OHIO STATEWIDE FILES OH-FOOTSTEPS Mailing List *********************************************************************** USGENWEB NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. *********************************************************************** OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest Volume 99 : Issue 206 Today's Topics: #1 Schmelzers in Franklin Co. [Maggie Stewart-Zimmerman <73777.25] #2 STARK COUNTY - PART 4 [AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M RE] #3 BENJAMIN MARTIN - STARK COUNTY [AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M RE] #4 SAMUEL FETTERS - STARK COUNTY [AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M RE] #5 JOHN M. ROOSE - STARK COUNTY [AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M RE] ------------------------------ X-Message: #1 Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 03:59:55 -0500 From: Maggie Stewart-Zimmerman Subject: Schmelzers in Franklin Co. From: Brother Mike Schmelzer OBIT: Schmelzer, Jacob I. 1919 Franklin Co. OBIT: Schmelzer, Anna R. 1935 Franklin Co. OBIT: Schmelzer, Faymond J. 1962 Hocking Co. OBIT: Schmelzer, Thelma L. 1962 Hocking Co. OBIT: Schmelzer, Raymond J. 1995 Pickaway Co. CENSUS: Schmelzer, Jacob I. 1880 Franklin Co. BIRTH: Schmelzer, Raymond J. 1898 Franklin Co. BIRTH: Schmelzer, Raymond J. 1925 Franklin Co. BIRTH: Schmelzer, Patricia L. 1930 Franklin Co. BIRTH: Schmelzer, John R. 1947 Franklin Co. BIRTH: Schmelzer, Michael A. 1949 Franklin Co. BIRTH: Schmelzer, Sharon L. 1950 Franklin Co. BIRTH: Schmelzer, Julie M. 1966 Franklin Co. ------------------------------ X-Message: #2 Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 15:42:15, -0500 From: AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M REASONER) Subject: STARK COUNTY - PART 4 HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF OHIO By Henry Howe, LL.D. 1888 TRAVELING NOTES Canton is a solid substantial appearing town. A marked feature is it public square in the centre, whereon forty years ago was a market. The square is some two hundred or more feet wide and say four hundred feet long, all open and paved, used as a street and bounded with substantial buildings. The new view is looking out of the square down Tuscarawas street. On the right appears the new courthouse, occupying the site of that shown in my old picture; beyond is seen the tower of the Hurford House, and in the distance appear the spires of the First Methodist Episcopal, Presbyterian and Lutheran churches, costly and elegant buildings. The last named is built of the cream-tinted Massillon sandstone, on which is carved the sublime heart-resting line, which opens Luther's famous battle hymn -"A mighty fortress is our God." The Hurford House at which I stopped, is a remarkably well-built, well appointed hostelry. It has 110 rooms, and cost, including furniture, $125,000. The proprietor, Mr. Alex. Hurford, is past the hustling period of life; has the honor of being one of the town born; his first appearance here was in the "sad and dreary month of November," A.D. 1817; but there is nothing of the sad and dreary about him. He has lived the town and has given me some amusing items. Like a large part of the original stock of this central back-bone region of Ohio, his father, Thomas Hurford, was from Pennsylvania; moreover a Chester county Quaker, and a queer thing about him was that he changed his Quaker garb at the beck of a poll parrot. He was in Winchester, Virginia, on business, and while there, on passing up a street he was startled by the cry, as he supposed from an upper window, "You're a Quaker." Looking around, he saw no one and started on, but, had proceeded but a few steps more, when the cry was repeated, "you're a Quaker." Again looking around and seeing no one, he hastened on, angry at what he considered a deliberate insult to his religion. Some hours later he passed the same spot, when he was again saluted with the same cry, "You're a Quaker." Quickly turning, he discovered the guilty party: it was a parrot. He was so much chagrined at the circumstance, that, as soon as he got home, he doffed his Quaker clothes and never resumed them. My father learned the milling business, emigrated to Ohio and worked in a mill at Steubenville, for the great man of the place who had founded it, Bezaleel Wells. During this time he took a flat-boat to New Orleans with flour, on which he cleared, $2,500. With this money he came to Canton, which had been laid out by his old employer, Bezaleel, and built the now abandoned mill yet standing below the Oak Grove. "Before the building of the Ohio canal," said he, "the people were wretchedly poor for the want of a market. Within my memory, the farming folks used to start to church Sunday's barefoot, carrying their shoes and stockings in a handkerchief until they got to the foot of south hill, near where Aultman & Co's works now are, when they would stop and put them on. At that time wheat brought but twenty-five cents a bushel and had no outlet except by wagon to Cleveland and Pittsburg. The only things that would bring cash were beeswax and ginseng. Store coffee then cost fifty cents a pound. It could not be bought without ginseng, beeswax or money. Most well-to-do families made it a point to have store coffee on Sunday: on other days, used coffee from burnt rye or wheat. My father, about 1823, kept a store on the southeast corner of Market Square, now the site of Durben & Wright's drug store. He paid about 25 cents a pound for ginseng. It was cut into, say, about four-inch pieces and strung on strings, like as our grandmothers used to string their apples for drying. The ginseng was sent to Pittsburg in wagons and thence to China, for