Defiance Ore Route Defiance Crescent News 11-20-1932

Pig Iron

    TIME was when the Maumee river and the canal at Defiance during the open river months carried several boats loads of iron ore weekly. This ore was bound for Paulding Furnace, located where the C. N. railroad now crosses the abandoned Wabash and Erie Canal was the only handy means of transportation in the era when ambitious minds sought fortune by using the abundant hardwoods of North Paulding county as fuel for smelting ore.
    This era of the iron foundry, one of the farthest inland iron foundries ever established in the state, began in 1871 and continued for about 12 years. Leaders in the enterprise were Evans, Bennett and Marshall, one huge frame shed was floored with sand which was moulded while wet into forms for the molten purified ore. These forms were called "sow" and "pigs." This name was applied because the main form of each mould was long with narrow opening along the side, appearing much like a sow with suckling pigs. Before the ore was thoroughly cold men wearing wooden shoes took heavy bars and broke the "pigs" from the "sow", and also broke the sow into smaller pieces to make the handling of the iron easier. It is from the nickname of "pigs" applied to the smaller forms that the name "pig iron" comes.

Johnny Logan (Spemica Lawba) (Gen. Leslie Combs)

                                                                                                                                   September 21, 1846

My dear Sir:

General Leslie Combs  29 Nov. 1793

     I proceed to comply with my promise made to you some months ago to give you the particulars of the last battle and the death of Logan, a distinguished Shawnee chief and a nephew of Tecumseh. Although more than a third of a century has passed since then, my recollection of the thrilling event is as fresh as if it had occurred only yesterday. Indeed, there are many scenes that I can never forget in the severe campaigns of 1812 and 1813.The first campaign terminated January 22, 1813, on the bloody battlefield of the Raisin River; the second ended May 5, 1813, with Dudley's defeat opposite Fort Meigs.

