Twentieth Century History of Findlay and Hancock County, Ohio, and Representative Citizens, Part 9

Author: Jacob Anthony Kimmell
Publication date: 1910
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 1189

USA > Ohio > Hancock County > Findlay > Twentieth Century History of Findlay and Hancock County, Ohio, and Representative Citizens > Part 9

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

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HISTORY OF HANCOCK COUNTY

1764, but soon after escaped and returned leader among the Wyandots and Shawanees to savage life. In 1774 he took part in Lord Dunmore's War on the side of the Virginians. Here he met Simon Kenton and the two young men soon became fast friends. He also became intimately ac- quainted with Colonel Crawford and was frequently a guest at his hospitable cabin.

Girty aspired to a captaincy in the regular army in 1778 but, failing in this, deserted Fort Pitt in company with fourteen others. He immediately inaugerated a reign of terror among the frontier settlers. He rep- resented to the friendly Delawares that the white people intended killing every Indian they met; that Washington was killed and the Revolutionary Army cut to pieces; that there was no Congress, the British having hung some members and taken the rest to England. The Delawares disbelieved his story and he moved on westward to the Shawanees on the Scioto, to whom the Delaware chiefs sent word not to believe what he told them.

Girty now started for Detroit. On his way he was captured by the Wyandots. The Senecas who recognized him, de- manded that he be given up to them be- cause, having been their adopted son, he had now taken up arms against them. But Leatherlips, the Wyandot chief, ignored their claim to him. The Wyandots finally set him at liberty and he proceeded to De- troit, where Gen. Hamilton, the British commander, gave him a cordial welcome. He was now given work that suited his na- ture exactly. He was employed at sixteen York shillings a day and sent back to Upper Sandusky to incite and assist the Indians in their border warfare. He soon became a

along the head-waters of the Scioto and Sandusky rivers, in their murderous forays into the border settlement. From Pitts- burg to Louisville his name carried terror all along the Ohio. Doubtless he led many a helpless victim of the frontier captive along the trails through Hancock County or danced with his dusky companions around the helpless victim burning at the stake. He was present at St. Clair's defeat in 1791 and at the battle of the Fallen Timbers in 1794. After the Treaty of Greenville, he engaged in the Indian trade at Lower Sandusky and later at "Girty's Town" on the site of St. Mary's in Mercer (now Auglaize) County. He then removed to Malden, Canada, where he settled on a farm on the Detroit River where he died in 1818, aged 70 years. For several years be- fore his death he was nearly blind and a complete wreck.

"The last time I saw Girty," wrote Will- iam Walker, "was in the summer of 1813. From my recollection of his person he was in height five feet six or seven inches; broad across the chest; strong around ; com- pact limbs, and of fair complexion. To any one scrutinizing him, the conclusion would forcibly impress the observer that Girty was endowed by Nature with great powers of endurance." Spencer, a prisoner among the Indians, gives this vivid description of him : "His dark shaggy hair; his low forehead; his short flat nose; his brows contracted and meeting above his short flat nose; his gray sunken eyes averting the ingenuous gaze; his lips thin and compressed; and that dark and sinister expression of his countenance

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HISTORY OF HANCOCK COUNTY

-to me seemed the very picture of a off clothing of the settlers, but afterwards villain."

JOHNNY APPLESEEDS.

This eccentric individual, whose real name was John (or as some say, Jonathan) Chapman, was one of the well known char- acters in early days. He was a Sweden- borgian, acting as a kind of missionary amongst the Indians, and in his perambula- tions through the wilderness planted the seeds of the different kinds of fruits, so that in many places in the county, there were fruit trees in great numbers and some of them already producing fruit, at its first settlement. He was supposed to be a na- tive of Massachusetts and was regarded as an intelligent, harmless, but slightly de- mented man! At all times sociable, and full of pleasant story and good advice, after his fashion, he was always made welcome by the pioneers. His personal appearance was as singular as his character. He was a small chubbed man, quick and restless in his motions and conversation. He wore his hair and beard long and had a sparkling black eye. He lived the roughest life and often slept in the woods. He went bare- footed, and often travelled miles through the snow in that way. Wherever he went he circulated Swedenborgian works. He was careful not to injure any animal, and thought hunting morally wrong.

