Wayne County, Ohio - Chapter 19: Wooster, 1878 (part 8 of 8)

Samuel Routson, the founder of the first and only pottery located at the county-seat, was born in Slankerville (Easton), Chippewa township, and has always lived in Wayne county. On both sides of the house his parents were of good old pioneer stock, his mother belonging to the great Franks family. He organized his present business in Doylestown in 1841, where he engaged in the manufacture of stone-ware until 1846. Then he embarked in mercantile trade there, to which he gave his attention until 1856, when with his family he removed to Wooster, locating on Pittsburg av- enue, east of the railroad depot. Here he at once built a residence, and buildings for carrying on the manufacture of pottery. From that time to the present, in connection with his brother, Quincy A. Routson, he has with industry and care successfully conducted the business in all branches, including drain tile, chimney tops, flower pots, vases, etc., his goods finding sale all along the line of railroad from Pittsburg to Chicago. The works are run by hot-air power engine, the only one in Wooster, and very serviceable for the business. He obtains his clay in Franklin township, on farms of Daniel Snyder, Andrew Miller and Jacob and Israel Franks, buying many tons from them in the course of a year. His crockery ware is among the very best in the market, and his drain tile in demand, of which, in one year, he has sold as high as 3 5, 000 feet, or nearly seven miles, mainly to farmers, and used always with success.

Mr. Routson is a man of the most upright character; as a neighbor he is kind, accommodating and sympathizing; socially, no one can be more pleasant and cordial ; his house is a home to all that come, and he enjoys company always ; and in all his relations to the community he is held in esteem as one possessing those qualities that make a good citizen. He is a consistent Christian man, for many years a member of the Baptist church, of which he is now one of the Trustees.

The superior processes introduced into modern mechanic industry by the knowledge of machinery have led to the establishment of various branches of manufacture, and made them of the most vital importance. Its application to the immense lumbering districts of the Penobscot river, in Maine, of Michigan and Wisconsin, on the headwaters of the Hudson, the Susquehanna, Delaware and Allegheny rivers and the Cascade and Coast ranges of mountains in Oregon, is one of the triumphs of mechanic and industrial skill, and demonstrates more clearly than ever that the employment of steam-power is not only a mighty factor in civilization, but is one of the agents by which science succeeds in mitigating the oppressiveness of labor, and by which the possibilities of human energy are multiplied beyond all moderate calculation.

lumber establishments, and is a source of positive benefit, not only to mechanics and architects, but to the whole community, the city builder and the farmer alike, as well as a means of profit, as it certainly should be, to its conductor and proprietor.

The lumbering establishment of D. C. Curry & Co., embracing some of the bolder features of the huge mills of the pineries, has, in a brief struggle of a few years, anchored itself in our midst as one of the successes and permanences of the city of Wooster. It has survived hard times, the panic, and a destructive fire on February 3, 1875, and at present moves along in the line of business and prosperity. The firm was constituted in January, 1868, having purchased the machinery, grounds, areas, etc., from Stibbs, Spink & Co., with James Curry then as a member of it. It was conducted under this arrangement until October, 1874, when he retired from the partnership, although the style of the firm - D. C. Curry & Co. - underwent no change. The following, the sons of James Curry, are the members of the firm in the order of seniority: John Curry, born in Holmes county, February 18, 1839, and married Miss Elizabeth Laubach; D. C. Curry, born September 25, 1841, in Holmes county, Ohio, and married December 24, 1868, to Miss Jennie J. Yergin ; Wellington Curry, born in Holmes county. May 27, 1845, ^"d married January 9, 1866, to Miss May E. Vanhouten - all coming to Wayne county, with thair father, in 1853.

The initial member of the firm, it will be seen, was twelve years old when he came to Wooster, and received his rudimentary, in fact all of his education, in the schools of the city, serving an apprenticeship of nearly four years as a compositor in the Republican office, under the proprietorship of Enos Foreman, Esq.

When Sumpter was fired, in the spring of 1861, he was among the first to respond to President Lincoln's call for 75, 000 men, and was enrolled on the 23d of April, of said year, as a member of the Sixteenth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, in the three months service. Upon the re-organization of that regiment, he enlisted for three years, on the 5th of October, 1861, in Company H, commanded by Captain A. S. McClure, and was discharged October 31, 1864, having served his country faithfully for a period of forty-one months and sixteen days. On the 19th of April he was wounded by the fragment of a shell in the left arm and stomach, in the first assault in the rear of the besieged and doomed city that so gracefully capitulated to General Grant on the 3d of July, 1863. He was

He is a stockholder in the Quinby Opera House of Wooster ; was the contractor for said structure, employing the mechanics for its construction.

