USA > Ohio > Ross County > Chillicothe > Ohio centennial anniversary celebration at Chillicothe, May 20-21, 1903 : under the auspices of the Ohio State Archaelogical and Historical Society : complete proceedings > Part 3
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From the time Ohio became a state her growth and progress have been factors in the growth and development of the nation.
In times of war her people have shown their patriotism by their readiness to respond to the call to arms; and among the military heroes she is proud to number among her sons such national idols as Grant, Sherman, Sheridan and Custer.
In times of peace she has contributed her full quota to the ranks of the nation's statesmen, and the nation has honored Ohio by elevating five of her sons to the presidency, Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Harrison and Mckinley.
Chillicothe claims many of Ohio's distinguished sons, among whom may be mentioned Massie, Tiffin, Worthington, McArthur, Allen and Thurman; she has furnished to the commonwealth four governors, and to the nation four senators and nine repre- sentatives in Congress, and the wife of one of its chief execu- tives.
We are fortunate in having with us to-day in the person of the eloquent gentleman who has presented this tablet on behalf of its donors, a lineal descendant of our first governor, Edward Tiffin; and in the person of the young lady who unveiled it a great-granddaughter of Governor McArthur and a granddaugh- ter of William Allen, the last of Ross County's citizens to occupy the governor's chair.
I have the honor to represent the people of this city and county, and to accept for them, and in their name, this tablet, donated and erected by the Century Club, the Daughters of the Revolution, the Daughters of the American Revolution and nu- merous citizens, in commemoration of the adoption of the first constitution of the state of Ohio, and on the one hundredth an- niversary thereof.
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S COUNTY USED
SEAL OF THE STA
4000+1800+HS
OHIO
*1802%
ON THIS SITE STOOD THE FIRST STATE HOUSE OF OHIO. WHEREIN WAS ADOPTED THE ORIGINAL CONSTITUTION OF THE COMMONWEALTH NOVEMBER XXIX MDCCCII
Ohio Arch. and His. Society Publications.
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May it remain in its place to relate its historic story to all who may pause to read so long as Ohio remains a state and re- tains her proud position in the union of states.
DISTINGUISHED VISITORS.
After an invitation extended by Mr. H. H. Bennett to the people to attend the afternoon ceremonies at Memorial Hall, an informal reception was held in the court house. The strangers were in- troduced to Col. Wm. N. King, of Columbus, great-grandson of Gov. Worthington, Mrs. Mary Manly, Miss Diathea Cook, Mrs. Frank Gilmore and Miss Eleanor Cook, granddaugh- ters of Gov. Tiffin ; Col. Matthews and sister, Mrs. Blackburn, of Cleveland, great-grandchildren of Gov. Hunting- ton; Dr. Walter S. Scott, W. Allen Scott, descendants of Gov. McArthur and Gov. William Allen; Miss Doro- thy W. McArthur and Mrs. Allen W. McArthur, relatives of Gov. McAr- H. H. BENNETT. thur, and Mr. C. E. Kirker, of Manchester, great-grandson and Mrs. C. E. Bedwell, of Columbus, great-granddaughter of Speaker Kirker of the first Ohio House of Representatives, and also gov- ernor of the state ; Gen. J. Warren Keifer, of Springfield, speaker of the United States House of Representatives and chairman of the State Centennial Commission and Historical Society Exec- utive Committee; Mr. S. S. Knabenshue, editor of the Toledo Blade, and a noted archæologist; Judge Rush R. Sloane, San- dusky, president of the Fire Lands Historical Society; Mr. E. O. Randall, secretary of the Ohio State Archæological and His- torical Society ; Mr. Fred. J. Heer, state printer and publisher of the Ohio State Historical Society publications.
MEMORIAL HALL EXERCISES.
The afternoon exercises at Memorial Hall were of a most in- teresting character and the attendance was large. Judge J. C.
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Douglas presided and after a patriotic chorus by the Euterpean club, Mr. William T. McClintick, of Chillicothe, was introduced and spoke as follows :
Fellow-Countrymen:
I bid you a hearty welcome on this, the day which marks the one hundredth year since the adoption of the first constitu- tion of the state of Ohio.
It is fit that one who was born in Ohio as early as February, 1819, should bid you such a welcome, for such a one may well serve as a connecting link between the past and the present,-the past of one hundred years ago, when Ohio was almost a wilderness, and the present, when it is almost a garden full of the fruits and flowers of the highest cultivation, and when the wilderness has literally been made to bloom and blossom as the rose.
