USA > Ohio > Wayne County > History of Wayne County, Ohio, Volume I > Part 36
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"Immigration now became more rapid, so then in ten years from the organization of the township at least one-half of the quarter sections that could be farmed had on them one or more cabins. In the year of the organ- ization George Sommers settled in the township, the only resident of that . time. About the same time John McIllvaine and James Smith moved in, settling near each other, a mile west of Jackson. Soon after Daniel Oller, Henry Kopp, Simon Kenney, James and William Haskins and Enoch Gil- bert and a number of others from the New England states and New York came ir.
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"Charles, son of James Rose, was the first white child born in the town- ship. Simon, son of William Ewing, Sr., was the second and still lived on the old homestead in 1878. The oldest native Canaanite is the last named. Susan, daughter of William Ewing, Sr., is supposed to have been the first person married in the township to her first husband, Ramsey, who was killed at a mill raising, near Wooster. The first school house was on James Rose's land, in which James Buchanan, a Scotchman, taught the first school.
"Almost every family, men and women, wore homespun, at home and abroad. The only difference between the dress to 'go to meetin' ' and that of the field or the clearing, was in being fresh washed for the former. The diet, too, was of the plainest kind, quite limited in variety, and frequently also in quantity. Corn, in its various forms, whole or ground, with buck- wheat, potatoes, beans, pork, venison and other wild meats, were the chief articles of food. Game abounded, and many families depended upon getting their meats from the forest. Though the pioneers could get but little for the wheat they sold, the articles they bought cost much more than at present. As late as 1825 salt sold for eleven dollars per barrel, and before cost still more.
"If the times of settlements were recorded by decades, from the first coming of William Ewing. in 1812, the first up to 1822, would find from twenty-five to thirty families in the township. And this may be called the true pioneer decade ; whilst the next to 1832, would be of immigration, which dur- ing this time poured in in streams, so that by 1832, of land suitable for occu- pation, not more than twenty-five quarters were unoccupied. During this second decade came many of the most useful and substantial citizens, among them mechanics and men of capital. Some of those who came during this period were, as remembered, John and Justin Miles, Smith and David Hois- ington, Simon Kenney, and the Shanklings, Joseph Notestine, Henry Shuff- ling, John D. Hockert, David Wiles, John and Henry and Daniel Frank, Jason and Sylvanus Jones, Zenas Z. Crane, Joseph Henry and Jacob Zarer, the Wells and many others equally prominent, whose names do not now come to mind. At the close of the second decade, the last entry of the public land was made in this township. Among the men last named was John Kearns. a man of sterling worth, industrious, skillful and of much business ability. He settled a mile north of the Center, on the present Henry Smith farm. He was an ardent supporter of the church in general, and of his own, the Meth- odist Episcopal, in particular. At his death, in 1839, he was one of the wealthiest men in his township.
"Wooster was the nearest point of trade, but it was a poor place to sell
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products of any kind. Wheat and flour were often hauled to Cleveland, and hogs were driven there, as the nearest market.
"There are five villages in the township, Burbank, Golden Corners, Wind- sor (or Canaan Center), Jackson and Pike."
Of the educational features of this township, it may be stated that one of the first institutions of learning in Wayne county was Canaan Academy, located at Windsor, this township. The original building was a structure of frame, thirty-six by forty-eight feet, erected in 1842 by a stock company. This academy was controlled by a board of directors, the first board of which consisted of John Paul, M. D., Jonas Notestine, Justine Mills, Harvey Rice and Alfred Hotchkiss. The school was first opened December 3, 1843, with forty-seven pupils, under the instruction of Prof. C. C. Bomberger, A. B., who taught three years. Reverends Barr and Barker had charge during the summer of 1847; succeeded in the winters of 1847 and 1848 by Prof. Isaac Notestine, who, with short intervals, remained in charge until 1863. After that year the school was taught by a number of professors until 1875, when it was permanently closed, Prof. J. W. Cummings being then in charge. While Professor Notestine was teaching, in the winter of 1851, the house was burned, and the next building was constructed of brick. It is conceded that Canaan Academy has been an important factor in the educational work of Wayne and adjoining counties.
The churches of this locality are treated in the Religious chapter of this work.
