200 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO the present the United States and Canada have lived side by side as peaceful and kindly neighbors, presenting to the world the unique situation of a frontier more than three thousand miles in length without a single fortification on either side. In consideration of this fact the War of 1812 may be said to have been a victory for both sides, if the purpose of war is to insure an honorable and lasting peace. It is the opinion of nearly all historians that the war accomplished the true completion of American independence. Since that time no nation has ever dared to look toward our country or any of its possessions with the intention of conquest. The country has been free to work out its destiny. The treaty of Ghent officially ended the war on December 24, 1814. It really settled nothing. Both sides realized that the real reason for war, Napoleon Bonaparte, had ceased to be a European menace. The fact that the Emperor returned from his exile on the Island of Elba, to conduct the campaign of Waterloo, while a most tremendous historical episode had no effect on the relations of the United States and Great Britain. Both sides were willing to have the situation as it was. A great sensation of relief spread over the entire world, only to be equalled by that which came on November 11, 1918. The close of the war brings to an end the pioneering period of our history. In the eighteen years since the organization of the Connecticut Land Company the country had changed from a wilderness to a settled civilization. The land was to a great extent cleared, villages had sprung into existence, schools were organized, churches were built and filled with worshippers, some small attempts at manufacturing had been begun; the citizenry began to think with pride of their growing country. To be sure life was still primitive in many respects. In 1814 a large majority of the citizens still lived in the HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 201 log cabins which they had built when they cleared the land. Each community was self-contained. Very little in the way of goods of any kind from the outside world came into northeastern Ohio. Every housewife was herself a manufacturer. The spinning wheel hummed in every home, and the local weaver wove the woolen yarn and cotton thread into cloth which was tailored by hand into the family clothing. The tallow candle furnished the illumination of the house when the family was not content to sit by the fire. Candle moulds are not uncommon, yet among the relics of the times preserved by the descendants of the early families. But even a candle mould was not always available. Often the Ohio child spent hours dipping the candle in the making into a pot of molten tallow, until the desired diameter was attained. The family raised and grew all its own food. Indian corn was the common grain of both man and beast. Wheat was grown and made into flour at the local grist-mill, but the rural families really preferred corn meal. Mush was a common and most nutritious commodity. Buckwheat became a common crop, the housewife setting a crock of yeasty batter every night in cold weather from October to May, to be made in the morning buckwheat cakes. These with butter and maple syrup were the mainstay of the Reserve breakfast. The family killed, butchered and preserved its own meat. Hams and bacon were smoked in the family smokehouse, the wood of the shag-bark hickory being regarded as especially desirable for this purpose. Great crocks of pork sausage were salted down to accompany the breakfast pancakes. Apple orchards grew and began to bear, to serve a double purpose; the winter apple was the dessert of the Reserve family, either raw or made into pie, while apple cider was the popular beverage. In the Fall the children gathered hickory nuts, chestnuts, walnuts and butternuts, 202 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO the last having a delicacy of flavor which made it highly desirable in spite of its difficult shell. The hulls from the walnuts were useful in another way. From them was obtained an almost indelible dye, as many a boy ruefully discovered when he examined his hands after a day's nutting. Their pleasures were simple and few. A cornhusking was a day of celebration much enjoyed. A barn or house raising was always an occasion for a neighborhood gathering. Spelling-bees, when old and young stood in rows, falling one by one, until the contest became a bitter struggle among the last survivors, were popular. Noted "spellers" became famous for miles around. They had few outdoor games. Horse-shoe pitching was a favorite. Horse racing, both formal and informal, was the commonest sport. Baseball and football were still far in the future. Roads were poor. At first merely forest trails, when the woods were cleared they often were hub deep in mud. To remedy this "curduroy" roads were built, of logs or slabs laid side by side, making a solid but most uncomfortable surface. Vehicles with springs were scarce. Most people rode horseback or in the farm wagons. When the winter snows came they converted the wagon into a bobsled, and the cheery jingle of sleigh-bells brightened