USA > Ohio > Wyandot County > The History of Wyandot County, Ohio, containing a history of the county, its townships, towns general and local statistics, military record, portraits of early settlers and prominent men etc > Part 57
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beauty of spring. Even in a spasmodic outburst of " hallelujah," he would scatter the balm of a thousand flowers and bring some sister to her feet with " glory to God!"
And yet this Tabler loved his chicken like other ministers, and would even growl if the collections did not come up to his expectation of christian fortitude. He had a weakness for some of the good looking sisters, so Bishop Tuttle said, but every body shook his fist and called Bishop Tuttle a liar. Whatever Tabler might have been in the kitchen or a back room is nothing to us as a truthful historian. We only know him as a great reviv- alist, who could murder the King's English and at the same time charm you with its destruction. He was a man who could give thought and ex- pression to sound, and fasten it with the holy wag of his head. To the en- thusiastic in the faith he was irresistible. He could say " come " three times with that fervor, feeling and solicitude, that you would feel yourself involuntarily rising to your feet with a readiness to wade in. He could in- stil a whole sermon into these three words of invitation, and the result was the mourner's bench was a popular resort for half the congregation. Many souls were converted that winter to thaw out in the spring, yet there were others who proved faithful to the last; and one or two are still living here who thank Tabler for pointing them to the light that shines from another world.
RAMSAY.
His name was Ramsay, and he gloried in the pleasing ripple that these six letters made in weaving their music into syllables. He informed the sketcher that it was pronounced Ram-zee, with a trip-hammer accent on the ram part. The zee was simply a beautiful French zephyr to ornament be- neficent design in embellishing the individuality of an eminent people. That Ramsay was a name of distinction; of Scottish origin; of distinguished scholars, poets, painters and physicians. That Ramsay Alexander was au- thority on the anatomy of the heart, brain and liver. That Ramsay Allan was a painter whose master-pieces made the Raphael Madonna look sick; " and Bob, the Greek Slave that Major Sears talks so much about, is nothing but a hitching-post in comparison to the fair and lovely virgin that one of my ancestors chiseled out of a common nigger-head." That Chevalier Ram- say wrote the " Travels of Cyrus " and the " Life of Fenelon," and although a Scotchman, wrote them in French. That the balance of foreign Ramsays just made the hemisphere brilliant with the grandeur of their thought and the wonder of their achievements, but that he was a hairpin from the cush- ion of David Ramsay, an American historian and physician, who was born in Lancaster, Penn., a short time before the American eagle.
The Ramsay under discussion dropped from, no one knows where, upon a forty-acre tract of unimproved land in Antrim Township, and commenced life as a farmer. He was a tall, good-looking fellow, only remarkable for the size of his lips, and the critical glare that made prominent a large pair of blue eyes. His energy was only exceeded by his ambition. To battle life in the woods with convenience and economy, he married; but making rails at 50 cents a hundred didn't agree with young Ramsay's diaphragm, and, concluding that there was an easier road to fortune, it was not long be- fore a man of his indomitable will found and pursued it. In reading one of Jayne's almanacs and learning of the fabulous sums of money made out of pills and cough syrup, Ramsay made up his mind to be a doctor, and every spare moment from daily labor was given to the study of medicine. Lacking in education, the study was a difficult one; for those terrible Latin
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jawbreakers would shake him up and hold him suspended over the picture of a skeleton, in that doubt and despair which rattled through his head in a thousand aches. But he did not surrender-he wasn't that kind of a Ram- say. He had the distinction of his Scotch lineage to brace him, and what he lacked in classics was more than made up by the magic spell which sur- rounded a great name-the name of Ramsay!
After a short course of study he scratched his name upon a little tin sign, and, illuminating it with the professional affix, commenced practice in or near the village of Wyandot. The ills common to new countries are the agues and fevers which quinine and calomel knock in the head without the slightest provocation, and the Doctor had good success.
He removed to Upper Sandusky and formed a partnership with Dr. Watson, killing and curing under the firm name of Watson & Ramsay. In winters, these men alternated in attending lectures at Cleveland, as one hand could generally run the ague business during the dull season. While Ram- say had the experience of considerable practice, he had never whittled the benches of a lecture room; so when it came his turn to break for Cleveland, he spread himself in the best toggery that could creep from under the artis- tic fingers of Peter Huffman. With his Dundreary whiskers, cane and eye- glass, he looked like an Irish-Italian impressario, but his name was still Ramsay. When he returned from Cleveland he brought back with him a manikin and a pica edition of Shakspeare. This Shakspeare was a second- hand paper copy that would pleasantly fill a wheelbarrow, and the manikin occupied about the same space.
