Medina, Medina County, Ohio

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CHAPTER VI.

A RETROSPECT—MEDINA'S EMANCIPATION—THE FIRST RAILROAD—THE COUNTY'S JUBILEE*—
THE CENTENNIAL "FOURTH"—THE ORATION.

THE greater part of the volume of which this chapter forms a part might properly be called a retrospective glance over the past sixty-nine years of the history of .Medina County ; but in these pages it is desired to give more fully than could elsewhere be given, a sketch of two important events in the county's history. Succeeding generations will find it difficult to appreciate the handicapped condition of commercial and social development before the rail-road opened the door to equal advantages with the surrounding country. That emancipation day that brought the first train-load of passengers to Medina was full of hope for the future, and, though, some respects, the word of promise was kept only to the ear, it was a grand event in the annals of the county's development, and one which all, no doubt, will recall with pleasure. Wednesday, November 15, 1871, was a day long to be remembered in Medina. It had been longed for and prayed for some twenty years ; but most anxiously awaited during the last few weeks of its delay. With the completion of the Lake Shore & Tuscarawas Valley Railway to Medina, and the arrival of the first train of passenger cars, the hopes and the prayers and the efforts of the people were crowned with success. In the language of the Gazette, published on the 17th inst., the people could say : " The day has ar-

* Compiled from the Medina Gazette

rived at last, thank God ! and we all feel happy. We are out of the wilderness ! And we celebrated the event. We celebrated it bully ! We had a grand good time and no failure."

A storm of rain on the preceding day was succeeded at night by a fall of snow and cold winds. This prevented large numbers of the country people from coming to town, where every preparation had been made to give them a hearty welcome. Still, there was a big crowd of people in the county seat. They lined the sidewalks, filled up the business houses, pre-empted the hotels, and sat in the offices, and all contributed to the general cheer, notwithstanding the cold weather.

It having been announced that the excursion train would reach Medina at 12 o'clock, M., long before and after that hour the current of travel set toward the railroad track. Medina's lone piece of artillery, reenforced by the Seville battery, was posted on Bronson's hill, near by, and, during the forenoon, let off eight or ten guns " just to wake 'em up." It was tedious waiting for the train, and it did not finally arrive until about 1 o'clock, the crowd remaining good humored and reasonably patient in the meanwhile. A temporary platform had been erected for the passengers to step on from the cars, and this was the rallying point of the confused mass of beings. It was a trying hour to wait.

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The people. benumbed with the early touch of winter. and beset with an anxiety that all shared alike. found it hard to direct their minds from the absorbing subject. People walked up and down the track. up and down the road. and up and down anywhere to counteract the benumbing influence of the weather. The track, the switch. the remaining engine of the construction train, all were the object of the admiring scrutiny of the assembled crowd. There were a good many false alarms of the " train is coming!" and once or twice. those who had charge of the hells and steam whistles up town. " let them off "—all of which created considerable amusement and helped to pass the time. But all trains do get in at last. and this train proved no exception. It was heard to whistle at York Center. only four miles away. and pretty soon the rumble of the wheels was heard : and then a shriek of' the locomotive came tearing through the woods. and a passenger train of six coaches and a baggage-ear drove in sight. Off went hats and shawls and shouts and bells and whistles and cannon ! The passengers in the cars leaned out of the windows and cheered. the people at the landing cheered, the locomotives added their voice to the grand uproar. until the whole made up a volume of' sound excelling anything in the experience of the oldest inhabitant.

The unloading of the train was quite as unique in its way. The passengers did not walk out—they seemed to just roll out into the arms of their frantic friends. The " reception." upon which care and circumstance had been elaborated. "didn't come off." In fact. the reception committee did not know whether they were on terra firma or walked the ether. but all were happy and all felt welcome, which was the end sought. In carriages and on foot. the crowd of guests moved up town to the court house, where the weather compelled the formalities of the occasion to take place. Here Mayor Blake. as President of the day. gaining the attention ofthe crowded audience. welcomed the guests of the hour as follows :

Fellow-Citizens : It is altogether proper that the people of Medina should feel s deep interest in the occasion that has called us together. It is well to do honor to this noble enterprise, and honor to those who are engaged in its completion. It is a great work, and one that will give new life and enterprise to Medina and the whole county. By the completion of the Lake Shore & Tuscarawas Valley Railroad, Medina will be tied by iron bands to Lake Erie on the north, and the Ohio River on the south. By it, Cleveland, on the lake, and the citizens on the Ohio River are made our immediate neighbors, from whom must grow up mutual intercourse and commerce. The coal-fields of the Tuscarawas and Hocking Valleys will furnish the motive power, and the beautiful. healthy location of Medina, and the productiveness of the surrounding country will form the inducements for capitalists and artisans to make their location here. Here the iron ore of Lake Superior and the coal of the Tuscarawas Valley will meet ; here, machinery of all kinds will be put in operation, and mechanical skill will find ample scope for all its powers.

Cleveland, now regarded as a part of the suburbs of Medina, will soon make all the necessary combinations to form a more perfect union," and thus Medina will become one of the railroad towns of Ohio. This road is to he a coal road, and to tap the great coal region of the State. embracing, as it does, not less than 10,000 square miles, or quite equal to all that possessed by Great Britain, and far in excess of that of any other European nation. While the coal-fields of Ohio, through which this road is to run, are as large as the entire coal fields of Great Britain and larger than any other European country, the annual production of coal in Great Britain is over 100,000,000 tons, and the annual production in Ohio is only about 3,000,000 tons. It will be seen, therefore. that, while we have an inexhaustible source of wealth in our coal-fields, we have scarcely begun to draw upon them.

Great Britain, one of the most powerful nations on the thee of the earth, of whom it is said. "the sun never sets on her possessions," derives her great wealth and power from her manufacturing industry; and the mainspring of her industry is her coal-field. It is said " that the power developed in the combustion of one pound of coal is equal to 1,500.000 foot-pounds. The power exerted by a man of ordinary strength, during a day of labor, is about the same : so that a pound of coal may be regarded as an equivalent to a day's labor of a man.

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hence, 300 pounds will represent the labor of a man for a year. It is estimated that the contributions made to the wealth of Great Britain, by her annual coal products, is equal to that of 133,000,000 of skilled operatives laboring for her enrichment." If these statements are true, all may see what Ohio can become by a proper development of her coal-fields. and a wise regard for her mechanical industry. The Lake Shore & Tuscarawas Valley Railroad being one of the links in that great chain of railroads calculated to develop the coal interests of Ohio, its importance cannot be overestimated. All honor, then, we say to the President and Directors of the road. And all honor to those, who, by their labors and money, furnished the old road-bed years ago, without which we would not now have a railroad.

We welcome you, one and all, to the hospitalilies of our village. For more than eighteen long years, the people of Medina have labored and struggled to accomplish the building of this road ; and "now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer" by the ushering in of the first train of cars over the Lake Shore & Tuscarawas Valley Railway. We welcome our brethren from Cleveland and from the whole surrounding country. Let us all rejoice together that labor and science have here erected another monument that shall constantly proclaim the great truth that nature presents no obstacles that may not by man be overcome, and made to minister to his comfort and happiness. And here, my fellow-citizens, permit me to conclude, in the language of our own poet, made to suit this occasion :

" Has the theme grown too old, and the triumph too cold.