I have said that I feel myself to be a connecting link between the past and present, and so I am, for I have per- WILLIAM T. MCCLINTICK. sonally known all the governors of the state from Edward Tiffin and Thomas Worthington down to our present governor, George K. Nash, except Samuel Hunt- ington, who died in 1817, before I was born; Return Jonathan Meigs, who died in 1825, when I was but six years old, and Ethan Allen Brown, who removed from the state at an early day.
I had the honor of having a tooth pulled by Dr. Edward Tiffin, in my childhood, and my recollection of Governor Worth- ington riding down High street on Sunday morning on a gray horse, with his little son, William Drake, behind him, hitching his horse to a post and then mounting the stile into my father's front yard and making his way, with his little son, to a rear room in my father's house to attend a Methodist class meeting, of which my father was the leader, is as fresh as if it had happened yes- terday. William Drake and myself were provided with small stools on which we sat while the meeting progressed. I also fol-
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lowed the procession which carried Governor Worthington to his grave, at Adena, in 1827.
Nathaniel Massie, the surveyor and pioneer of the North- west and the founder of our town of Chillicothe in 1796, died before I was born, but I knew his widow and all his children, all his grandchildren and many of his great-grandchildren. One of his grandsons, Hon. D. M. Massie, is a resident of our city, and would gladly have participated with us in this celebration, did not his duties as commissioner in Cuba forbid his presence here.
I might name many other distinguished men of that early period with whom I have spoken and shaken hands, such as Jacob Burnet, that great lawyer and judge, who came to Ohio in 1796, and remained here until his death in 1853; William Henry Har- rison, the hero of Tippecanoe, whose history is identified with the Northwest Territory, and the state of Ohio, from 1795 or earlier, until his death at the White House in Washington City in April, 1841, while president of the United States; Duncan McArthur, whose services in peace and war are known to us all, and who died at his Fruit Hill home, near this city, in 1840,- long will his memory be honored and revered; William Creighton, Jr., who passed through Chillicothe on his way to Kentucky, in 1796, look- ing for a location, and after returning to Virginia, again came, in 1798, to Chillicothe, where he made his permanent home. After the admission of Ohio into the Union, he was our first secretary of state; afterward United States attorney for the dis- trict of Ohio ; then a member of the Ohio Legislature, and a mem- ber of the United States Congress, in which office he served at intervals for many years. He was president of the branch bank of the United States in Chillicothe during its existence, and was appointed to the office of United States district judge in 1828, which he held until March 4, 1829. After his retirement from Congress in 1833 he was not again a candidate for any public office. He was, along with Col. Wm. Key Bond, my preceptor in law studies from 1837 to 1840, and afterward my partner in prac- tice. I never knew a more genial and kindly man, a more sincere lover of the poor, or a stauncher friend. He died October 2, 1851.
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Did time permit, I might swell this list to a very large num- ber of the eminent men of that early period with whom I was per- sonally acquainted.
The change in the face of the country which has taken place in that part of the Great West which constitutes the state of Ohio, since the adoption of the state constitution in 1802, and the present time, might well challenge comment, as most extra- ordinary and wonderful - but we must hasten to consider the story of the old house memorable in the history of the state as the first state house of Ohio.
My early recollection of the court house square, bounded east by Paint street, north by the alley between Second and Main streets, west by private property (now the Presbyterian church), and south by Main street, goes back to a period when there were but three houses on the lot. These were the court house proper, of stone, about sixty feet square, curving outwardly on the west side; another brick house of two stories of about the same size as the court house, which stood about ten feet south of it, fronting toward Main street, the upper story of which was connected with the upper story of the court house by an en- closed corridor, lighted by windows on either side. The third house was the jail, in the rear of the court house, in which Wil- liam Rutledge, the jailor, resided with his family.
I was told in my childhood that the brick house fronting toward Main street had been a part of the state house prior to the removal of the capital from Chillicothe to Columbus, the lower story being occupied by the state offices, and the upper story by the Ohio Senate; while the upper story of the court house was occupied by the House of Representatives, the en- closed corridor being the means of communication between the two houses, through which a sergeant-at-arms could pass, or one body join the other when required to meet in joint session.
