Randolph County, Indiana - Chapter 15: Agricultuke, 1882

General

In these artificial times, to begin on a farm requires a formidable outlay of money. A modern house and barn built of lumber, etc., purchased at a railroad town and brought by the locomotive from the distant factory, or by river-floats and by steamer from the forests of Michigan or Wisconsin, or elsewhere, is an expensive thing. A stalk of wheat cannot be cut down in these latter days without a $150 reaper, nor a spire of grass brought to the ground without a costly patent mower; no raking can be done except with a patent horse-rake, a hill of corn cannot be put into the soil without a horse-drill, or, at least, a handplanter; nor can the growing corn be worked unless a man has a walking plow or a riding plow, mayhap, with an umbrella to sit under; hay must be pitched into the mow with a horse and a pulley fork. To sow a kernel of wheat one must have a two-horse drill, and, to thresh it, a $1,000 steam enyine and a $500 separator.

The machinery of the present time has come to be so multifarious and so complicated that an old-time pioneer who has been dead fifty years, were he to return to the scenes of his forest life, would be utterly nonplussed and could not imagine what the immense array of ''new-fangled inventions" could be intended for.

Our fathers and grandfathers, when first they threaded their weary way among the giant forest trees to the spot of their choice in this new country,-needed no such host of outlandish, bewildering implements, nor such a costly array of 'edifices. A rude camp, made of poles or rails against a huge log, and upheld by stakes driven into the ground, or at best a log cabin, the logs dragged up to the spot by a horse and raised by helping, friendly neighbors, or by settlers gathered from miles around, or by the Indians themselves, was, to the hardy emigrants, a palace, because it was their own. No nails, nor rock, nor brick; no glass nor plank were needed; no boughten tables, nor doors, nor shingles, nor bedsteads, nor chairs had to be purchased; the roof was clapboards, weighted down by poles laid on them, or fastened by pins through the boards. The doors and the floor and the tables were puncheons, and the chairs were pieces of puncheon set upon legs; the hearth was pounded clay, the fireplace was clay, against puncheons; the chimney was dirt and sticks built up together; the bedstead was poles, with ends bored into the walls and held up at the corner by a single post driven into the ground; the hinges, latches, ete., were all made of wood; the latch was raised by a string, and the door was locked by pulling the string inside.

The wheat was cut with a sickle, threshed with a flail and cleaned by shaking in a sheet or by a basket fan; hay was cut with a scythe and raked with a wooden fork, and hauled on a sled or on some poles to the log stable or the stack. Plowing was done with a bar-share plow and tending corn with a single shovel plow; hauling was done upon a sled and gears were made with rawhide tugs and corn-husk collars. Clothes for men were made of deerskin; buckskin jacket, hunting-shirt and vest and pants and buckskin moccasins and deerskin cap were an excellent supply for men, and home-made linsey wolsey for women. Men could dress the deerskins themselves, and make them up into garments with their own hands. Women would pull and thresh, brake and scutch and hackle their flax, and spin and weave the cloth, and make it into garments for themselves and for the children. Even the girls were equal to the occasion. At one time, a mother of a large family with several nearly grown girls was obliged to leave home for ten days. 'The flax. lay spread upon the ground, where it had been placed for rotting. The girls, with the help of a half-grown brother, gathered up the flax, broke, swingled and hackled it, spun and wove it and made it into clothes for the younger children, and when the mother came home, the little "younkers" were wearing their new clothes as proud as young princes. Little wheel, reel, winding blades, warping bars, rattling, pounding loom and hand-needle were better than a $500,000 factory, for they were right at home and could be put to use at any moment without money and without price, and no cost except labor; and stalwart boys and strapping girls had muscle in abundance. Hand-milland hominy-pounder, or burnt-log mill, or corn-grater, made meal or hominy, saving the trouble of going twenty, thirty or forty miles on horseback, or with two or three yoke of slowly-plodding oxen through almost trackless ways to the distant mill.

Many came from the Old Country with only a solitary packhorse, and that horse supplied their need for weeks, and sometimes for months. .A settler would often lose his only pony and would be obliged to dig along with none, because he would be too poor to get another one.

Often settlers would move into the woods in the winter, so as to take advantage of the sugar-making season before deadening the splendid sugar trees, which were so abundant in many places. One family who moved into Stony Creek Township nearly at its first settlement, consisting of a young man and his active, robust wife and her young brother, a lad of sixteen years, had a very serious misfortune almost at their first coming. Only three or four days after their arrival, while he was splitting clapboards with a "frow," it glanced into his knee and gave such a fearful wound that he was helpless on the puncheons of their camp floor for six weeks or more. They had come in February, and the heroic wife and her helpful brother, no wise dismayed, set to making sugar. They had brought with them four large kettles on purpose for that very service, and, by the coming of warm weather, the woman and the lad had succeeded in making four or five barrels of excellent tree sugar, which answered a splendid purpose during the coming summer months in exchange for corn and other supplies. Theiy only horse, also, died shortly, but one was obtained of an uncle in Wayne County, with which they contrived to pass the summer. The husband is dead, but the heroic wife is still alive to tell the tale of their early trials.

Another settler some years before that made a great quantity of sugar, and, on taking it to Cincinnati, found the market overstocked and had to bring part of it home again, and, being a mechanic, he set a barrel of sugar open in the shop for anybody to eat when he chose to do so, and in that way he contrived to get rid of his surplus sugar.

making no "improvement'' beyond barely a cabin for temporary occupancy, opening no clearing, but subsisting by hunting and trapping, living on the flesh and bartering the hides for such necessaries as had to be purchased. It took little to do such families, Johnnycake and hominy and venison and other wild game furnished them an aimple subsistence. And, when permanent settlers began to plant their stakes and build their cabins, these "squatters" would '' pack up their traps" and "shove out" for some newer region. One of the Western pioneers declared that he would not live nearer to any neighbor than fifteen miles, and another, that he wished to be so far from settlers that he had to 'camp out" at least one night in going to visit them. A neighbor only three or four miles distant was "'close by," and a woman thought it no hardship to start out of a morning on foot, with a babe in her arms, and two or three others trotting and prancing along by her side, to meeting, three or four miles, or to visit a neighbor at the same distance.

For instance, when the Peacocks and the Hills settled in Jericho, in the spring of 1818, Mr. Kennedy was living near Mt. Zion Meeting-house, south of Nathaniel Kemp's. They were the nearest settlers to the Jericho people, and so they would " neighbor" together upon a path marked by blazed trees through the woods. When Rev. Thomas Wiley first settled near New Lisbon, north of what is now Union City, their nearest neighbor, outside of their own group, was Mr. Fowler, one mile south of Union City, and those "neighbors" used to visit back and forth, because they lived so close together, vou know.

And it is the uniform declaration of aJl early settlers that the soéiety of acquaintances was much more highly prized, and welcomes were far more hospitable in those days, than is the case in these later years.

But when men " came to stay,'' the next thing after building a house, or, oftener, a camp, was to make a ''clearing,"' and plant a field of corn. The man and larger boys would set promptly to girdling the larger trees, 'twelve inches and over," and under that size, to cut down and pile and burn. The woman and the girls and younger boys would pile brush and grub, and fire the heaps, and in a few weeks, by the time for corn planting, early or late, a sightly clearing would appear, and the precious seed would be buried in the earth, forerunner of the golden harvest. Sometimes seven acres of ground would be prepared and planted at the first planting, by a single family. With the 'buying " propensities implanted in the present artificial generation, these methods would seem almost like starvation, but wants were then few and easily supplied. There were no roads and nearly no markets. The towns were few and small - mere log hamlets in the vast and endless forest. When the first settlers came to Randolph, Cincinnati was a little straggling town; Richmond was a hamlet of perhaps twenty houses; Newport, Winchester, Muncie, Indianapolis and hundreds of other places, now fresh and thriving towns, had never yet been thought of. Nineteen-twentieths of the whole State of Indiana were still virgin forest, and to get into or out of these new settlements was a task indeed. Iron and salt must in some way be gotten, and they were obtained, but it was "by the hardest." One resident, still living, declares that his father once paid $18 for a barrel of salt. Another one, now an old man, says that a barrel of salt which he once got from Dayton stood him in $11.