For a song of joy, I wonder?

No, not while the shout of the engine rings out

And the rumble of wheels, like low thunder,

Falls on the glad ear. No sound that we hear

Wakes half such emotions of pleasure,

And the echoes resound, and our pulses rebound

And heat to a rhythmical measure.

" By valley and mead, flies the steam-propelled steed,

Like Sheridan's charger to battle.

The hopes and the fears of eighteen long years

Are ended at last, and the rattle

Of his iron hoofs say, as they speed on their way—

Behold here the triumph of labor !

The hamlet awakes, and the City of Lakes

Reaches her hand to her neighbor.

"The air is rife with new vigor and life.

Wherever my hoofs are heard sounding,

And my shrill shrieking voice makes the valley rejoice,

And the pulse of the village is bounding.

The stage-horse is seen on the meadow land green,

And his neigh comes down like a blessing ;

And poverty's flying and ignorance dying,

And science and commerce progressing.'

"Hurrah! and hurrah! for the glad day that saw

A village and city united.

The prayers of the past have been answered at last

And the hearts of the people delighted."

To this address of welcome. Hon. F. W. Pelton. Mayor of Cleveland. being called out, responded as hollows : Mr. Mayor and citizens of Medina : In visiting your city to-day. I did not expect to reply to your welcoming address. but came to join in the general rejoicing over the realization of our hopes in the final success of your railroad project. The completion of the Tuscarawas .Valley Railway secures to you communication. not only with Cleveland, but with every city in the land. It is well calculated to stimulate the rejoicings of your citizens. Medina is now linked with the fairest city of the lakes. whose citizens rejoice with you to-day. and are here to extend to you the hand of welcome. with the cordial wish that the new railroad may unite us more firmly together."

After this brief response. which was received with rounds of hearty applause. Judge Tyler was introduced as the man who had done as much or more than any other person, to secure the building of the road on the old roadbed. He began by saying that the compliment was too high for his merits, but to sit still and say nothing on such an occasion would not do at all. Three months ago. Medina was 250 miles away from anywhere. Today she is added to the family of railroad towns. Some twenty years ago. Medina started a railroad project and, like the Medina of old. she has kept the bones of the prophet in the shape of the old road-bed, and many a dollar has been brought to this shrine. The starters of the old project deserve credit. and I am glad your Mayor gave them credit in his ,address. Like Rip Van

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Winkle. Medina has slumbered for twenty years, but you see it has taken but two and a half mouths to wake up—to renew your life. And I want to say that you must thank the workmen for bringing the railroad to your doors so soon. Just set Pete Young to work on a railroad. and he will take it anywhere. Two months ago. or about that, the first stake was driven. and today. a passenger train arrives in your town. The railroad comes at the right time. It restores the losses by your great fire. and will build you up. The railroad itself will be a success. The stock will be good. In good hands. as it is, I am not afraid to guarantee 12 per cent on your stock in two years Its relations with other roads are of the most favorable kind ; connections good ; they all favor it. It runs through the richest agricultural and mineral portions of the State, and Medina is midway on this great line. It now depends upon the citizens of Medina whether they will take advantage of their splendid location. where coal and iron and lumber will meet; to build up a thriving manufacturing business, and a prosperous town. Go ahead—make the most of your advantages. I did everything I could to help on the enterprise, and assure you no man in Medina rejoices at its success more heartily than I do."

This happy speech called out " three cheers " from the happy crowd, succeeded by earnest calls for Hon. James Monroe, the Congressman for the district of which Medina County formed a part. In responding, he said that. upon receiving the cordial invitation to be here, he had examined carefully the programme. where he found that all that was required of him was to be happy and eat dinner. He was happy already. and. as for the dinner, he was not going to talk long enough to keep it waiting. He did not expect to say a word—the gratification of coining to Medina on a railroad train was supremely satisfying. One thought. however, forced itself upon him. He saw a great manyyoung people here. When he was young, he read about the grand old times in history, when there were Knights-errant, and he remembered that he felt a great regret that he was born in a prosy age—an age when there was no more chivalry, no more chance for heroic deeds. He had no doubt the young people now thought the same—thought that this was only a corn and potato planting age. But since then he had seen how much there was to do ; what a work there is for stout hands and heroic hearts ; and he felt that this is the age of true chivalry. There are still useful deeds to be performed. We require as much heroism. and magnanimity, and all that noble quality of body and soul, called force. now as ever. The events we are met here to congratulate the people of Medina on. are the kind of deeds required of us. This is valiant service. It is a different and more useful service than that of the Knights-errant, more worthy of a Christian age and a Christian people. The old Knights destroyed cities by the sword and torch; but it is the glory of this people, when their cities are burned, to build them up. I put it to the young men. if the age of chivalry is gone !"

Closing with some congratulatory remarks on the completion of the road, and a humorous allusion to his own services in getting a bill concerning the old roadbed through the legislature, when a member from this district, he was heartily applauded, and succeeded by Gen. John Crowell. of Cleveland. He said his errand here was to join with the people in rejoicing over the completion of the railroad. His first visit to Medina was in 1823, when there were very few inhabitants in the town or township. The country was chiefly primeval forest. with now and then a log cabin and small clearing around it. How different the scene today ! The wilderness has been removed and transformed into cultivated fields and happy homes. I do join in rejoicing at the completion of your road, and trust you will realize all the benefits

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from it you justly expect. Bat, Mr. Mayor, five-minute speeches are, or ought to be, in order, and all I shall add is, to assure you that Cleveland, one of the suburbs of Medina, expects, at the close of the present decade, to number 200,000 people ; and Medina may congratulate herself; by her present enterprise she is promoting not only her own interest, but the growth and happiness of her enterprising suburb."

The happy reference to Medina's aspirations and newfound dignity, fell pleasantly upon the ear of the audience, which responded with enthusiam. James A. Briggs, Esq., of New York, was then called out, who by his comprehensive salutation left none to feel that they were omitted in his thoughts. and paved the way for a patient hearing, notwithstanding the length of the exercises preceding him. He began with : Men, women, children, babes and sucklings of Medina : The world moves, progress is the order of the day, and the good people of Medina are henceforth and forever in railroad connection with all parts of the country ; for the iron horse and his train are here, and have made their long-waited-for appearance, amid the roar of cannon, the ringing of bells, the trumpets' pealing sound. and the glad shout of a happy people. And I am glad to be here once again after an absence of so many years, to meet you today, not to talk of fields and crops, of lowing herds and bleating flocks, of advancement in agriculture. ' the noblest because the natural employment of man ;' not to discuss here political questions upon which you are divided, but to stand with you upon a common platform, where all are united, where you have but one feeling and one interest. and where all rejoice in one common impulse. to be ridden on a rail out of town. and to take this long-wished-for ride. without tar, without feathers, without disgrace. and under the care of a good conductor.