Ramsay, through his early struggles and disappointments, had become quite a misanthrope. He acknowledged without decent hesitancy that he no longer loved his wife nor cared for his children; that his marriage was the result of ignorance, and his family a misfortune. He had an aversion for the society of men, and was only in agreeable elements when he had for a companion some mild-eyed boy who could listen enchanted at the wonders of Ramsay; and the sketcher was usually that mild-eyed imitation of bifur- cated humanity. He used to say that the success of a young physician was in looking wise and feeding his patient on any amount of harmless prepa- rations, such as white sugar, flour, starch, etc. He said he gained his first triumph by looking at old Brown's tongue, which was wrapped in about four coats of dog-leg tobacco; and the altisonant explanation he gave of the color of that tongue, conducting it through the realms of most beautiful metaphor to the lower lobe of the old man's liver, met with a pleasing re- sponse. The old patient, full of gratitude, shook the Doctor's hand, and said he was the only physician that understood his case, He knew it was his liver, but that contrary old woman of his always insisted that it was nothing but dog-leg. So Ramsay put on a wise look and treated this man for a bad liver. He left him a half peck of pulverized licorice to be taken in small doses with the regularity of clock work, spreading over all the caution that his patient, during the use of this powerful medicine, should beware of stimulants, especially anything that had the narcotic effect of garlic or tobacco. He threw in the garlic to pull the old man off the scent. The result was that in a few days old Brown was himself again, sounding the praises of Ramsay all over the neighborhood. He only charged him $50, which Brown thought was entirely too cheap, and in addition made the doctor lug home a spring calf and a bag of potatoes. He owed his re- suscitated liver to Ramsay, and if he wanted a barn raised or a note in- dorsed, all he had to do was to call on his friend Brown. At this, Ramsay
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melted to tears, and said he wouldn't have charged a cent, but that liver medicine was so terribly expensive. It could be got nowhere nearer than the Alps; that it was discovered by Bonaparte while crossing the Red Sea- a beautiful brook of pure carmine which meanders through a crevice in that wonderful peak. " History, Brown, history, is where the effulgence of this beneficent drug first poured upon me its limpid light. No other physician has this wonderful work of 'Bonaparte after a Bad Liver.' "
The manikin which Ramsay brought from Cleveland locked very natural in wax and bright colors, representing all parts of the human frame with the skin off. He said it was modeled after Alexander the Great, but as the Alexander part was missing, he would call it Susan. The pica copy of Shakespeare had its history which the doctor rattled off with a flourish, then both were placed in a large store box. One morning the manikin was miss- ing; burglars had crawled through a back window and borrowed it. The doctor was in a whirl of excitement. All his fond hopes of a summer study had vanished. Police! police !! Officers were notified of the theft, and a reward offered. The greatest vigilance and the most active search availed nothing. All the doctor could do was to mourn over his loss. "If they had only taken the Shakespeare, but the manikin, my God!" A few days after, the lost was found in the old Council House with the following card tied to its left ear:
" My dear Ram-We are through with the business, but since your manikin has been sleeping for the last week with Russell Bigelow, we consider its character ruin."
The burglars and the writer of this note were probably graduates from Brown's shoe shop.
Ramsay had a vain desire to be great or at least rich; and conceiving the idea that wife and family were a hindrance to success, deserted them -- leaving wife and two beautiful children forever! The poor woman was heart-broken over this dastardly, unnatural act, for she idolized her husband.
