OHIO STATEWIDE FILES OH-FOOTSTEPS Mailing List Issue 174 *********************************************************************** 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. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. http://www.usgwarchives.net/ *********************************************************************** OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest Volume 01 : Issue 174 Today's Topics: #1 Fw: Cemeterys near Graysville, Ohi ["MaggieOhio" To: OH-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-ID: <02a201c14785$f7298380$0300a8c0@local.net> Subject: Fw: Cemeterys near Graysville, Ohio Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit ----- Original Message ----- From: Stan Carpenter To: Maggie Stewart Sent: Saturday, August 04, 2001 10:08 PM Subject: Cemeterys near Graysville, Ohio On SR 26 between Graysville and Stafford we stopped at a house and with the owner walked out back about 1000 feet and came upon a small cemetery.Names were: Joseph Cummings, John Jackmen d 5/20/1851, Mary L Wallace d 2/6/1854, Thomas D. Harman d 1/31/1857, William McConnell, and infant Maple d 12/6/1857. I recall a while back someone was hunting for cemeteries near Graysville and the owner said when he moved there that you could not tell it was there for the trees and brush. Stan ______________________________ ------=_NextPart_000_05E1_01C152C1.F9E3B4A0 Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="Bio_ William Hewitt, Pike county.eml" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="Bio_ William Hewitt, Pike county.eml" X-Message: #2 Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2001 15:43:47 -0500 From: Tina Hursh To: OH-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.20010927204347.0188fae8@clubnet.isl.net> Subject: Bio: William Hewitt, Pike county Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" "Historical Collections of Ohio, Vol II" by Henry Howe. Published in 1888. Pages 428-429 William Hewitt, the Hermit On an adjoining page is given a view of the Cave of the Scioto Hermit, which we visited to make the drawing for our first edition, and therein gave the folloing account: About eleven miles south of Chillicother, on the turnpike road to Portsmouth, is the cave of the hermit of the Scioto. When built, many years ago, it was in the wilderness, the road having since been laid out by it. It is a rude structure, formed by successive layers of stone, under a shelving rock, which serves as a back and roof. Over it is a monument, bearing the following inscription: William Hewit, The Hermit, Occupied this cave for fourteen years, while all was a wilder- ness around him. He died in 1834, aged 70 years. But little is known of the history of the hermit. He was, it is said, a Virginian, and married early in life into a family of respectability. Returning one night from a journey, he had ocular proof of the infidelity of his wife, killed her paramour, and instantly fled to the woods, never to return or associate with mankind. He eventually settled in the Scioto valley and built this cave, where he passed a solitary life, his rifle furnishing him with provisions and clothing, which consisted of skins ofanimals. As the country gradually filled uphe became an object of curiosity to thesettlers. He was mild and inoffensive inhis address, avoided companionship with those around, and if any allusion wass made to his history, evaded the subject. Occasionally he visited Chillicothe, to exchange te skins of his game for ammunition, when his singular appearance attracted observation. in person, he was large and muscular; the whole of his dress, from his cap to this moccasins, wass of deerskin; his beard was long and unshaven, and his eye wild and piercing. In passing from place to place he walked in the street to prevent encountering his fellow-men. Many anecdotes are related of him. He planted an orchard on government land, which afterwards became the property of a settler; but so sensitive was he in regard to the rights of others, that he would not pluck any of the fruit without first asking liberty of the legal owner. While sitting concealed in the recesses of the forest, he once observed a teamster deliberaltely cut down and carry off some fine venison he had placed to dry on a limb of a tree before his cave. Hewitt followed, got before him, and as he came up, suddenly sprang from behing some bushes beside the road, and presenting his rifle to his bosom, with fierce and determined manner bade him instantly return and replace the venison. The