These prices are, of course, very extreme cases, yet $4 and $5 per barrel were only ordinary prices. And iron, too, and articles made of iron, were very expensive. But the products of the farm were much of the time excessively low. Pork and wheat and corn and cattle, almost the only things available to a farmer, were so low as scarcely to repay the cost or trouble of hauling or driving to market. A pioneer of Central Ohio, who came from Eastern New York as late as 1839, had, in the fall of 1841, two crops of corn and of oats on hand - the oats in the stack, and the corn, one crop in the shock and the other inthe crib. When asked by an Eastern visitor why he did not market his grain, '"' What's the use?" he said; ''corn is only 10 cents at Columbus and'oats 12 cents, forty-five miles away, and that will not pay

"Higgs are very scarce and hard to get - 6 cents; butter is scarce and rising rapidly - 8 cents; corn high, hardly any to be got - price, 15 cents; pork (net), brisk, good business doing - $2 a hundred."

Early settlers of this county have sold pork at Richmond at $1 a hundred net, and half trade at that. A resident who came in about 1842 was offered pork, good and well-fatted, at. 75 cents cash per (net) hundred, and declined to purchase, because, as he said, he could do better. Another who was born in Randolph, and is still a citizen, says that he has hauled hams and shoulders to Cincinnati and sold them for $2 a hundred. An ancient resident of Wayne County assured the writer of this article that he had tried and tried in vain to sell as good wheat as ever grew for 124 cents per bushel to obtain money to pay his taxes.

An emigrant to Randolph County as late as 1846 bought a cow with a calf ten weeks old, fat and fine (which now alone would almost or quite bring the money), for $10.

He bought a dressed hog, weighing 212 pounds, for $4.25. A year or two before that (fall of 1844), the same man bought an excellent cow (which, if he had now, he would not sell for $50) for $9, and he sold the same cow for $7.

Beef during those times was sold at 14 to 2 cents per pound. It is a curi us fact, however, that. tallow was even then 8 to 10 cents a pound, whereas now, while beef is anywhere from 5 to 15 cents, tallow only is from 5 to 6 cents a pound - lower than beef ribs! The quantity of tallow has vastly increased, but the demand for it has decreased still more. Then tallow was from two to five times as high as ordinary beef in the large, now the tallow is the very cheapest part of the whole animal.

For many years, the farmers of Randolph did, not as they wished, but as they could, and labor-saving inventions and other improvements were but slow in finding their way into what was then the far West. And in the stock, too, the settlers had to be satisfied with the commonest cattle, sheep, swine, atc. " Klm-peelers" for hogs, that, when fattened, would weigh 150 pounds, were good enough, and a 200-pound hog was splendid. There were many wild hogs in the woods, and it.was one of the diversions of the time to go out on horseback, with gun and dog, to chase and shoot their winter's pork, with a horse and boy, moreover, to hitch to the gambrels of the dead hogs and haul them to the open road, whence the wagon or the sled would take several at once to the dressing-place at home. And the cattle and the horses were of the commonest kind. Many, indeed, did their best with the "common stock," and not a few fine specimens of the '' native breeds " were to be seen, showing what care and feeding will accomplish. But, as time rolled on, men saw what older settlements in Ohio and elsewhere had done, and gradually ''improvement" began to be the order of the day in Randolph, as well as in other places. It is, in fact, true that but few of the Randolph farmers have at any time been noted for extensive handling of improved breeds, most preferring to go to Wayne County or to Ohio to get what animals they wished. But the result of the gradual movement has been that the whole matter of domestic stock has, in the course of years, been almost wholly revolutionized, and the elm-peeler hog and the scrub cattle are rarely, if ever, seen. The farmers of Randolph, moreover, have kept pace to the full with the onward march of things, and the fields, and the sheds, and the dwellings, of the thrifty and wide-awake residents are tilled with all manner of machinery and implements without number or end, to make labor easier and more productive.

Stock Improvement. - James Moorman is thought to have brought nearly the first bull to Randolph County of blooded stock from Kentucky, in 1853. Benjamin Hunt, west of Lynn, is known to have handled Durham blooded stock on his farm about 1840 or 1842. He had also black Berkshire hogs even earlier than that. William D. Frazee had fine blooded cattle. He exhibited, in 1858, a splendid Durham cow, which, with only poor keeping, gave nine gallons of milk per day, and whose calf at a year old, without ever having eaten an ear of corn, was estimated at 1,000 to 1,100 pounds' weight. Other cattle-owners were Charles Stevenson, below Huntsville; Isom Sedgwick, near Huntsville; John Brooks, west of Winchester; Anthony Way (one of the leading stock men), etc. William Starbuck and Nelson Pegg, near Buena Vista, have dealt in shorthorns. James Branson, of Stony Creek, first had Jersey cattle. In sheep, Joshua Johnson, of Buena. Vista, and Isaac Farquhar, of Huntsville, have owned fine stock. As to swine, Benjamin Hunt was one of the very earliest. Nelson Pegg, Buena Vista; Elza McIntyre, Maxville; Messrs. Graves, Morton and Kennon, Bartonia; - - - Botkin, Farmland, and others have been noted. Thomas Smith Kennon has dealt in fast horses, and has a private track on which to test and train and show the speed and mettle and bottom of the horses which he may own. In 1882, Samuel Conkling, living west of Union City, had one bull and a cow and some heifers and the finest mare in the county. She took, afterward, tho first premium at the Ohio State Fair; the cattle were shorthorns.

The first improved swine were "black Berkshires."" Who first introduced them or when is notnowknown. Peter Stidham, of Greensfork; Esquire Graves, of Bartonia, as also George Parent, near Union City, in Ohio, have been prominent in dealing in blooded swine, as also in sheep. Messrs. Morton and Kunkel, near Bartonia, have also done something in that line.

The first nursery in the region was by Joseph Cole, in Darke County, Ohio. Afterward, George Gephart, south of Union City, established a nursery, and after him, Benjamin Buckingham, ast of Union City. Levi Hill, of Greensfork, south of Sparusburg, is carrying on the nursery business to a considerable axtent. Mr. Woodbury got his trees in Wayne County.

Joseph Hewitt, near Neff; Gallaher, south of Neff; Israel] Smith, son of Amos Smith, in Stony Creek, have handled much stock, some of them having been engaged in raising and selling for twenty-five years or more. Armfield Thornburg, in 1839, owned what was judged to be the best horse then in the county. He kept the animal two years, charging $8 per colt, and clearing $450 the first year. The horse was taken into Iowa to Black Hawk's Purchase, and afterward to Illinois, and sold for $265. The horse was of the Bertrand stock, raised in Clinton County, Ohio.

Samuel Amburn and Isaac J. Smith, east of Windsor, are good farmers. Smith especially raises great numbers of swine, owning sometimes twenty-five brood sows in a single year.

Stony Creek, as also Nettle Creek, is a good township, finely watered by streams and springs, and well suited both for stock and grain. At the present time, Calvin Hinshaw, north of Lynn, is very prominent among ownersof swine. He has alarge herd of very fine animals of the Poland-China variety, selling them at high prices.

Among farmers who have handled fancy stock in years past have been Jonathan Johnson, Nathan Johnson, William Johnson, Anthony Way, Benjamin Hunt, David Clevinger, Frank Cranor, Paul Beard, Lemuel Wiggins, besides others not known.

