HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY                      171

premises the original site was laid out, in 1873. The postoffice was es-
tablished in 1874, the first one in the township. Asherville is in the block
coal field, several mines having been operated within the immediate
vicinity.
    The pioneer merchant of this place was John Bonewitz, who was
succeeded by Neidlinger Brothers, William May, Frank Snyder, Monroe
Peyton, Lowdermilk & Ricard, Asher Brothers, A. L. Witty, Samuel
M.  Stigler, Wesley Stigler, Woolf Brothers, William Seigelin, G. W.
McMillen, W. H. Payne, John T. Elliott, Lewis McCullough.
    The postmasters have been: John Bonewitz, Monroe Peyton, William
May, Samuel Stigler, Lewis McCullough, W. H. Payne, John T. Elliott,
Dora Elliott.
    The practicing physicians: Moses Swinehart, Dr. Price, Fred Nussel,
B. F. Holmes, Dr. Strowbridge, B. T. Lewis, R. Gantz, Dr. Mendenhall,
F. M. Siner, Dr. McNutt, Dr. Ray.
    The fraternal organizations maintained here are: Asherville Lodge
I. 0. 0. F., No. 757, having a membership of 70; Knights of Pythias,
No. 290, instituted in 1890, with a present membership of 160; Pythian
Sisters, having a membership of 100, and Home Defenders, very recently
instituted.
    There is but one house of worship here, the Church of Christ, built
and dedicated in the year 1881. There is no schoolhouse here, as the
school population of the town is within easy reach of the first department
building, known as “The Center."
    Nor are there any manufacturing industries; only local mechanical
shops. Population 200.

                        DONALDSONVILLE.

    Donaldsonville, a town in Brazil township, on the old National road
and on the line of the Terre Haute & Indianapolis interurban, less than
a mile east of Morgan’s Crossing, laid out in 1867, by Mrs. E. D. Rardan,
so named in honor and memory of the founder, whose name before
marriage was Donaldson. When this place was platted it was in Van
Buren township, but a year later, when Brazil township was organized,
it was included within the survey of the new civil division. Then the
plat of Donaldsonville was two miles out from Meridian street, but now
it is suburban to Brazil. Population 150.

                                CORY.
    Cory, the only town in Perry township, on the Evansville & Indian-
apolis Railroad, a mile and a half east of the Vigo county line, founded
in 1872, by John S. Donham, Newport Staggs and Oliver James, named
for Simeon Cory, a pioneer and popular hardware merchant of Terre
Haute, who, in recognition of the honor, volunteered to put in a town pump
and build a schoolhouse. The public well was dug and the pump put
in, but the schoolhouse was not built, for the reason that Mr. Cory took
sick and died soon thereafter. The altitude of Cory is greater than that
of any other town on the line of the E. & I. Railroad between Terre
Haute and Worthington. The original town plat comprised forty-three
lots and six streets, to which additions of small area were subsequently
made by John S. Donham and Samuel Lucas. Cory postoffice was
established the same year of the founding of the town, and Oscar Rankin
appointed postmaster. His successors in this position have been Oliver
James, Webb Lucas, Wesley Danner, Edgar Mewhinney, G. E. Leberer,
David Lawell, J. E. Phillips, T. P. Hartley, Edgar Staggs, John R. Fer