the country side. The problem of the farmer was difficult. Much of the soil was stony, either from outcrop of the native rock, or from the granite boulders ("nigger-heads") deposited by the glacier. To add to the difficulty, when the trees were cut the stumps remained and their removal was a serious and abiding problem in a country where explosives were scarce and dangerous. Also the farmer's tools were primitive. Due to the scarcity of iron the plow often had a wooden shoe, the maintenance of which was a matter of extreme difficulty. HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 203 Yet the country grew and prospered. By the census of 1810, the first national census in which Ohio figured, Warren led the Reserve with 875 inhabitants; Poland was second, with 837; Youngstown third, with 773; Hudson fourth, with 693; Hubbard fifth, with 674; Painesville sixth, with 670; and Cleveland seventh, with 547. The whole number of inhabitants in Trumbull County in 1810 was 6,871; in 1820, 15,542. CHAPTER VIII TRANSPORTATION—CANALS AND RAILROADS The most difficult problem of the early settlers in the country west of the Alleghenies was transportation. The Indian made all his short journeys, by necessity, on foot, by trails through the forest country, trails so narrow and so concealed that they were of no practical use whatever to the incoming white man. For his longer journeys the red man followed the streams, traveling in that extraordinarily well adapted vessel, the canoe—a vehicle which deserves recognition among the world's greatest inventions for its seaworthiness, its light draft, its easy control, and the slight power needed for its propulsion. In his canoe the Indian braved alike the mountain torrent and the stormy lake shore. When it was necessary to portage, he lifted it to his shoulders and stepped out easily along the trail. The canoe is still the favored vessel for navigation of the remoter lakes and streams of our northern states and of Canada, and to those who love poetry of motion rather than speed, it is a most delightful pleasure boat. But the settlers necessarily found the streams and trails soon inadequate to their transportation needs. We have described the "corduroy" roads which were their first attempts at pavement. The only quality they had to recommend them was that they were passable in bad weather. Without the corduroy the roads were well nigh impassable half the year. The Conestoga wagon, with four horses, handled the fast freight. They made the three-hundred-mile journey from - 204 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 205 Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, with luck and good weather, in about three weeks. The ox team, probably the slowest of all motive power in history, was the commonest form of local transport and farm labor. Ohio was isolated : barred by the mountains on the east, by the lake on the north, by the trackless prairie frontier on the west. The highway to the south was open; but there was no market there for such things as Ohio had to sell, with the exception of a few items such as Western Reserve cheese. Under such conditions, by 1820 Ohio was land poor in the midst of potential plenty. The population was growing, but the growth was doing more harm than good, when it is to be considered that each new settler had to be taken care of, a place found for him, a living to be made. Some method of transportation for Ohio's surplus had to be found, if Ohio were to avoid the isolation that means decay. The steamboat, introduced on the inland rivers of the great Mississippi basin in the second decade of the century, gave relief to the southern portion of Ohio, to an extent. But, as we have just noted, their only road was to the south, where foodstuffs—what Ohio had to sell—were not needed. Lake Erie, to be sure, furnished a broad, though treacherous highway, but the end of Erie navigation, at the great fans, was little less of a wilderness than the western shore. Stephenson and others, in England, were beginning experimentation with railroads, but to Ohio these were only the wild dreams of romance. What was to be done? The idea which saved Ohio seems first to have grown into a definite purpose in the great mind of Washington. He of all men saw the necessity of western expansion if the nation were to endure. He more than any other man was willing to invest a fortune in this development. He voiced in the Farewell Address a solemn warning to the East to join in common purpose with the West, toward a common destiny. 