" Farmers, merchants. traders. business men,you have long looked for this event, because the completion of this railroad will add to your convenience, to your material prosperity ; and whatever will add to the material prosperity of a people, is a matter of no small moment. Some transcendental philosophers and remarkable geniuses, who live in garrets and are always out at the toes, and out at the elbows, may regard those who are in pursuit of money, as laborers who have not a proper appreciation of the true dignity of man. But he who at this hour of the world's history regards money as of no account, lives to as little purpose as he who regards its mere accumulation as the only end and aim of life. Money enables you to have comfortable, elegant houses, to improve your field stock, to make your labor, by the use of implements, lighter, and gives you the means to contribute to all the benevolent, humane, educational and religious demands of the age, and, when calamity comes upon ' your neighbor,' as in Chicago, Wisconsin and Michigan, to help him in his hour of need to food and clothing, and to make you all feel how blessed it is ' to give.'

To the farmers of Medina, this railroad is a matter of no small concern. Your county is a very productive one. Only eleven counties out of the eighty-eight in the State have more cattle. five counties make more butter, seven make more cheese, three make more pounds of maple sugar, seven raise more bushels of oats, six have more acres of meadow, and only seven counties cut more tons of hay. This is certainly a : good show' for a county with 20,000 people. You will soon have railroad transportation for all your products. and a few cents a bushel on grain. or two cents a pound on butter and cheese, saved in the cost of getting to market, will add largely to the profits of farming. Your county, with the five counties south of you, through which the Lake Shore & Tuscarawas Valley Road is to pass, raised about six millions of bushels of wheat. corn and oats

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for export. Now, if this road enables the farmers of these five counties, to save five cents a bushel in marketing this grain, then they will put into their pockets $300,000 a year. I have no doubt this road will give an additional value to the products of these six counties of $1,000, 000 a year, as you will not raise anything that will not have a market value.

" Previous to the opening of the Erie Canal, the cost of transporting a ton of merchandise from Buffalo to Albany was $100. and the time twenty days. Upon the opening of the Erie Canal, the cost was reduced to $10. and now to $3. Ten barrels of flour make a ton, and, if it now cost $100 a ton for freight from Buffalo to Albany, you can figure up at your leisure how much wheat and corn would be worth a bushel in Medina County. 'Corn at 75 cents a bushel will bear transportation in the old way, 125 miles to market, and wheat at $1.50 a bushel 250 miles, while upon a railroad corn will have a marketable value at 1,600 miles, and wheat 3,200 miles away.' Railways are great equalizers, for they make land far away from market almost as valuable as land near the centers of population. A few years ago, the tolls on the Ohio Canal were more per mile for freight than the cost of transportation on railroads is now.

"Another thing of great value to be derived from this railroad is this : It will supply you coal for fuel at 'cheap rate. and this will save your timber. The farmers of your own and of other counties cannot do a better thing than to save your forests. Good timber is becoming more and more scarce and valuable ; and how to save it is a question your State and county agricultural societies cannot too thoroughly discuss. In New England. I have seen stone walls in woods, when twenty years ago they divided cultivated fields. It pays to grow timber and wood on that land where it is too cold to grow almost anything. except good men and women, for export.

" The transportation of grain by railroad, from the West, is rapidly increasing ; and this kind of carrying is of great profit to the grain -growers, as the grain is shipped by rail from the district where it is grown. and taken, without change of cars, to the place of consumption in the East. thus saving two or three commissions. At a recent meeting of the officers of the Albany & Boston Railroad, it was stated by Mr. Chapin. President of the company, that its business was rapidly increasing, and by reason of its connections with the Western roads. It had carried the last year 4.55 7.700 bushels of grain. and that $5.000,000 were needed for additional rolling stock and improvements. In a few months the cars of the Lake Shore & Tuscarawas Valley Railroad will be seen loaded with grain, eggs and poultry, in towns and cities of New York and New England.

" Wonderful has been the growth of the Northwest ; it has no parallel in history. When I started in 1832 from the hills of Berkshire, with my old friend, Judge Humphreville—who. for many years. has lived among you. and whom you have honored with high public trusts, and who is worthy of your honor and confidence—the only railroad between the Atlantic and the Mississippi was the railroad from Albany to Schenectady. Now. we have one railroad to the Pacific, and two others are in progress of construction. In a little more than a generation the Northwest has increased from 1,600.000 people to 13,000,000, and for this marvelous growth it is greatly indebted to railroads to which its own people have contributed but comparatively little. At $42,000 per mile. the railroads in the Northwest have cost $830,000.000, and from this large investment of capital, farmers derive the largest dividends—not only in the actual increase of value to their lands, but in the increase of price they obtain for every article their lands or their labor will produce. If this railroad adds only $3 an acre to the six counties south of Cuyahoga, it gives

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an additional value to the real estate alone, of $6.555,390. What was the land worth in the counties along the line of the Cleveland, Columbus & Cincinnati Railroad, at the time that road was put under contract, and what are they worth now? There is life. business enterprise, industry, flourishing towns. and growing cities. and improved agriculture along the line of railroads ; and silence most profound. and dullness in the extreme. where the locomotive is not seen.

"In 1850. the Northwest had 1.276 miles of railroad : Ohio had 575 miles. Now, the Northwest has 19.765 miles. and Ohio 3,448 miles. Forty years ago. there were 910 miles of railroads in the United States, now over 50.000 miles. and it is a remarkable fact that the large increase of railroad mileage was, in 1869. 4,990 miles. This is evidenee of the faith that capital, the most timid of all things, has in railroads in the United States. While our population is increasing at the rate of 1,000.000 a year. our railroads are increasing about 3,000 miles a year. At $42.000 per mile. the cost of the railroads of Ohio has been $144,816,600. What has been the effect of this investment in railroads in Ohio ? In 1850, with 575 miles of railroad, the value of real estate. 8341,588.838, the value of personal property. $98,481,302 ; total value of taxable property. $439,966,340. In 1870. with 3.548 miles of railroad, the value of real estate is $1.013.000.000. and this does not include the value of real estate belonging to railroad companies, and taking the value of personal property as returned in 1869, $459,884,351, and the total value of taxable property is $1.452.960.340. The real estate in Ohio has been trebled in taxable value in twenty years, and the personal property has been increased more than four and a half times. Mr. Poor, in his carefully prepared statistics of railroads and their influence upon property, states in his Manual of Railroads for 1870-71,' " that every railroad constructed adds five times itsvalue to the aggregate value of the property of the country.' If this is so, and I believe the estimate of Mr. Poor not too high, as the increase in Ohio is much larger than the estimate of Mr. Poor, then the construction of the Lake Shore and Tuscarawas Valley Railroad, will add $20,000,000. Some of you may think this too much, but it is not. When the line of this railroad is continued from the Chippewa coal-fields to the Ohio River at Wheeling, passing as it will, its entire length through one of the richest mineral districts in the United States, who can compute the wealth that will be developed by means of this work? I do not think that $20,000,000 is too much to estimate the increase of value along its immediate line; within ten years from the day the road is through to Wheeling.

