USA > Pennsylvania > Jefferson County > Jefferson County, Pennsylvania : her pioneers and people, 1800-1915, Volume I > Part 77
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Third. The abandonment of farms, neg- lect of agriculture, rushing to the city to work for hire, and in crowds.
Fourth. The enormous annual influx of foreigners who when here are only consumers and have to be housed, clothed and fed.
Fifth. The mining and manufacturing workers and commercial runners that are con- sumers only.
Sixth. The individual high ideals and re- quirements in every walk of life; the plain people wanting to live better than million- aires.
Seventh. We demand everything needful. useful or ornamental without regard to cost.
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Every American wants to live in state by speculation and his wits.
Eighth. Personal ostentation, vanity and extravagance.
Ninth. Church ostentation, vanity and ex- travagance.
Tenth. Civic ostentation, vanity and ex- travagance.
Eleventh. Prodigality and waste in every- thing, and of foods in hotels, cafes, restau- rants and private homes.
Twelfth. Continual and expensive recrea- tions, like Home Weeks, Reunions, Ball Games, Excursions, etc.
Pure food laws have increased the cost of produce, laws regulating quality, purity, weight and measure certainly must advance prices. Such laws are a great step in progress. Cold storage is another advanced step-this enables us to preserve and have for table use at all seasons of the year meat, butter and eggs. This mode is modern and is expensive. To reduce cost in living buy sparingly of luxuries such as meat, bananas, oranges, canned goods, ice cream, etc. Economize on all needful sup- plies. I am glad the present advanced condi- tions are here and that they have come to stay. Adjust yourself to them, and by so doing you can become "well to do" in the world. Re- member you don't live in China, Italy or Eng- land. You need not beg. fight or strike for wages or employment. Work for yourself. Move on or back to the farm. The cause of the high cost of living to-day is the great army of non-producers, extravagance, "a good time," wilful waste and an abundance of money.
Grumblers say. "The poor pay the taxes." They don't. They never did. What have they to pay with? The spendthrift may indirectly pay some, but that is his own fault. But the criminal, the outlaw, the sensual, the prodigal, the slothful, the glutton, the wasteful, the use- less high salaried officials and grafters, the in- temperate, indolent, lazy and immoral men and women make the taxes. These human drones are now fed, housed and clothed as never before. Fifty years ago the poor in a neighborhood were sold by the township by private sale or public auction to some miser- able family in the community, to be kept, for a small pittance monthly. Of course the poor were underfed. ragged and dirty. Their con- dition was too dirty to relate here. Look to- day at and through the palatial, fraternal and county homes for the indigent. In addition to the necessities, these homes have all the lux- uries of modern civilization, hot and cold
water baths, toilets, etc. Under the new hu- manity of brotherhood the poor are no longer poor, but through the benevolence of the rich, who are the early risers, hard workers, active dealers and close calculators, yes, through the benevolence of this class of thrifty working people, the poor to-day are living in ease, com- fort and luxury. They are kept thus by the class of people who believe and practice the injunction, "in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread." Fifty years ago there were no medical and surgical hospitals for the poor in our county, no free tuberculosis treatment, no free antitoxin treatment. "Say not that the olden times were better than these." But croakers say, why does one individual in a family or community prosper and the others remain poor? Well, here it is, all extreme statements begin and end in error. The vul- gar idea that prosperity and wealth come by luck and not by labor is false. There is no such thing as luck in nature. The successful man of respectability and property, the tax- payer and worker, whose blocks of houses adorn the streets, and whose word and note are par at the bank, can you think for a ino- ment that he has no distinguishing and sub- stantial qualities different from those who were his school- and playmates? True, he may be no wiser, he may be no better, his education in school and church and in other matters may be inferior, but for accumulating he must be a vastly superior being to his earlier associates who are failures.
Scan the thrifty working and practical man's history and you will find that in his boyhood he was provident and frugal, that he shunned expense and dissipation, that he feasted sel- dom and at others' cost, that he was rarely seen at ball games or idle amusements, that he was diligent in study and in business, that he did not hesitate to work at low wages when he could not secure high ones, or to work at a disagreeable job when he could not secure a pleasant one, only that he kept busy. That he husbanded his hours and made each one count. By constant labor at some wage he accumu- lated little by little. Thus his first thousand dollars came slowly but surely. His founda- tion was thus deeply and solidly laid, and nothing could prevent him from realizing a fortune unless death or some great calamity would befall him.
