USA > Pennsylvania > Fayette County > Uniontown > A history of Uniontown : the county seat of Fayette County, Pennsylvania > Part 40
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The vast territory of the West hung by a slender thread
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to the fragile republic east of the mountains for the same geo- graphical reasons as separated Italy from France. Could the East and the West be held in one common brotherhood? Could their interests, sympathies and ambitions be made one? The spectre of the National road echoed " Yes," and time has proven that the population which poured into the Ohio valley over this road saved the western states to the union.
Fortunately, President Jefferson favored the movement and appointed a commission to report on the feasibility of the proj- ect, and it was to the master mind of Albert Gallatin, an adopted son of Fayette county, then secretary of the treasury, to devise the means by which the conception could become a reality. The first funds for the construction of the National road were derived from the sale of land in Ohio, amounting to $12,652, and became available on the first day of October, 1805. These funds were from the two per cent. reserved for the laying out and making roads to the state of Ohio by virtue of an act of congress, April 30, 1802, forming that state.
By an act approved March 29, 1806, was authorized the laying out and the making of the road from Cumberland in Maryland to the state of Ohio, and the legislature of Pennsyl- vania authorized the construction of the road across her terri- tory by the act of April 9, 1807, providing the route be changed so as to pass through Uniontown, which was done.
The frontier settlers of the West now turned their faces with bright anticipations to the East, and in the beams of the rising sun they beheld the mirage of the great highway over which there was to be borne to them the happiness and pros- perity of civilization.
The construction and control of the road was placed under the supervision of the War Department of the general govern- ment, and was the first internal improvement attempted ex- clusively by the government, whence the name of the National road, but from the fact that it began at Cumberland and ran westward, it was also known as the Cumberland road.
The first contract was let in April, 1811, for the first ten miles west of Cumberland, and from which time section after section was let and constructed until in 1818 the great national highway was opened for travel and traffic to the Ohio river at Wheeling, reducing the time from Baltimore to Wheeling from eight days on horseback over the old Braddock road, to three
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days by stage coach over the new National road. The great eastern mails leaving Washington city were delivered at Wheel- ing in fifty-five hours, thus fulfilling one of the important ob- jects for which the road was constructed. The road was con- tinued through the states of Ohio and Indiana and into the prairies of Illinois, a total length of 800 miles.
The construction of this great highway was the crowning act of national expansion of all that had gone before, and proved to be the most historic road in America, and one of the most famous in the world-a splendid monument of national fore- sight and of national greatness. Not like stupendous monu- ments erected in other countries for the purpose of show or of aggrandizing the pride of some despotic monarch, but this was a work of utility, tending to cement the bond of union, and bring together the distant parts of the republic, and diffuse wealth among a free people, and instead of impoverishing the nation, it was made the richer by its construction.
Upon the advent of the National road, Uniontown, as well as all other towns along the route, took on new life. All kinds of business was revived; shops were built for the manufacture of stage coaches, wagons and other vehicles; dwellings were erected, and houses of entertainment were opened for the com- fort and accommodation of those who thronged this great thoroughfare. All kinds of farm produce found a ready market at remunerative prices, and the people became prosperous.
Towns sprang into existence along its route, taverns were established at convenient distances, at which the weary traveler could procure refreshment and lodging, and the whole length of the road soon became thronged with home-seekers desiring to cast their lots and make their homes in the fertile valleys of the West. At the same time a counter tide was flowing eastward, consisting principally of immense and continuous droves of horses, cattle and hogs and other products of the farm to supply the markets of the East.
Four-horse stage coaches were put on the road for the con- veyance of passengers and the United States mails ; and wagons of every capacity, from the ponderous Conestoga, with its burden of ten tons, drawn by six powerful bell-bedecked horses, to the smallest, thronged the way, conveying freight and families with their household goods. The Good Intent stage coach line and the National Road stage company were the principal competing
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lines on the road. The latter having the National House on Morgantown street as its stopping place, and having a large stageyard in connection, where coaches were built and sheltered and horses stabled. These stage coaches were furnished with three seats and would accommodate three passengers on a seat, and a seat on the front with the driver was preferable in fine weather on account of the opportunity it afforded to enjoy the scenery along the route. These coaches were also furnished with a front and a rear boot, the front for the United States mails and the rear for trunks and baggage, and rocked and rolled on wide leathern supports known as thoroughbraces instead of springs.