" A town in these days. without a railroad, is of no account. It is ' off the track,' at least, of trade and travel. Medina is now in the line of promotion, and may hope for advancement, and may bid a long farewell to the lumbering coach—to stage wagons, to mud roads, and to patience-trying journeys. There are men here today who have been as long coming from Cleveland here as it takes now to go to New York from Cleveland. All hail the coming of the cars of the Lake Shore & Tuscarawas Valley Railroad ! Before another year is gone the road will be finished to Dennison, on the line of the Pittsburgh & St. Louis road, as I am told that Mr. Selah Chamberlain, the contractor, a man who knows no such word as fail, intends to have the whole line completed by the first day of October, 1872.

" Let me say to you, business men of Cleveland who are here in numbers so large and so respectable today. that the railroad will, in my opinion, be of more importance to all your industrial interests than any line of railroad leading out of Cleveland. It is a Cleveland road, and one that cannot be ' gobbled up' by the Pennsylvania Central to hold you at the

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mercy of that great corporation. It will bring you cheap coal, salt, iron, oil, fireclay and agricultural products in great abundance. Nourish it and give it your support. It will pay.

" Friends of this railroad enterprise, you have been fortunate in the men who have taken this work in hand, in the character of its officers, in the ability, energy and responsibility of the contractor, who is pushing right on with the work, and has not felt the blow which shook the credit and tested the strength of the strongest in the land, since this road was commenced. Fortunate, indeed. has this country been in making connection at Grafton with the Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati & Indianapolis, and the Lake Shore & Michigan Railroad companies. Without the arrangement made with these two great lines of roads, I do not see how this road could have been made. One of the best railroad men in Cleveland, told me. a few days ago, that the facilities obtained by this company for passengers, freight. coal and dockage in Cleveland, from the roads above named, would have cost, even if they could have been obtained. $2,000,000. I believe the stock of this railroad will be at par in two years, and its bonds are as good as any railroad ever offered in the market, as the 40 per cent for freight and passengers to be paid by the Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati & Indianapolis, and the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern are, in fact, a guaranty of the bonds.

" Well may you ring the bells and fire the guns and make merry and prepare a feast of good things, at the completion of the first link in the chain of railroad that is to connect you with the Lake at Cleveland, and with the Ohio River at Wheeling. Onward is the word. And, if, in our rapid progress in all material prosperity, we do not. as a people. forget that virtue is the strength of a nation—that a correct public opinion is stronger than armies—and if the common schoolhouse, the meeting-house. and the town house. well filled with honest. intelligent people, ' who know their rights and dare maintain them.' shall be seen from every railroad along our prairies. over the broad savannas, in our gorges, among our hills and valleys —then all will be well in the future of this Republic, the world's best treasure and last hope."

This was the oration of the day, and it will, at this day, probably. afford a consolation to many who would hardly be ready to indorse his opinion so far as it concerns the value of the stock. Gen. Duthan Northrop. T. W. Browning. C. G. Washburn. editor of the Elyria Democrat ; A. W. Fairbanks. of the Cleveland Herald ; Royal Taylor, Esq.. and Thomas Jones. Esq., were called for and made short responses. when dinner was announced. The invited guests were taken to the American House, where all the variety the market afforded was provided. Ample provision had been made to feed the crowd that gathered from the country, at Empire Hall. Here the ladies waited on some twelve hundred persons, who were bounteously fed. The dinner was the free gift of the citizens of the county. and, after all that cared .to partake were provided for, there was a wagon-load of good provision that was dispensed among the poor, who were thus, at least, made to rejoice in the coming of the railroad.

As soon as dark set in, the square began to blaze out with unwonted brilliancy. One after another illumination, was lighted in the business blocks. hotels and offices. Some were quite elaborate, and all were bright and light, responsive to the happy mood of the people. Some of the mottoes were. "' Out of the wilderness ! Hurrah for the railroad ! Goodbye, old hacks. goodbye !" Welcome to the L. S. T. V. Railway. This is the way we long have sought !'' " The motive power which develops the vital interests of our country—the locomotive !" The trees of the park were beautifully illuminated with colored lanterns. while " rockets. serpents, wheels, Roman candles. nigger-chasers. zig-zags,

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whizzers and whirligigs, and fire balloons " amazed and delighted the assembled crowds. A fine pyrotechnic display was made on the balcony of Phoenix Hall, where a piece of fireworks. after a little fizzing, blazed out into the large letters. "L. S. & T. V. R. R." The day's festivities closed with a grand ball at Phoenix Hall.

The excursion train was furnished by the Cleveland. Columbus, Cincinnati & Indianapolis Company. It was brought to Grafton by “Cuyahoga." Engineer Blush, and from Grafton to Medina by the " Maryland." Engineer Welsh. The conductor of the train was Mr. C. Langdon. The returning of the train was set for 4 o'clock in the afternoon, but it was nearly 5 before it got started. Each guest was furnished with a ticket which read as follows :

LAKE SHORE & TUSCARAWAS VALLEY R'Y.

OPENING EXCURSION.

Wednesday, November 15th, 1871.

PASS THE BEARER TO MEDINA AND RETURN.

W. S. STREATOR, President.

Excursion Train will leave the Union Depot at 10.30 o'clock A. M.

Returning, leave Medina at 4.30 P. M.

Among the guests in attendance upon this occasion were : Selah Chamberlain, J. F. Card, H. M. Claflin, E. G. Loomis. C. L. Russell, Directors of the new road ; L. T. Everett, its Treasurer ; and Judge Tyler. of Cleveland, whose services as lawyer for Medina's interests made him especially welcome as a guest on this occasion. Dr. W. S. Streator, the President of the road, was detained at home on account of sickness, to the great regret of all. Of the Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati & Indianapolis Company, there were the President, Oscar Townsend : Superintendent, E. S. Flint ; Assistant Superintendent. Robert Blee, and others ; from Cleveland, there were Mayor F. W. Pelton, and several councilmen ; T. P. Handy. D. P. Rhodes, A. Cobb. E. P. Morgan, E. Mill, N. B. Sherwin, Gen. John Crowell, T. L. Jones, A. W. Fairbanks. Philo Chamberlin, William L. Terrell and others. The press was represented by W. F. Hinman, of the Cleveland Herald; F. H. Mason, of the Cleveland Leader ; Thomas Whitehead, of the Cleveland Plain Dealer; C. G. Washburn, of the Elyria Democrat; J. M. Wilcox, of the Berea Advertiser; J. A. Clark, of the Wadsworth Enterprise ; and Judge Sloan, of the Port Clinton Union.

The following letters were received from some who were not able to be at the celebration :

ELYRIA, OHIO, November 13, 1871.

Committee on Invitations: GENTLEMEN—I am in receipt of your favor inviting me to attend the celebration of the opening of the Lake Shore & Tuscarawas Valley Railroad to Medina, on the 15th inst. I sincerely regret that judicial labors on that day will prevent my acceptance of your friendly invitation, and deprive me of much enjoyment to be derived by being present at your celebration. Though absent in the body, I will be with you in spirit. and join in your congratulations. I am and remain very truly,

Yours, W. W. Boynton.

AKRON, OHIO, November 13, 1871.