The firm is the largest of the kind in the city or county, disposing of, annually, from three to four million feet of lumber and constituting a source of supply to all the surrrounding counties. They retain in their employment a first-class architect, and furnish steady work, on a daily average, for twenty-five hands. They make a specialty in the manufacture of church furniture, such as pews, pulpits, etc., for which they find an easy market in other States as well as Ohio.

The members of the firm, as will be discovered, are comparatively young men, but a glance at the foregoing indicates very clearly what pluck, energy, activity and perseverance can accomplish. Hard work, getting down to business and sticking to it always did achieve wonders, and the rules of successful business, whether defined by Ricardo or Amos Lawrence, are inflexible and admit of no modifications.

The first marble shop opened in Wooster was by D. A. Griffith, of Boston, in the spring of 1848. Jacob Eberhardt accompanied him from Massachusetts, and did the first work performed. The shop was located one door south of the present office of Connelly's Washington House. In July, 1852, Mr. Eberhardt and his father-in-law, Daniel Yarnell, an ex-Sheriff of Wayne county, bought out Griffith, and run the business together for six years, having their shops opposite Banker & Hanna's carriage works, on South street. In 1858 Mr. Yarnell retired, and Eberhardt carried on the business himself for seven years, when he formed a partnership with Sylvester Gray, June i, 1865. The energy of the establishment, redoubled by the enterprise and activity of Mr. Gray, soon acquired new dimensions. Although Mr. Grayhad no money in the business, they undertook, in the spring of 187 1, the erection of the splendid structure of brick, stone and iron on the corner of South and Buckeye streets, finishing it during the year, at a cost of ^10,000, and it is no doubt one of the finest buildings for marble purposes in Ohio.

Mr. Eberhardt died a few years later, and Mr. Gray assumed control of the business for a time. Two years ago Samuel Rhoads entered into partnership with him, the firm styled Gray & Rhoads, who are now successfully carrying on the marble works.

Bees will not work except in darkness ; thought will not work except in silence ; neither will virtue work except in secresy. Let not thy right hand know what thy

Officers, January I, 1878 - Edward P. Bates, Thrice Illustrious Master; Levi R. Kramer, Deputy Illustrious Master ; Philo L. Van Houten, Principal Conductor of the Work ; Finley L. Parsons, Captain of the Guard ; William C. Moore, Cap

WOOSTER - SECRET SOCIETIES. retain of the Council; Benjamin Eason, Treasurer; Lewis P. Ohliger, Recorder; T. Tickner, Grand Steward ; William W. Hanna, Sentinel.

Officers, January I, 1878 - Henry J. Kaufman, Chancellor Commander; James M. Lusk, Vice Chancellor; Anthony Wright, Venerable Patriarch; George Brauneck, Keeper of Records and Seals; Levi R. Kramer, Master of Finance; William H. Banker, Banker ; James E. Wescott, Master of Arms ; William Beresford, Inside Sentinel; Thomas Hetherington, Outside Sentinel.

Officers, January, 1S78 - John Diehl, Chancellor Commander; Joseph Schuch, Vice Chancellor ; William Nold, Venerable Patriarch ; John J. Bringger, Keeper of Records and Seals ; Charles Gasche, Master of Finance; Leonard Saal, Banker; Philip Young, Master of Arms ; George Schuch, Inside Sentinel ; Frederick Kostenbader, Outside Sentinel.

Officers, January, 1878 - Prophet, Abraham Saybolt, Jr.; Worthy Sachem, James A. Ogden ; Senior Sagamore, Enos Pierson ; Junior Sagamore, William H. Banker ; Chief of Records, Henry J. Kaufman ; Keeper of Wampum, J. R. Naylor ; Guard of Wigwam, Andrew Rieman ; Guard of Forest, George Brauneck ; Trustees, D. W. Immel, E. S. Dowell, William H. Banker.

Wayne Council No. 13. - A secret beneficiary and life insurance order (similar to the Knights of Honor), instituted in Wooster, September 5, 1877.

Temple of Honor No. 27 was organized on the nth of November, 1847, with thirty charter members. The first officers were David Parrett, W. C. T.; D. H. Holiday, W. V. T.; McKean, W. R.