CHAPTER I. GEOLOGY: THE GLACIAL PERIOD. Early Glacial Ages—Chronology of this Period—Cincinnati Anticline—The Trenton Limestone—Oil and Gas Rock—How Glaciers are Formed—Their Movements— Transportation of Boulders—Limit of Glacier in Ohio—Sandusky County Boulders— Harrison Rock —Dr. Zimmerman's Residence—Boulders Found at Top of Mt. Washington—Glacial Effect on the Drainage System—Outlets and Temporary Lakes Formed—Sandusky Valley Once a Lake—Sand Ridges are Former Lake Shores—Rich Soil of the Valley Result of Glacial Action—Time of Ice Disappearance Ascertained from Erosion—The Niagara Gorge—Observations of Dr. Wright at Plum Creek, Oberlin, Ohio—Glacial Man in Ohio —No Implements or Relics of Him Found in Sandusky County—Found South of Water Shed Separating Lake Erie Basin, and Ohio River— Stone Implements Found by Dr. M. C. Met: at Madisonville Near Cincinnati and at Loveland in Clermont County—By Prof. W. C. Mills at Newcomerstown, Tuscarawas County—By Mr. Sam Houston at Brilliant in Jefferson County—By Mr. Licey Near Wadsworth, Medina County. This chapter, except that relating to Glacial Man, which was added later by Dr. Wright, at request of the Editor, is taken from the able and instructive address delivered at the Sandusky County Pioneer and Historical Association, September 8, 1908, by G. Frederick Wright, D. D., LL. D., of Oberlin, Ohio, president of the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society. It is constituted a chapter of this volume with his permission. In coming to Fremont we sat with a gentleman, who told us a story of early days. He said that his grandfather in the early part of the last century moved from Lower Sandusky to Perrysburg, and that he started out with his ox team and went as far as he could, the road being bad, and then walked back to stay in Lower Sandusky over night; after which he went to his team and wagon to resume his journey. It seems to have been a custom of the early immigrants to do so, and that stage coaches would stop at night some miles out and tell the passengers to walk the rest of the way to town to lodge for the night, and then return to ride to town in the stage the next day if they chose to do so. What was the reason or cause of these muddy roads? It was because they were built without stone. From Monroeville to the Maumee River the country is cov- ered with the sediment of a former lake. If Lake Erie should dry up it would leave a valley covered with a sediment like this. In early geological ages, the Gulf of Mexico extended to this region. We are here on what is called the Cincinnati Anticline of rocks, that run from the islands down to Cincinnati. If we go down about 1300 feet we strike the Trenton Limestone where we get the oil and gas. Then we reach the Huronian and Laurentian rocks at an unknown depth below. The rocks of this region are much younger and are called the Water Lime like those on Put-in-Bay Island, deposited when this was the bottom of the sea, which became filled with sea shells and shell fish and a vast accumulation of marine deposits. The superficial deposits here belong to the glacial age. The chronology Of the period is indicated by the boulders found here. There is a large one, called the Harrison Boulder a few miles southwest of Fremont, - 31 - 32 - HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY surrounded by other smaller ones. This boulder is a species of granite from the oldest land in the world. The highlands of Canada north of Lake Erie is the place from which the glacial boulders in this basin are derived, That rock is about from Twenty-five to one hundred and fifty millions of years old. But it was transported here only 10 000 or 12,000 years ago. In size it is 13 feet long 10 feet wide and 3 1/2, feet out of the ground, probably about seven feet thick. That would make about one thousand cubic feet of rock, and it would weight about one hundred and eighty thousand pounds or 80 tons, and could be removed to Fremont as there is no bridge between there and her to break down. But it would take the pluck and patience of the Egyptians to get it to Fremont. It should be preserved as a heritage to preach geology in all the ages to come. It has already withstood the influence of climate in this region for many thousands of years, and will not decay. It comes from the north of Lake Huron 300 miles distant in the Canadian Highlands, which extend from Hudson’s Bay to Labrador and as before said an the oldest land in the world. They are composed of crystaline rocks and consist of granite syenite, gueiss and a variety of eruptive rocks as well as a variety of metamorphic rocks. The Harrison Boulder is pretty largely made up of hornblende, which takes the place of mica and belongs to what they call in Canada the Laurentian System. There are a great number of bolders around it of that nature as well as others of the Huron water, but of snow of vast depth, which under great pressure becomes ice and moves slowly like a semifluid. The snow by its own pressure becomes ice. Some fields of ice are ten thousand feet thick, notably those of Greenland. This is the accumulation of ages, and covers 500,000 square miles of surface, an area twelve. times as great as the State of Ohio and which is now enveloped in ice nearly two miles thick. Now on the lower strata of that ice there is immence pressure and being a semifluid it has the property of moving toward the point of least resistance, like cold tar or cold molasses; and if it freezes onto a rock it carries it alon its movement. Thus the boulders found here were transported from the Canadian highlands. Boulders like these are to be found in ''..Kentucky from the ledges of rocks north of Lake Huron, These boulders indicate the direction from which they came. We can tell the place by tracing them to the ledges where faimilar firnations are found north of Lake Dr. Wright has zigzagged from the Atlantic Ocean westward the course of these boulders or “ nigger-heads,” as they are popularly called. Before the Civil War there were continual processions of “niger-head," going from the; south to Canada. Canada had sent these boulders or "nigger-heads" to us ages ago and we were only returning the compliment by sending ours to Canada. AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS - 35 vealed. We have in Mt. Washington in New England a glaciometer 6,000 feet high, and even there we found these boulders from Canada on the top of the mountain where they could not get in any other way. The total area in America covered by these boulders is 4,000,000 miles. Some boulders must have come 700 or 800 miles and the ice has been one mile, and some say three miles, deep. This glacial movement has transformed all the northern part of the United States. Before the glacial period there was a long time in which the action of frost and heat had disintegrated the rocks of Canada and covered them with soil. The movement of the glacier scraped this off from Canada and deposited the most of it on this side of the line. Go outside of the glacial region and you will find it now as it was in Canada before the glacial period. Now when this moving mass of ice came on, it ground down the hills and filled up the hollows, leveling the whole country and leaving a deposit over this region 100 feet deep or more, covering all as with