man tremblingly obeyed, receiving the admonition, "never again to rob the hermit." A physician riding by stopped to gratify the curiosity of his companions. He found the hermit ill, administered medicine, visited him often gratuitously during his illness, and effected a cure. The hermit ever after evinced the warmest gratitude. In the above acoutn, William Hewitt is stated to have refused to associate with mankind, a result of the infidelity of his wife and the killing of her paramour. This fact was related by the hermit to the father of Col. John McDonald. Hon. James Emmitt, who knew Hewitt intimately, states that the cause of his solitary life was a quarrel with other members of his family over the disposition of his father's estate. Disgusted by the avariciousness of his relatives he sought the solitude of the Western wilderness. The occurred about 1790, when Hewitt was twenty-six year old. He first located in a cave in what is now Jackson county, Ohio, but as the game upon which he subsisted began to grow scarce with the advent of the settler and trader, he removed into what is now Pike county. ______________________________ ------=_NextPart_000_05E1_01C152C1.F9E3B4A0 Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="Hewitt bio part 2.eml" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="Hewitt bio part 2.eml" X-Message: #3 Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2001 16:03:59 -0500 From: Tina Hursh To: OH-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.20010927210359.0188d6e4@clubnet.isl.net> Subject: Hewitt bio part 2 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Here's some more from where the last bio left off Pg 430, 431 Mr. Emmitt gives many interesting reminiscences of Hewitt, from which we extract the following: The Hermit's Cave.-Almost at the base of the Dividing Ridge's gently slope to the southward, he found a cave in a lowly hillside. This camve was nothing more than a great ledge of rock, projecting out eight or ten feet over a shelving bank, and forming a one-sided room of fair dimensions. The rock-ceiling was so low, however, that at now poin could a man of ordinary stature stand erect. He enclosed the cave's open front with a loosely laid up wall of rock. At one end of the cave he erected a heavy oaken door, which he had hewn out with his little tomahawk. This door was swung on very clumsy wooden hinges, and was fastened by driving a peg through its outer board and into a crevice in the rocky wall. A magnificent Physique.-When Hweitt first came into this section, and took possession of his cave, he was a splended specimen of a man. He was six feet two inches in height, broad and deep-chested, and a straight as a nickel-tipped lightning rod. He weighed somthing over 200 pounds, and was a strong and active as a gladiator. Clad from head to foot in buckskin-moccasins, leggins, hunting shirt, belt and hat-and alwaysarmed with gun, tomahawk and knife, Hewitt, the hermit, was a very picturesque citizen to suddnely meet in the woods. An Ohio Robinson Crusoe.-When he took possession of his cave, be it rememvered, there were very few people in this section, and the only road traversing this country from north to south, was known as Yoakum's Trace. It was merely a wagon trail, and passed Hewitt's cave at a point about 100 yards distant from the present curve-beautified turnpike. When the travellers up and down Yoakum's Trace first became aware of the fact that there was a sort of buckskin-clad Robinson Crusoe skulking about the woods, armed to the teeth, they were much alarmed, and their alarm was heightened when it became evident that the Recluse of Divinging Ridge didn't see their company. But this fear gradually diminished as they became more familiar with his appearance and manners, and managed to strike up an acquaintance with him. There was this peculiarity about Hewitt, while he never sought any man's company, he never acted the fool about meeting peoople, when a meeting was unavoidable. When brought into contact with his fellow-men, he always bore himself with striking native dignity; rather with the air of a man who felt himself to be a trifle superior to the ordinary run of citizens. The Hermit's Antecedents.