and Crawford. The surface is level and the soil fertile. The Wyandot Indians frequented this section. It was the scene of Crawford's defeat in June, 1782, and his fearful death. By the treaty of 1817, Hon. Lewis Cass and Hon. Duncan McArthur, United States commissioners, granted to the Indians a reservation twelve miles square, the central point being Fort Ferree. The Delaware reserve was ceded to the United States in 1829. The Wyandots ceded theirs March 17, 1842. The United States commissioner was Col. John Johnson, who thus made the last Indian treaty in Ohio. Every foot of this state was fairly purchased by treaties. The Wyandots were ex- ceedingly brave and several of their chiefs were men of exalted moral principles.
80
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
Upper Sandusky is the county seat and was laid out in 1843. General Harrison had built Ferree on this spot during the war of 1812. Governor Meigs, in 1813, encamped near the river with several thousand of the Ohio militia. The Indian village of Crane Town was originally called Upper Sandusky. The Indians transferred their town. after the death of Tarhe. to Upper Sandusky.
CHAPTER II.
PHYSICAL FEATURES.
GEOGRAPHY, TOPOGRAPHY, GEOLOGY, SOILS, ETC.
Union county occupies a nearly central position in the state of Ohio, and is bounded on the north by Hardin and Marion counties, on the east by Marion and Delaware, on the south by Franklin and Madison and on the west by Champaign and Logan. Its area by townships is as follows :
Townships.
Number of acres.
Allen
19,037
Claibourne
19,560
Richwood School District
1,57I
Darby
19,416
Dover
14,203
Jackson
17,776
Jerome
22,718
Leesburg
18,677
Liberty
23,022
Mill Creek
13,807
Paris
19,649
Marysville School District
1,973
Taylor
16,463
Union
22,095
Washington
17.819
York
23,523
Total
271,309
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
i
1
1
1
1
1
1
I
1
1
1
1
1
I
1
I
1
1
I
1
1
1
1 1
1 1
1
1
This acreage amounts to almost four hundred and twenty-four square miles. Union county contains five incorporated villages : Marysville, Paris township; Richwood, Claibourne township: Milford Center, Union town- ship; Unionville Center, Darby township: Plain City, Jerome township.
(6)
S2
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
The unincorporated villages and hamlets are as follows: Irwin, in Union township; Dipple and Chuckery, in Darby township; Arnold, New California and Jerome, in Jerome township: Watkins, in Mill Creek town- ship: Pottersburg, in Allen township: Peoria and Raymond, in Liberty town- ship : Dover. in Dover township: York and Boke's Creek, in York township; Broadway, in Taylor township; Pharisburg and Magnetic Springs, in Lees- burg township; Claibourne, in Claibourne township; Arbelia and Byhalia, in Washington township: Rush Creek and Woodland, in Jackson township.
The entire area of the county of Union is drained into the Scioto river, the principal channels through which this is effected being Rush, Fulton, Boke's, Blue's, Mill, Big Darby and Little Darby creeks. The origin of a few of these names is known, as for instance. Rush creek, being a sluggish stream is probably named from the rushes which grow along its banks; Blue's creek so called for an unfortunate individual named Blue, who was one of an early surveying party and received a ducking in its waters; Mill creek was named probably from the fact of its furnishing power for very early mills in Delaware county : Darby creek is said to have been named after an Indian chief who once lived in this region. The general course of nearly all these streams is southeast. In former years they furnished fair mill power, but long ago it was found necessary to introduce steam for manufacturing or mill purposes.
The greater part of Union county is either level or gently undulating. The rougher portions are on the upper waters of Mill creek and in Jerome township. There is little in the county to which the term hill can properly be applied, although the divide between Mill and Blue's creeks would in some regions be termed a hill, and the broken lands along Big Darby approach nearly to that dignity. The streams have cut below the natural level, Big Darby creek having the deepest channel. South of this stream are the well- known "Darby Plains" whose fertile soil has yielded golden returns for the labors of the husbandman through many years. In Liberty, Paris and Allen townships, including the locality known as the "Bear Swamp," is a district formerly known as the "Flat Woods," from being very level and covered with a dense growth of timber. The latter has been largely cleared away and a thorough system of drainage has reclaimed the land, including even the "Bear Swamp," in which corn now is grown where once was a wooded morass and a shallow lake. In Claibourne township, north of Richwood, is a very level tract known as the "Big Swale." which has been drained into Rush creek.
83
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
GEOLOGY.