206 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO And, finally, he saw the way to make highways which would solve the problem of the mountains and unite the nation. Before the Revolution, Washington had considered the feasibility of a canal to join the Potomac to the Ohio. It was a road that he knew well. He had barely emerged from boyhood when he bore the message of Governor Dinwiddie to the Frenchmen on the Allegheny. He built the Virginia outpost on the upper water of the Youghiogeny, Fort Necessity. He followed the same road with Braddock, and crossed the Pennsylvania mountains with General Forbes. Naturally, as a Virginian, he had the idea of a Potomac and Ohio canal first in his mind. But during and after the Revolution he learned to know the wonderful possibilities of the Mohawk Valley as a road to Erie. He was great enough to give his approval and recommendation to the improvement of this natural highway. It is one of the qualities of Washington's greatness that he was first an American, second a Virginian, in a time when nearly all men placed state far in advance of nation. But the making of the Erie Canal, and the opening thereby of western commerce, as an actual enterprise belongs to a New Yorker, who thereby placed his name forever on the rolls of America's great pioneers. Many men were instruments in the planning, but Governor DeWitt Clinton must be given credit for bringing all these plans to a head and causing the enactment of the legislation which made the canal. The building of the Erie is a story for which this work has no room, although it has a romantic interest which will well repay the student of history who takes the time to study it. As the first of the great canals, and the only one which resisted the competition of the railroads and survived, it is a story of great enterprise. We are interested in it here because it opened a pathway for the commerce of Northern Ohio. HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 207 In spite of Washington's advice and aid, the Potomac canal never crossed the mountains, and has no part in our story. But Pennsylvania showed more enterprise, or more engineering ability, than Virginia, and succeeded in crossing the mountains from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, making the steepest ascents and descents by a most remarkable system of inclined planes, by which the cargoes, and sometimes the boats themselves, were lifted from the water, moved across the mountain top, and replaced in the water again. This Pennsylvania canal made contact with the Ohio River, but a branch which was to ascend the Beaver and Shenango and enter the lake at Erie never went beyond New Castle. This was far enough, however, to be extremely useful to the Reserve, as we shall see. Thomas Worthington, intellectual leader of the Virginia Democratic group which dominated the Ohio constitutional convention of 1802, received as his reward the election to the Senate of the United States. In 1807 he introduced in the Senate a resolution providing a plan for government aid in opening both roads and canals. This seems to have been the first actual suggestion in the movement for the Ohio canal system. In 1816, as governor of Ohio, Worthington opened a correspondence on the general subject of canals with Governor DeWitt Clinton of New York. In 1818, he conducted further correspondence with William H. Crawford, Secretary of the Treasury under Monroe. But these were only suggestive movements. The real father of the Ohio canals is Governor Ethan Allen Brown. Governor Brown, in his inaugural address in December, 1818, made a special point of the necessity of "cheaper ways to the market for Ohio farmers." Brown had been an advocate of canals for years before his election, to such an extent as to discredit him with that conservative element of the population who, then as now, regarded progress as folly, when 208 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO that progress is by new and untried ways. The assembly of 1819 almost at the beginning of its session appointed a committee to investigate the problem of an Erie-Ohio canal, but, although it made a favorable report, nothing further was done at that time. Governor Brown recommended in 1820 the appointment of three commissioners, who were to "employ an engineer to survey routes for canals—provided, however, that Congress would aid the construction." This hope for Federal aid, however, proved vain, and the matter lay dormant for another two years. However, during these two years agitation in favor of canals grew throughout the state, with the result that, in 1822, the Assembly passed a bill creating a board of canal commissioners, whose duty was to arrange for the exploration and survey of canal routes across the state. The names of these commissioners, as appointed by Governor Brown, were Thomas Worthington, Alfred Kelley, Benjamin Tappan, Jeremiah Morrow and Ebenezer Buckingham. The commissioners, in their search for an engineer, turned to the Erie Canal, then in course of construction. One` of the young men who had acquired experience and fame in this work was James Geddes. Geddes was a lawyer by profession, and had little engineering education (scarcely any one in America had) , but he had proved his ability, or rather genius, by making the survey on which the Erie Canal was founded. He came to Ohio with a reputation which he justified by his work. For two years Geddes and his corps of engineers trod the length and breadth of Ohio, studying the watercourses, roughly measuring levels and planning routes. At the completion of the survey they reported five of these routes as feasible, as follows: 1. The Mahoning and Grand rivers; 2. The Cuyahoga and Tuscarawas-Muskingum rivers; HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 209 3. The Black, Killbuck and Muskingum rivers; 4. The Scioto and Sandusky