Ohio's Yesterdays

Dr. Henry Skinner's Account of the Battle of Fort Stephenson

2012-01-15T11:17:00.000-08:00

Five Maryland county historical societies have formed a consortium to build a website commemorating the War of 1812 on the state’s Eastern Shore. The website, appropriately titled Eastern Shore 1812 Consortium, is working “to provide in depth information, complete tourism access, and the best educational access for both teachers and students.” The site features lesson plans, books, scans of newspaper articles, information about the U. S. Army, U. S. Navy, Maryland battles and skirmishes, African Americans, military leaders, Native Americans, ships, British viewpoints, government documents, links to important locations in each of the counties (Kent, Dorchester, Queen Anne’s, Talbot, and Caroline) and much more!

We thank members for kindly forwarding a scan of an article about the Battle of Fort Stephenson published in the Weekly Aurora newspaper. On 31 August 1813, the newspaper published an extract from a letter written 4 August 1813 from Lower Sandusky (Fremont, Ohio) by Dr. Henry Skinner to his brother of Annapolis, Maryland. Dr. Skinner provided a detailed firsthand account of action at the Battle of Fort Stephenson.

If you would like to learn more about the Battle of Fort Stephenson and Major George Croghan, go to Sandusky County Scrapbook.

Exhibit: The Wildlife Art of Bob Hines

2011-12-17T12:45:00.000-08:00

Ohio native Robert Hines (1912-1994) holds the distinction of being the only National Wildlife Artist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Hines developed his love of nature growing up along the verdant banks of the Sandusky River in Fremont, Ohio. Despite almost no formal art training, Hines’ innate talent led him to become an internationally recognized wildlife artist and a pioneer of the conservation movement. His work illustrated a weekly newspaper feature, and numerous wildlife guides and books – including those by author Rachel Carson (a close personal friend) and Robert McClung (of Grizzly Adams fame).

The Hayes Presidential Center created The Wildlife Art of Bob Hines in celebration of the 100th year of Hines’ birth. Set for exhibition February 15 through August 14, the exhibit includes an array of original artwork from private and public collections. It is made possible through sponsorship from The Fremont Co., Diversified Insurance and Ohio Department of Natural Resources-Division of Wildlife.

Sidney Frohman Foundation Sponsors 2011 Hayes Center Onsite Visit for Sandusky City Schools

2011-11-12T16:59:00.000-08:00

Hancock Elementary 4th Grade Students Tour the Hayes Center's Special Civil War Exhibit

In early November, students from Hancock Elementary are the first of nearly 300 4th grade students from five Sandusky City Elementary Schools to visit the Hayes Home and Hayes Museum. Their firsthand learning experience was made possible by The Sidney Frohman Foundation, who sponsored the students' participation in the Hayes Center's Curriculum Connections educational program. The Sidney Frohman Foundation is one of six original Curriculum Connections sponsors. Students. teachers, and the Hayes Presidential Center were pleased that the Sidney Frohman Foundation chose to sponsor students' onsite visit again in 2011!

Developed by the Hayes Presidential Center staff, Curriculum Connections is a three-part program, providing a "classroom satellite" experience by incorporating Ohio's Social Studies Academic Content Standards into a pair of DVD resources given to teachers for classroom use before and after students' onsite visit.

In a time of tight school budgets and greater emphasis on meeting curriculum goals, schools have been forced to cut back or eliminate visits to Ohio's historic sites. In the words of one teacher: " The Sidney Frohman Foundation's sponsorship of the Curriculum Connections program gave our students "a special opportunity to see the real thing! The historic past takes on new meaning for them! "

Curriculum Connections allows teachers and students to better connect with our nation’s past, Ohio’s history, and our local history while addressing Ohio’s Social Studies and English/Language Arts Academic Standards.

The program finds sponsors, like The Sidney Frohman Foundation, that are willing to cover admission and/or transportation costs for school children to visit the Hayes Presidential Center.

Hayes Presidential Center Development Director Kathy Boukissen is seeking additional sponsors for school systems that do not have adequate funding for a visit. For more information about Curriculum Connections or to donate to the program contact Kathy at 419-332-2081, ext. 26 or email her at kboukissen@rbhayes.org.

Civil War Lecture Series at the Hayes Presidential Center

2011-11-12T08:33:00.000-08:00

Larry Strayer

Civil War: Battlefield and Homefront
Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center

In conjunction with its exclusive exhibit CIVIL WAR: Battlefield and Homefront, the Hayes Presidential Center hosts a series of three lectures in the Hayes Museum. Each lecture is free and open to all.

November 17
• Center Executive Director Thomas Culbertson opens the series with his 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 17 presentation Rutherford B. Hayes: Citizen Soldier. The lecture takes an in-depth look at what inspired a 39-year-old lawyer, husband, and father to enlist in the Army despite having no prior military training. Culbertson’s talk also examines the effects the war had on Hayes’ life and career.

December 8
• An archaeologist who has spent years researching on Johnson’s Island, discusses discoveries he has made at the site of a former Confederate prisoner-of-war camp beginning at 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 8. David Bush, Ph.D., is director of the Center for Historic and Military Archaeology at Heidelberg University. He has been excavating the Johnson’s Island site for more than 20 years. Recently, Bush authored a book about the camp titled I Fear I Shall Never Leave This Island: Life in a Civil War Prison. The work combines letters written between a prisoner and his wife, with archaeological evidence Bush has unearthed. A book signing will follow the lecture.

December 15
• On Thursday, Dec. 15, Civil War expert and collector Larry Strayer shares the story of how he got involved in collecting Civil War memorabilia, and how his collection has evolved over 40 years in Battlefield & Homefront Exhibit - An Inside Look at Civil War Collecting. Numerous items from Strayer’s collection are on display in the CIVIL WAR: Battlefield and Homefront exhibit. Following his lecture, Strayer will invite participants to view the exhibit with him.

Major funding for CIVIL WAR: Battlefield and Homefront is provided by
Diversified Insurance partnered with Auto Owners Insurance.
Additional funding is provided by Croghan Colonial Bank

Lest We Forget: Remembering Sandusky County, Ohio's Veterans

2011-10-22T15:46:00.000-07:00

CBS Sunday Morning

On Memorial Day 2010, CBS Sunday Morning featured the efforts of Wayne Van Doren and his family to place American flags beside the grave sites of veterans in six Sandusky County cemeteries. From Revolutionary War soldiers to the highest ranking general killed in the Civil War, McPherson Cemetery in Clyde, Ohio, is the final resting place for nearly a thousand veterans. Wayne has meticulously mapped the location of each so that on every Memorial Day he and his family can continue their tradition of honoring those who have served in America's wars.

Wayne Van Doren

Fremont, Ohio's Oakwood Cemetery
Courtesy of The News-Messenger

Wayne has extended his reach. He hopes to honor each veteran buried in Sandusky County, Ohio by placing an American flag beside each grave. Wayne stated that there are 64 cemeteries in Sandusky County where veterans are buried. Above is a picture of Wayne in Fremont's Oakwood Cemetery that appeared in the September 16th, 2011 issue of The News-Messenger. Wayne has been walking Oakwood Cemetery all summer, attempting to locate all of the veterans' grave sites. It is one of the largest in the county. Sadly, in Oakwood alone, there are 357 veterans' graves that do not have bronze flag holders beside them. Flag holders and an American flag are issued to veterans' surviving family members when veterans die. Each flag holder has the emblem that identifies the war in which the veteran served.

After learning of my attempts to discover Sandusky County's African American Civil War soldiers, Wayne took photographs of their gravesites while walking Oakwood. Below is the photo he gave me of David J. Vance's tombstone. Others that Wayne shared with me are posted on the Hayes Presidential Center's Civil War Research page, where short sketches of each African American Civil War soldier appears. (With the help of Charles Weiker, we recently discovered the service of two additional soldiers. Both have been added to the page.)

David J. Vance
Oakwood Cemetery, Fremont, Ohio

Pvt. John Grabach: Third Ohio Cavalry at Lovejoy's Station

2011-10-03T05:56:00.000-07:00

During a visit to Clyde, Ohio for a family reunion, John Grabach, then living in Grand Island, Nebraska, related his experience after saving the life of a wounded comrade at Lovejoy's Station during the Civil War. Grabach served in the Third Ohio Volunteer Cavalry. The "Clyde Enterprise" published his reminiscence in the January 12th, 1899 issue of the newspaper.

Pvt. John Grabach
1843 - 1924

John Grabach died November 13, 1924 in Portland, Oregon, where he was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic Post #12. His grave remained unmarked for 85 years until a government headstone was obtained and placed by the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War. The above photograph is courtesy of Randy Fletcher, who took the image at the Grand Army of the Republic Cemetery in Portland and placed it on Find A Grave. As a member of the Sons of the Union Veterans of the Civil War, Mr. Fletcher worked to complete the renovation of this cemetery in 2009, which included the replacement of a bronze statue stolen more than forty years earlier.

"Clyde Enterprise"
January 12, 1899

About the middle of August 1864, General Kilpatrick received orders from General Sherman to take such regiments of cavalry as he wished and to the rear of the Confederate army near Atlanta and destroy all railroads, so that it would be impossible for them to move out of the city by rail. On August 17th General Kilpatrick was ready to move, with five regiments of cavalry and about 3,000 men. One of the regiments selected was the Third Ohio Cavalry of which O.M. Mallernee, J. M. Kelsey, J. Setzler, Henry Grabach, Robert Benfer, Jacob Trott, Joseph Britenburg, Orrin Buzzell, and Theodore Rickey of Clyde [Ohio] and vicinity, also John and Augustus, brothers of Henry Grabach, and the late F. VanHorn of Monroeville, husband of Mrs. Elvira VanHorn of Clyde were all members. They were ordered to carry five days rations and none but sound men and horses were allowed to go. One of the survivors now living here tells the story of what followed in the following way:

“We started in the morning, going to the extreme right of Sherman’s army and far to the left of the Confederate army (under command of General Hood) marching all night and stopping early in the morning for an hour’ s rest and to feed, but made no fires to cook coffee. By this time we were in the rear of the Confederate army. Then we started again as fast as our horses could stand it, and when night came we again stopped to feed, but built no fires nor unsaddled horses. About midnight we struck the first railroad, which we tore up, built fires and heated the rails in the middle and bent them around telegraph poles to make them unfit for further use, and as soon as the job was done we went on as fast our horses could carry us.

Track of Confederate railroads destroyed by Union troops became known as "Sherman's Neckties"

About daylight we came to another railrodad at Lovejoy Station, where we again tore up the track and destroyed the rails, but before we were ready to move we found that the enemy were firing on our pickets from every direction. They had moved quite an army from Macon on the east and from Atlanta on the west, and before we were aware of it they had us surrounded and it looked as though the only thing to be done was to surrender. However, we found that General Kilpatrick was not the kind of a man who surrenders. When an aide from the rebel general demanded our surrender, General Kilpatrick replied, “Go back and tell your general that the government don’t furnish us horses to surrender to rebels.” He quickly formed us into proper shape for a grand cavalry charge for freedom, and at the command from a signal gun we were off with drawn swords and everyone shouting at the top of his voice. We did not have far to go before we met the Confederate infantry, which were at “charge bayonets to receive cavalry.” But we went on and on, over bayonets and men. No we did not all go on. Many were killed or wounded in this charge and hand to hand fight.

H. Grabach had his horse shot, but fortunately for him he found a horse without a rider, and he went on. By this time we were badly demoralized and it was necessary to halt and reform our lines and commands, and soon the command was again on the move, but unfortunately, the Third Ohio Cavalry was put on as rear guard. We counted off our thinned ranks by fours, and every fourth man held horses while numbers one, two, and three were deployed on foot as rear guard to hold the enemy in check and give the balance of the command a chance to retreat in good order.

While on this rear guard fighting we had many men killed and wounded, and among them was Lieutenant George Garfield, a nephew of General J. A. Garfield, who was wounded in the neck and shoulder, so that he was unable to hold up his head; but the comrades, among them John Grabach, who were near to him, put him into a rubber blanket and carried him back a little ways and then again used their guns upon the enemy. But we were so hard pressed that they carried him back further. He was losing blood and was in such a condition that without care he would have died in a short time. When Garfield saw they could not carry him further, he asked if anyone of them would stay with him, whereupon John Grabach informed him that he would stay and care for him. Grabach immediately gave his arms to Lieutenant Charles Kelsey, a brother to our townsmen, James and A. I. Kelsey, who was the last man to go. In a few minutes the enemy were there, and at once traded their poor shoes for Grabach and Garfield’s good boots and the next squad traded coats etc., but offered no personal harm.

After the escape of Kilpatrick’s force the wounded were picked up, both Union and Confederate, and all the Union men that were able to be moved were sent to Andersonville prison hospital, where John Grabach was installed as wound dresser.

Up to this time, no guard had been placed over Grabach, who was the only sound Union soldier. Only his duty to his comrades kept him seventeen days after the fight, Wheeler Forgerson, a cousin to our townsman, Tom Forgerson, bunkmate of Grabach, died from a wound received in the charge, and a few days later Lieutenant Garfield had so far recovered that he was able to be moved, and he was sent to Libby Prison, an officers’ prison in Richmond, Virginia, and the other wounded had died or were on the way to recovery. Then one day an order came to the hospital from Captain Wirz for all sailors and marine men to fall in for exchange, Whereupon Grabach made up his mind he was a sailor. But the officer in charge said there were too many, and he wanted only sailors and marines, and all others should fall out. Many fell out, but Grabach still insisted that he was a marine. When they arrived at Captain Wirz’s headquarters, the roll was called. Finally a name was called and no one answered, and soon another name was called without an answer. When it was called again, Grabach answered and also another soldier, whereupon an investigation followed and the other man was decided to be the right one. Captain Wirz ordered a guard to take charge of Grabach, and after the roll was finished there were four more men than they had on the roll, and Captain Wirz ordered the guard to take them to the guard house and put them in stocks, and pointing to Grabach, he said, “ and that _____ put him in the spread eagle stocks.” They were placed there but the guards were more humane than the officers and took them out of the stocks with a promise that if any of the officers came around they must at once be placed in the stocks again until they were gone.

Libby Prison
(National Archives)

Within a few hours an order came to send all prisoners in the guard house to the train, which was loading with prisoners, as they claimed for exchange, but the real object was to keep them from falling into the hands of General Sherman. In the night, the train arrived at Macon, Georgia, and here Grabach jumped from the train and dodged the guards, and before daylight was out of the city in the open country headed for our lines. After many days of traveling by night and hiding by day, and being fed by the escaped prisoners’ friend, the black man, he was retaken just before reaching our lines.

Again he was a prisoner, and this time he was taken to Millen, being the first of a lot of 35 to be put into this prison stockade, but in a few days it had been increased five thousand. One day after a few weeks of prison life he with a squad of others was taken outside of the stockade to carry in some wood. When the opportunity offered, Grabach dropped behind a big log and again made his escape, and commenced his lonely march by night and sleeping in woods and fields by day, and after many nights of marching, hunger, and cold he was again recaptured.

Again he was a prisoner of war and was being taken to Florida. While going through Savannah with other prisoners he again made his escape, this time by playing off sick, being apparently in such condition that he could not go any farther. Here in the city of Savannah for several weeks he was cared for by a German family and often went downstreet where almost every day some prisoners were being put aboard transports for exchange. One day he found an opportunity to fall into the ranks of prisoners for exchange. He got on board the transport as one of them with much difficulty. This time he was successful in gaining his liberty and in due time arrived in Annapolis, Maryland, and then came to his home near Clyde, Ohio, and in a few weeks rejoined his regiment at Gravelly Springs, Mississippi, where he was mustered out of the army in February, 1865, having been a prisoner about five months, and about four months after his term of three years service had expired.”

For several years after the war, he lived in Clyde, but for many years he has lived in Nebraska, which is now his home. For the past few weeks he has been revisiting this, the home of his younger manhood, and participating in the Grabach family reunion.

The Family of George and Deborah Godette

2011-09-11T08:54:00.000-07:00

Charles Weiker of Fremont, Ohio shared this story and these images of his family. At Find A Grave, you'll see further images and information posted by Godette family members.

James Godette, Jr.

The family of George and Deborah Godette’s French connection derives from Jean Gaudet, the progenitor of Gaudet/Godette descendants in North America. He was born ca. 1575 in Martaize Vienne, France. He and his family along with his brother Aubin Gaudet arrived in Port Royal, Acadia in 1636. Jean Gaudet was a farmer who raised cattle and sheep and cultivated his acres of land in the Annapolis Basin for over 30 years, caring and providing for his family in his new homeland. Jean Gaudet died in the year 1672 in Port Royal, Acadia.

Nearly a century later, between 1755 and 1762, it became a very tumultuous and tragic time for Acadians. It was in those years that the British authorities decided to enforce the deportation orders. Acadians were stripped of their rights and placed on overcrowded vessels bound for unrevealed destinations. The events were horrendous and marked the memories of the exiled and their descendants for decades to come.

Acadia, Annapolis Basin

As with so many of those who were exiled; George Godette’s definitive destination cannot be fully documented due to the uncertainties of acceptance and survival of the assorted deported. What can be determined within his timeline of exiled events is his connection by marriage to Deborah George, whose family is documented to be living in Craven County, North Carolina as early as 1753. Deborah’s brother, Peter, was listed in a Company of Foot Soldiers commanded by Captain Abner Neale by Commission bearing the date of April 11, 1753 for the District between the Head of Slocombs Creek to the Head of Turnagain Bay. The first known record in Craven County, North Carolina for George Godette, himself, is his being excused from paying taxes in September of 1780 due to the fact that he was crippled.

Among the children of George and Deborah Godette were Peter Godette and Deborah Godette. Deborah married Isaac Perkins, a veteran of the American Revolutionary War. He enlisted for three years, was granted a pension, which was repealed and later restored.

Peter Godette married Sarah Barber in 1797 in Craven County, North Carolina. They were the parents of John Godette, who married Clarissa Jackson. The laws of North Carolina allowed free people of color to have a license to carry guns. The names of John Godette and his sons William Godette and James Godette appears on lists dated September 1851; June 1852; and September 1854.

As mixed raced people they were free and had rights, but conditions before the start of the Civil War became unsettled and unsatisfactory for them. The relationships between ethnic groups was of a fluid nature among early working class people, before legalized slavery and stringent laws unnaturally and unnecessarily strained and defined color lines.

For whatever the reasons, decisions were made within the family of John and Clarissa Jackson Godette. Some of the family would remain in Beaufort County, North Carolina and continue their lives there. Those who chose to stay were: John and Clarissa Godette, their son, William Godette and his family; and their daughter, Ellen Godette Cannon and her family.

Those who chose to go with a group of 60 people for the migration to Ohio were three of John and Clarissa Jackson Godette’s children and their families: Elizabeth “Patsy” Godette Laughinghouse; James and Elizabeth Driggers Godette; and John and Linda Godette Blackwell. They left before the start of the Civil War and made their way northward to Ohio, settling in the communities of Oberlin, Pittsfield, and Kipton in Lorain County; Fremont in Sandusky County; and Elmore in Ottawa County.

Godette Family Home in Pittsfield, Ohio (ca. 1860s)
James Godette, Sr. and Elizabeth Driggers Godette; and two of their daughters, Henrietta and Josephine

They were true pioneers in the very sense of the word, as are many of their descendants to this day. Among them were two of the sons of James and Elizabeth Driggers Godette of Lorain County: William and Alfred Godette. The two brothers moved to St. Paul, Minnesota, where they joined the city’s fire department. William Godette joined in 1885 and rose through the ranks to captain during his 41 years of service. Younger brother Alfred joined in 1909 and died fighting a fire in 1921, the ultimate sacrifice for service.

William Godette, St. Paul, Minnesota

The new St. Paul Fire Department Headquarters and Station 1 is now named the William and Alfred Godette Memorial Building to honor their memories. It was formally commissioned and opened in September 2010

Alfred Godette

1874 - 1921

(Courtesy of Find-a-Grave)

Hughes Granite Company Created Ohio's Enduring Civil War Memorials

2011-09-09T19:20:00.000-07:00

The name Hughes Granite is long gone from Clyde, Ohio, but the exceptional markers, monuments, and memorials the company created remain a physical presence throughout the eastern half of the United States. Carmi Sanford founded the company in the 1880s. After Sanford’s death in 1893, his brother-in-law William E. Hughes oversaw operations. Under his management, the firm flourished becoming one of the best-known granite companies in the United States.

The secret to Hughes’ success was quality. He purchased stone directly from quarries in Scotland, New York, and Vermont. The company employed as many as 55 master stonecutters, sculptors, and engineers. Its most skilled sculptor was James B. King who, like several other Hughes employees, came from Scotland to work for Hughes.

Located on East Buckeye Street in Clyde, the Hughes Granite cutting room featured the most modern tools for cutting, polishing, and carving. The end product was a beautifully executed, high quality, durable marker.

An astute businessman, Hughes also perfected the use of ventilation in designing mausoleums and crypts. His American Mausoleum Company constructed more than 100 mausoleums nationwide, including the Inglewood Park Mausoleum in Inglewood California.
Perhaps the company’s greatest success came when the state of Ohio selected its designs to memorialize its Civil War dead. Competing against 11 other firms, Hughes won the contract to create 34 monuments for Ohio’s fallen at Shiloh battlefield near Pittsburg Landing, Tennessee. Employees described their efforts as a “labor of love and duty.” In addition to creating the monuments, the company agreed to deliver them to the site. The monuments were transported to Tennessee by rail and barge. Each 16-ton monument was raised from the river up the 100-foot bluff to the battlefield.

In the spring of 1902, during a ceremony at Shiloh, the state dedicated the monuments to its native sons. One Ohioan accurately predicted “the beautiful memorials… will stand and be admired by future generations when the memory of those who created them has been forever buried in oblivion.” And so it is.

Hughes Granite and Marble Company may be lost to time, but its inspired work lives on as part of the sacred landscape of Andersonville and the Civil War battlefields of Shiloh, Vicksburg, Gettysburg, Antietam, and Chickamauga.

Read about the Hughes Granite and Marble Company in-depth at Sandusky County Scrapbook.

Anna Pittenger McMeens: Civil War Nurse

2011-09-05T17:44:00.000-07:00

Anna McMeens (with purse) and Cooke Family Members

Anna Pittenger McMeens may have been one of the first nurses to serve in a military hospital during the Civil War. When her husband, Dr. Robert R. McMeens enlisted as the surgeon of the Third Ohio Volunteer Infantry, Anna assisted her husband at the military hospital at Camp Dennison.

She traveled with him to Nashville, Tennessee, where he served as Acting Medical Director of the Tenth Division. He oversaw the Union’s 800-bed military hospital. Anna returned to Sandusky when her husband left Nashville with his regiment. She immediately began working with the Sanitary Commission to provide medical supplies for soldiers in the field.

Cooke Castle on Lake Erie's Gibraltar Island, 1901

She never remarried after the death of her husband in 1862. She traveled to Washington, D. C., where she worked in military hospitals for more than a year. Following the war, Anna McMeens managed the summer home of Jay Cooke, financier of the Civil War. Cooke Castle is located on Lake Erie’s Gibraltar Island.