This portion of the chapter will be principally from an account prepared in the eighties by N. H. Winchell on the state geological survey, with addi- tional items concerning the waters which had then but recently been dis- covered on Boke's creek, at what is now the village of Magnetic Springs.
Professor Winchell's report is as follows :
"Natural Drainage. The surface drainage all passes into the Scioto valleys by streams which flow with gentle current in a southeasterly direction. They rise in the Logan county corniferous area, a region of very rough or hilly surface, rising several hundred feet above the surrounding waterlime flats and toward the southeast enter upon another area of corniferous which, although presenting different surface features, yet is not so broken as the Logan county area. There is a remarkable uniformity in direction and alteration in these streams. The principal valleys have a slope to the east or southeast toward the Scioto, the valley of which is excavated over a hundred feet in the bed rock in Delaware county. To one who has closely observed the systemis of drainage in the various counties and has aimed to ascertain from the effects seen the causes that located streams in various parts of northwestern Ohio, this alone suggests a halting retreat of a glacier across the county, throwing down greater accumulations of drift where it remained stationary for a length of time. Such would be the divides between the streams, the valleys being in those belts where the drift was left thinner. But, with a single exception, nothing of this is indicated by the surface fea- tures so far as the time devoted to the survey would disclose. The whole county was carefully examined. In counties further northwest, where such moraines are seen to guide the drainage diagonally across the general slope of the surface, the tributary streams enter the main valleys from opposite sides. The surface between the streams is flat and there is no evidence of a thickening of the drift, except between Big Darby and Mill creeks.
"Surface Features. Between Big Darby and Mill creeks there is a very noticeable thickening of drift. It rises into long ridges and high knolls which consist of hardpan or glacier drifts. Northern boulders and stones are on the surface and in the soil indiscriminately, though the same is true to some extent throughout the county. This ridge of drift is greatly de- veloped at New California, where wells are sunk to the depth of fifty-four feet without meeting anything but blue clay, the water obtained being bitter. West and south of Marysville two or three miles, the surface is high and roll-
84
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
ing, with clay hills. Toward the north and east it is flat with gravel near the surface in some places. Between Milford Center and Unionville, clay knobs and rolling land can be seen north of Darby creek. while toward the south and in Union township, the Darby Plains extend several miles. Wells at Pottersburg penetrate the drift over sixty feet without meeting the rock, but obtain good water at that depth. About Raymond there is a very rolling and bluffy tract of land, some of the wells obtaining bitter water in blue clay at fifty-two feet. This rolling strip of clay knobs dies out toward the south and west and toward the north and east. Throughout the rest of the county the surface is very nearly flat. wells being usually less than twenty-five feet. This belt of clay knobs crosses the entire county, although it seems to turn a little toward the north in Jerome township. The following elevations above Lake Erie are taken from profiles of railroads that cross the county :
Richwood
369 feet.
Broadway 422 feet.
Marysville 425 feet.
"The following points of elevation were obtained by aneroid barometer, connecting with railroad stations :
Marysville (with Bellefontaine) -325 feet.
New California
375 feet.
Hill east of New California
395 feet.
Plain City 225 feet. 1
Hills west of Marysville 355 feet. 1 1 I 1
Peoria
110 feet.
Newton
160 feet.
Pharisburg 304 feet. 1
Essex 359 feet.
Northeast corner Washington township 389 feet.
York Center
399 feet.
Survey No. 5,270 Allen township 485 feet.
Allen Center
435 feet.
Milford Center 315 feet.
1
1
1
1
"Soil and Timber. The soil is derived entirely from the drift and may be denominated in general a gravelly clay. It exhibits the well-known char- acteristics of fertility and endurance that mark all the drift soils of north- western Ohio. It shows a very fair sprinkling of stones and boulders, but in some places is very fine and heavy. It is only along the immediate river
85
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
banks on the bottom lands that the sandy element prevails and it is then con- fined to the alluvium."
Among the species of timber noted by Mr. Winchell are sugar and soft maple, beech, several varieties of elm, ash and oak, linn or basswood, dog- wood, shellbark and pig hickory, sycamore or "buttonwood," buckeye, prickly ash, blue beech, honey locust, hackberry, thorn, black willow, black walnut, black cherry, wild apple, ironwood, cottonwood, papaw, trembling aspen and Judas tree: several, others are found in different varieties of willow, the butternut, etc. He proceeds with the geological structure as follows:
"The rocks of the county embrace the following limestones, including also the Oriskany sandstone :
Hamilton or Upper Corniferous
Lower Corniferous
Devonian.
Oriskany Waterlime Upper Silurian.