A pony express was put on the road for carrying light mails. This consisted of a single horse and boy rider, who rode in relays of six miles each and was intended to carry urgent mail with greater speed than the stage coach.
In a test to ascertain the shortest time in which a mail could be carried from Cumberland to Wheeling a coach and relays of four horses were placed in charge of Redding Bunting, who left Cumberland at 2 o'clock a. m., reached Uniontown, a dis- tance of 63 miles, at 8 a. m., Washington, a distance of 94 miles, at 11 a. m., and arrived at Wheeling, a distance of 131 miles, at 2 p. m., making the whole distance in just 12 hours.
Among the distinguished personages who passed over the old National road and honored Uniontown with their presence, may be mentioned Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, James Monroe, William Henry Harrison, James K. Polk, John Tyler, John Quincy Adams, Abraham Lincoln, Henry Clay, Thomas Benton, Lewis Cass, General Lafayette, General Santa Anna, the Indian chief Black Hawk, Jennie Lind, P. T. Barnum, General Winfield Scott and others.
The immense traffic on the road soon made a demand for repairs and it became a grave question as to Congress having the authority to make an appropriation for this purpose. It would be hard to conceive how Congress could have the power to con- struct a road over which to carry the United States mails and have no power to repair and maintain the same. But so grave was the question that it was deemed expedient to pass the road over to the states through which it passed, and upon the govern- ment so doing, the legislature of Pennsylvania passed an act, which was approved April 4, 1831, providing for the erection of six toll-gates to be erected within her limits at which tolls should
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be collected sufficient to keep the road in good repair. This system prevailed until by an act of the legislature the gates were thrown open and the old pike was made free on the first day of June, 1905.
But alas! this great national highway which had throbbed with animation; over which the wheels of traffic had rolled, and over which the stage coach had sped, was doomed to be super- seded by the superior facilities of the railroad and steam car.
The same faces that had lighted up with joy and animation in anticipation of the coming of the National road, and beheld in it a mighty colossus standing over the land beneath whose giant strides passed the commerce of a nation, now turned pallor as they viewed with horror the blighting hand of a spectre stretching over the road which they had learned to love. They contended earnestly for the exclusion of the railroad and for the maintenance of the old road. But the demands of the grow- ing West could no longer be met in the old way, and American enterprise was to meet the demands.
Upon the completion of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad to Wheeling, January 13, 1853, the death knell of that part of the National road between Cumberland and Wheeling was heard in the scream of the steam whistle of the locomotive, and
" We hear no more of the clanging hoof, And the stage coach rattling by, For the steam king rules the traveled world, And the old pike's left to die."
Proud towns which once enjoyed the prosperity of the road have dwindled to comparative insignificence. The stage lines were removed to other roads, the tavern keepers sought other avocations, and travel no longer thronged the old highway; but it still remains a monument of a past age, both interesting and venerable. Having carried thousands of population and mil- lions of wealth into the West, it served as a bond of union be- tween the East and the West, and harmonized and brought together in a common interest an otherwise divided peoples. It was the principal means of building up and strengthening a great and growing republic, and was the pride and glory of its day, and the government that built it, instead of being im- poverished was enriched thereby.
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" It stands all alone like a goblin in gray, The old-fashioned inn of a pioneer day, In a land so forlorn and forgotten, it seems Like a wraith of the past rising into our dreams ; Its glories have vanished, and only the ghost Of a sign-board now creaks on its desolate post, Recalling a time when all hearts were akin As they rested at night in the welcoming inn."