Burbank, within this township, was incorporated in 1868, when the name was changed from Bridgeport. Burbank Academy was organized in 1873. The Methodist Episcopal church was the first to be organized in the place. The business factors in the hamlet in 1909 were: M. W. Hower & Son : Will Frary, who is postmaster, George Brothers. R. L. Malcomb, J. E. Addleman, H. A. Overs and A. Overs & Company.
.CONGRESS TOWNSHIP.
Congress is the extreme northwestern sub-division in Wayne county ; is south of the line of Wayne and Medina county, west of Canaan township, north of Chester township and borders on the Ashland county line. Wayne township was organized October 5, 1818. Hon. Michael Totten and James Carlin gave the following concerning the settlement of this part of the county :
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In 1815, the first families moved into what is now Congress township. Sometime during the first week of February, Michael and Henry Totten, ac- companied by George and Isaac Poe, cut a trail from Wooster to where the village of Congress stands, which at that time, was all forest, the lands not yet having been entered. These gentlemen camped until they finished their cabin on section 27. Mrs. Catherine Totten was the first white woman in the township. The first furniture within the township was drawn on a sled from Wooster by the Totten boys, in February, 1815. The first week in the following April, George and Isaac Poe and a few other families came in and settled upon the same section. Peter Warner and family moved into the southwest part of the township that spring. In 1816 Matthew Brower and James Carlin, with their families, moved onto the same farm, where they spent the remainder of their lives. The next to invade this fair domain was George Aukerman and John Nead, with their families. After this period emigrants came from different sections of the country and settled the town- ship in various sections. The first white person who died in Congress town- ship was Mrs. Amasa Warner, and the second was Mrs. Totten.
The first school was taught by John Totten in the first cabin built.
George Poe was the first justice of the peace. The first school house was erected in 1819, on the southwest quarter of section 27. The first clear- ing was made by the Tottens and consisted of five acres, which was planted to corn and cut in the autumn for fodder purposes, and the same fall winter wheat was sowed on the land, these crops being the first corn and wheat grown within Congress township. Game was very plentiful. and for some time after the arrival of the first families was the chief article of diet. Hogs and sheep could not at first be raised, on account of the wolves that would devour such animals at sight. One early-day winter the first settlers-the Tottens-had twelve sheep enclosed in the same lot with the cabin, and they were believed to be safe there, but one night a pack of wolves assailed the pen and killed all of them but two and one of these escaped and ran into the house, awoke the family, but the hungry wolves had finished their work and fled for the woods. The next day one of the Tottens pursued them as far as the Harrisville swamp, in Medina county, but got no opportunity of shooting at them. Near the swamp was a camp of Indians, numbering about thirty or possibly forty.
Among the earliest settlers in Congress township may be recalled : John Jeffrey, Walter Elgin, David Gardner, Jacob Holmes, Jacob Shellebarger, Peter and Samuel Chasey. G. W. Howey. David Nelson. James Grimes' father, James Boyd, Hector Burns, Samuel Sheets, N. N. Perrine. A. Yocum, John
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Vanasdoll, Rev. John Hazzard and family, Isaac Matthews and others whose names have slipped from memory.
James Carlin is the authority for the statement that the first marriage in Congress township was that of Jesse Matteson and Eleanor Carlin. The first sermon was preached by a Presbyterian minister, named Matthews, who spoke with a sword girded to his body. The first grist-mill was built by Naftzger, where a man named Buchanan was killed, waiting for his grist. The earliest doctor in the township was Mr. Mills, while the first carpenter was Jacob Matthews.
Royce Summerton, away back in the seventies, gave the following rem- iniscence on Congress township in early times when his father was numbered among the pioneer settlers :
"When father and his family moved into the county there were but five neighbors within a radius of several miles. Isaac Matthews came as early as 1814, and the Poes were here and Peter Chasey and his son, Samuel. On one occasion, when father and I were coming home from Naftzger's mill with the wagon drawn by two oxen and a horse hitched on in front, I mounted on the horse, the wolves gathered in large numbers at our side, and I got greatly alarmed, but father just laughed and said there was no danger. After butchering day the wolves were very troublesome, and on one occasion a large hog was missing for three days, when it returned mangled and fly- blown, having been, as was supposed, attacked by a bear.
"In the early days the woods were infested with pea-vines, which crept over the ground and would climb small shrubs and trees to the height of two or three feet, and in the fall of the year the cattle would eat it and fatten on it, and many of them died, and it came to be believed that it was from the overeating of this pea-vine.
