USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Cleveland > The pioneer families of Cleveland 1796-1840 Vol. I > Part 18
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Amasa Bailey was married in April, 1814, in Suffield, Conn., to Sally Eaton. Mrs. Sally Eaton Bailey was born in Springfield, Mass., and at the time was 20 years of age. The same year they set out for Cleveland, ac- companied by Mr. Bailey's sister, Mrs. Sophia Bailey Henderson, presuma- bly a widow with children, and his brothers, Richard and James Bailey.
James lived in Buffalo for some years, but died in Cleveland. Mrs. Henderson moved, at an early day, to Fort Wayne. She had a son, Zenus Henderson, who traded and lived with the Indians and died wealthy. The Baileys' first child was born January, 1815, and died the same month. The next child, Mary Ann, was born May, 1816, and at her death in August, 1905, at Massillon, Ohio, at the age of 89 years, the local papers gave lengthy accounts of her funeral, and full sketches of her life.
In 1824, Amasa Bailey removed to South Akron, and again, two years later, to Massillon, Ohio. That part of Massillon in which they settled was known as the Kendal Community, and the center of a thriving village, but the growth of the city in time embraced it, and the community was disbanded. Amasa Bailey assisted in settling up its affairs.
The children of Amasa Bailey who lived to maturity were:
Mary Anne Bailey, b. 1816; m. Will- Fidelia Bailey, b. 1821; died 1841.
iam Tinkler; 2nd, David Brown Horace Bailey, b. 1825; died 1841.
of Massillon, Ohio. Amasa Bailey, b. 1830.
Cyrus B. Bailey, b. 1820; died 1840.
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1815
BAILEY
The last child, and the only one not born in Cleveland, is yet living in Massillon, Ohio. A very old picture, one of the first attempts in the art of daguerrotyping, of Amasa Bailey and his wife, is in the possession of Miss Hazen of Wabash, Ind.
Richard Bailey, brother of Amasa Bailey, was born in Cummington, Mass., in 1794. Therefore, he was about 20 years of age when he arrived in Cleveland. He married Polly White, daughter of Levi White, and one of that historic family who in 1804 came all the way from Vermont in an open row-boat. She was born in 1795, and at the time of her marriage, 1817, was living in Newburgh with her widowed mother.
Richard and Amasa Bailey kept a general store of merchandise, in 1825. After Amasa removed to Massillon, Richard had a grocery, and lived on Bolivar Street. He moved to Wabash, Ind., in 1853. Polly White Bailey, his wife, died in 1873, in her 78th year. Mr. Bailey died in Cleveland at the home of his son Joseph, on Cheshire Street, aged 89. He was buried in Wabash, Ind., beside his wife.
Their first two children died early. Those who reached maturity were :
Joseph Bailey, m. Mrs. Sophia Fox. David Bailey, m. Levina Hazen.
Sophia Bailey, m. Aaron B. Hazen. John Bailey.
Helen Bailey, m. James M. Furrow. Mary Bailey, m. Lewis B. Davis. Richard Bailey. Gustavus Bailey, m. Mary Wingard.
George Bailey.
These children were all born in Cleveland, the last one in 1835. All moved west but Joseph. He was a mason contractor, and accumulated considerable property. But his marriage was a most unfortunate one, and finally he turned over to his wife nearly everything he possessed, and for the rest of his days lived with a well-known physician on Broad- way Avenue, where he died in 1908, aged 87 years, all of them spent in Cleveland. He had no children of his own, but adopted his wife's son by another marriage, also a young girl. Neither of them proved worthy of the care and affection he freely bestowed upon them.
Richard Bailey, son of Richard, died young and unmarried. George Bailey went to the far west, and he was supposed to have been killed by the Indians. Mrs. Sophia Hazen and Mrs. Helen Furrow were fine women, greatly attached to the home of their childhood, and loving to talk of it. They married soon after removing to Wabash, Ind. Richard Bailey, Sr., was a very kind-hearted, unselfish man, the writer has been told, since writing above. He was known to work all day in his grocery, and sit up all night with the sick, in one of Cleveland's epidemics, obtain a little sleep the following day, and again administer to his suffering neighbors through the long watches of the night.