rivers; 5. The Maumee and Great Miami rivers. The final decision of the Assembly on the canal question came on February 4th, 1825, when an act was passed creating a board of seven canal commissioners, a canal fund, to be obtained by the sale of stocks and the collection of special taxes, and a board of three commissioners of the canal fund. The routes finally established by these commissioners were two : the Maumee-Great Miami route, and another which followed part of two others, as follows: from the mouth of the Cuyahoga to the Great Portage, thence down the Tuscarawas and along the Licking to a point near its headwaters, and thence across to the Scioto along Little Walnut Creek, thence down the Scioto to its mouth. The reason for this combination of routes was that it reached, in the opinion of the commissioners, a larger area of the state than was otherwise possible. An interesting point in connection with the routing of the canal which directly interests this history, is the fact that from the Akron summit through Stark County two routes were about equal in feasibility; one through Canton, and the other through Massillon. For some reason the leading citizens of Canton raised opposition to the canal, and it was thereby routed through Massillon, a fact which was the making of the latter city, and on the other hand reacted against Canton to such an extent that the Canton people later on made a frantic effort to connect with the ill-fated Sandy and Beaver Canal. On the "Licking Summit," about three miles southwest of Newark, on July Fourth, 1825, a great concourse of citizens met to celebrate the opening of operations on the Ohio Canal. The chief guest of honor was Governor DeWitt Clinton, of New York, the founder of the Erie Canal, which in 210 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO that same year saw its completion from the Hudson to Lake Erie. With great solemnity, Governor Clinton raised a spadeful of earth. Ohio's Governor Morrow took the spade from Clinton and in turn raised a spadeful, and then the other nearest distinguished guests struggled for possession of the historic spade. The canal was begun. From the Licking Summit the party proceeded to the leading cities of the state, made speeches, and ate dinners. The work on the canal was let out to private contractors, among whom was Abram Garfield, father of the President. While the expense of building was greatly in excess of the original estimate, be it said to the credit of our forefathers that practically no scandal was attached to the project in any way. On July 10th, 1830, just a day or two more than five years after Clinton raised his spade, a boat arrived in Newark from Cleveland. By 1832 the canal was open to the mouth of the Scioto. The effect on Ohio commerce was immediate. Before the canal, for instance, flour was selling in Cincinnati at $3.50 per barrel, in New York at $8.00. It had been estimated that the freight by canal and lake would amount to about $1.70, leaving a profit of nearly three dollars a barrel. While these prices were not quite realized, since competition always lowers prices, the margin of profit on Ohio goods delivered at the seaboard was sufficient to bring about the beginning of great prosperity to Ohio farmers—a prosperity which has been almost continuous ever since. While the Ohio Canal only touched the territory of this history in its course through Stark County, it was of great benefit to all the southern counties, so great that local business leaders in Columbiana, Mahoning, Trumbull and Portage began almost immediately to plan the construction of tributary canals. Finding that state aid was not to be ob- HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 211 tained, they resorted to private enterprise, and incorporated two canal companies, the "Sandy and Beaver" and the "Ohio and Pennsylvania." The Sandy and Beaver Canal was planned to follow the course of Sandy Creek from its mouth at Bolivar, on the southern boundary of Stark County, across the corner of Carroll County to its source in Columbiana County. Thence it crossed to Lisbon, and from that place was to follow the Little Beaver to its mouth on the Ohio, just across the Pennsylvania line. The incorporators and stockholders were nearly all citizens of the territory along its line, Benjamin Hanna, grandfather of the senator, being the first president of the company. The coming of the Sandy and Beaver was hailed with great enthusiasm by the local citizenry. On November 24th, 1834, Elderkin Potter "broke ground" near Lisbon, with ceremony, in the presence of a large gathering. But the problems of construction were great. It was nearly twelve years after the opening of construction before a boat reached Lisbon from the Ohio. The contours of Columbiana County are such that the canal consisted almost entirely of curves. The middle section of the canal was never put into practical operation, and the final result was the abandonment of all but the six miles nearest to Bolivar, and the section between Lisbon and the Ohio River. A branch, called the Nimishillen, projected to connect with Canton and thus correct that town's original error, also proved a failure. The construction of