A sketch of Anna McMeens in Woman's Work in the Civil War (published 1867) highlights her contributions during the conflict. It states that after the Civil War, and while at Gibraltar Island, she took part in missionary work among the sailors of Lake Erie.

If anyone can identify the organization or the Lake Erie's sailors missionary work in which Anna McMeens participated as early as 1867, I would appreciate hearing from you.

Coming North: Martha Laughinghouse Weiker

2011-09-03T14:25:00.000-07:00

My search for photos of African American Civil War soldiers led to a conversation with Charles Weiker of Fremont, Ohio. He not only provided a photo, but also shared these photos and this fascinating story of another of his remarkable ancestors who came to Ohio, eventually settling in Sandusky County at the time of the Civil War….

Martha Laughinghouse Weiker holding son Charles. Son Walter stands at her side (ca. 1888)

Martha Laughinghouse Weiker was born in 1848 in New Bern, Craven County, North Carolina; the 2nd daughter of Ajax and Elizabeth “Patsy” Godette Laughinghouse. The family of freeborn mulattoes traces its history to Ajax’s great-grandfather, Andrew Laughinghouse, who actually wasn’t a Laughinghouse at all.

Around 1769, a shipwreck occurred along the treacherous shoals of the North Carolina coast. The only survivors of the vessel were a small boy and his small body servant. That child was Andrew, who along with his slave, was taken in by the family of Thomas and Patience Smith Laughinghouse of Beaufort County, North Carolina. When questioning the boy (who must have been well off because he traveled with a servant) neither he nor his servant, due to their young ages, could tell the Laughinghouse family what Andrew’s last name was. Andrew was raised as one of the family and adopted the Laughinghouse surname as his own.

Martha’s oldest family lineage is through her mother’s side, stretching to the saga of Margaret Cornish, who at the age of nine, was kidnapped from her homeland of African Angola in the Mbundu nation within the kingdom of Ndongo and was put aboard a Spanish slave ship. The ship was captured by an English pirate ship that took its selected human cargo to Jamestown in 1619.

Margaret Cornish, along with her generations of descendants, lived their lives through a myriad of changing laws in the English colonies that slowly and blatantly circumvented their rights because of their mixed bloodlines. But they persevered despite difficulties.

In time, laws and events would converge and create a situation for free people of color. Just before the start of the Civil War, unsettled and unsatisfactory conditions relative to slavery as practiced in the South, led to the organization of a group of 60 people who migrated to Ohio. Members settled in Oberlin, Pittsfield, and Kipton in Lorain County, Ohio; Fremont, in Sandusky County, Ohio; and Elmore in Ottawa County, Ohio. Patsy and her daughters eventually settled Fremont around 1863.

703 Ohio Avenue

Fremont, Ohio

1901

Back Row (standing l to r ) Charles Weiker, unknown, Walter Weiker, Sarah Weiker Willey, William Dixon, Clara Weiker Dixon, Charles Cooper, Catherine Weiker Cooper, Gardner Willey

Second Row (seated l to r) unknown, unknown, Philip Weiker, Catherine Smith, Martha Laughinghouse Weiker, daughters of Clara Dixon Weiker, Clara Cooper

First Row (boys seated: l to r) Tom Weiker, Fred Cooper

In 1874, Martha married Philip Weiker at the Four Mile House. Following their marriage they located to a farm in Riley Township. Years later they moved into Fremont, where they built a house on the corner of Ohio Avenue and Mulberry Street. The residence still stands today. Philip and Martha had 10 children of their own. They also raised 2 other children.

Martha was a devoted member of the A.M.E. Church on Second Street for more than 50 years. She took an active part in church work, becoming an honorary member of the Missionary Society. After living a full life with family and friends, and perhaps, sometimes pondering over the miles and years before and after the migration that brought her family North, she passed away in 1932 at the age of 84.

A version of this article appeared earlier in Lifstyles 2000.

John Evans: Civil War Sailor

2011-08-29T20:59:00.000-07:00

U.S.S. Carondelet

(Courtesy of the Naval Historical Center)

When attempting to document the Civil War service of Sandusky Countians, it was difficult and at times impossible to identify those who served in the U. S. Navy. Unlike infantry regiments that were largely formed from specific geographic areas, there were few clues leading to the enlistments of Navy personnel. Generally those identified came from post-war biographical sketches, county histories, obituaries, records of veterans’ organizations, service records, and extant diaries and letters preserved by descendants. A recently discovered obituary appearing in the January 26, 1899 issue of the “Clyde Enterprise” revealed the extraordinary naval service of Sandusky Countian John Evans. Evans resided on East Street in Clyde, Ohio, where he died at the age of 72.

John Evans was born in Ireland, May 1, 1826, of English parents. He entered the English navy about 1850, serving for six years, part of the time during the war between the allied powers and Russia known as the Crimean War, and was in the siege of Sebastopol. After the close of the Crimean War, he was discharged and came to America, settling at Sandusky, Ohio in 1857, where he lived until 1861. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy at New York December 18, 1861 and served for over three years, being in the Mississippi and Gulf squadrons under Porter and Farragut, taking part in the naval engagements at Island No. 10, April 8, 1862; Fort Pillow May 10, 18626; Memphis, June 5, 1862; Vicksburg, May, June and July, 1863; and in the Red River Expedition under General Banks, where the Navy under Porter saved Banks’ Army from complete destruction.

For meritorious conduct, he was promoted to gunners mate, and was discharged from the U. S. ship Carondelet as gunners mate in charge. On May 17, 1865, he enlisted in Company C, 5th U.S. Veteran Volunteers, for one year, and was discharged March 25, 1866.

After his discharge he lived in Fremont, Ohio, two years, then moved to Sandusky where on February 1, 1869, he was married to Mrs. Nancy E. Reed. One year later, they came to Clyde, which has since been his home. He wife died in 1887, since which time he and his daughters have lived in the home on East Street where he died.

Besides possessing a remarkable naval and military record, deceased was an industrious, hard-working man, who had the respect of all who knew him. One daughter, Maria Evans, and four step-children survive him.

The Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships (Naval Historical Center) provides the following proud history of the Carondelet.

She was an ironclad river gunboat, was built in 1861 by James Eads and Co., St. Louis, Mo., under contract to the War Department; commissioned 15 January at Cairo, III., naval Captain H. Walke in command, and reported to Western Gunboat Flotilla (Army), commanded by naval Flag Officer A. H. Foote.

Between January and October 1862 Carondelet operated almost constantly on river patrol and in the capture of Forts Henry and Donelson in February; the passing of Island No. 10 and the attack on and spiking of the shore batteries below New Madrid, Mo., in April; the lengthy series of operations against Plum Point Bend, Fort Pillow, and Memphis from April through June, and the engagement with CSS Arkansas on 15 July, during which Carondelet was heavily damaged and suffered 35 casualties.

Transferred to Navy Department control with the other ships of her flotilla on 1 October 1862, Carondelet continued the rapid pace of her operations, taking part in the unsuccessful Steele's Bayou Expedition in March 1863. One of those to pass the Vicksburg and Warrenton batteries in April 1863, Carondelet took part on 29 April in the five and one-half hour engagement with the batteries at Grand Gulf. She remained on duty off Vicksburg, hurling fire at the city in its long siege from May to July. Without her and her sisters and other naval forces, the great operations on the rivers would not have been possible and Northern Victory might not have been won. From 7 March to 15 May 1864, she sailed with the Red River Expedition, and during operations in support of Army movements ashore, took part in the Bell's Mill engagement of December 1864. For the remainder of the war, Carondelet patrolled in the Cumberland River. She was decommissioned at Mound City, III., 20 June 1865, and sold there 29 November 1865.

A Veritable Flotilla of Rare DART Boats at the Toledo Classic and Antique Boat Show August 27 and 28

2011-08-28T19:25:00.000-07:00

The "Bootlegger," 1929 26-foot Dart

Sponsored and organized by Ramsey Brothers Restorations of Toledo, Ohio, the Fifth Annual Antique and Classic Boat Show took place on the weekend of August 27th and 28th. This year's featured boat was the Dart, a stylish vessel first built in Lima, Ohio, at the Indian Lake Boat Company and later at Toledo, Ohio by a group of investors headed by Admiral Webb Hayes, grandson of President Rutherford B. Hayes. Read more about the famed Dart boat by following this link to an earlier post where you can also see a 1928 video of the Hayes family in a Dart on Lake Erie.

Perhaps as few as 35 Darts exist worldwide. Thanks to the efforts of the Ramsey Brothers and Dart owners, visitors were treated to the rare opportunity of seeing FIVE Dart Boats in one location! The video clips immediately above and below are of the "Bootlegger," a 26- foot 1929 Dart.

The "Bootlegger" 1929 26-foot Dart

Below is a video clip of an unrestored 22 1/2-foot Dart, once owned by the United States Coast Guard and used during Prohibition to chase down bootleggers hauling liquor across Lake Erie from Canada to the U.S. Owner Scott Ramsey displayed this great classic at the boat show.

Scott Ramsey's 22-1/2 foot Dart once owned by the U. S. Coast Guard

Check out the Youtube footage of Scott Ramsey putting his 1927 unrestored Dart through her paces on the Maumee!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=USd2S3eJFoU

Two more rare Dart boats on view at the 5th Annual Toledo Classic and Antique Boat Show

Special thanks go to Ramsey Brothers Restorations for making it possible for so many to see these vintage boats that not only included the rare Dart, but also restored Lymans and Chris Crafts that are so much a part of the heritage of Great Lakes recreational boating. Owners came from Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Florida to display their classics. The weekend show also included displays of historic Great Lakes lighthouses, shipping, postcards, books, and memorabilia; great food and music; and antique autos.

United States Mint Launches Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential $1 Coin

2011-08-20T13:45:00.000-07:00

On August 18th, residents of Fremont, Ohio and the surrounding area celebrated the release of the new Presidential $1 Coin honoring Rutherford B. Hayes, 19th President of the United States. “The Presidential $1 Coin series connects us to the wellspring of our nation’s government and the many stories that unite us,” said Marc Landry, Acting Associate Director of Manufacturing of the United States Mint. “One of those is captured here at Spiegel Grove, the beautiful home where President Rutherford B. Hayes retired from elected office but remained a dedicated public servant, helping veterans, improving prisons and fighting for universal education.

Over 400 people joined Hayes Presidential Center Director Tom Culbertson, Sandusky County commissioners Terry Thatcher and Dan Polter, Fremont Mayor Terry Overmyer, U. S. Representative Bob Latta, and Ohio State Representative Rex Damschroder for the official coin launch.

Free dollar coins were available to children 18 and under who attended the ceremony on the front lawn of the Hayes home, while Fremont-based Croghan Colonial Bank was on site to exchange dollar bills for the new Hayes coins for everyone else. The bank had nearly sold out of the 12,000 coins it brought to Thursday's event, although the Hayes coins will be available at the bank's main branch.

Toledo Antique & Classic Boat Show: August 27 and 28, 2011

2011-08-17T18:57:00.000-07:00

On August 27th and 28th, Toledo, Ohio's annual Antique and Classic Boat Show takes place at Toledo's Maritime Center at 1701 Front Street on the banks of the Maumee. It's a treat! You'll see some of those great vintage boats from the 1920s to the 1960s that were so much a part of summer recreation on the Great Lakes.

This year, the focus will be on the DART BOAT. From 1928 to 1932, Admiral Webb C. Hayes II, grandson of President Rutherford B. Hayes, headed a group of investors who built the famed Dart (first built at Indian Lake Boat Company in Lima, Ohio.) The Dart was offered in four models – an 18 ½-foot; 22 ½-foot; 26-foot and 30-foot, ranging in price from $1,500 to $5,000. There were three-cockpit, split-cockpit, open and sedan models to choose from. The queen of the fleet was the 30-foot Gold Dart with its 125 horsepower Chrysler Imperial engine. You can read more about the Dart on our earlier post by clicking on this link. You will also enjoy the displays of books, postcards, and artifacts of the Great Lakes as well food, music, and antique autos! It's a great way to spend the weekend!

Casper Miller: Sandusky County Ohio Civil War Soldier

2011-08-16T18:00:00.000-07:00

Casper Miller

The above 16" x 20" image is believed to be that of Casper Miller of Ballville Twp. Sandusky County, Ohio. It was recently donated to the Hayes Presidential Center by Harriet Stiger Liles of Coral Gables, Florida. The photograph was given to Mrs. Liles in 1965 by one of Casper's granddaughters, Helen Miller Newman, the daughter of John Henry and Mary C. Miller. Mrs. Newman and Mrs. Liles taught at the Old Fort School in Old Fort, Ohio.

Casper Miller was born in Switzerland October 5, 1832. He came to the United States in 1854 and became a naturalized citizen. He married Mary A. Diehr March 4, 1858. Mary was born in Germany January 6, 1839. She was the daughter of John and Mary Diehr, also of Ballville Twp. Casper and Mary Miller were the parents of Louis, Willie, John Henry, and Rosie.

Casper died in Ballville Twp. Sandusky County September 13, 1910. Mary Diehr Miller died in Ballville Twp. February 6, 1917. Both are buried in the McGormley Cemetery.

A single individual by the name of Casper Miller appears on a list of Civil War draftees for Sandusky County. The document is part of the Local History Collection at the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center. Casper Miller is believed to have enlisted as a private in Company C of the 72nd Ohio Volunteer Infantry raised largely in Sandusky County, Ohio.

Senator George Norris: Gentle Knight

2011-07-30T21:02:00.000-07:00

Few Ohio children came in direct contact with the Civil War, but many who lived through those years were deeply affected by the conflict for the remainder of their lives. George Norris was one. Born not far from Clyde during the war’s first year, George was the youngest of 11 children and the only surviving son of Chauncy and Mary Mook Norris.

Of course, I had known that as a U. S. congressman and senator from Nebraska, Norris had exerted extraordinary power and influence during his 40-year career in Washington. What I didn’t know until reading his autobiography, “Fighting Liberal,” was the extent to which those childhood years had shaped his attitudes and motivated his every action throughout adulthood.

John Henry, Norris’ much older brother, had held a special place in their mother’s heart. Although she made John promise that he would not enlist, he eventually joined the 55th Ohio. At the Battle of Resaca, John wrote his mother that a bullet had pierced his leg. He assured her that it was only a minor wound, but word soon came that John Henry was dead from infection.

Norris Family Marker

York Free Chapel Cemetery

Courtesy of Don Heuring

Norris remembered that “my father’s death [some months later] intensified my mother’s grief over the loss of John. I never heard a song upon the lips of my mother. I never even heard her hum a tune. The song of life…. was silenced forever in the bitter grief and sorrow of those years between 1864 and 1867. The war ended, and the young men came back, but John slept in a soldier’s grave in the blackened southern countryside. There were times when it seemd that her heartache over her son never would pass.”

From that day forward, Mary Norris relied on faith, family, friends, and hard work. There were no government programs to serve as a safety net for families on the frontier, struggling to survive in an economy built on physical labor. As Norris tells it, not only did his mother spin, weave, wash, cook, sew, and can, but she worked in the fields and handled the family’s finances.

His childhood memories of his mother’s grief and “grim drudgery and grind which had been the common lot of eight generations of American farm women” never left him. That vision of loss and of so many grown old before their time drove Norris to find ways to improve the lives of America’s farm families in whom he believed so deeply.

Today it is difficult to comprehend that only 10% of America’s farms had electricity during those years. Norris knew that hydropower could dramatically change their lives. Tempered by childhood adversity, the “Gentle Knight,” as many called him, was up to the challenge. From 1912 to 1933, right through the Great Depression, he fought on, enduring presidential vetoes and resistance from his own party. In the end, he was victorious. The Tennessee Valley Authority and the Rural Electrification Act that soon followed, tamed the Tennessee River and brought flood control, hydropower, and light to thousands of poor farm families across a six-state region. One insightful journalist wrote that “the powerful senator had fought for the poor and the beaten down…and he seemed never to forget that in his own time he had been among them…” .

A version of this story appeared in Lifestyles 2000.

Louis Baus' Great Lakes Commerical Shipping Photographs

2011-07-30T19:45:00.000-07:00

As an Ohio native and three-time governor, President Hayes held a deep interest in the state’s history. He was an early member of area historical societies. He collected original materials that help tell the stories of the people who settled and developed the region. Since the Hayes Center’s creation in 1916, collecting and preserving the area’s history has remained part of the institution’s mission.

Among the Hayes Center’s holdings is the Charles E. Frohman Collection. The wide-ranging archive of unique materials chronicles the lives of those who shaped the future of the Erie Islands and the communities of Lake Erie’s Western Basin. It is a rich collection of books, papers, photographs, and maps of which more and more are digitized. Through support from the Sidney Frohman Foundation, some 2,400 photographs now appear online at Lake Erie’s Yesterdays through OhioLINK’s searchable image database.

Recent efforts have focused on photographs of ships that once plied the waters of the Great Lakes. The photographs were taken and collected by Louis Baus. A long time Cleveland, Ohio photographer, Baus worked independently and then as a staff writer for the Cleveland Plain Dealer. A native Clevelander, Baus in his later years was fascinated by commercial shipping on the Great Lakes. As a member of the Great Lakes Historical Society, he spent many days traveling and photographing American and Canadian vessels.

Before his death in 1949, Baus had compiled 18 albums of more than a thousand pictures of Great Lakes ships. There are pictures of tugs, freighters, ferries, mail boats, lumber and car carriers, barges, and the ports and harbors they called home. His original black and white prints fill most of the albums, but Baus also collected drawings, pen and ink sketches, and photographs by others. For each vessel, he wrote a capsule history.

You can search Lake Erie’s Yesterdays for a picture of a single ship by entering its name or the entire collection by entering “Baus.” Whether viewing his albums in their entirety at the Hayes Center or online, one gains a sense of those vibrant days when vessels carrying wheat from the Great Plains, ore from Minnesota, and timber from Michigan dominated the Great Lakes. At the same time, one can’t help but be struck by the number of ships lost in storms, collisions, and groundings, taking lives and fortunes to the bottom with them.

Louis Baus’ passion for the region’s waterways extended beyond the Great Lakes. Between 1896 and 1933, he traveled and photographed the entire length of the old Ohio Canal - from Cleveland to Portsmouth. In 2004, the University of Akron purchased Baus’ collection of photographs of canal boats, crews, passengers, locks, and businesses along the canal ways. His more than 400 photographs can be viewed on the university’s website.

Sarah Ellen Drew, 1838 - 1940

2011-07-05T16:04:00.000-07:00

Documenting the lives of African Americans of Sandusky County, Ohio is not an easy task! In depth research by Charles Weiker of Fremont, Ohio has identified some of the families. Many were related either before coming to Sandusky County or by marriage after their arrival.

One of the most well known in the community was Sarah Ellen Drew, wife of Thomas Drew, who came to Fremont in 1880. In March of 1933, Sarah, was interviewed by Juel Reed of the Fremont News Messenger. That interview provides a rare glimpse into the life of a child born into bondage in Frederick County, Maryland and enslaved in Loudon County, Virginia as a young woman during the Civil War.

At the time of the interview, Sarah, 95 years of age, was living alone at the home she and her husband had built at 541 Second Street in Fremont. Her husband had died 25 years earlier. She had also lost a son and a daughter.

Sarah was born into slavery on a plantation owned by the Crummel family of Frederick County, Maryland. She said, “I did everything around the farm – milked cows, rode horses, did all kinds of general work.” Sarah stated that later she “went into service across the Virginia line. There were lots of tobacco fields there – no cotton – they don’t raise it there – not far enough south.”

Sarah frequently went with her master and mistress to Baltimore and Washington, D. C. Shortly after President Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated, she attended an affair at which he was present and had the privilege of shaking his hand. She recalled, “He was a wonderful man – not handsome – but so kind looking. We all loved him.”

Two months after the firing on Fort Sumter, Sarah heard the first rumblings of guns near the Loudon County, Virginia plantation, where she lived. “I can still see them bringing the wounded men in – wagon load after wagon load. Some of them were screaming and praying for someone to shoot them and put them out of their misery. Every church was full and they quartered them in every house. Even the place where I was in service had some. I remember seeing 15 of them on the floor of one room. And the way they were buried! They died like flies, and even yet I can see them burying men in boxes that weren’t fit to put a dog in they were so rough. They died so fast they had to get rid of the bodies in some way, I guess.”

When the Emancipation Proclamation was signed, Sarah returned home to her father, her mother having died the previous year. “We were crazy with joy. Remember, we were in bondage all those years, and the thought of being free was almost too much.”

Sarah’s three brothers fought in Union regiments. Immediately after the surrender, she received a letter from one of her brothers stating. “We ate breakfast in Richmond this morning and not a shot was fired. But the panic was awful. Women and children ran all over screaming. We had to order them inside the houses.”

When freedom came, her father moved on a small farm of his own, and a few years later, Sarah married Thomas Drew, who had come from Jefferson County, Virginia. Three months each winter, Sarah did housework for wealthy families in the vicinity. When one of them, the Raifsnyders, came to Fremont in 1880, Sarah came with them.

Recalling her arrival in Fremont, Sarah laughed, saying, “It was the furtherest I’d ever been up north. Do you know what impressed me the most – the board walks! I’d never heard they had them up here, but I never saw them before. Down south we had flagstones.”

Sarah recalled the celebration in Fremont the following spring when the Hayes family returned to Spiegel Grove. A short time later, her husband Thomas and their children joined her in Fremont. When the Raifsnyder family moved away, Sarah worked for the Stanley Thomas and Grund families.

She later worked for the Hayes family. She recalled, “They were grand people. I don’t know as there were any nicer white folks any place. Whenever they were short handed at the Grove they always called me. Sometimes I cooked for them and some times when they had big affairs I’d usher. And Mrs. Hayes! She was the most wonderful person to work for you could imagine. Why, I remember that several times she drove me home. They had a white horse – his name was Nimrod – and the carriage would bring me right up here to my door.” Henry Drew, Sarah’s son, also worked for the Hayes family. Application for probate of will of Thomas Drew by his widow Sarah Ellen Drew
She remembered the days when Colonel Webb Hayes and Fanny Hayes, children of President and Mrs. Hayes, were young. “After Miss Fannie married and went to Washington, she used to come back here to visit real often. She had a colored nurse for the baby, and she used to bring the nurse over here to visit me.”

In her final years, Sarah Drew lived for a time at the Sandusky County Infirmary. Benefiting from an “old age pension,” Sarah moved to Oberlin, Ohio, where she resided with her granddaughter, Sadie Whiteside. Sadie (born Sarah Ellen Drew) was the daughter of Thomas and Sarah’s son, Cornelius Henry Drew.

Sadie had married Leander Dixon, a son of William M. and Elizabeth Dixon. William M. Dixon was a Civil War veteran and member of Fremont’s Eugene Rawson G.A.R. Post. After the death of Leander, Sadie Drew Dixon married William Whiteside. Sarah Ellen Drew died at Sadie’s home in Oberlin in January of 1940 at the age of 102. Services were held at the Warren A. M. E. Church in Fremont, Ohio, where Sarah Drew had been a devoted and active member. She is buried in Oakwood Cemetery in Fremont.

