Miami County, Indiana - Chapter 9: Progress and Development, 1896

To-day is not yesterday; we ourselves change; how can.our works and thoughts; if they are always to be fittest, continue always the same. - Carlyle's Essays;

HE progress of this county has been phenomenal, not only in the home T and social life of the people, but in the natural resources and the physical conditions of the surface of the county.

The round-log cabin. with its clapboard roof and shed long since disappeared and in its stead is the palatial residence. The idea of ornamentation in building has far outshadowed that of utility. No one now thinks of erecting a building; with simply the thought 'that iv-is a shelter from the winter's storms. 'Ihe Greek and Roman architecture is combined in thousands of homes. 'The idea of utility has been absorbed by that of the grand and beautiful. The fence built around the residence is not simply a protection against the stock, but is also an ornamentation. This idea of the beautiful has superseded that of mere utility in every walk and phase of life.

The dress of the pioneer was simply to hide his form and proteet him from the elements. If one of the earliest settlers of this county, should don the summer suit he wore to church fifty years ago, and appear in the county seat on acircus day, he would no doubt attract but little less attention than the circus. So the idea of ornamentation in dress has grown equally as rapid as that in dwellings. Should an English tourist visit a Miami county fair, and see the well dressed farmers he would declare they were all laudlords. This growth of the home life and dress of the people is only a manifestation of the growth and development of ideas.

The progress of the county has been harmonious and complete. From the growth of home life, came a thousand avenues of progress. 'The history of the progress of this county in the home and social life, in the church. in the school, in the government and in the methods of agriculture is the general history of America.

In the wake of the rounda-log cabin followed the hewed log house, with shinglea roof; and then the frame house soon appeard with lath and plaster walls, and in many places, especially along Eel river, handsome and elegant brick residences were erected. But a few of the old cabins are standing yet, hard by the modern structure, and are used for kitchen, or vood house, ora shelter for grain, or a work-shop on rainy days. Here and there the old Dutch oven is still standing and it took a number of years before the good, eld mothers would believe they could bake as well in the modern stove as in it. The old well-sweep has been replaced by the great wind-pumps. The improvements in the barns seemed to.have preceded that of the dwellings. About thirty or thirty-five years ago was the era of bank barns, and farmers vied with each other in building large, durable and capacious barns with great threshing floors. These erected to-day are not near the equal of those built a geueration ago. Often the large barn was built before the mansion was put up. The frugal farmers would reside in their old cabin, until the fertile fields were wide, then built their prouder domes.

America proudly boasts of her inventive genius and the phrase, '' Yankee ingenuity, " is a common expression everywhere, The inventions, which have been an aid to agricu]ture, have completely revolutionized the methods in this industry. The early settlers of this county will remember the old barshare plow, used in breaking the ground. It was made ofa plate that formed the base, and a coulter wedged in the beam. The rest was wood. After the «*bull-plow " was introduced, the common joke on the old bar-share was, that it **took ten rods and half a day to turn it round." The iron part of the «bullplow" was made by the country blacksmith out of what was called a plowmole, a wrought triangle plate, with a kind oi a handle tu it, which formed the nose of the plow. The wood part of it, or stock, was generally put on by the wagon maker, but some of the farmers could do it themselves.

The methods of planting the crops, and cultivating and harvesting them is now fnll ifinetrest. But the greatest change is in harvesting the crops. The harvest time of 50 years ago, or 40, or even 20 year's ago, was looked forward to the year round. The good, old mother was always preparing for the next harvest. The sweets were made, the fruits were canned, and the best hams smoked all for harvest. If a farmer had 40 or 50 acres of wheat to cut, he would have eight, ten or twelve hands. 'The cradle was considered a great invention, and when the heavy, old McCormick reaper was invented, it was wonderful, and no one could ever have dreamed that much improvements could have been made on it.

The progress in the physical change of the county has been most wonderful. Where a half century ago, wound the Indian trail, or the '' glazed way," or the corduroy road, are good pikes or graded highways. Where the primeval forests waved, is now the goiden grain. Hundreds of acres of the richest soil have been redeemed from the swamps and sloughs.

A thousand creeks and rivulets that once babbled through the forests are now concealed in tile ditches. Thus physical developement is very rapid and constantly going on unobserved.

Good roads are the essentials to good government. The great public roads of Kome added as much to her glory as did her standing armies. The early settlers saw the importance of good roads and all turned out to work them - man, horse, boy and team. They plowed the earth, hauled the logs and bridged the slough and stream. They dug, ditched and drained to avoid the quagmire. They graveled and corduroyed and felled the trees that leaned. Sewers were made of hollow logs and laid beneath the roads. Bridges were constructed with long oak beams the ends resting on wooden pens, filled with stones. The floor was made out of hewed logs. Derricks, nor hoistingcanes, nor snatch blocks, nor tackles were known to the early road builders.

Miles and miles. of corduroy roads were built in this county. The word corduroy is not familiar to the younger Hoosiers, but just mention it to one of the pioneers, and he will smile significantly. The road was built by laying logs or poles across a swamp, marsh or mud-hole and covering them with dirt. Often, after heavy rains. these corduroy roads were all afloat, and when the dirt watbed out from over the logs, one can imagine how pleasant to 'take a pleasure ride over them.

Geologists have prophesied that sometime in the future, the many beautiful lakes of Northern Indiana will be filled with dirt that is constantly washing into them from the hills that surround the shores, and from the many ditches. The decayed vegetation will also do much towards filling the lakes. Mud lake, located west of Macy, just across the line in Fulton county, was no doubt, centuries ago, the margin of the Great Lakes. The early settlers, who have lived near it for many years, remember when it was twice as large as it is now. Once it was all one lake, but is now divided into two parts, kaown as North and South Mud lake. The margin is year by year elosing in. The large ditches, which led into it, are depositing tons and tons of earth there. In the fall of the year myriads of leaves are blown into it. The vegetation, which is so luxuriant about the water's edge, decays every year and new vegetation springs up. This vegetable growth is rapidly assisting to fill the lake. In the northern part of this county are many depressions similar to the basin of Mud lake that are now farmed. Thirty-five or forty years ago there were a number of large ponds in Allen township in which fish were caught. These have been drained and tne soil yields heavy crops. Silently and effectively is the hand of nature.