Licking County, Ohio - Chapter 30: Historical, 1881

DIMENSIONS OF THE COUNTY - MILITARY AND REFUGEE LANDS - PRIMITIVE GOVERNMENT - EARLY SETTLERS AND SETTLEMENTS - EARLY PREACHERS - TABLE OF CHURCHES - NUMBER OF MILES OF RAILROAD, TURNPIKE AND CANAL - THE LOG-CABIN-HARD-CIDER-COON-SKIN CAMPAIGN OF 1840 - EARLY MAIL MATTERS - PROMINENT MEN OF THE

HE extreme width of Licking county is twentytwo and a half miles, from north to south, thirty miles from east to west. These dimensions would give the county six hundred and seventy-five square miles of territory; but as the original surveyors of 1796 failed to give a straight line on the northern boundary, a strip of, sixteen miles in length, and about three-fourths of a mile in breadth, was lost, which reduces the figures to six-hundred and sixtythree miles. A tract of nearly two miles by two and a half in extent is also lost at the southeast corner of the county, which still further reduces the territory almost five square miles, leaving a sum total of only six hundred and fifty-eight square miles.

productive, yet nearly all cultivable; while the western half is level or rather undulating, and with a very small proportion too uneven or steep for the plow. It is beautifully diversified by hill and dale - by high, irregular ridges and level plains - by sterile hills and fertile, alluvial bottoms - by the rough "hill country" of the eastern half of the county, and by the level and undulating lands of the western half. The eastern half is varied here and there by beautiful landscapes, high peaks, dark glens, inaccessible bluffs, cavernous dells, abrupt acclivities, rugged hillsides, craggy cliffs, such as are found on the "Flint Ridge," at the 'Licking Narrows," along the Rocky fork, and in some other localities.

Nine-tenths or more of the county is situated within the old United States Military District, and is, therefore, to that extent composed of United States Military lands - that is, lands set apart by Congress in June, 1796, for the payment of certain claims of the officers and soldiers for services rendered during the Revolutionary war. The narrow strip of two and a half miles wide, along the southern border of the county belongs to the Refugee tract - a tract of land dedicated by Congress in April, 1798, to the payment of the claims of those refugees whose possessions in Canada and Nova Scotia had been confiscated by the British government, upon the alleged ground that their owners had abandoned them, and had joined the colonists in their struggle for independence.

The United States Military lands amounted to two million six hundred and fifty thousand acres. The tract was bounded on the east by the west line of the seven ranges; on the south by Congress lands and by the Refugee tract; on the west by the Scioto river, and on the north by the Greenville treaty boundary line.

The Refugee tract was four and a half miles wide, and forty-eight miles long, extending eastward from the Scioto river, and contained one hundred thousand acres. The villages of Gratiot, Linnville, Amsterdam, Jacksontown, Hebron, Brownsville, Luray and Kirkersville are near to or upon the north line of the Refugee tract. Etna and Bowling Green townships are wholly within it; and the southern portions of Harrison, Union and Licking townships are also in the Refugee tract.

The territory which now constitutes Licking coun ty, was within the limits of Washington county (the first county organized in the Northwest Territory), from 1788 until 1798, when, by the organization of Ross county, it became a portion of it, and so remained until the year 1800, when Fairfield county being established, it was thrown into it and continued to be a portion of said county until 1808, when ,the organization of Licking county was effected.

The first Territorial legislature of the Northwest Territory met at Cincinnati, September 16, 1799; and Ross county's representatives in that body were Edward Tiffin, Thomas Worthington, Samuel Findlay, and Elias Langham; and their only constituents living within the present limits of Licking county, were the families of Elias Hughes, and John Ratliff, consisting of twenty-two persons. The second session, with the same representatives, was held at Chillicothe, in November, 1800. The third session, with the same representatives, except Samuel Findlay, met at Chillicothe, November 23, 1801.

The Territorial delegates in Congress were General William H. Harrison, who served from 1799 until 1800. William McMillen succeeded him, but served only until 1801, when Paul Fearing took his seat as such and served until 1803.

In November, 1802, a constitutional convention was held at Chillicothe, and formed the first constitution for the State of Ohio. At that time we were part and parcel of Fairfield county, and that county was represented in said convention by Henry Abrams and Emanuel Carpenter.