the use of "the pig-tail people." They used it as a substitute for opium and as joss ticks, to burn as incense before their idols. My father was, at the beginning, farmer, miller and distiller. Whiskey sold for two cents a dram, or eighteen cents a gallon: and everybody drank. In the spring of 1821 or 1822, he loaded two flat-boats with whiskey, at Bethlehem, in this county, for New Orleans. The river changed its name according to the branches that poured into it. At Bethlehem it was the "Tuscarawas," lower down "White Woman," then "White Woman" was succeeded by "One Leg," and that went into the "Muskingum," which in the Indian, signifies an "Elk's Eye," and next came the Ohio, the "Beautiful River." This swelled the "Father of Waters," and so at last, on the bosom of these many waters, father's whiskey got to New Orleans. When the idea of the Ohio canal going through Canton was broached, it met with great opposition from some of the leading men, who fought it away, and it was located eight miles west and made the town of Massillon, and that sunk this town for twenty years. Among its opponents, were three old doctors, who shook their heads, looked wise, and said it would increase the ague: almost everybody was then shaking with the ague. Every season seven out of every ten had their turn at the shakes. So the three wise doctors scared the people dreadfully, by simply delivering themselves lugubriously. Great personal animosities arose in consequence between the enemies and friends of the "big ditch;" my father who favored it, made enemies who remained so until he died. This statement of Mr. Hurford but supplies another illustration of the old truth, that mankind may forgive your crimes, but never your opinions. To one of the old doctors, the work seemed so stupendous, so impossible of accomplishment that he said if the Almighty would just allow him to live until the canal was finished, he would willingly lie down and yield up the ghost. Within three years from that utterance, the canal was in full operation from the lake to the river, yet the old doctor seemed not quite ready to have his ghost "go up a spout." My father claimed the canal would create a current and drain the swamps. When it was finished the sanitary effect, of the measure was astonishing. It drained the swamps throughout its course and malaria largely disappeared through its influence. The very first start of the work was beneficial. The canal was principally dug by Ohio farm boys; eldest sons of the farmers who earned from $6 to $10 per month and boarded at home: this with a larger part of them was about the first chance that they ever had to get a whack at any money. And this greatly benefited the farming people; and put them in happy smiling frames of mind, Massillon at once sprang into a great wheat market for a large section of country; -for Stark, Carroll, Wayne, Holmes and Richland counties. And strings of wheat wagons from all directions poured into the place, cumbered the streets, and Massillon rejoiced in much trade. In the palmy days at Massillon, one could tell on meeting the returning farmers on the road, without a question, whether wheat was up or wheat was down. If down, they approached slowly, their heads hanging, and to your question would drawl out in sleepy tones, kind o'grumpy, "f-eef-ty cents." If wheat was up they would be seen coming up at a rapid rate, horses on a gallop, heads up, eyes bright, and if you inquired, "Neighbor, how is wheat to-day?" they would jerk out sharp, with an upward toss of the head, but a single word -"Dollar!" The loss of the canal was the first lost opportunity for the prosperity of Canton. The second came years later. The projectors of the Cleveland and Pittsburg Railroad, the first railroad built across Eastern Ohio, from lake to river, said to our people, subscribe $10,000 and you shall have the railroad. But the leaders again sniveled their noses and gave a toss of their heads and blurted out, "Won't do any such thing. It's all in your eye. The railroad has got to come through Canton anyway, the railroad folds can't help themselves!" But it didn't: it went 18 miles east and thereupon the town of Alliance sprang up. But for these dead weights, neither Alliance nor Massillon would have had a being, and Canton to-day would have more than absorbed their entire populations, for growing centres increase through their own accommodations. Now comes a third opportunity, the chance for obtaining the great Hampden-Dueber watch works. ------------------------------ X-Message: #3 Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 15:42:07, -0500 From: AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M REASONER) Subject: BENJAMIN MARTIN - STARK COUNTY BIOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL RECORD OF ADAMS COUNTY, INDIANA The Lewis Publishing Company, 1887 Page 309-310 BENJAMIN MARTIN, farmer, section 30, Union Township, was born in Franklin County, Pennsylvania, in December, 1812. In 1835 he removed to Stark County, Ohio, with his wife and two children, where he lived until 1842, then removed to Union Township, Adams County, this State, and settled upon the farm he now owns. He came with wife and four children, one child having died in Stark County. He came with wagon and two yoke of oxen, and cut his own road a part of the way from Decatur. While building his log house he lived with a man named Peter Sickafoose. His cabin was one and a half stories in height, 20 x 24 feet, with puncheon floor. He lived in that house until 1862, when he built his present frame house. Mrs. Martin died March 23, 1854, leaving twelve children, three of whom have died since her death. One died in Pennsylvania, and one in Stark