164
1815
PEASE
George Pease, born in Enfield, Conn., and a direct descendant of Governor Bradford of Plymouth Colony, came to Cleveland about 1815, perhaps a year or two earlier. He was about 40 years of age at that time. His home had been for a few years in Hubbardtown, Vt., from thence he removed to Hudson, Ohio, in 1801, and joined a colony of Goshen, Conn., people, among whom were relatives, who settled Hudson in that year. His occupation while in this city has not been ascertained definitely, but his name appears in connection with other prominent men of the hamlet, who in January, 1818, publicly refused to accept scrip in lieu of money.
His family became very well known in the town, the sons as business men, and the daughters as wives of old citizens. George Pease died in New Orleans, La., in 1845, aged 69 years. His wife was Esther Thomp- son, born in Goshen, Conn., in 1777, so that she was about 38 years old when she first came to Cleveland. She was the daughter of Deacon Stephen and Mary Walters Thompson of Goshen. Mr. and Mrs. Stephen Thompson removed to Hudson, Ohio, in 1801, and with them were their grown sons and daughters. Mrs. Charles Miles, Sr .- Ruth Thompson of Newburgh-was a sister of Mrs. George Pease. Mr. and Mrs. Pease were among the first members of the Old Stone Church.
After the death of her husband in 1845, Mrs. Esther Pease resided with her daughter, Mrs. Irad Kelley. She is remembered as a very sweet- faced, motherly woman, whom it was always a pleasure to meet. She died aged 84 years.
Sylvester and Jesse Pease attended the old Academy on St. Clair Street, and were the chums in boyhood, and the close friends in maturer age of many of the old citizens who received their classical education in that school. They seem to have been popular young men. Harriet, Lucretia, and Huldah Pease were charming young women, and as the wives of Irad Kelley, Morris Hepburn, and Prentiss Dow, all prominent merchants of the town, they held a conspicuous place in the social life that drew men and women of kindred tastes together in those early days.
The children of George and Esther Thompson Pease:
Harriet Pease, b. 1800 in Hubbards- town, Vt .; died 1862 ; m. Irad Kel- ley of Cleveland.
Sylvester Pease, b. 1803; m. Julia She died in 1832, aged 25 years; buried in Erie Street Cemetery.
Norman Pease, b. 1805. Jesse Pease, b. 1808.
Hulda Pease, b. 1813; m. Morris Hepburn. Lucretia M. Pease, b. 1815 in Cleve- land; m. Prentiss Dow.
There was another family by the name of Pease living in Newburgh from 1820 on. The marriage of Samuel Pease to Octavia Ruggles was published in the Herald in 1830.
A Samuel Pease, b. 1805, came 1828 Mary E. Pease, b. 1816, came to Cleveland 1823; died 1891.
from Massachusetts ; d. 1892.
Melissa Pease, b. 1816.
165
1
1815
MEEKER
The Meeker brothers, Smith, Enoch and Stephen, did not live within the limits of early Cleveland, but as their pioneer homes have long been a part of the present city and their children intermarried with old Cleve- land families, the history and genealogy of the Meekers rightfully belongs in this work.
The American ancestor of the family came in 1639. Timothy Meeker, the grandfather of the three Cleveland pioneers, was a Revolutionary soldier, and the homestead of their parents built in 1758 yet stands near Newark, N. J., and is occupied by their descendants.
Smith Meeker married Abigail Oliver. They lived on Mayfield Ridge. Mrs. Smith Meeker died in 1867, and her husband soon followed her.
Their children :
Caroline Meeker, m. Alexander Mc- Norton Meeker, m. Ann Sherman ; 2nd, Mary Thomas.
Ilrath, his second wife. She died 90 years of age. Byron Meeker, m. Mary Buckley;
John O. Meeker, m. Mary Hender- shott.