The first permanent white settlement made within the present limits of the county was effected in 1798, by Elias Hughes and John Ratliff. They came to the Bowling Green (now in Madison township), on the Licking, from western Virginia and were the only settlers until early in the year 1800. The two families spent the preceding year at the mouth of the Licking, and in the spring of 1798 they ascended said stream some twenty miles, ahd there squatted, both families numbering, upon their arrival, twenty-one persons; During the year 1799 a son was born to Elias Hughes, thus increasing the colony to twenty-two. The first death was that of an infant child of John Stadden, whose birth and death occurred in the latter part of the year 1801. The first marriage within the limits of Licking county, was that of the parents of the aforesaid child - John Stadden and Elizabeth Green - which took place on Christmas day in the year 1800. John Ratliff died on the south side of the Licking, near the mouth of the Brushy fork, about or in the year 1811. ants of Hughes and Ratliff still reside in the county.

In the year 1800, 'Benjamin Green and Richard Pitzer settled on the Shawnee run, two miles below the junction of the North and South forks, having come from Alleghany county, Maryland. In the same year Captain Samuel Elliott, from the same county, settled half a mile above them. And in the same year Isaac Stadden, an emigrant from Northumberland county, Pennsylvania, settled half a mile above Captain Elliott. His brother John, an unmarried brother, accompanied him. He remained unmarried, however, only until the Christmas of this year. And it was during this year also that John Van Buskirk left Brooke county, Virginia, and settled upon a thirty-one hundred acre tract of land he had purchased, situated in the valley of the South fork (now in Union township), some eight miles or more above the mouth of the South fork. His death occurred December 31, 1840.

Isaac Stadden was the first civil officer elected within the limits of the county. At an election held in January, 1802, at the cabin of Captain Hughes, he was chosen a justice of the peace of Licking township, then Fairfield county, and Elias Hughes, was elected captain of militia, at the same time and place. John Stadden became the first sheriff of Licking county, in 1808, and served as such, and as collector of taxes until 1810. Captain Elliott was elected coroner of the county in 1808 and served as such for a score of years or more. He had been a soldier in the Revolutionary war. His death took place in May, 1831, in his eightieth year. Benjamin Green lived until 1835, dying at the age of seventy-six years.

The year 1801 brought with it quite a number of settlers. John Larabee ascended the Licking river in a canoe to the mouth of the Bowling Green run, where he landed, and near that point on

A few of the descendthe south side of the Licking, he occupied a_hollow sycamore tree, while he cleared some land, and raised of corn. He served throughout the whole Revolutionary war, and probably also in the Indian wars afterwards. Mr. Larabee died February 6, 1846, aged four score and six years. James Maxwell came up the Licking with Mr. Larabee, John Weedman and a Mr. Carpenter. Maxwell was the first school teacher, and made that his life-long profession. He was also the first constable, having been elected to said office, January 1, 1802, at the same time and place of the election of Captain Hughes and Isaac Stadden, esq., Samuel Parr this year settled on the Licking bottoms, just below the junction of the North and South forks. James Macauley and James Danner located themselves near the mouth of Ramp creek, where the first named built a "tubmill," or "'corn-cracker," the first water power concern within the present limits of the county. Phillip Barrick settled near the 'Licking Narrows." John Jones built his cabin in the Raccoon valley, five miles from the mouth of Raccoon creek, and Phineas and Frederick Ford and Benoni Benjamin theirs in the Ramp or Auter Creek valley, some miles from the mouth of Ramp or Auter creek. Phillip Sutton, Job Rathbone, and John and George Gillespie settled in the Hog Run valley. In September of this year, John Edwards came to the South Fork valley, from Brooke county, Virginia. He was distinguished as a hunter and an expert with the rifle, having been engaged as a spy for some years on the frontiers of Virginia, as well as the Northwest Territory. In coming he blazed the trees and killed the game for their subsistence, while others cut out the road, where necessary, and still others followed with the wagon, which contained his family and household effects.