H. G. BLAKE, Esq.: Dear Sir—Your favor of the 10th, inviting me to* be present at the opening of the L. S. & T. V. R. R., received. I am sorry I cannot, on account of business, be present to join in your grand rejoicing on the 15th. Akron, proud of her own success, joins, however, in spirit with Medina and hopes that her new road will add greatly to the wealth and prosperity of her inland neighbor.

Respectfully yours, L. S. EVERETT,

Editor of the Akron Times.

UPPER SANDUSKY, OHIO, November 14, 1871.

HON. H. G BLAKE, Committee on Invitations, Medina, Ohio:

Dear Sir—Your kind note of the 10th inst., inviting me to be present at the inauguration of the L. S. &. T. V. R. R. at your village on the 15th inst., received yesterday, and have delayed answering the same in the hope that I might be able to so arrange my business as to allow , my absence, but I regret to say that I am disappointed. I would delight to be with you on the happy occasion of welcoming the " Iron Horse" to your place. I have many pleasant recollections of Medina and my brief

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residence there. Heartily congratulating you and the good people of Medina upon your final success in securing a railway line, and thanking you kindly for the cordial invitation extended to me, I remain

Very truly yours,

P. CUNEO.

The sequel to this chapter is found elsewhere, and, while it does not realize the pleasant theories propounded in regard to the value of stock held forth in these speeches. yet the great outcome to the county has been grandly beneficial. and, with this example freshly before their eyes. the citizens in other parts of the county are quite as eager to invest in the building of a new railroad;

The "Fourth of July " is of very ancient origin. and it is firmly believed by a considerable portion of the people in this country. that Adam raised Cain " on that day very much as is the fashion of this age. While this belief is probably cherished principally by the younger portion of the community, a very general respect for the day obtains among the older portion. and Fourth of July celebrations." of late years. have not been so rare as generally to become a matter of historical mention. But the occasion to which reference is had in these pages. was an exception. which. like that floral phenomenon. the century plant. blooms but once in 100 years. and then with a glory so short-lived that its odor is lost in a day. The '̊ Centennial Fourth " was a subject of national consideration. and in the State of Ohio. at the suggestion of the Governor, it was made, in most of the counties of the State. a special occasion for the review of the history of the county. State and nation. and that of these fragments nothing should be lost. many of the county authorities have taken measures to preserve them for future ages. On this occasion in Medina, both the history of the county and the nation were reviewed. Of the historical paper presented by Judge C. G. Codding, this whole volumemay be considered an elaboration, and the sketch of national history, the oration of the occasion. presented by J. H. Greene. we append in full at the repeated request of friends of this enterprise :

“MR. PRESIDENT AND FELLOW CITIZENS : A Fourth of July celebration without an oration, would be like the play of Hamlet with the part of Hamlet left out. The committee were unable to secure the services of a speaker from abroad. and their partiality assigned to me the duty of taking this part. I can promise you no studied rhetoric or polished oration. such as would well befit the occasion. but. if you will give me your patient attention. I will try to give you a little plain talk on the theme that is uppermost in all our minds and hearts today—the commemoration of the one hundredth birthday of our nation. It is an event. the anticipation of which has stirred the blood of the most sluggish. and kindled the enthusiasm of all. until today American patriotism finds expression in celebrations that fill the land with jubilant voices.

“We celebrate the birthday of the youngest of all the nations of the earth. It is true, that in our time we have seen all of Germany gathered under the flag of Prussia—but those States have before been in league. It is true. that in our time we have seen the Italian nation emerge from the Papal dominions—but it was Italy reunited. not created. The South American Republics are yet in a chaotic state. Under the strong influences radiating from our successful experiment in the North. the Southern continent may. in our time. crystallize into a nation. But. today, there is none to dispute with us the palm of youth.

"A hundred years is a brief period, and compared with the age of other nations, we are but an infant. Far back in antiquity, nations arose. flourished through thousands of years, and fell to pieces by wars. calamities or the slow processes of decay. Others have survived all

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the vicissitudes of time. and still exist, hoary with many centuries. China, containing nearly one-half the population of the globe, has been a compact empire for four thousand years and over. Egypt. under various rulers. has existed for more than three thousand years. without radical change in territorial area or character of the people. Persia dates back to the same misty antiquity. and is Persia still.

"The modern nations of Europe are from five hundred to twelve hundred years old. And away up in the Northern seas—on the borderland of that unknown Polar country. to discover which so many heroic lives have been sacrificed—only within the past year Iceland celebrated her one thousandth birthday. and it was the good fortune of America to be represented in the festivities of the Northmen by Bayard Taylor. who so well represents the courage. adventure and culture of his countrymen.

"Compared with maturity like this, we can realize the brevity of our single century ; yet side by side with the nations that have grown gray and old, we come. today. with our hundred years. and challenge the records of antiquity or of modern history to furnish a parallel to our marvelous growth and development.

" We boast our hundred years ;

We boast our limits, washed by either sea :

We boast our teeming millions, and that we

All, all are free'. '

“But, while it is true that as a nation we are only one hundred years old. as a people we are much older.

" The forces and ideas which culminated in , the Declaration of Independence and the Revolution. had been in operation on this continent ' for at least a hundred years : and the causes which resulted in the colonization of America, had convulsed Europe for a hundred years before that. Civilization was then passing through the ordeal of a death struggle between ecclesiasticism and the toleration of individual thought. All the principles of civil, political and religious liberty, upon which the fabric of our government has been built, were fought for and died for under the shadow of despotisms which exercised unlimited sway over the bodies and souls of men, while Columbus was yet searching for the shores of the New World.

“The seeds of American liberty were planted in the dykes and ditches of Holland in the sixteenth century. When William the Silent—the Washington of the Dutch Republic—fought for and established religious toleration in the Netherlands against the sway of Rome, and the cruel Philip of Spain, the battle was for us and we reaped the victory. Although separate nationality and independence was not in the thought of the Puritans and Pilgrims, it was in their every act. The Declaration of Independence itself was foreshadowed in the spirit of that small colony which could put on record, while surrounded and occupied with nothing but hardships and dangers. the resolution that they would abide by the laws of God until they could find time to make better ones !

“The hundred years of colonial life previous to the Revolution was a period of preparation. The circumstances and condition of the people were fitting them, unconsciously, for an independent national existence. Necessarily, they were trained to habits of self-reliance; and, although they had no right of choice in the selection of their Governors and Judges, and no voice in framing the measures which affected their relations to the Crown or their inter-colonial interests ; yet they had almost unlimited control of their local affairs. Their religious, educational and material interests were confided to their care ; and the town meeting became a source of power at the earliest period in our history. greater than Parliament or Congress, and has continued such to this day. It naturally follows that the habits of self-government thus formed should make them more and more

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restive under the restraints of a Parliament and King, separated from them by the vast ocean ; and the rightfulness of their exclusion from the control of their own affairs in larger matters, became a question of absorbing interest. Objection to taxation without representation, brought on the struggle for independence.

