Rose Tavern, Washington Twp., Sandusky County, Ohio

Rose Tavern, 1981

Fremont News Messenger

James Rose was born in Bedford County, Pennsylvania, February 6th, 1811. At the age of three, his parents migrated to Perry County, Ohio, settling near  Zanesville, Ohio. His ancestors originally came from England. Both his maternal and paternal grandfathers were Revolutionary War soldiers.

James married Nancy Gordon, a native of Perry County, Ohio, where James farmed and taught school.  In 1834, he purchased 105 acres from the federal government in tract #142  along the Maumee and Western Reserve Pike. James' property today lies on the south side of State Route 20 in Washington Twp.  A month prior to his arrival, James built a two-room log cabin measuring 26 x 40 feet on his land.

Traveling by wagon from Perry County to their cabin in Sandusky County took James and Nancy eight days. While living here, James cleared 26 acres. "Wyandots and Senecas were frequent visitors at his place, often staying all night, but always exhibiting a friendly disposition." After ten years, he sold the property to William Thraves for $836. 

James moved his family to another purchase he had made in the township.  On this land, he built a round-log cabin containing a single room.  Two years later, James built a house on the property.  Over 70 acres had been cleared by the time James sold the land in 1854. While living in Sandusky County, James had served as a county commissioner  and also 18 years  as a justice of the peace. 

James and his large family left Sandusky County and settled on a farm five miles from Cardington, Ohio. The parents of 11 children of which seven of his eight sons served in the Civil War.  James died in Morrow County in 1890 nearly 79 years of age. 

In 1981, the original building, known as the Rose Tavern,  was donated by the Waggoner family who were owners of the property. It was disassembled (see photo above) and moved to Historic Lyme Village in Bellevue. Ohio.

The "Fremont Weekly Journal" reprinted much of James Rose's obituary from an article carried in the "Morrow County Sentinel" of Mt. Gilead, Ohio, and also a biographical sketch of James Rose published in a Morrow County history.

 

Atkins Papers: Proposals for Constructing the Bridge Across the Carrying River at Woodville, Ohio,

List of Bids Submitted for Constructing the Bridge across the Carrying River at Woodville, Ohio
1825

The scanned documents are part of the Quintus F. Atkins Business Papers recently donated to Hayes by Mr. Harry Wilkins on behalf of the Tabor Historical Society of Tabor, Iowa.  They were preserved by Martha Atkins, who graduated from Oberlin College where she met her husband John Todd. Before moving to Tabor, Martha and John  were active in Oberlin’s anti-slavery and temperance movements.

Martha’s father, Quintus F. Atkins was appointed by the state of Ohio as Superintendent of the Maumee and Western Reserve Road that passed through the Black Swamp.  Having discovered the description of the Atkins Papers held by HPLM, Wilkins and the Tabor Historical Society believed that Tabor's Atkins Papers could be better utilized if it were merged with those located here at Hayes Presidential.

A portion of Tabor's Atkins Papers includes proposals sent to Atkins from Sandusky Countians, hoping to gain the contract to build a bridge across the “Carrying River” (i.e. the Portage River) where the road passed through Woodville, Ohio.

Atkins listed the names of bidders, their sureties, amounts proposed, and expected dates of completion. The eleven proposals listed in the first document were written during the spring of 1825. Tabor's Atkins Papers include a total of 18 proposals. Below is that of Thomas Miller. Thomas and Harriet Miller owned a tavern at the site where the Portage River (Carrying) crossed the Maumee and Western Reserve Road (now Rte. 20) as early as 1825.

Proposal Submitted by Thomas Miller
1825

Unfortunately, Tabor's Atkins Papers do not provide evidence of who was awarded the contract. A Sketchbook of Woodville, Ohio: Past – Present, written in 1986 for the village’s sesquicentennial, states on page 14 that the “first bridge over the Portage River in Woodville was a covered wooden bridge. It is not known just when it was built.” The latest date proposed by a bidder was August of 1826. The requirements stipulated that the bridge should be capable of withstanding ice, flooding, and driftwood for a period of three years. The wooden bridge did all that and much more; it was not razed until 1878 when it was replaced with an iron bridge. 

Bidders were:
John P. Rogers
James Birdseye
Josiah Rumery
Ezra Williams
S. B. Collins
James Justice
George J. Moore
Jacques Hulburd
Joseph Wood
Seth Doren
Jonathan H. Jerome