The year 1802 brought many immigrants. Alexander Holmes and James Hendricks came from Brooke county, Virginia, and settled in the South Fork valley near the residence of their brother-inlaw, John Van Buskirk. Theophilus Rees, David Lewis, David Thomas, James Johnson, and Simon James came this year, most of them settling on the Welsh Hills. Jacob Nelson settled in the Licking valley, and not long thereafter built a mill, a mile or more below the junction of the North and South forks. Newark was laid out this year by General W. C. Schenck; and Abraham Miller, John Warden and Henry Claybaugh came from the South branch of the Potomac, and settled 'in its immediate vicinity. Michael Thorn, Frederick Myer, and Henry Neff located at or near the Little Bowling Green, on the southern borders of the county, during this year. 'They were from the Monongahela country, in West Virginia. Adam Hatfield, James Black, Richard Parr, Samuel Elliott, Henry Claybaugh, Samuel Parr, and Samuel Elliott, jr., built and occupied cabins in Newark this year, except the younger Elliott, who probably had a tenant in his. The senior Elliott built the first hewed log house with shingled roof. Black kept a tavern on the lot now occupied by the Park House. Beall Babbs, James Jeffries and Mrs. Catharine Pegg, settled in or near Newark during this year. Jonathan Benjamin, father-in-law of John Jones and the Ford brothers, located on Ramp or Auter creek, in the spring of 1802. He had passed through the French and Indian wars, and through the Revolutionary war, also, and had been a frontiersman from his youth up. Mr. Benjamin died in 1841, at the great age of one hundred and three years. Patrick Cunningham, Abraham Johnson, Abraham Wright, James Petticord, Edward Nash, Carlton, Benedict, Aquilla, and two John Belts settled about and in Newark, except Cunningham, who first lived neighbor to John Jones, having built the second cabin within the present limits of Granville township. He was from Tyrone county, province of Ulster, Ireland; the others were from Washington county, Pennsylvania. A considerable colony from Brooke county, Virginia, also settled in the South Fork valley.

In 1803, John Evans settled in the North Fork valley, seven miles north of Newark, and in the spring of the same year Evan Payne and Jacob Wilson located in the same valley about a mile above the mouth of the North fork. They, as well Evans, were Virginians. John Simpson, Robert Church, William Schamahorn, Richard Jewell, Edward Crouch, William and John Moore, Thomas Seymour, and William O'Bannon settled within the present limits of Madison township, during this year also.

Peter Cramer settled on the Welsh Hills; Evan Humphrey and Chiswold May settled near the Big Spring in Newton township. These were all Virginians. Daniel Thompson, his son-in-law, Daniel Enyart, and Matthias and Hathaway Denman also came this year and settled in Hanover township; and Moses Meeks, William Harris, Charles Howard and John and Adam Myers settled in Bowling Green township; Maurice Newman settled in Newark; John and Jacob Myers, Daniel Smith and James Taylor settled in Union township; John Channel, Thomas Deweese and Henry Smith settled in Madison township. Mr. Smith had officiated for some time as Territorial magistrate, under a commission from Governor St. Clair. He became one of the early time magistrates of Madison and associate judge in the county.

In 1805, Rev. Joseph Thrap settled in the eastern borders of the county ; George Ernst and John Feasel came from Shenandoah county, Virginia, and settled in Clay Lick valley; Elias and John Farmer came from Bedford county, Pennsylvania, and settled a few miles southwest of Newark; John and Jacob Switzer came to the Clay Lick from "the glades" of Pennsylvania; John Siglar settled in Hog Run valley; John Price, W. H. Mead and perhaps David Beaver located in the South Fork valley, as did David Herron and David Hatfield, in Newark; General John Spencer settled on Spencer run, in Newton township; Archibald Wilson, jr., settled in Newark. The most valuable addition to the inhabitants of this year was the Granville colony, an account of which appears elsewhere. Several emigrants also came to the Welsh Hills during this and the succeeding year, among whom were John Price, Benjamin Jones, John H. Phillips and Thomas Powell.