-One fay, in 1832, Mr. Emmitt, while at the Madeira Hotel, in Chillicothe, was accosted by a gentleman, who introduced himself, and said that he was from Virginia. He came to Ohio, he said, to look up a man named William Hewitt, who years before had been lost tot he knowledge of his friends until a few months before. Mr. Emmitt heard the story of Hewitt's flight from home-related above-and then proffered to accompany the strange to Hewitt's cave. The two men rode down to the cave, knocked, and were bidden to endter. The found Hewitt comfortable seated on his fur-carpeted floor. He did not get up to receive his visitors, but in a friendly way made them welcome. He did not at first recognize thie stranger, but when told who he was, he said: "How are you , Bill," as though it had only been yesterday that they had met. The stranger sought Hewitt to axquaint him with the condition of his property back in Virginia, and how it had been abused by those who then had unlawful possession of it. Hewitt heard him through, with but little show of interest, and when urged by the stranger to return and claim his property, he answered, with some vehemence: "Never mind; I'm going back some of these days, and then I'll give 'em hell." He didn't seem to care anything about the value of his property, but showed that he was filled with bitterness toward those on whose account he had renounced civilization and home. The stranger went back to Virginia, a dissatisfied and rather disgusted man. more to come.... ______________________________ ------=_NextPart_000_05E1_01C152C1.F9E3B4A0 Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="Hewitt bio - final part.eml" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="Hewitt bio - final part.eml" X-Message: #4 Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2001 18:22:39 -0500 From: Tina Hursh To: OH-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.20010927232239.0074bc04@clubnet.isl.net> Subject: Hewitt bio - final part Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" pg 431 & 432 A pitiable Condition.-Hewitt, as he frew old, became very careless in his personal habits, and or two years preceding his death never changed his buckskin garments. He had grown fat and lazy, and made no exertion that was not a necessity. And as he grew old he became more sociable. One day, in the winter of 1834, he stopped at the house of a widow woman, named Lockhard, with whome he ate a hearty dinner. After dinner he was taken violently ill with a chill. Mr. Emmitt, who was then one of the Poor Commissioners of Pike county, was notified of Hweitt's illness, and he had the old man removed to a frame building in Waverly. Dr. Blackstone was summond and gave the man needed medical assistance. The Hermit was stricken with pneumonia. His person was in an absolutely filthy condition. The dirty buckskin garments were cut from his person, and he was given a thorough bath-the first he had had for three years, or longer. He was newly and comfortable clothed by Mr. Emmitt, was provided with a male nurse, and made as comfortable as possible. The ladies of Waverly were very kind to him, and dialy brought him many delicacies. He began to improve, and one night, about a week after he was taken ill, his nurse, a man named Cole, left him alone, and went up to Downing's hotel to spend the night. Whe he returned in the morning Hewitt was dead. The Hermit's Skeleton.-Hewitt was buried in the old graveyard at Waverly, about one square southeast of the court-house. But he was not allowed to remain long in his grave. He was resurrected by Dr. Wm. Blackstone, and carved up in artistic shape. A portion of Hewitt's skeleton-the entire skull, and the bones composing the chest, ribs and backbone-was mounted by Dr. Blackstone. No one knew what became of the remainder of the skeleton until 1883, when they came to light in a most unexpected way. One day, while some of Mr. Emmitt's workmen were digging a cellarway to a house he owned, adjoining what had been Dr. Blackstone's office, they came upon a pile of bones, buried four feet below the surface of the ground, andclose to the stone foundation wall. The bones were evidently those of a victim of the Doctor's dissecting-table, and Mr. Emmitt promptly concluded that they were a portion of Hewitt's skeleton. Theis opinion found its wasy into print, and a few days later he received a letter from Dr. Blackstone, of Circleville, making inquiry about the discovered bones. He said that he was in possession of what he believed to be the other portion of Hewitt's frame, bequeathed to him by his uncle, Dr. Wm. Blackstone. Mr. Emmitt boxed and sent him the bones and they fitted, exaclty, the upper half of the skeleton in Dr. Blackston'e possession. This was a remarkable reunion of bones, surely, after a separation of a half-century. Hewitt's Monument.