2nd, Sarah Demeline. Cummins Meeker, unmarried.
Enoch Meeker was a shoemaker, and he came to Ohio about 1816 with Paul Condit, also a shoemaker from Elizabeth, N. J. He purchased, 15 acres of land on Euclid Road, now Euclid Avenue. Noble Road was laid out years afterward, to the west of his property, leaving the home- stead on the south-east corner.
He discovered later that he had paid the highest price asked for land in that locality, also that he had undertaken more than he could accom- plish if he remained on the property. He could secure little work at his trade to help out in his payments, due each in following years, so he concluded not to work the land at present, but go where the country was more thickly settled, and where there was more demand for boots and shoes, then made stoutly and by hand.
He chose Painesville and its vicinity for this field of endeavor, a lucky one he ever afterward considered it, for there he met Susanna Hulburt, who was then teaching school in Mentor. Previously she had taught in Painesville, and was a member of the household of Governor Huntington while doing so.
. She was born in Northampton, Mass. Her mother was an Eliot, and a relative of the Indian missionary of that name. Mr. and Mrs. Enoch Meeker were married by Judge Peter Hitchcock in 1816. They continued their residence in Painesville until after the birth of their first child, when Mr. Meeker concluded that he could pay the indebtedness upon his East Cleveland property and returned to live upon it. His old friend and chum Paul Condit was keeping a tavern in order to help pay for his own land, and this influenced Enoch Meeker to try the same thing on a smaller scale. He built a large and substantial frame-house, still standing on the corner of Euclid Avenue and Noble Road, and occupied by his son Samuel C. Meeker .*
Mrs. Meeker, although making no outward objection to the tavern scheme, felt certain that neither her husband nor herself was fitted for
* Now deceased.
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1815
MEEKER
the work. It was the custom of the day to name a tavern and place it as a sign over the door. Mrs. Meeker laughingly suggested that they choose a horn for their emblem, and place the sign with the small end of the horn pointing toward the house.
The retail sale of liquor in that day was considered perfectly legiti- mate. No stigma was attached to the man who dealt it out over the counter of his grocery store or his tavern bar. The latter was considered a necessary adjunct of every country tavern. After a long, cold drive a hot drink proved most grateful to the weary traveler accustomed to the use of stimulants, and no tavern would receive patronage that failed to have whiskey on tap.
Travelers in some years were scarce, and many of the eastern families on their way to Ohio came fully equipped for camping out all the length of their journey, and taverns reaped no benefit from the emigration. Landlords became more and more dependent upon local patronage of their bar-rooms, until their taverns became, at last, little more than saloons. Mrs. Meeker was a very intelligent woman and anxious for the mental and spiritual development of her children. She did not wish her boys to be raised in a bar-room, and so the tavern project was abandoned. Mr. Meeker heeded to the advice of his good wife and remained a farmer and a shoemaker.
Mrs. Meeker was also very ambitious for her sons. She wanted them to be school teachers, as well as farmers, and prevailed upon Clinton, the third one, to apply for a school at the "North Woods," 4 miles away on the lake shore, afterward known as "Frizzells." Mr. Frizzelle lived in a log-house and was a school director of the district. Clinton Meeker taught there three months, walking two miles each way to his boarding place. Sixty-eight years afterward he visited the spot for the first time since he left it at the close of his school term.
Nathan Meeker, the oldest son of Enoch, was a very intelligent, ambitious man. He drifted to New York where he became an editorial writer on the New York Tribune. Horace Greeley, the famous editor of that newspaper, wished to found a western colony, and Nathan Meeker invested his all in the project, and was appointed one of a committee to choose the location for the proposed colony.
A tract of land in Colorado was selected, and a town laid out to which the name of Greeley was given. Seventy families removed at once to the spot. Dissension arose with Evans, a town four miles distant, and in the heated controversy, Mr. Nathan Meeker was murdered. It made a great sensation all over the country, and every detail of the affair was dwelt upon by the press of that day. His photograph hangs in the old homestead on Euclid Avenue, and his two remaining brothers speak of him in terms of great admiration and affection.