In 1858 the United States government ap- propriated eighty million dollars for expenses. This caused a howl from center to circum- ference as an alarming waste and extrava- gance. Fifty years ago musical instruments
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were rare, such as organs, pianos, etc., and these were in possession of the very rich. The plain people had to sing or whistle. I whistled.
"Hog and Hominy"
I used to say this when I was a boy :
Some love to feast on fish and flesh, And some on ducks and drakes; But to keep your mind at ease Eat hog and buckwheat cakes.
In these days of church suppers, festivals, feasts and banquets, I thought it would not be amiss to give some of our pioneer dishes. First and foremost there was old lye hominy, made from the Indian or little yellow corn. In my boyhood it was the dish of dishes. 1 was always willing and anxious to help mother make some. It was an Indian dish like all the corn dishes were, and this was the way we made it: Select ashes made from hickory, maple, sugar, beech, elm or dogwood. Put these ashes in a hopper, which every family had, the bottom of which was covered with sticks and rye straw, carefully pour over these ashes rain or spring water and give this water time to percolate through the ashes into a ket- tle below. This would be the lye. Then put into this lye grains of shelled corn and let the corn remain until the lye had completely eaten away the husks of the grain. Now wash the grain through many waters until the corn is thoroughly cleansed from the lye. After the corn is bleached white from the many wash- ings put it into an iron pot containing water and boil until the grains are tender and will vield to a pressure between the thumb and fingers. The hominy is now ready for use. Store it in crocks, cut it out when needed, and serve it cooked in milk or cream, or fry it in the skillet with sausage or spareribs. If you eat this hominy properly cooked you have a feast, a banquet. and will escape "pellagra" and "hookworms." Of course, mush and milk was a constant diet for supper which we ate when milk was scarce with sweetened water, and sometimes with bear's oil. Fried mush we ate for breakfast with buckwheat cakes; and Indian pone was a constant diet for dinner. Another Indian dish we had was succotash. This was made in the summertime from green corn and green beans, seasoned with cream and butter and served hot. In the wintertime this was made from dried beans and hulled corn. cooked in cream and milk. This was a superb dish.
An Early Tornado
All I know about a tornado is that it is a violent windstorm which whirls, gathers, lulls and scatters, without thunder or rain, but usu- ally followed by torrents of rain and hail. It rises and falls in spots, and travels from four to forty miles an hour.
On the morning of May 30, 1860, a great tornado originated at or struck Christopher Foster's farm in Sugar Creek township, Arm- strong county, and went through Madison township, the same county, crossed the Alle- gheny river near Madison run, and passed from there up to the mouth of Leatherwood creek, where it destroyed J. B. Hasson's store. It is said by some who saw this whirlwind approaching, as it traversed with ten-mile-an- hour speed, some two hundred yards in width, that it carried with it fragments of houses, barns, trees, fences, etc., and seemed to be a sheet of fire, terrifying beyond description. The standing trees, covered with mire and clay to their very tops, looked as though a mighty flood had passed over them. Large trees, roots and rubbish were seen some two hundred feet in the air. From the fact that the trees were burned in many places, some supposed that there was fire in the wind.
Daniel Fogle, Esq., a citizen of Brookville then, and now living in Kansas, was on his way home from the mouth of Mahoning, and when he had reached Kellersburg, Clarion county, he was a witness of the passing hurri- cane or tornado. He said it was in shape like an inverted cone, in color like smoke, and well defined in its outlines. The sight was grand and imposing. Objects were observed in the cone, and were supposed, at first, to be birds, but were afterwards discovered to be branches of trees and other substances.
People in Mayville, seeing this moving destroyer from different positions, gave differ- ent descriptions of its appearance. Some say that it was "a column of midnight darkness streaked with lightning"; others, "as a mass of smoke surrounding fire." and others say it was "like a whirlwind of fire."
In the track of the storm large stumps were torn out-trees and stumps were found lying in the fields where for fifteen years not one stood and no one knew whence they came. Hail- stones measuring from seven to nine inches in circumference were picked up all along its course. At New Bethlehem dry goods, cloth- ing and tinware were picked up, which were supposed to have been from Hasson's store.