    In November, 1812, the left wing of the Army of the Northwest, commanded by General Winchester, was stationed at a camp on the Maumee River six miles below Fort Defiance at the mouth of the Augaize and about forty-five miles above the rapids. The Kentucky volunteers had served more than half of their term and were becoming restless because of inaction and starvation; they were very anxious to go out in quest of food and fighting. On November 21 General Payne had intimated to Logan a doubt concerning the latter's fidelity to the American cause, since Logan's uncle was commanding the Indians allied with the British. This suspicion was rather roughly expressed, and it fired the noble Indian to a degree of excitement; he avowed his fixed resolution to give unmistakable  evidence of his honor and courage. A large force of the enemy had located itself at the rapids, and Logan determined to go there and take a prisoner or lose his scalp in the effort.
    I was then a beardless cabet only eighteen years old. By order of General Payne, I had been attached to Colonel Charles Scott's regiment of Kentucky volunteers. On that day I was detained for guard duty as a subaltern officer in command of twenty-four men. My position was near the river below the camp, and my line of sentinels extended out at right angles for two or three hundred yards in order to protect the flank of the army. Although it was cold, the day was bright and beautiful and the air was crisp. At early dawn, as the last notes of the reveille echoed through the air, Logan was conducted by the officers of the day through the outer lines of the army. On his perilous enterprise, he was accompanied only by two Shawee warriors from Wapakoneta, his own village. The first, Captain Johnny, was a tall, swarthy, villainous-looking fellow. He was not popular with the troops because they believed he had fought against General Harrison at the battle of Tippecanoe. The other was a noble-looking young Indian about twenty-two years of age who was known by the English name of Bright-horn. Subsequently, he distinguished himself in Dudley's defeat while under my immediate command. The boldness and the extremely  hazardous nature of this voluntary undertaking excited our highest admiration, but many of us expressed serious apprehensions concerning the consequences to the daring chief and his intrepid companions.
    Military men know that the officer in command of a camp guard never sleeps while on duty. Consequently, midnight found me awake. Lying on my back with my head to the light, I was reading one of Miss Porter's novels; my men wrapped in their blankets, were sleeping around the fire. The night was clear and dark, and all was silent and quickly repeated challenges of one ot the sentinels neasrest the river bank. As I sprang to my feet to arouse the guard, I recognized Logan's voice. Answering the challenge and announcing himself, he said, "My friends, we have had a bloody battle, I am badly wounded," I was greatly shocked by this reply. All day long I had been talking and thinking of him. Instead of his usually loud, musical, and manly voice, I heard his feeble and tremulous answer, and I did not wait for any military formula. Immediately, I ordered the sentinel to let him pass, and I hastened him and conduct him to the fire. He was accompanied only by Brighthorn, and both of them were well mounted. I knew they had left camp that morning on foot, as there was only one horse in that wing of the army. All of the other horses had perished or been sent into the interior.
    At my request, Logan immediately proceeded to give me an account of the events of the day. He and his companions had left the beaten path along the riverbank and had taken a low swamp route a mile or two away in order to avoid observation or discovery. Before they had gone ten miles, however, they saw six persons on horseback short distance ahead. These six were traveling the same presumably safe and secret way but were coming from opposite direction.
    It required no interpreter to inform Logan and his companions that they were within rifle shot of six deadly enemies. It was to late to think of flight through the open woods in daylight with any hope of escape; and it would be madness to fight while outnumbered two to one. But the steady, poised chief did not hesitate in the adoption of his plan, and his promptness of action probably saved him from immediate death. His companions watched his countenance and all his movements with keen concern. They were ready to second or sanction whatever he might do or say. Logan resolved to attempt by stratagem what he despaired of effecting by immediate combat. He did not halt in his onward march and manifested neither surprise nor alarm, but with a bland smile he hastened to meet and salute the horsemen. Indeed, he expressed his high gratification at the unexpected good fortune of finding them so near at hand. Now he need not go all the way to the rapids to see them and communicate the important intelligence which he possessed. Skillfully blending fact and falsehood to give a semblance of truth to all he said, he told them that an early movement of Winchester's army was contemplated.
    If anything could have shaken Logan's firm nerves or caused him to hesitate a moment, it would have been a fact which he discovered only after coming in close contact with the strangers. Their leader was his deadly personal foe--an Indian celebrated for his cunning, courage, and cruelty-- Winamac, the great Potawatomi chief. Among the others was Captain Elliott, a half-breed son of Colonel Elliott of the British army. The latter was well known afterward for his cold-blooded treachery to the unfortunate Kentucky captives taken at the Raisin and Dudley's defeat. A tall, young Ottawa chief and three grim-looking, painted warriors were also in the group.
    Immediately at the outbreak of the war,the British government had taken measures to enlist under the immediate control of Colonel Elliott all the  tribes of Canada. Those tribes,.led by Robert Dixon and Tecumseh, on the northern and western frontiers of the United States also joined the British cause. Tecumseh was the prime mover of the hostile operation of the Indians  against  us. After Hull's surrender at Detroit, a large body of these Indians had moved forward to attack Fort Wayne. They had been driven back by General Harrison and were encamped at the rapids of the Maumee River nearly opposite the point where Fort Meigs was afterward built. General Proctor naturally wanted to know whether General Harrison had taken up winter quarters at the points then occupied by several of the Army of the Northwest or whether he intended to invade Canada during the winter. Therefore, Proctor had dispatched this carefully selected band of six Indians to spy on Winchester's camp. If they could not secure a prisoner, they were to ascertain the intentions of the American general from preparation and appearance. Therefore, the capture of Logan was a godsend far beyond their most sanguine hopes and expectations. Logan, who had been employed for months by General Harrison as a spy and guide, would necessarily know more about the General's plans and intentions than anyone else.
    The band proceeded no farther toward our camp but turned back toward the rapids. Winamc did not believe Logan's story was disposed to disarm the three Indians and to tie their hands behind them in order to avoid all possibility of danger or escape. But Captain Elliott and the others objected; they believe that there was no risk during the daytime while they were mounted and Logan and his companions were on foot. In the course of the day, Winamac asked Logan why he was now coming to join them; in the past he had always positively refused. Winamac charged that Logan had even risked his life in passing through enemy lines at the siege of Fort Wayne to urge the garrison to hold out until General Harrison's forces arrived. Logan's answer to the charge was as prompt as it was plausible. He said his family was at Wapakoneta within the American lines, and he feared that they would either be forced into settlement or be killed if he joined the British as Tecumseh had urged him to do. He also stated that General Payne's treatment of him had been so outrageous that he had determined to sacrifice everything in order to be revenged. Although he was temporarily treated as a friend, Logan saw and felt that he was distrusted by Winamac and his companions, and he realized that at night he and his comrades would be confined as prisoners.
    In the evening they stopped to encamp near a small watercourse. Winamac and his party dismounted and began to unsaddle their horses. The critical moment had arrived.Not a word had passed between Logan and his fellow prisoners, but he knew their bravery and devotion and did not doubt their active and efficient co-operation in anything he might attempt. He pretended to see a squirrel in a tree short distance away and mentioned it to Captain Johnny and Brighthorn. Not a word of his bloody purpose passed his lips; he only asked them if they desired some tobacco.Then with a significant look, he handed each a leaden bullet., which they put into their mouths. In an instant, the sharp, simultaneous cracking of three rifles announced that the work of death had commenced. The quiet of the November sunset was changed into the noise of savage strife and battle.
    Winamac and Captain Elliott fell dead, and one of the warriors was wounded. The combatant were thus reduced to numerical equality, but there were six loaded rifles on one side to three empty ones the other. In this emergency, Logan and his companions boldly attempted to seize the enemies' arms which had been placed against a tree. But this action was anticipated by their foes, who were fully aware of the life-or-death nature of the combat. As all rushed toward the loaded guns, the opposing parties were brought face to face. Logan's enemies jumped behind trees for shelter with their loaded rifles. A typical Indian fight began and continued until darkness ended it. Many shots were fired from Logan's rifle struck down the Ottawa chief. Brighthorn disposed of a another warrior and was severely wounded himself. attempted to move nearer the enemy. Unfortunately, at that instant, the enemy planted a ball in his body just below the center of the breastbone. The ball passed through his body and lodged just beneath the skin near the lower part of his back. Although mortally wounded, Logan did not fall. The enemy fled. Logan's last act was to drive his tomahawk into Winamac's head, That duty was left for Captain Johnny, after he had aided Logan and Brighthorn to mount the enemies' horses and start back to our camp.
    Next morning the fatal ball was extracted from Logan's back without difficulty, but he was a dying man. He suffered the most acute agony without a groan and calmly provided for his wife and children. About forty-eight hours after he had received his wound, he died. When it was announced that the great chief was dead, a deep gloom settled over the army, as if a dire calamity had befallen each individual officer and soldier.
    At the time of his death, Logan could not have been over forty years of age; perhaps he was not over thirty-five. He was above medium height and heavier than most Indians. He had a deep, broad chest and a high forehead. His countenance was mild, amiable, and playful rather than stern; yet it combined marked firmness and decision of character.
    Please excuse any inaccuracies of style and manner. My next letter will contain a brief account of Captain Johnny's fate, Logan's funeral, and the announcement of the chief's death to his village, and the fate of Logan's family.