a mantle. The glacial period had also an immense influence upon the drainage system of North America. When the advancing ice closed up, as it did, the mouth of the St. Lawrence River, what could the water do but swell up into a flood over the lakes and pour over to the south. At first there was a movement of water through the valley of Lake Champlain. That, however, was soon filled up, and the water came around the Adirondacks, and flowed at first through the Mohawk and finally through the Susquehanna. Then at Fort Wayne, Indiana, there was a great body of water that poured down into the Ohio, through the Wabash River. Then came the reverse action. As the ice retreated and began to melt, it withdrew from the head of the Maumee River ; and thus was formed a temporary lake, with its outlet at Fort Wayne flooding all this part of the state. In the middle of Fort Wayne, there is to be seen a channel about a mile wide, twenty-five feet or thirty feet deep, leading from the head waters of the Maumee to the Wabash. That was the line of drainage for the waters of this temporary lake. What then was the condition of the region that was to become Sandusky County ? Why, it was then covered with water one hundred feet deep. Oberlin, Lorain County, is 817 feet above the ocean and 250 feet above Lake Erie. At Norwalk, Huron County, there is a sand ridge on which the principal street was built. Here is struck the 200 foot line above Lake Erie. That was the former shore of Lake Erie during the continuance of this temporary lake, whose outlet was Fort Wayne as we have seen. It is also found similarly at Fostoria, Tiffin, Van Wert and on to Fort Wayne. There is a sand ridge that runs through Clyde, Sandusky County, 50 feet lower than that at Norwalk. The south ridge, middle ridge and north ridge are of elevations above Lake Erie of 200 feet, 15o feet and 100 feet, respectively. At Saginaw Bay there was an outlet that ran over into the Grand River Valley and so into Lake Michigan, from which it had an outlet to the Illinois River through the Chicago Drainage Canal. As the ice melted back the Fort Wayne outlet was abandoned and lower passes occupied across Michigan. The height of these determined that of our lake ridges. When you come to the middle ridge it does not go to Fort Wayne, and you have a swampy region on the right and on the left continuing into Michigan. When this ice had melted back through Saginaw Bay, there was a channel 100 feet lower than the upper one. Then the third ridge nearest to the lake was formed. Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, is built on that ridge. The water at this time poured into the south end of Lake Michigan, and thence as already said, through the Chicago Drainage Canal. If you should raise the water of Lake Erie twenty-five feet it would run out into the Illinois River. The Drainage Canal of Chicago has cut down into that a 20-foot channel, restoring the old direction. So it is as a result of an episode of the glacial period that we have in this country a deep and fine soil, in fact one of the richest in existence. In the early days it was difficult to drain it, but it was finally done and now it is one of the gardens of the world. Everywhere in America we are just entering the heritage of the glacial period. This glacial period indeed has been a disturbing ,element 36 - HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY of great significance the world over. It is now at work in Greenland; it was at work thousands of years ago here, and is still at work in the polar regions. The glacial ice did not melt off from central New York and the region about Quebec until about seven thousand years ago. This is proved by the gorge of Niagara ; the Niagara River began to run where it is now when the ice melted from the Mohawk Valley. When it fell down to that level, the Niagara cut its gorge in the rocks, which extends from Lewiston a distance of 35,000 feet. So now we know how fast it works; we can solve the problem. If we observed a man sawing a board and got his rate of speed, we could easily tell how long it would take to saw it off. Now we have been watching the wearing of rock by water at Niagara for many years, and have noted the yearly progress, and we find to our surprise that the falls are receding 5 feet a year. Now if we divide 35,000 feet by 5 feet, we will get 7,000 years, which gives the date of the retreat of the ice from the Mohawk Valley in New York. But we have not only Niagara Falls, but many other data, which confirm this calculation. Little Plum Creek in Oberlin, Ohio, is as good for the purpose of investigating such problem as is Niagara Falls. Oberlin is about 6o feet above the Norwalk Sand ridge, which makes the first glacial lake emptying through the pass at Fort Wayne. Plum Creek has been enlarging its channel ever since the glacial period, and we have measured the amount of this enlargement. Twelve years ago we built a reservoir and cut a new channel for the creek 12 or 13 feet across. Hence we know how much it has enlarged in twelve years and how much it would enlarge under similar conditions in 7,000 years. The calculations amply sustain those from Niagara. We will find all over this region similar opportunities for independent calculations. GLACIAL MAN IN OHIO. From the nature of the case we would not look for the remains of Glacial Man in Sandusky County. For, during the retreat of the ice from Ohio where man followed up the retreating ice front here, as he does in Greenland and Alaska at the present time, there was no chance for him to live north of the upper lake ridge which passes through Norwalk, Bellevue, Tiffin, Fostoria, and Van Wert. For, at that time the whole region between that ridge and the lake was covered with a body of water 50 or 100 feet deep, having its outlet at Fort Wayne. When at a later period a lower outlet was opened by the retreating ice so that the water level fell so low as to expose Sandusky County, there was no chance for any human relics to be buried and preserved by subsequent deposition. If any relics were left here, there would be nothing to fix their date: as they might be indistinguishable from those of modern Indians. The relics of man in Ohio, which can be definitely assigned to the glacial period occur south of the watershed which separates the basin of Lake Erie and that of the Ohio River. In that area there were large streams of water flowing away from the melting ice through all the present river valleys, and depositing in them a vast amount of gravel which had been brought over in the ice from Canada. These gravel deposits now border all the south-flowing streams in Ohio, rising to a height of from 5o to loo feet above the present flood plains. They are conspicuous objects in the valleys of the Miami. the Scioto and the Muskingum Rivers, and of all their northern tributaries. Stone implements found in undisturbed strata of these gravel deposits can be definitely assigned to the glacial age. The definite evidence of the occurrence of implements in these glacial terraces in Ohio are only four in number. Dr. M. C. Metz, of Madisonville, in the valley of the Little Miami, near Cincinnati, found one twenty years ago at the bottom of a cistern which he dug upon his place, where the soil could not have been disturbed since its original