the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railroad, through the northern side of Columbiana County in 1852, practically was the death blow to the Beaver and Sandy Canal, with the added result that Lisbon retired to quiet repose, if not to obscurity. The Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal was also organized by private and mostly local capital. It was more successful and more long-lived than the Sandy and Beaver; first, because the 212 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO route was more practicable; second, because the need was greater. The Pennsylvania and Ohio united with the Pittsburgh and Erie at the mouth of the Mahoning River, below New Castle. It followed the Mahoning Valley up to Warren and Leavittsburg, thence followed the west branch of that river to the Ravenna height of land, and thence followed the Cuyahoga in its downward course to Akron, where it joined the Ohio Canal. This canal was of great benefit to the inhabitants of the region for about a generation. It was completed in 1840, and was finally abandoned entirely when the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad acquired its course for a right of way, in 1877. A little pamphlet, "Ravenna Forty Years Ago," by Mr. A. B. Griffin, gives an interesting account of the coming of the first boats on the Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal to Ravenna: "The Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal was opened for business in the spring of 1840. On the third clay of April, that year, the first passenger boat, or boats, rather, there were two of them—Tippecanoe and Mohawk—arrived in Ravenna from the east, bound for Akron. They were welcomed by a great crowd of people, who lined the banks on either shore. The boats emerged from the 'deep cut' amid the booming of cannon, vociferous cheers and stirring strains of music. The guns on board were responded to by guns on shore, cheer resounded to cheer and music to music. After a brief tarry, the boats were loosened from their moorings, and the voyage westward resumed. The crowd then retired. This crowd gathered on the banks of the canal as citizens, to celebrate an event in which all were equally interested. They retired as partisans—Whigs and Democrats—for the reason that this was also the day of the 'great Whig convention.' There were delegates to the same on board. The Democrats retired HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 213 quietly to their several places of business. The Whigs formed in line, and with bands of music and waving banners marched to the speaker's stand, where they listened to speeches, music and song. In this procession were delegates from all parts of the surrounding country. Ellsworth sent a long train of wagons with banners, motto—`The people are coming.' Tallmadge sent with her delegation a canoe mounted on wheels. Boston Township sent a delegation of eighty on horseback with badges and banner. Cuyahoga Falls sent a large delegation, also Hudson, Aurora, Windham, Nelson, Hiram, Mantua, Freedom, Shalersville and other surrounding towns." It will be remembered that 1840 was the year of the election of William Henry Harrison to the Presidency. Our forefathers took both their canals and their politics seriously. As a matter of historical fact, the Democrats who went quietly back to their "several places of business" were much fewer in number and quieter in conduct than the whigs who remained to cheer. Portage County was strong in Whig sentiment. The canal, as a method of transportation of freight, was most satisfactory. It was economical, safe and, for the time, expeditious. It certainly saved the West from stagnation and isolation. As a method of transportation of passengers, while about as slow as land travel—the average speed of a passenger boat, including stops, was not above four miles an hour—it was picturesque and friendly. The reader who wants a picture drawn by a great artist, who was not too well pleased with his surrounding, is referred to Dickens' "American Notes." The frequent stops, the passage through the locks, the boy with his three mules on the tow-path, the bridges, "high" and "low," the neighbors on shore, all combined to make travel by canal interesting. It is an episode in 214 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO our history, the passing of which may cause a slight feeling of regret in the mind of the lover of American antiquities. But almost before the last shovelful of dirt was thrown from the Ohio Canals the railroad was coming, and with its coming spelled doom to the canals. Three great trunk lines stretched out toward Ohio before 1850. The Baltimore and Ohio, which ran a train into Wheeling in 1853, did not touch our part of the state until later years. But the great Pennsylvania system made connection with the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago, which crossed Columbiana County in 1852, and in the same year the Cleveland and Pittsburgh Railroad, which was to become a part of the Pennsylvania system, reached East Liverpool. The Cleveland and Mahoning, of which Governor Tod was the first president and principal promoter, was in operation a year or two