-The Columbus & Portsmouth turnpike was built past the mouth of Hewitt's cave in 1840, and in 1842, Mr. Felix Renick, the first President of the company, had a respectable freestone monument erected on the shelving rock forming the roof to the cave, to mark the grewsome home that Hewitt had occupied from 1820 to 1834. The erection of this monument was a wise, money-making scheme, and has paid for itself an hundred time over. Thousands of people have driven up or down that pike-and paid their toll both ways-in order to see the monument, and the cave where the old Hermit lived, slept on a bed of finest deerskin, ate choice venison, and laughed at the cares of a struggling, feverish worl. He always ate his pawpaws in peace. ______________________________ ------=_NextPart_000_05E1_01C152C1.F9E3B4A0 Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="Fw_ Know Your Ohio -- Ohio's Canals -- Part 6.eml" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="Fw_ Know Your Ohio -- Ohio's Canals -- Part 6.eml" X-Message: #5 Date: Fri, 28 Sep 2001 03:53:03 -0400 From: "MaggieOhio" To: OH-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-ID: <005101c147f3$0879a760$0300a8c0@local.net> Subject: Fw: Know Your Ohio -- Ohio's Canals -- Part 6 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit ----- Original Message ----- From: "Darlene & Kathi kelley" To: Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2001 1:31 AM Subject: Know Your Ohio -- Ohio's Canals -- Part 6 Contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by Darlene E. Kelley Sept. 11, 2001 ********************************************* Historical Collections of Ohio Know Your Ohio by Darlene E. Kelley Ohio's Canals -- Part 6. ********************************************** Ohio's Canals -- Part 6. Growth of Canal Towns and Cities-- As the migration of people came from various other places, Ohio's population increased and new towns along the Canal routes grew abundantly. Population in the state of Ohio in 1800 was approximately 45,365. By 1810, there were 230,760. In 1820, 581,295 and in 1850 the population grew to 1,980,329. The economy was certainly enriched. For instance; Akron grew from 700 in 1820 to nearly 4,000 by 1857; Chillicothe from 2,416 to over 10,000: Cincinnati, from 2,602 to 200,000, the greatest growth; Circleville from 500 to 3,500; Cleveland from 400 to 60,000; Columbus from 1,400 to 25,000; Dayton from 1,139 to 16,000; Hamilton from 600 to 4,000; Newark from 700 to 4,000; Portsmouth from 500 to 5,000; Toledo from 500 to 14,003; and Zanesville from 2,000 to 12,000. It was never fully determined what the cost of the canals were in reality, however some estimates were that the State of Ohio lost around $ 13 million on the project as they funded smaller systems that were beyond their time before they were built. However, the profit to Ohio and its people in general is inestimable. The canal system opened Ohio and Ohioans to such economic and industrial improvements that Ohio was now a significant member and contributor to the economy and spread by the immigration and migration of the United States of America across the vast continent. List of Ohio Canals and their feeders -- Eastern Ohio ; Ohio and Erie Canal Pennsylvania & Ohio Canal Sandy and Beaver Canal Walhonding Canal Muskingham River Improvement Hocking Canal Ohio City Canal Middlebury Branch Canal Nimishellen & Sandy Canal Cuyahoga Feeder South Feeder Zoar Feeder & Sidecut Trenton Feeder Dresden Sidecut Granville Feeder Columbus Feeder Western Ohio; Miami Canal Miami Extension Canal Wabash & Erie Canal Miami & Erie Canal Warren County Canal Cincinnati & Whitewater Canal Gilead Sidecut Toledo ( Swan Creek ) Sidecut Maumee Sidecut Grand Reservoir Feeder Sidney Feeder Hamilton Sidecut Central Ohio Milan Canal ****************************************** Milan Canal -- This 3 mile long canal with 2 locks ran from Huran to Fries landing on the Hudson River from where it was navigable to lake Erie, bringing prosperity to the wheat growing region of Milan. It opened in 1840 with a mile long ship canal that opened up Milan as an interior port. Milan became second only to the Russian Port of Odessa in the export of wheat. The development of the canal greatly increased the export of the areas products, mainly wheat and flour to other regions of the country. The canal basin was formed by damming the Huron River. This provided enough water to supply the whole canal and operate the locks. In May of 1847 a line of wagons waiting to unload into the canal boats was over 6 miles long, over 35,000 