Hayes Presidential Center Exhibit: Civil War: Battlefield & Homefront

2011-05-28T10:26:00.000-07:00

The Hayes Presidential Center commemorates the 150th anniversary of America ’s Civil War with the opening of its exhibit, CIVIL WAR: Battlefield & Homefront on April 12th, the date that marks the first shots fired on Fort Sumter . The Civil War touched the lives of all Americans. More than 300,000 men, nearly a tenth of Ohio’s citizens participated in the war.

Through the holdings of the Hayes Presidential Center and the L. M. Strayer Collection, Battlefield and Homefront explores the wartime experiences that changed forever the lives of Ohio soldiers and the families and communities who supported them.

The exhibit provides visitors with a deeper understanding of the sacrifices and suffering of soldiers and families who lived through four long years of war.

On loan from Civil War expert and dedicated collector Larry Strayer are photographs, documents, and artifacts of Northern Ohio soldiers. Included are the field trunk and a rare canvas and wood cot that belonged to Dr. Robert R. McMeens of Sandusky who served with the Third Ohio Volunteer Infantry and became Acting Medical Director of the Tenth Division. McMeens’ name appears on the cot that was patented in 1858.

Although desperately ill, McMeens refused a furlough, believing it was his duty to follow his “friends in their fate.” On the night of October 29, 1862, Dr. McMeens performed two surgical operations on soldiers wounded at the Battle of Perryville. Hours later, he collapsed and died. McMeens’ possessions, including his cot, were brought back to Sandusky by his devoted attendant.

Following his death, his widow Anna cared for soldiers in hospitals in Washington, D. C. Featured in the exhibit is her autograph book that is a part of the Hayes Presidential Center’s holdings. The book contains more than forty signatures of prominent individuals including that of President Abraham Lincoln.

Through decades of research, Strayer has gained extensive knowledge of Ohio’s role in the Civil War, its regiments, and the soldiers who fought for the Union cause. Strayer says “that the families of Civil War veterans and their descendants were more inclined to save martial artifacts such as guns and swords rather than cups, spoons, bedding, and cots” that were necessities in soldiers’ daily lives. Although it may take years to accomplish, Strayer finds it especially rewarding to once again, bring together groupings of individual soldiers’ Civil War possessions.

CIVIL WAR: Battlefield & Homefront is made possible through funding from Diversified Insurance and Auto-Owners Insurance. Exhibit hours are 9 am to 5 pm Tuesday through Saturday and noon until 5 pm Sunday. The Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center is located at the corner of Hayes and Buckland avenues in Fremont, Ohio. The facility is affiliated with the Ohio Historical Society.

Company C, 192nd Tank Battalion, Port Clinton, Ohio

2011-02-01T11:38:00.000-08:00

Company C, 192nd Tank Battalion

The above photograph was donated to the Hayes Presidential Center by the late Betty Neidecker, who was extraordinarily interested in the local history of Ottawa County, Ohio. Its origin is unknown, but it is identified as Company C, 192nd Tank Battalion that began as Company H, Tank Corps, Ohio National Guard. In 1921, Company H was designated the 37th Tank Company and assigned to the 17th Infantry Division. On September 1, 1940, the 37th became Company C and was combined with three other companies.

This photograph was believed to have been taken in late November 1940, at Port Clinton a few days after the company was inducted into federal service. The men were about to depart from Port Clinton at the New York Central depot. They were headed to Fort Knox. After training at Fort Knox and Fort Polk, the unit left San Francisco for Fort Stotsenberg in the Philippines, arriving November 20, 1941. A short time later, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.

Later that same month, the unit saw its first combat. Company C supported the allied retreat onto the Bataan Peninsula, continually battling larger enemy forces; enduring shortages of food, water, and medical supplies, and suffering from disease. On April, 9, 1942, at the fall of Bataan, they were captured by the Japanese. The men of Company C were subjected to the infamous Bataan Death March. Those that survived were held as prisoners of war for 3 1/2 years. Only ten of the local men who left in November 1940 survived the Bataan Death March and the horrors of Japanese imprisonment.

A Memorial Wall, designed by a group of 5th and 6th grade students of Port Clinton's Bataan Memorial Elementary School, surrounds the school's flagpole. The memorial was dedicated in the spring of 1992, the 50th anniversary of the Bataan Death March. Three of the six still-living survivors were present to memorialize the bravery and sacrifice of the men of Company C, 192nd Tank Battalion.

Hodes Zink Manufacturing Company

2010-12-29T13:21:00.000-08:00

Hodes Zink Manufacturing Company

Fremont, Ohio

May 1923

(Shipping Room of Hodes Zink: Man standing at left is Howard Zink. Mayme Young Newberger, head seamstress and forewoman, is standing at right)

Hodes Zink Manufacturing Company

Fremont, Ohio

May 1923

(Seamstresses: Woman standing at left is Mayme Young Newberger, head forewoman, who was employed at the company from 1919 through 1953.)

The Hodes-Zink Manufacturing Company began operations December 1917 at a second floor location in downtown Fremont, Ohio. A. K. Hodes and Howard E. Zink were equal partners in the business with Hodes overseeing production and Zink focusing on sales of their products. The company’s first major products were storm fronts for buggies but they soon expanded into producing accessories for newly popular automobiles. Some of these accessories included radiator and hood covers, top recovers, and rear and side curtains for touring cars and roadsters. The Hodes-Zink Company developed a system of using patterns of each model and mass producing each item which were sold under the trademark Sure-Fit.

The company prospered and grew. In 1921 they moved to the corner of Napoleon and Lynn Streets in Fremont, Ohio and in 1923 incorporated. Hodes-Zink Manufacturing Company opened a facility in Passaic, New Jersey in 1936 to service the eastern trade outlets and added a second plant in Fremont, Ohio on Jefferson Street.

A.K. Hodes died suddenly in late November 1938. With the purchases of his assets by Mr. Zink the company name was changed to the Howard Zink Corporation. Purchasing another plant at Charleston, Mississippi in 1939 the firm’s primary focus shifted to the production of automobile seat covers which were widely sold under local and national names. Other products were cushions, seat pads, mother’s utility bags, nationally famous baby pals, reflectorized outdoor highway signs, and advertising display signs. A west coast plant opened in 1945 at Long Beach, California and the Consolite Sign Division was purchased in 1947.

Upon the death of Howard Zink in 1957 Jack Zink became president and general manager of the corporation. With his physical condition a factor (Jack Zink suffered severe injuries to both legs in World War II), Jack Zink announced the sale of the company, with the exception of the Consolite Division, to Indian Head Mills January 1966. The company became part of Crawford Manufacturing. In the next 40 years the company went through several changes of owner and name: 1969-Starlite Industries bought the firm and changed the name back to Zink due to its reputation; 1977-the name was changed to Starlite; 1984-Wynn International took over the business and named it Wynn’s Automotive; 1986-Bestop, Inc. split from Wynn’s; 1989-Bestop split, selling half the company to Saddleman, Inc. which took the Fremont, Ohio facility and changed the name to LeBra Products.

Gibsonburg Ohio Volunteer Fire Department Drill Team

2010-12-19T12:57:00.001-08:00

Gibsonburg, Ohio Volunteer Fire Dept. Drill Team, 1901

The village of Gibsonburg, Ohio, suffered devastating fires in 1895 and again in 1897 when many businesses were damaged or destroyed. As a result, a volunteer fire department was established in February 1898 for the purpose of providing fire protection to property in and around the village of Gibsonburg. The first equipment, hoses, a cart, and rubber coats and hats for the men, was ordered later that month. Initially the village was divided into three districts with a trustee overseeing operations in each of these districts and reporting to the fire chief. The department also formed a drill team. Henry Paul (in front of the team) was the drillmaster. This photograph is part of the Gibonsburg Volunteer Fire Department records donated by the organization in 1999 to the Hayes Presidential Center at Fremont, Ohio.

Maple Grove School, Seneca County, Ohio

2010-12-19T09:24:00.001-08:00

Maple Grove School, Liberty Township, Seneca County, Ohio

The above photograph is of students who attended the one-room school at Maple Grove in Liberty Twp. Seneca County, Ohio. The photograph was shared by Marcia Thomas of Connecticut. Her Paul family ancestors attended the school, located south of Bettsville, Ohio. Maple Grove was originally known as Linden, where a post office was established in 1874. The post office soon faded from existence. By 1886. the name became Maple Grove. It was the site of two railroad crossings.

Although this photograph is undated, the names of all of the children and the teacher are written on the reverse. The names listed here are given in the order written:

Sylvester Paul, Richard Huffman, Peter Hygelund, Blanch Kelley, Josie Kelley, Ella Noggle Teach[er], Mary Cook, Oliver Paul, Anna Paul [?], Thomas Cook, Carrie Smith, Adam Paul, Arthur Morgan, Edith Paul, Harry Paul, Pearl Shffler [sp?], Charley Shifler, Julia Schroder, Jocie Davis, Gerhardt Hygleund, Mary Jones, Sarah Cook, Dora Smith, Bryce Kelley.

Maple Grove School

Kyle Burks, 1st Engineers, Operation Iraqi Freedom

2010-04-01T12:00:00.000-07:00

The following interview was conducted by Christy Meggitt, a student participating in the Fremont (Ohio) Ross High Scho0l Veterans Project 2009. Student research and/or interviews with veterans may be found in the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center's Local History Collections.

Interview with Sergeant Kyle Burks, 1st Engineers, 111th Sapper Company. Burks saw service in Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Kyle Burks was born to Susan Burks on November 16, 1982, in Fremont Ohio. He attended Clyde High School and played football throughout his high school years. After high school Kyle was planning on playing football in college, but a torn A.C.L. and meniscus made him have a change of plans. He then got a job at Whirlpool, where he worked until 2005 when he enlisted in the United States Army. On September 23, 2006 he was deployed to Mosul, Iraq,where he was a part of the 111th Sapper Company. His job was route clearance. His team found over 250 road side bombs and was in over 100 fire fights during its time in Iraq. Kyle served in Iraq until December 15, 2007.

And here is Kyle Burks' story of Operation Iraqi Freedom:

What was your job and rank in the war?
“My job was the gunner on the main truck. So I talked to the other trucks and would let them know what was going on. I would fire when I needed to and look for “IEDs” at all times. My rank was E-5 Sergeant.”

When and where were you deployed during the war?
“I was deployed on September 23, 2006 to Mosul, Iraq.”

What kinds of weapons did you use?
"I shot the M-16, the 240 Bravo, and the 50 cal almost every day.”

What was a typical day like while you were deployed?
"I would wake up and eat, then I would go to the gym for about an hour, come back take a hour nap, then go on mission for 5 hours come back, eat, rest for about 2 hours then go on another 3-4 hour mission. Then do it all over again.”

Why did you enlist and what made you choose this branch?
"I wanted a change in my life, and I chose the Army because my grandpa was in the Army at one time.”

How do you feel the war is going right now?
“I think it’s a lot better over there now, and that we need to pull out. I think it’s time that they get a chance to run their country themselves. I don’t agree with the reasons we went there. It’s funny because the government says that we were not there for oil. But, when I was over in Iraq, the main reason I did route clearance was to clear the road of bombs for oil trucks to go to Turkey. I truly believe we were there for oil in the long run. I know we are not using their oil right now, but someday I think we will be.”

Personal Stories of Kyle Burks

I asked Kyle to share a few personal stories with me that happened while he was deployed in Iraq. Below are two stories that he told me during my interview with him.

1. “I remember it was some time in November of 2006. I had only been in Iraq for 2 months and as my team and I were driving down the street, I saw a blue car at the intersection. I didn’t think a lot about it. The first truck drove by, then the second truck started to go by, and that’s when the blue car floored it. I took a shot at the blue car but missed and that’s when the blue car blew up on the truck in front of me. It was a suicide car bomb. Luckily, the car bomb only knocked everyone out in the truck no one was killed. Within seconds of that happening we were fired at. The fire fight lasted about 10 minutes then help got there, so we were able to check everyone out.”

2. “I believe the time that sucked the most wasn’t going out on the road but during the months of June – August. It was awful because we could only shower once a week after being on missions for 8 hours a day, with no air conditioning in the trucks, during the hottest months of the year. We could only shower once a week, and it was only during the times of 2000-2300 hours on Sundays. If you were on a mission during those hours, you had to wait until the next week to shower. It was awful; I always felt so dirty. Also, during the week, we could only use one 20 oz bottle of water per day. This was the worst time. I think it was even worse than being on the road looking for “IEDs”.”

Kyle also shared with me the story of how he earned the very honorable Purple Heart award. “I got my Purple Heart because a 300 pound “IED” went off under my truck. It threw me around the truck and almost knocked me out; I had no idea what was going on. I began throwing up in the back of the truck and to this day still get headaches from that incident. I was hit by at least 4 “IEDs,” but this one was the only one that really rocked me.”

I asked Kyle if he had earned any more awards, and this was his answer, “I also have a Valor Award, a soldier receives this when he/she shows extreme courage and bravery. We were in a 3 hour fire fight, and I almost got hit by a sniper round. The bullets hit the top of the truck right beside where I was standing, but I stayed on my gun and kept shooting.”

A Friendship Forged Amid the Bloodshed of Shiloh

2010-03-14T17:10:00.000-07:00

General Ralph P. Buckland

One of the most prominent national figures to ever visit Sandusky County, Ohio was General William Tecumseh Sherman, commanding general of the United States Armies from 1869 to 1884. Sometimes he accompanied President Hayes, but whatever the reason for his visit, Sherman never failed to make his way to the Park Avenue home of Fremont attorney Ralph P. Buckland. Their common bond was their shared experience at the Battle of Shiloh, the Civil War’s first great bloody battle.

General William Tecumseh Sherman

Ignoring warnings of an imminent Confederate attack, Sherman was surprised on the morning of April 6, 1862, when thousands of Rebel troops streamed out of the woods and attacked his division of green troops. Terrified, hundreds of soldiers threw down their weapons and fled to the rear. But somehow in the chaos of battle, Buckland kept his cool and the 72^nd Ohio held its ground. The Sandusky Countians unleashed a withering fire as Rebels charged their front. Sherman quickly amassed what troops he could around Buckland’s defensive stand and held off the enemy long enough for Union forces to reorganize and avoid a complete rout.

General Ralph P. Buckland's Civil War Pistol

Gift of his Nephew Captain Henry Buckland

(privately owned)

Rather than accusing Sherman of negligence, Americans hailed him as a national hero for his courageous leadership under fire. No doubt, grateful to Buckland, Sherman gave high praise to the “cool, intelligent” Buckland, whose brigade was “the only one that retained its organization.”

Shiloh was a turning point in Sherman’s life. Only an average student at West Point and a failure in civilian life, he re-entered the Army at the outbreak of the Civil War. After enduring defeat at Manassas and humiliation in the press for dire predictions of Union failure in Kentucky, Sherman suffered intensely. After Shiloh, he found his footing under the command of Ulysses S. Grant. Together they formed a lethal combination.

An advocate of total warfare and never one to evade hard truths, Sherman said, “You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it.” Called hero and liberator by some and demon and destroyer by others, General William Tecumseh Sherman earned his reputation as America’s first modern general.

Lloyd Abbott with the 24th Marines at Iwo Jima

2010-03-08T17:08:00.000-08:00

The ten-part mini-series, The Pacific will soon air on HBO. One portion will focus on Iwo Jima. In February 1945, a U. S. force of some 70,000 Marines invaded Iwo Jima, a small volcanic island some 500-plus miles south of Tokyo. It was defended by more than 22,000 Japanese. Americans expected Iwo Jima to fall within five days. However, the battle lasted from February 19th to March 26th. The United States suffered more thant 6,800 fatalities and nearly 20,000 wounded.

The nearby pictures are those preserved by the late Lloyd E. Abbott of Burgoon, Ohio. Lloyd was born in Helena, Ohio, in 1925. He entered the United States Marine Corps May 18, 1944. He donated these photographs and others, along with his wartime letters, to the Hayes Presidential Center. Lloyd was part of the 24th Marines , 4th Division. Corporal Abbott joined the 24th Marines in Hawaii as a replacement for losses suffered by the 24th in the Marianas. In late January 1945, the 24th sailed for Iwo Jima with other 4th Marine Division units. The 24th encountered fierce resistance and were often involved in hand-to-hand combat. The regiment suffered 652 killed and 1,053 wounded.

At left is a picture of Company A and Company B of the 24th Marines, who survivied Iwo Jima. The photograph was taken just prior to the regiment's departure. Corporal Abbott identified himself as the Marine standing in front of and between the two tallest soldiers in the back row. Much later he recalled the hoards of flies that descended on the island and the black sand that made maneuvering so difficult. Although Corporal Abbott did not see the raising of the American flag at Mt. Suribachi by his fellow Marines, he distinctly remembered the shouts that went up from the island. At left is a map of Iwo Jima. Corporal Abbott wrote that he picked it up as he was leaving the island. Click on the map to read Corporal Abbott's notes and see his landing location (x marks the spot).

The photograph of Corporal Abbott and his fellow Marines was taken aboard the U.S.S. Newberry, a 12 1/2-ton troop transport. The photograph is a reprint of the original owned by one of Abbott's comrades. Abbott identified himself as sitting in front of the organ. Interestingly, Abbott stated that he celebrated Easter twice as the 24th Marine Division on board the Newberry crossed the International Date Line on Easter.

The 24th Marines remained in Hawaii until October 1945 when it was ordered back to California where it was deactivated. Corporal Abbott was discharged from the United States Marine Corps on May 28, 1946. He returned to farming at his home near Burgoon, Ohio. Lloyd Abbott passed away in 2008.

Lucy Webb Hayes and Her Four-Footed and Feathered Friends

2010-02-07T19:14:00.001-08:00

The nearby photo of Lucy Webb Hayes, wearing the President’s hat while feeding pigeons on a cold, snowy morning, is one of the last ever taken of the former first lady. It has always been one of my favorites. This candid image would be considered common place in today’s casual world, but in the 19th century, such unassuming poses of women, particularly former first ladies, were much less common. Perhaps its appeal is that it represents a true reflection of who Lucy Webb Hayes was and how she lived her life.

Compassionate, cheerful, gracious, and possessed of a quiet confidence, Lucy showered kindness on family, friends, children, the sick, and the helpless. The same was true for animals - be they domestic or wild. It was always her way.

Upon Lucy’s arrival in Washington, society columnists commented on what changes she surely would make in her hair style, her dress, and her demeanor. But the First Lady remained unchanged - outwardly and inwardly. It wasn’t long before such questions were forgotten. Rather, Lucy’s warmth and kindness to all around her became the recurring topic in DC newspaper columns.

Gifts for Lucy poured in – a mockingbird, a Siamese cat, a turkey, a cow, and other feathered and four-footed creatures. They all found their place in the White House family. When Lucy learned that an owl had become trapped inside the unfinished Washington Monument, she asked that construction stop until it could be freed.

When the Hayeses returned to Ohio, their White House pets came with them. Their homecoming at Spiegel Grove brought more gifts of dogs, chickens, turkeys, and cats. Lucy welcomed and loved them all.

In his letters and diary, President Hayes often mentioned how children, servants, and animals responded to Lucy. He wrote, “All seemed to know her, and loved to be near her. The dogs would climb on her, the Jerseys would rush to her, the pigeons came at her call….How happy she was to see their glad welcome of her. I must preserve the pictures that show these things.”

Lucy's Jersey Cows at Spiegel Grove

Everyone was aware of Lucy’s love for animals and the affection they returned. Some weeks after her death, a Fremont teamster came up to President Hayes after Sunday services. He said, “There was a notable thing at [Lucy’s] funeral. I noticed it and many others [did]. The jerseys – her Jerseys – all came up as near to the funeral procession as they could get and stood in a row looking at it – standing still like soldiers in ranks until the funeral had all passed.”

Willetta Adams Michaels: Woman of Talent and Vision

2010-02-07T18:09:00.001-08:00

When Willetta Adams graduated from Fremont Ross High School in Fremont, Ohio, in 1910, the right to vote for her and all women across the United States was still a decade away. Casting a ballot wasn’t the only restriction women faced in 1910. Their career choices also were greatly limited.

None of that seemed to matter to the talented Willetta Adams. Holding a firm vision for her future, she charted her own course. She joined the first women’s basketball team in Fremont. Willetta went on to attend secretarial school, eventually leading to employment at Claus Shear and the well-known Jackson Underwear Company.

A gifted vocalist, she studied at the Toledo Conservatory of Music and at Heidelberg University. Willetta joined Fremont’s Musical Matinee Club, Madrigal Glee Club, and the Brahms Choral Club. She performed in musical productions that featured lavish sets and costumes. Pictured here is one of her family’s photographs, showing the cast of the club’s performance of the popular Gilbert and Sullivan production “H. M. S. Pinafore.” Willetta can be seen standing second from the left dressed for her role as Little Buttercup.

She was one of the first to perform musical readings for Fremont composer Elizabeth Cox. Winning numerous honors, Willetta gave recitals throughout Ohio. A significant highlight was recognition by and the opportunity to sing for the internationally renowned opera contralto Mme. Schumman – Heink.

After her marriage to Hayes Michaels, one might have expected that being a wife and mother would have consumed all of her time and energy. But while caring for their ten children, Willetta continued her musical career. As a member of Trinity Evangelical Church, she also sang in the choir, taught Sunday School, and participated in the Dorcas Circle Class, Women’s Missionary Society. The Batesole Farm Women’s Club was part of her life as well.

Willetta lived until 1978, long enough to see career opportunities open up for young women. But in her era, the full and vibrant life Willetta Adams Michaels carved out for herself was accomplished only by a personal vision and a drive to make the most of every talent she possessed.

This post first appeared in Lifestyles 2000 Fremont, Ohio

Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans Home, Xenia, Ohio

2010-02-07T08:45:00.000-08:00

The stereoscopic view at left is of children playing on the lawn before one of the cottages at the Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home in Xenia, Ohio. The image, one of a series, was given to Lucy Webb Hayes, who was instrumental in rasing funds to establish and support the orphanage.

The Grand Army of the Republic, a veterans' organization of Union soldiers who fought in the American Civil War, established the Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home in Xenia, Ohio in 1869. GAR officials rented a two-story building, where some 50 children were housed.

Initially, children whose fathers had died in the Civil War or as a result of service-related wounds or disabilities were accepted. The need was so great that the city of Xenia donated more than 100 acres outside the city to establish a larger orphanage. A committee petitioned Ohio's General Assembly to assume control of the orphanage. In April 1870, the orphanage officially became an institution of the state of Ohio. That summer, the orphanage was moved to the land outside Xenia.

The first board members (1870 - 1874) were General Ralph P. Buckland, of Fremont; General James Barnett; General J. Warren Keifer; Barnabas Burns; General Manning F. Force; head of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Home at Sandusky; General John S. Jones; and A. Trader.

Originally, the Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home provided Ohio children who had lost their father in the American Civil War with a place to live. Eventually, the State of Ohio opened the institution to orphans of all military conflicts and the children of all veterans, including ones who had not died on the battlefield. In some cases, the children of a living veteran and/or his spouse, who were suffering financial difficulties could leave their children at the home. In 1901, more than 900 children resided at the institution. It was the largest institution of its kind in the world.

