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 199 Today's Topics: #2 JAMES L. AMERMAN - STARK COUNTY [AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M RE] #3 STARK COUNTY - PART 1 [AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M RE] #4 PAUL B. BELDEN - STARK COUNTY [AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M RE] ------------------------------ X-Message: #2 Date: Mon, 29 Mar 1999 19:59:10, -0500 From: AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M REASONER) Subject: JAMES L. AMERMAN - STARK COUNTY HISTORY OF OHIO The American Historical Society, Inc., 1925 Volume III, page 169 JAMES L. AMERMAN. Two of the ablest members of the Stark County bar during the past century have been James L. Amerman and his father, James Amerman. James L. Amerman, who is senior member of the Canton law firm of Amerman and Mills, was born two years before the death of his honored father, so that an interval of over twenty years separated the close of the professional career of the one from the beginning of that of the other. The late J. Amerman died in 1884, and though only thirty-six years of age, his reputation as a lawyer extended all over the state. He was born at Genesee, Michigan, August 20, 1848. His father's name was John Laidler, a native of Scotland. John Laidler brought his family to America in 1842, locating in Michigan. His wife was Mary A. Duns. She died in 1850, when James, the youngest child, was less than two years old. James was then adopted by Daniel and Mary Amerman, who in 1858 removed to Alliance, Ohio. James Amerman served two years as a Union soldier in the Civil war, with the Eighty-second Ohio Infantry. He was wounded at the second battle of Bull Run and was taken prisoner at Gettysburg. Soon after the close of the war he began the study of law at Alliance, was admitted to the bar in April, 1867, and for seventeen years his time and talents were fully engrossed with his profession. His practice brought him connection on one side or another with a number of the noted criminal trials of that period, and he was also a counsel in cases involving large property and other interests. Associated with him or as opposing counsel in such trials were many of the most eminent lawyers of the Ohio bar at the time. On November 7, 1870, when he had been practicing law three years, James Amerman married Rachel Teeters. Her father, Elisha Teeters, was born in Mahoning County, Ohio, January 11, 1814, a grandson of Elisha Teeters, who came from Germany and was a pioneer settler in Eastern Ohio, and a son of John Teeters, who served as a colonel in the War of 1812. Elisha Teeters made the original plat of the Town of Alliance in 1851, having bought a farm at the north edge of what is now the City of Alliance in 1846. At one time he owned Alliance College, and was generous of his means to support educational institutions. He was a merchant, a private banker, a railroad official and one of the conspicuous citizens of his day. Elisha Teeters died in 1899. James L. Amerman, the youngest of the four children of James and Rachel (Teeters) Amerman, was born at Alliance, March 23, 1882. He attended the public schools of his native town, also Mount Union College, and in 1906 graduated in law from Western Reserve University. He was admitted to the Ohio bar the same year, and soon afterward admitted to practice in the United States District Court and the United States Circuit Court of Appeals. He began his professional career at Alliance, but in the fall of 1908 removed to Canton. He was a member of the firm Ake, Day & Amerman, subsequently Day & Amerman until Luther M. Day removed to Cleveland, and was then in the firm of Amerman & Quinn two years. When Judge C.C. Bow left the probate bench the firm of Bow, Amerman & Mills was organized, and at the present time Mr. Amerman is senior member of the firm Amerman and Mills. They are engaged in general practice, and have represented a large volume of important interests. Mr. Amerman is a member of the Stark County and Ohio State Bar associations. He belongs to the Canton Club, the Brookside Country Club, and Congress Lake Club. He is a republican in politics. On November 23, 1910, Mr. Amerman married Miss Mary G. Milbourne, of Alliance, daughter of M.S. Milbourne, who was a banker and manufacturer. Mr. and Mrs. Amerman have one daughter, Mary Elizabeth. ------------------------------ X-Message: #3 Date: Mon, 29 Mar 1999 19:59:27, -0500 From: AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M REASONER) Subject: STARK COUNTY - PART 1 HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF OHIO, By Henry Howe, LL.D. 1888 STARK STARK COUNTY was established February 13, 1808, and organized in January, 1809. It was named from Gen. John Stark, an officer of the revolution, who was born in Londonderry, New Hampshire, in 1728, and died in 1822. The surface is generally rolling; the central and northeast portions are slightly undulating. The soil is a sandy loam; in some parts of the north and east a clay soil