In its course the dwelling of Fulton Miller
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was blown down, his hoard pile scattered a distance of two miles. The dwellings of Thomas Daugherty, J. M. Henry, Joseph Smith, John McMillan, Sr., and Charles Stew- art were all blown down, and the barns of Mc- Millan and Stewart burned. Their families were wounded also. John Grabe's house was taken into the air as if it had been a balloon. The house and barn of John Hilliard were totally destroyed. The family escaped by tak- ing refuge under a bed. The stone chimney tumbled around them and they were rescued from beneath the ruins. The house and barn of Matthew Stewart were blown down, and his wife and child instantly killed. The house and barn of Widow Smith were demolished. William Shumaker had both his legs broken, his house and barn blown down and away, and his family injured. At the house of Joseph Ack- man his wife and daughter were injured. James Lias, wife and other members of the family were badly injured, house and barn of Samuel McCartney blown down, wife badly hurt, two horses killed. Adam Beer's house and barn were blown down and Mr. Beer badly hurt. Old Mr. Hollis's house was blown down, and one son hurt. The houses and barns of Wil- liam Brown and John Caldwell, John Rus- sell and G. Hollis were all blown down. North of Millville and cast of New Bethlehem houses and barns were destroyed and roofs carried from one farm to another. One mile and a half this side of Millville Mr. Shick's house and barn were blown down and the barn burned.
Passing thence to Mayville, the tornado did its most fearful ravages there. Twenty families were left homeless and their dwell- ings destroyed. There was not left in the village of Mayville, including the hotel of Major McFarlane and his store, the large gristmill and sawmill, enough material to build one house. The large bridge over Red Bank at this place was torn to pieces. Major Mc- Farlane had eight hundred dollars in money carried away, and Mr. Young. of the same place, had three hundred dollars. I saw some of this money that was picked up on the John Millen farm, in Washington township, Jef- ferson county. The killed in Mayville were Mrs. Irvin McFarlane. David Baughman and two children. Those injured and requiring medical aid included: Two of Mr. Irvin Me- Farlane's children, John Hess. Mrs. Hess and three children, one of Mr. Haines's children, John Sarvey, John Shick, Mrs. Shindledecker, D. D. Boyington and four or five of his family. Matthias Leicht and two strangers, David
Hess had his arm broken in two places. Mrs. Ferry, the blacksmith's wife, had her arm broken in two places, and three of her chil- dren were injured. Mrs. Haines's ribs were broken and one leg so badly crushed that the physicians had to amputate it. Dr. Strassly was there at Ferry's shop getting his horses shod. His buggy was taken up by the whirl- wind and torn to pieces, and the harness was stripped off the horses. His boots were torn into shreds and his clothes from his body. None of these effects of Dr. Strassly were ever found. Mr. Ferry, the blacksmith, was carried five or six rods and was injured. The physicians who rendered aid in Mayville were Dr. Mechling, of Brookville ; Dr. R. B. Brown, of Summerville; Dr. Stewart, of Greenville ; Dr. Vanvalzah, of Clarion, and Dr. Hill, of Ringgold.
llogs, dogs, poultry and sheep were killed. Apple trees were lifted out of the ground and carried away. The gardens were entirely de- stroyed, and in some spots the ground was plowed three feet deep. Three wagons just newly painted were literally torn to mere par- ticles.
Passing from Mayville across Red Bank creek it demolished Paul Gearhart's house and barn, the barn being burned. Passing towards the northeast it destroyed the house, barn and all of the other buildings belonging to Isaac Mottern, near Zion church, in Beaver town- ship. Jefferson county. He and all his family were badly injured. From the region of Me- Lean Ferguson's the storm passed, crossing the Brookville-Indiana road between the late John Montgomery's and Cool Spring, thence near Knoxdale, where it did considerable dam- age. Here the track of the storm was about a half mile wide, and Simon Montgomery, who was working in a clearing near where Joseph E. Hall's dam was on Sandy Lick, was struck by it. He had his knee and hip joints either broken or put out of place by the falling trees. The horse he was riding was killed. while another one escaped. The uninjured horse was hemmed in by fallen timber so that he had to be fed as hemmed in for sev- eral days. The whirlwind crossed the pike at what was then Henry .Amers', near Reynolds- ville, took the roof off his house, and from there went to William Dixon's, near the county line, where it tore his buildings to fragments, broke a leg for one of his boys, and injured a man in his head badly. And thus went the storm in its career of destruction away towards the northeast through Clearfield. Center and Union counties, but in these counties modified
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into a heavy rainstorm until it reached the Atlantic ocean, between Philadelphia and New York City.