later, making a connection by rail from Youngstown and Warren to Cleveland, and thus practically closing the lake business of the Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal. The Cleveland, Painesville and Ashtabula Railroad was opened in 1854 all the way to Buffalo, furnishing competition to the treacherous lake traffic. A little later came the Atlantic and Great Western, now the main line of the Erie. As each new railroad came through Ohio the value of the canals lessened, until finally it ceased altogether. At some places along the line of the old canals the passerby yet sees the narrow ditch, possibly filled with stagnant water, possibly empty and grass grown, which is all that is left of any of these once busy waterways. If he be young, he may wonder what manner of work it may have been which has left this curious remnant. The writer as a boy often passed an old canal boat at the foot of Federal Street in Youngstown, then long aground, and remodeled into a cheap eating-house for the railroad men who had ruined the canal. HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 215 Even that old boat is now long gone. But it is a curious perversion of history that engineers are now planning a greater, deeper canal on the course of the old Ohio and Pennsylvania, to furnish cheaper and better transportation than may be obtained from the railroads. So do men's affairs run in cycles, and the old returns to supersede the new. BOOK FOUR From the Close of the War of 1812 to the Beginning of the Civil War Period CHAPTER I ORGANIZATION OF THE COUNTIES The establishment of the county as the primary local administrative unit was one of the integral theories of the founders of the Constitution of 1802. The inhabitants of the Western Reserve, on account of the New England origin of the first organizers, conceived the establishment of township, or "town" government as a necessity, and we have seen that during the period when the entire Reserve was included in Trumbull County, it was subdivided into a number of townships for the purpose of local government. These townships were composed each of several geographical townships, and they seem to have contemplated the eventual increase of the number of townships until each unit of government measured twenty-five square miles, according to the plan of the original survey. The Constitution of 1802, on the other hand, provided for the establishment by the legislature of counties, no one of which was to have an area of less than four hundred square miles, and the subdivision of these counties into townships. No provision is included in this constitution for the creation of municipal corpora- - 217 - 218 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO tions, or in fact of any corporation, but the legislature assumed, in the absence of any constitutional requirement, the right to create corporations, municipal and others. These several ideas combined produced a duplication and sometimes a triplication of authority which as the state grew in population made confusion and added to the expense of local government—a condition which still exists. In accordance with the provision above described the legislature during the nineteenth century increased at different times the number of counties to the present number of eighty-eight. Various forms and sizes of townships exist in different parts of the state, due to the diverse nature of the original surveys. In northeastern Ohio the townships, as we have seen, are generally of two sizes, five miles square in the Reserve, six miles square in the Seven Ranges, with such exceptions as the nature of the land and the local conditions seem to require. It is our intention now to record the development and subdivision of the northeastern corner of the state into the eight counties which are the special subject of this history. The first division of Trumbull County was the setting apart of Geauga County in 1806. Geauga as constituted at this time included all of the present Ashtabula, all of Geauga, Lake, and that part of Cuyahoga east of the Cuyahoga River. The name of Geauga is Indian in origin, and is preserved in the Geauga Lake, a beautiful body of water lying in the extreme southwestern corner of the present county. In 1808 Portage County was created, to include all of Trumbull west of the first range of townships. Portage, of course, gets its name from the series of portages from the lake to the rivers flowing into the Ohio. During the same year Ashtabula and Cuyahoga were separated from Geauga, but not organized as separate government until 1812. "Ashtabula" is another Indian name. HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 219 The townships numbered "eight" in the first five ranges were the subject of controversy until 1812, as to whether they belonged to Ashtabula or Trumbull. The inhabitants complained that they were taxed by both and governed by neither. The legislature settled this problem in 1812 by locating them permanently as part of Ashtabula. In 1812 Portage County was also reduced by the creation of Huron and Medina counties. From 1812 to 1840 no further change was made. In this year Lake County was created from the northern part of Geauga