Nathan Johnson used to deal extensively in improved stock, mostly short-horned cattle. Joel A. Newman was engaged considerably in the cattle business, but he has mostly quit. Daniel Engle owns a large stock of cattle and swine. Jonathan Johnson and Elijah Nichols were stockmen thirty years ago. Isaiah

Hockett dealt in Berkshire hogs thirty or forty years ago; he was one of the very earliest to deal in improved breeds. Lemuel Wiggins, at Losantville, has been a large cattle-owner; he owns twelve orchards on his various farms. Joha C. Clevinger brought twelve head of cattle (males and females) from Warren County, Ohio, about 1855; he sold them for $60 to $100 each before the war. Henry C. Thornburg, Mr. Driscoll and Thomas W. Reece boughtione each at $100. Mr. Reece had improved stock later, from Wayne County, Ind. William Adkins brought swine, chiefly Poland-China, from Butler County, Ohio. One male, three years old, was sold by Adkins for $58, A. J. Day, in later years, sold many pigs. Marion Hewitt has fed fifty to sixty head of swine in a year. William Hewitt raises 100 to 120 head; J. C. Clevinger often has 100 head, ete.

These men deal also largely in cattle. Horses and sheep throughout the region are about on an average. The stock of horses is good, and there are many splendid animals owned. Sheep are but few, and of but moderately improved stock.

William Hewitt has raised considerable fruit: he sold 300 bushels of winter fruit in 1880. Marion Hewitt also sells quite a quantity of fruit. William Peacock and William A. Macy, of Wayne Township, have orchards of excellent fruit.

John T. Thornburg has engaged extensively in bee culture, but, during the winter of 1880-81, his bees died extensively, many of his hives being killed by the severity of the cold. Bee culture is low, the swarms have largely perished, and people have become greatly discouraged in the matter. William Johnson, of Washington Township, is employed in bee culture, with much interest and skill and gratifying success; he has obtained Queen bees from Alabama and the '' Holy Land" for the improvement of his stock of bees, as also whole swarms from Alabama, obtaining, in 1880, six from that State.

Fruit Inprovement

The first orchard is thought. to have been planted by Henry H. Way, near Sampletown, west of Winchester, perhaps before 1820. Many orchards were early started, very few of them, however, being "grafted fruit." The first nurseries were established by one Hinshaw, an eccentric genius who traveled through the country, sowing apple-seeds, making pumps and what not, akin to 'Johnny Appleseed," of Jay County memory, if, indeed, he were not the same person. (He was not the same, but one of kindred spirit and similar pructice.)

One of the first to undertake the improvement of fruit was William Doty, near Buena Vista, who afterward removed to Farmland. Asahel Stone began a nursery, from which several orchards were planted. John Howard, west of Bueua Vista, planted several nurseries; he seemed well skilled in his business, but he did more good for the public than for himself, as he was given to drink.

G. D. Huffman commenced a fruit farm in 1873, and has now forty acres planted; 2,500 apple trees, 800 pear trees, two acres of grapes, with 2,000 grape vines, besides other kinds of fruit, are found inhisgrounds. The products of his orchard and vineyard are just beginning to appear. He had 200 bushels of apples last year, and several tons,of grapes. William Snyder has 500 acres of apples, begun in 1873. William Botkin has grown fruit considerably.

Several nurseries have existed from time to time in different places in the county. Levi Hill, of Spartansburg, is spending much time and money in establishing himself in the fruit tree business.

Among ''beemen" may be named John Somers, near Winchester; Benjamin Puckett, who had a large stock of bees; Thornburg, of Winchester, extensive business; Rey. Pierce, of Winchester, had a large stock; James McNeal, south of Winchester; William Johnson, of Johnson's Station. Poultry fanciers have been N. H. Ward, of Winchester; Mote Mills, Winchester, formerly with Joshua Johnson, of Buena Vista.

Horticulture

No horticultural society had ever existed in Randolph County, until January 14, 1881. The State association was organized in 1860, holding its nineteenth session in 1879. Several citizens of Randolph County have been connected with the State movement, Gen. Asahel Stone being, perhaps, one of the foremost. Daniel E. Huffman has been connected with it since 1866; he was a member of the Executive Committee for years, and is now one of the Vice Presidents. Hon. W. E. Murray, Gen. A. Stone and William Botkin are members of the association from Randolph at present.

The annual meetings for the State are held at various points - at Dublin, in 1879; at Crawfordsville, in 1880, and the society will meet at Muncie in 1881. Though there had been no public culture, etc., in Randolph County, yet much was done in a private way. The contrast between the beautiful shrubbery, creeping plants, house flowers and what not of the present day and the of primitive days, is indeed wonderful. But still only the bright dawn of the morning of beauty and delight has barely begun to break over the darkness of the past. The sublime declaration of Holy Writ, 'He has made everything beautiful in its time," is only faintly realized.

It is a sad thought that money and labor enough to have made this world of ours a very paradise of unspeakable beauty from end to end of the civilized world have been squandered for ages upon ages upon the low and useless, and even base, human beset and propensities. A single farmer, an old settler of andolph Ccunty, declared, not long ago, that he and his family of several boys had spent more money for tobacco alone than would suffice to pay for his farm of eighty acres. Only think of the pictures, the musical instruments, the ornaments of beauty apd skill, the shrubbery, the flowers and the articles of adornment of every imaginable sort, that that $4,000 would have procured for that tobacco-devouring group during the past fifty years.

And yet men and women will smoke and chew tobacco and drink spirits and do abundant other similar and even worse things, lavishing money like water upon foolish, useless and hurtful practices and indulgences, dragging the race ever downward toward sensuality and loathsome corruption and crime. God speed the day when, as the wild prairies are clothed with endless and bewildering beauty, so the haunts of men, where the objects of natural beauty have been ruthlessly destroyed, may come to be robed in the splendor of cultivated art spread abroad on every hand.

County Horticultural Society. - January 14, 1882, a meeting was held in the grand jury room at the court house, in Winchester, to organize a horticultural society. Hon. William E. Murray was chosen President of the meeting, and D. E. Huffman, Secretary. On motion, a committee was appointed to present a constitution and by-laws, consisting of J. P. Lesley, Nelson Pegg and Obadiah Fields. After discussions and remarks by William Snyder, D. E. Hoffman, Jesse Willmore, E. Hiatt, etc., the committee reported a constitution and by-laws which were adopted by sections:

The President delivered a brief address, a communication was read from W. H. Ragan, Secretary of the State Horticultural Society. J. P. Lesley read an instructive paper upon fruit trees; several new members joined the society, and an adjournment was had to Saturday, March 4, at 1:30 P. M.

March 4, 1882, society met upon adjournment. A communication was read from W. H. Ragan, Secretary of the State Horticultural Society, under date of February 20, 1882. The time of meeting was changed to the second Saturday of each month. Specimens of apples, very fine, were exhibited as follows: Roman Beauty, Uriah Davis; Wine Sap, White Pippin, Never Fail,

Newtown Pippin, Nelson Pegg; Red Romanite, Jesse Willmore. Methods of grafting were explained and illustrated by David Huston. An essay on apple culture was read by Obadiah Fields. Remarks were made by Jesse Willmore and Nelson Pegg. D. E. Hoffman presented a list of varieties for an orchard of 100 trees - three Early Harvest, two Ked Astrachan, two Karly Trenton, three Fall Wine, three Rambo, four Maiden's Blush, two Lowell, three Twenty-Ounce, two Belmont, twenty-five Ben Davis, ten Roman Beauty, ten Smith's Cider, ten Wine Sap, five Wagner, five Tallman's Sweet, three Baldwin, three Willow Twig, three Grimes' Golden, two Roman Stem. For a commercia] orchard, fewer varieties and more Ben Davis and Roman Beauty.