predominates. It is a rich agricultural county, one of the great wheat producing counties. It embraces within itself the requisite facilities for making it the seat of various manufactures -mineral coal, iron ore, flocks of the choicest sheep, and great water power. Limestone abounds, and inexhaustible beds of lime marl exist. It was settled mainly by Pennsylvania Germans, and from Germany and France. Area about 580 square miles. In 1887 the acres cultivated were 202,996; in pasture, 48,540; woodland, 41,991; lying waste, 6,080; produced in wheat, 986,962 bushels; rye, 2,195; buckwheat, 610; oats, 944,367; barley, 6,434; corn, 1,020,356; broom-corn, 60 pounds brush; meadow hay, 4,107 tons; clover hay, 25,649; flax seed, 12 bushels; potatoes, 171,921; tobacco, 100 pounds; butter, 1,155,775; cheese, 1,097,000; sorghum, 940 gallons; maple syrup, 16,881; honey, 12,766 pounds; eggs, 762,909 dozen; grapes, 52,208 pounds; wine, 637 gallons; sweet potatoes, 578 bushels; apples, 118,588. [In 1876 it produced in apples 881,832 bushels, probably never equalled by any other county in the State.] Peaches, 24,799; pears 3,697; wool, 194,716 pounds; milch cows owned, 12,676. Ohio Mining Statistics, 1888: Coal 793,227 tons, employing 1,747 miners and 216 outside employees; iron ore, 11,455 tons; fire clay, 14,730; limestone, 2,043 tons burned for lime. School census, 1888, 25,376; teacher s, 443. Miles of railroad track, 239. TOWNSHIPS AND CENSUS 1840 1880 Bethlehem 1,019 2,304 Canton 3,298 14,873 Jackson 1,546 2,079 Lake 2,162 2,177 Lawrence 2,045 4,351 Lexington 1,640 6,287 Marlboro 1,670 1,942 Nimishillen 1,927 3,114 Osnaburg 2,333 2,298 Paris 2,474 2,639 Perry 2,210 9,219 Pike 1,409 1,514 Plain 1,838 2,540 Sandy 1,265 1,265 Sugar Creek 1,862 2,285 Tuscarawas 1,942 2,957 Washington 1,389 2,187 Population of Stark in 1820 was 12,406; 1830, 26,552; 1840, 34,617; 1860, 42,978; 1880, 64,031; of whom 47,161 were born in Ohio; 5,885 Pennsylvania; 586 New York; 306 Indiana; 30 Virginia; 36 Kentucky; 4,100 German Empire; 1,451 England and Wales; 917 France; 6223 Ireland; 294 Scotland; 129 British America, and 23 Norway and Sweden. Census, 1890, 84,170. The first Moravian missionary in Ohio, Mr. Frederick Post, settled in 1761 in what is now Bethlehem township, on the north side of the Muskingum, at the junction of its two forks, the Sandy and Tuscarawas. The locality called Tuscararatown is on the south side of the river, just above Fort Laurens, and immediately contiguous to Bolivar. Just there was the Indian ford, on the line of the great Indian trail running west. The site of Post's dwelling, or missionary station, was long indicated by a pile of stones, which had probably formed the back wall of the chimney. The site of the garden differs from the woods around it in the total want of heavy timer. The ruins of a trader's house, on the opposite side of the river, have been mistaken for those of the missionary station. The dwelling built by Post must have been the first house erected in Ohio by whites, excepting such as may have been built by traders or French Jesuits. The Indian and Moravian village of Schoenbrun was not commenced until 1772, eleven years later. Loskiel's History of the Missions says, in allusion to this mission -"On the Ohio river, where, since the last war, some Indians lived who had been baptized by the brethren, nothing could be done up this time. However, brother Frederick Post lived, though of his own choice, about 100 English miles west of Pittsburgh, at Tuscararatown, with a view to commence a mission among those Indians. The brethren wished him the blessings of the Almighty to his undertaking; and when he asked for an assistant to help him in his outward concerns, and who might, during the same time, learn the language of the Delaware Indians, they (the brethren) made it known to the congregation of Bethlehem, whereupon the brother John Heckewelder concluded of his own choice to assist him." "We know of Post that he was an active and zealous missionary, but had married an Indian squaw, contrary to the wishes and advice of the directory, who had the oversight of the Moravian missions, and by that act had forfeited so much of his standing that he would not be acknowledged as one of the missionaries in any other manner than under the direction and guidance of another missionary. Whenever he went farther, and acted on his own accord, he was not opposed, had the good will of the society, of which he continued a member, and its directory, and even their assistance, so far as to make known his wants to the congregation, who threw no obstacle in the way if any person felt inclined of his own choice to assist him; but he was not then acknowledged as their missionary, nor entitled to any farther or pecuniary assistance." This will explain the above passage in Loskiel. "In Heckewelder's Memoirs, written by himself, and printed in Germany, there is a short allusion to the same subject. he says in substance, that he had in his early youth frequent opportunities of seeing Indians, and