" But separation from the mother country was scarcely thought of, much less supposed to be probable, except by a few prophetic souls. The right of representation—the right to a voice in the choice of colonial rulers, the right to levy their own taxes—these did not seem to imply separate national life. The kind of government that would have suited the colonies, under which they would, no doubt, have been willing to remain, and, content and satisfied, would have been some such system of parental government, as that which the United States extends over its Territories today. Some of the best statesmen of England, with a strong popular sentiment to back them, entertained and advocated views in favor of a radically I modified colonial system of government. The hope that this result would be reached, was ever uppermost in the minds of the colonists ; and their loyalty to King and attachment to mother country were of such a nature that no revolution could have been inaugurated, had the issue been separation and independence. And, even after the struggle had begun, after the great bell that was 'to proclaim liberty throughout the land, to all the inhabitants thereof, had been rung in Independence Hall for patriotic purposes, there were not wanting earnest, able and honest men to assure the timid, that separation was not the aim of the Colonies. But George III and his Ministers. and the controlling element in power were inflexibly determined to rule America with a rod of iron. They entertained no notions of mild government for the colonies. And to their severity, to their uncompromising hostility to show anything like favor to the American colonies, more than to any other cause. are we in. debted for the full measure of freedom and independence which we enjoy today.

" The story of the Revolution is a melancholy page of history. He does no good service to the rising generation, who, on this centennial anniversary, paints the picture of that seven years' struggle in glowing colors. Since time began, there never was a people so little able to cope with a powerful foe and carry on a protracted war as were the Americans of 1776. It needed the Boston massacre, the destruction of tea in Boston Harbor. and the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill to unite and solidify the patriot sentiment of the colonies in favor of independence.

"The country was without friends abroad or resources at home. The war was not a series of brilliant campaigns. of daring adventures, or great victories ; but for the Continental army was a series of reverses and weary retreats. The large cities of the country were successively in the possession of the enemy, from which they emerged at their convenience to chase the " rebels." Oh the sorrowful sight that history presents of the patriot army with such a character as Washington at its head—flying. flying —retreating, retreating almost continually, before the well-fed, well-clothed. well-appointed British armies. His troops were half-naked half fed. poorly armed, and not half-paid. Their recompense. if it ever came. would be the gratitude of succeeding generations. For them there was only hardship. weary, wounded bodies. poverty and death. About most wars there is the glory and charm of ' battle's magnificently stern array '—the ' pomp and circumstance of glorious war '—to kindle the ardor and inspire the enthusiasm. But there was no romance in the Revolutionary war. It was the dreary, heart-sickening struggle of a down-trodden, desperate people.

"Often the wretched army was on the brink of dissolution—often on the point of disband-

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ing from sheer despair. The body which, by courtesy, was called Congress, was powerless to aid it. It could only appeal to the already beggared colonies for help for the famishing soldiers, and for recruits for their wasted ranks.

"But for Washington, irretrivable disaster must have overtaken the cause. Through all the difficulties of those days, his patience and his serenity seem to us, at this distance, almost divine. He held the country up to the work which it had put its hands to do. He never despaired or became discouraged when every one else lost heart and hope. He snatched victory from defeat. He bore the calumny and envious carpings of disorganizers calmly, never once losing sight of the interests of the country.

"American Independence would at some period have been secured ; but, to George Washington is it almost entirely due that the Revolution was successful 100 years ago.

" It seems miraculous that success could have been reached through such a sea of difficulties. Even the superhuman energies and efforts of Washington must have failed, for the time at least, had it not been for the aid furnished by France through the agency and personal endeavors of La Fayette—a name that will be pronounced even today with quivering lips and moistened eyes—a name forever honored in America, and forever enshrined in the hearts of her people. The story is old—it is as familiar in our ears as a twice told tale—but we would be ingrates, indeed, if on this day of all others we neglected to recall his services and honor his memory with the tribute, feeble though it be, of our grateful praise.

" The long struggle for freedom and independence closed, and victorious peace crowned the sufferings and trials of our forefathers. The foremost nation in the world reluctantly conceded the independence of its colonies, and withdrew its forces.

"The Continental army was not invincible, but it won a victory for progress and civilization against difficulties that seemed insurmountable. y Our hills and mountain fastnesses and Southern swamps fought for us. Our inaccessible forests and bridgeless rivers were our allies. r Our very feebleness, which compelled us to worry and harass the enemy, rather than engage him, except on fields of our own choosing, was our very strength. The King and Parliament of Great Britian, by their harshness and bitterness against our cause, fought for us. A divided public opinion in England helped us. The God of battles was on the side of the weak

and the weak won. "We come now to that period in our history about which the least is known—a period running over as many years of peace as there had been of war. from the close of the war to the adoption of the new constitution—a period, which it has been said, the historian would gladly consign to eternal oblivion.

" We. who have gathered here to-day. have still fresh recollections of the closing scenes of a war of far greater magnitude. It may, therefore, be worth our while to revert briefly to the condition of the army and country at the close of the Revolution.

" The country had been drained of its resources, and was helplessly bankrupt. The people were wretchedly poor, and the nation, if it could be called a nation, was without credit. Politics were in a chaotic state. The authority of the Confederate Congress had dwindled to a low ebb. It could vote to raise money, but the operation was like calling spirits from the vasty deep—would they come ? The States were in a league, not in a union as we have it now ; and so slight was the compact that it was seriously proposed each of the thirteen States should send ambassadors to treat with foreign powers. They were distracted by jealousies of each other, and consumedly tardy in granting power of any kind to the General Government. Tax-paying was almost optional with the indi-

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vidual, and the tax gatherer was considered as a standing joke. The treasuary vaults were empty—not a dollar in hand for, the public service. The currency of the confederacy was worthless. Two hundred millions of paper money had been issued by the Government; but SS millions had been taken up and canceled by the States in payment of taxes. at the rate of forty dollars for one. Congress attempted to call in the balance by issuing new bills, but the new bills rapidly depreciated to par with the old. Down went the paper money until it touched 300 for 1 in gold. and then lower and lower it sank until one thousand dollars of the Continental money was gladly exchanged for one dollar in gold or silver ! A lower depth could not be reached. and when the slang phrase was invented by the Yankee patriot. not worth a continental ! ' the rag baby of the Revolution disappeared.

"Our ambassadors in Europe—Franklin. John Adams and Jay—were begging on their knees for help. thankful for every miserable pittance that was doled out at exorbitant rates of interest; and our Minister of Finance had no other means of raising funds than to draw on the Ambassadors and sell the drafts. The private fortunes of the prominent patriots had been swallowed up to sustain the army. That was no meaningless exclamation—no glittering generality ' in the Declaration of Independence. where they pledged their lives. their fortunes and their sacred honor. Their lives and their fortunes were freely offered upon the altar of freedom. and their sacred honor will remain untarnished to the end of time !

"The patriot army was to be disbanded. The soldiers had not been paid for months or years. and the only prospect before them was starvation. No wonder they mutinied in Philadelphia and surrounded Congress with their determined bayonets ! It was all that Washington and Gates could do to suppress the rising storm in their camps—and there is no more ,pathetic picture of the whole Revolution than that scene in camp where Washington stood among the discontented veterans. eyes dimmed with tears. wiping his spectacles and speaking simply and pathetically, Fellow-soldiers. you perceive I have not only grown gray. but blind in your service:

“They had fought the fight to the end. and. instead of marching to their homes as victorious conquerors. to the sound of martial music. and under the shadow of waving flags. with the plaudits of a grateful people cheering them on. the soldiers of the Revolution were penniless. in rags. and the object of' years and reproach by the people. On many obscure country roads and lonely by-paths. the ' Old Continental in his ragged regimentals. with his well-worn

flint-lock on his shoulder. and his empty haver-sack by his side. trudged his weary way from camp and garrison to the home he had left years before. to the home in ruins or in wasteful decay. and to friends on whom labor and care and poverty had left their marks.