deposition. This was 8 or 10 feet below the surface. Soon afterwards the same high authority reported another implement found at Loveland, also in the valley of the same river, and in gravel of the same age. Dr. Metz has a high reputation as a careful observer, so that his testimony would be final upon such a question. A few years later, William C. Mills, the AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS - 37 present accomplished curator of the Ohio Archælogical and Historical Society, at Columbus, and whose reputation as a careful investigator is of the very highest, discovered a similar stone implement in the freshly exposed face of the glacial terrace, and seventeen feet below the surface, at New Comerstown in the valley of the Tuscarawas. The fourth instance is that of a stone implement discovered by Mr. Sam Houston in the high glacial terrace at Brilliant, a few miles below Steubenville in Jefferson County, in the. main valley of the Ohio River. Another implement, not so well attested, is that which was brought to light in 1908 by Mr. Licey, of Wadsworth, Ohio. This was found by a workman on the floor of an extensive gravel pit, on the west side of the valley of the river Styx, two miles from Wadsworth. The gravel is no doubt of glacial age, having been deposited while there was an overflow from the great glacial floods which poured through the pass, east of Medina, which connects Rocky River, flowing into Lake Erie with the river Styx, which flows into the Tuscarawas. But in this case there is not direct evidence that the implement occurred in undisturbed gravel. Probably it did. But it may have fallen down from the surface. Still the type of the implement is entirely unlike those which are generally found in that region upon the surface, and is similar to those found elsewhere in glacial deposits. If we are to reproduce in our imagination the conditions under which the men lived who made and used and lost these implements, it would be found closely to resemble those of the Eskimo in Greenland and of the Tlinkit Indians in Alaska. The implements are of the rudest sort, manufactured from nodules of the flint deposits that occur in various places in the state. It is easy to see how they became-- incorporated in the gravel; for the glacial floods that deposited the gravel could occur only in the latter part of each recurring summer, when the melting of the ice was proceeding most rapidly. During the late fall, the winter, the spring, and early summer, the streams would be low and the gravel deposits laid down the preceding season would be bare. Implements lost upon this surface of gravel would be covered up by the floods of the following seasons and so be preserved for our inspection and instruction. But, as already said, the glacial deposits where these implements have been found in Ohio were considerably earlier than those of the period when the glacial waters receded from the temporary glacial lake which covered northwestern Ohio. Probably, however, they were not more than a few hundred, or in the case of the most southerly, not more than i,000 or 2,000 years earlier. While those implements were being imbedded in gravel the whole portion of Ohio north of the watershed was deeply surrounded in glacial ices as Greenland is today. But it is a matter of extreme interest to know that Ohio falls into line with New Jersey and with southern England and northern France in yielding evidence of a race of men living on both continents which very likely antedated the Noachian Deluge and in the opinion of many high authorities became extinct amid the rapid physical changes on the surface of the earth which preceded that event. The date was probably 10,000 or 12,000 B. C. CHAPTER II. ANCIENT EARTHWORKS AND WHO CONSTRUCTED THEM. Ancient Earthworks—Old Fort and Relics at Muskash—Mounds in Riley and Sandusky Townships—Human Remains Found Near the Williams Residence in 1840—Old Fortifications at Croghansville—Ancient Fort in Ballville Township—Authors. of Ancient Earthworks—Indian Traditions—Destruction of the Eries. There were the remains of a line of earthworks which appear to have extended from Muskash Point, in what is now Erie County, southward on the solid lands along the marshes of Sandusky Bay to the Sandusky River, striking the river in Section 12, Township 5, Range 15; thence up the river to what is known as Negro Point, and further up the river on the high banks on the east side, extending to the south line of the county in Ballville Township. ( 1) Mr. Michael Stull, an aged farmer now deceased, of Riley Township, in 1879 informed Homer Everett, who was then investigating the matter for historical purposes, that in 1820 he came to Muskash and owned a piece of land there, on which were the remains of a considerable ancient fort. The walls were of earth, in a circular form and inclosing several acres of ground, with gate-like openings. He found therein, flint arrow heads, stone axes, and numerous specimens in various forms of rude pottery, which appeared to have been made of burnt clay largely mixed with pulverized shells. (2) Another one containing- similar remains was found in Section 1, Riley Township. (3) Another on the farm then owned by Mr. Stull in Section 12 in Riley. The site of this last structure was in August, 1879, when Mr. Everett visited it, part of a beautiful clover field, not revealing even a trace of its walls or form. Mr. Stull had leveled it himself. It was, according to his description of it, circular in form, with two openings opposite each other. The circle was about twenty rods in diameter. A distinguishing feature of this fort was that a part of the wall on the west side was made by piling soft limestones, which were found in plenty on the surface of the land a short distance from its structure. The walls when first seen by Mr. Stull, were about four feet high. The ridge of soft limestone had been covered on the sides and on top by earth to a considerable height ; the other portions of the wall were composed of a ridge of earth only. (4) Another was found on premises in Section 12, Sandusky Township. (5) Another was on land owned by Charles Werth, in the same section, and a little farther up the river than that last mentioned. (6) Another a little farther up the river was on land owned by Jacob Thum in the same section. (7) Another was on the Williams Reserve, still farther up the river, in Section 14, same township. This included five or six acres of land, situated partly on the land once owned by L. D. Williams, and partly on another tract. The five last mentioned of these ancient works were in the form of semicircles, the river forming the arc. The banks of the river where these remains were found, is composed of earth which dissolves readily and washes away by the action of the water upon the land, which, in times past, was some distance from the river. It is quite plain, therefore, that these, like the one at Muskash .Point and the one of the Stull farm, were originally circular in form, and some distance from the perpen- - 38 - HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY - 39 dicular low bank of the river, for all the remains of the other forts in this chain, unaffected by the wash of the stream, are in that form complete. (8) There are evidences of another of the same kind above