Enoch Meeker built or gave a home to each of his sons. That of Nathan's stands back of the homestead and on Noble Road, and is occu- pied by Rufus Clinton Meeker, or "Clinton," as he is called. He never married, and now, 1911, is 87 years old .*
Samuel C. Meeker, 81 years of age, still youthful and active for his age, resides in the home his parents built 93 years ago .* The aged broth-
Now deceased.
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1816
THE NOTABLE SUMMER CALLED "THE COLD SUMMER"
ers have become strong Spiritualists and firm in the belief of another life beyond this one. Both dwell much upon the anticipation of again meeting their mother, whose memory to them is most precious. Enoch Meeker died in 1867, and his wife in 1874.
The children of Enoch and Susanna Meeker:
Nathan Cook Meeker, b. 1817; m. Samuel Cleveland Meeker, b. 1830; m. Lida Shaw.
Arvilla Smith of Clairdon. He died in Greely, Cal.
Henry Clay Meeker, died young.
Stephen Cary Meeker, b. 1819; m. Martha Meeker, the only daughter, Adra Hendershott. died at 12 years of age to the life-
Rufus Clinton Meeker, b. 1824; un- married; d. 1812.
long sorrow evidently of her brothers.
Stephen Meeker, the third of the pioneer brothers, settled on what is now the north-east corner of Mayfield and Taylor Roads, a site now occupied by Dr. Milliken. Nothing has been secured of this family save the names and marriages.
Stephen and Elizabeth Chips Meeker came to Cleveland about 1818. Their children were:
Ebline Meeker, b. 1820 in Cleveland; m. Oscar Brown. She died 1811.
Kate Meeker, m. Dr. Richard Houghton.
Ogden Meeker, m. Mary Bebee of Parma.
Naomi Meeker, m. Edwin Duty. She died 1860, leaving two children.
Harriett Meeker, m. William Hart of Mt. Vernon, O.
Morris Meeker, went to Australia. Elizabeth Meeker, m. Marion Minor. Charlotte Meeker, m. Asa Curtis of Wheeler, Ind.
Susan Meeker, m. William C. Brace.
1816
THE NOTABLE SUMMER CALLED "THE COLD SUMMER"
There were severe frosts every month of this year all over New England. There was no corn raised, and very little hay or oats. All kinds of vegetables were cut down by frost when half grown. This caused great poverty and suffering in that section of the country. Horses and cattle had to be almost given away, or killed because of the lack of fodder.
"The winter of 1816-1817 was extremely severe, and the following spring was so backward that New England farmers were plunged in despair. In June the hills along the Connecticut Valley were almost as barren as an ordinary November. Cattle died by thousands, and many farmers' families came near perishing from starvation."
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1816
TAYLOR
This unprecedented weather was also experienced in Ohio, and caused much poverty and suffering.
1816
Cleveland's first bank was organized in this year, the Commercial Bank of Lake Erie. President, Alfred Kelley; Cashier, Leonard Case; Directors, John H. Strong, Samuel Williamson, Philo Taylor, George Wallace, David Long, Erastus Miles, Seth Doan.
(Sketches of all the above pioneers and their families will be found in this volume.)
Trinity Protestant Episcopal Church, Cleveland's first church, was or- ganized November 9th. Timothy Doan, Moderator; Charles Gear, Clerk; Phineas Shephard, Abraham Scott, Wardens; Timothy Doan, Abraham Hickox, Jonathan Pelton, Vestrymen; Dennis Cooper, Reading Clerk.
The following year were added: John Wilcox, Alfred Kelley, Thomas M. Kelley, Irad Kelley, Noble H. Merwin, David Long, Darius C. Hender- son, Philo Scovil.
Rev. Roger Searl of Plymouth, Conn., Rector.