Children lived in cottages like the one featured in the image above. They received a traditional education and manual training. In 1978, the Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home became known as the Ohio Veterans' Children's Home. In 1997, the Ohio Veterans' Children's Home ceased operation. More than 13,500 children had been cared for and educated. The Greene County Library maintains an online database of "Applications for Admission" to the home from 1877 - 1919.

As early as 1881, the Association of Ex-Pupils was formed. Members consist of former pupils of the Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home or of the Ohio Veterans' Children's Home. You can read a 1901 article from the institution's newspaper, the "Home Weekly", reporting on some of the former pupils. For pictures of the home from 1901, follow this link to those displayed on Ohio Memory.

Each year, the association holds a three-day reunion on the former site of the home. They also operate a museum and have worked to improve the care of the Collier Chapel Cemetery. In 1963, a history, titled Pride of Ohio: The History of the Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home at Xenia, Ohio, 1868-1963, was published. The association is now in the process of publishing a second history due out this year.

William King Rogers and Duluth, Minnesota's Skyline Parkway

2009-12-31T13:40:00.000-08:00

Columbus, Ohio native and ordained minister, William King Rogers was an early law partner of and later personal White House secretary to President Rutherford B. Hayes. Before the Civil War, Rogers moved to Minnesota where he was involved in the development of the cities of Hastings and Duluth. He also invested in railroads, a canal across Costa Rica and Panama, and mining interests in northern Mexico. Sadly, Rogers suffered financial losses in nearly all of his investments.

Despite his misfortunes, Rogers made a lasting contribution to the city of Duluth that exists to this day - the Skyline Parkway. As an investor in the Duluth Highland Improvement Company, Rogers realized that the development of his hilltop property depended on better access. As he surveyed the view of the city from the upper terrace, Rogers wrote that "no one can glance over it and doubt that one of the great cities of the world is here in the making...."

To that end, he advocated the construction of an incline railway to reach his land holdings. During a visit to Ohio in the summer of 1889, Rogers met with President Hayes at Spiegel Grove, explaining the importance of constructing the incline.

In his diary, Hayes indicated that he was fully aware that his dear friend Rogers was a poor businessman. Despite his concerns, Hayes agreed to invest in the project. Hayes believed that his share of the cost should have been one-tenth, but in reality, Hayes knew that he was paying one-sixth of the construction costs. To secure his investment, Hayes explained that his portion would only be forthcoming when the incline reached the Duluth property he himself owned. At right, is a 1904 image of the incline railway from the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

At left, is a map of Duluth given to President Hayes by Rogers. According to Mark Ryan in his article, "The History of Skyline Parkway," the incline intersected with the Old Beach Road, a path that followed a natural terrace left behind by glaciers.

In 1875, Rogers had looked out over the view from the terrace - the lake nearly 500 feet below. It was then that he conceived of a park system that would one day feature a citywide boulevard built across the hilltop, following the natural terrace. Such an improvement, he was certain, would attract more real estate investors.

As head of Duluth's park board, Rogers wrote to Hayes early in 1889, telling him that work on the parks and driveway had already begun. He believed that construction costs for four miles of the terrace boulevard would not exceed $5,000. "Nature has done the work" of creating a natural roadbed by grading, graveling, and draining. A wooden fence followed the boulevard's rim. Boulders were placed near the curves. Known as Rogers Boulevard or Terrace Parkway, the road was an immediate attraction for tourists and locals who enjoyed Sunday caravan rides and the spectacular view of Duluth and its harbor.

Due to ill health, Rogers resigned from the park board in 1891. He returned to Ohio, where he died in 1893. But others had already caught hold of his vision and would extend and complete the scenic byway. The total cost reached $312,000! Originally, the boulevard ran from from Chester Creek to Miller Creek, a distance of some 5 miles. Today, linked by bridges and parks, Skyline Parkway extends nearly 25 miles. Above, right is one of Bob Hendrickson's 2007 photos of Chester Park available on Google Earth. The breathtaking natural beauty that so captivated Rogers more than 100 years ago remains evident today.

Many of Rogers' Papers are located at the Hayes Presidential Center. His correspondence with President Hayes is part of the Rutherford B. Hayes Papers.

The Sidney Frohman Foundation Funds Educational Museum Experience for Sandusky City School 4th Grade Students

2009-12-05T17:21:00.000-08:00

On November 18,19, and 20th, more than 300 4th grade students from six Sandusky City Elementary Schools visited the Hayes Home and Hayes Museum. Their firsthand learning experience was made possible by The Sidney Frohman Foundation, who sponsored the students' participation in the Hayes Center's Curriculum Connections educational program.

Developed by the Hayes Presidential Center staff, Curriculum Connections is a three-part program, providing a "classroom satellite" experience by incorporating Ohio's Social Studies Academic Content Standards into a pair of DVD resources given to teachers for classroom use before and after students' onsite visit.

In a time of tight school budgets and greater emphasis on meeting curriculum goals, schools have been forced to cut back or eliminate visits to Ohio's historic sites. In the words of one teacher: " The Sidney Frohman Foundation's sponsorship of the Curriculum Connections program gave us a chance to lift history from the pages of the book for our students! The 'real thing' has enduring appeal."

Curriculum Connections allows teachers and students to better connect with our nation’s past, Ohio’s history, and our local history while addressing Ohio’s Social Studies and English/Language Arts Academic Standards.

The program finds sponsors, like The Sidney Frohman Foundation, that are willing to cover admission and/or transportation costs for school children to visit the Hayes Presidential Center.

Hayes Presidential Center Development Director Kathy Boukissen is seeking additional sponsors for school systems that do not have adequate funding for a visit. For more information about Curriculum Connections or to donate to the program contact Kathy at 419-332-2081, ext. 26 or email her at kboukissen@rbhayes.org.

More on Andersonville Survivor David Daub

2009-09-25T08:44:00.000-07:00

In an earlier post, the Andersonville Survivors Association certificate of David Daub of Burgoon, Ohio was posted. Daub was born in York County, Pennsylvania and later moved with his parents to Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, where he enlisted in the 45th Pennsylvania Infantry. Captured at Petersburg, he was imprisoned at Andersonville, Libby, and Danville.

Following the war, Daub moved to Jackson Twp., Sandusky County. In later life he settled at Burgoon, Ohio. Thanks to Richard Hanny for sharing this picture of David Daub, his wife Lydia, and daughter Sarah Catherine, standing in the front yard of the Daub home in Burgoon. Richard also brough us this albumen print of Daub with other Civil War veterans at an apparent reunion. Unfortunately, there is no date or location on the print.

Discovery of WW II Seaplane Confirmed as that of Fremont Native Lt. Col. Jack Zimmerman

2009-09-06T10:11:00.000-07:00

More often than we might think, the past meets the present. In 1996, relatives donated materials to the Hayes Center, documenting the aviation career of Fremont native and pioneering pilot Lt. Col. Jack Zimmerman. They included his log books, photographs of his planes and fellow pilots, and articles appearing in newspapers and aviation newsletters.

There was no doubt that Zimmerman was one of those daring, early pilots whose every flight was filled with danger. He was one of a handful who catapulted TWA’s fledgling airline into a leader in the commercial aviation industry.

Zimmerman logged more than two million flight miles, crossed the Atlantic more than 100 times, flew TWA’s first Boeing 307, set numerous aviation speed records, and piloted TWA’s first flight into New York City's LaGuardia Airport. He also flew secret flights for the FBI. A 1942 biography, The Million Miler, the Story of an Air Pilot, chronicled Zimmerman’s aviation career

It was almost a given that he would enlist in the Army Air Corps when WW II broke out. In charge of a fleet of seaplanes that ferried supplies to Allied Forces in England, Zimmerman was the most senior pilot. In November 1942, Zimmerman’s seaplane foundered on take-off in rough seas. With seawater rushing into the fuselage through a damaged wheel well, the PBY Catalina

sank instantly. Fishermen from Quebec’s Longue-Pointe village rescued four of the nine men, but Jack Zimmerman was not among them.

The dark, cold waters of the Atlantic swallowed up the seaplane along with its brave pilot and four crew members – seemingly lost forever. That was until August 7th when I received a call from a Canadian who was searching for information on the Internet about Jack Zimmerman..

He said, “Didn’t you hear? It was in the New York Times, Bloomberg News , and in all of the Canadian newspapers. Parks Canada believes they have discovered the plane of Jack Zimmerman, the pilot you wrote about in your article!” He told me that during a routine survey, underwater archaeologists found the wreckage of a well-preserved seaplane in the area where Zimmerman and his crew were lost 67 years ago.

Side-scan sonar indicated the plane appeared to be well preserved. Parks Canada said that “in collaboration with the U. S. Government, they will be launching an operation to formally confirm the identity of the wreck and to explore the possibility of eventually recovering the remains of missing crew members. Parks Canada is dedicated to managing the discovery with the dignity and respect owed to lost American soldiers.”

On August 21st, Parks Canada, using a remotely operated vehicle (ROV), confirmed conclusively that the PBY they had discovered was that piloted by Lt. Col. Jack Zimmerman. You can watch a video of the underwater archaeologists as they view the downed aircraft.

This post is an updated variation of an article published in the September 2009 issue of Lifestyles 2000.

Analyzing a Victorian Era Gown

2009-09-02T13:32:00.000-07:00

Dating and identifying owners of 19th-century clothing can be difficult without documentation from individuals or descendants who know the history. When the Hayes Center received the George Buckland Collection from Jacksonville, Florida, a number of pieces of clothing were included in the donation. Among the items was an elegant silk dress. When it was made and for who remained a mystery until intern Alexandra Hutchings analyzed and researched its fabric and style. Below is Alex's analysis and description.

A one-piece elegant gold-colored dress features a fitted bodice and a train skirt, originally called a “mermaid’s tail,” a style that dates to approximately 1880. The bulk of the fabric used for this dress is silk. Hand-embroidered cream-colored silk flowers and leaves adorn the entire hem, skirt front, and bodice.

A matching gold velvet ribbon is sewn into the bottom of the bodice and wraps around to the back to form a bow with long ribbon tails. Cream-colored cording is used as lacing for the bodice front. Hand-sewn openings for the cording feature the same embroidery floss as the flowers and leaves. The sleeves puff slightly at the shoulder tapering down tightly at the wrist, ending with 1½” upturned cuffs.

Beneath the embroidered flowers of the skirt at the hem is ruching approximately 5½” in width. The lace placed on cream-colored silk on the front of the skirt gives the illusion of a complete under petticoat, but the lace in reality covers only the space visible to the eye. The same lace adorns the collar, cuffs, and shoulder areas.

There is a balayeuse or “dust ruffle” made of heavily pleated strips of fabric serving as a hem guard, with one ruffle in the front and three separate ruffles in the back under the “mermaid’s tail.” The dust ruffles are hand stitched loosely to a stiffer fabric perhaps for easy removal for washing.

Some of the manufactured items in this dress include: a belt secured on the inside back of the bodice to help with the weight of the garment. It includes a printed brand name, Cregmile Cincinnati. Quarter and half inch boning along with brass hook and eye closures were used in the bodice. Lace (different from the lace used on the bodice and front of skirt) found at the hem beneath the ruching of the skirt was also manufactured.

This gown has many qualities that fit the princess style dress dating from 1875 to 1881. The “mermaid’s tail” measures about 70” (evening gown length). The bustle, and the fitted and boned bodice are markers of the “princess style dress”.

The bulk of the dress was sewn by machine. However, the many finished edges were done by hand.

The overall appearance of this gown clearly emphasizes the hourglass shape.

A further search of the collection turned up two cabinet card images taken in Mora’s Studio at 707 Broadway in New York. One of the images was identified as “Elizabeth Huntington Rice, June 1881.” We later learned that Elizabeth Huntington married Brigadier General Edmund Rice, June 14, 1881 in Cincinnati, Ohio. We now know that the dress in our collection was Elizabeth Huntington’s wedding gown.

Andersonville Survivors Association

2009-09-02T08:38:00.000-07:00

Discovered recently behind a framed picture was this certificate presented to David Daub of Burgoon, Ohio on the 2nd of January 1880 by the Andervonville Survivors Association.

Daub was born in York County, Pennsylvania on February 18, 1845. He was the son of Michael and Katherine Daub. He moved with them in 1855 to Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. At the outbreak of the Civil War, Daub enlisted from Lancaster County as a private in Company B of the 45th Pennsylvania Infantry. He fought at the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and Petersburg. Following the Petersburg mine explosion, he was captured. He was imprisoned at Andersonville for seven months and later at Libby Prison and Danville. Daub was paroled February 22, 1865 at Annapolis, Maryland.

The certificate recognized Daub as a lifetime member because of his imprisonment at Andersonville. The certificate further states that "his Health has been seriously impaired and he contracted General Disability during confinement in Rebel Prisons."

The organization was founded in the wake of the publicity surrounding the trial of Henry Wirz, the commandant of Andersonville. Former prisoners of war formed the organization to lobby Congress for disability pension legislation.

Following the war, Daub moved to Sandusky County and farmed 120 acres in Jackson Township. He married Lydia Shale and the couple had five children. In 1901, he moved to Burgoon, where he sold hardware and implements until fire destroyed his business. Daub was a member of Sandusky County's Eugene Rawson Post of the Grand Army of the Republic. He was also a road supervisor and a member of the Evangelical Church. December 5, 1919, Daub died suddenly of a heart attack.

Digital Diaspora Family Reunion

2009-09-01T19:02:00.000-07:00

While working to compile the names and service records of Sandusky County, Ohio Civil War soldiers, I uncovered nearly two dozen African Americans, who served in the conflict. Some were born free; others escaped the bonds of slavery. From GAR membership rolls; the research project of Washington Courthouse High School students; cemetery records; and obituaries, I was able to piece together fragments of their lives. (You can read about them by following this link.) My great frustration was my inability to locate even one photograph!

I am hopeful that in the coming weeks, all that will change. This month Digital Diaspora Family Reunion goes live! The project is the brain child of New York documentary filmmaker Thomas Allen Harris. While working on Through a Lens Darkly, a documentary about professional African American photographers, Harris decided to explore broader themes. He has developed a web-based multi-media project, where individuals will be able to upload their family photos to a central archive. They will also have the opportunity to explore other family stories, make comments, and add data.

Using an “Antiques Roadshow” format, Harris held events in Georgia, Maryland, and other states, where he has already gathered and archived thousands of African American family photographs. He hopes that photographs lying hidden in shoeboxes and attics will be shared, allowing African Americans to explore the lives and history of their ancestors. Further, he believes that his initiative “will document moments in African American history that have been lost or overlooked - such as the inter-racial communities that flourished briefly but were later stamped out by Jim Crow laws and the Ku Klux Klan.”

Harris is correct in stating that “museums, historical societies, and archives have rarely preserved and interpreted the work of professional and amateur African American photographers.” One of the few African American photographs preserved at the Hayes Center is this cabinet card of Lizzie Breckenridge. Sadly, I have been unable to find much information on her. But I remain hopeful that through the Digital Diaspora Family Reunion, I will have the opportunity to learn more about the life of Lizzie Breckenridge and those of other African Americans who lived in Sandusky County. Most especially, I would like to see the faces of brave Civil War soldiers like Edwin Leonard who, along with his African American comrades of the 54th Massachusetts, launched the Union attack on Fort Wagner.

Memoir of John Gephart Sneider

2009-07-19T17:39:00.000-07:00

Between the years 1850 and 1870, some 200 of the 1,500 residents of Wolfurt, Austria emigrated to the United States. Wolfurt, is located in Vorarlberg, the westernmost state of Austria. It borders three countries: Germany, Switzerland, and Liechtenstein. Tyrol is the only Austrian state that shares a border with Vorarlberg. Many of the Wolfurt residents settled in or near Sandusky County, Ohio. They included families with the surnames Fischer, Flatz, Heim, Kalb, Reiner, Schneider, Dur [Dehr], Gmeiner, and Bohler.

Below is a memoir by John Gephart S[ch]neider, who came with relatives to Sandusky County, Ohio in 1853. The memoir was transcribed and provided by descendant John Fischer.

From the time I, John Gephart Sneider [also spelled Schneider], left the Old Country until the present date, March 15, 1915.

I left my old home, a village by the name of Wolfart, not far from Lake Constance, Voralberg, Tirol, on the 18th. Day of February, 1853, with my two uncles, Messrs. Flatz, and an Aunt Johanna Flatz, Martin Schwerzler, Joseph Bohler, Martin Kalb and their families. We went though Switzerland and part of Germany, and got to Antwerp, Belgium, in five days, from where we shipped for America February 28, 1853, in a sail boat by the name of Petrol, and in forty-nine days we landed in New York (April 18th). April 24th, 1853 we got to Fremont, Ohio.

My two Uncles bought forty acres of land east of Linsay. I worked for them that summer for the passage they payed for me to come to this country. In the winter of 1853 and 1854 I was trying to learn the cabinet trade by Adam Miller at Fremont, but he called me a dog, which I could not stand and left him, and went to Scott Township, and worked for Jacob Zimmerman on the farm that summer, and worked for other farmers until in the Spring of 1856.

In the Fall of 1855 I was taken with the Ague and could not get rid of it. I was told I had to change climates before I could get rid of it, so in the Spring of 1856 I went to Iowa where I had some Old Country friends. When I got to them they were ready to move to Minnasota, and they wanted me to go with them, so I did, and staid with them that summer; but they said the winters were very cold, so late in the Fall I came back to Ohio again, and went back to my old friend, Zimmerman in Scott Township. I staid with him that winter of 1856 and 1857, and done the chores for my board, and went to English school for three months.

In the Spring of 1857 Joseph Bohler and I started for Kansas, and each entered a piece of Government land at a Dollar and a Quarter an acre. In the Spring of 1859 the Gold Excitement of Pikes Peak came up; then Joe Bohler and I sold out in Kansas and made preparation to go to Pikes Peak, four in company. Each bought a yoke of cattle and wagon in company. Then we went to Leavenworth City and bought provisions for six months, then started West. As we got out a couple hundred miles we met hundreds of gold seekers coming back, who reported it was no good.

We having plenty of provisions with us, we concluded then to go to California. The five years and four months I was in California I worked in the gold mines, but I was not one of the lucky ones to strike it rich. When I went in the mines I had $150.00, and after working five years I came out with $750.00. Then in December, 1864, I started for Ohio to see my Father, Brothers and Sister whom I had not seen for nearly twelve years. My Father and Mother, with the family, came to this Country in 1859, six years after I did. My Mother died four days after she came to Fremont.
Coming back to Ohio from California, I made the trip by water, and passed through Panama about where the Panama Canal is located now. The Winter of 1864 and 1865 I made my home with Father, Brothers and Sisters in Rice Township on the farm my Brother Leonard lives on now. In the Spring of 1865 I went West again to Iowa, and worked for a railroad company, firing a construction locomotive at Two Dollars a day. If I had been a younger man, I would have learned the railroad business, but I was then in my thirtieth year, and too old to start in to become a railroad engineer. At that time they all had to start as firemen. Then at beginning of winter of 1865 and 1866 I came back again home.

On October 22d, 1866, I got married to Mary Ann Reineck, and located in Fremont for one year. I then bought six acres of ground of Flat Brush, a mile west of the Corporation of Fremont, and put buildings on it, and made that my home for forty six years. My Wife was the mother of twelve children (one died when nine weeks old; the other eleven we raised to manhood and womanhood). My dear Wife died April 24, 1908. She had been sick and ailing for over five years, and for over two years helpless. My girls and myself have taken good care of Ma. It was done for her all that could be done for a sick person.

After I was married and moved to town I went to work at Carpenter work for Mr. John Stierwalt, and worked for him twenty-seven years. Then Mr. Stierwalt quit carpenter business, and then I contracted for myself until my dear Wife died. After my dear Wife died, my younger children and I stayed and kept house at our home in Ballville Township until a year ago last July 1914 (moved July, 1913). I then sold the old home to R. W. Jackson. Since then my youngest daughter, Mary, and I have made our home in Fremont.

Birth of myself, Wife and Children: -

John Gebhard Sneider, born June 12, 1836, married to Marry Ann Reineck Oct. 22, 1866. Mary Ann Reineck Sneider, my Wife, born Nov. 10, 1847, died April 24, 1908.

There was born to us twelve children, as follows:

Balbina Susana March 31, 1868,
John Martin November 5, 1869,
Frank Joseph August 6, 1871,
Mary Josephine September 11, 1873
Eleanor October 30, 1876
Gephart August 27, 1878,
Ida Rose May 9, 1880, died July 10, 1880,
Wilhelm Oct. 15, 1881,
Johanna Adeline December 2, 1883,
Bernhard June 9, 1885,
Ann Mary June 9, 1888,
Roman Isidor March 14, 1892.

Reverend Franklin and Bertha Ohlinger: Methodist Missionaries of Foochow, China

2009-06-24T12:11:00.000-07:00

Born in Sandusky County, Ohio, in 1845, Reverend Franklin Ohlinger (standing third from left with other faculty of the provincial university) was the son of David and Hannah (Miller) Ohlinger. Next to the youngest of seven children, Franklin managed the family farm and supported his mother while his father and older brothers served in the Civil War. Shortly after the war ended, Ohlinger entered German-Wallace College (now Baldwin-Wallace College) located at Berea, Ohio. In 1868, he was ordained in the ministry of the Methodist Church. Early in 1870, Ohlinger attended a lecture about the mission fields. That fall, the Methodist Mission Board sent Ohlinger to serve in Foochow, China.
The opium wars, arrogance of foreign representatives, and the plundering of Peking in 1860, made Ohlinger's mission extraordinarily difficult. A skilled linguist, Reverend Ohlinger quickly learned the Chineses language and founded the "Zion's Herald." As president of the theological school, Ohlinger translated English hymns into the Chinese language for his students.

In 1876, Ohlinger returned to the U.S. and married Bertha Schweinfurth. The couple left that fall for Foochow. Ohlinger believed that education and evangelism went hand in hand. Assisted with funds from the wealthy Tiong Ah Hok, he founded the Anglo-Chinese College in 1881. For the next 6 years the Ohlingers taught, translated, published texts in the Chinese language.

In 1887, the Ohlingers joined the newly opened mission fields of Korea. It wasn't long before the Ohlingers had mastered the Korean language and established the the first printing facility in Korea.

Following the deaths of two of their children in 1893, the Ohlingers returned to the U. S. for a furlough. Two years later, Reverend Ohlinger returned to China as an independent missionary. Ohlinger translated and published literary works, articles, and texts. In 1909, the Chinese government hired Ohlinger to teach languages at the provincial university at Foochow. (The image at left is one of Ohlinger's class schedules).

Reverend Ohlinger returned to the United States because of illness. Although frail, he lectured extensively on the Chinese culture and the Methodist Church's missionary work. Equally at home in the German, Chinese, Korean, and English languages, Ohlinger published and translated hundreds of articles, books, and pamphlets. Reverend Ohlinger passed away in 1919 at the Scarlet Oaks Sanitarium in Cincinnati, Ohio.