bushels of produce were handled in that one day. Exports of wheat rose from 4,000 bushels before 1840 to 1.6 million bushels in 1847. This example is proof of how the canals in Ohio helped the economic growth of a poor State into a prosperous State wth links to markets in both the east and west of a fast growing and expanding country. The canal was closed when a davasting flood occurred in 1868. Ohio City Canal -- The community of Ohio City across from Cleveland, incorporated in 1836, authorized the building of a canal to promote the growth for their community. It entered the Cuyahoga River opposite the outlet of the Ohio & Erie Canal. It attracted warehouses and docks to its side of the river. Ohio City was soon absorbed into the fast growing City of Cleveland. Gilead Sidecut; It provided access to the Miami & Erie Canal for the town of Gilead, now Grand Rapids. It was 2/10 of a mile long with no locks or rise. Zoar Feeder & Sidecut; This canal was most profitable economically to the German religious community of Zoar, but also ultimately to be the reason for the demise of the religious sect. It was built by the Zoarites in order to avoid foreclosure on their property and connected the town of Zoar with the Ohio & Erie Canal. Directly due to the influence of the Canal the community built up a good wheat, flour, and iron ore industry and even purchased some canal boats of its own. However, the influx of new people from the canal business to the community, brought with it diseases, such as cholera, that had up until this time, been unknown in the community, and the prosperty of these people caused dissention amongst its members of the sect and then to its demise. Nimishellen & Sandy Canal; The Town of Canton, proposed the building of a canal alng the Nimishaellen River and Sandy Creek to join it with the Sandy Beaver Canal. A furrow was dug along the route that was wide and deep enough for small craft and enthusiasim was high. However, due to the fact that the stream was too small to suppy the required water and two swift. The canal never came to fruition and thousands of dollars were lost. There would have been more locks per mile on the canal than any other exisiting canal at the time because the drop in the short distance from Canon to the Sandy Creek was so great. Dresden Sidecut; This sidecut entered the Ohio & Erie Canal at Webbsport, connecting the Muskingham River Improvement with the caal at Dresden. It had an aquaduct over Watakomica Creek that was 3 miles long with 3 locks with a total rise of 29 feet. Granville Feeder; Near Millersport on the LIcking Summit. It was 6 miles long with one lift lock of 10 feet rise and one guard lock. Toledo ( Swan Creek ) Sidecut & Maumee Sidecut; These two sidecuts wre near the mouth of the Maumee River and caused a great competition between the two communities.Both Toledo and Maumee were to have sidecuts from the Miami & Erie Canal to the Maumee River which was to give both direct access to Lake Erie. The direct river access was not used much due to the inability to control the Canal boats in the currents of the Maumee River. As with the southern terminus in Cincinnati, cargo was offloaded and trans-shipped to the lake. The Toledo ( Swan Creek ) Sidecut was one mile long, with two locks, having a rise of15 feet. One of three northern termini of the Maimi & Erie Canal, the Toledo Sidecut, by 1871, became the sole northern terminus for the canal , due to acts of the legislature, that closed the Manhatten Extension and the main canal north of Swan Creek in 1871 and the Maumee Sidecut in 1864. The Maumee Sidecut was 1 1/2 miles long with 6 locks, having a total rise of 63 feet. It left the main channel 8 1/2 miles south of the head of the Toledo Sidecut and " locked " into the Maumee River at a point directly across from Perrysburg. A rock bar, allowing only shallow river traffic to travel the sidecut. This led to the decision in 1864 to abandon the connection to the river. Sidney Feeder ; The Sidney feeder was 14 miles long, with no locks or rise. It followed the Great Miami River from Loramie Creek through Sidney to Port Jefferson. A dam across the river at Port Jefferson, fed the feeder. Lewiston Reservoir, now Indian Lake, was created at the head of the Great Miami and became the principal water source for the summit. The water flowed down the river for 18 miles before it entered into the feeder at Port Jefferson. The Columbus Feeder; This feeder was begun on April 20,1827. It was 12 miles long, which connected Columbus with the main line of