David Huston presented another list - three Yellow June, two Bailey's Sweet, four Early Harvest, two Tallman's Sweet, four Red Astrachan, eight Roman Stem, two Daniel Apple, eight Wine Sap, two Fall Wine, six Roman Beuuty, six Maiden Blush, six Smith Cider, six Rambo, four Wagner, three Fall Pippin, four Yellow Bellflower, three R. I. Greening, four Ben Davis, three Seek-no-further, four Never-Fail, three Spitzenberg, four Baldwin, three Red Romanite, four Tapehocken, two White Pippin. Marion Harter recommended the Esopus Spitzenberg and American Golden Russet.

A deep interest was manifested throughout, and the members were greatly encouraged. Additional members, John Commons, Harvey Hiatt and Marion Harter. Jesse Willmore was appointed essayist; subject, "Forestry and Transplanting Trees." Adjourned till the second Saturday in April.

Society met April 8, 1882. New member, I. J. Farquhar. Essay on Forestry by Jesse Willmore, with remarks by Messrs. Farquhar, Murray, Fields, Huffman. J. P. Lesley read a paper on "Orchard Culture," full of facts and suggestions. D. E. Hoffman essayist for next meeting. Society adjourned to meet at the residence and in the grove of D. E. Hoffman on the second Saturday in May, 1882.

Sorghum

Some twenty yesrs ago, a new industry arose in the United States - the raising of cane of various sorts:for sirup. The kind first raised was imported from China to France, and from France through our Patent Office to this country. Many kinds, the Chinese, or Sorghum, the African, or Imphee, and still other varieties have been cultivated with large success through most of the Middle and Western States. The product amounts to many million gallons of sirup in the United States. Many attempts have been made to manufacture sugar from the Northern cane, but with only partial success. The molasses product from sorghum, etc., enters little into the general national market fr uotation at the great centers; yet the farming population ra. - and use it largely. At first, each producer undertook to have a mill, and make his own cane into sugar or sirup. Wooden mills were first employed to crush the canes, and, though less rapidity was attained than by the iron mills now in vogue, yet it is the general and probably the correct opinion that the wooden mills produced a better article of sirup than is made with the other sort. The sorghum is raised commonly in small quantities, in patches though not a little is sold, also, to parties who raise none. Randolph began the raising of sorghum and the kindred canes early, and large amounts have been produced from year to year. Latterly, mills have been established at convenient points, and one mill answers for a large region; 1,000, 2,000 and 3,000 gallons are no uncommon quantities to be made by a single mill. Farmers haul their cane sometimes six or eight miles to be crushed. When made properly, this sorghum sirup is very nice and palatable, and many like it better than they do the New Orleans article. The general custom in making the sirup is to do it ''upon shares," taking two gallons to every five, eleven pounds being considered a gallon; or, for cash, an amount varying from 15 to 20 cents per gallon.

The improvements in utensils and methods have been such that the product is now a very superior article, bright, clear, sweet and every way adapted for general, nay, for universal use.

many years, but general statistics are not available, and guess work would add nothing, and might start some on a false scent, and serve simply to perplex them, with no good result. Among the owners of mills for sorghum have been Mr. Koyer and Mr. Bunch, in the southern part of Greensfork Township, as also Mr. Weiss, near Grangerville, Mr. Alexander, north of Spartansburg, etc. Mr. Royer and Mr. Bunch are old hands at the business, and succeed in making a very splendid product. Probaby the rest make as good. A Mr. Fulghum was very noted a few years ago for the wonderful sorghum, bright, heavy, clear, pure, which was produced at his mill, but he has left the township, and only the memory of his splendid production remains. Mr. Fulghum lived in Greensfork, southeast of Spartansburg. Some think the "sorghum culture" has declined within two or three years past. We cannot, judge how the fact may be as to the matter.

Our statistics upon this matter are but meager, concerning the manufacture referred to in this article. We have no general information as to the county at large. We only know that sorghum, etc., is grown, and, of course, manufactured throughout its whole extent, but definite details we are unable at present to furnish.

Fencing

An immense, almost an inconceivable, amount of labor has been expended by the farmers of Randolph County during the sixty-eight years of their settlement therein, in fencing their cultivated land. From the beginning, untold quantities of the finest, grandest trees - oak, ash, hickory, and even walnut and what not - have every year been felled remorselessly tothe ground, and, by the hardest and severest toil, been severed into rails to be piled up into huge fences, eight, ten and even twelve rails high, that no beasts, and scarcely man himself, could surmount. And quite well have those old-time fences served their purpose. A son of one of the earliest pioneers, himself an enterprising farmer, states that last spring (1881) he reset a fence laid by his father more than sixty years ago, that had never before been disturbed since first the rails were laid into the "worm,'' and that he found many of the walnut rails still sound and firm.

But, oh! the mauling and pounding and chopping and lifting and tugging for sixty years past, that the farmers of Randolph have accomplished, in order to make and repair and renew those same rail fences. Few, perhaps none, have any idea of the amount of such materials and such structures in the county and in the country at large, and of their amazing cost in labor or in money, or in both. To fence Randolph County in fields of ten acres each, with roads one mile apart, would take about 7,500 miles of fence, which, at twenty rails to the rod, will require 48,000,000 rails, which, at $30 per 1,000, would cost about $1,- 500,000; or, to make post and board fence at $1.60 per rod, the cost would be $3,840,000 - equal to the value of 96,000 acres at $40 per acre! It is evident, that, with the exhaustion of the timber, sources of fencing material, a necessity is arising for finding some other means of creating or renewing fences. Only two methods have thus far been suggested or practiced, viz., by live hedges and by iron. The first is unsuitable for genéral use for several reasons, and so is the latter. What will be done in the future is hard to tell. Some hedges have been set and have grown to be suitable for fence, and a small amount of fence has been made of iron wire, while some iron fence has been constructed in cities and villages. Very lately, an idea has arisen that posts, and possibly rails, may be cheaply manufactured of artificial stone by each farmer at home. If so, the matter will be of incalculable advantage to the country. The manufacture of stone has indeed long been an assured fact. The question whether it can be done so easily and so cheaply as to enable each farmer to make his own farm fencing material has not yet been determined. Experiments with this in view are in progress, and the hope is that in the near future, the manufacture of stone posts, rails, etc., by each land-owner upon his own premises will have become an accomplished fact. Barbed wire seems to be coming into extensive use in many regions of the country; yet there are very serious objections to its employment for general fencing purposes, one of which is the great danger of damage to stock from running against its sharp and jagged points, which fact not seldom occurs. The manufacturers are trying to obviate this difficulty by making the points less sharp and also by having it of a whitish color so as to be readily seen; still, it remains true that "barbed wire fence" is 2 nuisance and ought not to be employed.

Sedgwick Fence. - Within a short time past, a new kind of fence, consisting of woven wire, has been invented by Messrs. Sedgwick, late of West River Township, Randolph County, and the material is manufactured in great quantities at Richmond, Ind., and the sale of it has become very extensive and is constantly increasing. The fence is light, cheap, tasteful, beautiful, safe and durable, and would seem to be admirably adapted to its intended purpose; and it may prove, at least, a most important factor toward accomplishing the solution of the great and perplexing fence problem in this Western world. Let us hope so, indeed, since this vast problem stands well-nigh like the wondrous Sphinx on the Egyptian sands, ready to devour whatever unhappy wight shail fail to answer the question propounded to his vexed and troubled soul.

For more than fifty years within the bounds of Randolph, such a thing as a ditch for drainage made by public authority had not been heard of, much less been seen or known. However, the necessity of ditches became apparent, and the Legislature provided a way for their construction, and in due time the good work was begun in Randolph. The first ditch that appears on the Commissioners' records, so far as discovered, was petitioned for by Henry Handschy, in the northeast part of Jackson Township, to drain a pond to the Mississinewa by a ditch seventy rods long.