The Ohlingers are buried in the Woodlawn Cemetery in Toledo, Ohio. Their tombstone reads: "Friends of the People of China and Korea."

September 2011
Jon Shafer, whose great grandmother was the sister of Bertha Schweinfurth Ohlinger shared an incomplete news clipping about the Ohlingers. A relative shared it with him while attending a family reunion. The story is believed to have been published in a 1910 issue of the Toledo News Bee.

RACE 11,000 MILES WITH DEATH TO SIDE OF STRICKEN PASTOR

Spurred by the hope of reaching her goal in time to again see her husband in life, Mrs. Franklin [Bertha]Ohlinger, of the Vistala apartments, on Twelfth Street [Toledo], is preparing to undertake an 11,000 miles race with death to Foochow, China. Mrs. Ohlinger will be accompanied by her daughter,Constance, aged 10.

Cablegram bearing news of the serious illness of the Rev. Franklin Ohlinger at his Methodist missionary station in Foochow, has been received by his son, Attorney Gustave Ohlinger. No details were given.

Suspense of the Rev. Mr. Ohlinger's relatives here is made greater because of the distance that separates the stricken missionary from his home. The minimum schedule between San Francisco and Foochow is five weeks.

Mrs. Ohlinger is planning to start by next Friday. She will travel across the continent to San Francisco and expects to embark on the steamship "Nippon Maru" which sails on February 8. The route will ___ by the way of Honolulu, thence to Yokohama, and to [Shan?]ghai across the Pacific Ocean _________

[Mrs. Ohlinger was?]..... a missionary with her husband both at Korea and at Foochow. Her husband is one of the best known missionaries in the country. For over 40 years he has been teaching Chinese and Koreans.

The Rev Mr. Ohlinger and his wife started the first newspaper in Korea. Up to the time he was taken ill, Mr. Ohlinger was editing that publication. He has often been referred to as "Korea's Caxton." The Reverend and Mrs. Ohlinger were the pioneer missionaries of Korea. Two of the children, who died in 1893, were the first white children buried in Korea. Mrs. Ohlinger made her last visit to Foochow in 1899.

HAS LIVED ABROAD

While he always called Toldedo his home, the Rev. Mr. Ohlinger has lived here only at intervals, spending a major portion of the last 40 years of his life as a missionary in foreign lands. He is 65 years old.

The Rev. Mr. Ohlinger left Toledo in September, 1909. [?He?] intended to retire as a [?missionary?] within the next year and ____ several volumes on ____ wo__ the manuscript to ___

Fremont Then and Now: A Pictorial History of Progress and Change

2009-06-08T08:32:00.000-07:00

Deeply interested in the area's past, Larry Michaels and Krista Michaels worked for more than two years to create a visual record of Fremont, Ohio's amazingly rich history. Arranged in a "then and now" format, their 186-page work contains over 250 images. More than 100 historic photographs were carefully selected from the holdings of the Hayes Presidential Center's Local History Photograph Collection. Others came from private collections, the Birchard Public Library, and the Sandusky County Historical Society.

The authors paired many century-old images of homes, stores, churches, schools, streets, businesses, and the Sandusky River with modern views of the same scenes. Fremont: Then and Now chronicles the change and continuity of this vibrant Northwest Ohio city. Also included are key dates in Fremont's history, the origins of street names, and an index. You can purchase their fascinating book, Fremont: Then and Now, at the Hayes Presidential Center's Museum Store.

John Brown, Jr. In Canada

2009-05-28T13:26:00.000-07:00

Born in Hudson, Ohio in 1821, John Brown, Jr., eldest son of the abolitionist John Brown, took part in the violent struggle in Kansas between the free-staters and the proslavery faction. However, he and his brothers Salmon and Jason and brother-in-law Henry Thompson refused to join the raid on Harper's Ferry. John Brown, Jr., served as agent of Emigration for the British North American Provinces in 1860-1861, where he labored on behalf of African Americans as well as Native Americans. Brown wrote the following letter to his wife, Wealthy (Hotchkiss) Brown from Chatham, Ontario. Working under James Redpath as an agent for the Haitian Bureau of Emigration, John Brown, Jr. recruited African Americans in and around Chatham to emigrate to Haiti. Brown later resigned his position as recruiting agent and took a group of "New York sharpshooters" to Kansas, where he and his men were attached to the Seventh Kansas Cavalry. But within a short time, Brown fell ill and was forced to resign his captaincy. In 1862, John Brown, Jr., purchased a ten-acre plot on the south shore of South Bass Island at Put-in-Bay, Ohio. His sister Ruth and her husband Henry Thompson also settled at Put-in-Bay. Later, Owen Brown, who had participated in the raid at Harper’s Ferry, joined them. Owen lived in a small cabin on his brother’s land; he spent the winter months on nearby Gibraltar Island serving as the caretaker of Jay Cooke’s summer home.

John, Jr., remained on the island until his death in 1895. He farmed, harvested grapes, practiced surveying, taught science and mathematics to the islanders, and lectured on temperance and slavery.

Windsor Canada West
Friday Eve, March 22nd 1861

Ever Dear and faithful Wife,

It is now Friday evening, and I trust before another Friday Eve I shall be on my way to my much loved home once more. Indeed I have long been counting the days. I expected to have been here last Monday, but could not get ready to leave Chatham until this morning. Reached here about 11 o’clock this afternoon and found your dear letter of the 13th, also enclosing once from Jennie to you. I also found here seviral letters from persons in this region who propose going to Hayti. Also, two from Boston, one from Mr. Newton and one from Mr. Redpath. But as you are the only prompt and faithful correspondent I have, I shall answer you first of all. I sent you a paper from Chatham this morning, and one a day or two before. Have read here the paper Called “the sacrifice”, and one of same name from Mrs. H. F. M. Brown. I would now give you the items of my Journal for several days past, but as I shall probably see you so soon I will defer until I see you. It is late at night and all save me have gone to bed. I presume Johnny is by this time fast asleep. How I do want to see you. Tell him I have bought a little axe for him and will bring it home next week in my trunk. I can almost hear him say “Ma, when will next week come?” Tell him that in 7 days more I hope to see him.

I am getting along well in getting emigrants for Hayti. Ones 50 have signified this determination to go from Chatham, and many will go from Dresden, Boston, Rondeau &c, though the greater number will not be ready to leave before Fall.

There are about 20 who intend leaving this place for Hayti in May. The Free Press Came out in another scurrilous article about me shortly after I left here for Chatham. Stating that, I had finally left this part of Canada, without so much as getting a single donkey to go to Hayti. I have nothing more to say to the Press. The Editor is infinitely beneath notice from henceforth.

It will really afford me a resting spell to get once more to a land where prejudice against Color assumes a milder type than it does in Canada. Indeed, if I were myself as black as ebony should not receive more undisguised coldness from the white inhabitants here than I now do, and this simply because I treat the colored man as an equal socially. In all of Canada West, a man would be read out of what they call “Good Society” who should ask a Colored man or woman to eat at the same table with him. In consequence of my boarding and lodging at their Houses, and in the street and at all places meeting them on terms of social equality, I have scarce been recognized by the white inhabitants here, as belonging to the human family. Every where I have met the cold shoulder. It is perhaps well. I am thereby enabled to sympathise with these people in their experience of a new form of Slavery, at least to me. “Man’s inhumanity to me makes countless thousands mourn.”

Tomorrow, I shall answer letters all day. _ On Monday go to little river settlement, and meet a number of those who wish to go this Spring to Hayti. I have just learned that a white man has made an appointment for a meeting in that settlement next week, at which meeting he proposes to prove that I am not John Brown, but an imposter, who is trying to get the colored people away from Canada and back into Slavery. If it is convenient I shall try and attend that meeting, and so find out with certainty who I am.

Well it is getting very late and I will once more bid you goodnight. I may write again before I leave and may not. _ Give to Mr.& Mrs. Smith Edwards my very warm regards. I hope soon to “greet the bride with a holy Kiss” _ Say to Martha, that the long letter she promised to write me, must have miscarried. Perhaps Smith, forgetting to mail it, yet has it in his pocket. If I keep on writing I may fill out my sheet. I dont want to go to sleep, and yet I must or be unfitted for business. It is now nearly three months since I left home. Well do I remember the time Johnny stood in the Road and kept looking into the Hack as long as he could see me. Don’t let him forget me._ These three long months without companionship, its awful. If it had not been for your letters I don’t know how I could have endured it. What a dear thought, that this is some one whose sympathies go out to us ever faithful and true. _ One such, makes all the rest of the world look poor.

If I can get a moments time I shall send you another letter before leaving here. Mr. Redpath wants me to stay until the middle of April, before returning to Ohio, but I had made up my mind to go home at the time I wrote you, and no ordinary event shall prevent me.

Mr. Anderson accompanied me to the cars at Chatham to day. he sends his kindest regards to you and Owen, and Johnny and to the Edwards family_ Shall look for a letter from you up to the time I leave. Hug Johnny for me “real right”, and believe me ever faithfully

Your loving husband
John Brown Jr.

Lt. Col. William Charles Shortt and His Descendants by Mike Hedges

2009-04-11T06:11:00.000-07:00

Through the decades, descendants of Lt. Col. William Charles Shortt and Hayes Presidential Center staff have exchanged information about Lt. Col. Shortt's family, his descendants, and his military career. Most recently, Mike Hedges of Portsmouth, England, a great great great grandson of Lt. Col. William Charles Shortt contacted me. I thank Mr. Hedges for graciously agreeing to share some of his research in the article below. Above is a photograph of a portrait of Lt. Col. Shortt sent previously by a descendant of William Tayler Peter Shortt.

My great great great grandfather, Lt Col William Charles Shortt, served in the 41st Regiment of Foot in the British Army and died a heroic death at the Battle of Fort Stephenson, Lower Sandusky, Ohio (Fremont, Ohio), on 2nd August 1813.

The Battle of Fort Stephenson

This battle, won decisively by the Americans, was the last western battle in the Second War of Independence (War of 1812) between Britain and America. Fort Stephenson guarded an American supply base on the Sandusky River and became a target for the British, led by Major-General Henry Proctor, after they had failed to capture Fort Meigs at Perrysburg, Ohio.

Fort Stephenson was commanded by Major George Croghan. His superior, Major-General William Harrison, ordered him to destroy the fort and withdraw, believing the British force to be larger than it really was. However, Croghan was confident that he could defend the fort and successfully persuaded Harrison of this.

Croghan’s view was decisively endorsed by the outcome of the British assault. The British and their Indian allies had 96 men either killed or wounded, of whom 25 were from Lt Col Shortt’s column of men from the 41st Regiment of Foot. Shortt himself died with many of his men in a murderous barrage of American fire as he led them into one of the perimeter ditches of the fort.

A full account of the battle can be found on the website http://www.sandusky-county-scrapbook.net/FtStephenson.htm

Lt Col William Charles Shortt

Lt Col William C. Shortt had a rather colourful life and seems to have passed this trait down the generations that followed. According to information provided in 1909 by his great-nephew Captain Henry D. Shortt to the Hayes Presidential Center, he was the eldest son of Major John Shortt of the Madras Native Infantry. William was born in Trichinopoly (now Tiruchirappalli) in India in 1764 and was apparently educated at Eton College[1]. He joined the Army as an Ensign in the 24th Foot in 1782, became a captain in 1783 and joined the 99th Foot at the same rank in 1801. By the time of the Battle of Fort Stephenson, he was a Brevet Lieutenant Colonel[2].

William C. Shortt had a relationship with (or may in fact have married) a Shawnee Indian called Sally Bluejacket (born 1778) while his regiment was garrisoning the British fort on the Maumee River, Ohio, in 1794 and 1795[3]. They had a son, Thomas Shortt, born in 1796, who was later recorded as living in the Indian reservation at Flat Rock, Mi[4]. Thomas had a son Joseph, born in 1833, and Joseph had two daughters[5]. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the relationship between William and Sally did not last and she later married a trader called Wilson. They may have met again in 1813 just before the Battle of Fort Stephenson, as by then Sally was living on the Detroit River, within the area commanded by William’s superior officer, Major General Henry Proctor.

By this time William C. Shortt had married Jean Margaret Stuart (known by her middle name) and they had a son William Tayler[6] Peter Shortt, who had been born in Marylebone, London, in 1800. The name Tayler was no doubt chosen because it was the maiden name of William’s mother Jane; her brother Lt Gen William Tayler was an equerry to King George III.

William C. Shortt’s wife Jean died in 1805 while giving birth to a daughter, Mary, who survived for just seven weeks. In 1809 William married Jane Crooks, whose sister had married the borther of his commander, Henry Proctor. William and Jane had a son, James Symington Shortt, who was born in 1812 and was my great great grandfather. James’ mother died in 1812, probably after giving birth to him.

With the death of their father at the Battle of Fort Stephenson and the earlier deaths of their mothers, William TP Shortt and his half-brother James became orphans at the respective ages of 13 and 1. To support their upbringing and education, the guardians of both boys were granted payments from the Royal Bounty, a fund established to support the families of people who had died in service of the British Crown, for example officers killed in battle.

The Elder Son, William Tayler Peter Shortt

William TP Shortt was educated in Quebec, but eventually returned to England where he gained a Bachelor of Arts degree at Worcester College, Oxford, in 1821 and, true to family tradition, embarked on a career in the British Army. However, before this he engaged in another tradition for wealthy families of that period by going on the so-called ‘Grand Tour’, a visit to classical cities, art galleries and historical sites of continental Europe. In his case, the tour was through France and Switzerland to Italy and consequently, in an early pointer to his future occupation as an author, he published A Visit to Milan, Florence and Rome, etc in 1821. The visit inspired his lifelong interest in Roman antiquities. In 1824, he co-authored Journal of the Principal Occurrences During the Siege of Quebec.

By 1826, William TP Shortt was a Lieutenant in the 17th Regiment of Foot, joining from the 34th Foot. However, he soon abandoned his military career and moved in 1832 to Heavitree, Exeter, England, where he lived as a gentleman of independent means (on his father’s death, he had inherited the freehold rent of Remenham House, near Henley-on-Thames, England). He developed a keen interest in Roman relics and especially coins, many of which were being found during the substantial reconstruction of Exeter that took place from the 1830s to the 1850s. At this time, no great interest was aroused whenever archaeological remains were discovered and building contractors regarded any interference in their work to recover relics as obstruction. However, William TP Shortt was not deterred and, over a period of 23 years from 1832, took it upon himself to retrieve and investigate as many items as he could and to publish the results of his findings.

His persistence led to some incidents on building sites, typical of which is one of July 3rd 1835 when, during his enquiries with labourers about relics found during the re-development of the Upper Market, Shortt was confronted by a prominent Exeter builder, Henry Hooper, ordered off the site and helped on his way by a shovelful of earth! Enraged by this slight on his dignity as an ex-officer and a gentleman, Shortt summoned Hooper for assault. At a court appearance the next day, Hooper admitted the assault but said that Shortt’s habit of retrieving artefacts was constantly interrupting work at the market and that he had refused to leave the site when asked. The Mayor of Exeter, conforming with the general indifference to the history of Roman Exeter, found Hooper guilty but levied a token fine of 10 shillings (50 pence) on him. Shortt was rebuked for his ‘warmth of temper’. The case was well publicised in the local and national press, which generally supported Shortt, and began a trend of making archaeological excavation and research more fashionable[7].

William TP Shortt published many articles about his findings in the Devonshire Chronicle, the Flying Post and other local journals. He apparently insisted on receiving printers’ proofs of his articles, which he then savagely corrected before they were printed! He also wrote two books about his work; the first, with the not very catchy title of Sylva Antiqua Iscana, Numismatica Quinetiam Figulina, or Roman and Other Antiquities of Exeter, was published in 1841 and the following year came Collecteana Curiosa Antiqua Dunmonia; or An Essay on Some Druidical Remains in Devon. The latter book was based on his visits on horseback and in all weathers to every known prehistoric site in Devon. Each book is, it has to be said, hard to read for the modern eye, but each was no doubt very learned and based on Shortt’s great historical knowledge and extensive field work. This did not prevent a magisterial put-down by one writer, who said of Shortt’s books: ‘I could refer to the two works of this author with much more confidence had they been drawn up with the gravity which becomes the subject. They have been compiled in such a careless, rambling and ill-arranged manner, and are so full of haphazard assertions, that I lament extremely that I cannot quote them as authorities’[8]!

Despite this criticism, there is no doubt that William TP Shortt carried out pioneering archaeological work in Exeter that recorded and preserved valuable Roman artefacts. Without his intervention and dedication, they and the valuable historical information that they yielded would certainly have been lost.

William TP Shortt moved to Heidelberg, Germany, in 1855 and died in 1881. He and his wife Margaret had a son and three daughters. His son Stuart followed a military career, and the Army also featured strongly in the lives of his daughter Ann and of the descendants to the present day of his daughter Kathleen. She married Captain John Dent Bird, who was murdered by one of his troopers at Aldershot, England, in 1874. Their son Wilkinson Dent Bird (born 1869) was a decorated soldier, became a Major-General, and lectured and wrote about military history and strategy.

The Younger Son, James Symington Shortt

Orphaned at the age of just one year when his father William died at the Battle of Fort Stephenson, James Symington Shortt probably then lived with his maternal grandmother, Elizabeth Crooks, and his material aunt, Mary. His middle name Symington came from the surname of John Symington of Niagara, who was his maternal grandfather and one of the executors of his father’s will (the other was William C Shortt’s cousin, Captain William Thomas Tayler).

Family researches have so far thrown up no other information about James Shortt’s early life. He is next recorded as living in Ancaster Township, Brent County, Ontario, in 1832. Within a year he was an Ensign in the 48th Foot Regiment of the British Army. In 1835 he transferred to the 4th, or King’s Own, Regiment of Foot, became a Lieutenant in 1837 and a Captain in 1844.

In 1839 at Sholden, Kent, James married Mary Harvey, one of the daughters of Vice-Admiral Sir Thomas Harvey (1775 – 1841) who, along with many other members of his family, served with great distinction in the Royal Navy. Mary died only two years later and James subsequently took her sister Annie as his partner, but they never married because, at that time in England, it was illegal for a man to marry the sister of his deceased wife.

Over the period of James Shortt’s service in the 4th Foot, the regiment was stationed first in Australia then, from January 1838, in India[9]. James and Annie had their first child, a girl, in 1844, but the child did not survive her first day. A son ws born a year later, but is believed to have died in infancy. Their first surviving child, Mary, was born in Kamptee, India, in 1846. James remained in the Army until 1847-48. James’ departure from the Army came shortly after he had been found guilty at a court martial of being drunk at the funeral in Kamptee of a fellow officer, Ensign William Thorpe.

The remainder of James’ life was punctuated by misfortune and tragedy. During the 1850s, he and Annie had five more chilren. a son and four daughters, but only Jessie (born 1850 in Colaba, India) and Helen (born 1855 in Broadstairs, England) survived. Four of these five children were born in India, but it seems that Annie purposely came back to England to give birth to Helen there and give her a better chance of survival. Helen may well have remained in England in the guardianship of Annie’s sister Eliza and may never have returned with her mother to India; certainly Helen was living with Eliza and her husband Admiral William WP Johnson[10] in England in 1866.

James and Annie’s youngest child was Edith Annie Shortt, my great grandmother, who was born in 1861 in Ahmedabad, India. Tragically her mother Annie died just 17 days later from diarrhea and exhaustion following her confinement.

James’ fortunes with employment were no better. After leaving the Army, he and Annie stayed in India and he is recorded as working in the secretariat of the Judicial Department in Bombay from 1851 to 1853. In 1855 he is listed as a clerk, but then prospects seem to have improved, as he held the post of Deputy Marshal of the Byculla House of Correction (a prison in Bombay) in 1856 and was its Governor from 1857-59. Thereafter his employment appears to have resumed its decline, for by 1862 he was a clerk on the Bombay, Baroda and Central Indian Railway.

In 1864 he brought my great grandmother Edith (and possibly one or more of her older sisters) back to England. Edith was put first into the guardianship of her maternal aunt, Sarah Rainier, and her husband Revd. George Rainier, and then into the guardianship of her maternal uncle, Admiral Henry Harvey.

The final tragedy of James Shortt’s life came when he died at sea of dysentery in 1865, probably on his return journey to India, and was buried at sea.

Thus, like her father, Edith Shortt was orphaned at a very young age. She was clearly told of the fate of her parents; a poignant letter, still in the family’s possession, from Henry Harvey to his sister Eliza mentions that ‘little Edith….says her own Papa “gone, dead, gone into the water. Mama died too.”’

Of the four surviving daughters of James Shortt, Mary remained in India and married a civil engineer, Robert Gompertz, but is believed to have died before 1882, when Robert re-married. Jessie (1850 – 1939) never married but went to England, eventually giving birth to a son, Henry. Helen (1855 – 1925) married George Humphreys, a farm labourer. Edith (1861 – 1933) married Thomas Hall, a post office clerk.

Contrasting Fortunes

Thus the two sons of Lt Col William C. Shortt and their descendants experienced contrasting fortunes. William TP Shortt initially followed his father’s footsteps by joining the Army, but the academic side of his nature led him away from military life into pioneering archaeological work. He lived to the age of 81, and several of his descendants continued the family tradition of military service right through to the early 21st century. He did not escape sadness, losing his daughter Kathleen when she was only 27 years old and his son-in-law in an act of murder in 1874.

His half-brother James S. Shortt suffered disadvantages that stemmed from being a second son orphaned at the age of just one year. With no university education, he joined the British Army at the age of 21. His first wife died when he was 29. For him, the early prestige of being an Army officer was later significantly tempered by his court martial, and more sadness came with the loss of five of his children in infancy. The final personal tragedy for him and his daughters was his death at sea at the age of 53; almost inevitably perhaps, the guardians of his three younger daughters could not provide sufficient financial resources for them to be able to live the privileged lives of their parents’ families.

This story of the lives of Lt Col William Shortt and his descendants is the result of much research by my cousin David Royle and myself. There are still many gaps in our knowledge and we would welcome any further information. This can be passed to us by contacting Nan J. Card, Curator of Manuscripts, Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center, Fremont, Ohio at(ncard@rbhayes.org).

Acknowledgements: My family is grateful for information provided during our research by the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center (Fremont, Ohio), National Archives (Kew, London), the British Library (London), the Families in British India (FIBIS) website, Sue Andrew, G. Carlyle Hinshaw and Margaret McGrath.

This article has been copyrighted by Mike Hedges.

Footnotes:

[1] Henry Shortt said that William was educated at Eton College, but my enquiries with the College suggest that this is not correct.
[2] Brevet rank was awarded for distinguished service, but the recipient retained the pay and responsibilities of his previous lower rank. Brevet rank could not be purchased.
[3] Ref. Bluejacket: Warrior of the Shawnees by John Sugden (University of Nebraska Press, 2000).
[4] Article in the Wyandotte Tribune, 3 November 1948.
[5] Information provided in an e-mail to the author.
[6] Correct spelling, but generally recorded as Taylor in later mentions of WTP Shortt
[7] From An Antiquary in Devon (WTP Shortt 1800 – 1881) by R.G. Goodchild, Transactions of the Devonshire Association for the Advancement of Science, Literature and Art, 1947.
[8] From A Dissertation on the Site of Moridunum, The Gentleman’s Magazine, January to June 1849.
[9] From The King’s Own: The Story of a Royal Regiment Volume 2, 1814-1914, by Colonel L.I. Cowper (Oxford University Press, 1939).
[10] William Ward Percival Johnson (1790 – 1880) served as a young seaman on HMS Victory at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805.