" Oh! the songs they would sing and the tales they would spin, As they lounged in the light of the old country inn. But a day came at last when the stage brought no load To the gate, as it rolled up the long dusty road.
And lo! at the sun-rise a shrill whistle blew
O'er the hills-and the old yielded place to the new- And the merciless age with its discord and dinn Made a wreck, as it passed, of the pioneer inn."
During the interim between the taking off of the great mail and passenger coaches and the immense freight traffic, upon the completion of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, and the present time, the National road continued to be a great thoroughfare of constant and valuable use; and since the legislature of Pennsyl- vania has made provisions to rehabilitate the old road, and the same spirit has been manifested along its entire route, this old National road may soon be the route selected for a grand ocean- to-ocean boulevard, which as a national highway and boulevard will surpass any national monument ever attempted by any of the world powers, and is destined to be thronged by the elite of this and other countries, whose touring cars, which for speed and comfort, vie with the palatial Pullman coach, shall glide over this continental highway and cause the great spirits of Washington, Jefferson, Gallatin, Stewart and others who were instrumental in its construction to exclaim, "Surely we have builded better than we knew."
For a full and complete history of this old National road, the reader is referred to that able work of Colonel Thomas B. Searight, entitled " The Old Pike."
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THE TELEGRAPH.
Congress appropriated the sum of $30,000 to enable Pro- fessor Morse to construct a telegraph line between the two cities, Washington and Baltimore, Governor Wallace of Indiana, then a member of congress, casting the deciding vote. Miss Anna Ellsworth, daughter of the Commissioner of Patents, first conveyed the news to Professor Morse that his bill had passed, upon which the professor promised that she should have the honor of dictating the first message over the line. When the line was completed Miss Ellsworth was sent for and dictated the following message: "What hath God wrought?" This first message that ever passed over an electric telegraph line is still preserved in the archives of the Historical Society at Hart- ford, Connecticut.
The first message was sent on the 24th day of May, 1844, from the supreme court chamber in the capitol at Washington to the Mount Clair depot at Baltimore.
The line between Baltimore and Washington was opened for public business under the auspices of the Post Office Depart- ment, April 1, 1845, and one cent for every four characters was charged, and during the first four days only one cent was re- ceived. After a week the receipts reached one dollar. In 1845, New York and Philadelphia were connected, and in 1846, Phila- delphia and Baltimore were connected.
The Genius of Liberty of January 14, 1847, contained the following: "The magnetic telegraph line has been completed to Pittsburgh, and that place has been brought into communica- tion with the eastern cities. Communications from Pittsburgh are sent and replies received from Philadelphia and Washington in the short space of ten or fifteen minutes."
Poles carrying the wires were erected along the National road from Baltimore to Wheeling and were placed in Union- town in July, 1848, and were about half the size of those in present use and bore only two wires.
The first telegraph office established in Uniontown was in the fall of 1848, and was located in a small brick building next south of the Episcopal church on the old stage-yard lot on Morgantown street. The first operator was William Bart, who acquired the sobriquet of Telegraph Bill, and William Smith, son of Daniel Smith, Esq., was employed as assistant and mes- senger boy. The first message sent over the line from Union-
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town was dictated by Joshua B. Howell, Esq., to a friend in New Jersey requesting him to send a box of peaches. The first election returns received over the telegraph line were those of the election of Zachary Taylor in the fall of 1848, on which oc- casion a mass of people congregated in the vicinity of the of- fice to receive the returns in this novel way.
The above incidents show how closely Uniontown has kept upon the heels of progress. The telegraphic system, like all other public utilities, came to stay, and Uniontown has never . been without telegraphic communication with the commercial world since its advent.
A company composed of citizens of the town constructed a line along the right of way of the old Fayette County railroad company, which did a telegraphic business for the public until the road passed into the hands of a lessee company who devoted it exclusively to private use.
The Western Union Telegraph company have maintained an office here for many years, and have transacted the principal part of the telegraphic business of the town.
The Postal Telegraphic company opened an office in Union- town in April, 1899, with James Case as operator, and have con- ducted an office here ever since.