Of the above names those of Gear, Cooper, and Henderson have not been located by the writer.
1816
TAYLOR
The first Superintendent of the first Cleveland Sabbath School and a charter member of the Old Stone Church cannot but be an interesting personage to every one to whom that organization is dear through ances- try, association, or membership.
Deacon Elisha Taylor was no ordinary man. He was very much alive in whatever community he lived, always working for its commercial, social, and moral uplift. He was a temperance man of the most ardent type, working and pleading with the council of the little hamlet and with individuals to stamp out an evil that had fastened itself upon the infant community, causing untold sorrow and misery. He was one of the very earliest of dry-goods merchants, those preceding him dealing more with Indians than white people, and trading mostly in furs.
His store and dwelling combined was on the south side of Superior Street, between Bank and Seneca, and into this from Cherry Valley, N. Y., he came in 1816, when about 32 years of age, bringing his small stock of goods, his household furniture, and his young wife and child.
Mrs. Elisha Taylor was Miss Anna Dunlap of Schenectady, N. Y., one of four sisters who lived here at a very early day. She was not strong,
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1816
TAYLOR
the climate was a terrible ordeal, even for those best fitted to resist its deadly malaria, and so at the birth of her fifth child, in 1824, she died, and was buried in Erie Street Cemetery.
Whether this sad event or the state of his own health influenced him, we have no record, but two years afterward he returned to Cherry Valley, retiring upon a farm where he remained about eight years, and in 1843, after a brief sojourn in New York City, he came back to Cleveland.
It can be imagined what a reception he received from the church he had helped found, now well established and prosperous, and from the old neighbors yet surviving. Perhaps it was the dear associations of that earlier time that drew his feet westward again.
He had sold out to T. P. May, and his former store was now "May and Barnett," but he soon established another store, and continued the same line of business for a few years, then dealt in real-estate until his death, aged 75 years.
Only three children of Elisha and Anna Dunlap Taylor reached matur- ity. They were:
Alfred Taylor, b. 1820; m. 1st, Ma- ria Dewey; 2nd, Helen A. M. Leonard. Mrs. Helen Taylor had three children reach maturity, Rev. Frederick, Harry, and Bes- sie Taylor. Alfred Taylor was drowned in the Ohio River in 1864, while in the service of his country.
John William Taylor, b. 1824, m. 1st, Anna Sexton of Albany, who
had one child, Anna Louise Tay- lor, now living in Washington, D. C .; 2nd, Clara Cushing of Springfield, Ohio, who had one child, Edith Taylor; 3rd, Sarah Bell Cushing, a niece of his sec- ond wife.
Louise Taylor, only sister of Alfred
and John W. Taylor, married H. F. Waite, and died in 1849, in ear- ly womanhood.
Some time after the death of his wife, Anna Dunlap, Elisha Taylor married Elisabeth Ely, a daughter of Nathaniel Ely of Long Meadow, and of a distinguished Massachusetts family. She was about 35 years of age at her marriage, and well fitted to care for the very young children entrusted to her. She was a very calm, quiet woman, who never made remarks to be regretted or answered a question hastily. She had a little habit, peculiar to herself, of placing her finger to her lips, pondering over the subject, and then saying, "I think it was so and so," and one felt sure that her "think" outweighed the affirmative of several others combined.
She outlived her husband 13 years, dying in 1874. After Mr. Tay- lor's return from the east, he built a large stone cottage on what was once Vine Street off Woodland Ave.
The family rest in Erie Street Cemetery, not far from the Erie Street entrance.
170
1816
WILLARD
In the year 1816, or near that date, the north side of Euclid Avenue, from the corner of Willson Avenue west to the corner of Case Avenue, now East 55th and 40th streets, came into the possession of one man. It was an original 100-acre lot, extending north to what is now Payne Avenue, and for 40 years or more was known as the "Willard Farm," because a family of that name owned and occupied it.