the Williams Reserve a short distance, on the high bank of the river, in Section 13, Sandusky Township. This work is different in form from the others mentioned, being nearly square, and is supposed to include about three acres of land. It is situated where there was once an Indian village called Muncie-town, about three miles below the city of Fremont. (9) Another and larger one of these works was found a little down the river from the. residence of Mr. L. D. Williams, which, he said was a circle and included ten acres of land. (10) Near the residence of Mr. Williams, and not far from it, was found a mound about fifty feet in diameter, which must have been of very ancient construction. Mr. Williams said that about the year 1820 he assisted in cutting down a white oak tree which stood on the very summit of the mound, for the purpose of capturing a swarm of bees which had long been in the tree, and that this tree was then near three feet in diameter, and the elevation of the mound was eight feet above the general level of the surrounding land. The mound was afterward opened by Mr. John Shannon, of this county, and his brother, about the year 1840. The mound he said attracted considerable observation and much speculation among the observers as to what it was raised for, and what might be in it. The stump of the oak had then so far decayed that it was removed without much difficulty. On removing the earth from a considerable space and a little below the general level of the surface around the mound, they found the teeth of a human being in good preservation. Upon further carefully removing the earth they found, marked in a different colored earth from that surrounding it, the figure of a man of giant size, plainly to be seen. Where the breast of the buried man had lain were found two oval-shaped plates of what appeared to be white mica. One of these plates appeared to have been perforated, as there was a round hole in it near the center. On the other plate were dark streaks and spots, which the discoverers supposed might be characters or letters, understood at the time, recording the name and rank of the man who had been buried, and the circumstances of his death; but these inferences can only be entitled to the rank of conjectures; what became of the teeth or mica no one now knows. (11) Following the river up about two miles from the location of the mound just mentioned. the remains of another ancient fortification were found on the hill overlooking the river. It included the block of lots once called the old Whyler or Moore property, where there was once a brick cottage, not now standing. Here the hill or bluff trends quite sharply to the east for some distance, and then curves southward. No more advantageous point for a fortification and lookout could be found along the whole course of the Sandusky River than this one. The late Julius Patterson told Mr. Everett that he saw the remains of this fortification before improvements had obliterated it. According to his description of the location of these remains this fort was in the original plat of the town of Croghansville, on Lots 649, 650, 667, 668, 669, 670, as now numbered on the present map of the city, and perhaps other parts of other lots. In the government survey of Croghansville, made in 1817, this ancient fortification is mentioned in the field notes, and the width and depth of the ditches surrounding the same are specially noted by the surveyor, Joseph Wampler. From these field notes it appears that this fort included all the land on the east bank of the river between what is now Pine Street and Kentucky Avenue and eastward to about Second Street. (12) There were a few years ago the remains of another fortification about two miles from the last mentioned on the bluff commonly known as the Blue Banks. (13) The remains of another ancient fort were discovered by our informant some distance from the river, on Sugar Creek, in the south part of Ballville Township, on the east side of the river. 40 - HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY AUTHORS OF THESE WORKS. (Obed Edson, Chautauqua County, New York.) There can be no doubt that these earthworks and other evidences of the occupation of this region by an ancient people, were the work of men who lived very long after the Ice Period, allowing them a great antiquity, according to human chronology. The span of human history we know is very brief compared with the world's physical history and is measured in years and centuries, while the long stretch of time, required by the seemingly slow-moving but mighty changes in the structure and surface of the earth, is measured by epochs, cycles and ages. Even the Mound Builders, who dwelt in the valley of the Scioto, Miami and Muskingum, began their existence long after the Glacial Period, and it must have been many centuries before the Mound Builders reached such a degree of organization as to have been able to build earthworks of such magnitude, and so extensive as existed in those valleys—in some instances extending almost to Lake Erie, and as to attain such a degree of culture as to construct works of such exact proportions, and perfect symmetry, for primitive people move as slowly as the receding glaciers that they follow, and are long in acquiring even a small degree of civilization, as all records show. As to who were the authors of the earth works in Sandusky County, written history does not certainly tell, but with such few facts as it has given us, and archaeological investigation offered, and by the aid of some Indian traditions, we are able to determine with some degree of certainty who were their authors. By later researches it has been discovered that Indian traditions have often remarkable foundations in fact—and sometimes none at all. The Huron-Iroquois, to whom the Eries, the Hurons of Canada, the Six Nations of New York, and some other tribes belonged, have similar customs and spoke in a similar tongue, sometimes called the Wyandot. They have a well-known tradition that away back in the past, their ancestors waged a war upon a powerful people who built many forts extending from the south to the southern shore of Lake Erie. The Leni Lenape or Delawares, who spoke a different language, known as the Algonquin, were a famous people who preserved their history well, have a concurrent and well-defined tradition, that their ancestors joined with the Huron-Iroquois in the war with this powerful people, whom the Delawares called the Alligewi, believed to have been the mysterious Mound Builders, vanquished them, and drove them southward and down the Mississippi. After this war, we are informed the Delawares journeyed eastward and became the great rivals and mortals foes of the Iroquois branch of the Huron-Iroquois family of Indians; that the Huron-Iroquois lingered for a while around Lake Erie, and all finally journeyed eastward with the exception of that portion that was afterwards known as the Eries, and possibly the Senecas. We have reason to believe the Eries continued to occupy the region south of that lake, and gave it its name. About 1634, the French Jesuits established a mission among the Hurons, on the Georgian Bay in Canada. These Catholic priests were able, observing and trustworthy men. They for some years sent reports to the head of their mission, containing