The lower room of the court house proper was used for the sittings of the United States District and Circuit Courts, the Su- preme Court of Ohio, and the Court of Common Pleas of the county.
I do not remember the tearing down and removal of the building which had its frontage toward Main street. It was prob-
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ably done after 1830, and contemporaneously with the erection of the two-story brick edifice at the northwest corner of Main and Paint streets, which latter had a frontage of probably forty feet on Paint street, and fifty feet on Main street, the lower story be- ing occupied on Paint street by the offices of the clerk of courts and the county auditor, and the frontage on Main street by a wide hall and stairway and the office of the county recorder. The upper story was occupied by lawyers' offices.
I was admitted to the bar of Ohio in March, 1840. I remem- ber the court room as it was then, and doubtless had been from the beginning. The judge's bench was in the curve at the west side, about six or eight feet above the floor, with space for the presiding judge and his three associates in the Common Pleas ; the clerk's desk in front, about four feet lower, with juror's seats on either side, on the same level; the sheriff's box and the wit- ness stand on the south side, and the lawyers' desks arranged in front, the whole enclosed by a bar, so as to shut it off from the crowd of spectators who thronged the room on the opening day of the court or when causes of general interest were being heard. Four tall, fluted pillars were interspersed at equal intervals for. the support of the upper floor.
The room was heated in winter by a wide open fire-place, in- side the bar, on the north side of the house, and by an old-fash- ioned tin plate stove in the center, outside the bar.
The stairway started near a door on the north side of the house, and extended upward with the wall on that side, about half way, when it turned to the right along the east side, to the upper floor, which was occupied by a large room for the use of the grand and petit juries as occasion required, with two smaller rooms for witnesses and other purposes. In this large upper room were also held the meetings of literary societies, with lec- tures on literary subjects, and otherwise by the citizens, when not occupied for public purposes.
Later a two-story building of limited dimensions was erected south of the court house, fronting directly on Main street, the lower story of which, when I returned from college in 1837, was occupied by a volunteer fire company, the "Citizen's," of which I was a member, and the upper story for the mayor's office. This
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building was not removed until 1853 or 1854, prior to the erection of the present court house.
In 1840, the bench was occupied by the Hon. John H. Keith as presiding judge, with his three associates, from the business walks of life. Col. Wm. Key Bond had removed to Cincinnati and Gen. John L. Green had taken his place as the partner of Mr. Creighton. The firms Creighton & Green and Allen & Thurman had the largest practice. The other lawyers were Thomas Scott & Son, Henry Brush, Benjamin G. Leonard, Frederick Grimke, Richard Douglas, Joseph Sill, William S. Murphy, Jonathan F. Woodside, Henry Massie, John L. Taylor, Robert Bethel, Gusta- vus Scott, James Caldwell, Amos Holton, and perhaps others, not now recalled.
Mr. Theodore Sherer, who had read the law with Messrs. Allen & Thurman, and I, with Creighton & Bond, were admitted to the bar by the Supreme Court on the circuit in Scioto County, Ohio, in March, 1840. From that time we continued to fight our legal battles in the old court house until the spring of 1852, when one day in March of that year, I was passing through the court house yard on the way to my office upstairs in the building I have heretofore described as on the corner of Main and Paint streets, I heard Charles Martin, then sheriff of the county, crying off, under the order of the county commissioners, the court house for sale. "Who bids?" said he. In jest I said, "Seventy-five dollars," and passed on to my office, forgetful of my jest, and was soon absorbed in the study of some case. What was my surprise, when some minutes later the sheriff ap- peared to inform me that I was the purchaser of the court house. What was I to do with it? It ought to have been allowed to stand as a monument of the early days in Ohio history, but the commissioners were inexorable, and the terms of sale required it to be taken down and removed without delay. Unfortunately for the city, but very fortunately for me, "the great fire" occurred on April 1, 1852, and a demand for stone, brick and lumber sprang up for rebuilding, and so the old court house vanished into cellar walls, stables, etc., and became a thing of the past save a few relics which curiosity lovers preserved.
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The court house square was soon covered with stone and lum- ber for the present building, but the corner stone was not laid until July 12, 1855, when the Hon. Thomas Scott and myself had the honor of delivering addresses on the occasion from a point where the northeast pillar of the portico now stands.