County, Ohio. Mary C. died in Pennsylvania at the age of thirteen months; Thomas died in this county, aged about twenty-two years; Benjamin Franklin was born in November, 1835, and died in this county; Peter, born July 6, 1837, died November 7, 1837; John, born May 22, 1839; Catherine, born May 13, 1841; Haman M., born November 29, 1842; Margaretta, born February 23, 1845; Sarah, born April 17, 1847; William H., born April 10, 1849; Amelia, born December 20, 1850; George W., born February 22, 1852, died August 7, 1853. December 2, 1873, Mr. Martin was married to Caroline Courtney, widow of William Courtney, and daughter of John and Sarah (Parks) Leach. Her father died in Trumbull County, Ohio, when she was about ten years old. Her parents came from New Jersey to Ohio, settling in Trumbull County. The mother died in Greenville, Ohio, in 1876, aged eighty-nine years. Mrs. Martin was born in Trumbull County some time after her first marriage, and they removed to Allen County, this State, where the husband died, leaving four children, three of whom are living -Margaret, born May 29, 1844, now the wife of James Leach; Sarah R., born December 22, 1845, died in 1881, leaving three children; Mary A., born September 22, 1847, wife of Jacob Shull; William H., born October 28, 1852. The Martins and Leaches are of English ancestry; Mrs. Martin's first husband was of German ancestry. ------------------------------ X-Message: #4 Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 15:42:04, -0500 From: AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M REASONER) Subject: SAMUEL FETTERS - STARK COUNTY BIOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL RECORD OF ADAMS COUNTY, INDIANA The Lewis Publishing Company, 1887 Page 28 SAMUEL FETTERS, farmer, Jefferson County, Ohio, May 24, 1847, a son of John W. and Elizabeth (Gross) Fetters. In his third year he was brought by his parents to Adams County, Indiana, where he was reared to manhood on the home farm in Jefferson Township. March 23, 1865, he enlisted in Company E. One Hundred and Fifty-fifth Indiana Infantry, and was discharged at Dover, Delaware, August 24, 1865, when he returned to his home in Adams County. He was united in marriage July 30, 1871, to Miss Lavina Woodward, who was born in Columbiana County, Ohio, March 3, 1855, a daughter of William and Lucinda (Rash) Woodward, who were also natives of the same State. They came to Adams County, Indiana, in 1863, where the father still lives. The mother died in Jefferson Township in February, 1877. They had a family of eleven children, six sons and five daughters. The following children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Fetters -Frank R., Charles M., James F., Harry H. and Emma C. Mr. Fetters has always followed agricultural pursuits, and is a thorough, practical farmer. He settled on his present farm in the fall of 1874, which contains eighty acres of choice land under a fine state of cultivation. In politics Mr. Fetters is a Democrat. He has served eight years as justice of the peace and is now serving his first term as township trustee, having been elected to that office in the spring of 1886. He is a comrade of John P. Porter Post, No. 83, G.A.R. John W. Fetter, the father of our subject was a native of Stark County, Ohio, born March 14, 1818, a son of Philip Fetters, who was born in Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania, of German descent, and died in Ohio. John W. Fetters grew to manhood in Stark County, and was there married, in 1840, to Elizabeth Gross, a native of New York City, her parents being natives of Germany. To this union were born seven children, four sons and three daughters. The parents were members of the Lutheran church. The father exchanged eighty acres of land in Stark County for three eighty-acre tracts in Adams County, Indiana, locating here in the fall of 1849, and made his home on section 21, Jefferson Township, till his death. He was very successful in his farming operations, and added to his land till he had almost 400 acres. in politics he was a staunch Democrat. He took an active interest in public affairs, and held the office of justice of the peace for a period of twenty-four years, and also served as township clerk during the old township organization, and was a prominent citizen. ------------------------------ X-Message: #5 Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 15:42:02, -0500 From: AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M REASONER) Subject: JOHN M. ROOSE - STARK COUNTY HISTORY OF OHIO The American Historical Society, Inc., 1925 Volume III, page 212 JOHN M. ROOSE is proprietor and owner of the Auto Garage and Sales Company of Canton. He has had more or less active connection with the automobile business since its infancy, and has perfected a fine sales and service organization in his present company at Canton. Mr. Roose was born in Stark County, Ohio, January 2, 1876. As a boy he lived on farms in his native county, and in Columbiana County, and acquired a public school education. Mr. Roose has been a resident of Canton for twenty years, since 1903. For two years he worked in a grocery store and spent three years in the livery business. He left that to become a representative of the United Tire & Rubber Company, and two years later began handling the Chalmers cars, and is one of the oldest representatives of that car in Northern Ohio. Mr. Roose is a Mason, a member of the Moose and Red Men, and belongs to the Canton Automobile Dealers' Association. He is a republican in politics. -------------------------------- End of OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest V99 Issue #206 *******************************************