interesting facts concerning the Indians in that far distant part of the continent. These reports are well known as the "Relations of the Jesuits." From them we are able to gain some further knowledge of the Eries, or Nations of the Cat. As early as 1640, Father Ragueneau, one of these Jesuit priests, writes : "These people of the Cat have a number of stationary villages, for they till the soil and speak the language of the Hurons." We have vague accounts of the wars of the Eries with enemies west of them, by which they were slowly forced eastward along the southern shore of Lake Erie, toward the Alleghany, where they had frequent wars with the Iroquois, and where authentic history at last finds them. About 1655 they were defeated in a great battle with the Iroquois, and entirely destroyed as a nation. Those not killed in this battle were burned at the stake after it, or perished in the woods of starvation and exposure, or AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS - 41 were adopted by other Indian nations. Very many of them were adopted by the Iroquois or Six Nations, their conquerors. To this day, in the veins of many a Seneca runs the blood of some Erie ancestor. In the "Relations of the Jesuits," is given an account of this battle, and the reprisals that preceded it. Father Simeon Le Moyne visited the chief village of the Onondagas in New York, in August, 1654, and witnessed the preparation of the Iroquois for this war, when 1800 warriors were gathered from the four western nations of the Iroquois confederacy to invade the country of the Eries. When they were destroyed they dwelt in western New York, western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio. That the Eries were the same race that constructed the earthworks in Sandusky County, we have further evidence, in the valley of the Alleghany, French Creek, the Canandaigua and the Conewango; around Chautauqua Lake, and along the shore of Lake Erie are scattered the evidences of their long possession. In Chautauqua County, New York, alone there were not less than thirty circular earthworks, when the first white settlers came there. Besides the ordinary burial places, there were several ossuaries or bone pits, where the crumbling bones of their dead indicated that there had been there a general burial, The remains found in western New York and the methods of life of the authors, as gathered from the evidences so left by them, closely resemble those of the people who constructed the earthworks in Sandusky County. The distribution of these earthworks along the water courses, the size and height of the embankments, their irregularity of form, the lack of skill in construction, the mounds, the character of the stone implements and the rude pottery, would answer for a general description of the ancient remains of the Eries in Chautauqua and Cattaraugus Counties in New York. Such differences as exist may be due to the fact that the western earthworks and mounds were constructed at an earlier date, and that a longer period has elasped for their decay. It has been 250 years and more since the Eries were destroyed. Several centuries must have elapsed before that event, while they were being pushed eastward to the place of their extermination, which would account for the better preservation of the bones of the dead buried in the eastern and last home of the Eries. CHAPTER III. TOPOGRAPHY. Surface and Inclination. of Land—Highest Grounds—Sea Level—Sand Ridges in Eastern Part of the County—Sinkholes—U nderground Waters—Forests—Streams—Sandusky River and Tributaries—Bay and Marshes—Portage River—Effects of Winds and Waters on the Shores—Destruction of Trees by Rise of Waters—Tilting of the Earth—Changes in Bay and Marshes—Wild Animals—Birds, Fowls and Fishes—Drainage and its Effects. PHYSICAL FEATURES. The surface of the land in the county is mainly flat, with a general inclination as indicated by the natural drainage, from .south to north, bearing northeasterly, and, as shown by recent government topographical surveys, the average altitude at the south boundary line is approximately 680 feet above sea level, and about 100 feet higher than at the north. The highest land is at Bellevue in York Township, being 751 feet above the level of the sea. Other levels higher than the average are as follows: 750 feet in Sections 23 and 30 in York Township; 730 feet in Section 34 in Green Creek Township; 710 feet in Sections 11, 21, 22 and 27 in Scott Township and in Section 19 Jackson Township. At or near the villages of Greenspring and Burgoon the elevation is 700 feet, and also the same in Sections 3 and 18 in York, and 34 in Townsend Townships. The average above sea level at the north boundary line of the county is about 580 feet. Sandusky Bay is 573 feet. At the Court House the altitude is 636 feet above the level of the sea. The surface in York and Green Creek Townships is more undulating than in any other sections of the county, except, possibly, in the immediate vicinity of the river in Ballville Township. Three well defined sand ridges angle through these townships in a northeast direction from the southwest, known as North, South and Butternut Ridges. The last mentioned takes its name from the large number of white walnut or butternut trees originally growing thereon. It begins near the southeast corner of Green Creek and loses its identity near the turn-pike road in York. The crest of North Ridge trends through Green Creek. and extends across the northeast corner of York, and southeast corner of Townsend, and thence into Erie County. South Ridge takes a parallel course, and its crest is about two miles southeast from the crest of the North Ridge. There are but few surface streams in York Township, and the natural drainage at first, and until improvements in the way of artificial drainage was effected, was largely through numerous sinkholes there found, haying outlets into running waters many feet beneath the surface of the land. The part of the county west from the Sandusky River lies within the region known as the "Black Swamp." The surface is not very-low but it is level, \v et and swampy, or was so before the work of clearing and draining transformed the swampy wilderness into fertile fields. Originally it sustained a growth of forest trees, so dense as to be almost impenetrable to the sun's rays, and much of the country was covered with water a considerable part of the year. Some idea of its condition may be found in a letter of Gen. Harrison in November, 1812, to the War Department, in which he writes : "An idea can scarcely be formed of the difficulty with which land - 12 - HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY - 43 transportation is effected north of the 40th latitude in this country. Beyond that it is almost a continued swamp. The greater part of the way at this season is covered with water. Such is actually the situation of that space between the Sandusky and the Maumee Rapids." There are, however, a few stone and sand ridges occurring in the part mentioned. The soil of the swamps is deep and composed of a black decayed vegetable matter and when drained is very productive of crops of grain, grass and garden vegetables. The township of Riley and parts of Sandusky, Green Creek and Townsend are covered with soil similar to that just described. THE