                                         Yours truly
                                                           General Leslie Combs

Daily Indiana Journal, December 4,1852










                                                                                                                  September  25, 1846



My dear Sir

    In my last letter I related that Captain Johnny was left on the battlefield where Logan had received hs death-wound. Captain Johnny was to scalp his dead enemies according to the customs of the savages. Logan told me that I need not expect Captain Johnny before daylight. Johnny spoke English very poorly, and he would fear being shot as an enemy if he approached the sentinels during the night. I cautioned the guards and order them to keep a sharp lookout for him.
    At daybreak we were somewhat uneasy, since Captain Johnny had not made his appearance. Soon I heard a most unearthly noise near the river. It seemed to imitate the human voice, and I supposed that the Shawnee brave was trying to halloo like a white man and hail the sentinel nearest him. After advancing fifty yards toward the river, I saw the black ugly, painted face of Captain Johnny anxiously peering from behind a huge  oak tree. He was repeating with all his might the strange, discordant sounds which had first attracted my attention.
    I had expected him to appear on horseback with the captured steeds of the defeated foe in his train and their gory scalps at his girdle. I was much surprised to see him on foot, more haggard than usual, with only one reeking trophy of victory dangling from his belt. I hailed him and told him to comeup without fear. I was anxious to hear what had happened to him after Logan had left him. He did not need a second invitation  but immediately strode toward me. He looked as proud as Lucifer. When he was about ten or fifteen paces from me, he exhibited his only evidence of success. Raising the trophy with its gory, disarrayed locks, he exclaimed exultantly, "Winamac scalp! Winamac scalp!" Latter, when Logan saw it, he declared that it was not from the head of the Potawatomi chief. Winamac had  only a single tuft of long hair; this scalp was covered with long hair. At that time I was unaccustomed to sight and scenes of blood  and carnage. As I looked for the first time on this horrid,  savage trophy, a cold chill passed my heart.
    I could understand little of his barbarous English, but it seemed that Captain Johnny had lost no time after his two companions had left him. He had torn the scalp from the skull of the warrior nearest him and was in the act of scalping when he saw a flash of light a few steps ahead. He heard the loud, ringing crack of a rifle and the same instant felt the burning of a bullet as it grazed the skin of his own head. He leaped into the air and broke his knife. Immediately, he hastened to the spot where the horses were hitched. Alarmed by his sudden, noisy approach, the animals broke loose as he came near them, and he was compelled to escape on foot from this new attack.
    Captain Johnny supposed that the warrior who had fled after the shooting Logan had returned. The gathering darkness and the dense forest enabled the wily foe to creep upon him unperceived. It is probable that the departure of Logan and Brighthorn had been observed; because Captain Johnny was left behind, it was inferred that he was too badly hurt to get away. His scalp would, in some degree, compensate for the heavy loss sustained in the combat.The only survivor of the party had cautiously returned and found scalping the fallen warriors. To drive a ball through his brain was a natural instinct; the darkness saved Captain Johnny. It was well for Captain Johnny's fame that he had escaped, for previously he had been distrusted. Many would have believed that he had deserted us and again joined his old friends. But Logan said that we need never fear his fidelity again. He had shed their blood and knew he would not be spared if ever he should fall into their hands.
    Before I write of Logan's funeral, you may be interested in knowing something of his birth, parentage, and early history. From reliable sources I learn that he was half-white and half-Indian. His complexion and features indicated that he was a half-breed. His father was a young man from Greenbriar  County, Virginia. A great hunter in his day, he developed a disgust for quiet, inactive, unexciting, civilized life. He wandered off into the trackless forest north of the Ohio River. He settled among the Shawnee Indians and assumed their habits. His skill in the chase and his bold daring in war soon brought him into prominence; he was adopted into the tribe and later became a chief. He made the acquaintance of an Indian maiden of high birth --the elder sister of Tecumseh and the Prophet; the couple was united in marriage according to the formalities of her nation. Logan was the younger of their two sons; the elder died in childhood. By the fortunes of war, the younger boy was taken prisoner by Colonel Logan of Kentucky, who brought him home and treated him as a son. He learned to speak English fluently. After the peace treaty which followed Wayne's great victory at the rapids (Fallen Timbers), he was restore to his family and friends. In gratitude to his generous captor, he assumed the name of Logan.
    While he was still a captive, all his boyish sympathies were for a little Indian girl who was also a prisoner; she had been captured about the same time and was then the cherished member of a neighboring family-- that of Colonel Hardin. Both prisoners were released at the same time. When they grew up, they were married in their native village. Major Harden, a son of Colonel Harden, was at Logan's deathbed. He tended the Indian like a brother and closed the unseeing eyes when the last struggle was over. To this gentleman, Logan entrusted the fate of his family and asked that his wife and children be moved to Kentucky, until the war had ended. "I have killed a great chief," said he, "and when I am in the land of the spirits, his friends will creep upon little ones and murder them all."
    About ten o'clock on the cold, bleak morning of November 26, 1812, the fife and the solemn, muffled drum announced a military funeral. The ground was already covered with several inches of snow, and snow continued to fall. A crowd of officers and soldiers were assembled around the tent where the departed warrior lay He had been wrapped in his blanket and placed in a rude coffin made of the best materials we could obtain. Although there was little pomp and circumstance, all showed their respect for their loved and distinguished comrade.
    The chaplain, the Venerable Mr. Shannon, was present. He humbly besought the Heavenly Father to have mercy on this noble son of the forest and, as but little light had been granted him on earth, to ask but little of him on the Last Day. An armed military guard of honor was also ordered on duty. After the services had been concluded, the lid of the coffin, which had been removed to allow us to look for the last time upon the noble countenance of the dead chief, was replaced and fastened down. Since we had no horses in camp, we constructed a small sled. Using thongs of rawhide for traces, the officers who acted as pallbearers hauled the body six miles to old Fort Defiance. There he was buried. A rude stone was placed at his head and another at his feet; the initials of his name were roughly carved upon the to mark the spot.
    A few days afterwards Major Hardin, accompanied by Captain Johnny and one or two other officers, started on his mission to Wapakoneta. some sixty or eighty miles distant. He was charged by the commanding general to tell Logan's people the circumstances of the great chief's last battle and death and the honor paid to his memory. Harden was also to express the deep sympathy of the whole army for the chief's untimely end. Harden conferred with the chiefs and the widow concerning the removal of Logan's family to Kentucky. The proposal was respectfully decined, and Major Hardin returned to camp.
    The years passed. One day I received a message saying that a company of Indians at the hotel said they knew me and desired to see me. Hoping to fine some of my campaign companions among them, I immediately called on them. I was then a bearded man and doubted that they would recognize me, even if they had formerly known me in uniform. But I had hardly entered the room when, after a moment's piercing scrutiny, one of the Indians rushed across the floor and seized me my the hand. It was my old friend Brighthorn. "Different time this," said he, "from when I last saw you."
    "Yes," I replied, "for it was just before we were taken prisoners together in Dudley's defeat. We both were be grimed with the smoke of battle, and there were a few fresh scalps at your belt."
    "And you," he rejoined. "were very sick, " pointing to the place an enemy's ball had penetrated my shoulder.
    With the party was a tall, handsome youth, straight as an arrow, and about fourteen or fifteen years of age. He was Logan's eldest son, who had visited Kentucky with some of his father's friends and relatives. He was to decide for himself whether he would remain or not. He said he could not stay, because his heart yearned for the playmates of his childhood and the wild woods surrounding his native village. After remaining only a few days, the Indians left.
               
