USA > Tennessee > Sullivan County > Historic Sullivan; a history of Sullivan County, Tennessee, with brief biographies of the makers of history > Part 24
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THE NEWSPAPER-POLITICS.
In 1896 the Daily Times was launched by Faw and Underwood. In 1898 this paper bought the Daily Courier and became the Times-Courier-John Slack, however, re- taining the Weekly Courier. In September, 1898, the Daily Tribune was started as a campaign paper, James A. Stone and John W. Price being the promoters, with Herschel Dove as associate editor. This paper was merged into the Times-Courier in December, same year. In 1900 a company bought the Tribune-Times-Courier and the paper again became the Daily Courier.
The first daily paper published in the county was called the Daily Argus, the first copy appearing November 17, 1879. George T. Hammer and John T. Barnes were the proprietors, with W. F. Rhea, John Caldwell and Will Pepper editors at different times. It lived for three months and was the first penny daily ever printed in Tennessee. It declared in its first issue, "our aim shall be to live and let live and in order to live up to it or rather down to it we must run our business strictly on a cash and pay-down system." The subscription price was five cents per week.
In 1873 William Burrow published the Souvenir, a literary journal, which for a time had the phenomenal circulation of five thousand, covering many states. It was run for two years.
In 1879 William and Robert Burrow began the publi- cation of the Reporter, a weekly paper. In 1885 Thomas J. and Joseph H. Burrow took charge. This paper ran for two years and enjoyed the distinction of being the best condenser of news in the state.
The Landmark was a Bluff City product, appearing in 1872-W. D. Pendleton, proprietor, and Maj. B. G. McDowell, editor. R. M. Dickey and Will V. Vance were also editors, the former in 1873 and the latter in 1874.
This paper was moved to Blountville in 1878 and was the first paper to be published at the county capital.
The Central Star followed it a few years later, fostered
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by Ben. L. Dulaney and N. J. Phillips. Phillips, coming into full possession, removed the paper to Newport, Tennessee. After sinking a discouraging amount of money the editor one day opined that he would as soon as not sink the whole outfit in the river, which ran back of the office. And such, sometimes, is the vexatious and uncertain existence of this kind of enterprise.
Between the closing of 1906 and the beginning of 1907 there was an interregnum in the newspaper business of Sullivan. But this lapse was partly covered by the issuance, at Kingsport, of a weekly paper called The Zephyr, William Peltier being the promoter.
The Sullivan County Developer is the latest offering from the press and began its existence at Bluff City in 1908, with W. D. Lyon, editor.
With all the drawbacks in the way of office accommo- dations and the meager support the early editor derived from his paper there is no doubt of its influence. As a fashioner of sentiment it was most powerful because of extensive circulation. The men who conducted these old-time weekly papers uniformly gave sound advice and were conservative. Whatever radical opinions they may have had they did not find it expedient, in the face of limited means, to assert such views, and in all instances were builders of prosperity as well as of public opinion.
POLITICS.
Most of the newspapers of Sullivan have been political and the politics of the county has been democratic. The influence of Andrew Jackson still lives.
The most exciting campaign was during the Polk and Clay candidacy for President. Polk being a Tennessean made the fight local as well as national. It was a color campaign-pokeberries and clay mud being the party emblems. One side would stain a fence or house with pokeberries and the other would would cover it with a
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daub of clay mud. In those days candidates always engaged in joint debate. It was not necessary to chal- lenge-it was understood. These joint discussions drew immense audiences and were consequently conducted in a grove or open-air pavilion. There being no great number of newspapers the people sought information from the political speakers and they usually obtained it, for these speakers, accustomed to public appearances and never knowing what inquiries might be made, became well informed men.
During the Know-nothing campaign of 1855, in a speech at the Institute grove in Blountville, Andrew Johnson, for the edification and enlightenment of his audience as well as to the discomfiture of his opponent-Meredith P. Gentry-defined know-nothingism as "the little end of nothing whittled to a point."
These speakers, too, often appealed to the sentiment of the audience and when lacking for a more suitable plea imposed upon prejudice.