FORESTS. Originally the county was, in general, quite densely timbered, although in every township some treeless land was found, both dry and wet, as appears from the field notes of the early surveys (18.19-20) made by direction of the Government. In examining, now, the records of these surveys, one is surprised to find the many references, in the field notes kept by the surveyors, to these treeless portions, designated by them as prairies, some of which are noted as dry prairies, some as wet, while others, as covered with water. The greater number and extent of these prairies, however, are noted as being in Rice and Scott Townships. In the central and southeastern portions of the township of York occurred the barrens known as "Oak Openings." where the larger forest trees were really "few and far between," but where occurring they consisted mostly of white oak, interspersed with scattering hickory. The undergrowth was small hickory, shrub oak, sassafras, spice, hazel, huckleberry and alder. The forests, through the county generally, consisted of white, black, red, scarlet, bur and pin oak, white and red (slippery) elm, white, black and blue ash, common and big shell bark hickory, smooth hickory, white and yellow poplar, cottonwood, linden (basswood), sugar maple, beech, black and white walnut, soft maple, buckeye, sycamore, hackberry, honey locust, willow and ironwood. The chestnut was found in a very few places in the county—among them being Green Creek Township, south of Clyde; Sandusky Township on east side of the river in Section 23; in southwest corner of Madison, and in the northwest corner of Scott Townships. The streams and nature of the soil, however, had much to do with the difference in species and varieties of trees as to their distribution. Among those on the higher and naturally better drained land, and along the higher banks of streams may be mentioned, the white oak, sugar maple, walnut, yellow poplar and beech, while on the lower and wetter grounds occurred generally the elm, cottonwood, soft maple, black ash, sycamore, bur oak, hackberry, and willow. The undergrowth was mainly shrub oak, shrub hickory, thorn, wild crab, water beech, dogwood, hazel, sumach, papaw and spicewood. Some of the early settlers, coming from the east, on entering the "Oak Openings" were not favorably impressed with the soil as to fertility, supposing that a soil which had not produced large trees in abundance, would not produce large -crops, so many of them passed by these barrens and settled in the heavily timbered regions, some going into the "north woods" in what is now Riley and Townsend Townships, while others went into Green Creek and other territory further west; and there spent the best part of their days in making-farms in the, dense forests, instead of settling on lands, already- nearly cleared by nature; and which subsequently proved to be of the best quality for the production of crops of nearly all kinds. Many of these settlers were afterward known to express. regret in regard to the mistake they had thus made. SHRUBS, VINES AND PLANTS. A few among the many are as follows : Swamp rose, wahoo, hop tree, sweet brier, nine-bark, witch-hazel, barberry, winterberry, dwarf wild rose, dwarf thorn,- syringa, black-haw, bayberry, hazelnut, redbud, pussy willow, foxgrape, frost grape, trumpet creeper, trumpet honeysuckle, virgin's bower, Virginia creeper or woodbine, sarsaparilla, five-leaved ivy, three-leaved, or poison ivy, morning glory, wild cucumber, wild potato vine, sweet flag, blue flag, rose mallows, dragon-head, lobelia, or cardinal flower, geranium or cranesbill, 44 - HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY bloodroot, mandrake, lady's slipper or moccasin flower, columbine, buttercup, water-lily, yellow pond-lily, aster, anemone, spring beauty, trillium, hepatica, or liver-leaf, Indian turnip, goldenrod, adder-tongue, violet, sweet-william, coreopsis, peppermint, spearmint, horsemint, poke, hoarhound, ginger, water-cress, boneset, pepper-grass, ferns, golden-seal, elecampane, cumfrey and cohosh. WILD ANIMALS. The buffalo, elk, deer, bear, panther and wolf, formerly here, are no longer to be found. The same is also true of the beaver, badger, otter, wild cat and porcupine. The wolf was probably the last to finally disappear. As late as the forties, the amount paid annually for wolf scalps by the county, was one hundred dollars and more, as the records show. It may be said without much exaggeration that "the woods were full of them." Wolf Creek was appropriately named because this animal was so numerous in the swamp near its source and in the thickets around the wet prairie at its mouth. Among others of the wild animals originally within the county were the gray and red fox, raccoon, opossum, wild cat, otter, badger, skunk, muskrat, mink, gray, black and fox squirrel, flying squirrel, woodchuck and chipmunk. As to the existence, here, of buffalo and elk we have the following authorities : Atwater in his History of Ohio says : "We had once the bison and the elk in vast numbers all over Ohio." Prof. Brayton in his report on zoology in Vol. I, p. 73, Ohio Geological Survey, says : "There is ample evidence of the former existence and abundance of buffalo in northern Ohio." In this same volume, Dr. Kirtland says : "The elk was frequently to be met with in Ashtabula County, until within the last six years" (1838). It seems from good authority that the buffalo disappeared about the year 1800, and not by migration, but by extermination. BIRDS AND FOWLS. A partial list is as follows: Robin, bluebird, catbird, thrushes, kinglets, warblets, wrens, skylark, rose-breasted grosbeak, cardinal grosbeak, scarlet tanager, marten, swallow, waxwing, vireos, orioles, finch, bobolink, yellow-bird, yellow hammer or flicker, sparrow, woodpeckers, blackbirds, crows, bluejay, snowbird, indigo bird, whip-poor-will, humming-birds, cuckoo, dove, pigeon, red-winged blackbird, eagles, hawks, owls, quail, plover, snipe, woodcock, heron, bittern, crane, pelican, swan, wild geese, ducks, wild turkey, loon, gull, tern, kill- deer, divers and buzzard. Some of the game fowls named are becoming scarce; the turkey is no longer found and the swan is rare. In the volume before quoted, Dr. Kirtland writes (1850) : "Wild geese, swans, ducks and wading birds literally swarmed about every lake, pond and creek during spring and autumn.' SANDUSKY RIVER AND TRIBUTARIES. As mentioned in another chapter, the Sandusky River has its rise in Richland County and flows through Crawford, Wyandot, Seneca and Sandusky Counties to its lower rapids at Fremont, whence it pursues a general northeasterly course to where it empties into Sandusky Bay, a distance in a straight line of about 88 miles from its source, but by way of its many windings the distance is more than one-half greater than a direct course. From its source to the slack water, which reaches Fremont, there is a fall of an average of about six feet to the mile. From there to its mouth the river is very sluggish with about one foot fall to the mile. At the lower rapids is the head of navigation. The influence of northerly and easterly winds upon the waters of Sandusky Bay and the river, extends to the slack water, at the terminal of the lower rapids, a short distance south of the Lake Erie & Western Railway bridge