"In the first log (Methodist Episcopal) church in Congress, Harry O. Sheldon was preaching at a quarterly meeting, and there being a large crowd present, it was difficult for all to be seated. Joseph Ewing stood up defiantly in the center of the room. Mr. Sheldon came back to him and asked him to be seated, which he refused, when Sheldon caught him violently on his hip, car- ried him out and forced him to kneel down while he prayed for him."
The Poe family was one of much historic note, and the encounter with Bigfoot, the noted Indian, is narrated in the Miscellaneous chapter of this volume.
The towns and villages of Congress township are West Salem, Auker- man, Congress and Pleasant Home.
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Congress was originally called Waynesburg. It was platted March 6, 1827, by Philip Gates and David Newcomer, Peter Emory doing the survey- ing. The first house in this village was built by Michael Funk and Elmer Yocum and was situated upon the site of the present Methodist church. The first postmaster was Jacob Hare. The pioneer physician was Doctor Mills. George Wicks kept the first hotel and David W. Poe established the first tannery in the village. Among the early deaths after the village was platted was an old Indian. He and his wife were on a tramp and stopped at Griffith's tavern, where they got tight and abusive, and the landlord's wife threw a pot of boiling water on him, and he died.
Congress village was incorporated in 1837. The first officers were : Mayor, John Tarr; recorder, William Rogers; councilmen, Joe Fish, John Zuber, P. Pancost, R. Summerton and John Potts.
West Salem was platted by Peter and John Rickel, June 14, 1834. It became an incorporated place in 1868, the first officers being : Mayor, D. H. Ambrose; trustees, D. Eshleman, D. Gable, J. Georget, J. J. Shank, W. R. Huber; recorder, E. Fritzinger; treasurer. John Zehner. This town is located in the extreme northwestern part of the township and county.
In 1878 Mrs. Peter wrote the following reminiscence that now, after a third of a century almost, is appropriate in the history of Congress town- ship :
"It was fifty-five years ago yesterday (October 10, 1877) when Peter and I landed here with our two children, coming from Bedford county, Penn- sylvania, where he was a farmer. We settled in the woods near where I now live, built a cabin with a puncheon floor and stick chimney. My first neighbors were Rev. John Hazzard, Mr. Ford and Charles Crile. Peter, however, had been out here two years before we moved and entered a quarter of land on which West Salem is now largely built. There were no roads then around here, and we had a hard time getting the two-horse wagon through. Peter was born in Virginia, January 30, 1794, and died October 7, 1865. My maiden name was Nancy Rickel and I was born in old Lan- caster, Pennsylvania, May 1, 1803. We had seven boys and two girls. I used to work in the field and fainted in the field once while husking corn. Folks had to work then indeed, and I used to help haul logs and such things, and now would like to live again in the woods, instead of in town, for then I could hear the wild birds sing as in the old days. John Rickel, who, with Peter, laid out West Salem, was a brother of mine. He was a native of Lan- caster, Pennsylvania, and came to Wayne county three years before we did.
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and some of the town is built on land he settled on at that time. John was an Albright preacher.
"Joseph Harbaugh put up the first house in West Salem after it was laid out. It was an old-fashioned frame and he paid about twelve dollars for the lot. Jacob Hyatt rented the house and died in it three months after he moved in. James Hyatt kept tavern there afterwards and it was the first public house in Salem. Cass and Emerson were among the first doctors. William Cass started the first store, without any counter save a bench. He bought eggs, butter, etc. Reverend Beer was an early preacher."
An agricultural society was formed in West Salem in 1867, when by- laws were adopted and first officers elected as follows: William Buchanan, president ; John Wicks, secretary; D. Eshleman, treasurer ; and John Zehner, Peter Stair and Captain Mitchell, directors.
In the village of Congress, in 1909, the following were the business fac- tors : George W. Michael, general merchandise ; C. A. Wiler, general dealer ; A. W. Mowrey, hardware and paints; Ebert & Eby, furniture and under- taking; Bert W. Mowrey, furniture and undertaking; C. C. Fresh, hotel and feed barn; Clemen C. Holmes, harness and shoemaking; Arthur J. Garver, wagonmaking and blacksmithing; Clifton Martin, hay, grain and potatoes ; Simson & Ginter, hay, grain and potatoes ; David Moser, furs, skins and pelts.