                                            Your friend and most obedient servant,

                                                     General Leslie Combs


Daily Indiana Journal,  December 8, 1852

Wayne Street (Defiance Ohio)

Kettenring Country Club Defiance Ohio (1957)

Automobiles on Clinton Defiance Ohio (1910)

Columbana Pump Company (Hicksville Ohio)

State Dam (Defiance Ohio)

Defiance City Hall (Defiance Ohio)

Don Miller (4 Horsemen Notre Dame) Defiance Crescent News July 30, 1976 and Find a Grave.com

         Don Miller who  was born   March 30,1902, to Annie (O'Reilly) and Martin E. Miller of Defiance, lived at 18675 Parkland Drive, Shaker Heights .
    Don began his football career at Defiance High School where he played until his gradation in 1920. During his senior year the team compiled 328 points to its opponents' 54.

    Don and his brother, Jerry entered Notre Dame together in 1920, following in the footsteps of three other brothers. Harry, Ray and Walter, who gained recognition on the Irish football field.

    Don played right halfback for Notre Dame from 1922-24 under the direction of coach Knute Rockne and carried the ball 283 times for 1,933 yards an average of 6.8 per carry, a Notre Dame record that still stands (1979). 

    Don once said that "I wasn't much of player in high school and I couldn't even make the freshman team at Notre Dame. I was discouraged and ready to quite when Rockne astonished me one day by putting me in the regular backfield. And he kept me there. He had seen something in me that even I didn't know I had."

    Following the Irish's 1924 victory over army, a team considered almost unbeatable, sportswriter Grantland Rice compared the Notre Dame backfield to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the name stuck.

    The team finished the season undefeated and topped it off with a Rose Bowl victory over Stanford.

  The other members of the famed backfield included Jim Crowley,Elmer Layden and Harry Stuhldreher. Crowly is now the only living member of the foursome (1979). 

      In 1923, Don was the only member of the Notre Dame backfield to earn All-American honors but the following year, his three backfield teammates were chosen and he was omitted.
       After graduating from Notre Dame, Don was backfield coach at Georgia Tech for four years and was there when Tech beat California in the 1925 Rose Bowl game.
     Then, until 1933. he joined the Ohio State staff as a assistant football coach.
    In 1933, he entered private law practice in Cleveland with three of his four brothers. One of them, Ray, went on to become mayor of Cleveland from 1931-33 and chairman of the Cuyahoga County Democratic Orgnization.
     In 1942, Don was appointed to succeed Emrich C Freed as U.S. district attorney for northern Ohio and held this post for 11 years. During his first 15 months in office, Don got 358 convictions.
     Don was unanimously elected of the United States District Attorneys Association in 1947
    In 1965, he was appointed U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge and remained at that post until his retirement in 1977.
    Don returned to Defiance in 1953 to receive a key to the city and to be honored for his selection to Cleveland "Assembly of Famous Personalities." On Nov. 12, 1976, Don received an award from Defiance city officials when he attended a football game between Defiance and Elida high schools at Fred J. Brown Stadium.
    Don was  initiated into the National Football Hall of Fame for College Stars in 1970.
    On May 14, 1931, Don married Mae Lynch, Family include one son, Donald C Jr; five daughters Ann Barrett, Nancy Beringer, Dodie Thompson, Judith Collins and Elizabeth Miller and 28 grandchildren.
    Don Miller passed away 28 July 1979, at Cleveland, Ohio and buried at All Souls Cemetery, Chardon Geauga County Ohio.

Evansport School (Defiance County Ohio)

Ohio National Guard (Defiance,Ohio)

Daeida Hartell (Hicksville, Ohio) (From Ancestry.com)

    Born in Hicksville,Ohio,  22 July 1862, Daeida Hartell, was the daughter of farmers, Amelia and John Emerson Hartell. Daeide attended private school in Hicksville before moving to Canton, Ohio. Daeida married H.H. Wilcox, a Kansas prohibitionist. They moved west by train in 1883. Three years after setting in Los Angeles, the Wilcox purchased 120 acres of apricot and fig grove in a frost-free belt nearby. H.H. subdivided the property into lots. Daeide landscaped the lots and named the streets to appeal to buyers. Their property, bought for $150 an acre, now sold for $1000 a lot.
    Soon thereafter Daeida traveled back to Hicksville by train and met a women whose description of her summer home near Chicago so captured Daeida's attention that she insisted its name given to the Wilcox subdivision. In 1887, a subdivision map was filed as Hollywood, California, with street name including Sunset Boulevard. According to the Ohio Women's Hall of Fame, into which Daeida was inducted in 1995, many Hollywood streets and location names were taken from friends and places in Hicksville (Ohio).
    Although H.H., an invalid, died in 1891, Daeida increased the value of the properties and continued to be an important force in the up building from a collection of lots into a community. She donated land for 3 churches, the first library, and a city hall. She built the first banks, post office, the Hollywood club, and a theatrical playhouse. Daeida installed the first sidewalks and developed one of two commercial districts. She gave land for a park, primary school, and a police station. Daeida used her power judiciously, always with a eye to the betterment of her city.
    In 1894, Daeida married Philo J. Beverridge, son of the governor , who shared her vision of community. The Beveridges had 4 children and continuted philanthropic and civic good works. At the time of her 1914 death, Daeida's associated had only kind words for her- reliable, forcible, kindly, a woman of rare judgement, and worthy opponent. Not bad description of a woman born in Hicksville, Ohio who moved west and became "just a housewife."