at Fremont, and at times raises the water here over two feet higher than the ordinary stage. From measurements taken from the government surveys, the distance from the bridge at State Street, in Fremont, to the mouth of the river at the lower end of Eagle Island, measured along the center of the channel, is 171/2 miles. The river forks at Eagle Island, the old channel being to the south of the island, and emptying its waters into Sandusky Bay at the eastern extremity of AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS - 47 what was formerly a part of Peach Island; on which early history, as we shall see, informs us was located Fort Junandat, the fort and home of Nicolas, the rebel Wyandot chief. In 1865-6 a cut or channel was dredged through on the north side of Eagle Island to a depth of ten feet, which has since been used as the main channel of the river. The river receives only very few local additions, as tributaries, from its source to its mouth. Its most southern tributary, in this county, is Wolf Creek, while four miles north of Fremont, it receives the waters of Muscallonge Creek. The next largest stream in the county is Portage River, which enters Madison Township near the northwest corner and flows thence into and through Woodville Township and Village, and thence to the northwest corner of Section 26, where it passes into Ottawa County. It is not a tributary of the Sandusky. Sugar Creek, in the west part of the county, is a tributary to Portage River. Mud Creek on the west, and Green Creek, South Creek and Bark Creek on the east, flow in a northeasterly direction nearly parallel with the Sandusky for many miles, gradually converging until they unite with the Sandusky, near the northern boundary of the county. Green Creek is the most important of these. The west branch of this stream rises in Seneca County, about three-fourths of a mile south of the north boundary line of said county, its source being a series of sulphur springs, the largest of which, it is said, discharges about six hundred cubic feet of water per minute. The spring, which is the source of the east and the main branch, is the most celebrated of all the springs in the country, and is known as "Green Spring." It is located in Section 31, Green Creek Township, Sandusky County, about a half mile north from its south boundary line. Here, "a river of water forces itself through a fissure in the rock bed fifty feet below the surface, and from a great natural well ten feet in circumference and reaching to a depth of eighteen feet, without an obstruction, discharges eight million gallons of water every twenty-four hours. The water is strongly impregnated with sulphur and other mineral solutions, which stain every substance coming in permanent contact with it a rich emerald, varying in shade under the influence of light." Visitors, when first seeing the water as it gushes forth, frequently designate it as "liquid emerald." The water is reputed to possess highly curative medicinal properties. The two branches unite near the center of Section 30 forming the stream of Green Creek. The removal of the heavy forests, the clearing, ditching and under draining of the lands have wrought a great change in all our streams. Formerly the water stood higher in all of them during the entire year, and was much less subject to changes of season than now. Following heavy, or continual rains, the Streams now rise with great rapidity, overflowing their banks, and the strong currents washing the shores carry sediment down to the slack water where the deposits are gradually filling up the channels. Although the bed of the river south of Fremont is eroded in part into the native limestone yet the water is not as "hard" as the water of many wells of the vicinity. From below the city of Fremont to where it joins the broad waters, near its mouth, it is of nearly uniform width, being about 100 yards wide. The average depth is about fourteen feet, except on the bars, the principal one of which is known as Whitaker Bar, about two and one-half miles north of Freemont ; also at the junction of Mud Creek Bay, and at the dredged cut at its mouth, the channel has filled up with deposits and soft ooze until, in the summer of 1908, there were less than six feet of water over the most shallow places. The topography of that part of Sandusky County adjacent to the mouth of the Sandusky River, and head of Sandusky Bay, has so materially changed from the time of the making of the first rough maps, by the early French and English explorers, in about 1754; and from the time of the surveys by the government in 1820, as compared with the surveys made as late as 1893, that it is quite difficult to reconcile the change until one has studied the conditions that produced it. The first government survey made of the northern part of this county in 1820, by Sylvanus Bourne, shows Eagle Island at the mouth of the river, as containing an area of 134 acres of land and 48 - HISTORY OF SANDUSKY COUNTY covered with heavy timber, mostly honey locust and walnut ; today there is scarcely one-eighth of an acre of dry ground remaining, marked by only a few willow trees. M. de Lery's map of 1854 shows the northern and southern shore lines, at the west end of the bay to be quite parallel with each other, and the bay of a general uniform width. The west end is now more than six miles wide, with a deep bow southward. Along its southern shore were dense primeval forests of oak, ash and elm, but the northeast gales produced heavy seas, raising the level of the water over the lands, and washing the earth away from the roots of the trees, until unsupported, they tipped over into the bay; a large amount of new earth being thus loosened by the roots as the trees fell, facilitated further inroads by the waves. The greatest change on the bay has been along the shore from a few miles east of Pickerel Creek, to the mouth of the river. The bay here is wider than farther east, and as the shores receive the full sweep of the northeast seas, erosion shows with greater force and extent on the south shore than on the opposite side of the bay. Several of the present land owners in this vicinity say, that the shores have washed away from eighty to one hundred rods during their recollection. The north shore of the bay has, from recent measurements compared with the original government survey of 1820. receded as much as forty rods near Presque Isle, while at its western end it has undoubtedly receded much farther. The great northeast storms, which there so frequently occur, have produced lasting changes on the bay and marshes; and those which were most effective, because occurring at a time of the highest water, were in 1857-1862. A large part of Eagle Island, as well as many acres along the south shore, were washed away in these storms. Records show that Lake Erie reached a higher level in 1838 than ever before. so far as we have evidence, and much of the timber bordering the shores of the bay and on the islands was killed by the stand of high water then, and also by the later high water of 1858 to 1860. Most of what is now marsh and open water from Raccoon Creek to South Creek was formerly prairie, covered with joint grass and hoop-pole grass, as was also that west of South Creek to Green Creek. Records of the lake level, kept in different