Many years passed before the whereabouts of Ramsay became known. He had gone to New York, engaged in practice as a specialist in private diseases and amassed a fortune. Several years ago he was smitten with the charms of a beautiful Spanish lady who was traveling in America with her mother. The Doctor, who contended that love was a humbug, acknowledged the soft pas- sion to the Spanish belle and pleaded for her hand. But the belle hesitated with " Si hay calculos, tomense repetidas dosis de aceite de oliva que hayan pasado;" which means in English that "the Ramsay was too entirely too too d-d old for La Senora Ambrosia," and before her mother would per- mit the surrender of her youthful beauty to the rich old specialist, he must come down with the pewter. An ante-nuptial contract was made placing to the credit of the daughter $25,000 in bounds, with a neat little clause in- serted, that on the death of the daughter, bonds and their increase should pass over absolutely into possession of the mother. The marriage took place and the fashionable watering places sparkled with their `presence. It was not long, however, before the beautiful belle began to pine for the sun-lit skies of her Spanish home. The bloom faded from her cheeks, and some- thing like a cough had in it the terror of a most dreaded disease. The gentle mother insisted that her daughter should look upon her beloved Spain once more, assuring him that it would bring back the roses to his bonny bride. Would he accompany them? How could he with a practice on his hands worth twenty thousand a year; so he kissed his lovely wife good-bye and prayed for a speedy and safe return.
After a few months' absence a telegram announced her death, and this
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was soon followed by a fashionably dressed corpse, embalmed and hermeti- cally sealed in an elegant and costly casket. The crystal front exposed a profusion of flowers through which peeped the face of a dead beauty. Did the Doctor recognize that loved and cherished face? Most assuredly, al- though disease and death had stripped it of all its charms. His grief was intense, and he never recovered from it, until his Spanish mother-in-law de- manded her rights under the marriage contract-the $25,000 that was set- tled upon her daughter with a tender reversion to the mother. Ramsay having his suspicions aroused, had the body exhumed, but as all first-class Spanish corpses look alike when several months old the examination was everything but satisfactory. Suit was commenced to establish a conspiracy and recover back the money, and a New York court tussled with Ramsay and the mother-in-law for several weeks, giving in at last to the latter, who pocketed the securities and left for Spain.
It was intimated that the beautiful La Belle returned from heaven by way of the Isthmus as soon as the $25, 000 were secured, and is now the wife of a curled mustache who knows how to handle the supple and unscrupulous stiletto. Was the Doctor wise? You can smile that he was-very, very wise, and'correspondingly discreet, in not seeking for his wife in Spain; for verily, a still, small voice became resonant, that it would scarcely be healthy for Ramsay to circulate in that beautiful, yet perfidious Spain, where the stiletto secures what the law oftimes is powerless to maintain.
The wretch at last felt a shock of the wrongs which shattered the hearts of his little family in Upper Sandusky; and if full retribution has not already followed, let a fervent prayer ascend that it may. To conclude with a benediction, permit us to add, that it would cheer our way to the tomb, and make plesant and joyful a trip up the golden stair, to learn before start- ing, that the craven who caused so much misery, was compelled to live with a heart full of Spanish holes, similar to the one inflicted by the beautiful La Belle.
TRAGER.
"Halloo, Abe, can you shoe my horse, to-day ?" "Well, don't know, Bill; Red Thread is here with four turkeys, which he borrowed from a fel- low 'cross the river, and we are having it red hot on a raffle to see who takes the pile. Come in, Bill; let your old nag go a couple of days. Can't? Want to go to mill? Out of flour? Well, get off your horse and take a throw. I've got lots of flour, and you can help yourself. And Tom's here; so is Jim, and so is old Steve, drunk as a fiddler's bycicle. O, get off- hitch; what's the use of being a d-n fool for a little flour, when there's bushel's of fun for five cents? Russ., you ugly old Ingin, get up and give Bill a seat on the anvil." Allow the sketcher to introduce Abe Trager, blacksmith.
Of all the men that ever lived in town, Abe Trager was the jolliest and biggest-hearted. The scene we introduce above has in it an inference that Trager was a careless fellow, more given to trifling away his time than attending to the better pursuits of life, but such was not the case. While Abe was full of fun, and would sometimes adjourn trade to join the boys in a harmless pastime, no man worked harder or had a greater pride in look- ing after the comforts of his family. His little shop stood for years on Main street, south of the railroad half a square, and on the east side of the street. It was a popular place, and few ever passed the shop without hav- ing a word with Abe. He had a call and an answer for every one, and if you needed assistance, off would go that leather apron in an instant.
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He was a little uncouth. You might even have called him rough, but he had a heart as tender as a child's. A useful man was Trager. He was at the sick bed of every neighbor, and those large callous hands of his were offices of comfort in smoothing the pillow of restless heads. Those same rough hands, with a tender touch, have closed the eyes of our dead and arranged their pallid forms for the last sad servico.