that gradually he became desirous of becoming useful to them; that already in his 19th year, his desire was in some measure gratified, as he was called upon by Government to accompany the brother Frederick Post to the western Indians on the Ohio. He then mentions some of the fatigues and dangers of the journey, and that he returned in the latter half of the year 1762. In Heckewelder's Narrative of the Indian missions of the United Brethren, he gives a more detailed account of this mission. He says, in effect, that Frederick Post, who had the preceding year [1761] visited the Indians on the Muskingum, thought he would be able to introduce Christianity among them; that the writer of the narrative, by and with the consent of the directors of the society, went with h im principally to teach the Indian children to read and write. They set out early in March, and came to where Post had the preceding year built a house on the bank of the river Muskingum, at the distance of about a mile from the Indian village, which lay to the south across the river. When they commenced clearing, the Indians ordered them to stop and appear before their council the next day, where Post appeared, and was charged with deceit, inasmuch as he had informed the Indians his intentions were to teach them the word of God, and now he took possession of their lands, etc. Post answered that he wanted no more land than sufficient to live from it, as he intended to be no burden to them, etc.; whereupon they concluded that he should have 50 steps in every direction, which was stepped off by the chief next day. He farther says, that an Indian treaty being to be held at Lancaster in the latter part of summer, Post was requested by the governor of Pennsylvania to bring some of the wes tern Delawares to it, which he did, leaving Heckewelder, who returned the same fall, in October, from fear of a war, etc. Post probably never returned to this station." In Zeisberger's memoirs there is no allusion to this mission, though he and Post were frequently associates at an earlier date, and in 1745 were imprisoned together in New York as spies. The foregoing is abridged from papers in the Barr MSS., comprising a letter from Mr. Thomas Goodman, in which was copied one from Judge Blickensderfer, of Dover, who had carefully investigated the subject. No mission it seems was established, only an attempt to found one was made. -Old Edition. ------------------------------ X-Message: #4 Date: Mon, 29 Mar 1999 19:59:15, -0500 From: AUPQ38A@prodigy.com (MRS GINA M REASONER) Subject: PAUL B. BELDEN - STARK COUNTY HISTORY OF OHIO The American Historical Society, Inc., 1925 Volume III, page134-135 PAUL B. BELDEN is one of the progressive young business men of the City of Canton, and his individual achievements as well as his thoroughly public spirited attitude have won from his fellow business men and citizens the honor of election as president of the Canton Chamber of Commerce. Mr. Belden was born at Canton, February 17, 1882, and represents an old and distinguished family of Stark County. He is a son of Henry S. Belden, and a grandson of Judge George W. Belden. His grandfather Judge Belden was admitted to the Ohio bar about 1833, after his early years were spent in medicine. He served as prosecuting attorney for Stark County, was elected to the Legislature and served on the same bench from 1852 to 1855. In 1857 he was appointed United States district attorney for the Northern District of Ohio. In that capacity he successfully prosecuted the parties from Oberlin who had rescued a fugitive slave and the subsequent appeal from this case to the Ohio Supreme Court was a notable event in the slavery discussion of that period. Judge Belden died about 1869. Paul B. Belden attended the grammar and high school of Canton, and from school went directly into the plant and offices of his father, Henry S. Belden, head of the Belden Brick Company, who was the pioneer brick manufacturer of Ohio, and developed the shale paving brick, thereby creating an industry of very considerable importance. The Belden Brick Company today have factories at Canton, Uhrichsville, Somerset and Port Washington. Mr. Paul B. Belden has had a long and successful experience as a brick manufacturer, and is now secretary and general manager of the Belden Brick Company, one of the important institutions in the clay product industry of Ohio. Mr. Belden was elected president of the Canton Chamber of Commerce in 1921. He is also president of the Canton Club, is a member of the Rotary Club, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, the First Presbyterian Church, and in politics is a democrat in national affairs, though casting his vote independently in the local and state elections. He and his wife, Mrs. Mary (Hinchliffe) Belden, who came from Paterson, New Jersey, have four sons, Paul, William, Daniel and Richard. -------------------------------- End of OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest V99 Issue #199 *******************************************