During the coldest weather he refused to wear shoes and upon one occasion, when forced to accept a pair from a kind hearted farmer, he came to Mansfield, which was then but a small village and gave them to a poor family who were going west. When he first came to Ohio he accepted the cast-

became convinced he was getting too proud and worldly and finally he adopted the coffee-sack suit, in which he died. His head was protected from Old Sol's smiles, by a tin pan, which was also used as a culinary utensil, when he was overtaken by hunger in the woods. He believed it a sin to tread upon a worm, or eat flesh of any kind dur- ing lent.

He was first seen in Ohio in 1801, and with him an old blind horse, drawing in an aged and infirm wagon a quantity of apple- seeds. These seeds he planted in Eastern Ohio along the banks of rivers and creeks. Returning to Pennsylvania, Johnny dis- posed of his steed and equipments and gathering up several bushels of seeds at the cider presses in Western Pennsylvania he started for Ohio with them on his back. For years he kept on in the even tenor of his ways, starting orchards all over this part of the state, but when emigrants from other states began to pour in and take up the land in Ohio, poor Johnny found his oc- cupation gone, and taking up his coffee sack moved into Indiana, where he continued to plant appleseeds for some time, until death overtook him, and he was laid away in a country churchyard a few miles from Ft. Wayne.

The following incidents are related as il- lustrating his eccentricities, as well as his kindness of heart. One cool autumnal night whilst lying by his camp-fire in the woods he observed that the mosquitoes flew into the blaze and were burnt. Johnny thereupon brought water and quenched the fire after- wards saying, "God forbid that I should build a fire for my comfort that should

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HISTORY OF HANCOCK COUNTY

be the means of destroying any of his creatures."

At another time he made his camp-fire at the end of a hollow log in which he in- tended to pass the night, but finding it oc- cupied by a bear and her cubs he removed his fire to the other end and slept in the snow, in the open air rather than to dis- turb the bear.

An itinerant preacher was once holding forth on the public square in Mansfield and exclaimed, "Where is the barefooted Chris- tian travelling to heaven?" Johnny who was lying on his back on some timber, tak- ing the question in its literal sense, raised his bare feet in the air and shouted : "Here he is!"

JACOB NEWMAN FREE.

A very interesting eccentric character who often visited Hancock County and es- pecially Findlay, commencing in the late fifties and down to 1906 was J. N. Free, or as he called himself, "The Immortal J. N." or "Phil- osopher."

He was born at Chambersburg, Pa., June 19th, 1828, of German parents, his father the Rev. Dr. John W. Free, and his mother, Mary Newman Free, being a cousin to the author of "Lead Kindly Light." The entire family of eight children lived to manhood and womanhood. Seven of them taught school. Mayor John W. Free and Henry N. Free were lawyers of Lexington, Ky., and Col. William Free was a merchant of the same city. The family moved from Pennsylvania and lived several years in Mansfield, Ohio, but later moved to Mc- Kutchinsville on a farm of 135 acres about a mile south of the village.

Jacob N. was a precocious child and his father crowded him with learning so that he was able to read and write in several different languages when he was nine years old, and graduated when quite young from the Meadville College, Penn. He was a tall, powerfully built man with long hair and a heavy moustache, high prominent cheek bones and a restless maniacal eye that seemed to fairly penetrate the object of his stare. His clothing was shabby and his hair unkept and he had the mien of a rest- less apprehensive man, rarely remaining long in one place; his voice was powerful, and he spoke in a style of command, short and positive. His memory, wit and sar- casm knew no bounds and woe to the man upon whom he turned these sharp tools; he fairly picked him up and spit him out, and people who had once been the sub- ject of his ability in that line gave him a wide bearth !

Once or twice a year he would send word in advance that he would be in Findlay on a certain night and would lecture at the old courthouse; his subject, that he would "Lift the veil and disseminate the truth." Sometimes he came and sometimes not. If he appeared he would wait on the outside until the audience were seated and there were generally plenty of seats and to spare -when he would enter the house, walk up the aisle in a dignified manner, ascend the platform, reach in his pockets and pull out a couple of Colt revolvers and a couple of pairs of handcuffs and, after slamming them down on the desk before him with some violence, and some offhand remarks about them, would then commence his desultory and incoherent address.

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HISTORY OF HANCOCK COUNTY

After the war a favorite theme of his was, "The North thought the South was wrong and the South thought the North was wrong. Both were wrong; both were right."