John Oliver Willard, of French descent in one line, was born in New Haven, Conn. In 1809 he married Selinda Lamb. They had two children born to them in New Haven, Sarah and Harrison Willard, and while their children were very young the parents bought the Euclid Road Farm of the Connecticut Land Company.
The purchase price probably was $150, and on deferred payments, as land in the vicinity was offered several years later, for $2 an acre. What an almost incredible change of value has 100 years witnessed! The tract was then covered with forest trees, save the little cleared space (a knoll), upon which stood the small farm-house.
Beautiful mansions have adorned it in the past years, some of which are still standing, others torn down. The Judge Andrews home, that of Judge Burke, the residence of the Masons, Zenos King, Bissells, Hales, and that of Sylvester Everett. But recently a shallow lot with but a frontage of 35 feet on Euclid Avenue was leased for a long term of years at many thousands of dollars' rental for each year. And yet the $150 proved a crushing debt to the poor pioneer of that early day. It was a hard struggle, in the midst of which he died of consumption. His heroic eldest daughter, Sarah Willard, when but a child, worked as a maid for neighboring farmers in order to help pay the balance due, and save the home.
Meanwhile, the Connecticut Land Company agents began to make trouble for the family. The latter's rights to the property had to be defended by the widow and children for many successive years, but they won at last. In this they were assisted by Ashley Ames of Newburgh, who had married Sarah Willard.
Euclid Avenue near E. 55th Street has been much graded and lowered from its early level. There was once a steep sand bank on the north-west corner, after Willson or E. 55th Street was cut through the property.
The children of John O. and Selinda Willard :
Sarah Willard, born 1810; married Ashley Ames of Newburgh.
Harrison Willard, married Wealthy Pierre of East Cleveland.
Adelia A. Willard, born in Cleve- land ; married Mathew Howe.
Eliot Willard, married Ruth Hudson of East Cleveland.
Rufus Willard, married Mary Allen of Olmsted Falls.
Harrison Willard died comparatively young, leaving three children. They were:
Sarah Willard, married David Gertrude Willard, married George Featherstone; lived in Chicago, Carriff ; live in Washington, D. C. Ill. Clara Willard, married Richardson, a Civil War soldier.
Adelia Willard Howe had one daughter, Mary Howe, who married John Baisch. 171
1816
WHITE
Mr. Howe was a southern gentleman who died young.
Elliot Willard lived on the farm, and in 1856 was a market-gardener, raising fruit and vegetables. His children were: Clistia Willard. John Willard. Adelia Willard.
Hudson Willard. Thomas Willard. Mary Willard.
1816
WHITE
Deacon Moses White and his wife were for so many years associated in the mind and in the remembrance of Cleveland proper that it is difficult to write of one without more or less mention of the other. He was the son of Jacob and Penniman White, and in 1816, when twenty-five years of age, turned his back upon the old town of Mendon, Mass., where he was born, and started life anew in the little hamlet of Cleveland. He was a tailor, and the prospects for his line of work must at once have been flattering, for the following year he sought a business partner and a wife, finding both in the person of Miss Mary Andrews, a young tailoress living in Providence, R. I. They took the fashionable six- weeks' wedding journey of that day, one that led westward without any return road, and they traveled the usual way, in their own conveyance.
Superior Street was their first home, a small frame-house on the south side of it, and here they lived for some years, then moved into a fine new brick house on the north-west corner of St. Clair and Bank streets. It had a large side-yard filled with fruit-trees and shrubbery. Years afterward, they flitted to the north-east corner of Prospect and Brownell, where they both died.
Mrs. White was tall, spare, and dignified. She was a quiet, modest, blue-eyed woman, the mother of eight children, only two of whom reached maturity. The malarious air of early Cleveland was severe on childhood, and the young people who lived were indeed the survival of the fittest in physical strength and endurance. Little Minerva White's grave was the first one dug for a child in the Erie Street Cemetery, and after the funeral, Eliza, afterward Mrs. Jesse Bishop, exclaimed tear- fully, "They buried little sister way out in the woods !"
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