the Ohio & Erie Canal. It took 4 years to complete. The water supply came from the dam across the Scioto River in Columbus with several locks. It joined the Ohio & Erie at Lockbourne through 8 locks. The first mile was built by convicts from the State Penitentiary. The first boat the " Governor Brown " was traveled on the canal September 23, 1831. The Trenton Feeder; This feeder was three miles long with one guard lock and no rise. Hamilton Sidecut; It was 6/10 of a mile long which included no locks or rise. Grand Reservoir ( St Mary's ) Feeder This feeder was designed to tap into the resources of several natural springs and the Beaver Creek, allowing some 50 miles of the Miami Extenson to be supplied with water in the dry season. It was started in 1837. It became a long process tat met with great controversy from the local residents. It was to become the largest man-made body of water in the world at that time. It covered more than 15,748 acres and spanned from 9 miles long to 2 to 5 miles wide. It was formed by building dams or large embankments across the eastern and western ends of a natural valley. Between 10 to 20 feet high, these embankments were finished in 1842 and the valley was finally closed. With 4,000 acres of low lying swampy land and the rest timbered, the original plan was to clear all the trees in the valley before filling the reservoir. However, the legislature felt that it was an unnecessary expense and ceased all clearing. In the spring of 1843, the reservoir was allowed to fill with water. In an effort to bring attention to the half submerged, rotting timber, local residnts caused a breach in the western enbankment, that drained the reservoir. Damages cost the State $17,000, causing the commerce reduced on the canal until the reservoir was refilled. Eventually the State, had the trees sawed off at the water line, creating an unseen hazzard to boats and fishermen on the reservoir. The tree stumps were not removed until recent times and the reservoir is now a very productive recreational area. The feeder itself from the reservoir to the canal was three miles long and entered the canal between locks # 11 and # 12 at St Mary's. The feeder was navigable and a wooden lock in the eastern embankment of the reservoir allowed canal traffic and boats to be lifted to Lake level and to travel the reservoir to Celina and Montezuma.There was no towpath along the lake and therefore, canal crews were required to take their animals on board and to use long poles to navigate the reservoir. The wooden lock was replced in 1852 with one built of Dayton stone. A return feeder was constructed the same year between locks # 6and # 7 to return excess canal water to the reservor. ********************************************* to be continued in part 7. ______________________________ ------=_NextPart_000_05E1_01C152C1.F9E3B4A0 Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="Fw_ Know Your Ohio -- Ohio's Canals -- part 8.eml" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="Fw_ Know Your Ohio -- Ohio's Canals -- part 8.eml" X-Message: #6 Date: Fri, 28 Sep 2001 04:09:19 -0400 From: "MaggieOhio" To: OH-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-ID: <006901c147f5$33d15140$0300a8c0@local.net> Subject: Fw: Know Your Ohio -- Ohio's Canals -- part 8 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit ----- Original Message ----- From: "Darlene & Kathi kelley" To: Sent: Wednesday, September 12, 2001 4:55 PM Subject: Know Your Ohio -- Ohio's Canals -- part 8 Contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by Darlene E. Kelley Sept 13, 2001 *********************************************** Historical Collections of Ohio Know Your Ohio by Darlene E. Kelley Ohio's Canals -- Part 8. *********************************************** Ohio's Canals -- Part 8. Clevelanders and the Canals-- Clevelanders were indifferent, more or less, to the Ohio Canals at first, some of them perfectly satisfied to give it to Painsville or Black River ( Lorain ), who wanted it badly. The lakes to the south of Cleveland, and the Cuyahoga and Tuscarawas rivers were the deciding factors, however, and the canal reached its southern goal in 1832. Clevelands's fame spread far and wide with the opening of the canal. Strategic location on the lake and inland water route made the village an exchange point for goods from the south and east as well as export. Long lines of overland wagons and heavy passenger traffic by waterways taxed housing facilities. Vessels, crowded the river, light and heavy vehicles