In 1806, the upper valley of Raccoon creek, now Monroe township, was settled by George W. Evans, and soon thereafter by Charles and George Green. Henry Drake also located in the upper valley of the South fork, now Harrison township, during this year. Chester and Elisha Wells and John Hollister settled near the mouth of the Rocky fork. Samuel Hand, James Holmes, and David Benjamin settled in the South Fork valley, Evan Pugh and Archibald Wilson settled north of Newark, in North Fork valley. The upper valley of the North fork, now Burlington township, was settled by James Dunlap, Nathan Conard and others. William Hull and Isaac Farmer located this year in the vicinity of the Flint ridge. :

In 1807 John Cook Herron built and occupied a cabin in the Raccoon valley, now St: Albans township. Granville township, Fairfield county, was organized this year. It embraced the western half of the present county of Licking, except the Refugee lands, Licking township, embracing the eastern half, with the same exception.

In 1808, Joseph Conard settled in the North Fork valley, near the present village of Utica. He came from Loudoun county, Virginia, and was the first settler within the present township of Washington. In this year (1808), the county of Licking was organized.

In 1809, Henry Iles settled within the present limits of Bennington township. In 1810, the Wakatomika valley was first settled by Samuel Hickerson, followed next year by James 'Thrap. Daniel Poppleton rendered a similar service within the present limits of Hartford township, in the year 1812. Joseph and Peter Headly started a settlement on the head-waters of the South fork (now in Jersey township), in 1815. Etna township, too, was settled in 1815, if nota little earlier, by John Williams, the Housers and others. Isaac Essex settled there in 1816. In the year 1818 David Bright located in the northeastern part of this county, and was the first settler of Fallsbury township, while in 1821, Rena Knight built a cabin and opened a clearing near the head of Brushy fork, at a point now in Liberty township- Thus one locality after another became settled, and finally fully occupied in every section of the county.

In 1802, a Presbyterian minister, named Mc- Donald, came along and preached two sermons to the settlers in the Licking valley. In 1803, Rev. John Wright, also a Presbyterian preacher, delivered two sermons in Newark. Thomas Marquis, another Presbyterian minister, gave the people of Raccoon valley a sermon or two during this year. During the autumn of this year, Rev. Asa Shinn, of the Methodist church, commenced preaching, as an itinerant minister, at Benjamin Green's, in the Hog Run settlement, and before his year closed he there organized a society, or church, and that was the original, or pioneer church organization in the county. He, probably, sometimes preached in Newark also; certainly his successor on the circuit, Revs. James Quinn and John Meeks, - did, small church organization as early as 1805, which was the second in our county.

The Congregational church of Granville, organized before the Granville colony left New England, was the third religious society of Licking county, and the Methodist society, organized in 1806, or a little later, near the Bowling Green, was, probably, the fourth. A Methodist. society, the eastern borders of this county, organized about the same time, and often ministered to by the Rev. Joseph Thrap, was most likely the next in order and the fifth in number. The Welsh Hills Baptist church was organized September 4, 1808, and was the sixth and next in order. In the autumn of the same year the First Presbyterian church of Newark was organized, and was the seventh in order, in the county, although there may have been a Methodist church organized earlier in the South Fork valley.

The Revs. Joseph Williams and James Axley were itinerating Methodist ministers in 1805. Rev. Peter Cartwright preached to the Methodist societies in 1806, as did also Rev. John Emmett: Rey. James Scott, a Presbyterian minister, also preached in Newark during this year. Rev. James Hoge, of the same denomination, visited and preached to the people of Granville during the year, as did also Rey. Samuel P. Robbins, of the Congregational church, and Rev. David Jones, of the Baptist church. In 1807, Revs. Joseph Hayes and James King were the itinerant ministers who ministered regularly to the Methodist churches hereabouts. Sometimes, too, Revs. Jesse Stoneman and Robert Manly ministered to them, as did also Rey. Levi Shinn. In 1808 the Revs. Ralph Lotspeitch and Isaac Quinn were the regular Methodist preachers. Elder James Sutton and Mr. Steadman appeared as Baptist ministers. Rey. Timothy Harris, a Congregational minister, took charge of the church in Granville this year and continued his ministration until 1822. His

Potter, Stephen Lindley, Jacob Lindley, John Wright and James Scott. In 1809 Revs. Benjamin Lakin, and John Johnson were the Methodist itinerants. Revs. Thomas Powell and John W. Patterson (Baptists), commenced: their ministerial services in Licking county. In 18ro the latter took charge of the Welsh Hills church, and in the next year of the Hog Run church, also. Rey. James B. Finley was the Methodist itinerant of the year 1810.