When Gen. Stokes and DeWitt Senter were opposing each other for governor they engaged in a discussion at Blountville. Stokes was the owner of Ariel, the famous race-horse. He appealed to the horse-breeding and agricultural spirit of his countrymen, "the bones of Ariel," said he, "are mouldering on Sullivan County soil."
Replying to this Senter said: "I grant you it is a great honor to have the resting place of the fastest horse of the times, but gentlemen the bones of an ancestor of mine, who fought in the battle of King's Mountain, are sleeping in Sullivan, and what are the bones of the fastest horse in the world compared with the sacred dust of a man who fought for your liberties."
That politics makes strange bedfellows is demonstrated in the following: When John Blair and John Tipton were running for congress in 1825 they had an engage- ment to speak in Blountville. After they had completed their discussion they went to the hotel and the proprietor
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unthoughtedly assigned both men to the same room. However opposed to each other's political views men in that day may have been they could accommodate personal inconveniences with singular inconsistency. When the two men retired Tipton described how he had been to Hawkins and fixed things to suit himself and thus, secure in his own contemplation, laughed himself to sleep. Blair then quietly dressed himself, slipped down stairs, ordered his horse, and when his antagonist awoke next morning the Hawkins affair was being fixed the other way.
JOSEPH R. ANDERSON
.
JOSEPH R. ANDERSON.
A BIOGRAPHY.
The true measurement of a man is not the much he amounts to while living, but more of the much he amounts to when dead.
The name of Joseph R. Anderson grows in strength as the years go by. He had the elements of greatness. A man who can found a city can found a republic -- the only difference-opportunity.
He was born in Scott county, Virginia, October 25, 1819, and spent his youth on a farm. He went to school at the country log schoolhouse-his favorite study being mathematics.
One day he sold a bushel of Irish potatoes, which he had raised, for fifty cents. This fifty cents was the first money he ever made and he kept it for three years. This act may indicate a miserly nature, but a miser he was not as his wealth was accumulated more through economy than selfish hoarding.
In his fifteenth year he went to Blountville and became a clerk in the store of his uncle, Samuel Rhea, who paid him fifty dollars a year and board. He remained in this capac- ity for eight years, until 1842, part of the time being deputy post-master.
During this time he had saved seven hundred and fifty dollars, and, borrowing one thousand dollars from his father and uncle, engaged in merchandising on his own account at Eden's Ridge. Here he remained until March, 1844, paid back the five hundred dollars to his uncle and offered to return to his father the five hundred dollars he had borrowed from him, but his father would not take the money. Thirty years later he paid the note with interest and the money was divided among the heirs.
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In March, 1844, he bought a half interest in his uncle's store and remained at Blountville until 1853.
He married Malinda King, daughter of Rev. James King, June 3, 1845. In September, 1853 he removed to Bristol and began selling goods in a brick store on the corner of Fourth and State streets. This store he con- ducted until 1860, when he also went into the banking business.
The Civil War interfered with his plans and disjointed his business, but after the war he resumed both the mer- chantile and banking business. Later he disposed of his store to his son, John C. Anderson and his nephew, A. B. Carr and devoted himself to the banking business exclusively.
Joseph R. Anderson was not a great banker nor was he a great financier. His methods lacked policy. He did not live in a day when captains of industry were co-evil with existing contradictions. A man who de- posited his money in the old Anderson bank deposited his morals with it. In all sincerity the banker reached out with a fatherly concern to his depositors. One day a patron of his bank went to the cashier and told him he wished to draw out some money-several hundred dollars. Seeing him there and knowing that he was dealing in futures, Anderson told him he could not have the money.
"Do you mean to tell me that I can't draw out my own money?"
"That's what I mean," said the banker, "you can't have it-you are gambling in futures."
The man threatened the banker, but the banker stood firm, until finally convinced that, although he would be doing the depositor a great service in refusing, he had no legal right to do so.
It is not for the money Anderson accummulated that he will be remembered. His fortune was small
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beside some that have been made by others since his time. And besides wealth is not worth.
It was for his moral strength-his high standard of excellent, irreproachable, clean, every-day life. He was clean of person and clean of character. He was a healthy man and he had a healthy, wholesome religion.