The first successful submarine cable spanning the Atlantic was laid from Valentia, off the coast of Ireland, to Heart's Con- tent, a fishing hamlet off the coast of Newfoundland. Mr. Cyrus W. Field, the master spirit of the enterprise, announced to his friends in New York the consummation of his project as follows : " Heart's Content, July 27, 1866,-We arrived here at nine o'clock this (Friday) morning. All well. Thank God, the cable is laid and is in perfect working order. Signed, Cyrus W. Field."
The first European tidings flashed across the cable to the western hemisphere were-that a treaty of peace had just been signed between Austria and Prussia-a most fitting message for the grand accomplishment. The queen of England sent her salutations to President Johnson as follows: "The Queen con- gratulates the President on the successful completion of an undertaking which she hopes may serve as an additional bond of union between the United States and England." To this the president responded by saying: "The President of the United States acknowledges with profound gratification the receipt of
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Her Majesty's dispatch, and cordially reciprocates the hope that the cable which now unites the eastern and western hemispheres may serve to strengthen and to perpetuate peace and amity be- tween the Government of England and the Republic of the United States."
After sending several signal messages in codes in an ex- perimental way across the Atlantic, Marconi, on Sunday, De- cember 21, 1902, announced for publication that he had just suc- ceeded in sending inaugural wireless messages from Glace Bay, Cape Breton, Canada, to Poldhu, Cornwall, England, with com- plete success, including one from the Governor General of Canada to King Edward VII of England and one from Dr. Parkin, M. P., special correspondent of the London Times, to that paper. Thus 1902 marks the introduction of one of the grand improvements of the age.
ADVENT OF THE RAILROAD.
The Baltimore and Ohio railroad company was incorpo- rated by the legislature of Maryland in 1826 and was the first corporation which made any actual movement toward the con- struction of a railroad line through the valleys of the Youghio- gheny and the Monongahela rivers. This company applied to the general assembly of Pennsylvania for authority to construct their road through the state to or toward a terminus on the Ohio. This privilege was granted requiring the company to complete their road within fifteen years from the passage of the act.
Preliminary surveys were made through Fayette county in 1835, and deeds on record show that the proposed route entered the county at the confluence of Casselman river with the Youghiogheny, and followed the left bank of the latter to New Haven, thence up the valley of Opossum run, thence one survey ran down Boland's run, and another down Bull's run to Red- stone creek, thence following that stream to its confluence with the Monongahela river. Another survey came down Cove run and Shute's run, near the present lines of the B. & O. and the Southwest Pennsylvania railroads to the confluence of Shute's run with Redstone creek, thence down the latter to its mouth.
Still another survey came down the right bank of the Monongahela river through New Geneva to Brownsville, while one came through near the present route of the Coal Lick run
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branch to Uniontown. From the mouth of Redstone the route lay along the valley of Ten Mile creek and up that valley to its head, thence down the valley of Templeton's run and Wheeling creek to Wheeling. A branch was to leave the main road at the mouth of Redstone creek and have its terminus at Pittsburgh.
The road was completed and opened for traffic to Cumber- land in the early 40s, and the Monongahela Navigation com- pany completed their slack water navigation to Brownsville about the same time. The section of the road from Baltimore to Cumberland absorbed the company's funds and the section through Pennsylvania was delayed beyond the limit allowed by the act of assembly and those who in 1838 and 1839 strongly favored the road, now as strenuously opposed it as a competitor with the proposed Pennsylvania railroad and of the Cumberland turnpike. The Pennsylvania railroad was being built westward across the Alleghenies with Pittsburgh as its western terminus, while the Baltimore and Ohio was to have Wheeling, a rival city, as its terminus. In 1842 the Baltimore and Ohio company's scrip was at a discount of 20 per cent., while the Good Intent stage company's shin-plasters commanded their full value and were redeemed upon presentation to the company.