The petition was acted on March 13, 1868, and John B. Clapp, Joseph Kemp and Dayid 8. Harker were appointed Assessors, according to the law of the case provided. September, 1868, John W. Griffis petitioned for a ditch 3,960 feet in length, through lands of Griffis, Holland and Shaffer. December, 1868, Jesse and Epaminondas Oakey asked for a ditch 2,957 feet long through lands of Oakey, Moorman, Thompson and Shoemake. Since that time, many ditches have been asked for and granted and made, vastly improving the condition of the lands of the county, making tracts that had been worthless from excess of water to become the finest and most fertile lands in the whole region. There is a ditch running west of Spartausburg, several miles long.

The longest ditch in the county thus far ordered is one draining the swamps of the '' Dismal," located June, 1880. The ditches that have been made up to this time are chiefly in White River, Greensfork, Wayne, Jackson, Monroe and Ward. Sixteen ditches were applied for from July, 1866, to March, 1874. Twelve ditches were asked for from March, 1880, to August, 1881.

In connection with public ditches, the subject of tile-draining may be considered, which has grown up from a thing unknown to be a vast industry, employing multitudes of hands and costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, but richly worth all it costs, and destined to become still more vast and wonderful in amount and importance and value.

Tile Making

The growth of this business in this county has been wonderful. In 1856, the first drain-tile ever made in the State of Indiana was made at Elisha Martin's brick-yard, south of Winchester. Mr, Martin's son, John K., a lad of nineteen, getting sight of half a tile, set to work, constructed a mold himself, made 200 rods of tile, by hand, of course, and burnt them in his father's brick-kiln. Now, in Randolph County alone, there are at least seventeen tile factories, turning out, in the aggregate, it may be, 100,000 rods of tile annually of various sizes. One of the factories, perhaps no more extensive than the rest, burns twenty kilns in a year, of 400 rods each, or 8,000 rods annually. At this rate, seventeen kilns would make 136,000 rods a year. Evidently, immense numbers are being used. A little calculation will show that tile-drains across the entire county, thirty rods apart, would require about a millior nd a half of rods of tile, which, at the rate now furnished, wou... ~ vut in in about twelve years.

The tile factories are located as follows: Parker, Farmland, Ridgeville, Saratoga, Winchester, Lynn (two), Bartonia, Huntsville (two), Buena Vista, Losantville (two), Spartansburg (near), Salem (near), Harrisville, Pittsburg and perhaps others. is also one on the State line, in Ohio, two miles south of Union City, and one in Union City, Ohio. This last is a remarkable establishment, an account of which will be found under Union City. The business of tile-making has been carried to a high degree of perfection, the machine sending forth a continual stream of ready-made pipe, which is cut by a wire into appropriate lengths of one foot each. This branch of industry is both honorable and greatly useful, the value of the soil for production being immensely increased. In old times, ditches were put in simply in swampy places or to drain ponds. Now, tile-drains are laid by many farmers over nearly the whole extent of their lands, and the soil is wonderfully benefited by the operation.

We present an account of three or four of the tile-kilns as an indication of the nature and extent of this new and most useful branch of industry.

Tile Factory near Buena Vista (Thomas Brady). - This establishment was set up at Buena Vista about 1875 by Gray Bros. In 1881, it was bought by Thomas Brady, and moved one and a half miles south and put into operation on a greatly enlarged scale and with facilities much improved. Gray Bros. used to burn twenty kilns in a season, with 450 rods each. Mr. Brady has introduced the '"' Wicker Kiln," being thefirst of the kind in the county. {t has a permanent brick top, and the tiles are put in and taken out at the side. The burning is effected in a peculiar manner; first, at the top and then below, both at the sides and the ends, Two firing-holes are at each side and five at each end. They save twenty-four hours' time and 25 per cent of the fuel, and make a superior quality of tile. Thirty-six to forty hours' time and four and a half cords of wood will complete the burning of the large kiln of 1,000 rods of tile. Mr. Brady has only just begun with his new style of kiln, but he is greatly pleased with its operation and expects abundant success. There are two tile factories near Huntsville, one owned by Jerry Bly and another besides that.

Tile Factory Near Pittsburg.- - Was established in 1877, being owned by Jesse Puterbaugh and operated by Moses M. Ferrell. They have burned twenty-three small kilns in a season, 350 rods each. The present kiln is large, holding 1,400 rods. They burn one kiln per month, and find ready sale for all they can muke.

Tile Factory, Lynn, Frist & Friekel.- - It was established in 1876. They burn eighteen kilns during the season, of 400 rods each, and find an abundant sale for ull they produce. 'here is also another tile factory near Lynn, owned by Hiatt & Shultz, which has been 1n operation for several years.

Weather, Crops, Etc

In the spring of 1817, the emigrants who came first to White River met a heavy snow at the top of the Alleghanies on their journey, and traveled in the snow all the way therein to their new home, crossing the Ohio on the ice, probably about March 1, at Cincinnati.

1841 - Jacob' Farquhar says (West River Township): "In the spring of 1841, I had abundance of corn, and many came from Jay County and elsewhere to buy of me. Among others, Mr. - - - - , the Sheriff of Jay County, came after corn April 6, 1841. He stayed all night, and on the morning of April 7, he started for home with a load of corn, the roads being frozen hard enough to bear up his wagon. Corn then sold for 124 cents a bushel, and coonskins for 75 cents apiece - six bushels of corn for one coonskin.'' About 1847 or 1848, the wheat crop was very poor, wheat rising from 40 and 50 cents to $1.20 and $1.25 a bushel. in 1851, wheat was 40 cents a bushel at Greenville, Ohio.

In 1874, the corn crop of Randolph was good, while yet in the country at large the yield was poor; and in the spring of 1875 the price of corn rose to 70 and 73 cents, netting the Randolph farmers a fine amount.

Years ago, the weather was much less cold and snowy than it has been of late. During the time from 1846 to 1854, there was but one period of sleighing of more than three or four days' continuance, and cold spells rarely lasted more than three days.

About 1875 was a very wet summer, the rains through July being so frequent and so severe that the gathering of the harvest became nearly an impossibility. Much of the grain grew and rotted in the shock, and much that was housed was badly damaged.

The wheat crop of. 1879 was wonderful for abundance and for excellence, many fields yielding thirty bushels und more to the acre, and some rising to the amazing figure of fifty bushels, and one small field in Grant County yielding at the rate of sixty bushels to the acre. Some new kinds, the Fultz, and some others, yielded amazingly.

The winter of 1880-81 was remarkable for cold and snow. The snow began about November 10, and continued mostly until March, with splendid sleighing much of the time, which was improved immensely by such a product of sawlogs, etc., hauled to the mills as Randolph County never saw before, The mills at Union City alone are said to have bought 25,000 logs, containing millions of feet of lumber.

The last week in March (March 1881), the snow began falling in the night of Monday, and by the next day it was some fifteen inches deep, and continued at intervals for several days, until the body of snow lay on the ground from twenty to twentyfour inches deep, a moist, heavy snow, and if it had not melted as it fell, many think it would have been three feet deep. That snow lay on for some two weeks or more, making, probably, about the worst roads that ever were seen.

The winter of 1880-81 is noted as being long, hard, snowy and severe, and the Mississippi Valley was greatly damaged by water, especially the Missouri River. The suffering through Minnesota and Nebraska and Dakota by deep snow and desperate weather was fearful, as also by the awful floods on the Missouri.