Early he espoused the cause of temperance and he never wavered. He believed that the preventive was better than the cure-that the best one could do with the man in the gutter was to reclaim him, and so he organized the Band of Hope-took little boys by the hand and led them away from temptation. It is significant of his foresight that a member of one of his boy bands led the forces in the temperance fight in Bristol in 1907.
He was nominated for governor by the Prohibition party in 1888, but the news never reached him until too late-he was dying and his family never told him.
When posterity sums up the work of the toilers who have struggled through the years, sometimes with little hope to cheer them; when they carry their riband wreaths to adorn the deserving, there will be a steady pilgrimage to his tomb.
GEORGE A. CALDWELL.
A BIOGRAPHY.
By the time a man deserves a title he does not have much need of one.
In East Tennessee Dr. Caldwell was not near as big a man as George A. Caldwell. Gen. Washington was no greater than Washington-and as for Mr. Napoleon-
George A. Caldwell was born near New Market, Jefferson county, Tennessee, February 10, 1825, and died in Bristol, July 2, 1896, aged seventy-one years.
He was educated at Maryville College and Union Theological Seminary, New York. His college life was not one of ease.
He began his ministry at Athens, Tennessee, in 1852, and in April of that year married Margaret Brooks, daugh- ter of Gen. Joseph A. Brooks, of Knoxville.
At the beginning of the Civil War the Southern Presby- terian church selected two missionaries. A church organi- zation in the army is not practicable on account of the uncertain movements of the men, and it was the duty of these missionaries to visit the various camps and have supervision over the chaplains. The church appointed Caldwell and B. M. Palmer, of New Orleans. The former was engaged chiefly with the armies of Johnson and Bragg and there was such a call upon his time that he did not get to see his family for four years.
The section where Caldwell was living became strongly Union in sentiment and when he returned after the war was waited upon by sympathizers with the Union and warned to leave town before morning or he would be whip- ped. He went to the gun-rack, whereon an old gun had rested and rusted during the years of his absence; this he took down, cleaned up, fired two or three times to see if in good condition, and awaited his persecutors. They did not
GEORGE A. CALDWELL
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come-they knew too well the meaning of these prepara- tions. He had perfect reliance on divine protection, but during these times it often took a gun to convince others.
He left Athens and came to Bristol, arriving on a sec- tion hand-car with his gun across his knee. At Watauga, on this trip, he met some stragglers coming back from the war. They were returning to their homes, but had been met by bushwhackers. One wretched fellow, who had been beaten, escaped from his pursuers and fell exhausted at the feet of Caldwell, imploring him to save his life. He was helped into a box car, where the minister had his household goods, just as the men who were after him arrived. They demanded the escaped soldier, but Caldwell stood in the doorway, protecting him. The mob threatened his life if he did not give up the man, but he stood firm and told them calmly the man should not be molested. His firmness whipped them-they skulked away.
Not long after he had taken charge of a Bristol church he had an appointment to preach in Hawkins county. The Sizemore band of outlaws sent him word that if he preached there he would be dealt with violently. Despite the threat he went and filled his engagement.
He was a fearless man. He barely touched the raiment of the disappearing wilderness preacher and brought down to the present many of his characteristics-his bravery; his enthusiasm for a cause and his way of telling about it, with fervid eloquence-an orator with tears in his voice.
There is one side of a preacher's life that is seldom seen by the general public-the cheerfulest part of him-his comradeship. It seems a mission of his to hide this, except when on jaunts or when in the company of his own cloth. There used to gather at the old Courier office, when it was lodged in the little checker-board front on Fourth street, a group of men consisting of Caldwell, Sullins, Munsey and Neal. That was the raconteur hour
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with them and they employed it to their content. Cald- well entering would often salute in rhyme: "Good morn- ing, Brother Neal, how do you feel?" "Not so well, sorry to tell, Brother Caldwell" came the rhyming reply. Munsey, gawky and green and hunting for words, would sweep the group with a broad grin-the same man who in after years swept vast audiences with his ethereal eloquence. And Sullins told tales.
If there was any one trait in Caldwell's life that stood apart from the others it was his fearlessness. Once satis- fied that he was on the right side no power could move him; it mattered not if he stood alone-he would stand by his convictions. He italicized sin when he told about it, either from the pulpit or on the pavement, and, being outspoken in his beliefs, he made enemies, but no man ever disputed his power as an eloquent preacher.