"The soldiers of the Revolution went out from the army. and down into civil life. down into the toils and struggles of rebuilding and repairing the wastes of' war down into poverty and drudgery, and down into the pages of history, where the record of their glorious lives will forever shine as a beacon light for liberty.

"Independence was achieved and liberty secured. but the union of the States was yet to be accomplished. The era of' statesmanship had arrived. Traditional policy must be sup-planted. by experiment. in new lines of political action. Public opinion must be educated to accept radical changes in society and government. The political action of the States was independent of each other. Each claimed and exercised sovereign power. Even in so important a matter as the treaty of peace with Great Britain. each State claimed and exercised the right of ratifying or rejecting so much as it saw fit. If the resources and power of the thirteen

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original States had been equal to their independence and assurance. they would have formed the greatest confederacy the world ever saw!

" It seemed a hopeless task to such statesmen as Hamilton and Madison to convince the States that their very existence depended upon a closer union. and they were denounced as monarchists for advocating a central government. Washington incurred wanton and severe abuse. and yet. he said there were not ten men in the country who wanted a monarchy. John Adams drew maledictions upon his head by the remark that the English Constitution was one of the grandest achievements of the human race.

“There was widespread opposition to a standing army. and a distrust that the recently disbanded soldiers would become a privileged, pensioned. idle class. The Order of Cincinnati, which the officers of the Revolution formed at the close of the war, was fiercely assailed by civilians. as the beginning of a military aristocracy. So general was the apprehension that the military would overshadow the civil authority. that the regular standing army of the United States was reduced to pig% men. twenty-five of them at Pittsburgh, guarding public stores. and fifty-five of them stationed at West Point ; while the highest officer of the army was a Captain!'

" The struggle of statesmen for national unity, vigor and power. was as long and as desperate as the struggle of the patriot soldiers for independence. The Constitution which has been handed down to us. was a battlefield fought over step by step, and inch by inch. It has its Concord and Bunker Hill, its Valley Forge and Yorktown ; and, as Washington led the forces and achieved the victory in one field of strife. justly earning the title of Father of his country, so Alexander Hamilton marshalled the forces in, the other, carried the day by the force of logic and statesmanship, and fairlyearned the no less honorable distinction of being the Father of our political system.

" The right of the General Government to collect the customs duties ; to maintain an army to enforce treaties ; to coin money ; in short; every fundamental principle which has been engrafted into the organic law, giving the nation vigor and strength, if not life itself, was vehemently opposed.

”It was tedious work to get the consent of the States to the holding of a convention to frame a Constitution for consideration ; and the adoption of the instrument was altogether problematical. But, finally, in 1789, six or seven years after the close of the Revolutionary war. the. States. or a majority of them, one after another. at wide intervals of time. and with reservations and evident reluctance, adopted it. Then. and not till then, did the United States of America become a nation—then, and not till then, could it be said that Liberty and Union were one and inseparable—now and forever !'

" We need to take a retrospective glance to rightly appreciate our present advancement, and fully realize how wonderful and rapid has been our progress.

" Although the impulse which led to the colonization of America was zeal for religious toleration, it is only in our day that it has become a fixed and unalterable and practical principle.

" Our forefathers of colonial times believed in the right of private judgment, provided private judgment coincided with their doctrines ! They established and maintained a connection between church and state, and the influence of the religious system prevaded and dominated the rising political, educational and social institutions of the country. The reality and intensity of the feeling may be inferred from the declaration of John Adams :That a change in the solar system might be expected as soon as a change in the ecclesiastical system of Massachusetts ! Massachusetts was not alone —in all the colonies there was a union of the

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political and religious systems, either directly, or indirectly in the way of religious tests as qualifications for citizenship or official preferment.

" What a revolution in thought has occurred we realize today in the abandonment of that system in nearly every State of the Union—the only lingering relic to remind us that it ever prevailed, being the exemption of church property from taxation—and that, too, must erelong cease to be a relic—for the whole system was long ago ' smitten with decay in the Old World, and it cannot flourish in the New.'

" The sun still shines in the heavens, and the planets revolve with the same unvarying precision and serene indifference to our affairs as they did in the days of John Adams ; but the ecclesiastical system of Massachusetts, and all the other colony States, has experienced a change ; and more nearly than ever before conform to the requirements of the great founder of Christianity, who solved the problem of church and state, in one sentence, 1,800 years ago, when He gave the advice to " Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's.'

" The divorce of the nation from the ecclesiastical system has not made us a Godless nation ; on the contrary, throughout the length and breadth of the land, today 40,000,000 of people, irrespective of faith or creed, fervently respond to the invitation extended by the President of the United States in his Proclamation issued last week, ' to mark the return of this day by some public religious and devout thanksgiving to Almighty God for the blessings which have been bestowed upon us as a nation during the centenary of our existence, and humbly to invoke a continuance of His protection.

" Our educational system is peculiarly American in origin, character and growth. Common schools were established in the colonies at a very early date. Documents over 200 yearsold are found on record, respecting the establishment of schools, which presented a plan embracing local responsibility, State oversight, moderate charges or free instruction, and recognition of the primary school, the grammar school and the university.' The watchword of Connecticut 100 years ago—' that the public schools must be cheap enough for the poorest, and good enough for the best '—is our watchword today ; and the common-school system of our fathers, expanded and improved—' differing in details but the same in outline—furnishes education of the children of our people in every State. from the Atlantic to the Pacfic.

" It is true there has been a controversy from the beginning in regard to religious instruction in the schools, and we are called upon at the close of the first century of the Republic to settle the vexed question. Can we doubt that it will be settled, so that ' instruction shall be free, unsectarian, nonpartisan, and open to all. without distinction of race, birthplace, or social standing ?

" Perhaps we are not so well prepared as the older nations to confer the benefits of what is called the higher education but our progress in this direction has been remarkable when we consider what an immense amount of pioneer work has had to be done. The nine colleges of 1776 have increased to five hundred and fifty in 1876. and millions of dollars in gifts are annually given to American institutions of learning. In no other country in the world has a college been established for the education of deaf mutes. We have no less than forty-five institutions for the education of that class of unfortunates ; and twenty-seven institutions for the education of the blind. Our cities and towns are provided with free libraries ; and the modern newspaper, grown to be a compendium of all knowledge no less than the record of current events, finds its way to every home in the land. . As a nation, if we are not the best,

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we certainly are the most generally educated of any people in the world.

" In literature, our Shakespeare and Milton and Burns—our Dante and Goethe—have not appeared ; but for the English Goldsmith we have Washington Irving ; for the cynic Carlyle, Emerson the thinker ; for Chatham and Sheriden and O'Connell, we have Webster. Choate and Phillips ; for the historians Macaulay and Fronde, we have Bancroft and Motley ; and for the poets and song-writers of all countries and climes we have our Longfellow, Bryant, Whittier and Holmes.