The summer of 1881 has shown us the hottest weather ever known in this region. About the 4th of July and onward, the thermometer ranged from 100° to 112° in the shade, and without a drop of rain for some weeks. The heat was awful. Some days have been almost without wind. However, at this writing, (September 25, 1881), the drouth and the heat are both at an end. Refreshing and abundant showers have watered the parched earth, and the severity of the scorching heat has greatly abated. No frost has yet fallen, and the weather is as delightful as can well be imagined. October 27, 1881, still nu killing frost, abundant rain has fallen, weather not even chilly, grass and other things growing with great luxuriance. Two nights, October 20 and 21, slight frosts, doing no damage whatever. The winter of 1881-82 was mild, with much rain and little freezing, and a small amount of snow.

The spring of 1882 was forward through March and the fore part of April, causing the grass to spring, the pie-plant to grow luxuriantly, the wheat to come forward with unusual vigor, and the peaches and early cherries to bloom. About the 10th of April, a smart snow fell, and the night afterward a freeze occurred, making ice half an inch thick and freezing the ground still deeper than that, Freezes and frosts kept on nearly every night for more than a week, and even to this time (April 29, 1882), the weather has not regained the warmth that prevailed during the latter half of March.

Prices have risen to pretty high figures - butter, 25 to 30 cents; cattle and swine, from $4 to $6; beef, to from 8 to 15 cents; corn, 70 cents; potatoes, $1.30 to $2.40, etc. Potatoes, sauer kraut, etc., have been imported from Europe during the present winter in large quantities, a thing which, perhaps, never before occurred in this country.

May 29, 1882. - The weather has been cold and very wet for more than a month; not more than half the corn crop is yet planted, and not one-tenth of the plant has yet come up. Much of the ground had to be replowed because the heavy rains had run the land together and made it hard and soggy, and the outlook is altogether very discouraging for the spring crops, especially for corn. Many years ago, the corn crop by the Ist of June used to be knee high and even more; and the 25th

June 25, 1882. - Crops generally look well, except corn, and that is now coming on finely, though exceedingly small for the time of year, the largest being not more than knee high. Corn has been known to furnish green corn by July 4.

Weather Account

The author of this work has obtained access to an account of the state of weather in the vicinity of Randolph County, kept at Economy, Wayne Oo., Ind., every day since April, "1833.

1854 - From June to September inclusive, there were fortyone days in the "nineties," viz., June 26 to 28, three days; July, seventeen days; August, twelve days; September, nine days; August 20 to September 10, eighteen days, above 90 every day but three; four were 95; September 4 was 96; September 5 was 98; July 30, 1854, average for the day 84 - highest but one on the record; January, 1856, coldest month on the record; January 9, 27 below; January 10, 29 below - coldest on the record; number of days below zero in January and February, twenty days; February 3, 22 below; February 4, 24 below; February 5, 22 below; June 22, 1856, 95 above - seven days in

Norr. - At Liber, Jay Co., Ind., the thermometer stood at 6 A. M. 26 below - cold New Year. At 9 P. M. the night before it stood at 45 above, thus falling in nine hours 71 degrees, or a fraction less than 8 degrees per hour.

Norrs.- - August, 1835, there was frost four times; February 28, 1836, at midnight, 10 below; at sunset, 11 below; at sunrise, 5 below; June, 1839, there was frost six times; July, 1839, frost twice; August, 1839, frost three times; June, 1840, frost four times; June, 1848, frost five times.

The above seems strange, since the thermometer indicated not much below 40. Howthere could be frost with the thermometer at 40 or thereabouts is not easy to understand; but the keeper of the record declares it to have been a fact.

The place where the thermometer hung in the shade was beneath the boughs of a thick pine tree, where no sunshine could penetrate, and at a distance from any wooden or other surface of any kind.

Mr. Osborn began the record in April, 1838, and kept it personally about forty years, and before his death he left it in charge to continue the work until at least fifty years had passed. Two years only remain of the full half century, and his son is faithfully continuing the record.

Patrons Of Husbandry

In 1872, the farmers of the county held meetings throughout the region to discuss the merits of that order lately established in the country.

In March, 1873, Round Top Grange, No. 85, was established. Before the middle of 1874, twenty-seven granges were organized in Randolph County, with from 900 to 1,100 members. The Randolph County Council of Patrons of Husbandry was organized November 8, 1873, with Nathan Fidler as President, and B. F. Willmore as Secretary. The object of the council was to impart instruction as to the inner work of the order, and for general supervision over its affairs.

June 24, 1875, Henley James, Master of the State Grange, met a company of Masters, Past Masters and Matrons at Winchester, and organized Randolph Pomona' Grange, No. 2, in- stalling I. J. Farquhar, Master; Isham Sedgwick, Secretary; William Ruble, Treasurer; the work of organizing, however, being completed August 31, 1875.

grange instituted, March, 1878; twenty-seven granges established; three disbanded; four consolidated; lodges in operation, twenty - aggregating several hundred members.

Since 1876, the growth has not been apparant. In fact, for some reason, many of the granges have ceased active operations. Some of them are still continuing their work.

The objects of the order are certainly excellent - increase of acquaintance and socialibility among farmers and their families, growth in intelligence as to business and the farming interests of the country, consultation as to the best means of sustaining the prices of farmers' products and lowering the cost of farmers' supplies, and, in general, the promotion of the welfare, prosperity and success of the farming population of the country, home life training, beautifying and ennobling farm life, sweetening, refining and purifying the minds of the community at large. The establishment of the order would seem, therefore, to have accomplished much good in several ways. In truth, the pursuit of farming lies at the very foundation of all business prosperity in the country and throughout the world; and whatever tends to enlighten, to elevate, to encourage, to energize, to strengthen, to purify, to ennoble that class of our people tends directly and powerfully to benefit the community as a whole. And it is to be hoped that the farmers of the land will lay hold with vigor and energy of every sound and wise means af attaining and disseminating knowledge, wisdom, friendship and fraternal love through all the growing masses of our people over the whole wide spread land.

Pleasant Grove Grange, No. 226 (two miles north of Spartansburg). - This grange was organized June 28, 1873, by Thomas W. Reece, with twenty male members and ten females. The officers were as follows: James Rubey, Master; C. F. Alexander, Overseer; James Macy, Lecturer; Levi Snyder, Steward; J. W. Jackson, Assistant Steward; Emsley Jackson, Treasurer; J. F. Middleton, Secretary; Alfred Rubey, Gatekeeper; Jennie Jackson, Ceres; Mrs. Hannah Wise, Pomona; Carrie Rubey, Assistant Lady Steward.

Members, January 1, i878 - twenty males, sixteen females, and in li 881, about the same, Meetings have been maintained once in two weeks from the first, with interest and profit.

The grange has a neat and convenient hall, which was dedicated by a picnic June 27, 1874, as also with addresses by Henley James, Master of the State Grange, and by Messrs. Willmore and Fidler, of Randolph County. A large and interested crowd was present. Several suppers have been prepared at the hall at various times.

Great harmony has prevailed, a. good social influence has been exerted, general information as to prices, the laws of business and trade, etc., has been diffused, a healthful influence has been spread throughout the community, and, by the general movement throughout the country, much advantage has accrued by the lowering of pr ices, consequently bringing producers and consumers together by improving methods of production and enlarging the amount of products, etc. The farming population are the strength of the Nation; but they labor under peculiar and heayy disadvantages, and every movement which adds to their knowledge and encourages and increases their activity and prosperity nourishes and strengthens every honorable and useful industry of the Nation. When the farmers prosper, all goes well; when they suffer and languish, every interest declines, and every business droops and weakens. '' God speed the plow," and Heaven bless and cheer and prosper the farmer.

Entwined the chaplet round, Till men of spoil disdained the toil, By which the world was nourished ; And blood and pillage were the soil In which the laurels flourished.

Shall fade, decay and perish. Honor waits o'er all the earth, Through coming generations, Fhe art that calls the harvest Sorth To feed the expectant nations.'