and the northeast corner of Cuyahoga. Lake is the smallest county in the state in area, and one of the most beautiful. In 1840 Portage County was reduced to its present limits by the creation of Stark. Mahoning was the last county to be created from the Reserve. It was made up of the ten southern townships of Trumbull and the five northern townships of Columbiana, in 1846. From these Columbiana townships a corner of Green and Goshen was retained by Columbiana, the purpose being to retain the entire settlement of Salem. This explains the peculiar broken southern line of Mahoning. It will, of course, be evident that Mahoning County is made up partly from the Reserve and partly from the Seven Ranges. The five southern townships therefore extend west from the Pennsylvania line thirty miles, while the ten to the north reach only twenty-five. There is a corresponding difference in the character of the original population in the two parts of Mahoning County. Stark County, with Wayne, was created on February 13, 1808, but was not organized as a separate government until January 1, 1809. That part of Stark east of the Tuscarawas River had been a part of Columbiana, the part west of the river being taken from the Indian unorganized lands. Wayne County was separated from Stark in government on March 1, 1812. 220 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO It will be seen that the system of organization of Ohio counties had little to do with the nature of the land or the character of the population. The idea was to establish the local administration units on such a scale that the seat of local government—the "county seat"—would be close enough to the inhabitants to be within easy reach of all, in a horse and wagon age. Very little change in county boundaries has taken place since the laying of the first railroad track in Ohio. Of course, automobiles and automobile roads were not even dreamed of by the makers of the county lines. On the other hand, the development of industry and of population centers has continually crossed, and to some extent been hindered by county lines. The growth of the Mahoning Valley, for instance, as a great manufacturing area has united the cities and villages in northeastern Mahoning and southern Trumbull very closely, in industry and social affairs, while each county has a large agricultural area comparatively remote in character of population and manner of living. Likewise, the whole of the Erie lake front in Ohio, from Toledo to Conneaut, has grown into an almost continuous procession of settlements, with nuclei centering around the numerous harbors, and the space between filled with summer resorts whose population more than doubles during the months when bathing is possible. For these reasons, while we must pay some attention to the history of the counties as such, the principal business of this history is to trace the development, on the one hand, of the industrial and commercial growth of our territory, and on the other of the agricultural development, and to a great extent these two main topics must be developed without much attention to county lines. CHAPTER II LIFE BROADENS IN THE RESERVE It seems to me, if an author may be allowed to obtrude his own opinions for a moment, that the character of the original immigrant population is in itself an explanation of the order of the development of the Western Reserve of Ohio. We have watched two converging streams, one coming from the old Puritan population of Connecticut, the other from the back-woods Scotch-Irish of Pennsylvania, flowing in ever increasing numbers into this new country. We have traced them through the hardships of their various journeys, and have seen them clearing and settling the land, up to the time when opposition to a common foe cemented them into an abiding fellowship. It is now our pleasant duty to trace them from hardship and suffering to comfort and prosperity; to watch their gradual elevation to a place of high honor and power. While these two original sources of population were separated far in America, and still farther in the old country, yet they had many things in common. The Connecticut men were English, the descendants of Cromwell's Commonwealth men, having two abiding principles in their faith, one political, one religious; a determination to govern themselves which had carried them through the dark days before and during the Revolution with the free charter they had demanded and received from the careless hands of Charles II; and a determination to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences which had led them to establish - 221 - 222 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO the Congregational form of church government, a form in which the congregation allowed no dictation even from the higher organizations of its own church. As to government, the Scotch-Irish had gone still farther. Exiled from their native Scotland to the alien Irish isle, they had moved across the sea to the New World with the purpose of removing far enough into the wilderness so that no effectual interference with their affairs by the mother country could be made. In religion also they tolerated no interference from any power or