Spends Half Century With Mark Center Store (Maryetta Bowyer Defiance Crescent News March 31, 1960)

    For 50 years Clyde Elder has served and manged a store at Mark Center. Now still active (1960) with his son, Arnold, in the business known as "Elder and Son", he looks back over the years to explain his success in making large and extensive sales in a small town location.

    Mr. Elder was born in 1885 on an 80 acre farm southwest of Mark Center (Defiance Co. Ohio). His father, Curtis Elder born in Pennsylvania, was a Civil War veteran who had moved to Fostoria and had about 1880 purchase land in Mark Twp. at the same time his friend, Valentine Lybarger, had bargained for land near Hicksville.

    Clyde's mother, Elder's second wife, was Emma Crawford, daughter of Samuel Crawford. She had come from Spitzenburg, Germany, when she was 12 years old.

    When a small boy, Clyde had attended District 8 School. The plank building was later replaced by one that stood until recent years. The family attended Mark Center Methodist Church. It was necessary for them to travel on mud roads in all kinds of weather.

    "Sometime we walk to Sunday School and then home for dinner. Often we returned for services," Mr. Elder recalled, "I can remember", he said "when we had protractive  meetings one winter and the minister decided that we would have a spelldown", as was often customary in those days. My brothers, sisters,  and I were very surprised when we discovered that our mother could out spell them all. Her stiffest competitor had been Uncle Ike Haver.
    Although Mr. Elder didn't dance much, he liked to watch the dancers. The "bowery" dance gave such an opportunity. He explained what such  dance would be like.
    "In the summertime, they would go to the woods and get poles which would then be laid on the ground, and clapboards placed across them. Other poles were stood on end around the edge and green boughs were placed over the top."
    "Then, at night, the place was lighted with lanterns. There young and old of the neighborhood danced, sometime 12 sets at a time."
    "I wish" said Mr. Elder, "young people of today could see the way those couples could dance. The men would dance jigs around the ladies, and they were really good."
    I was a Methodist," explained Mr. Elder, "that was the reason I didn't dance much myself."
    Mark Center was quite a place then with two stave mills, a railroad station, a store, and five saloons. It had earlier been moved from the center of the township at the junction of present route 2 and 18, and it was just begining to feel its importance as a community center.
    "When I was growing up," remark Mr. Elder, "I was always interested in horse. All of the young men had horses and buggies, and each though that he had the best. The greatest sport was to prove it. Sometimes, it was not without accident. I had my wrist broken three times. Twice it was because of horses."
    "If the word delinquent had been invented in those days, I for one, with my mad desire for horse racing, would have been called one," he chuckled.
    "The fact is the Kentucky Derby for several years. I already have my receipt for my ticket this year. You have to apply in January," he added.
    Timber men and stave mill workers, and money frequently crossed the counter in exchange for goods.
   The business continued in the Hire family, and Harry Hire became owners.
    In 1911, he built the present cement block two-story building. The upper floor was constructed for use as a apartment. It was here that the Elders lived for many after they became the store's owners.
    Mr. Elder explained how they had kept up with the times and not suffered from a depression.
    "Several years ago, I realized that one has to keep up with the times, so we built a feed mill.Later, when food supplement was used to feed livestock, we began to sell that."
    Amish farmers, near the Mark Center community, needed a place where they could buy feed without driving long distance. It has been for their convenience that the Elders have carried the extra sideline.
    "After my wife and I bought the store," he remarked, people used to come into town and sit in the seats that then lined the store. Sometime they bought nothing. They'd just sit there and visit the entire evening.
    "There used to be spittoons all around the store. Although we'd empty them frequently, often our customers missed their mark, and it was our job to clean up. I used to think that if one could only bottle the order what a good disinfectant it would have made.
    "The first sale I made was pound of crackers for a dime. These I sold to Mr. Mark Slough. Our business was greatest on Saturday. It seemed that every. It seemed that every man that came  to Mark Center bought three pounds of crackers for 25 cents.

     

    

Footnote  Clyde Elder pass away 30 Oct. 1964, and buried at Sherwood Cemetery, Defiance Co., Ohio.

U.S, War Dog "Smokey"

    Smokey entered Coast Guard in 1943, and trained at War Reception Center, Ft. Royal Va. Served at Naval Air Station, Traverse City, Michigan, and Curtis Bay Md. Discharge in 1945. "Smokey" owned by John A Kern, 208 E 2nd Street, Defiance, Ohio.
     
                The Men and Women in World War 2
                From Defiance County








   

Fort Defiance Flagstaff

    The treaty of Detroit, executed by Gen. William Hull at that place in 1807, was signed by the Ottawas, Chippewas, Wyandots, and Pottawatamies, and ceded lands surrounding and extending along Detroit River and Lake Erie down into Ohio as far as the Maumee River. This was the first public land to become available in what is now Michigan. The treaty line began at the mouth of the Maumee  and proceeded up the middle of that river to the present site of Defiance, thence due north beyond the present limits of Ohio. The line north from Defiance later became the meridian for all public land surveys in Michigan. This meridian also governs that strip of land between the Fulton and Harris lines in Ohio, and is known today as the Michigan Meridian in the public land system of the United States.