Childhood Dream Comes True for Helen Herron Taft

2009-04-09T20:02:00.000-07:00

Venus Williams, Miley Cyrus, Oprah Winfrey, Condoleezza Rice, and Katie Couric are just a few of the notable figures who serve as role models for today’s young women. But in the 19th century, it was an altogether different matter! Barred from voting and severely limited in establishing an independent career, women rarely rose to national prominence. But Helen Herron, a Cincinnati teen found her role model – First Lady Lucy Webb Hayes.

At the age of seventeen, “Nellie,” as her friends called her, visited the White House. She and her entire family were guests of President Rutherford B. and First Lady Lucy Webb Hayes. From that day forward, Helen knew that she wanted to become First Lady more than anything in the world. Years later, she recalled that her visit to the Hayes White House was “the only unusual incident of her girlhood!”

A short time after the Herron family visit, “Nellie” met “the adorable Will Taft.” They later married. William Howard Taft became solicitor general of the United States and then a federal circuit court judge. In 1900, Taft was appointed head of the civil government of the Philippines. Helen, the mother of three children, was more than willing to travel half way around the world to live in a foreign land if it helped her husband’s career. Four years later, the Tafts were back in Washington. President Teddy Roosevelt had chosen Taft as his Secretary of War. Helen was delighted at her husband’s rising political career.

In 1908, her lifelong dream came true! William Howard Taft was elected President of the United States! It was an exciting day when Helen Taft stepped into the role of First Lady. But only two months later, she suffered a severe stroke. Although ill for more than a year, Helen Taft was determined to resume her social obligations. By late 1910, the First Lady, with the help of her daughter, delighted the nation when she hosted the White House events during the Christmas holidays.

Helen Taft became famous for her elegant receptions for prominent dignitaries and foreign heads of state. In her memoir, Recollections of Full Years, the First Lady considered the celebration of the Tafts’ 25th wedding anniversary the “greatest event” of her White House years. Several thousand guests celebrated with them at an evening garden party.

Social obligations were not the First Lady’s only concern; she wanted to make the nation’s capitol a beautiful place for visitors. At her request, Japanese cherry trees were planted. The two original trees she helped plant at a ceremony still stand several hundred yards west of the John Paul Jones Memorial. When the cherry trees bloom each spring, they serve as a reminder of a young Ohio teenager with a big dream and an indomitable will – First Lady Helen Herron Taft.

Fort Stephenson Mining Association

2009-04-03T13:02:00.000-07:00

About to leave for California's gold fields in the spring of 1849, eight men of Fremont, Ohio established the Fort Stephenson Mining Association for their mutual aid and protection. John M. Smith (President); Levi E. Boren (Secretary); and John A. Johnson (Treasurer) joined brothers William and Robert Caldwell, Grovenor Gallagher, Isaac Sharp, and James W. Stevenson in forming articles of agreement that bound the men and their fortunes to each other for a period of eight months. All eight charter members arrived in California safely. Initially, they took up claims on Beals Bar located on the North Fork of the American River, near its junction with the South Fork in Placer County. During the next several years, other Sandusky Countians headed to California to seek their fortunes.

Cyrus Sebring wrote this letter from California to his friend Minerva Justice of Fremont, Ohio. His letter is particularly interesting because it provides a glimpse into the lives of some of the original members of the mining association as well as others from Sandusky County who crossed the plains in the intervening years.

Those mentioned in his letter from Sandusky County, Ohio are:

John M. Smith
Jaques Hulbard
Grove Gallagher
William Caldwell
Robert Caldwell
Putnam Norton
Henry Loveland
Cyrus Thompson
J.C.H. Montgomery
Add. Mann
Kenny Russel
Levi Boren
Peter Hershey
Hiram Kelly

Many of these men returned to their homes in Sandusky County, Ohio. Others lived out their lives in California. And, some died in the gold fields, having never fulfilled their dreams. The record of the Fort Stephenson Mining Association kept by John A. Johnson is housed at the Beinecke Library at Yale University. In an upcoming post, I hope to provide more details of these men who went West in search of gold.

Sacramento City, Feb. 26, 1851

Dear Friend Minerva

I have just received your very kind letter and I can assure you that it was a very welcome visitor for in reality I had about come to the conclusion that all my old friends had determined that I should never again hear from them but oh how agreeably have I been today in recieving your letter. I can truly say that this is the happiest day that I have seen since I left Fremont. Minerva I think I scarcely need attempt to tell you how rejoiced I am to learn that your health has so far improved as to admit of your visiting your friends and enjoying their society. I realy wish that I was at home a short time that I might have the pleasure of enjoying a share of your smiles, but I am far away and deprived of all the pleasure derived from mingling with society and I feel the loss very much but since I voluntarily left I shall endeavor to make the best of a bad bargain and there is one thing certain and that is that I shall know much better than ever before how to appreciate the blessings derived from society and I assure you that I shall endeavor to make my stay in this land of Cutthroats and Gamblers as short as possible. But you know that I came here for the purpose of obtaining gold and I must have some of it before I can return home and as soon as I can accomplish that object you will surly see me coming home. And when I do come it will be to remain. I can assure you that if I live to get back I shall be contented to stay there.

Well now Minerva I presume that you would like to hear from some of the rest of the boys and I am glad that I am able to inform you that they are all well for I have just returned to the city from a prospecting tour and I have visited all of the boys that came from Fremont. Russ and J.M. Smith live together. I took dinner with them on last Friday and they were both of them hard at work. When I went up to them they were both rocking their cradles. I think you would laugh if you could only see Russ at work with his blue shirt on rocking the cradles and then you would laugh I think to see him cook. He moves around so very graceful and then they are so very cleanly they make it ruleable to wash their dishes as often as once during the week. Jaques Hulbard went up with me. We staid until almost sundown and then Jaques and Russ and myself started back for Beals Barr where almost the whole tribe of Fremonters are located, as you will see when I come to enumerate them. And in the first place there Jaques and Grove Gallagher, they tent together and seem to live very agreeably together and both as fat as there is any need for, and the next Putnam Norton and Henry Loveland they live together and are in good health and next comes Robert and Wm. Caldwell. They live together and are quite well and then comes poor Cyrus Thompson. He lives in a tent by himself and is well but looks lonely. And thinks he will not keep house much longer. He talks of going to Scotts River, a distance of about three hundred miles from here.

I believe that I have mentioned all at that place and will next walk down the river four miles to Negro Barr and there I find J. C. H. Montgomery. He is in good health. And then I come down to within four miles of town and there I find Add. Mann [?] and Mr. Stark. Not our Stark but his brother, and they are both well. And then when I get into the city I find Hiram Kelly, Kenny Russel, and Mr. Boren and by the way he wishes me to say that he shall feel himself under lasting obligations to you for your kindness in saying that his family are well. He has had the horrors for the last month. He has not had a letter from home for the three last mails. And now I believe that I have given you a short history of all of the folks from Fremont, and now I must say something about myself and in the first place will say that I am very well and weigh ten pounds more than I ever did before, so that you may judge that California agrees with me very well.

And if I could only see all of the girls for about one day I think I should be willing to stay in this country for some time. For the climate is realy very fine. We have not had any rain as yet and it is about as warm here at this time as it is in Fremont during the month of May. Go out of town and we can gather as many flowers as we wish and we have lettuce and radishes on the table while you are sitting around the stove. And hardly dare look out of doors for fear of freezing your nose. I think that if I only could have the same society here that we have at home I should like very well to live in this country. But without we can be with those we love, there can be no enjoyment or at least there is not for me and now I have a few questions to ask.

And in the first place you speak of recieving but one letter from me. I have written two and in the second one there was a specimen of gold. You say nothing about it. Have you not received it or was it so small that you did not think it worth while to mention it. You must not think that I intended that to answer for the one that I promised to bring you when I come home for I have one on hand and the pin fixed to it. It is rather large to send in a letter but you shall surly have it. I will send it the first opertunity I have that I think that it will be safe to do so. And unless I can have such an opertunity I shall keep it until I come home, which I am in hopes I shall be able to do by next fall, but dare not promise positively to do so. I have written to several of the girls. I say several, I will say a few. I wrote to Eveline and Alvina and A. M. O. and to Hat F___ [?] and Nett and not a single sound do I hear from one of them. I hardly know what to think. It is to me a mistery that I am unable to solve and my sheet of paper is about coming to a close. And I shall soon be obliged to bid you good by.

Cyrus Sebring

I feel very much obliged to those who wished to be remembered to me. Say to Alvina I should very much regret to hear that she should have the consumption poor girl. I could almost cry and would if I could only keep from laughing. Should she be taken off suddenly she shall have my blessing. To start with give her my best wishes and to Eveline give my love in return and to Mrs. Ball and Mrs. Olmstead my kindest regards. Tell them I wish them to keep a protecting watch over the girls.

And say to A. M. O. that Peter Hershey is on his road home and I wish her to be a little upon her gard for I am inclined to think that he has some very serious intentions from what I could learn. Tell her it is my wish that she should take good care of the telegraph office until I return. Tell Nett I am glad to that she is so well employed as teaching the young idies how to shoot. But I don’t see why she did not go to the house that I picked out for her between Fremont and Sandusky City. Where is Rachel. Is she yet in the famous city of Sandusky. I somewhat regret to learn that Mr. Fitch is not yet married. I thought he would have been before this time. Tell him not to dispair but try try again.

I had almost forgotten to tell you that I was going to start for the mines tomorrow. I can’t tell how long I shall stay but will surly be back in time to get all letters that come for me so that I want you to be sure and write to me as soon as your receive this and if it was not asking too much of a friend I would ask you to become a regular corispondent and I will ask you to write as often as you can do so. And tell the girls that I think if they only knew how anxious we folks in Cal. are to hear from them they would surly write. Now I will stop. I think I have now written more than you will have the patience to read if indeed you can read it at all. And now I have one request and that is that you will again write to me and let me hear the news and by so doing you will very much oblige.

Yours C.S.

American Eagle to the Rescue

2009-03-10T11:39:00.000-07:00

While spring is coming to Northwest Ohio, it has beeen only a few weeks since the U. S. Coast Guard rescued fishermen from Lake Erie when the ice broke loose and began to drift. This brought to mind an article I'd read while researching the Lake Erie vessel, the "American Eagle." The vessel (161 tons, 104 foot keel measurement; 24 feet wide with a draft of 9 feet) was built by John Monk in Sandusky, Ohio. She was sheathed with ice iron capable of breaking 8 inches of ice without stopping. By backing up and bucking the ice, the "American Eagle" could break through 24 inches of solid ice.

During the winter of 1898/1899, a large crowd was skating on the Sandusky Bay when the ice broke loose and began drifting out into Lake Erie. Captain Fred Magle and the "Eagle" were dispatched "to the rescue." The "Eagle" succeeded in getting alongside the ice field and then put a line on the field. Magle towed the ice field back to the Sandusky Bay while the skaters continued to skate all the way home.

The "American Eagle" was built for Wehrle and Werk of Middle Bass Island, later known as Andrew Wehrle and Son. Duing the spring and fall of the 1880s, she carried all of the wines from Middle Bass Island and Kelleys Island to Sandusky. During the summer months, the "Eagle" ran the Sandusky and Peninsula route to Put-in-Bay; stopping at Marblehead, Lakeside, and Catawba.

In the spring of 1882, while carrying sport fishermen to the Pelee Island Club on Point Sheridan, the "Eagle" raced the steamer "Jay Cooke." Between Cedar Point and Carpenter's Point, Kelleys Island, the "Eagle's" boiler exploded, killing Chief Engineer James W. Johnson, Fireman Frank Battle, and deckhands Frank Walker and Lorenze Neilson. The tug "Mystic" towed her back to Sandusky, where her boiler was rebuilt.

Three years later, during an excursion run from Lakeside to Put-in-Bay, she struck a reef about 1 1/2 miles west of Kelleys Island. The shoal still carries the vessel's name today. After repairs at the Detroit Drydock, she was chartered by T. F. Newman for the "fruit run" from the Lake Erie islands to Toledo and Cleveland. The "Eagle" transported tons of peaches throughout the 1890s. During the summer months, she continued to run excursions.

The Price of "Progress"

2009-03-06T12:54:00.000-08:00

The night of August 18, 1893, was like any other in Lindsey, Ohio – hot, still, quiet, with stars twinkling silently in the dark sky. Local freight train Number 74 sat motionless on the siding, awaiting the passing of the Pacific Express. Bound for Chicago, the Express was 15 minutes behind schedule as it steamed out of Fremont. Its two coaches and three sleeper cars were loaded with weary passengers, including the entire Chicago Colts baseball team. The Pacific Express throttled up and thundered down the tracks at full speed toward the sleeping village of Lindsey.

Lounging beside their silent locomotive, the crew of Local 74 waved at the Express engineer. Seconds later, the earsplitting sound of metal grinding against metal ripped through the night air. The ground shook violently; windows rattled and then broke.

Although the Pacific Express’ engine and tender and baggage cars had passed the switch safely, weakened bolts suddenly gave way, sending the coaches and sleeper cars careening up the siding directly at train Number 74. Cars crashed into the freight train’s locomotive with such force that it spun completely around. It then toppled on its side.

As the cars of the Express grated against the freight train, the coaches and sleepers were ripped open, hurtling passengers into the midst of the tangled wreckage. The tender of the freight was tossed into a carload of flour, cushioning his fall. But Number 74’s engineer, porter, and brakeman weren’t so lucky. They were crushed beneath the freight’s engine as it toppled on its side.

Six Fremont physicians arrived at the scene by special train. The sight that greeted them was horrific. According to the Fremont Democratic Messenger, “arms, legs, and heads protruded from the twisted wreckage.” Many of Lindsey’s 500 residents stumbled from their beds, dug through the masses of metal, and carried victims to their homes. Those with minor injuries were loaded on to the undamaged cars of the Pacific Express and sent on their way. John Boyer’s mortuary took charge of the dead.

At 3 a.m., a wrecking train arrived from Norwalk to remove the debris. Late Sunday morning, railroad officials viewed the scene. By two o’clock, the tracks were cleared and repairs completed. A short time later, the line was up and running.

Despite numerous deaths and severely injured victims, there was no investigation, no policy change, and no new safety measures implemented. Tragic as it was, such accidents were not uncommon in the 1890s. Americans at the turn of the century were fascinated with technology’s steam, power, and speed. Trains could transport goods cheaply and reliably and travel to the far reaches of the country in record time. “Progress” and “a better life” had their price. Sometimes that price was extraordinarily high.

Elizabeth Rice at Fort Snelling in 1889

2009-02-06T13:32:00.000-08:00

Few wives of career Army officers enjoyed military life during the 19th century. Many found the primitive posts, harsh climate, and rough living conditions so unbearable they returned to live with families in the East. Although born into a life of refinement in Cincinnati, Ohio, Elizabeth Rice, second wife of General Edmund Rice, enjoyed the experience of living at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas; Ft. Keogh, Montana; and Ft. Snelling, Minnesota. Elizabeth wrote the following letter from St. Paul, Minnesota concerning General William T. Sherman, General Nelson Miles, and their families during a 4th of July visit in 1889.

Saint Paul – Thursday
July 4 [1889]

My dear brother: we have given up going with Genl. Sherman on his trip up the Red River and have decided to stay here until Tuesday when he will leave for Bismarck. They all tell me that it is not the season of the year to make the trip. The General is not coming to Keogh but will go to Bismarck and take a boat down the river. I must try and begin to tell you all we did yesterday. After all we did not go on the train but in a carriage. Genl Miles succeeded in getting a light carriage like ours (?) only with four seats inside. We did not start as early as most of the people so avoided the dust. Genl & lady, Genl Miles brother, and myself. Mr. Miles is a much older man than the General. He is president of the Westminster National Bank of Mass. He lost his only unmarried daughter a short time ago & the General persuaded him to take this trip with him. He is going home by the Yellowstone Park and California. Mrs. Miles says he lost his wife many years ago & was perfectly devoted to this girl of fourteen who has just died. She says he has a lovely home but it is to[o] desolate now that he cannot bear to stay in it.

He has traveled abroad and seems to be a very nice man. I tell his history all I know of it, for your benefit for I know you always like to know all about people. It is a ten mile drive to Minneapolis. We drove over the day & returned the other. I will send you a paper with an account of the performances yesterday if I can find one.

We arrived at the Grand opera (?) before the procession and secured good seats directly in front of the stage. Some of the first people we saw on the stage were our traveling companions the priests. The old gentleman proved to be the archbishop or bishop of Minnesota. He was called upon to speak, but he declined. I suppose because although he speaks beautiful English he is obliged to speak it very slowly. He had a very fine face - very different from the priest. We had very cordial pleasant bows from them. When Genl. Sherman arrived he came to the front of the stage & insisted upon my coming up but when I declined he said save a seat for Rachel. She will come & sit with you & she joined us with Col. Bacon. Genl. Miles occupied a seat on the stage. The Sec. of War quite not (?) ____ by his manner & what he said. I hope they reported his speech his manner was charming & you must hear him to appreciate what I mean. He is so ____ & has such a pleasant manner & good voice. General Sherman made a good speech & was cheered again & again when he came out & when his speech was over. He went to the Hotel for dinner. Of course he saw the fall of St. Anthony & the great mills – one of them makes 3000 bushels of flour in a day.

Ed ought to come here if he wants to make flour. I did not see the Hinkles & they say Mr. H. was probably not well enough to be there. We drove home via the Falls of Minehaha and Ft. Snelling – met Genl S & Miss S. and Col. Bacon at the Falls of Minehaha & we were with them last evening. They have gone out today to spend the day with Genl. Terry at Little Bear's. Will write on the trail - mail at Bismarck

Are You An Ohio "Weather Bug"? Take The Ohio Severe Weather Quiz

2009-01-24T07:21:00.000-08:00

(Courtesy of the Ohio Weather Library )

For Ohioans, weather has always been a topic of conversation - perhaps, more so than other states. The great variation in Ohio's weather frequently leaves us complaining of days that are too hot, too cold, too wet, or too dry. And, always in the depths of winter, weather seems to be on the minds of everyone as we deal with ice, freezing rain, fog, snow, and rapid fluctuations in temperature. While Mother Nature is often kind to us, Ohio has had its share of catastrophic weather events and extremes.

To see how you fare on knowledge of Ohio's weathered past, take the quiz below.

1. What and where was Ohio's deadliest tornado?

2. Ohio was one of 13 states hit by the infamous "Tornado Super Outbreak" when 148 tornadoes ripped through the Midwest, leaving a 2,500-mile path of destruction in just 6 hours. In what year did the "Tornado Super Oubreak" occur and which Ohio city was hit hardest?

3. What was the highest temperature ever recorded in Ohio?

4. What was the lowest temperature ever recorded in Ohio?

5. The greatest accumulation of snow from a single snowstorm event occurred during a 6-day lake effect snowstorm that began on November 9, 1996 and continued through November 14. Where did the record accumulation occur?

6. In what year did the worst blizzard in Ohio occur?

7. Has Ohio ever been the center of an earthquake?

8. Each year Ohio averages just over 3 feet of precipitation. What was the wettest year on record? What was the driest year on record?

9. Ohio has had at least a dozen severe floods. Which was the most deadly?

10. What was the deadliest storm to ever hit Lake Erie?

Check Your Answers Below:

1. Ohio's deadliest tornado occurred June 28, 1924 when a twister hit the Lorain and Sandusky area, killing 85 people. It ranks 22nd on the list of the "U.S. Top 25 Deadliest Tornadoes."

Tornado Aftermath along Waterfront at Sandusky, Ohio
(Charles E. Frohman Collection)

2. The "Tornado Super Outbreak" took place on April 3 and 4 in 1974. One of the most intense tornadoes hit Xenia, killing 41 people and injuring another 2,000.

Aftermath of Xenia, Ohio Tornado of 1974
(Courtesy of Ohio History Central)

3. The thermostat soared to 113 degrees on July 21, 1934 at Gallipolis, Ohio.

4. The temperature plummeted to 39 degrees below zero on February 10, 1899, at Milligan, Ohio.

5. Hampden Township in Geauga County recorded 68.9 inches of snow during the six-day lake effect snowstorm of 1996.

6. You guessed it. It was the Blizzard of 1978. The storm that hit Ohio on January 26 is often called the "Storm of the Century." Fifty-one Ohioans died and hundreds of thousands were without fuel, food, and electricity.

7. In January 1986 a magnituide 5.0 earthquake centered in Lake County shook northeastern Ohio, cracking plaster and breaking windows.

8. Ohio's wettest year was 1990 with 51.38 inches. Ohio's driest year was 1930 with 26.59 inches.

9. The flood that struck the Great Miami and Scioto River Valley and killed more than 467 people was the deadliest. It occurred Easter weekend in 1913. Flooding and devastation was statewide.

Flood of 1913
(Charles E. Frohman Collection)

10. The deadliest and most destructive storm to ever hit Lake Erie was the Great Lakes Storm of 1913. Called the "Big Blow," the "White Hurricane" or the "Freshwater Fury, the storm that hit the Great Lakes" packed hurricane-force winds, killing 250 people and destroying 19 ships

If you would like to know more about Ohio's weather, check out the Ohio Historical Society's Severe Weather web page.

Madame Marie Selika: First African American to Perform at the White House

2009-01-19T06:55:00.000-08:00

Madame Marie Selika Williams

When President Teddy Roosevelt invited the Tuskegee educator Booker T. Washington to the White House in 1901, there was a storm of media protest. But years earlier, the first African Americans had been invited to the White House without incident. Introduced to President Rutherford B. and First Lady Lucy Webb Hayes by Frederick Douglass, soprano Madame Marie Selika, known as the "Queen of Staccato" became the first African American to perform at the White House. On the evening of November 13, 1878 Marie Selika and her husband, opera singer Sampson Williams, entertained the President and the First Lady and their guests in the Green Room. Her performance included Verdi's "Ernami, Involami," Thomas Moore's "The Last Rose of Summer." "Ave Maria," and Richard Mullard's "Staccato Polka." Williams then sang "Far Away" for the more than fifteen guests who had been invited by the Hayeses to join them that evening.

The following year, First Lady Lucy Webb Hayes accepted Madame Selika's invitation to attend her concert at St. Luke's Protestant Episcopal Church. (It would be another 17 years before another First Lady attended an African American church.) After separating from St. Mary's, a mission church, St. Luke's became the first independent African American church in Washington, D. C. Madame Selika's performance was in support of the construction of the new church built in 1880 on 15th Street NW.

St. Luke's Protestant Episcopal Church, Washington, D.C.

Born in Natchez, Mississippi in 1849, Marie moved with her family to Cincinnati, Ohio shortly after her birth. Through the patronage of a wealthy benefactor, she began studying music as a child. Selika eventually moved to San Francisco where she studied with Signora Bianchi. In 1876, Marie made her debut as a concert soprano. Following her White House performance, Selika toured the nation, performing for all-black audiences. During her career, she made two European tours that included command performances for Queen Victoria at St. James Hall.