A large number of the societies have been suffered to die out. Some, however, still flourish. Those which now exist (1881) are: Sugar Creek, organized July 31, 1873; New Dayton, organized 1873; Pleasant Grove, organized 1873; Pleasant Mound, South Salem; Jackson, Jackson Township; Parker, Monroe Township; Green Township.

Many persons entered the lodges with extravagant expectations of immediate and striking results. Many had only a dim and shadowy idea of the real nature and design of the institution. Many expected to control the markets of the country and perhaps of the world, and when time and experience taught them a more sober view of things, they blamed the Order of Patrons and forsook the lodges. Those who entered the order with moderate views and a reasonably clear conception of its true nature, have remained steadfast and found therein increasing profit and delight.

Some of the objects may be stated thus: Association of farmers for mutual advantage, home life training, beautifying farm life, cherishing every possible sweet, purifying, refining, ennobling influence in the minds of the people at large, especially in the country homes.

1. The adoption of the no-credit system. This alone has been, so far as put in practice, of immense value. In fact, the debt habit, especially as indulged in the purchase of luxuries and finery, has been evil and only evil, and that continually. Credit will, of course, continue to exist; yet it is dlled with danger, and comparatively few know how to handle it largely with safety and success; and he who learns to pay as he goes, has acquired a method of life the value of which can hardly be overestimated. If the Grange should succeed in fastening this habit of economy upon the country, the result would be worth more than all it would cost.

2. The other result which we mention is the direction of the farming mind to the laws of business, the cost of production, and the means of direct communication between producer and consumer, and the consequent decrease of cost of transfer of commodities, especially of machinery and farming and domestic implements.

County Fairs

At a meeting held at the court house in Winchester April 17, 1852, after an address by D. P. Holloway. of Richmond, Ind., an agricultural society was formed, and officers appointed as follows: President, Ashael Stone; Wace, President, David Lasley; Treasurer, Uriah Ball; Secretary, John Lasley; Directors, George W. Daly, Washington; James Clayton, White River, Elza Lank, West River; James C. Bowen, Greensfork; Daniel Hill, Wayne; James Simmons, Jackson; Joab Ward, Franklin; Philip Barger, Green; J. B..Somerville, T. W. Reece, R. N. Butler. The first fair was held October 14 and 15, 1852. The ground was one acre, a beautiful grove northwest of town, near Judge

Colgrove's former residence. It was fenced as follows: The boards were placed lengthwise, edge to edge, the fence being seven feet high, and «¢ was held up by two upright posts at each end, and at the :.1 ule also, with the boards between the posts, and the posts ~» wned together by hickory withes near the top. The cost of zeparing the ground was $30. The display was good, with a fine show of horses, cattle, jacks, jennets, swine, ete. The surplus receipts were $150. The number of members was 2(().

1853 - Fair was held September 29 and 30 and October 1, 1853. The weather was bad, but the show was good. Hon. Samuel W. Parker delivered an address. Nathan Hinshaw presented proof of having raised four acres of corn, producing at the rate of 146% bushels per acre, and Thomas W. Reece four acres it the rate of 115 bushels per acre. Receipts, $615.02; outlays - premiums, $184.25; expenses, $203; total outlay $387.- 25; surplus, $227.77.

This fair was held near Mr. Pomroy's, northeast of town. The officers of the society were: President, W. A. Peelle; Secretary, John B. Goodrich; Treasurer, George W. Monks; Delegate to State Board, Asahel Stone.

The Association rented ground (seven acres) south of town for ten years, and inclosed it with an oak fence eight feet high. The weather was bad, the wheat and corn crops had been light and poor; but the display of animals was better than before, and the exhibit of fruit was fine. Daniel Hill showed a harrow and roller combined, which was considered a great improvement, and Carter Bros. exhibited buggies and carriages of very fine coustruction. One of them, a rockaway, was sold to Asahel Stone, Esq., and he has had it in use to this day, and it isstill in good repair.

1856 - Attendance small; display only moderate. There were some good horses, cattle and swine. President, T. W. Reece; Treasurer, N. Kemp; Secretary, J. W. Cottom.

Record of weather during the winter and spring of 1856: January 9, thermometer 27 degrees below zero at sunrise; February 5, 23 below at suprise; March 12, snow eleven inches deep, average: March 22, snow off, except drifts; April 7, some snow drifts still; somesowing oats and flax; April 28, 1856, first cherry bloom; April 29, 1856, first apple bloom; May 19, beech and sugar, full leaf; May 31, killing frost - corn, potatoes, etc., badly frozen: June 30, corn mostly only six inches high; August 16, vegetation drying up, leaves on trees dead in many cases; September 30, snowed smartly, season dry, crops poor; October, smoky throughout.

paid for. The grain crop was good. A field of corn of five acres yielded 1343 bushels to the acre. Fruit was fine, and the cattle, ete., good.

The fair was held October 13, 14 and 15,1858. The weather was rainy, but the crowd was large. As one result, the association got out of debt, with a surplus of several hundred dollars on hand. Among other fine exhibitions were a beautiful Durham cow, by. David Heaston; a splendid bull, by H. K. Wright; a superior cow, by William D. Frazee, giving five gallons in the morning and four gallons at night, without extra feed, and upon poor pasture; one yearling by the same, which had never eaten an ear of corn, and was estimated to weigh 1,000 to 1,100 pounds. Exhibitors of sheep were Brotherton & Reed, Picket, Puckett and Hartman. Swine were shown. by Thomas Robison, J. L. Shaw and H. D. Huffman. Fruits, dairy, honey, etc., by William Doty. Carriages and buggies by Carter & Craig. Premiums paid that year, amount, $500. President, James Clayton;

Treasurer, Nathaniel Kemp; Secretary, N. P. Heaston; Assistant Secretary, W. D. Frazee; one Director from each township. The records have been destroyed mostly up to 1868.

There seems to have been another Association formed in 1871, and by this association a tract of ground was purchased of L. L. Heaston, consisting of twenty-two acres, occupying a part of the old fort of the Mound-Builders, and containing the great mound in the center of the ancient inclosure.

1872 - Crops poor; wheat averaged eight bushels, badly damaged; price, $1 to $1.40; corn, forty to forty-five bushels per acre; price, 2) cents; swine, good throughout the county, many weighing 300 to 400 pounds at twelve months; there was much fruit; fair held September 24 to 27; second day 3,000 were present; entries for 1871, 779; for 1872. 888; receipts for 1872, $1,480.35; expenditures, $1,480.35; debt of Association, $1,000.

1875 - Officers: President, Joshua M. Johnson; Vice President, Richard Bosworth; Secretary, D. EH. Hoffman; Treasurer, John Brooks; Executive Committee, T. Tharp, Nelson Pegg, John 8. MeIntyre, Asa Teal, Andrew Adams, William O: King, Marcus D. Starbuck; fair held September 13 to 17, 1875; attendance good; display fair. Crops had been badly damaged by rain. Farmers are attending largely to draining their grounds.

1876- - The fair for 1876 was the best ever held here, up to that time. Total entrfes, 800; horses, 124; cattle, 38; hogs, 40; poultry becoming an important entry; they are largely dealt in throughout the county; twenty tons were shipped by one firm in twenty days; the crops were fair to good.

1877 - Fair held September 18 to 21; horse entries, 93 - 18 for speed; sheep and hogs, a fine display; poultry, a large show and a grand success; receipts, $2,032.20; grains good; potatoes splendid; fruits good, though quantity small, owing to overgrowth the previous year.

