464 - HISTORY OF TOLEDO AND LUCAS COUNTY
CHAPTER XII.
COMMERCIAL FACILITIES.
THE growth of agricultural production in this County and in the Valley, was a very slow one, when we consider that immigration hither commenced early in the century. Of course the commencement of that immigration was feeble, with only here and there a family developing sufficient robustness of body and purpose to encounter the hardships and dangers of frontier life at that day ; and it was, in all its severe and trying elements, frontier life. The whole country swarmed with Indians, and the River, from mouth to source, was the favorite home of a portion of several powerful tribes. Its dense and unbroken forests, with only the woodman's axe for an implement of improvement, formed a barrier, which, by the light of our day, would seem to have shut out all hope of a comfortable home. We cannot appreciate the dangers and privations of those early days. The life of those men and women was amongst scenes little in accord with the peaceful picture of later years; and when night drew its dark mantle over the forest and log cabin, the mother of those days, as she soothed her children to sleep, felt, in a sense that we do not now, that" Our Father " was their only protection from the roaming savage and wild beast.
These adverse conditions were supplemented by another and more disheartening than all besides, in the naturally unhealthfulness of the climate. The damp dews of the level lands and the evening air of the autumn, were alike laden with sickness and death. But all these were insufficient to deter adventurous, roving people from seeking a Western home. Later, and especially after the settlement of our Indian relations, this restless love of our people for immigration was signalized by further and increased additions to our population. But it was all a huge mistake. The spirit that stimulates immigration to the frontier aids those who come later to enjoy the fruits of improved society and more settled conditions generally ; but to the early settler and his family, it is a life of unending, unmitigated struggle and privation. The same degree of industry and privation in his old home might have won for him a far greater degree of prosperity, with the advantage to his family of schools, churches and fixed social advantages.
The movement Westward developed by slowly increasing momentum, until checked by the severe revulsion of business in 1837. Even at that date, the production of food in Lucas County was insufficient for the consumption, although a small quantity of wheat had been exported by one farmer at an earlier date than this. Major Coleman I. Keeler shipped in the fall of 1831, about 300 bushels of wheat by the little Schooner Eagle.
The construction of the Wabash and Erie Canal was commenced in 1838-9, and the great influx of laboring population consequent thereupon, was fed by importations from the Ohio Canal at Cleveland and from Michigan. At about this period Southern Michigan began to produce a limited surplus of wheat, some of which reached Toledo in flour, for sale here and for shipment to Buffalo. A little later wheat began to come forward from the same source, both wheat and flour being transported hence over the Erie and Kalamazoo Railway.
The rapid and enormous growth of the business of our country is a theme of surprise to those who have witnessed it and been connected with it. The methods of transacting business also present wide contrasts, and in none more so than in the manner of handling the surplus grain as it came to market for storage. At first it was carried on the shoulders of men from the farmers' wagons into the warehouse. When it began to come forward by the Erie and Kalamazoo Railroad it was in bags and was unloaded by means of a small cart, holding eight or ten bags, and hauled into the upper stories of the warehouses on an inclined track, by a horse attached to a rope running through a block properly fastened to the floor below.
Hon. Richard Mott, of our City, was the pioneer in the next advance on the method of grain handling and the building of warehouses more suitable to contain it. In the year 1838, the first building was erected on Water street, between Adams and Oak, with the additional strength required to store grain. Attached to it was a small elevator propelled by a horse. This improved method, though a little shaky and insecure, was a signal triumph in laborsaving. It marks the beginning of elevators in the West. This warehouse was burned the next year, but the enterprise of Mr. Mott survived his misfortune, and in 1840 the "Old Red Warehouse " (as it has long been called), at the foot and East side of Monroe street, was built, with the further and important improvement of a substantial elevator connected therewith, the horse-power for which was under the peak of the roof, where the animal performed its
COMMERCIAL FACILITIES. - 465
dreary but useful round of labor, month in and month out. This method of receiving grain, with enlargement and improvement in the elevators from time to time as necessity required, was continued in use for more than ten years.
The grain business of Mr. Mott consisted wholly of Railroad receipts from Southern Michigan, the surplus of Lucas County farmers being scarcely anything. Up to that year, the traffic of the Railroad was made up largely of bread supplies sent from Toledo to the settlers in Southern Michigan.
The change from horses as the elevating motor to that of the unwearying power of steam, began in 1847, when John Brownlee and Egbert Brown, partners, built a steam elevator, much increased in size over any previous structures, and with bins shaped to discharge themselves. This was built on the present site of the elevator of C. A. King & Co., and marked the commencement of this system, which, with great improvement, is now in use.
Returning to the growth of agricultural production in Lucas County, it can be stated that before the season of 1838, there was very little surplus of grain produced in this County. In that year, the surplus, though not large, gave a hopeful turn in the tide of trade.
In 1841 the commerce of that vicinity having been in a measure transferred from Perrysburg to Miami, below Maumee City, a small cargo of wheat was purchased by the firm of Smith & Hazard, at from $1.10 to $1.40 per bushel. The Schooner Morgiana was engaged to take the cargo to Buffalo, at 10 cents per bushel freight. It was heroic work to get that cargo on board without facilities, and it was accomplished by transporting the bags on the shoulders of laborers, and with 4,100 bushels the Vessel was deeply laden. So far this important event, the first cargo shipment of wheat from the Valley, proceeded favorably; but before the Vessel left the dock a gale of wind sprang up, under the influence of which the water, as is usual in such cases, retreated toward the Lake, and the Vessel settled down upon a large boulder, breaking a hole, through which the water entered, and the cargo was lost. This commencement of the export of grain was a significant event, in more than one respect ; not least of which was, that it marked a period when, after the fever of land speculation had subsided, and that other fever (the bilious had in a measure also subsided, and our farmers had recovered from this and the many other disappointments incident to frontier life, hope of better days began to brighten men's faces. There was a surplus in the land, and something to dispose of in exchange for other needed commodities.
About this time, the enterprising citizens of Maumee City commenced the erection of Flouring Mills, which have since been steady purchasers of the surplus grain of that portion of the County. The pioneer in the building of mills on the River, was George W. Reynolds, who was for long years connected with that and other leading enterprises at Maumee. Wm. B. Dicks, Judge Robert A. Forsyth, and Garrett & Merwin, followed in the same line of improvement at Maumee, as did Judge James Myers at Toledo.