CHESTER TOWNSHIP.
Chester township is the second from the north line of Wayne county and on the western line of the county, Ashland county, Ohio, being on its western border. It is seven miles from east to west and six north and south. With several other sub-divisions of the county, it was organized into a civil township March 5, 1816. Even before its real organization, it was styled Chestnut township, or the chestnut region, on account of its great growth of that kind of timber. In 1870 the township had a population of one thousand nine hundred and twenty-one. By the time the 1900 United States census was compiled it had decreased to one thousand six hundred and forty-eight.
The earliest settlers in the township were Judge James Robinson, Samuel Funk, Phineas Summerton, John Moyers, the Hillis boys and their mothers, John Emory, John Lowery, the Cunninghams, Joseph Aikens, James Fulton, Jacob Worst, Adam Rumbaugh, John, Abram and Isaac Myers, Samuel Vanosdol, Phineas Davis, Anthony Camp, Michael Mowrey, Philip Hoff- linger, Daniel and John Pittinger, Nathaniel Paxton, William and Hugh Adams, Benjamin Emmons, John Campbell, Thomas Johnston, John A.
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Kelley, Abraham Ecker, Isaac White, Henry Sapp, John Hern and John Helman. As the county is now bounded, some of these would be located in what is now Ashland county.
Chester township has within its borders the following platted towns and villages : Cedar Valley postoffice, Overton, New Pittsburg, West Union, or Lattsburg.
New Pittsburg was laid out March 6, 1829, by George H. Hovey. At this point John Hall built the first house and kept a hotel.
Lattsburg (West Union) was platted by J. W. Hoegner for Jacob Grose, February 27, 1851. The name of the village was changed in 1855 from West Union to Lattasburg, after Ephraim Latta. Here John Fesig built the first house, a log structure on the northeast corner of the public square. He used it for both a shop and residence. Latta bought out Fesig and began the manufacture of hand sickles. The postoffice was established here May 14, 1867, when W. C. Baker received his first appointment, and who continued many years as postmaster. Samuel Bridenstein started the first store in which dry goods were carried. Henry Allspaugh was the first to practice medicine in the town. It is claimed by old residents that the first person to die was a woman who was buried in the middle of the road (as later surveyed out ), between Lattasburg and the German Baptist church.
Concerning the first settler in Chester township, it may be here recorded that James Robison, brother of Thomas and David, so well known in the city of Wooster, was born February 17, 1787, in Franklin county, Pennsyl- vania, and in 1813 immigrated to Wayne county, Ohio, temporarily stopping in Wooster, the same year building the saw-mill on Little Killbuck creek, in the southwest corner of Chester township. He then became a citizen of Chester township, three years prior to its organization. A saw-mill, in those early days, was next in importance to a grist-mill, and hence the name of Robison's Mills became universally and popularly known throughout the entire western part of Wayne county, and was for many years after its builder had been laid away with other pioneers of the county. While the mill itself has for more than forty years been in ruins and decay, yet the locality is often spoken of as "Robison's Mill." Mr. Robison, aided by a single individual, spent three months in digging the race for the old saw-mill. The woolen factory, though not so ancient an institution as the mill, ranked among the best of its kind in the county, and was built at a very early period. During his presence in Columbiana county, in the discharge of his duties as a member of the Ohio Legislature, it was burned, as a result of defective flues. The
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saw-mill was also swept away by the flames. On his return, without indul- gence in any surmises or complaint, he quietly set about rebuilding the factory and the mill. He placed in new and better machinery in both factory and saw-mill. Before the disastrous fire, he simply carded, spun and pulled, but after the rebuilding he made other additions and introduced the manu- facture of yarns, blankets, cloths, etc.
Here was the waterpower, and Mr. Robison had the enterprise and intel- ligence to utilize it, and it became not only a benefit, but a benefaction to the whole community. He was not a visionary man, but practical, and devoted himself to material enterprises. He had been a soldier in the war of 1812-14 and supplied the army of Gen. W. H. Harrison with provisions, at Fort Meigs, his wagon on one instance standing in the woods loaded with flour, on what is now known as the Robison hill, to the south of Little Killbuck.
WAYNE TOWNSHIP.