The following table exhibits the number, location and denomination of the churches at present in the county, the number of Christian societies, represented by one or more church buildings, being twenty-seven, twélve of them having each only one edifice, the others being divided among the remaining fifteen denominations, forty being the highest number owned by any one, that being the Episcopal Methodist:

The total valuation of church edifices in the county is three hundred thousand dollars, and they are supposed to furnish sittings for more than twenty thousand persons.

The Methodists were the first denomination to organize, being in 1804; the Congregationalists were the second, being in 1805; the Baptists and. Presbyterians the next, being in 1808; the Covenanters organized in 1813; the Lutherans in 1817. The others afterwards.

There are at present within the county limits twenty-five miles of turnpike, being the National road running across the southern part of the county: and about the same number of miles of canal; both of these great internal improvements being buil between the years 1825 and 1835. There are at present about one hundred miles of railroad in the county, as follows: Straitsville division of the Baltimore and Ohio road, ten miles: Central Ohio division of Baltimore and Ohio road, thirty-two miles; Northern division of same, thirteen miles: Pittsburgh, Cincinnati & St. Louis, twelve miles; and the Ohio Central road (the new road not yet completed, passing through Granville), about thirty miles.

A most extraordinary political excitement pervaded Licking county, as well as the country at large, during the year 1840 - the year of "the log-cabinhard-cider-and-coon-skin campaign." As indicated, it was not a local but a general tornado raging with more 'or less fury, in all the States of the American Union, but in none of them was the hurricane wilder than in Ohio, and in no locality did it raeg more furiously than in "Old Licking." The people were wont to meet in immense crowds, and became intensely excited under the declamatory harangues of wranglers, demagogues and stump orators, press of the country, addressed to the passions, superadded to the fanatical and exciting speeches of the heated partisans, and candidates for public offices, roused the people as they had never been roused before, and worked them up to fever heat, producing a state of wild delirium among them, hitherto unparalleled in the history of the country and never afterwards approached in infuriated fanaticism. The stormy passions of the masses were lashed into uncontrollable fury; often displayed an intensity of feeling wholly unknown before, and manifested a degree of extravagance and wildness in the discussion of political questions that was a marvel to the few sober-minded men of both parties, that remained in a measure unaffected in the midst of the frenzy that had seized upon the multitudes. These abnormal manifestations characterized one portion of the people, while the other portion, little, if any less excited or delirious, erected their lofty hickory poles, surmounted them with huge hickory brooms, and displayed the living 'rooster in various ways and in every conceivable manner, as the representative of antagonism to the coon, while their speeches about equaled in defam- ation of character the ribaldry of the doggerels sung by the former. And all this frantic madness resulted from the determination of the party of the first part, to prevent the re-election of Martin Van Buren and Richard M. Johnson, and substitute for them General William H. Harrison and John Tyler - this and nothing more. The question was, shall we elect General Harrison or Martin Van Buren President? Licking county decided by about two hundred majority in favor of the latter. The great gathering of the clans during the year was in Newark, on the fourth of July, Thomas Corwin being the Whig orator of the occasion, and John Brough the Democratic. Sam. White and Joshua Mathiot were the chief local orators of the former, and B. B. Taylor and James Parker of the latter.

The delirium manifested itself in the oft-repeated gathering together by the populace, in immense meetings, at 'distances so remote as to necessitate an absence of a number of days, to the partial neglect of their usual avocations. The further irrational manifestations of the excited crowds while going' to and returning from those monster meetings, as well as while present at, them, consisted of singing songs and rolling balls - of riding from place to place in canoes on wheels, and of hauling with oxen or horses; from town to town, miniature log cabins, erected upon wheels partially covered with coon-skins (the ridge-pole of the roof being generally embellished with one or more live coons), and to whose corners were clinging, by way of adornment, full grown statesmen, nibbling at corn-dodgers or sections of johnny-cake and sipping at a gourd of hard cider, and at intervals singing, on the highest attainable key, doggerel. songs in the interest of "Tippecanoe and Tyler too." <A few of the trades and industries and arts were also represented in miniature, on wheels, at the great conventions, and temporarily operated, sometimes while in motion, Some large log cabins, built of heavy logs, and furnished with buckeye chairs, were built in which to hold neighborhood meetings, and in front of which the trunk of the largest accessible buckeye tree was erected, surmounted with a cider-barrel and a gourd attached. One of these log-cabins, with the usual adjuncts, was erected in Newark and used for