Once at the death-bed of a friend, when the poor wife, prostrate with grief, found relief in an anguish of tears, Trager, who was choking with sobs and the big tears running down his cheeks, said: "Maggie, don't cry for Jim. I never cry. Now be a man, Maggie, and don't cry. See how
calm I am, and I would have bet my last dollar on Jim. The last words Jim said, were: 'Tell Maggie not to cry;'" and here the great heart broke down entirely with the impulses of his tender nature. Recovering suffi- ciently to look upon his dead friend, he muttered half soliloquising, and half in the direction of the bereaved wife, to stimulate her with words of solace: That poor Jim was his best friend; that he had pitched horse-shoes with him a thousand times; that Jim never would cheat nor go back on a saw-off; and while old Steve and Red Thread, and even young Frank would try to get the better of him on a side flip, Jim always toed the mark and bought his pitcher of cider like a little man. And, Maggie, I was talking to Jim a short time before he died, and he said he was going home, and that death had no terror, if it wasn't for leaving his darling wife; and says he, "will you look after Maggie some, when its cold, Abe; when the flour'e low; and if the poor thing gets sick, will you, Abe?" And then he smiled and point- ing upward, said: "Its there, Abe; a star is shining, oh, so bright; and a little hand beckons me toward its beautiful light. Two little wings peep from under that star, and a bright, sweet face! It is my child, Abe; the darling boy who left us years ago! He's there, Abe, waiting and watch- ing-waiting and watching! Tell Maggie we'll wait for her, where there's no death, and where the star shines." Another peaceful smile and another hand reaching for the bright light and Jim was with his child. This glimpse of the immortal was a bow of promise to the stricken wife, If poor Jim could not stay with her, he could clasp to his breast their darling boy, and she could go to them-to Jim and her darling-where there is no death, and where the star shines. And old Abe was sitting astride a chair, with his chin resting upon its back, wiping the moisture from his eyes, and assuring Maggie that he never shed a tear in his life, and if she would cheer up he would tell her the biggest joke on his old woman she ever heard. "And Jim was with me, Maggie, and didn't he enjoy it? He said it was as good as getting married, and you know he always said that when he was extra pleased. Ain't that so Jim?" In a moment unmindful of the scene of death, old Abe had turned to the pallid features of his dead friend for the playful response that in life was so much a part of his nature, and again wiping the big tears from his eyes, muttered in broken sobs: " I did, Maggie, yes, I did -- I-I-forgot poor Jim was dead; but don't cry; see how calm I am, and I loved Jim dearer than a brother. He was just boss on a chicken roast, and one Saturday afternoon, my old woman killed two lovely chicks, fat as coons, filled 'em with stuffin' and laid 'em on the milk house to sweat. She was expecting the preacher next day, and when she has preacher on the brain for dinner, old Abe has to go on short allowance; so I thought I would hold a full hand on those chickens. I told Jim to meet me at Chaffee's mill, and we'd; roast 'em at the coal pit, and didn't we? You ought to have seen Jim go for that spotted hen. He just made it
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in ten minutes and was still hungry. He's the last fellow I ever thought would die, while so many chickens were running around loose. He said he'd take the breast bone home and try luck with Maggie. I didn't take mine home. I knew there would be no luck for me if I did; so I spent the balance of the day at the coal pit. In the evening I went home and told mother I never was so hungry since I had the ineasles; and if she had a piece of chicken left I would take a leg or two; and then you ought to have seen that old gal git up and dust! She just opened her mouth and screamed, ' It was you who stole my chickens, I know it was. Oh, Abe, Abe, how could you be so cruel?' 'Why woman have you been to the mourner's bench, that you've got it so bad? What about chickens? I just left old Ponder and he was swearing about snakes! Now its chickens! Never heard that it was chickens before. Mother, that current wine is entirely too strong, but I'd rather have it chickens than snakes; but what about your blamed poultry any how ? Its a sad thing that the father of this family can't have at least a wing to gnaw at, after a hard day's work at burning charcoal. Gave it all to Tabler, eh? Well, all right, mother, dish up those cold pota- toes and second-hand onions. Haven't touched a morsel since morning.' But she kept on yelling. 'where's my chickens, you old wretch ?' ‘Well, chickens again', said I, ' don't it beat h --- 1. Sis, go down and tell Dock Mason to come up and look at your mother's tongue, for I don't like this chicken business a bit; the next thing we know it will be snakes, then good- bye, Eliza Jane! Chickens! Me take your chickens! Why, gorolmighty, mother, did you ever know a blacksmith to steal chickens while firing a coal pit? Bet your life Russ Bigelow has taken those chickens, and I'll go right down to the shop and look after the bones. If I can't find bones, I'll weigh the Ingin, and if he pulls down ten pounds more than usual, he's got 'em,' and I'll whale the whisky out of him.' 'So it wasn't you then, Abe?' ' No, darling; I ain't that kind of a shanghai. I would't eat a chicken at no coal pit; neither would Jim; and Frank Tripp will cross his breast and tell you, that when I'm firing a coal pit, I hate the sight of chickens; for the Scriptures say, when your burning charcoal on Sunday, eat nothing but old Chaffee's roasting ears.' "
In the foregoing is indicated the nature of good old Abe Trager, who was the life of our town in early days. Many of our older citizens will re- member him with emotions of pleasure and recall to mind the incidents we have related; or many so strikingly similar, that they will say, "yes, that's Abe."