church with the local congregation. They were fond of theological disputation, and prone to controversy. The Scottish mind has always enjoyed religious polemics, much more than the Connecticut men the Scotch-Irish were likely to develop sectarian controversies which divided and subdivided them into little independent groups, but the fundamental idea of resistance to any other authority than their own was common to all. Three social characteristics, possibly apparently paradoxical, but not really so, were as common to the Reserve as its political and religious character, thrift, hospitality and a proud reserve. Each of these deserves a paragraph. In a new country whose resources seemed boundless a tendency to waste what was given them might seem natural. But the men of the Reserve were thrifty. A desire to possess a paying property, to improve and prosper on their own land, was an almost universal quality among them. As strictly honest a folk as ever lived, perhaps, each family nevertheless cleared and saved and built, respecting the property rights of others, but clinging as tenaciously to their own. The theories of communism, of government ownership or control, were unknown to them, and have never been tolerable to their descendants. They believed in individual ownership, and saw in it the basis of universal, permanent prosperity. The constitutional guarantees of life, liberty and HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO - 223 property, to be found both in the Federal and Ohio Constitutions, were sacred in their eyes. Yet they were hospitable. The stranger within their gates was welcome, and to deny him a share in the food on the table and the shelter of the roof was a thing unthinkable. To be sure, it was desirable that he should give an account of himself. If he showed an inclination to become a public charge, a burden on the community, he had the choice of going to work or moving on. They were a hard working people, and believed in the time honored principle that "if a man do not work, neither shall he eat." The latchstring was out to the passerby, but not to the community loafer. And withal they were proud. They prided in their ancestry, whether Puritan or Scotch-Irish. They felt themselves a chosen people. The newcomer, until he had established himself, was likely to feel a bit lonely. They were inter-related by blood in their origins, and they formed new inter-relations by marriage in the new country. Hundreds of family histories, hundreds of family reunions still held every year, testify to the pride of ancestry and of race. Even now, when two descendants of the Reserve meet, who happen to bear a common name, they are likely to spend an hour or two tracing a common relationship. Cousins to the fourth or fifth degree clasp hands in brotherhood when they meet., Naturally, this quality developed a sort of exclusiveness in the attitude of the Reserve toward strangers which at times undoubtedly retarded the growth of the whole. Community pride soon developed. As each little center of population grew from hamlet to village, and some began to take on citified airs, each became jealous of its own importance. Each had its little group of leading men, looked up to by the rest, jealously supported in the political field when opportunity offered, admired and followed or disliked 224 - HISTORY OF NORTHEASTERN OHIO and distrusted as the character of the man developed, but still held in esteem as the nucleus about which local greatness grew. There was a slight tendency to regard a man who removed from one community to another as having in a sense betrayed his trust—unless he moved to the county-seat. For they had a reverence for professional and political life. If a boy showed talent in school the fond mother prayed and the proud father hoped that the youth would go on to college and prepare himself for a learned profession. The order of preference in their minds, perhaps, was first the law, second the ministry, third, medicine. School teaching was not regarded as a permanent profession. The young man preparing for the law or the ministry was expected; when the family resources ran low, to take time out for a year or two and teach the district school. Even when, as we shall soon see, the little colleges began to spring up all over the state, there was a tendency to bring in the professorial staff from older educational institutions on the other side of the mountains. But the lawyer, the minister, the doctor from the family was the family pride. The less fortunate brother who stayed on the farm perhaps felt a little jealousy at times, but on the whole shared in his parents' admiration for the professional member of the family. The little streams of northeastern Ohio were a blessing to the inhabitants. Where the indefatigable beaver had built its dams in the primeval solitudes, the settlers built more enduring barriers, and each community soon was provided with a grist-mill and a saw-mill. While they had been satisfied in the beginning to house themselves in log cabins, they wanted better houses. The local carpenter became a personage of great importance. Over the Reserve sprang up a peculiar and typical form of farm architecture, many ex-