The Whig victory of 1840 was, in the opinion of its leaders, a crushing blow to the Democracy. So badly was the party defeated that it was doubtful if it ever again could rally, "unless with a change of name or a change of principles." During the administration under Van Buren, the country was plunged into one of its financial crises - its currency ten, fifteen, and sometimes twenty-five per cent. below par, and the laboring man had his wages cut In May, 1837, less than three months after the administration commenced, every bank in, the United States, with few exceptions, suspended specie payments, and refused to redeem its wild-cat issues of notes. Had the President been firm the banks would not have had the vantage ground. But. the treasuye of the people was locked up in bank vaults - the government. had nothing with which to pay its debts or its current expenses, and President Van Buren called Congress together in extraordinary session. Then the banks were masters. of the situation, and the President had a stormy four years of office.

General Harrison, who four years before had but seventy-three electoral votes for President, against one. hundred and seventy-six for Van Buren, at the election of 1840 had two hundred and thirty-four electoral votes to sixty for Van Buren.

The popular vote for Harrison and Tyler showed almost as'overwheming a majority as that of the Electoral colleges. The leading and more thinking men. of the party who achieved this unprecedented triumph were afraid they had an elephant on their hands that they could not manage. But the men who. voted to make times: better, who were promised '"'two dollars a day and roast beef" if Harrison was elected, and but "six and onefourth cents a day anda sheep's pluck" under Van Buren, were jubilant. They demanded a universal rejoicing - a day of jubilee for the salvation of the country. In many places they did rejoice with bonfires, illuminations, the firing of cannon, and with other demonstrations of joy. In Newark the rejoicing was to be one that would astonish the natives, and it did astonish. them - to be an illumination of the whole country, as far as the town could be seen, by a unique bonfire, and it was a unique one. Around the public square, in the center of the town, on each of the four streets, they planted innumerable barrels of tar, digging were placed on top. The whole county was advised of the grand event to come off on a particu-. lar night, which, after consulting the almanac, they

From all the country round - in wagons and buggies, on foot and on horseback - came the delighted Whigs, brimful of joy and expected satisfaction.

The night was an excellent one to show off a bright light, for the almanac was correct - there was no moon. The fire was applied to the shavings, and soon a bright blaze of fire was around the square; -the jubilant Whigs cheered, and all seemed happy. But their joy was transient. As soon as the shavings and light wood burned down to the tar the light was absorbed by a suffocating smoke, and the square and the whole town were enveloped init. Efforts were made to rekmdle the tar by the addition of more fuel, but as the pine wood and shavings burned out the smoke became greater than ever. The Whigs were crestfallen; the Democrats who ventured out were elated. As if by a sudden impulse, every supporter of Van Buren that owned or could borrow a lantern of any kind put a lighted tallow candle in and went out to see what they called the 'gloomination." The fires had to be extinguished, and for days the smell of tar was in and around the town of Newark. The Whigs were the worstbored men ever seen in that region. The mere mention of the grand illumination acted as quickly as the. sight of a red shawl does ona mad bull, exciting them to rage. But in the end the tables were turned, the biters were bitten.

The death of General Harrison, after being president one month, devolved the executive office on Vice-President Tyler. He was made the scapegoat for the violated promises of good times which came not.

In 1842 the same candidates for governor were again in the field, and Shannon beat Corwin by a plurality of nearly two thousand, and the Democracy from, what Governor Wood called, "benighted Ashtabula to intelligent Hamilton county," were uproariously happy. During the contest they worked to "right the wrongs of 1840 in 1842," and to their great surprise they were successful. Remembering the fawx pas of the Whigs two years before, in their celebration at Newark, when their illumination was but a "gloomination," the Licking county Democracy declared their intention of showing the silly Whigs how to do the thing right.