"By the Hamilton is here meant the blue limestone which is quarried at Delaware and which is regarded by Dr. Newberry as partly Hamilton and partly Corniferous. It has been mentioned frequently by the writer in re- porting on counties in northwestern Ohio under the designation of Upper Corniferous, in order to keep its district from the underlying limestone, which is plainly Corniferous. The Lower Corniferous is well represented in the quarries in Mill Creek township. The Oriskany has not been seen within the county but is probably conglomeratic since it has that character in Delaware county. These limestones with the Oriskany, make up the Devonian so far as represented within the county. The rock which immedi- ately underlies the Oriskany belongs to the Upper Silurian. It is the water- lime member of the Lower Helderberg. The Devonian is found only in the southeastern part of the county, although there are some evidences in the form of large fragments, that it extends as far west as Marysville. It under- lies the most of Mill Creek and Jerome townships. The rest of the county is occupied by the waterlime.
"The Lower Corniferous. The Delhi stone of the Lower Corniferous has been quarried at a number of places in Mill Creek township. The old quarry of Thompson & Brown, six miles southeast of Dover, exposed about four feet of fossiliferous, sometimes crinoidal limestone, in beds of two to four inches. It was principally burned for quicklime, but was also sold for cheap foundation stone. The lime which it made was like that already described made from the same beds at Delhi in Delaware county. The
86
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
fossils seen here are Crytoceras undulatum, a handsome little Strophomena, a large Cyathophylloid coral, the pygidium of a trilobite and various remains of fishies. There are also common a large Strophomena and a small Cya- thophylloid.
"Oriskany Conglomerate. The only proof that this, usually a sandy limestone or a clean quartz grit, has the character of a conglomerate in Union county, consists in the appearance of that character near the county line in Mill Creek. It there contains water-worn pebbles of the underlying water-lime, which are sometimes two or three inches in diameter. The whole thickness is not more than two feet.
"Wells and Springs. The following observations on the common wells of the county are of interest. They give some idea of the accessibility of water for domestic purposes and of the composition of the drift as well as of its thickness at various places: (Here follows a description of thirty- nine wells in various parts of the county, varying in depth from eleven to sixty-three feet. The shallower wells are sunk in gravel and afford good water, as a rule, while the deeper ones do not always do so, it having in several instances a sulphurous, irony or bitter taste. The deep wells were sunk through the gravel and penetrated at various depths into yellow, blue and brown clay, nowhere striking the rock. The shallowest and the deepest wells are both in Allen township, according to Professor Winchell's table, and are but two or three miles apart. )
"The Waterlime. This limestone is so named from its known hydraulic qualities in other states as well as in some places in Ohio. It appears in out- crop in widely separated parts of the county and probably is the surface bedrock throughout the most of the county. The old quarry of William Ramsey, in the bed of Mill creek in Mill Creek township, although not now in operation, is sufficiently developed to show the waterlime characters. Aaron Sewell burned a little lime here. The foundation for the old court house at Marysville was taken out here. The stone is in beds of about four inches, but is wavy. Some of it is brecciated. The creek has excavated about ten feet in this limestone along here, the overlying Corniferous reced- ing from the stream on both sides. This narrow belt of waterlime extends northward and makes, probably, an isolated outlier of Corniferous which occupies part of Dover township and crosses the Scioto in Delaware county from near Millville, southwesterly. The waterlime also is exposed on the old Ingham Wood farm one mile northwest of Pharisburg in Boggs (Boke's) creek. It is mainly a surface exposure in the beds and low banks of the
87
UNION COUNTY, OIIIO.
creek. At Unionville the waterlime appears in Big Darby creek. The beds are from four to eight inches thick and fine grained. This is said to be underlaid by a blue clay which is four feet thick. It also occurs two miles above Unionville and a mile further down.