Cyclones originate in the west and travel to the east. That summer was a cyclone summer. Whether this tornado came from the west I know not, but between three and four o'clock, on May 20, 1860, a cyclone struck Cincinnati and demolished a large number of buildings, hundreds of dwelling houses, killed four men and drowned two in the river, injured a great many women and children, and produced a great deal of miscellaneous destruction, but whether this was the same cyclone that struck this vicinity or not I cannot say. Small tor- nadoes were numerous that summer, there be- ing one at Roseville, one at Rural Village, Armstrong county, and others. These seemed to be entirely local, but were quite destructive.
SLAVERY
SOME LIGHT ON DARK CHAPTER IN OUR NATIONAL HISTORY
We hear a good deal said in these days about slaves and slave labor, but fifty years ago there was real slavery in these United States. In 1860 the slave population in this country consisted of 3.953.760 slaves, and these human chattels were owned body and soul by 347,425 persons. This slave aristocracy was opposed to free speech, a free press, free schools, free labor and free men, and in favor of free trade and sailors' rights. This small coterie of aris- tocrats kept the nation in constant agitation about labor from the formation of the govern- ment. This aristocracy under the guise of democracy dominated absolutely nearly one- half of the States, and dictated in the national government who should be president. judges of the Supreme Court, and in all other high of- fices. In 1850 this aristocracy captured the entire machinery of the Democratic party, and through the "Dred Scott" decision, and the "Fugitive Slave Law" and other infamous measures, seemed determined to make slavery national, and liberty sectional, hence the Civil war of 1861-65. In 1856 Dr. Duhling, of Mis- sissippi, in conversation asked me what a good blacksmith, shoemaker or carpenter could be bought for in Pennsylvania. This talk shocked me and made of me a very rabid Republican.
For the benefit of the present generation I herewith give some quotations from news- papers :
"Mr. Anderson, auctioneer, made the follow- ing sales of slaves, the first of this week: One
negro man, forty-five years, six months old, five hundred and seventy dollars; one negro boy, sixteen years old, seven hundred and seventy- seven dollars ; one negro woman and child, one thousand two hundred and five dollars; one negro woman, thirty-five years old, cash, six hundred and eighteen dollars; one negro girl, three years old, cash, one hundred and eighty- two dollars; one negro girl, sixteen years old, cash, six hundred dollars. These figures, we think, indicate a rather better feeling in the market than was manifested last fall, but they are below the rates current previous to that time."-Lexington (Ky.) Express, May 22, 1858.
In 1860 a slave trading firm in Richmond, Va., writing to Mississippi, gave the follow- ing intelligence concerning the slave market at that time :
"No. I men sell here from one thousand six hundred dollars to one thousand six hundred and fifty dollars, second-class men from one thousand four hundred dollars to one thousand five hundred dollars. No. I grown field girls sell from one thousand four hundred dollars to one thousand four hundred and seventy-five dollars. One extra sold to-day at one thou- sand five hundred dollars. Tendency of the market upward."
Slave Trade in June, 1860 .- "The following will exhibit the activity of the slave traffic. Within a fortnight four slavers have been cap- tured by the government, having on board over two thousand slaves, all taken to Key West, as follows : Bark 'Wildfire,' five hundred and thirty ; bark 'William,' six hundred and fifty; bark 'Bogota,' five hundred; a French bark. five hundred. Total, two thousand one hun- dred and eighty."
In 1860 the names of eighty-five vessels were published in New York City- which had been fitted out in that city for slave trading in that year.
Human slavery existed in Jefferson county from 1824 to 1840, sixteen years. William Jack, who built the house in which Mrs. Cyrus H. Blood resides, was elected to Congress as a Democrat from 1833 to 1840. He owned one or more slaves. Slaves were assessed at from forty dollars to one hundred dollars. The late John Butler. Esq., of Brookville, saw Jack brutally whip one of his slaves with a blacksnake whip in the middle of the road opposite the Blood residence.
I find also that John Eason, who built the pioneer hotel in 1830, owned a slave boy in 1833, and in 1834 was assessed for him at thirty dollars.
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(See also "Negro Slavery in Pennsylvania," Chapter III.)