He would wait until the next day to see what the local papers said of his speech the previous evening and seemed to enjoy a severe roasting with more relish than a favorable compliment. He took a copy of the paper with him and was generally bur- dened with a roll under his arm about the size of a stove pipe. Sometimes the boys in strange towns would tease him by try- ing to take away his newspapers but he would kindly give them a few pennies, thus making them his fast friends.

The story of this harmless mild maniac is as follows : Having studied law and being considered a man of immense ability he was considered a fine catch by the young ladies of his acquaintance. His special attention was attracted to a very beautiful young blonde, and winning her heart she became his fiancee. But young Free was poor and he determined that before he married such a noble lady he would accumulate a small fortune. So at the age of twenty-one he joined the "Forty-niners" in their search for gold in California. He and a partner were successful in the "digging" and soon bought mule teams to transport provisions and other mining supplies to the mines in the interior, hoarding their gold in their shack, and one of the partners staying with it while the other drove the mule team. One day "J. N." returning from his trip found that his partner had departed with the entire treasure, the savings of many days and nights of labor and exposure.

Young Free followed the thief to New York where he found that he sold the gold and departed for Europe. Free could not ex- pect to catch him in those days, but put an attachment on the gold, but at the trial, which he conducted with marvelous logic and eloquence he could not prove that the gold was his, as there was no private mark on it; or, if there had been, it had been re- moved. Neither could he prove that his share of the gold had been stolen. He lost the trial, he lost his gold, he lost his bride, he lost faith in humanity, he lost his mental balance and became a wanderer through- out the length and breadth of his native land for fifty-six years. But in all this time he paid no carfare or hotel bill. He would go to the railroad officials and procure a pass on one pretext or another, they being unable to refuse because of his importunity and the uniqueness of the claim upon which his right to the favor was based.

Some were dated for a trip, some for a year and some for life. Some were given for "Opening the eyes of the blind to the Pearly Gates of Heaven" for "Lifting the Veil of truth"; as a "Philosopher traveling for the dissemination of knowledge and various other themes; but always claiming that the people were not ready for him yet, but that when they were he would "lift the pressure."

This "Pressure" so frequently spoken of by him, referred to the state of mind or spirit of the one addressed; whether happy and inclined to lightness and charity (especially towards himself) or melancholy and parsimonious. When sad he advised the lifting of the veil to "let the sunshine in."

Once he received a pass by way of a joke

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from a railroad official to walk over the ties from a certain place to another. When the conductor came in to take up the fares "J. N." commenced to walk rapidly from one end of the car to the other. When asked for his fare he presented this paper. "But," said the conductor, "this is not a pass to ride on this car, it is a pass to walk over the ties." "Am I not walking over the ties?" queried "J. N." as he rapidly resumed his walk. The conductor was so paralyzed by his wit and the stern commanding authority, that he did not further insist on the payment of a fare. The same tactics were practiced on the hotel keep- ers as on the railroad officials.

The writer remembers of hearing him tell- ing a story of his stopping at a hotel for three days at two dollars a day! The landlord not wishing to lose the whole bill thought of a compromise by offering to throw off the half and take three dollars instead of six dollars, the entire amount. "Very charitable," said 'J. N.,' and it would be ill-bred in me to not return the favor by throwing off the other half of the bill, I never allow a man to excell me in favors."

The landlord had perhaps anticipated some- thing of the kind, retorted by asking "J. N." if he would not partake of a light meal pre- pared for him in the dining room, to which "J. N." willingly assented. Upon entering the dining room the landlord invited "J. N." to be seated at a small table upon which there were four brightly burning lamps together with a plate, knife, fork, and spoon and a glass of water. For once in his life he was beaten and the "pressure" was heavy on himself. Page upon page might be written of the anecdotes of this strange personage, but the above serves

to illustrate his style and manner. Along in the seventies, he and his brother Henry, trav- eled together, selling his lightning calculator, a table he had copyrighted to aid in adding rapidly. Figures could be put down no matter how large or how many and he would write the answer down as fast as his hand could move. "J. N." would get the crowd and Henry sell the calculator.