Such was my personal connection with the building, on whose frontage we have this day placed a tablet commemorating
" THE SITE ON WHICH STOOD THE FIRST STATE HOUSE OF OHIO WHEREIN WAS ADOPTED THE ORIGINAL CONSTITUTION OF THE COMMONWEALTH."
THE FIRST CONSTITUTION.
WHAT INFLUENCED ITS ADOPTION AND ITS INFLUENCE ON OHIO.
Hon. Daniel J. Ryan, of Columbus, ex-secretary of state of Ohio, author of "The Constitutional History of Ohio" and a trustee of the Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, was introduced by Judge J. C. Douglas, and spoke as follows : Fellow-Citizens of Ohio:
In order to appreciate intelligently the event which we cele- brate here to-day it is necessary that we have a clear conception of the principal actors concerned therein, and of the times and sur- roundings of a century ago in the Sci- oto Valley. The first constitutional convention, from an intellectual stand- point, is the greatest, as well as the most picturesque episode in the history of our state, and the events which led up to it read like a romance. The conversion of a wilderness into a garden; the invasion of the Virgin- ians; the overthrow of the great Ar- thur St. Clair; the struggle for state- hood; the victory of the people over the aristocracy; the framing of the HON. D. J. RYAN. constitution for a people without their consultation or consent, are all events that form a background for a picture that has no
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parallel in American history. And all these scenes were enacted in a theatre of intellect; the only weapons were tongues and pens, but they were directed by men who for brains and bravery are worthy of every tribute of admiration and respect that the people of Ohio can to-day bestow upon them.
Six years prior to 1802, there came into the Scioto Valley a young Virginian named Nathaniel Massie. He had served in the Revolutionary War from his native state at the age of seventeen, and at nineteen started to Kentucky to pursue his vocation of surveying the public lands and placing warrants for soldiers of the Revolution. He founded Manchester in Adams County, and in 1796 penetrated the Scioto Valley, which was then a beauti- ful but savagely wild territory. He located in the region about us to-day and laid out Chillicothe. It is easy to understand how he was attracted to this glorious land, which then, as now, bore all the evidence of the richness of nature.
One of his companions in his tours of surveying and explo- ration was John McDonald, afterward of Poplar Ridge in this (Ross) county, and sixty-two years ago he wrote a description of the land about Chillicothe as he saw it with Massie in 1796. His little volume-"McDonald's Sketches"-is now exceedingly rare and on that account I take the liberty to repeat in his plain style what he wrote. His description of the surroundings of the site selected by Massie for his town, and the condition of the same territory to-day shows a wondrous transformation from a land of savagery to the garden spot of a commonwealth of the highest civilization. Here is his picture of the Scioto Valley in the spring of 1796: "About four or five miles above the mouth of Paint Creek, the river (Scioto) suddenly makes a bend, and runs a short distance east, thence southeast to the mouth of Paint Creek. That stream, the largest tributary of the Scioto, for four or five miles above its mouth, runs almost parallel with the Scioto. Be- tween these two streams there is a large and beautiful bottom, four or five miles in length, and varying from one to two miles in breadth, and contains within the space upwards of three thousand acres. This bottom (as also the bottoms of the Scioto and Paint Creek generally), is very fertile; the loam of alluvial formation being from three to ten feet in depth. These bottoms, when first
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"settled, were generally covered by a heavy growth of timber, such as black walnut, sugar tree, cherry, buckeye, hackberry and other trees which denote a rich soil. A portion of them, however, were found destitute of timber, and formed beautiful prairies, clothed with blue grass and blue sedgegrass, which grew to the height of from four to eight feet, and furnished a bountiful supply of pas- ture in summer and hay in winter, for the live stock of the set- tlers. The outer edges of these prairies were beautifully fringed around with the plum tree, the red and black haw, the mulberry and crab apple. In the month of May, when those nurseries of nature's God were in full bloom, the sight was completely grati- fied, while the fragrance and delicious perfume, which filled the surrounding atmosphere, was sufficient to fill and lull the soul with ecstacies of pleasure. The western boundary of this valley, between the two streams, is a hill two or three hundred feet in height. Its base to the south is closely washed by Paint Creek, and where this stream first enters the valley, it terminates in an abrupt point, and then extends upon the valley of the Scioto, in a northwest and north course, for many miles, and forms the west- ern boundary of the bottoms along that stream. From the point where the hill abruptly terminates at Paint Creek, running north- northeast at the distance of about one mile across the valley, you reach the bank of the Scioto, at the sudden bend it makes to the east. The valley between this bend of the Scioto and Paint Creek, immediately below the point of the hill, was selected as a site for the town. This part of the valley was chosen, as it consisted of the high and dry land not subject to the floods of the river, which frequently inundated the valley towards the mouth of Paint Creek."