                                                                        Original
                                                     Ohio Land Subdivisions
                                                       C.E. Sherman  Inspector    1925    Pages 133-134

Evansport Marker (Defiance County Ohio)

St Paul's Episcopal Church (Hicksville Ohio)

St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Historical Site (Hicksville, Ohio)

Huber Opera House (Hicksville Ohio)

Huber Opera House  Today

Huber Opera House  About 1909

Decoration Day (Sherwood Ohio)

Dey Road Bridge Defiance Ohio

Defiance B&O Junction, West End of Defiance, Ohio

Defiance Public Library, Cornerstone Ceremony

Defiance Public Library, Today

Defiance Public Library, Cornerstone Ceremony  Oct. 9, 1904

The Indian and the Watch (Defiance County History 1883 Page 157)

William Lewis House   East Defiance, Ohio    2015

William Preston, Grave, Edgerton, Williams Co., Ohio

Double Log Cabin    (Auglaize Village Defiance County Historical Soc.)

    At an early day, when Defiance could boast of having a log jail and the Sheriff lived in a double log cabin in East Defiance, where stands the brick residence owned by William Lewis (Baker House now), one of Defiance early pioneers. His Honor the Sheriff William Preston, had an Indian in the lock-up for stealing a watch. The custom of the Sheriff was to hang the key to the jail at the entrance of his double log cabin, and as court convened but a year several young men, thinking it rather expensive to the county to keep the Indian until next term of court, proceeded to the Sheriff residents, took the key from the porch and let the Indian out. Several young men  being station at convenient distance, with whips in hand, whipped the Indian out of town. The next morning, the sheriff took down the as usual, and started for the jail with breakfast for his prisoner, found no Indian. The boys had locked the door, and returned the key to its proper place. Frederick Bridenbaugh, Allen Brocher, James Spofford, and others were te boys who had the fun.

Defiance Junction of The B&O Depot (Defiance Crescent News January 19, 1963) By Lloyd Tuttle

    The old B&O depot with its oil lamps, pot-bellied stove and hard seats. It was a big depot and a busy one. There were two large waiting rooms, a ticket and telegraph office in between. One end of the telegraph office was used by the Wabash and the stop was known as the Defiance Juction. At the west end was the baggage room where Ed Murphy held forth. Ed was not only an expert baggage man but a philosopher as well. He was one of Father Kincaid's boys, a local Catholic Priest whose admonitions led many a boy to sign the pledge. Ed never took a drink of intoxicating liquor in his life.
    The station was a big frame structure with a slate roof. Back of the depot building was a United States Express office where as high as 14 men were employed. The freight house had a crew of 17. Most were students, boys just out of school.
    There were plenty of trains those days. Both railroads operated passenger trains that stopped at all points, as well as fast trains. There was a big immigrant business and many cars changed for western points. The Wabash frequently had a string of Santa Fe tourist cars shunted on a siding across from the B&O depot. Each immigrant carried a bed tick and in that tick were his worldly possessions. He was tagged as to where he was going. These were the people who built up the great empire of the west.
    Sunday afternoons folks used to go to the B&O Depot to see the sights There were trains, immigrants, hoboes, and and Police Lt. Dan Shea in the mildst of all preserving peace and order and giving information. Lt. Shea was a typical Chicago-type Irish policeman of that period.
    It wasn't the depot so much that was an attraction as the immediate neighborhood. At one time there were nine liquor places, a Chinese laundry, three houses of ill repute, a fire department, (the clipper Hose co., with a hand drawn hose reel)ma cell block in the rear of the city's ward building where hoboes were kept over night and fed in the morning a good steaming bowl of hot soup, because that was the day of the railroad hobo, an eccentric lot never committed serious crimes but would not work and traveled from place to place in freight cars, and on brake beams under cars.
    Across from the depot was the Junction House which started as a hostelry and end up sort of a brothel. It was a tough place. One night a battle took place that would have been a credit to a Central American revolution. The entire police force of four men and the chief were engaged. They reached the scene in a street car. The street car line terminated at the south end of Harrison Ave. and received quite a patronage from the depot.
    The battle started about 9 pm and lasted until about 2 am when the police route the defenders who ran down the B&O tracks to the old Marshall hoop mill (now the Farmer Co-Operative). Here they made a brief stand but were driven out probably because of lack of ammunition. Many shots were fired and one of the occupants of the saloon who attempted to cross the tracks was shot in the sitter. Jim Montgomery, B&O fright agent, who was working at night had a close call. A bullet bored into the window sash,about two inches from his head.
    There was a barber shop, and also a restaurant. The restaurant served meals that would make folks today green with envy. You could buy a whole pie for 20 cents. And it was a pie both in taste and size.
    For a long time the B&O double tracks end in East Defiance and at Sherwood, with the result that there was always a congestion in the local yards. One day there was as high as 14 locomotives in the yards.
    Police officers were kept on duty 24 hours a day at the old B&O depot. Many Chicago and Toledo thugs made some of the places in the immediate vicinity a hang out.
    That was the day of the horse drawn buses. The Crosby Hotel, Cunningham Hotel and Hotel Wayne each had a bus that met the passenger trains and the drivers would line up and call out their hotel and bus. Sometimes they would yell "bus to any part of the city", at other times "Crosby Hotel bus." The competition became so spirited that the railroad company placed a wire in the wooden platform and the bus men were not allowed to step over the wire.
    Folks in the neighborhood of the B&O depot lived high on oysters. The B&O ran wht was called the "oyster train." It was a solid express train of oysters in wooden buckets at this point from eight to a dozen platform trucks loads were transferred every day to the Wabash. They were iced here and one of the peculiar things is that in the icing process the buckets overflowed but hardy any water ever ran over, but oysters instead. For 15 cents you could go to the "proper" persons and get all the oysters you wanted. Frequently consignees would refuse a shipment of oysters, then the Express Company was ordered to sell them.
    Whiskey was shipped in oak barrels. The rear end of the freight platform was quite high above, the sloping ground and there were a few vagrants who liked their liquor straight. They used to crawl under the platform, bore a hole in the barrel get a swig and then plug the hole.
     When the Baltimore and Ohio elevated their tracks through Defiance, built over-passes or viaducts, and erected a new depot on Clinton street and the freight house east of it, all changed.Today the site of all the activity is vacant. The land is on the east side of Deatrick street. between the two railroads and the fast freights whiz by at 40 and 50 miles an hour.
    The Junction House is gone, the barber shop is gone, the good old time restaurant is gone.
    Much of the switching has been transferred to east of Defiance so as not to block streets. Time marches on and scenes change!
                                                    Lloyd Tuttle

\B&O Depot on Clinton, Defiance Ohio     Last depot in Defiance

Foot note The old B&O Depot is still standing, now is The Station Bar and Grill.

