FRANKLIN COUNTY OHIO - Letter From a Pioneer (1872) *************************************************************************** OHGENWEB NOTICE: All distribution rights to this electronic data are reserved by the submitter. Reproduction or re-presentation of copyrighted material will require the permission of the copyright owner. *************************************************************************** File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by Nancy Taylor ohmmoose@home.com September 10, 1998 *************************************************************************** A distant cousin was able to supply me with a copy of the article from the 8 April, 1872 paper. Below is a transcription of that article that I am including as it has some interesting comments about life in early Franklin County. John Pike Taylor was b in 1822 in Hardy County Virginia (now WV) and came to Ohio with his parents Anthony Wayne Taylor and Malinda (Trumbo) Taylor. He married Rebecca Perfect b 22 Mar, 1819 in Johnstown, Ohio Nancy R. Taylor (ggg Grandaughter of (John) Pike Taylor) ************************************************ Written for the Columbus Gazette Letter from a Pioneer Hope P.O., Franklin Co., Ohio April 8, 1872 Editor Gazette Being a reader of your paper and a resident of Franklin county for fifty years, and something of a Pioneer, though not a member of the Association I will take the liberty to write to you something of some things, and you may read if it you can and publish as much as you please. Just fifty years ago to-day I was landed in this county, and brought here in a way I sometimes boast of. My mother, among the best of old women, now three score and ten, and living and in good health, carried me all the way from the head waters of the Potomac, in Virginia, in her lap on horseback. We stopped in this (Plain) township, on Easter Sunday, the very day I was one year old. Of course I have no recollection of things just then; but the love of horseback sticks to me yet. I need not say our roads were very imperfect, not wide enough for teams to pass without driving into the brush. No bridges except a few corduroy log-ways over streams which were really necessary. No post office nearer than your city, and postage on a letter as much as a quarter of a dollar, and little corn mills about on small streams. You better believe there was then some real friendship amongst the people. Every man had his log-rolling, and had to help his neighbor for help in return, which lasted sometimes three weeks in the spring of the year, every day except Sundays. School houses were nowhere, except a few cabins that were used as such sometimes in the winter season. Meeting houses not talked of, and but few religious organizations. The wants of the people were easily satisfied, but their necessities were great, and necessity is the mother of invention; so people's wits were sometimes taxed to their utmost. I remember the first preparation of pickled cucumbers we had, which were made with-out either vinegar or salt, and here is the recipe: placing the cucumbers in the bottom of a vessel and covering them with small twigs and curls of wild grape vines, with another covering of cucumbers and then of grapes vines and water, the acid properties of the vine preserving the cucumbers. Wild crab apples were plenty, and very palatable preserve was made of them and maple molasses. The forest abounded with deer and wild turkeys and wild hogs. In the fall of the year every man could kill some deer, when the pelts and tallow were valuable. Buckskin pants, colored yellow with the smoke of rotten wood, were nice enough to wear anywhere. The tallow we used to make candles, but where were the molds? No tin peddlers went through the country then. An old dutch lamp, stuck in the wall or joist, sometimes supplied the cabin with light; but candles were made without tin molds. I remember the operation well. A long hollow weed grew along the streams, having joints eight and ten inches apart, very smooth inside and large enough to mold a candle in. A wick of cotton or linen cloth was inserted and one end of the weed placed in a potato or turnip, and the melted tallow poured in. Now you wonder how the candle was got out. Well we split the weed, and next time took another one. They were cheap and plenty. In those days about the only instrumental music was an occasional violin; pianos and melodeons were beyond the means and knowledge of people. But the woods rang with the music of birds, and cow bells, and bull frogs brought in the chorus. Lasting, old-fashioned love, among the sons and daughters of the land, were made without a six hundred dollar piano, or riding in a nice rig and rapid drive. Not so many bills for divorcing married people as seem to be needed now, but love worth talking about, of a lasting kind. I wonder if stone coal stoves, coal oil lamps, abandoning riding on horseback, and out-door exercise have not taken away the rosy cheek and sweet breath and robust constitutions of the rising generation? You may look over this and read it if you can, and if it worth publishing I may resume the subject at a future time. Yours, &c. Among the Taylors I am named Pike [NOTE: FYI, Hope, Franklin Co. Ohio is now New Albany, located n.e. of Columbus at the intersection of SR 161, 62 & 605.]