REPUBLICAN PARTY
In 1856 the Republicans in our county had more votes than the Americans, yet they had no organization, and as the Americans had (sce chapter on Politics), they coalesced and formed the American Republican party, which con- tinued as an organization in the county until Monday, July 9, 1860, when the Republicans formed a distinct and an exclusive Repub- lican party, by properly elected delegates who met in convention in Brookville at one o'clock on that day, and after clecting William E. Gillespie, president, and Robert T. Perry, sec- retary, the following named delegates pre- sented credentials and were seated :
Brookville, S. C. Arthurs, William Reed; Beaver, Gilmore Montgomery, A. Thomas; Barnett, C. B. Yoemans, John Dobson ; Bell, James St. Clair, J. Miller ; Corsica, S. C. Espy, E. B. Orcutt ; Clover, John S. Barr, N. Carrier, Sr .; Eldred, A. S. Scribner, Jackson Hall; Gaskill, Robert S. Miller, H. S. Petterman; Heath, not represented; Henderson, Daniel Snyder, John Miller; Knox, Daniel Wolf, Nicholas McQuiston ; McCalmont, James Mc- Gee, John Smith; Oliver, Thomas Houston, William Gibson; Perry, J. H. Lewis, Irvine Robinson ; Punxsutawney, A. B. Miller, J. A. Mitchell; Polk, John Cochran, O. Davis; Por- ter, Jacob Howard, A. Kelso; Pinecreck, L. S. Geer, I. R. Long; Ringgold, Robert T. Perry, J. H. Hinderliter ; Rose, F. C. Coryell, William Carr: Snyder, Dr. W. J. McKnight, Ray Giles; Union, W. H. Morrison, J. B. Ilughes; Washington, W. H. Gordon, M. \\'right ; Winslow. W. II. Reynolds, J. C. Con- ser; Warsaw, A. Yetter, Ilenry Keys ; Young, William E. Gillespie, T. North.
After balloting they nominated the follow- ing ticket : For prothonotary. Joseph Hender- son, of Brookville; coroner, William .A. Dun- lap, of Punxsutawney ; sheriff. Philip Shanon, of Ringgold township: associate judge, one year, John J. Y. Thompson, of Brookville ; associate judge, five years, James Torrence, of Punxsutawney; commissioner, Andrew Smith, of Washington township; auditor, W. WV. Reed, of Corsica; trustees of academy, Andrew B. Mclain, John Matson, Enoch Hall.
IV. W. Wise, W. E. Gillespie and F. C. Coryell were appointed Congressional con- ferees. Ray Giles, John Barr and F. C.
Coryell were appointed a committee to wait upon I. G. Gordon, Esq., and solicit the use of his name as a candidate for Assembly to be placed before the conferees of the district. Matthew Dowling, S. C. Arthurs and Dr. W. J. McKnight were appointed representative conferees and instructed to support Mr. Gor- don. The only contest was over sheriff. There were eight ballots before a nomination was made and four candidates, to wit, Philip Shanon, Cyrus Butler, Joseph E. Hall and William Campbell.
The campaign of the party that year was educational and conducted by oratory in the schoolhouses. The "stumpers" were I. G. Gor- don, W. W. Wise, A. A. McKnight, A. P. Heichhold, D. C. Gillespie, Dr. W. J. Mc- Knight and J. K. Coxson.
W. W. Wise, a printer, was then practicing law, a poet and a great orator ; we called him "The Little Giant." Financially, he was poor like the rest of us. I have spoken at the same schoolhouse two or three times in a fall can- paign. I campaigned in Jefferson county for twenty years.
All evening meetings were announced to be held at "early candle-lighting." In stumping the speaker gave his own time and furnished his own transportation. If too poor to do this, some Republican would convey him in a hack, free of charge, or a number of workers would chip in and hire a team and go along. There was no campaign boodle to draw upon. We always had a county vigilance committee of one or two in cach township. This commit- tee was appointed at the county convention by the presiding officer, and was usually selected from the delegates present.
State delegates were selected as follows: An editorial notice was published in the Star that a meeting would be held at the court- house on a fixed date and delegates would be there and then selected. Our presidential ticket was Lincoln and Hamlin, and for State governor, Andrew G. Curtin. Our district nominee for Congress was John Patton, of Clearfield county ; for Assembly, I. G. Gordon, of Jefferson county : S. M. Lawrence, of Elk county.
Of all the persons named in the above sketch, whether delegates, conferees, candi- dates or stumpers, I am the only one now living, and as firm a believer in Republican principles as I was in 1856. I rejoice that it has been my privilege to uphold and advo- cate them in private and in public.
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EIGIITY YEARS' CIIANGES
Light and Heat in Brookville
Eighty years ago the only light at night in Brookville was the flame of the kitchen fire, the pitch-pine faggot, the fryings of meat poured into a saucer containing a rag, the old iron lamp, which looked like a miner's lamp, filled with oil and stuck into the chimney. Of course the well-to-do had a tallow candle, candlestick and perhaps snuffers. The odor and smoke from each and all of these lights were terrible. These were the lights used in the time when cost of living was low.
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