In 1874 he was a commissioner to the General Assembly at Columbus, Mississippi. This is the highest court of the Presbyterian church. The students of the theological seminary of Columbia, South Carolina, were protesting against an order issued by the faculty of that institution, compelling attendance upon Sunday services. Caldwell, as a member of the standing committee on theological seminaries, brought in a minority report together with Rev. L. H. Wilson. In the debate that followed, by his impassioned oratory and earnest pleadings in defense of the students, he won the distinction of being called "the Ajax of the Assembly." As a result two of the pro- fessors and some of the directors of the seminary resigned, while the students were vindicated in their stand for "liberty of conscience and right of private judgment", for it was decided that compulsory attend- ance was inexpedient if not unconstitutional.
Caldwell said he preferred to preach to congregations in the country-that they were the more receptive and responsive.
He dedicated many churches, among them Arcadia in 1872.
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He was sought all over East Tennessee as an evangelist and was a leading worker in the great revival in Knox- ville in 1874, when there were many hundreds of con- verions.
He was liberal in his views with regard to other denomi- nations and was often accused by his own members as being "half Methodist."
He served the church in Bristol actively for twenty- seven years-resigned in 1892, and was then chosen pastor emeritus, until his death four years later, making thirty-one years that he was connected with one church.
He grew up with Bristol and was one of its best guides. He knew the citizens of all denominations; he spoke to them; he treated them as one family and his genial socia- ble nature made him not only the pastor of the Presby- terian church, but the pastor of the people.
CHAPTER XXXII.
BRISTOL.
In the Sapling Grove tract there were, originally, nine- teen hundred and forty-six acres. It was surveyed and sold in 1749 to James Patten "in consideration of the ancient composition of 9£, 7s and 6d."
It later became the property of John Buchanan, having been sold to him by William Campbell and William Preston, executors of James Patten, deceased.
On February 11, 1773, Isaac Barker and Evan Shelby bought the tract for "608£ current money of Virginia." Anthony Bledsoe, who had been living on the land, bought an adjoining piece, to which, on May 18, 1789, he added twelve hundred acres in three separate conveyances- one tract being located on the Island road.
In the winter of 1809 James Shelby, the son of Isaac Shelby, visited Sapling Grove. His visit was for the pur- pose of seeing the home of his ancestors and making a trade. For some time James King had been in communi- cation with the Shelby heirs with a view to purchasing this section. James Shelby went from the home of King, with whom he had lodged, to visit friends and relatives in Abingdon, and while there wrote his father, urging him to dispose of the "distant property"-not to let the opportunity to sell go by. The Shelbys were anxious to sell and showed it, and James King was as anxious to buy, but assumed indifference, which made the young man more insistent that his father sell.
The tract was finally sold to King for ten thousand dollars and thereafter was known as King's Meadows until it took the name of Bristol, nearly half a century later.
The odor of fresh mortar and brick and building material impresses one that Bristol's history is now being
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made rather than has been made. But history begins where memory fails-twenty years makes history.
When the news reached Blountville that a railroad was in contemplation, whose terminus would be King's Meadows, Joseph R. Anderson, with a business foresight that always went far ahead of his time, bought one hundred acres of land from his father-in-law, James King, and employed Henry Anderson, the county surveyor, to lay the tract off into lots and streets. This was in 1852. And that foresight reached still further when he viewed the ore-beds all about the place-he foresaw smoke rising from furnace stacks; he heard the rumbling of heavy trains carrying away the products of this section, and he called the new town Bristol,1 after the manufacturing city of the same name in England.
This tract of one hundred acres was bounded by a line following Beaver creek, from the railroad culvert to Main street; then running diagonally across the country to the railroad, about where King College now is; then along the railroad, back to the culvert. It also included a little plot lying east of the railroad, on both sides of Main street, embracing a portion of Second and Third streets.