Defiance Home Saving and Loan Bank C1910 Defiance Ohio

Edwin Phelps (Defiance Ohio) Defiance County Express July 8, 1886

    Edwin Phelps came to Defiance 20th of August 1834. The time of his arrival was perhaps the gloomiest period the Maumee valley has ever known. About a month or perhaps a little more previous to his arrival there had been a great flood in the Maumee, Auglaize Rivers and Blanchard fork of the Auglaize, which had swept every thing in shape of crops on the Maumee from Fort Wayne to Maumee City, and the Auglaize from St. Marys to Defiance, and from Findlay to the Auglaize on Blanchard Fork. At that time there were no farm except along the streams and these few and far between; and a loss of crops at that time meant suffering if not starvation. As an evidence of the almost compete destructions of crops Edwin Phelps only mention one item, that of potatoes, which in the spring of 1835 at Fort Wayne, the only place where any to be had, sold at 37 and half cents per dozen, and small ones at that; and it was two or three years before the farmers obtained enough seed to be able to plant what they deemed necessary for domestic use.
    The crop of corn was in about the same condition, with this advantage, that there was great difficulty in procuring seeds the following spring. Of the wheat there was very little if any raised, as the ground was then considered too rich to produce wheat, and there were no mills in the in the country to grind it, the principal food was being literally hogs and hominy. The corn was mostly pounded in mortars made by burning holes in the top of a hardwood stumps.
    In this connection Edwin Phelps related a small incident personal to himself. "In June 1835, William A Brown came from St. Lawence County, New York, to Defiance, and an aunt of mine and has put five potatoes in his trunk for me. He arrived here just as I was recovering from an attack of billious fever. I cut the eye from the potatoes and planted them in the garden and ate the balance. By careful attention I raised about half a bushel of nice potatoes everyone of  which was kept for seed the following spring."
    But worse than the loss of  corps the high water had covered the banks of the streams with a shimy mud, and followed by the hot sun of July and August nearly every family in the whole region of the Maumee and Auglaize valley was prostrate by sickness, either billious fever or fevers and ague, and to make matter still worse nearly all the doctors were also sick and unable to attend to their patients.
    Defiance at that time was comprised of 150 lots. The town was laid out by Horatio Philips and Benjanin Levell.
    Defiance was surveyed in November 1822, but not acknowledge  until the 18th day  of April 1823, and recorded in the records of Wood County 23 day of April 1823. Then Williams,, together with Putnam, Paulding, Henry, and the territory comprising the counties of Fulton and Lucas were attached to Wood County for judicial purposes.
    In laying out  Defiance the square bounded by Wayne, Clinton. First and Second streets, was marked A on the map, and was reserved by Philips and Levell to be divided into lots and sold unless Defiance should become a county seat, to become a public common, location of public buildings and never to be sold, "B" on the map was the old fort grounds to be a common use as a fenced in for a pasture until Defiance is incorporated. Lot 126 a small triangular piece of land between Front and First street and west of Perry street, was donated for a school lot, and Phelps first saw it, an old log school house was there (corner of Perry and First streets).
    A good general idea of the appearance of Defiance in 1834,was that Defiance was covered with a thick undergrowth of bushes south of Second Street and west of the canal.
    The canal was not then built, but the ground occupied by a ravine or a small run covered with a dense growth of thorn apple and crab apple tree and sumac.
    The only person living south of Second Street and west of this side of the present canal was Robert Wassen, who lived in a log house on First street near Jackson street and Amos Evans, living at the corner of Second and Clinton Street, Alfred Purcell at the corner of Third and Clinton, Jacob Kniss on Jefferson Street. On the end of Jefferson and Third street, Peter Bridenbaugh, who lived near Walter Davis and had a log house and cooper shop near the corner of Third and Washington street.
    There was also a log cabin just south of where the Methodist church now stands was occupied as a parsonage and church by the Methodist church when they were so fortunate as to have a minister, and I think was occupied by Harry O Shelden. When there were too many for their accommodation at the parsonage service were held in the old court house was occupied as a residence of Henry Hardy (where the Post Office now is).
    The streets in the town were not even chopped out, with the exception of Front and First streets from Jefferson to Clinton. Jefferson street was underbrushed wide enough for a road from the Maumee to the Auglaize river, where there was a ford across the river, which settlers used who came to Defiance from the south side of the Auglaize on horse back. There was a road also underbrushed out leading from Jefferson street, commencing at its intersection with First, running diagonally across Defiance, passing near where the soldier's Monument now stands to near the present B&O  depot, where it forked the left branch going to Piqua, Miami Co., and the other to Fort Wayne. Neither of these roads was in condition to travel by wagons, but were trails upon which the mail were carried on horse-back, one route being from Maumee City to Fort Wayne, and the other from Defiance to Fort Wayne, which was carried weekly, the distance being about ninety-five miles each.

Chief Shabonee ( Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois Page 476)

Chief  Shabbonee   1775? to 1859

Chief Shabbonee Marker Old 424 Defiance Ohio

    Shabbona (Shabona), Ottawa Indian who would later in his life become a Pottawatomie Chief, was born near the the Maumee River,(Defiance Ohio) in Ohio about 1775, and served under Tecumseh from 1807 to the Battle of the Thames in 1813. In 1810 Shabona accompanied Tecumseh and Capt. Billy Caldwell to the home of the Pottawatomie and other tribs within the present limits of Illinois and Wisconsin, to secure their co-operation in driving the white settlers out of the country. At the battle of the Thames, Shabona was my the side of Tecumseh when he fell, and both he and Caldwell, losing faith in their British allies, soon after submitted to the United State through Gen. Cass at Detroit.
    Shabona was opposed to Black Hawk in 1832, and did much to thwart the plans of Black Hawk and aid the whites. Having married a daughter of a Pottawatomie Chief, who had a village on the Illinois River east of the present city of Ottawa Ill., Shabona lived there for some time, but finally moved 25 miles north to Shabona's Grove in De Kalb Ill.. Here Shabona remained till 1837, when he moved to Western Missouri. Black Hawk's followers having a reservation near by, hostilities began between them, in which a son and nephew of Shabona were killed. Shabona finally returned to his old home in Illinois, but found it occupied by whites, who drove him from the grove that bore his name. Some friends then bought for him twenty acres of land on Mazon Creek near Morris Ill., where Shabona died, 27 July 1859.