A leading soprano, Selika nevertheless, did not reach her full potential because of racial prejudice. During the 1890s, she opened a music studio in Cleveland, Ohio. Following her husband's death in 1911, Selika retired from the stage. At the age of 67, she accepted a teaching position at the Martin-Smith School of Music in New York, one of the most important musical institutions for African Americans in the United States. Madame Marie Selika Williams died in New York in 1937.

All of Life Was a Stage for Margaret Stahl

2009-01-05T08:12:00.000-08:00

As the curtain came down, Margaret Stahl savored the applause one last time. It would be the final performance of her professional career. Her thrilling, one-woman dramatic portrayals had captivated America’s small town audiences for nearly three decades.

Born shortly after the Civil War on a farm near Fremont, Ohio, Margaret discovered her love of acting on a Cleveland stage. Following training at a Boston dramatic school, she found her niche on the Chautauqua Circuit, an organization that brought both entertainment and enlightenment to millions of rural Americans.

Founded in 1874 in western New York at Lake Chautauqua, the Chautauqua Circuit offered cultural and religious programs that brought renewal of the mind, body, and spirit. It was an instant success. Tents sprang up across the United States. For many small town Americans, the advent of summer meant the arrival of the “big brown Chautauqua tent.” Beneath the canvas, families and communities gathered to enjoy plays, operas, symphonies and lectures on health, travel, and politics. President Teddy Roosevelt called Chautauqua “the most American thing in America.”

Margaret was a perfect fit for the Chautauqua Circuit. Bright, charming, and talented, she thrilled crowds with gripping performances. Her talent was matched only by her hard work. Whether using simple props or elaborate costumes for roles such as “Madame Butterfly” (see photo), Margaret brought life and a vivid reality to each of her characters. Critics praised her artistry, voice, and ability to perform each part from memory. Propelled to the top of her profession, Margaret became a headliner and in constant demand at Chautauqua assemblies, campuses, and local theaters across the nation.

But times changed. radio and the automobile ended the isolation that many American families felt. With the onset of the Great Depression, attendance at Chautauquas began to wane. In 1930, Margaret retired and returned to Fremont where she lived out the remainder of her life.

Margaret Stahl was grateful for her years in the limelight, her financial success, and memories of a life lived to the fullest. She had lived her dream and, as she told one reporter, “I have no regrets.”

Indentured Children in 19th Century Ohio

2009-01-01T11:36:00.000-08:00

Indentured Servant and Apprenticeship Record of
Green Creek Twp., Sandusky County, Ohio

Read abstracts from this township record

The term “indentured servitude” brings to mind a horrifying vision of a ragged, frightened child toiling his or her young life away for a hated tyrant – much like Cinderella in the children’s story. Today’s world, filled with the assistance of public and private agencies, makes it difficult to imagine a time when young children were “bound out’ until they reached adulthood. For families who settled in the wilds of Northwest Ohio’s Black Swamp, the death, illness, or injury of a parent could threaten the very survival of their children. As harsh at it seems, many parents had no choice but to place their children with those who were more financially secure.

During the 19th century, under Ohio law, the care of “destitute” children and orphans became the responsibility of township trustees. Intervening into the privacy of family matters was done with the greatest reluctance. But when relatives or neighbors could not help, trustees had little choice but to find families willing to care for another child.

Officials drew up contracts that legally bound caretakers to provide food, clothing, medicine, and some education for the child. In return, the parent or guardian committed the child to a stated number of years of labor. Beneath the cold, legal language of such documents, a parent’s heart-wrenching agony can sometimes be felt. When John Forester apprenticed his four-year-old Willie in 1866, he requested that his son “be treated as a member of the family.” The standard education was not enough for Forester either: he demanded that his son receive a “complete thorough education in the common sciences.” When Leah Shilts arranged an apprenticeship for her son, she asked trustees to spell out the exact number of months of schooling he would receive each year.

Not every parent felt as John Forester or Leah Shilts about parting with their children. The mother of Mariah and William Pembleton refused to care for her five and six-year-old – even after township trustees provided assistance. Trustees were forced to find them new homes. It must have given officials a sense of satisfaction when they placed the Pembleton children in the homes of two of the township’s most prominent families.

With no formal system for monitoring care, helpless children were indeed at the mercy of their masters. Yet, the record shows that officials remained concerned for them. The same trustees who bound out eleven-year-old William Spence later cancelled the contract and placed the orphan in the county home.

For others, indentured servitude not only saved their lives, but also provided them with loving families who trained and educated them. Boys like William Herald learned the skills of harness making – skills that served him well throughout his life.

After the Civil War, the system collapsed under the weight of so many fatherless and homeless children. Institutions established and managed by charities and churches became home to thousands of Ohio’s orphaned children.

Remembering Andersonville

2009-01-01T09:07:00.000-08:00

Gustavus Gessner

72nd Ohio Volunteer Infantry

For those who knew him, Gustavus Gessner was a successful, dedicated physician, pharmacist, and businessman. But beneath Gessner’s calm, capable exterior lay haunting memories of suffering and death.

Two decades earlier, Gessner, then 16 years old, was among the first to answer Lincoln’s call for volunteers. So outstanding was his military conduct that soldiers of the 72nd Ohio chose him as color bearer. His daring escape at Shiloh, after being seriously wounded, convinced many that he was the bravest man in the regiment.

Soldiering changed for Gessner when, in the spring of 1864, the 72nd received orders to join General Samuel Sturgis’ expedition against Rebel troops led by Nathan Bedford Forrest. After a grueling forced march in stifling heat, the 72nd met the enemy at Brice’s Crossroads. Just as the Union was gaining the upper hand, orders came to withdraw. Although shocked and confused, the 72nd did its duty, covering the retreat of the troops and the cavalry who acted as Sturgis’ personal bodyguard. When ammunition gave out, the men of the 72nd ran for their lives as the Rebel cavalrymen chased them down. Only a third reached safety some 90 miles from the battlefield. The rest - including Gessner - were destined for Andersonville.

Ohio Monument at Andersonville by the Hughes Granite Company
Clyde, Sandusky County, Ohio
(Photo courtesy of Dr. Wallace Eberhard, 2008)

Gessner survived the starvation and torture of Andersonville, but he was witness to countless murders and the suffering of dozens of comrades. He blamed only one man – “the shameless drunken coward” - General Samuel Sturgis. When the war ended, Gessner went on with his life, but he could not forget. “Always,” he wrote, “there was a world of bitter memories filled with scenes of the horror and death of Andersonville - days of torture and nights of agony."

Andersonville
(Photo courtesy of Dr. Wallace Eberhard, 2008)

When Gessner learned in 1882 that Sturgis was appointed head of the National Soldiers’ Home in Washington, D.C., he was outraged. How could the man responsible for the imprisonment, suffering, and death of brave soldiers be allowed to oversee their care in their final days? It was a cruel irony, and Gessner was having none of it.

He launched a massive letter-writing campaign and published editorials in newspapers throughout the Midwest. He contacted former prisoners of war from Ohio, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan, telling them that “we owe it to our dead comrades to expose Sturgis’ cowardice.” Hundreds of letters poured in from veterans, recounting Sturgis’ incompetence and their own sufferings. Gessner’s former comrade and business partner U. S. Congressman Dr. John B. Rice printed their letters and presented them to the House Committee on Military Affairs.

Sturgis was embarrassed and humiliated by the scathing testimony of veterans who had suffered because of the disastrous battle at Brice’s Crossroads. Seeking help from his superiors, Sturgis fought back, defending his actions and leveling sharp criticism at Gessner. A regular Army officer, Sturgis was too powerful and politically well connected for Gessner and his comrades. He kept his position, but remained forever tainted by the words of those who had suffered and survived - and would never forget.

The Dart Boat: A Revered Classic

2008-12-30T16:03:00.000-08:00

Restored Dart Boats
(Courtesy of Ramsey Brothers Restoration)

On August 23rd the Toledo Antique and Classic Boat Society held its annual show at International Park. Featured are antique and classic wooden boats built from the 1920s to the 1960s. Many have been lovingly and painstakingly restored to their former glory by skilled craftsmen. One of the truly revered classics is the Dart. Manufactured by the hundreds and sold around the world, the inboard mahogany runabouts were known for their speed, durability, and seaworthiness.

The Dart was originally built by Lima’s Indian Lake Boat Company. In 1928, a group of businessmen, headed by Admiral Webb C. Hayes, grandson of President Hayes, purchased the rights to build the Dart. Located on Summit St. in Toledo, the company eventually employed nearly 100 craftsmen led by the Dart’s original designer Hocky Holler.

The Dart’s closely spaced frames were constructed of clear white ash. Its hull was strengthened with steam bent white oak. The beautifully balanced Dart also featured a laminated double bottom with a layer of canvas duck between its inner and outer mahogany bottoms. Its deep “V” shape and planing hull were perfect for cutting through the choppy waters of Lake Erie at high speed. Every boat featured the racy chrome Dart “arrow” logo that came to symbolize speed and quality among boaters worldwide. “More speed per horsepower” became the company’s motto. The Dart was a favorite of “bootleggers” who were “hauling the mail” across Lake Erie during the days of Prohibition. Even fully loaded (75 cases of liquor), the Dart could speed across the lake at night, outrunning any and every Coast Guard vessel.

Burdened with the construction of a new plant on Haynes Street, Hayes and his partners had limited time for marketing. But the Dart’s reputation for speed needed little promotion. She gained international attention in 1929 when a 26-foot Silver Dart runabout raced along the River Ouse against England’s fastest train, the famous “Flying Scotsman.” The sleek and sophisticated Dart runabout won hands down. Photographs of the event soon hit boating magazines. Sales skyrocketed. Orders came in from as far away as Jerusalem, where a Dart runabout became the first speedboat to cruise the waters of the Dead Sea.

One of Admiral Webb C. Hayes' sons off Lake Erie's Mouse Island in a Dart Boat, ca. 1929
(Hayes Family Album)

To fill their back orders and meet growing demand, Hayes and his partners planned a 24-hour work schedule that would allow the company to manufacture three boats per day. The company offered four models – an 18 ½-foot; 22 ½-foot; 26-foot and 30-foot, ranging in price from $1,500 to $5,000. There were three-cockpit, split-cockpit, open and sedan models to choose from. The queen of the fleet was the 30-foot Gold Dart with its 125 horsepower Chrysler Imperial engine.

But just as rapidly as sales soared, they quickly nosedived. The Great Depression devastated the company. Hayes tried to forestall liquidation, but by late1933 the Dart Boat Company faded into history. Today, it is estimated that only 30 to 40 of the sleek, graceful Dart runabouts survive.

Play the video and watch Admiral Webb C. Hayes and Hayes Family members in a Dart Boat on the Maumee River at Toledo, Ohio and on Lake Erie at Put-in-Bay and Middle Bass Island. The video is a segment of a film made by the family of Admiral Webb C. Hayes. The film is part of the Hayes Family Collection at the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center

This article first appeared in Lifestyles2000.

The "S. O. S." or Charles B. Stilwell's Self Opening Sack

2008-12-22T13:13:00.000-08:00

“Would you like paper or plastic?” We’ve all been asked that question many times (although much less frequently of late). For more than a hundred years, our choice for hauling groceries was the durable, inexpensive brown paper bag. Once we’d unloaded our purchases, we found all sorts of second and third uses for that square-bottomed sack. From trash to lunches, schoolbooks, or clothes for an overnight stay, the versatile brown paper bag did it all – and we never gave it much thought. But one man did - Charles B. Stilwell, the son of one of Sandusky County’s most prominent pioneer physicians.

Born in 1845, Stilwell grew up in Fremont. At the age of 17, he defied his parents’ wishes and went off to fight for the Union in the Civil War. At war’s end, he studied mechanical engineering, eventually settling in Watertown, New York where he worked for a paper manufacturer. It was in Watertown that Stilwell began thinking about improvements to the conventional paper bag – an odd-shaped tubular affair that had to be pasted together by hand. Its V-shaped bottom made it inconvenient for packing; clerks found it difficult to stack and store.

In 1883, Stilwell was awarded a patent for his invention – a machine that produced a square, flat-bottomed paper bag with pleated sides. He dubbed it the “S.O.S.” or Self-Opening Sack. It quickly became a favorite of grocers, who discovered that with a flick of the wrist, the “S.O.S.” popped open and stood alone on the counter while they packed in more items than they ever thought possible. Collapsible, the “S.O.S.” could be stacked and conveniently stored. Customers liked it too. One man thought it was the “greatest invention of all time!”

The following year, Stilwell moved to Philadelphia where he married and raised a family. Working for the Union Paper Bag Machine Company, he continued to improve his invention, while securing patents for another machine, one that printed on oil cloth, and a map for charting the course of the stars.

Charles Stilwell’s “S.O.S.” revolutionized the paper bag industry, but it really came into its own in the 1930s when freezers, refrigerators, supermarkets, and cars emerged as part of the American lifestyle. It was then that families began shopping and transporting in a single trip, enough food for an entire week. The “S.O.S.” became a staple of the industry and proved indispensable to shoppers, who found a million and one uses for the brown paper bag once they’d unloaded the groceries.

Stilwell’s invention did not bring him wealth, but it did provide him with a comfortable lifestyle – one that allowed him to travel to England and indulge his passion for William Shakespeare. He died in Wayne, Pennsylvania in 1919. In accordance with his wishes, his ashes were interred at Oakwood Cemetery in his boyhood home of Fremont.

Nettie Cronise Lutes: Ohio’s First Woman Lawyer

2008-12-22T12:15:00.000-08:00

On that spring morning in 1873, Nettie Cronise appeared poised and confident as she stood before three judges of the Ohio Common Pleas Court. Beneath the calm exterior was a nervous, apprehensive young woman. The judges’ decision would shape not only her future, but also that of hundreds of other Ohio women in the years ahead. Despite her fears, Nettie was ready to present her qualifications for admission to the Ohio Bar Association.

With her she carried recommendations from four of Seneca County’s most prominent attorneys. They had offered to present the application on her behalf. Her colleagues knew that most judges opposed the idea of women lawyers. Indeed, at the very moment Ohio legislators were launching a successful campaign against all women seeking the right to vote.

While grateful to her colleagues for their offer, Nettie chose to confront the challenge personally. To her great joy and relief, the panel granted her a license. Nettie Cronise became the first woman in Ohio to practice law! Six months later, her younger sister Florence would follow in her footsteps.

Born in Republic, Ohio, in 1843, Nettie was the daughter of Dr. Jacob and Katharine Staub. While she was still a child, her parents divorced. Nettie and Florence moved with their mother to the home of their grandfather Judge Henry Cronise. Nettie attended school in Tiffin and studied at Heidelberg College and the State Normal School in Bloomington, Illinois. Nettie taught for a short time in Illinois, but returned to Tiffin to read law at the firm of Warren P. Noble.

After Florence’s admission to the bar, the Cronise sisters opened their own practice in Tiffin. A year later, Nettie married fellow attorney Nelson Lutes. When Nelson began to lose his hearing, Nettie dissolved her partnership with her sister and joined her husband’s firm. Through extraordinary teamwork, they developed a thriving corporate law practice in federal and district courts throughout Ohio, Indiana, and Michigan.

Nelson’s deafness demanded the couple have an especially thorough knowledge of their briefs, the evidence, and their opponent’s trial strategy. In the courtroom, Nettie silently repeated testimony to Nelson, enabling him to deliver opening and closing arguments and examine witnesses. Their skill and preparation made them a formidable team. Few courtroom observers ever realized that Nelson was totally deaf. The “Lutes Combination,” as they were known in legal circles, continued their highly successful practice until Nelson’s death in 1900.

Nettie Cronise Lutes’ remarkable accomplishments have not been forgotten. In recognition of her groundbreaking efforts, the women of the Ohio Bar Association present an award each year in her honor. The Nettie Cronise Lutes Award is presented to a woman lawyer who has “improved the legal profession through her own high level of professionalism and a commitment to opening doors for girls and women.”

E. W. Scripps: Hermit of the Seas

2008-12-22T11:49:00.000-08:00

The Detroit

Built by the Matthews Boat Company

Beginning as a copy boy at the “Detroit News,” E. W. Scripps rose to prominence as one of America’s great newspaper publishers. He founded the Scripps-Howard news syndicate, and established the United Press International, better known today as the UPI. The multi-talented publisher was also the founder and engine designer of the Scripps Marine Motor Company. Scripps served as the commodore of the Detroit Yacht Club and built “Miramar,” his enormous retirement home near San Diego.

Despite his successes, Scripps remained an eccentric, reclusive individual, who was most comfortable sailing the world aboard his yachts, the “Kenah” and the “Ohio.” He often referred to himself as the “hermit of the seas.” In 1912, Scripps found a way to thrill readers of his dozens of newspapers and promote his gasoline marine engine while spending time on the high seas.

Scripps would demonstrate the reliability of his company’s marine engine by using it to power the smallest boat to ever cross the Atlantic Ocean. He contacted the Matthews Boat Company of Port Clinton to design a vessel capable of such a voyage. Known around the world for quality construction, Scott Matthews took on the challenge. “The Rudder” magazine called the finished product a “trans-Atlantic liner,” but others called it an “oversized lifeboat.” Indeed, the 35-foot vessel was a double-ender that was heavily built - much like a lifeboat. Scripps christened her the “Detroit.” She was driven by one of his company’s 16-horsepower, two-cylinder model engines that could move the boat at 5 to 6 knots.

Five stainless steel fuel tanks, holding 1,000 gallons of gasoline, were fastened under the deck midship. Another 1,275 gallons was stored on deck. (No doubt the necessity of a smoking ban posed a problem for Scripps, who was known to smoke up to fifty cigars a day.) The “Detroit” also carried engine oil, 200 gallons of water, food for ninety days, and sails and a mast in case of engine failure..

Captained by Thomas F. Day, editor of “The Rudder,” she began her voyage from Detroit on July 12th. Scripps and two others rounded out the crew. The boat passed through Lake Erie, the Erie Canal, the Hudson River and Long Island Sound. On July 16th, the “Detroit” set out on her 4,000-mile transatlantic journey from New Rochelle, New York. Other than engine inspections that took place every few days and a single incident of water in the fuel, the engine ran continuously. Twenty-one days later the “Detroit” arrived in Cobh, Ireland – the smallest boat with a gasoline-powered engine to cross the Atlantic. After a few weeks rest and re-fitting, Scripps decided to head to Europe. From there, the “Detroit” journeyed to St. Petersburg, Russia, making port on Sept. 13th.

Scripps lived another 14 years after the “Detroit’s” transatlantic voyage. Much of that time was spent roaming the world aboard his yachts. He died off the coast of Liberia in 1926 at the age of 72. He was buried at sea.

Civil War Musician Henry Hunsinger, 72nd and 186th Ohio Volunteer Infantry

2008-11-25T12:09:00.000-08:00

Henry Hunsinger, Civil War Musician

(standing at left)

72nd and 186th Ohio Volunteer Infantry

A Hayes Presidential Center patron shared this print with us during a recent visit. The original is owned by relatives. The only individual identified is Henry Hunsiger, who is standing at left. Hunsinger was born May 30, 1845 in Fremont, Ohio. He enlisted as a drummer in Company B, 72nd Ohio Volunteer Infantry in November 1861. He participated in the Battle of Shiloh and the Siege of Corinth. He was discharged due to disability in July 1862. Hunsinger re-enlisted in Company E, 186th Ohio Volunteer Infantry in January 1865. He was promoted to Principal Musician March 2, 1865.

This picture appears to have been taken after Hunsinger re-enlisted in the 186th Ohio Volunteer Infantry and was promoted to principal muscian as was James W. Smith. George Smith, George E. Lepert, William Vananda, Robert C. Day, and David Moore are some of the men of the 186th listed as musicians in the Ohio Civil War Roster. I would be most grateful for an email if you can identify any of these Civil War musicians.

Katie Huntington and Morgan's Raid

2008-10-31T08:51:00.000-07:00

Katie Huntington

(from the George Buckland Collection)

The following letter was written during the Civil War by nine-year-old Katie Huntington to her father John Caldwell Huntington of Cincinnati, Ohio. Visiting relatives near Glendale, Ohio, Katie recounts the events of July 13, 1863 when Confederate General John Hunt Morgan and his cavalry entered Ohio near the Hamilton-Butler County line. Morgan led his men to the outskirts of Cincinnati, where he spent the night of July 13, in sight of the Union Army's Camp Dennsion. From the perspective of a young child, Katie tells of the excitement and fear Morgan's Raid generated among family and friends.

Tuesday Morning July 14th, 1863

My Dear Father

I was very much pleased your letter which I received last evening. I suppose that it is too late for me to answer Aunt Sarah’s letter and send it to Marys-ville but if I am not too tired after I have finished your letter I will write her one and put it in the same envelope.

I go down to the depot every evening and sometimes in the morning. Last evening I went down as usual with Annie and Cora to meet their father at the depot, but the train that was due from the north at six-oclock did not arrive before half past seven in the evening. We have breakfast at quarter to seven. Last night I went to bed earlier than usual and about two oclock in the morning while I was asleep John Morgan (but I don’t think he deserves the name John) and about three thousand of his troops passed through Glendale right by the College and about half a dozen of them went into the barn and took Mr. Drake’s horse (it was a very fine one the nicest one in the barn).

This morning I went down to the depot and Mrs. Fox and Elisa were down there and I said that I wouldn’t go home then for anything because if there was going to be a mob I should like to see it. Just then a man rode up on a white horse and said that some rebels were coming in full gallop and another man that was there said ladies and children take care out of the way because they may fire and Mrs. Fox took 7 or 8 of the children in to her house and told the girl to lock the house all up and we all went up in the garret and looked out of the garret windows and Mrs. Fox made us all be still for fear that we would attract attention to the house.

In a little while they rode up there were four of them well armed on horses. Mr. Bogart had two pistols that would shoot 6 times and, two muskets and he told they men to stop and they did not and so he fired of[f] one of his pistols up in the air so as to make them stop and then they stopped and began to sware dreadfully and said that Gen. Burnside’s sent them and all of a sudden three of them put spur’s to their horses and went off at full gallop. But too of the union soldiers went at the side of the one that staid and began to talk to him and all of a sudden just like that the other three went off very fast but after a little while we found that they were some union men.

I forgot to tell you that in the morning they took five of Morgans men prisoners and they sent them down to Carthage on the hand car. When we were in the midst of dinner (it was the same day) all of a sudden we heard a great noise and every person jumped up from [the] table and there was about 7 thousand of our cavalry passed during the afternoon. And we were to have had pie for desert but we gave it all to the soldiers they were chasing, Morgan and said that they might overtake him.