Our esteemed and respected fellow-citizen, Frank Tripp, Sr., commenced learning his trade with honest old Abe, and can, no doubt, give many en- ertaining accounts of his humorous side. About twenty-five years ago, Trager and his family removed to Iowa, and we understand he is still liv- `Eg; if he is, he is one of the men we would travel a hundred miles on foot to see.
AMIDELPHIAN.
The two Latin scholars we had-an Irish schoolmaster and an old French doctor- were struck with the euphony of this high-sounding word, and flew to Webster's Unabridged for consolation; but Squire Webster failing to an- ticipate the intellectual grasp which made the title of Amidelphian possible, contented himself with "Delphian," and left poor Ami out in the cold. Where Ami could have been when Noah was getting up his interesting cat- alogue, was suggested during the controversy by one of our literati, who said he didn't know, but thought the Ami we were looking for might be found in
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Chicago picking rags. One or two crossed-eyed imbibers of belles-lettres just squatted on their knees and held their sides, when a flaming poster announced that "the Amidelphian Society of Upper Sandusky would jerk dramatic thunder from a grand old English Tragedy, which had charmed as well as thrilled the crown-heads of three or four dozen continents," or words to that effect. Meantime, while the critics were making merry over a name that was ap- parently without name, because lexicographers had failed to find fair Ami among the Latin roots and Greek derivatives in time for the approaching exhibition, the amateur histrionic talent of Upper Sandusky were sweating at rehearsal for the grand debut that was to take place in Ayres' Big Brick. Capt. Ayres had just erected the brick block which now stands opposite the court house, and it was in this building, before completed, that the Amidel- phian Society spread its wings for fame.
The play selected was an English standard, entitled "Young Norval," and the several characters were assumed by Miss Mattie Ayres, Miss Rumina Ayres, Miss Cal. Doolittle, Isaac Newton Ayres, Frank Huber, Wean Beals, Howell Morrison, Charles Bagley, Charles Robins and the Sketcher. Scenic designer and toucher-off of calcium lights, Prof. Mikado, on a visit from Tiffin. Music by the band, which was composed of William Ayres, Deacon McGill and James G. Roberts. And couldn't they play. We shall never hear their like again. Ayres was all melody; Deacon came in with his soul- stirring " Bear's Trot," and Roberts with that clarionet filled you with feel- ings that drew forth glimpses of the gates ajar. Col. Jont. Ayres lent his able assistance in arranging the play, and the programmes were printod by an imp who scoured tails in the old Pioneer office.
On the opening night the house was packed; a dozen yards of calico rolled up and the play commenced. The scene unfolded was one never to be forgotten. It was the grand audience room of a King, in which a flour- barrel painted yellow formed the throne, and a circle of tin the insignia of royalty. The assemblage was spell-bound with admiration, and the play moved on. At last the stellar attraction waltzed in, and came very nearly landing on his ear, but struck an attitude before the King and yelled:
" Me name is Norval, on the Gram-pi-an hills Me fa-ther feeds his flock-a fru-gi-al swain, Whose only care was to protect his herd, And keep his only boy, myself, at home,
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