"The Drift. This deposit in Union county shows evidence of more recent date than it does generally in Delaware county. It appears very similar to the drift in the northwest corner of Delaware county. This evi- dence is of two kinds: first, that which pertains to the rock; second, that which pertains to the drift itself. The streams of the county have not excavated channels in the rock and but very rarely expose it in their beds. This is not strictly true in the southeastern part in the area of the Corniferous, where there is some erosion in the rock like that seen throughout the most of Delaware county. This indicates that in the southeastern corner the erosion by streams has been longest continued, although that part of the county has at the same time less elevation above Lake Erie-in other words, that the overspread of drift in the southeastern part of the county was earlier than in the rest of the county. The rock, where exposed in the southeastern part of the county, has the same longweathered appearance even when freshly uncovered by the removal of the drift. that is observable in Delaware county. The marks of glacial action are dim. The natural jointing and planes of separation are loosely filled in with the effects of oxidation and decomposi- tion to a greater depth than in the rest of the county. If we revert to the appearance of the drift itself, the most striking contrast is presented in the general smoothness of the surface throughout the county, compared to the surface of Delaware county. This is partly due to the effect of less erosion on the drift by the streams and partly to the evenness of the rock surface. With a single exception, the drift seems to have been very uniformly and gently deposited in Union county. The uniform direction of and the regular intervals between the main streams may all have been at first determined by slight differences in the thickness of the drift deposited. but such differences are now so obscured that they cannot be detected by the eye, except in the interval between the Big Darby and Mill creeks. Besides this general flat- ness of surface, the yellowish color, caused by the formation and infiltration of hydrated oxides from above. does not extend so far downward in Union county as in Delaware. In the latter county the light-colored clay extends downward to the depth of fifteen or twenty feet and sometimes as much as twenty-five feet. In the former the blue clay is usually met within ten feet. It sometimes rises within eight feet of the surface and occasionally the yel-
88
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
lowish color extends to twelve or fifteen feet. The depth of such superficial coloring seems to vary not only with the length of time the drift may have been exposed to the air and surface water but also with the ease with which these agents find access below. A sandy or gravelly knoll is generally weathered deeper than one of clay and a rolling surface is apt to be more deeply oxidated than a flat one. The drift ridge which separates Big Darby and Mill creeks has already been alluded to under the head 'surface features.' Its exact form, limits and location, even within the county, have not been made out. The time given to the county would not allow a careful survey of this ridge in detail. It is well known to the inhabitants of the county. It forms a belt of high and rolling clay land which shows boulders and gravel somewhat more abundantly than the surface of the rest of the county. It is believed to be of the nature of a glacial moraine and was probably thrown down by the ice at a period when the retreating ice-foot was nearly stationary for a long time at about that place. It is very similar to those other very extended drift moraines that cross northwestern Ohio, but is somewhat more clayey than they. Its connection with them is not known, but it was doubt- less cotemporaneous in origin with one of them. The elevated region in Logan county, where there is an island of Devonian rock which withstood the ice period, was a disturbing element in the otherwise very regular con- tour of the foot of the glacier. Union county seems to have been in the pathway of a spur or branch of the ice sheet and to have suffered very ex- tensive erosion thereby. After the actual withdrawal of the ice from the county, the drainage of a large tract of ice-covered surface would have passed principally through the same pathway. This pathway is bounded on either side by a persistent barrier of Corniferous limestone. It is probable, also, that the Waverly overlaid this area, at least in the Logan county island, since fragments of the Berea grit are found in the drift in the southwestern part of Union county. The effect of this drainage over the county is probably seen in the near approach to the surface of heavy gravel beds in the drift over wide tracts, although the level of the county in the same tracts is now that of the general country and is perfectly flat. This may be seen in the frequent gravel pits about Richwood and Essex, where the surface is out- wardly comparable to that of the Black swamp of northwestern Ohio, but is so closely underlaid with gravel that almost every cellar encounters it within three or four feet. This gravel belt runs southward toward Pharisburg and is also penetrated on the old Josiah Westlake farm a mile and a half north of Marysville, who used to aver that small shiner fish appear late in summer
89
UNION COUNTY, OHIO.
or in the fall of nearly every year, in a shallow well curb by a 'gum' which is inserted in an excavation penetrating to the gravel or to the water of a subterranean lake. This circumstance would not be mentioned had it not been frequently reported by others in reference to certain wells in Defiance and Fulton counties. The facts are given with great circumstantiality and positiveness and cannot safely be denied.
"Material Resources. The most of the county is poorly supplied with building stone. This necessary article is imported from Logan county, where the Onondaga quarries at Middleburg afford a good stone; from the quarries in the Hamilton at Marion in Marion county and from the same at Delaware. Not much lime is made in the county ; the drift clays, however, are freely used in the manufacture of red brick and tile. The natural features and the geological structure of the county will forever preclude the develop- ment of any other element of material wealth that will rank with that of agriculture."
MAGNETIC SPRINGS.
A more complete account of these springs and the village which has grown up around them in thirty-one years' time will be found in the history of Leesburg township, in which they are located. There is no doubt of the wonderful efficacy of the waters in certain diseases. The appended analyses of the waters of two of the springs will give an idea of their medicinal virtues :
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.