1878 - Officers: President, John Brooks; Vice President, Nelson Pegg; Secretary, George S. Fisher; Treasurer, Thomas W. Kizer; Executive Committee. Isom Sedgwick, George Hamilton, William Snyder, Aaron Harris, L. L. Heaston, George Addington; fair held September 17 to 20; weather good; entries, 1,500 - more than ever before; attendance, third day, 5 000 people. Fruit was nearly a failure, because of a killing frost May

1879 - Fair held September 16 to 19; show of fruits excellent - the best ever made at this fair; 1,300 entries; 4,700 tickets sold, a reasonable success, though display and attendance not so great as at some previous fairs; balance of receipts, $400; entries of fruit alone, 343.

The fair for 1881 was held at the usual time and place, and would probably have been a substantial success bnt for the week of rain, which threw a wet blanket over its affairs and of course greatly checked attendance upon its exhibition, and, moreover, seriously interfered with the amount of its receipts.

The officers for 1881-82 are: John R. Frazier, President; William O. King, Vice President; A. R. Hiatt, Treasurer; D. E. Hoffman, Secretary; Messrs. Carter, Murray, Heaston, Kizer, Sheeley, Farquuar and Branson, Directors.

It is a fact worthy of remark that Clarkson T. Pickett has (fall of 1881), two watermelon vines having a growth of 330 feet of vine, and the melons weighed 706 pounds 12 ounces. Some of the melons from that kind of seed have weighed eightytwo pounds each.

This Association was created about January 10, 1870. The record of the first meeting does not appear, but the officers elected for the second year (chosen in November, 1870), were: J. N. Converse, President; J. M. Janes, Vice President; E. Starbuck, Treasurer; W. C. Johnson, Secretary. The first President is not known; the others were as follows: Vice President, J. M. Janes; Secretary, C. J. Van Andy; Treasurer, Edward Starbuck.

L. D. Lambert has been Secretary for ten years; E. Starbuck was Treasurer until his death. and Henry Stockdale succeeded him and holds the position still.

The society was accommodated with suitable and commodious grounds for their annual fairs by a generous act of Dr. Joel N. Converse, securing to their use a tract cf land containing forty pi by a free lease for the term of twenty years from April 1, 1870.

The original capital stock was $2,000, in $10 shares. The stock was some years afterward enlarged to the limit of $10,000. All the old stock and 213 shares of the new stock has been taken.

The territory embraced by tke association is Randolph and Jay Counties, Ind., and Darke County, Ohio, and the Constitution provides that the Directors shall be chosen from the two States in proportion to the stock held in each, with not less than three, however, in either State at any election.

Betting, gambling, traffic in intoxicating drink, and all immoral shows are expressly prohibited. The fairs held at Union City grounds have been mostly free to all the world.

The first fair was held in the fall of 1870, and was a reasonable success; and a fair has been held each year since that time. The interest has varied from season to season, yet the stockholders and managers have felt satisfied that tho enterprise that they have in hand is a good and praiseworthy one, and that a healthful effect has been produced upon the community through their means.

The Presidents have been Messrs. Converse, Janes, Branham, Smith, Reeder and Parent, and possibly others. The Vice Presidents have been Messrs. Janes, Elston, Smith, Reeder, Morris and Jaqua, and perhaps others. The Managers have been Messrs. Johnson, Arnold, Woodbury, Griffis, J. D. Smith, McFeely, Debolt, Turner, Parent, Trine, Buckingham, Wiggs, Stockdale, Mills, Trine, Grants, Morton, Hamilton, Shockney, Kunkle, Hall, and perhaps others."

The association was in debt January 14, 1881, $2,247.95. Besides the use of the fair ground for the annual gatherings of the association, they furnish an excellent opportunity for large meetings of various kinds- - picnics, camp-meetings temperance assemblies, political mass-meetings, and what not, find ample accommodations within its shady retreats.

In 1876, an immense Republican mass-meeting assembled at the fair grounds to listen to O. P. Morton. Camp-meetings have been held there for three successive years - 1879, 1880 and 1881. The first was under the auspices of the Holiness Band, the second under that of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and the last in 1881, was addressed mostly by colored clergymen from Ohio and Indiana.

The ground occupied by the association is well suited to its purpose, being reasonably rolling and largely covered with thrifty shade trees, which every year become more and still more delightful, while several abundant wells yield a grateful supply of healthful water for the use of man and beast.

Notwithstanding the regular county fairs held every year at Greenville, Winchester, Portland, etc., Union City still bravely holds her own. Some departments were well represented, while others made not so grand a show. A very fine display of live stock was on hand; much of it, however, was from abroad. The vegetable department made only a middling show, on account of the dry season. Machinery was present in full force. Millinery, organs and furniture gave a creditable appearance, while the fine arts hardly put in an appearance at all. As to entries, there was of swine an unusual display; about eighty head of all kinds were on hand. Some of them were very large, and all were excellent. With such hogs, the value of corn for ordinary feeding is more than doubled; and in beauty and general merit there is no comparison between the old hound chasers, that could outrun a dog in olden times, and these splendid new breeds.

Of cattle the exhibition was superior. One firm from Delaware County, Ind., brought to the fair twelve head, older and younger, all Short Horns, full blooded - two cows, two bulls, two and three years old, five heifers, one and two years old, and three calves. The three-year-old male was very large, while the two-year-old would weigh 1,800 pounds. His owner bought him for $50 when a calf ten days old, and has been offered $500 for him now, but he would not take $1,000. The calves six months old he asks $75 for, and has sold one of them at those figures. The name of the firm owning this herd of cattle is Sharp & Skinner.

An Alderney bull and heifer belonging to J. H. Stine, Esq., of Washington City, were there, the stock of which was imported from Europe by W. W. Corcoran, banker at the National Capital. The number in all was twenty-eight or thirty head.

Nearly seventy sheep, Merinos, Cotswolds and Southdowns were in the pens, and a fine sight they were to see. There were many horses also, though how many we did not lvarn.

The crowd of people on Thursday was very large, said to be probably 8,000. The weather was all that could be desired until Friday morning, when a heavy storm of wind and rain swept over the country and gave the thirsty*varth a delicious and plentiful supply of the life-giving fluid.

A very large Short-Horn bull, six years old, weight 2,200 pounds, was on exhibition by J. W. Starbuck, of Buena Vista, as also a cow and a grade heifer. Some owner had brought to the fair a splendid Devonshire male five years old, as also a yearling heifer which gave a quart of milk though never with calf. Thomas Mellen of White River, one cow with a male calf seven months old, said to be the finest there, except for color, which was spotted. Many of the cattle were beyond all praise for the glossy richness of their color and their excellence and splendor in general.

Agricultural Implements

The change in this respect is well nigh inconceivable. At first a hoe, a mattock, a plow, an ax, a scythe,a sickle, u rake, a fork, a sled, a shovel plow, a barshare plow, a flail, a fanning sheet. Now, an amount and variety of tools, of implements, of machinery, perfectly amazing and bewildering. Knowledge and time alike fail to describe this branch of farming affairs. An account of the needful apparatus for convenient and successful farming work at the present day would of itself fill a volume.

An Oliver chilled steel plow, a horse drill, a riding corn plow, a combined reaper and mower, a self-binder, a patent hay fork, a threshing separator run by a steam engine - these are only the beginning of things in this new era of inventions for the purpose of saving labor and multiplying power. And what is remarkable, and to some inexplicable, the more the machinery for superseding human labor, the higher the wages of human labor on the whole becomes. To find labor now when the selfbinder takes the harvest on the stem and leaves it nicely, snugly bound in the sheaf with no human labor save a driver to the machine, is as difficult as it was when the whole vast work from first to last was done by human hands.

The business of making and handling agricultural implements has grown to be an industry very extensive and very useful. Immense factories have sprung up throughout the country, and dealers put forth their signs of business in every city and village, and the agents who handle these things meet you on every hand, and tease one nearly to death to purchase some one or more of the ten thousand implements fabricated for the farmers' use.