While the ex-confederate president, Jeffer- son Davis, was confined in a casement of Fort- ress Monroe, "J. N." called and asked to see him and contrary to all strict orders obtained entrance to the apartment of the noted pris- oner. Nothing seemed to please him better than to exhibit the newspapers containing a para- graph that Jefferson Davis had been visited by a lunatic.

Thousands of persons in all the states of the union were acquainted with "The Immortal J. N., Philosopher." Many times during his life his death was published in the papers and many were the amusing remarks he made upon seeing and reading them himself. Thus lived and died one of the most notable men of this section. His memory was faultless and if he ever met a person he never forgot his name or his face, but could call him by name and name the place of meeting without mistake, and had he not met with mental infirmity his name might have gone down to posterity as one of the intellectual giants of the age. As it is, he is kindly remembered by all who met and became acquainted with him.

His death occurred at the State Hospital for the Insane at Toledo, O., on June 26, 1906, and he was buried at McKutchinsville, Ohio. Peace to the memory of the kind old philoso- pher.

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CHAPTER VII.

TRANSPORTATION.

First Roads and Bridges-Steam Railroads-Electric Roads.

The first roads in the county were for years scarcely more than blazed paths through the woods. Very many places would have been utterly impassable had it not been for a system of bridging, then extensively indulged in, known as "corduroy." This was a kind of railroad in which the position of the ties and rails on an ordinary railroad were reversed. That is, the ties were laid lengthwise and the rails crosswise. But as timber was abundant, and not much attention was paid to the smooth- ness of the road, they were not so very expen- sive.

Among the records of the county for 1829 is found the following, which was presented at the June session of the commissioners :

"A petition being presented by sundry citi- zens of Hancock County, praying for a county road, commencing at the county line at John Smith's farm, running thence a northwesterly direction to John Longs, in Section One, thence to cross Blanchard Fork at or near John J. Hendricks, thence to run down the river to the mouth of the three-mile run, thence to the nearest and best direction to Findlay, which was granted, and John Huff, John J. Hen- dricks and William Moreland were appointed viewers, and William Taylor, Surveyor." On

the 16th of September the commissioners met in special session to receive the report of the viewers of said road. Report received and the road established. This road is the one now known as the Findley and Vanlue road, which crosses the river at the farm of William Wyer.

Again in August, 1839, the county commis- sioners met for the purpose of apportioning the amount of three per cent fund on the sev- eral state roads, and the record says: "Where- upon it is agreed on by said commissioners that the aforesaid amount of money appropri- ated, shall be laid out on the following roads, to-wit: The road leading from Bellefontaine to Perrysburg, and the road leading from Up- per Sandusky through Findlay to Defiance, which work is to be performed in cutting out said roads, thirty-two feet wide, all timber twenty inches in diameter, and clearing the ground of all timber."

Another petition was presented to the com- missioners July 21, 1831, "Humbly represent- ing that it would but conduce much to the pub- lic convenience if a county road was estab- lished between the following points, to-wit: Beginning at the west end of Main Cross Street, in the village of Findlay (at a point where West Street crosses Main Cross Street,

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at the residence of Mrs. Dr. Detwiler), thence on the nearest and best route to Solomon Fo- glesong's improvement on Toway Creek, thence on the nearest and best route in direc- tion of Toway Village (now Ottawa, Putnam County), to the county line." This is now one of the best roads in the county.

After these followed the location and open- ing up of the Tiffin, Port Clinton, New Haven, Lima and other important roads. In fact, for the first ten years after the organization of the county, the principal part of the business of the Board of Commissioners, was to receive petitions for, and confirm reports of reviewers and surveyor of county roads. Such has been the desire of the people, and the acts of the commissioners, that we have now public high- ways running by and bordering on almost every farm in the county, thus affording to everyone an easy and convenient means of communicating with his neighbors.

The "Road from Fort Meigs, or the foot of the Rapids of the Miami of the Lake (Mau- mee), to Bellefontaine, opened December II, 1829." This is the road now known as the Perrysburg and Bellefontaine state road, which crosses the county from north to south, and divides it into two almost equal parts. This road was laid out on and near "Hull's Trail."

The commissioners of Wood County, on the 6th day of June, 1826, "Ordered that four hundred dollars of the road fund be appropri- ated for Hancock County, to be expended on the Urbana road in said county." This road was the Perrysburg and Bellefontaine road.

BRIDGES.