places, show, that at four times in the first half of the last century, the water was lower than at any time in the last half. In 1810 and in 1819 it was lower than at any time since 1820; in 1841 and 1846 it was lower than at any time since the latter date. In the absence of any record of exact measurements of lake levels west of Cleveland, we have, however, evidence that the water about Sandusky Bay and the islands was lower in the early part of the last century than it was later. Certain it is, that during the past century, heavy timber grew in and about the Sandusky River marshes, where there is now two or three feet of water, and no timber. From a survey made for the Winnous Point Club in 1893, in eight sections of land adjacent to the mouth of the river, there is not now more than half a section of dry land. These same sections in the survey made by the government surveyor in 1820, show five and one-half sections of dry land, most of which is now open water and marsh. In the broad water to the west of Eagle Island, were located Peach, Graveyard. Squaw and Cape Islands and the Middle Ground ; the latter two have entirely washed away in late years and Peach, Graveyard and Squaw Islands are so diminished in size that the noted rebel chief, Nicolas, and his band of recalcitrant Wyandots who inhabited Peach and Graveyard Islands in 1745, would today have much difficulty in securing sufficient dry ground for a habitation. The same is also true of Cherry Island, where some accounts say he at first settled. From the statements of a number of land owners residing along the shores of the bay, who are familiar with the annual encroachment of its waters, it is safe to say that the present site of Fort Sandusky, which was, according to the Journal of M. de Lery, built on the north shore of the bay nearest to the Portage to Lake Erie in about 1745. is probably one-eighth of a mile out in the Sandusky and, of course, now under water. M. AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS - 49 de Lery was a distinguished French Army Engineer, whose residence was at Quebec. He traversed the regions described and kept a journal of his travels. Prof. E. L. Moseley in 1904, in an address before the Ohio State Academy of Science on the "Formation of Sandusky Bay and Cedar Point" says: "The bay with the connected marshes is probably twenty per cent larger now than in 1820. So far as the enlargement is due to erosion it should proceed more rapidly the wider the bay becomes, for the waves attain greater force. The effect of the waves, however, is diminished by the bay bridge, by jetties at the entrance to the bay. by docks and by stones put on the shore purposely to protect the land. The enlargement of the bay, clue to the subsidence of the land, may be partly prevented by dikes and may be effected to some extent by changes at Niagara Fails, produced by human agency. We may reasonably expect, however, that the bay will continue to spread over the adjacent lowland much as it has been doing for centuries past. "It has been supposed that the lake, which after the melting of the southern portion of the glacier. overspread a larger area than Lake Erie does now, subsided until what are now the islands appeared above its surface. This view is doubtless correct, but there is now much evidence to show that it continued to subside until the islands formed part of the mainland and afterward rose and isolated them again, and is still rising and likely to submerge them again. The old beaches which may be traced for long distances running nearly parallel to the present shores of the Great Lakes, must have been level at the time they were formed, but they are not now level, and there has, therefore. been a tilting of that part of the earth's crust which includes the basins of the Great Lakes, as there has been of many other parts. Tnese beaches all have gentle slopes, toward the south and southwest. indicating that in this part of North America. there has been an uplifting of the land toward the north and northeast, or a depression toward the south, southwest or both. The effect of this tilting of the basins of these lakes has been to raise the water on the south and west, as compared with that on the opposite sides, just as the tipping of a saucer partly filled with water would do. "The rise of the water due to tilting of the land, 2.14 feet in a century, is about the same as the change of lake level that sometimes occurs within a year, in consequence of variations in the rainfall ; and is considerably less than that produced in Sandusky Bay by a single northeast gale. The present generation is likely to sec the water higher than it was in 1858, and in northeast gales, the lower parts of Sandusky submerged ; and before the middle of the next century the water at such times may fro quite across the peninsula from Port Clinton to Sandusky Bay. After two or two and a half centuries, the water may cover this part of the peninsula for months at a time and after three centuries may do so at ordinary stages. Marblehead will then be an island and Sandusky Bay will show no resemblance to its present form." A very important source of food supply to the early traders and settlers was the river and adjoining marshes, which abounded in various kinds of water fowl, principally wild clucks and geese and with fish easy to catch and more easy to entrap, than in larger bodies of water. The settlers along its course at times largely subsisted upon them. The furs of the muskrat, mink, otter and raccoon were the medium of exchange for supplies at the trading posts in early times. In the spring of the year the rapids at the head of the slack water at Lower Sandusky were fairly alive with white bass, which were easily taken out with a seine. While farther down the river in deeper water, sturgeon, muscallonge, black bass, catfish and pickerel were the important catch. Sandusky River and marshes were widely known for the excellent duck hunting and fishing. About ten thousand acres of marsh land contiguous to the mouth of the river are owned and controlled by the Ottawa Shooting Club and the Winnous Point Club, a majority of whose members are residents of Cleveland. The Fremont Club, on the north bank of Mud Creek, has a very pleasant location and commodious quarters, and is quite freely patronized by its Fremont members. The mouths of the creeks and hays, emptying into the river, were, up to twenty years ago the best shooting grounds to be found for open water ducks. The artificial drainage of the country into the creeks and estuaries has deposited sediment and washings over the feeding grounds of the ducks, and the German carp, which are so numerous in these waters, have so thoroughly rooted out the aquatic vegetation, that now these bodies of water are nearly entirely denuded of any form of food for water fowls. Practically the only duck hunting grounds of any value are the land-locked ponds where, during the summer and early fall, grain is scattered by the shooting clubs, to entice the ducks to these localities. The black bass, which formerly abounded so plentifully in the river and in Green Creek, have been nearly entirely caught out, mostly with nets or been driven out by the carp, whose society is shunned by these and all other fishes. The German carp is comparatively of recent