A convention was assembled in the Episcopal church at Brownsville on the 25th and 26th of November, 1835, at which were delegates from Baltimore, Cumberland, Wheeling, Pitts- burgh and other localities. Hon. Andrew Stewart was made president ; he also serving as a representative of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal company.
At this convention resolutions were adopted that the great and growing commercial and social intercourse between the Atlantic and the western states demands the early completion of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad from Cumberland to Pittsburgh and Wheeling, and that we memorialize the congress of the United States, the legislatures, of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia and Maryland, the municipal authorities of Baltimore, Pittsburgh and Wheeling, asking for aid for the extension and completion of the road.
Frequent meetings were held urging the speedy completion of the road until the Monongahela Slack Water Navigation company completed their improvements to Brownsville, No- vember 13, 1844, when the sentiment of the people changed. It was now thought that the Cumberland turnpike road would be
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of more profit to the western counties than a railroad; travel would be increased between Cumberland and the head of navi- gation, and the railroad must forever have its terminus at Cum- berland.
At a meeting held at Uniontown in July, 1845, General Henry W. Beeson, who had previously represented this district in congress, and had been an ardent advocate of a railroad, now strenuously opposed the completion of the Baltimore and Ohio road as a dangerous competitor of the Cumberland road.
In his address on this occasion he urged that steam power would utterly supplant horse power. He then went into details to show how many horses were employed in the traffic over the Cumberland road ; how much hay and grain would be consumed as food for these horses; how many sets of harness and other equipments required ; how many blacksmiths and the number of horse shoes necessary to keep these horses shod ; the number of coaches, wagons and other vehicles required on the road; the number of drivers, wagoners, drovers and others employed in handling the traffic, and the profits accruing to those who ad- ministered to the comforts of the numerous patrons of the road, and the ready markets and remunerative prices received for the products of the farm.
These and much more, would necessarily be done away with by the advent of the railroad. The general in closing his re- marks appealed to the citizens of Western Pennsylvania to stand firm to the interests of the Pennsylvania canal and the Cumber- land road and compel the Baltimore and Ohio railroad to fix its terminus at Cumberland.
General Beeson has been severely criticised for his utter- ances on this occasion, when he but voiced the sentiment of the people as they saw the situation at that time, but individually, he was always foremost and liberal in his views and donations toward public improvements as he saw them.
American enterprise knows no bounds; it halts at no obstacle, but bounds the river, scales the mountain and tunnels the hill as it pursues its way ; and when the legislature of Penn- sylvania refused to renew the charter, the Baltimore and Ohio railroad passed through Virginia and within a few feet of the southwest corner of the Keystone state to Wheeling, and sub- sequently reached Pittsburgh by the purchase of another road already constructed. Thus the people of Western Pennsyl-
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vania lost not only the railroad, but the travel and traffic of the Cumberland road and the Pennsylvania canal as well,
An act incorporating the Pennsylvania railroad company was passed, April 13, 1846, and on the 25th of February, 1847, Governor Shunk granted a charter to the company, and on the 2nd of August following, he issued his proclamation declaring the privileges granted to the Baltimore and Ohio railroad abrogated.
The opening of the Pennsylvania railroad to Pittsburgh in 1852, aroused the citizens of Uniontown to immediate action, and on the 11th of January, following, a rousing railroad meet- ing assembled at the court house over which the Honorable John Dawson presided. A stirring address was delivered by James Veech, Esq., in which he depicted the wonderful prosperity that would accrue to the citizens of Fayette county by the advent of a railroad. At the close of his address Mr. Veech offered the following resolution, which was unanimously adopted : Resolved -That it is expedient for the county of Fayette by her com- missioners, to subscribe at least two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to the stock of the Pennsylvania railroad for the con- struction of the Uniontown branch, and that the General County Committee be directed to take the proper and necessary meas- ures to have such a subscription made with the least possible delay. Resolved-That the proceedings of this meeting be pub- lished in the papers of this and of Westmoreland county, and that copies thereof be sent to our representatives at Harrisburg.
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