filled the unpaved streets, and pedestrians wormed their way around bags, barrels, boxes on the sidewalks. Real estate values rose at alarming rate, and rents were high. Newcomers were met at the docks by smooth talking promoters with beautiful city plans on paper, urging them to buy. Inflationary prosperity was mansifested in new taverns and hotels, commercial blocks, stores, tenament buildings, and extended boundry lines. Cleveland, a boom town, was riding the crest of the wave. Private individuals and companies who were subject to tolls, charged by the canal buillder, sprung up. Jobs were offeed at low pay, and those who needed work, oft time applied for those jobs to feed their families. Canal travel was safe and became popular, especially in fair weather, when passengers could lounge on the top decks, leisurely enjoying the wooded hillsides, the shadowy mysteries of the canal, and the twinkling lights in isolated houses. " Missing the boat " was not necessarily a disaster. The passenger merely hired a rig and galloped to the nearest bridge across the canal, waited for the boat and climbed aboard. The expression " Low Bridge " is said to have originated when the skipper warned passengers riding on top of the packet to prepare them to recognize the three or four foot clearance between the bridge and boat. The completing of the Ohio Canal, the State seemed to have abandoned the burden of laying out state roads, and gave to private corporations the right to improve certain roads, and charge tolls. Stock in the company was usually purchased by the state. These tolls were high, compared to the canal tolls. Turnpike, and plank road companies sprang up over night, all over Ohio, building a network called the Farmers Railway, some conecting to the terminels to the canals. Others did not. By 1870, the companies had almost disappeared, leaving upkeep to the counties. Reports of railroad progress in the East incited emphatic expressions for and against the new development. Pessimists pointed out the hazards that accompanied wood burning engines, their stacks belching out great glowing cinders along with the smoke. On the other hand, Clevelanders were spurred into the idea, as they realized that speed by stage and canal was slow, and isolated during winter months. So they began planning rail connections with Pittsburg and Cincinnati. In the face of many protests from the citizenship, forward looking businessmen took their first steps in the long uphill climb to bring the railroad to Cleveland. At the same time, local promoters were laying wooden rails for a streetcar line motivated by horsepower that was ahead of their time. With the coming of the wooden planked roads, horses were replacing oxen as beast of burden. They were speedier. Fine farms around Cleveland boasted fine breeds. Those who wished to travel on business or for pleasure could hire saddle horses, gigs, sulkies, and hacks at a number of local livery stables. There was always room for one more rider on the patient family nag when ladies chose to do a bit of shopping. It was considered for two buxom females to mount one horse, jog to town with perhaps a basket of eggs and a pail of butter, and trade for their family needs at the general store. The one horse principle served equally well when a young man took his best girl to a sociable, Starched and smiling, she stood on the mounting block, and with a sprightly leap, born of experience, she settled herself on the horse behind her escort, arrnged yards of skirts and petticoats, and clung to him with genuine pleasure. This area of canals was the period of Clevelands city making. The business district of the new city fronted on the river, where steamers, schooners, and canal boats exchanged imported commodities for products of local industry. The river bank was a thriving center of forwarding and commission warehouses, ship chandlers, merchants, and artisans. Stores lined steep, unpaved Superior hill, and there were a few brick buildings of several stories on the street beyond.. All this accomplished by the for- thought of City makers, politicians, and dreamers, who had the mind of genius, and created the Ohio canals by shovels, wheelbarrows, hard work, and their own ingenuity, giving unselfishly their time, money, and lack of family. We are in awe of the creation of these mighty canals. *********************************************** -------------------------------- End of OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest V01 Issue #174 *******************************************