1 While Bristol has undergone three changes in name, Bluff City not only takes first rank in the county but in the state for the number of names it has borne. It was first known as Shoate's Ford, named no doubt for Emanuel Shoate, whose name correctly spelled would perhaps be Choate. At the beginning of the eighteenth century it took the name of Middletown and really became a town- the name was given because of its location between Abingdon and Jonesboro and between Blountville and Elizabethton. Lots were selling at a good price as early as 1805-in that year one quarter-acre lot brought eighty-two dollars. Later the town took the name of Union-then at the beginning of the Civil War the citizens hurried from one extreme to honor the product of another, and called it Zollicoffer When the war was over the town resumed life as best it could under the name of Union. Then in 1876 when prosperity began to filter through the clogged seive of past misfortunes it took the name of Bluff City.
Kingsport holds next place for changes of name in the county. It began its career as the Island-then Big Island, Great Island and Long Island. Then when it became known as a good starting point for boatmen, a large number of boats were built there, and it took the name of Boatyard. When Gilbert Chris- tian purchased a large tract of land there and plotted it for a town it took the name of Christianville. When the lots were put on sale the first two purchasers were William King, of King's Iron-Works, and William King, of Abingdon, owner of the salt-works. These two men shipped such large quantities of the output of their forge and salt-wells that it was called Kings' Port. The fusion of the words by usage made Kingsport.
Paperville on the other hand, one of the oldest towns in the state, has always held to one name-this originated from the manufacture of paper there by the Burkhardts.
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Originally the streets were only numbered, no names being used, and extended through both sides of the town. Nine was the highest number reached. Anderson street was then Ninth street and Cumberland street was then Seventh street. Of the old streets only three remain with the original names and location-Second, Third and Fourth. Sixth street was where Fifth street now is and Fifth was where Olive now is. Sixth street ran into a graveyard at the Presbyterian church and had to go through an alley to get around the church. There was no other cross street between the then Sixth street and the bridge. There was no Fairmount addition nor Piedmont avenue, and the citizens cut down big trees on Solar hill and in the Blountville addition to make their winter fires. There were two hundred and sixteen lots in the plot of the town-among the first purchasers were Robert L. Owen, Robert Bibb, John N. Bosang, Francis McCrosky and John G. Simpson. Lots were sold for one hundred dollars each.
Circulars were sent out announcing the sale of these lots. One clause of the announcement read-"Reservation will be made in all conveyances to prohibit the occupant or his agent from making or selling intoxicating liquors upon the premises. This regulation is deemed indispen- sable to the peace and prosperity of the town."
The first group of buildings was constructed along the railroad. The old brick house on the corner of Fourth and State streets-the home of the Anderson family for a number of years-is the only remaining one of the original group.
The town was chartered February 22, 1856. Joseph R. Anderson became its first mayor, 1856-59. Those who have filled this office since are L. F. Johnson,2 1859-65;
2While Bristol people have been givers to educational, charitable and other causes-gifts that have sometimes been beyond the portion of the giver, yet it is notable that Bristol's first two mayors have been the only ones who have given to the public at large. Each gave resting places-one for the living-ons for the dead. Anderson gave the city park and Johnson gave the cemetery.
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A. P. Campbell, 1865-66; Jacob R. Crumley, 1866-70; E. C. McClanahan, 1870-72; T. L. Nelms, 1872-73; George B. Smith, 1873-74; J. M. Barker, 1874-78; J. A. Dickey, 1878-85; J. W. Norvell, 1885-89; John H. Caldwell, 1889- 91; S. W. Rhea, 1891-93; John C. Anderson, 1893-1901; Charles J. St. John, Jr., 1901-02; J. A. Dickey, 1902-09; L. H. Gammon, 1909.
The Virginia side was incorporated in the same year under the name of Goodson, being named for Samuel Goodson. The First mayor was W. L. Rice. The mayors who followed were I. C. Fowler, John F. Terry, A. F. Miles, W. A. Rader, J. H. Winston, Jr., Charles F. Gauthier and W. L. Rice.
In 1879 Bristol, Tennessee, was recognized by an act of the legislature establishing chancery and common law courts, which privilege was extended to the First, Second, Seventeenth and Nineteenth districts. Accord- ingly Judge H. C. Smith organized the chancery court June 9, 1879, and E. A. Warren was appointed clerk. Others who have served as clerks are George T. Hammer, A. C. Smith, R. L. Torbett, M. M. Pearson and James Wood.
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