That night one of the soldier[s] kissed Annie and Cora and me and said that he would always remember the children of the union. They gave them all this square bread and biscuit and ham and cold meat and cake and cold water, some tea, pie. bring my cat out with you and tell Mother that I have decided to stay another week. I have received your letter and want you to come out here so that I can tell you some things that I can not write because my hand is tired.

goodbye

from Katie

Heights Consolidated School, Ballville Twp. Sandusky County, Ohio

2008-10-03T13:01:00.000-07:00

Heights Consolidated School, Ballville Twp., Sandusky County, Ohio

(Elmer A. Whitney Collection)

Sandusky County, Ohio photographer Elmer A. Whitney took this picture of the Heights Consolidated School students and staff in October 1919, only months after the "modern two-room building" was opened. The building, located on South Buckland, was the first attempt of Sandusky County citizens to provide better facilities for its students. While some objected to the cost and the school's distance from Fremont, others felt that the consolidation of 74 students from three rural schools - Glen Spring, Krugh, and Ballville Village - provided cost savings in maintenance and staff. Even though the building and land cost $17,000, the Board of Education believed that two teachers instructing grades one through four in a single structure was more cost-effective than three teachers teaching grades one through eight in three separate buildings.

Folding doors separated the classrooms. When opened, the two rooms were transformed into an "auditorium" large enough for community gatherings. The building boasted a 75-barrel cistern, movable chairs and desks, windows on either side, a library and reading room, piano, furnace, and two "lavatories equipped with soap and sanitary towels." Perhaps most appealing to the students was the two-acre playground

Even though its capacity was 96 pupils, the structure apparently was outdated within 15 years. During Sandusky County's building program, the school was replaced by Lutz Elementary, located across Buckland Avenue. E. H. Buchman bought the building and property. In 1936, the Edgar Thurston American Legion Post purchased the structure. Through the years, the American Legion added to the original two-room brick structure.

James A. Dickinson in the Civil War's Brown Water Navy

2008-09-29T12:05:00.001-07:00

James A Dickinson

U.S. Mississippi River Squadron

Fortunately for thirteen-year-old James Alpheus Dickinson, zero tolerance was a policy that no one considered in 1863. Had such a disciplinary code existed, the life of this bright but rebellious teen surely would have taken a different course.

The youngest child of U.S. Congressman Rudolphus Dickinson, James grew up fatherless in Fremont, Ohio. His birth occurred just months after his father's untimely death in Washington, D.C. By 1863, ideas of manhood, warfare, and adventure captivated the young boy's imagination. Dickinson ran away from home, planning to enlist in the U.S. Army. His rejection (due to his small size) was undoubtedly a severe disappointment, but Dickinson remained determined to serve his country. He signed on for a year's service in the U.S. Navy. Within a week, he found himself aboard a gunboat patrolling the Mississippi River, fending off the attacks of Rebel guerrillas on Union supply channels.

Dickinson reveled in his newfound freedom. He proudly recorded in his diary incidents of smoking, missing church, and chewing "because all sailors chew tobacco."

Disciplinary measures did not deter Dickinson from jumping ship to enjoy nightlong drinking sprees in towns along the Mississippi. Despite swift, severe punishment, the young sailor continued his wild ways - missing inspections, drinking, enjoying forbidden night swims, and stealing food. Yet he performed his duties admirably. Even with a painful shrapnel injury, he continued to return sniper fire. Dickinson withstood a bullet wound to the knee and endured frozen toes, the result of long hours on guard duty in the cold. He wrote his mother regularly. She responded with her own letters and issues of the Catholic Telegraph.

A year later, his Civil War service complete, the high-spirited Dickinson returned to Fremont where he spent his first few weeks fishing and dancing with his boyhood friends. We can only guess what forces molded the rebellious teen into a man. But at age sixteen, Dickinson took a positive step and entered Notre Dame. He graduated with a law degree in 1869. He practiced law in Fremont until he took a position with the U.S. Treasury in Washington, D.C. and then the Department of Labor. While supporting a family, Dickinson returned to school and earned a degree in medicine from Howard University in 1889. He moved to North Carolina where he practiced medicine.

Upon his death in 1922, Dr. James A. Dickinson was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

If you would like to read James A. Dickinson's diary, click here.

One-Eyed Charley Parkhurst's Secret

2008-09-27T13:22:00.000-07:00

Charley Darkey Parkhurst

Pioneer Cemetery, Watsonville, California

(Courtesy of Find a Grave)

On December 12, 1879, one of the great “whips” of California’s Gold Rush days died just outside Santa Cruz. Charley Parkhurst, a legend among Wells Fargo stagecoach drivers, passed away quietly, having suffered the ravages of rheumatism and cancer. When friends prepared Parkhurst’s body for burial, they were startled to discover that “Charley” was a woman!

Born in New Hampshire, “Charlotte” Parkhurst spent her early years in an orphanage. The independent teen soon ran away. Dressed as a boy, she found work at a livery stable where she became adept at handling horses. In 1851, a former employer offered her a position driving a stage route amidst California’s gold fields. For the next twenty years, Parkhurst drove for nearly every line around the Mother Lode. Parkhurst confronted robbers, Indians, runaway teams, and narrow mountain passes, eventually gaining a reputation as one of Wells Fargo’s fastest and safest drivers.

A kick from a horse cost Parkhurst an eye. From then on, nearly everyone called the tough little driver “One-Eyed Charley.” Sporting a black patch and a great coat of buffalo hide, Parkhurst drank, chewed, and gambled with the best of them – all the while keeping her secret.

Charley Parkhurst’s name appears on a list of registered voters in the 1868 presidential election of Ulysses S. Grant – some fifty years before women were legally allowed to vote! Californians contend that Parkhurst was the first woman to vote in the state and possibly the first in the nation.

In 1886, the Santa Cruz Surf stated that Charlotte was the daughter of one Frederick M. Parkhurst. Friends attempting to settle Parkhurst’s estate reported that in 1848 Charlotte was living with a Parkhurst family near Sandusky, Ohio. Indeed, the 1850 census of Townsend Twp., Sandusky County, Ohio lists a Charlotte L. Parkhurst, aged 16, living with the prominent Parkhurst family of Sandusky County. Yet, no local descendants have ever been able to place her.

Although the facts of Parkhurst’s early years remain elusive, she continues to hold a unique place in the rich history of California’s wild Gold Rush days. Students examine her extraordinary life in women’s studies courses. A ballad commemorates her Wells Fargo adventures. Women re-enactors drive six-hitch teams over her old Santa Cruz route. And today a monument near her grave declares “One-Eyed Charley” the first woman to vote in the United States.

John Garvin: U. S. Naval Academy Midshipman

2008-09-27T08:03:00.000-07:00

John Garvin: U. S. Naval Academy

After helping defend Washington, D.C. during the last months of the Civil War, sixteen- year-old John Garvin of Fremont, Ohio, was certain he wanted a career in the United States Navy. Aided by his older brother Jacob, he received an appointment to the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis.

But aboard the frigate Santee, preparing for his first cruise, he was no longer sure. He wrote his brother, "The midshipmen play some pretty rough practical jokes on the green ones. The naval school is not such a fine thing as people at home think".

A week later, young John was convinced he was entirely unfitted for the Navy. He told Jacob, “My ardor for a military life is completely quenched." He wanted out! Knowing brother Jacob would be a tough sell, John wrote his brother, anticipating his every argument.

John claimed, "We are ordered around like dogs. A person might almost as well be in the States prison. As I do not like it here, I of course will not feel like applying myself much and will possibly fall behind and get expelled." And finally, if those weren't reasons enough to come home, he told Jacob, "The graduates from here are sadly corrupt in their morals and not only swear, chew & smoke, but drink to excess."

The following morning, John wrote again in desperation. This time he used a positive approach. He assured Jacob he would be happy in Fremont. Then, John must have wondered if Jacob might not want him at home? Well - that would be fine too! He pleaded, "IF I ONLY GET AWAY FROM HERE. Please send permission to leave …as I am sick and disgusted with the whole Navy and not merely the school."

Later that same day, desperate and angry, John fired off another letter. This time he issued an ultimatum. If Jacob didn't respond within one week, he would resign with or without his permission!

It must have been a relief to Jacob when the letters stopped coming. Whether the frigate put to sea or young John gave up trying to convince his brother, history does not record. But Garvin continued at the academy and became a fine naval officer, who loved life on the high seas. As he sailed the world, he wrote his brother delightful letters, filled with descriptions of exotic cities, dangerous hurricanes, and life aboard ship.

When not at sea, Garvin taught mathematics at Annapolis and inspected naval weaponry. He returned to Fremont and married Maude Edgerton in 1876. For the next eighteen years, whenever Garvin was stationed at U. S. ports, Maude and the couple’s children traveled there to be with him.

Martha Treat Canfield in the Civil War

2008-09-22T10:24:00.000-07:00

Martha Treat Canfield

(General Ralph P. Buckland Collection)

"The ravages, the desolation, the misery, the horrors of war forced us to construct a religion of our own. If there was any heaven, a soldier who had endured the things we endured, would be very liable to go there, no matter if he had never heard of a creed or a catechism,” explained John Lemmon, captain of a company of northwest Ohio soldiers in the Civil War.

Shiloh had taught them harsh lessons: death did not discriminate between young and old, strong and weak, brave and cowardly, or righteous and sinner. Civil War soldiers, of whom 90 percent saw combat, became contemptuous of chaplains who, as Lemmon put it, “did not stay year. All went home long before the war ended.”

Others whom soldiers deemed more virtuous and selfless replaced them as religious counselors. For the 72nd Ohio, Martha Treat Canfield more than any other individual filled that role. She was the wife of Lt. Col. Herman Canfield, killed during the opening moments of the Battle of Shiloh. Despite her own grief, she comforted Julia Grant when her husband General Ulysses S. Grant came under severe criticism following the battle. That relationship gave Martha Canfield unique access to the 72nd and other Ohio regiments on the battlefield at a time when most thought women were “too delicate” for such work.

Intelligent, confident, and courageous, Martha Canfield acted as minister, nurse, and mother to thousands of Ohio soldiers. Captain Orin England of the 72nd claimed, “She did more good than all of the chaplains in the army. If we had one in every brigade, yes, one in every division, how much good they could do!”

With her young son in tow, she visited military hospitals in Memphis and Vicksburg where she found thousands dying for the lack of good food, clean water, and decent care. She sought help from Ohio’s governor and hundreds of aid societies. They responded with a continuous flow of medical supplies, nurses, and food to Union hospitals in the South. Ohioans funded her efforts to establish a hospital ship at Vicksburg and a waterworks system at the Memphis military hospital. “None excelled and few could equal the remarkable Martha Canfield on the battlefield or in the hospital,” claimed one admiring doctor.

When all else failed, she sought out General Ulysses S. Grant. Grant held Martha Canfield in such high regard that on one occasion, on her word alone, he cut through military red tape and ordered several thousand of the sickest soldiers onto boats, sending them North for better care.

When peace finally came, Martha Canfield’s efforts to help the sick and dying did not end. For the remainder of her life, she assisted at the Bristol, Rhode Island, hospital established by her physician sons.

Tragedy Along the Washita

2008-09-06T05:18:00.000-07:00

Clara Harrington Blinn

Despite dangers and hardships, thousands of Americans settled in the West in the decade after the Civil War. Among them were Richard and Clara Blinn.

Clara Isabel Harrington was born in Elmore, Ohio, October 21, 1847. She was the daughter of William and Harriet Bosley Harrington, who owned the Baird House in Perrysburg, Ohio. On August 12, 1865, in Sandusky County, she married Civil War veteran Richard Blinn of Perrysburg. The couple spent their wedding night at the Croghan House in Fremont.

The Blinns settled in Colorado Territory, but hard times forced them to join a wagon train returning east to Kansas where Clara's father lived.

On October 9, 1868, near Lamar, Colorado, Cheyenne warriors attacked the train, carrying off Clara and two-year-old Willie Blinn. The warriors left their captives at the winter camp of Chief Black Kettle on the Washita River.

Charge of the U.S. Seventh Cavalry on Black Kettle's Village

(Harper's Weekly, December 19, 1868)

General Philip Sheridan ordered George Armstrong Custer to destroy the village in retaliation for raids throughout the region. Black Kettle pleaded for protection for his people from General William Hazen stationed at Fort Cobb. When Hazen learned that Clara and Willie were in Black Kettle's camp, he began negotiations for their release. His superior was of little help; Sheridan believed that Clara had been "subjected to fearful bestiality of perhaps the whole tribe; it is mock humanity to secure what is left of her for the consideration of five ponies."

Clara's feelings were decidedly different than those of Sheridan! A month after her capture, she smuggled a note to Hazen. Clara pleaded desperately for help - if not for herself, then for her son. Believing that her husband had died in the Cheyenne raid, Clara begged that someone notify her father in Franklin, Kansas.

Custer's troops struck the sleeping village before dawn on November 7. Black Kettle, his wife and 100 other Cheyennes died during the short but vicious battle. Two weeks later, Custer, accompanied by Sheridan, returned to the site of the massacre. There among the dead lay Clara - scalped, a bullet hole in her forehead, and her skull crushed. Nearby the generals found the thin, little body of Willie, bearing evidence of bruises about the head. Soldiers buried them at Fort Arbuckle.

Outraged by the deaths of Clara and Willie, General Hazen criticized the generals for attacking during his negotiations. Without eyewitnesses, the official inquiry proved futile.

Richard Blinn survived the Cheyenne raid. He was found on the plains, still searching for his loved ones. In his letter of condolence to Blinn, Sheridan enclosed a piece of Clara's dress and a lock of Willie's hair - remnants of the tragic end of Clara and Willie Blinn.

Van Horn/Hummel/Gephart/Fisher

2008-09-05T09:17:00.000-07:00

Van Horn- Hummel-Gephart- Fisher

Sandusky County, Ohio

"Iomes (?) Grove." Sandusky Co, July 1908

The above photograph belongs to J. Derald Morgan of Madison Alabama. His grandmother, Leafy Fern Van Horn was born in Bettsville, Ohio, December 1886. Leafy Fern is seated sixth from the left, holding a small child on her lap.

Leafy Fern was the daughter of Samuel Cornelius and Emma Elizabeth Hummel Van Horn. Samuel had migrated from Pennsylvania to Ohio. He married Emma in Fremont, Ohio. Emma died in Bettsville on January 4, 1887, only a few weeks after Leafy Fern's birth. Samuel then married Emma's sister, Jennie. Emma and Jennie were two of the 12 children of Chrisitan and Margaret Ann (Fisher) Hummel (spelled Hoomel, Hommel, Hurnel, Harnel, and finally Hummel). Jennie (Hummel) Van Horn in Dalhart, Texas, August 14, 1929

Mary Hummel, an older sister of Emma and Jennie, married a Gephart. Other Hummel sisters married Rossenberger, Dicken, Keefer, Kiser, Young, Ludwig, and Rumpler.

Written on the back of the photo is the word "Iomes." However, it is difficult to read. If you know WHERE this picture was taken or WHO any of the individuals are, Dr. Morgan would appreciate your help. (DeraldM@knology.net)

Lake Erie's Ballast Island

2008-08-22T11:29:00.001-07:00

The Cochran Cottage on Ballast Island, 1888

Lying a mile northeast of Put-in-Bay is Ballast, one of Lake Erie’s twenty islands. According to legend, Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry used rocks from the island to provide ballast for his ships before sailing out to meet the British fleet during the War of 1812. A shallow reef connects the 13-acre island to a sliver of land known as Lost Ballast.

Life on Ballast was shaped by one of its earliest owners, commercial shipping magnate and two-time Cleveland mayor George W. Gardner. At age nine, he ran away from home to sail aboard a lake schooner bound for Buffalo. While still a teenager, Gardner became head clerk of the Northern Transportation Company, managing the accounts and cargoes of the firm’s Great Lakes vessels. After a 5-year stint in the banking business, Gardner purchased two tugs that plied the Cuyahoga River. In partnership with John Rockefeller and others, he shipped grain throughout the Great Lakes, making Cleveland one of the largest grain markets on the Great Lakes.

Cottage on Ballast's North Cliffs, 1888

Few men loved the water more than Gardner. Well before the Civil War, he founded the Ivanhoe Boat Club, bringing rowing to the Cuyahoga River. He later founded the Cleveland Yacht Club and organized the Inter-Lake Yachting Association. He canoed the Mississippi River from Cincinnati to New Orleans.

In 1874, Gardner purchased Ballast Island and a short time later sold undivided interests to his friends who enjoyed sailing nearly as much as he. Eventually, the cooperative association of wealthy friends built nine cottages along the east and west shores of the island. The Gardners’ cabin was built of logs from hackberry trees found on the island. A hotel and dining hall were constructed on the cliffs to the north. The families planted vineyards and fruit trees. At the invitation of Commodore Gardner, the Western Canoe Association transported its boat house from Ross Lake, Michigan to Ballast.

Lost Ballast Island, 1888

Those at Ballast formed their own canoe association, naming it the Longworth Canoe Club after the father-in-law of Alice Roosevelt Longworth. According to Commodore Gardner’s great granddaughter, Presidents Teddy Roosevelt, McKinley, Garfield, and Cleveland all visited at Ballast. And, each summer the resident canoe club and other canoe associations held their annual races in the sheltered waters surrounding Ballast.

Eventually, an ice house, caretaker's home, and work shed were added. All were protected by a curving breakwall made of log cribs filled with stone. Passing steamers and Ballast's proximity to South Bass Island made travel to and from the island convenient. Good friends, good conversation, and great sailing made summering on Ballast in these early years an idyllic time.

Henry Pletscher and Lake Erie's Buckeye Island

2008-07-21T07:32:00.000-07:00

Henry Pletscher

Buckeye Island is a small outcropping of glacial rock lying on the northeast tip of South Bass Island. For Henry Pletscher is was much more than rock and reef; it was his retreat –a place of peace and quiet where he spent long summer days tending his garden and fishing with friends and family.

Born in Cleveland in 1842, Henry served with the 13th Ohio Volunteer Infantry in some of the Civil War’s fiercest battles. After 3 years’ service, he returned home to marry his childhood sweetheart. Following the death of their two-year-old son from diphtheria, Henry headed West in search of his brother. Gone for nearly two years, Henry discovered upon his arrival back in Ohio that his wife, believing him dead, had married again. Heartbroken, Henry set out for the West once more. He re-enlisted, serving in the U. S. Cavalry in the Dakotas and the Arizona Territory with famed Indian fighter General George Crook.

It was Henry’s stories of high adventure fighting the Apaches that held his nieces spellbound. In a 1991 article in the Put-in-Bay Gazette, niece Elsa Watters shared her childhood memories of summer afternoons with Uncle Henry, listening to his tales as they picked raspberries, caught crayfish, and searched for seagulls’ nests.

Henry Pletscher at his cabin on Buckeye Island

According to his niece, Henry purchased the island in 1909. There he built a cabin, tool shed, and dock for his fishing boat and those of the many relatives he invited to Buckeye. Sharing his special place was Henry’s way of repaying family members with whom he stayed each winter.

But Henry’s days on that idyllic island came to an end on his 76th birthday. After stopping for a drink, Henry mistakenly signed papers agreeing to sell Buckeye. The following day, after realizing what he had done, Henry was nearly overcome by the loss. But he knew his little retreat was gone forever. Elsa recalled that “after that day, he seemed to shrink in stature.” It wasn’t long after that he left his beloved island for the Sandusky Soldier’s and Sailor’s Home.

On their visits to Put-in-Bay, his nieces would often stop at Sandusky to see Uncle Henry. They thought he seemed content enough, but life was never the same for Hnery. As Elsa put it, “his sparkle was gone with his island.” Henry Pletscher died there in the spring of 1922.

Without Henry, the winds and waves of Lake Erie began to take their toll on the little island. The garden, cabin, and dock soon were gone. But for Elsa Watters and her sister, their childhood memories of summer days on Buckeye Island with Uncle Henry would remain forever.

That Magical Place: The Blue Hole

2008-07-13T11:25:00.000-07:00

Blue Hole by Ernst Niebergall

If you grew up in northern Ohio during the 40s and 50s, chances are you made a trip to the Blue Hole near Castalia. I know I did. In fact, I recall passing through the impressive tufa rock entrance many times as we made our way to that fascinating natural phenomenon.

In my mind’s eye, I can still see myself as a child, bending over the rail of the rustic foot bridge. Mesmerized by the encrusted stumps and vegetation, I would peer deeply into the quiet blue-green waters of that “spring without a bottom.” With the vivid imagination of a child, I often wondered if it went all the way to China. What would happen if I fell in? Would I disappear forever like the farmer with his wagon and team of horses? Even though I later learned that the story was the stuff of legend, I am still certain that one time I saw a wagon wheel far below the Blue Hole’s quiet surface!

Blue Hole by Ernst Niebergall

I wasn’t the only one who found the Blue Hole a magical place. Long before Ohio was Ohio, the Wyandots believed the clear, cold waters held curative powers. And in 1761, when Major Robert Rogers first recorded the discovery of springs surrounding the Blue Hole, he called it a “remarkable fine spring.”

Years passed before I discovered that my mysterious Blue Hole was in fact a funnel-shaped sink hole created when pioneer Dorastus Snow built a grist mill and dam on Cold Creek in 1810. Water pooled, causing the collapse of strata in the area of the Blue Hole, allowing water to “spring” through to the opening.

The spring puts forth an estimated 450,000 gallons of water every hour! The water’s constant temperature of 48 degrees prevents the Blue Hole from ever freezing. Its color comes from its mineral content - potassium, magnesium, lime, soda and iron. Without oxygen, nothing grows in the enchanting pool of water that today measures 75 feet in diameter.

Owned by the Castalia Trout Club, the Blue Hole opened as a tourist attraction in 1925. Improved with fences, footbridges, walkways, and benches, “Ohio’s Greatest Natural Wonder” attracted an estimated 150,000 visitors annually during its heyday. On sunny days, visitors could see to a depth of 50 to 60 feet below the surface. The sun illuminated the openings through which water surged from the underground streams. After more than six decades, interest in the Blue Hole began to wane. In 1990, the Castalia Trout Club closed it to the public.

Whenever I grow nostalgic for those long-ago visits to the Blue Hole, I look at the photographs Ernst Niebergall took around 1910. They are now preserved in the Charles E. Frohman Collection at the Hayes Presidential Center. I see the Blue Hole in its natural setting, but it is one that I never knew. Now thanks to Glenn Kuebeler, I can enjoy Niebergall’s photos and many others that do depict the Blue Hole just as I remember it. Pick up Glenn’s book, “Castalia, Cold Creek, and the Blue Hole.” You will enjoy a memorable journey back to that magical Blue Hole of our past!

[This post was first published in "History Notebook" in Lifestyles2000]

Allison Gollehon: Free Lecture on Quilting, June 29th at the Hayes Presidential Center

2008-06-26T12:36:00.000-07:00

The Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center, in conjunction with its exclusive exhibit Patterns from the Past: Quilts of Northern Ohio, presents a series of lectures by talented Ohio quilt artists and quilt experts.

Join Allison Gollehon of the Black Swamp Quilt Shoppe in Millbury at 2 P.M. Sunday, June 29th in the Hayes Presidential Center auditorium for the first in a series of 4 free lectures on quilting, A gifted quilt artisan, Allison discusses her favorite quilt medium in her talk titled Using Wool in Quilts. Her shop specializes in quilting-wool and she shares project ideas past and present with those in attendance.