" If the work that has been done in this country in the field of original scientific research and discovery will not compare with that of Germany, France and England. it is because we have not had the leisure to devote to the patient, monotonous and apparently objectless labor, without which results are not reached. For the most part the business of our lives has been to get roofs to shelter us, and food and raiment to sustain its. If it was literally true that our forefathers secured a foothold and established a home on this continent, with

"' One hand on the mason's trowel,

And one on the soldier's sword,'

—it is no less true that we. their descendants. have had to fight and build and struggle to subdue the mighty West.

" ' We crossed the mountains, as of old

The Pilgrims crossed the sea,

To make the West, as they the East,

The homestead of the free.'

" Yet Franklin, Rittenhouse, Fulton. Morse, Henry, Howe and ' Old Probabilities ' are American names suggestive of discoveries and applications in science without which the civilized world would be much more than a century behind its present progress. Our science has been immensely practical, not abstract ; and we have applied the science of the age and of all ages, until we outstrip the oldest, the largestand the most powerful nations of the world in the extent of our material prosperity.

" What a growth has been ours ! What prosperity we have reached ! In no spirit of vain boasting, but with grateful hearts and joyful pride, do we point to the blessings that crown this centennial year of the Republic.

" The inventive genius of the world has been laid under contribution to aid our mighty enterprises and to relieve our overburdened hands and brains of much of the drudgery of labor. Our resources have been developed at a marvelous rate, and to an extent that has made us prodigal of wealth ; but yet, they are practically inexhaustible. Our territorial area embraces nearly the whole continent. Our commerce spreads over every sea, the grimy smoke of our steamships curling upward from every port in the known world ; and the steam whistle that calls the mechanic to his daily labor in our villages, is heard in the remotest interior of Japan, as the key note of a newer and better civilization. The 3.000.000 of people who, one hundred years ago, were invincible in the holy cause of liberty, have multiplied to nearly fifty millions ; the thirteen States to thirty-eight ; and our national wealth is practically beyond computation.

" The borders of the Great West have been pushed from the Alleghanies to the lakes, and from the lakes to the prairies, from the prairies to the plains, and from the plains to the mountain ranges, on whose further slopes the surf of the Pacific beats a perpetual rhythm.

"Our telegraphs and railroads have annihilated time and space. Where the emigrant of 1849 trudged for months beside his heavily loaded wagon, crossing the American desert to reach the El Dorado of California. the steel locomotive and palace cars of the fast train now speed over the same distance in three days and a half and the telegraph fairly transmits to our ears the whir of its wheels, as it flies from station to station.

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It is said of us that we are given to boasting : but how can we recount the story of our progress. so that it shall not seem to imitate the romance of Aladdin's lamp? Our most severely simple record tells of achievements that winged Mercury with pride could have reconnted to the gods ; or Puck. girdling the earth in forty minutes, could have joyfully repeated to the astonished people of fairy land! Our soberest words seem like wild exaggerations.

“Embarrassments and periods of depression we have had. but they have been temporary, .and. in the end. beneficent. as the one will be through which we are passing now.

“Our youth. the principles underlying our system. the arts of peace we have cultivated. and our community of interests and simplicity of social customs. have been measurably our safeguards against national misfortunes and calamities which follow national departures from the laws of right. But we have not escaped the penalty of any wrong action. Our brief and inexpensive war of conquest resulted in increased sectional strife, and only gave us a viper that stung the bosom that warmed it.

“By the sacrifice of the best blood of the nation. and the expenditure of untold treasure. we extirpated slavery and atoned for our former neglect of the rights of the black race. History will bear testimony to the redeeming fact, that. during all the years the system of slavery disgraced our civilization, it was only tolerated, not protected by the organic law of the land. and that the judgment and conscience of the larger part of our people held the practice in abhorrence.

"Today the nation is free in reality as well as in name. The hands that were raised to dismember it for the sake of perpetuating a crime against humanity were beaten down by the uprising of a people determined that the Union. founded upon justice and liberty. and cemented by the blood of the patriots of the Revolution.should not be impaired or destroyed. The tattered battle flags of our loyal regiments. the flower-strewn mounds in our graveyards, the armless veterans in our streets. speak eloquently of the terrible earnestness of the struggle. The amended constitution guaranteeing the rights of the enfranchised race. and their elevation to citizenship, and equality before the law, tell of our reparation for their wrongs. And this flag. with not a stripe erased. or a star obseured, waves over the length and breadth of the land today. the symbol of' beauty and glory, vindicating our courage and honor before the whole world.

" It would be recreancy to the great memories of this day to leave unsaid that there are blots on our record the odium of which can never be effaced—crimes against liberty, against humanity, against civilrzation. The treason of Benedict Arnold. the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, the torture of our soldiers in the prisons pens of the South. and sympathy for the cause which demanded and the miscreants who committed the atrocity. are crimes that deserve, and to the end of time, will receive. the execration of the civilized world, Over the memory of individuals whose misdeeds are committed from sudden impulse, passion, or the ordinary motives of depravity. we throw the mantle of charity and oblivion ; but for those whose crimes, like these. humiliate and involve a nation in their consequences. History has no forgiveness and the memory of man no forgetfulness.

“In conclusion, fellow-citizens. I trust to violate none of the proprieties which all parties on this day cordially unite in observing. by conjuring you to let your condemnation rest with emphasis upon corruption. intriguing. and faithlessness in the administration of public affairs. Demand the unconditional abandonment of practices not strictly in accordance with the dictates of simple truth and plain honesty. Corruption. prostitution of power to

HISTORY OF MEDINA COUNTY - 375

purposes of self-aggrandizement, fraud. and a long catalogue of vices of a darker hue have fastened themselves upon every government, like barnacles on a ship. since governments began. Absolute purity and fidelity in the execution of public trusts it were rain to expect ; but the people of a nation who excuse or palate the slightest deviation from the straightforward performance of duty in their public servants are themselves responsible. and justly suffer the consequences. Honesty and faithfulness in the everyday life of the citizens of the State. will secure honesty and faithfulness in official life. We have no trained class of public functionaries. and need none. No need of a complicated civil service system. when we can go into our offices. stores and factories. into our shops and on our farms and choose at a venture men educate.!. self poised and capable of tilling any office from President down. The strength and glory of the nation. which today enters upon a new era depend not upon the greatness of its rulers. but upon the virtue. industry and intelligence of its people ; and for the untried future this is the promise and potency' of a national career. the highest and completest that human society can reach. Let us hope that the impulses which go forth from this day to influence our national character. may give strength to our love of justice. as well as a brighter glow to our patriotism.

"As we look back over our history from the vantage ground of a hundred years. we see that the nation of today is not the nation of yesterday; but the outgrowth of conditions and struggles which can never be repeated. And he who stands in this place on our next Centennial Fourth of July. to review the century hidden now by the vail of the future. will see that progress has been made. not by repeating our experience, but in new directions—our age and our acts furnishing the impulses which lead into new pathways of enterprise and honor."