In the same public square the Democratic leaders had collected a large quantity of dry elm logs, from ten to fifteen feet long. These they had split in long strips. Procuring the longest pole they could get, they fastened a couple of slips of light timber at a distance from the bottom suffcient to allow the pyramid of elm sticks to reach it. Above they had empty tar barrels around the pole, the lower end resting on the intended pyramid. The barrels, as they were put on the pole, were filled with shavings, straw, etc., all well saturated with tar and turpentine - and then the pole, thus decorated, was, with much difficulty, raised to a perpendicular and the end firmly secured in the ground. The pyramid of dry elm was then made by placing the upper end of the sticks against the cross-pieces at the foot of the barrels, with barrels, shavings, and other combustibles placed in its center and between the sticks, so as easily to be fired.

At the appointed hour, in the sight of thousands collected to see it, the mass was fired. Kike the evening of the Whig celebration, the night was a fine one. Nota breath of air was to be felt. In a few moments the fire found its way through the barrels, which acted as a chimney, and the flame shot upward, as a pillar of fire by night, until it almost seemed to reach the heavens. But the best laid plans '"'o' mice and men gang aft aglee." Just as it reached the highest point a breeze struck it, and the column of fire seemed gently to bend, until it finally wrapped the cupola of the court house, then one of the most costly in the State.'

A panic, swayed the crowd; for a moment men stood aghast, and a rush was made. The pyramid was torn down, and the pole with the barrels on it was promptly razed. The court house was saved, and with it, perhaps, other buildings, and that ended the Democratic illumination by bon-fire. If the Whigs, two years before, were chagrined at their failure to illuminate, the Democrats were doubly so in 1842 at their success. The one almost smothered the town in tar-smoke; the other came near burning down the town to make a light. Terms were finally made between the parties. Each was to ignore in speech any mention of the ill-success of the other.

This manner of conducting a presidential campaign continued many years after 1840, though, perhaps, few were characterized with such intense excitement, bitterness of feeling and universal interest. Even yet the people are much given to bonfires and processions, cannon, music, pole-raising, etc., in the conduct of political campaigns; but it would seem as if they were growing less conservative in this respect, and more and more inclined to listen to speech-making, and to indulge in the quiet reading of newspapers, and the forming of their opinions in less demonstrative and a more sober and sensible manner. The campaigns are being conducted more and more on the principle of appeal to the judgment and higher intellectual faculties, rather than the passions and prejudices.

The advance in mail facilities, and the increase in post offices from time to time, well illustrates the growth of the county. During the first five years after the first settlement of the county, Zanesville was the nearest post office. Newark was then made a post town, and some years thereafter a post office was established in Granville. A post office was established in Utica about the year 1815. A weekly mail, carried on horseback, supplied these offices. A post office was established in Hanover at Chester Wells, and another between, Newark and Utica, called Newton Mills. 'These were the principal offices before 1825, except those at Johnstown, Vandorn's, and Homer, numbering eight in all, which were chiefly supplied by the two mail routes, one crossing the county east and west, the other north and south, run by two-horse, and sometimes four-horse stages, twice a week. After 1828 came the ponderous, fast-going four-horse coach, running daily at about seven miles per hour. Afterwards came the packets, and the pony express - now the principal mails are carried daily or several times a day, in railroad cars moving at the rate of thirty miles an hour. The post offices now number thirtyfive in all, there being one or more in almost every township of the county, so that probably not a man in Licking county lives more than five miles from a post office.

The prominent men of the county are thus mentioned by Hon. Isaac Smucker in his Centennial history; he forgets, in his modesty, to place his own honored name in the list:

"' Tt may not be amiss to give the names of some of those who commenced their career here during the first half and finished it during the last half of the century. Conspicuous among this class were Captain Bradley Buckingham, David Moore, Isaac