For many years the inhabitants of the county contented themselves by bridging the smaller streams and water courses, wherever abso-

lutely necessary, and then only with a tempo- rary structure, barely answering the purpose of its building, without a thought of bridging the river. The latter seemed to them so immense an undertaking that no one dared mention such a project. In 1841, when it was seriously con- templated to build a bridge across the river at Findlay, the matter was deemed of so much importance, that this order was made: "Or- dered that the auditor instruct the assesors to take the vote of the people as to the propriety of laying a tax of eight hundred dollars for building a bridge across Blanchard River in Findlay." How the voters of the county de- cided the matter does not appear by the rec- ords, but the inference is, that they "seconded the motion," for in March, 1842, the follow- ing resolution was passed by the county com- missioners: "Resolved, That the auditor re- ceive proposals for building two bridges across Blanchard River, one at Findlay, and the other at the crossing on the Fidlay and New Haven State road (known as the Marvin Bridge), until the first day of April next, agreeable to the plans now in this office, as submitted to the commissioners, one half the pay in Janu- ary, 1843, and the other half in one year there- after." On opening the bids, at a special ses- sion, January 7, 1843, for the completion of the extension of the bridge across the river at Findlay, it was found that James Robinson was the lowest bidder, and the contract was awarded to him.

In the proceedings of the commissioners at a special session in March, 1843, it was "Or- dered that the auditor of Hancock County, Ohio, inquire into the cause why the bridge across the Blanchard Fork of the Auglaize River, at Findlay, is not completed agreeable to contract by S. Carinn and H. Eaton, and if

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no good cause is shown, institute a suit against said contractors, and employ counsel if neces- sary." June 1, 1843, the commissioners "Or- dered that the auditor of Hancock County en- ter a suit against the contractors of the bridge at Findlay, by the first of July next, if the same is not by that time finished to the satisfac- tion of the commissioners."

It is fair to presume that the bridge was finished to the "satisfaction of the commission- ers," as there is no record of a suit being brought. The bridge was a wooden structure, known as a trestle bridge, the superstructure being supported by wooden trestles, placed, perhaps, twenty feet apart. The finish was of the plainest kind, only ordinary railing, no cover, no paint.

In 1850 the contract for a new and better bridge across the Blanchard, was let to Jesse Wheeler, William Klamroth and Edwin B. Vail, for the sum of fifteen hundred dollars. It too, was a wooden structure, but of a different plan, not only more pretentious in appearance, but a much more substantial piece of work. It consisted of two spans, being supported at the ends by massive stone abutments, with a pier in the centre, of the same material. The sides were elevated, it being a truss-bridge and in- closed, and the whole covered with a shingle roof. There was a double track for wagons, with a foot path on either side. The bridge when finished and opened for travel, was re- garded as a superb piece of work.

But in time, this structure wore out, and de- cayed, and the business and travel of the county demanded a better bridge. One that would not only answer the purpose for which it should be intended, but which would also be an honor to the county, and an ornament to the county seat. In 1873 the old bridge was torn down

and the Canton Iron Bridge Company, under contract with the county commissioners erected a substantial iron bridge, at a cost to the county of about thirteen thousand dollars. This bridge erected in 1873 was among the first iron bridges built in the county, and was allowed to do service until 1889 when it was removed to a point about a mile west of Miami Street, and re-erected over the river north of the cemetery. Previous to the building of any of these bridges, the river was crossed by canoes when too high for teams to be driven across.

At the March session in 1839, John Byal, Aquilla Gilbert and Daniel Fairchild, commis- sioners, "Ordered that there be appropriated for building a bridge across Eagle Creek, at what is now called the Upper Ford, or where the Milmore and Findlay State road crosses the creek, the sum of ten dollars, pro- vided, there is a good and sufficient bridge erected thereon before the first day of Novem- ber next." This bridge was to be built where the Sandusky Street bridge now is. What would our friends in East Findlay, and in the eastern part of the county say to a ten dollar bridge at that place now. But they must re- member, that when this order was passed, that the place designated for the bridge, was a considerable distance out in the country.

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Twentieth Century History of Findlay and Hancock County, Ohio, and Representative Citizens, Part 9

Author: Jacob Anthony Kimmell Publication date: 1910 Publisher: Number of Pages: 1189

Author: Jacob Anthony Kimmell
Publication date: 1910
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 1189