Wayne township derives its name from the county, which was named for Gen. Anthony Wayne-"Mad Anthony." This township is centrally lo- cated in the county and touches the incorporate line of the city of Wooster, the seat of justice. It is a full congressional township, six miles square. It dates its organization from October 12, 1816, and in 1870 had reached a pop- ulation numbering one thousand seven hundred and fourteen. Its popula- tion according to the federal census of 1900 was one thousand seven hundred and eleven.
The first white man to settle within the limits of this township was among the following, but it is not certain who did actually effect the first clearing. The first pioneer band was as follows: James Glass, the Roses, the Feazles, the Clarks, Meeks, Turners, Thomas Armstrong, Moses Thomp- son, Thomas Pomeroy, Henry Perrine, George Gibson, Ralph Cherry, John and Peter Vanostran, Fred Garver, Armstrong Davison, John Richey, John and Peter Bacher, Thomas Beall, Peter Anspaugh, Peter Eiker, George Bair, Henry Snyder, Peter and Jacob Ihrig, William Elgin, Mordecai Boon, Peter Everly, Jacob Seiford, Benjamin Miller, Abraham Vanmeter, William Bur- gan, Alexander Hanna.
George Blair and Thomas Armstrong were the first justices of the peace.
Fred Garver erected the first saw-mill in the township, in 1814. A year later he built the first grist-mill, deriving his water power from the Little Apple creek.
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Being so near the city of Wooster, there have never grown up any towns of much importance in Wayne township. The only one now in existence is Madisonburg, in the center of the township.
The churches and schools of this township are treated in the two chap- ters on these respective subjects, and to which the reader is referred.
While it is not the object of this volume to treat much on the personal histories of many of the pioneers, as many are fully treated in the biograph- ical volume of this work, yet it may be of historic interest to mention, in this township history, something concerning the life and deeds of the Wasson family.
Joseph Wasson, Sr., was born in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, March 29. 1775. His grandson. Joseph Wasson, was born June 30, 1839, two miles east of Congress village, Wayne county, Ohio, and until the age of eighteen years, remained upon the farm. when he first began his ventures upon the untried seas of life's journeys. He spent much of his life on the Pacific coast, where he achieved a reputation as a writer. He was for many years a newspaper man, acting as editor, proprietor and correspondent. He at- tended the Vienna Exposition as a special correspondent for Forney's Press, writing a series of brilliant letters, signed "Josef." On his return, he was despatched to New Orleans by the Press and New York Times as a corre- spondent. He was one of the early contributors to the Overland Monthly. He was in the campaign and within twelve miles of General Custer when he was destroyed by the Indians, a correspondent of Eastern papers and furnish- ing the news of that region to the Associated Press. He finally settled down in such work and profession in San Francisco, California.
GREENE TOWNSHIP.
Greene township is second from the north as well as from the east line of Wayne county-in it the thriving city of Orrville is situated-and it was organized February 5, 1817, taking its name from Major-Gen. Nathaniel Greene, a Revolutionary soldier and a native of Warwick, Rhode Island. The population has grown from two thousand seven hundred and fifteen in 1870 to three thousand three hundred and eighteen in 1900, as shown by the fed- eral census. The first township officers were: Trustees, Peter Flickinger, George Bodyston, Thomas Hayes; treasurer, Thomas Dawson; clerk, David Boydston.
Of the first settlers and the first events in this township let it be recorded
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in this connection that the inhabitants of this part of Wayne county observed one peculiarity in the first occupancy of it. It was a wilderness, overgrown with timber, with the exception of about twelve acres on the southwest quarter of section 3, which was clear of trees, stumps, and even roots, and was called by the first comers "the Indian field."
Tradition is not always reliable to pin history to, but in the absence of the recorded facts we always must place some credence to traditionary fea- tures of early settlements. In this case a tradition runs thus: As early as 1802, a party of four young men, who had passed from Pennsylvania to Cleveland, and leaving the latter place for Tuscarawa, now Coshocton, were attacked by the Indians and one of their number killed, when the remaining three retrated by the line of trees they had blazed. The bullet that killed the young man entered a small oak tree, which the Indians notched high above the ground. A few years later two of the three young men, accompa- nied by others, returned to the spot of the murder, discovered the notched tree, but saw no remains of their dead comrade. This was evidently the first white person to meet death within what is now Greene township.
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