"'To give a measure of completeness to this Centennial history of Licking county, I beg leave also to bring to notice some of the gentlemen who have most conspicuously identified themselves with our.county during the latter half only of the Centennial period now closing. Prominent among the list given under this head are Jonathan Taylor, Joshua Mathiot and Danie] Duncan, who were all elected to Congress, as well as to other positions of honor and responsibility. Another trio of this class consisted of Israel Dille, Dr. J. N. Wilson and Lucius Case, all men of intelligence, extensive information and talents, who were largely influential in giving direction to public sentiment. They were original thinkers, zealous investigators, enthusiastic students. The two first named pushed their investigations in the direction of philosophy and the natural sciences, with diligence and a good degree of success. The tastes of the latter led him to the study of jurisprudence and political eeonomy; hence he became prominent as a lawyer, and as an active and influential debater in the Constitutional convention of 1851-52. Conspicuous also among our latter-half-century_ men was-he who was familiarly called Sam. White. He was an influential legislator for a time, and moreover attained to the highest reputation among us as a popular orator, and an unfaltering friend of freedom! Colonel B. B. Taylor, too, for a brief time as senator and political orator, filled a large space in the public eye. James Parker and James R. Stanberry also obtained distinction as public speakers, not only at the bar and before political assemblies, but also as grave and dignified senators. Among others of our modern legislators were Samuel D. King, George H. Flood, P. N. O'Bannon, Daniel Duncan, W. B. Woods, Charles Follett, Willard Warner, Dr. Walter B. Morris, R. B. Truman, George B. Smythe, John F. Follett, C. B. Giffin, William Parr, William Bell, J. B. Jones, J. W. Owens, W. D. Smith and others, who exerted a degree of influence as members of our State legislature.

"Among those of our citizens other than legislators who have 'done the State some service,' and acquired honorable distinetion in other departments of the public service, or in the line of their own chosen pursuits, are Presidents Pratt, Going, Bailey, Hall, and Talbott, of Denison university; Judges Searle, Buckingham, Brumback, and Follett; W. D. Morgan, T. ie Davis, M. M. Munson, L. B. Wing, A. B. Clark, Dr. J. R. Black, T. J. Anderson, Colonel William Spencer, William to Kerr, J. W. Webb, C. H. Kibler, Rev. Ebenezer Buckingham, Rey. Alexander Duncan, Dr. Edward Stanbery, Rev. H. M. Hervey, Rev. Isaac N. Walters, Dr. Daniel Marble, and many others that might be named, including the still living former residents of Licking county, Samuel Park, esq., of Illinois, a voluminous and widely known writer on,various subjects; Dr. Z. C. McElroy, of Zanesville, a strong, vigorous and original thinker, and an extensive contributor to the best medical journals of Europe and America; and Dr. T. B. Hood, of Washington city, who made an honorable, widely extended, and well known reputation for himself while in the service of the medical department during the late rebellion, as well as since the close of the war, as an author, to the performance of his duties in the surgeon general's department of the Government.

'And I also avail myself of this occasion to make mention of other gentlemen who were natives of Licking county or residents of it in early life, that attained to a good degree of dirtinetion in other sections of our country, both in military and civil life, And first of those whose military;services brought them prominently before the country I name General Samuel R. Curtis, General William S. Rosecrans, General Charles Griffin, General B. W. Brice, General W. D. Hamilton, General Charles R. Woods, General Willard Warner, General William B. Woods. Of eminent civilians those whose names occur to me at this moment, were Horatio J]. Harris, a senator in Indiana, and a United States district attorhey in Mississippi; Ed. Roye, who attained to the position of President of the Republic of Liberia; James F. Wilson, long a distinguished member of Congress from Iowa; James B. Howell, a United States Senator from Iowa; General Willard Warner, a member of the United States Senate from Alabama; Hon. William B. Woods, a judge of the Federal courts in Louisiana and other southern States; and George H. Flood, American minister to the Republic of Texas; ''Johnny Clem,'' a favorite orderly of General Thomas and now an officer in the regular army, also acquired a national reputation as the youngest and smallest soldier in the Union' army, as well as for gallant conduct. Colonel W. H. Hollister, too, has acquired wide-spread fame as one of the largest of American land-owners and stock raisers. He isa native of Licking county, now a citizen of California. "Thomas Jones, the sculptor, and Rey. Dr. Rosecrans, the popular Roman Catholic bishop, are also entitled to mention in this con: nection, the latter being a native, and the former a resident ir early life, of Licking county. Mr. Jones has been a resident of Cincinnati for many years, and has a national reputation. Bishop Rosecrans was an honored citizen of Columbus, whe enjoyed the confidence of the entire community."