540                     HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY


years later, "The Y,” then known as Clay City, had absorbed the industry
and business of its rival. There is no longer a school-house on the site,
which was abandoned in 1903, after having been maintained forty-two
years, the enumeration then being merged into the adjoining districts.
The three places—Middlebury, Clay City and Danville—are the points
of a triangle, of which the base, perpendicular and hypothenuse are,
respectively, one mile, a mile and a quarter and a mile and a half, and
within the area described are two clay plants, two coal banks and a
canning factory. Here, at what is now known as “the Danville cross-
ing,” the intersection of the east and west and the north and south
dirt roads,on originally surveyed lines,is crossed directly by the railroad,
which intersects the southeast and the northwest quadrants of the sur-
rounding circle, the point of intersection crossed, also, by a small stream
a circumstance not elsewhere known in the county.

            A Congressman’s Salary Flowing from Oil Wells.
    Many Clay countians have “gone west” to better their condition in
the sense of growing up with the country by participating in, and being
benefited by, the common development in improvement and wealth. Very
few, however, fare as well as did Lewis Weaver, of Van Buren town-
ship, son of John C. Weaver, who, some years ago, sold his farm in the
Eaglesfield neighborhood at a good round price, to go west, where he
might buy a larger acreage with the same amount of money. His mov-
ing “out west” was not expensive, as he was induced, from some cause,
to stop over in Illinois, in Clarke county, just across the Wabash from
Terre Haute, where the opportunity was afforded him, as he thought,
to buy land very cheap and he bought a large tract, acquiring in course
of time as much as a thousand acres, not far from Casey. Then in due
time came along the oil boom. Only the sequel remains to be told.
Weaver fell a victim to its magic touch. At last account there were
thirty-three wells on his lands, thirty of them flowing, and his royalty
$625 a month, just equal to a Congressman’s salary.

Bob-town and Jim-town.
    This caption is a pair of quaint names in geographical terminology,
but both have their places on the map of Clay county. Bob is the older
and better known of the pair. Bobtown is but another name for what
is known as the “Knightsville Crossing,” the point at which the National
road and the interurban line cross the public road leading from Knights-
ville northward. Fifty years ago, the only recognized way of designating
this point was to say "Where Sam Cox lives.” In the early seventies,
at the time of great activity in coal development, Robert Guest, a miner
and operator, came into possession of the former Cox homestead, who
soon became known to every one as “Uncle Bobby Guest.” The point
of his location became so prominent in the industrial development of its
surroundings as to need a distinctive name, and from Uncle Bobby’s
place to Bobtown was easy of transition.
    Along in the eighties, James B. Arnett came into ownership and
possession of a tract of several acres, a part of the former Weaver place,
lying immediately on the east side of the town of Middlebury, affording
desirable building sites. On this he made improvements himself, and
sold a number of small tracts, or lots, to others, who proceeded to build
thereon. As this is not a regularly platted and recognized addition to the
town, the public convenience suggested a distinct designation for it. As