It was amid these natural surroundings that Massie selected the site that was to be the standing point of a great, powerful, wealthy and patriotic state.
The territory of the Scioto Valley had for centuries been the selected living place of divers races of men. In the very dawn of human knowledge it was populated by the mysterious race of mound builders and was the seat of their cities, camping places, fortifications and altars. Attracted, doubtless, by the magnificent soil, beautiful scenery and natural resources, both of the animal
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and vegetable kingdom, they filled this valley in great numbers until driven away or destroyed by a succeeding race. After them came the Shawanees, famed for their bravery and numbers, and occupied for perhaps centuries the land along the Scioto River in their populous towns. They too, lived in this elysium of nat- ural bliss, receiving from bounteous nature all that forest and chase could give. The very beauty and richness of the land made them guard it with such jealous spirit, that when Massie first entered it, it was a great and expansive territory of danger and death to the white man.
Chillicothe, in the very heart of the Virginia Military Dis- trict, at once attracted immigration from Virginia. It was in the midst of a great domain reserved by that state for the use and settlement of her loyal sons that served in the war for inde- pendence. The influx of settlers commenced as soon as the town was laid out and even before the winter of 1796 it had stores and taverns and shops for mechanics. The influence of civilized life soon began to unfold and within a few years a substantial town was in full operation, with a population of one thousand.
In the spring of 1798 there came to Chillicothe from Berkeley County, Virginia, one whose life and actions influenced the his- tory of Ohio in a greater degree than any man in its history. This was Edward Tiffin. He played such an important part in subse- quent events, including the first constitutional convention, that we may well pause in our labors to-day to view a full length portrait of his remarkable career. It will help us to understand his power and the wonderful work he accomplished. He appeared upon the scene of action in the Northwest Territory in its creative period, when the work of moulding the destinies of a future com- monwealth was committed to the care of very few men. Head and shoulders above them all stood Edward Tiffin. His subse -- quent official life displayed a greater general average of states- manship than any of his contemporaries. He met successfully all the opportunities and responsibilities of his life, which is the best indication of ability. His work in creating, advancing and developing Ohio has not been equalled by any man in its history. His boyhood was spent in the city of Carlisle, England, where he was born June 19, 1766. He emigrated to this country when
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eighteen, and after an excellent medical education obtained in the University of Pennsylvania, settled in Berkeley County, Vir- ginia. There amid the scenes and lives of the early Virginians he spent several years as a quiet and successful physician. When he came to Chillicothe he was still a physician, practicing with marked success financially and professionally. In the sparsely settled Scioto Valley his labors carried him over many miles of travel, and he formed the friendships that explain much of his popularity in after years. He had decided views on politics ; the principles of Jefferson were adopted by him early in his Virginian life, and his anti-Federal proclivities were well-known in his new home.
In 1799 the people of the Northwest Territory assumed the legislative form of government and under the provisions of the Ordinance of 1787, they elected a legislature, there being at that time five thousand male voters in the territory. Dr. Tiffin was sent as representative from Chillicothe and upon the assembling of the first Territorial Legislature at Cincinnati he was unani- mously elected speaker of the House of Representatives, which position he held until Ohio became a state. He was a man of strong religious and moral convictions. In his early life he was an Episcopalian ; in 1790 he associated himself with the Metho- dist Church and was consecrated by Francis Asbury, the mis- sionary bishop, as a local preacher. Thus he brought into the new territory beyond the Ohio, with his professional skill, the still greater influence of the spiritual physician. In both capaci- ties he firmly held the confidence of his fellow-citizens throughout his life. Upon his entry into the Church he manumitted his slaves, and his subsequent record shows how sincere were his convictions on this subject. As president of the first constitu- tional convention he won still greater honors and established his reputation as a man of unquestioned ability; indeed so pro- nounced and universal was this that he was elected governor of the new state in January, 1803, without opposition. He was re- elected in 1805, without opposition, and in 1807 declined a third term which public sentiment was ready to confer upon him. Dur- ing his second term he summarily arrested the participants in the
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