                   N. Matson  Personal Friend of Shabona     (Chicago 1878)

Soldiers Monument Defiance Ohio

Our Old Apple Tree (Defiance County History 1883 Page 207)

Drawing of  Defiance French and Indian Apple Tree 1860s

Defiance Apple Tree marker today.

      We were at Fort Defiance two years (1824) before we had a school. Then a Mr. Smith came with his family and moved into an old trading house, and opened school in an old blacksmith shop that stood near Shane,s apple tree. The tree was full of apples. Mr. Rice claimed the apples, but the scholars were allowed to play under it. It gave a fine shade. The trunk was short and thick, the top large and spreading. The tradition of the tree then was that the wigwam where Shane was born stood near there, and on that day his father planted this tree, and when Shane was a little boy, the Indian boys when mad at him would break down his tree to spite him, which accounted for it shape.

    Shane was then a man fifty years old, living at Shane's Prairie, on the St. Mary's River (Darke County, Ohio).

                           Ruth Shirley  Austin     1883

Northwest Ohio Survey (Defiance County History 1883 Page 83-84)

    The lands now embrace within Defiance County were ceded to the United States by the Indians by a treaty made September 29, 1817, at the Rapids of the Miami of the Lake Erie (Maumee River), between Lewis Cass and Duncan Mc Arthur, Commissioners, and the chiefs and warriors of the various Indian tribes. Surveys were made from the Indiana line east to the line of the Western Reserve, and south to the Greenville treaty line. The base line of this survey is the 41st degree of north latitude, and it is also the south line of the Connecticut Western Reserve. The plan of survey of the lands originated with Jared Mansfield, Surveyor General of the United States. From the base line the townships are numbered south and east of the Indiana line, our meridian. Each township is six miles square and is subdivided into thirty-six sections, parallel with the township lines, of one mile square each, containing 640 acres, so that every regular land township contains 23,040 acres of land. Each section can be legally subdivided into quarter section of 160 acres; and each quarter section into quarters of 40 acres; and each 40 acres, for convenience of sale, can be divided into quarters, also, of 10 acres, so that an exact and legally correct description of ten acres of land out of a whole section can be made without a survey, and the line afterward be exactly determined by a competent surveyor.
    The townships were surveyed in 1820. In Defiance County, Hicksville, Milford, Farmer, Mark and Washington Township were surveyed by Joseph Wampler; Defiance, Richland, Adam and Tiffin by James Riley, Highland and Delware Townships by James Powell.
    The land office was located at Piqua, and was opened in 1821, in which year some of  the best land along the rivers was entered. Until 1834, very little was taken, but during the years 1835-36 and 1837 the greater portion was entered, principally by speculators and land companies. The Hicks Land Company, in Hicksville alone, owned 14,000 acres. Mr. A.P. Edgerton, at Hicksville, agent for this and the American Land Company in Northwestern Ohio, sold over 107,000 acres. These extensive purchases, however, proved disastrous. The expected speedy increase in value did not occur, and much land was sold in four or five years for less than the original price paid.

Evansport Photo ( Defiance County Ohio)

Defiance County Sunday School Association meeting in Evansport Ohio

Holgate Ave. (Defiance Ohio)

How the Flag of the 48th Ohio Inf. was Saved (Defiance County History 1883 Page 130)

Capt. Daniel Gunsaullus 48th Ohio Vol. Inf. Company F

    When the 48th Regiment, to which Company F (Defiance Ohio), was overpower and captured at the battle of Sabine Cross Roads, La., April 8, 1864, the color-bearer, Isaac Scott, in the midst of the excitement threw down the regimental flag, but an old man sprang forward and tore the old flag  from its staff and slipped it into his haversack. He was left sick on his way to prison, and did not arrive for some time after; but through all his sickness he clung to the flag, and upon arriving at Camp Ford, Tex., to which place the regiment had preceded him, delivered the flag to the officers of the regiment for safe keeping, and it was sewed up in Capt. Gunsaullus' (Co. F), inside of the lining, where he wore it in safety up to the time of their being  exchanged, at the mouth of the Red River, on the Mississippi, October 23, 1864, after an imprisonment of six months and fifteen days. Passing down the Mississippi a short distance, they left the rebel craft and were turned over to Col. Dwight Commissioner of exchange. He order them on board the St. Mary's, where a band of music from New Orleans, and a number of ladies-wives of Union Officers were awaiting their arrival. Upon boarding the vessel, they proceeded immediately to the upper deck. The old flag was then torn from its place of concealment (Capt. G.'s blouse), and hastily tied to a staff prepared for the occasion. At this signal, the band struck up the "Star Spangled Banner>" and the old flag of the 48th Ohio Inf. was unfurled to the breeze, with waving of handkerchiefs and amid the wild shouts and deafening cheers of the released prisoners.
    The flag was afterward placed in the flag room of the State House at Columbus, Ohio,
    The rebel Assistant Agent of Exchange, Capt. Birchett (who accompanied the prisoners), on his return to Camp Ford related to the remaining prisoners how the flag of the Forty- eighth Ohio, in his presence, was torn from the coat of one of the officers, after they were exchange at the Red River. He said it was one of the most exciting scenes he ever witnessed, and that the regiment deserved a great deal of credit for preserving their colors during their imprisonment.