Fitchville Township

Fitchville Township

Fitchville township is supposed to have received its name from a man named Fitch, who was quite a large land-holder within its limits, and who resided in Connecticut.

The land is generally rolling or sufficiently so to make it easy of drainage and good tillage. The soil is various, some portions, being well supplied with clay, others quite sandy, and many of the ridges quite gravelly. The township was formerly well timbered with beech, maple, white-wood, black walnut, oak, hickory, white ash, black ash, bass wood and elm. The Vermillion river heads at a lake near Savannah, Ashland county, enters this township near the southeast corner, passes through near the center, and leaves it a little east of the center.

This stream furnished water power and was of great service to the early settlers. As early as 1825 there was a sawmill built near there which did much towards supplying the settlers with lumber.

There was a flouring mill erected at the center at an early date, and there was also an establishment for wool carding and dressing cloth. The flouring mill was later run by steam and furnished considerable flour for the eastern market.

The first settlement made in this township was in the summer of 1817, by Peter Mead, Abraham Mead and Amos Reynolds. They made their beginning on the east line of the township. Early in the season of 1818 an addition was made by the arrival of the Palmer family. In 1819 a few more were added to the number of settlers by the arrivals of Gilbert Martin, W. W. Watros, Abijah Palmer and Charles Lyon. In 1820 came Jotham Curtiss, J. N. Pickard, Henry Pickard, Absalom Coleman and Hiram Curtiss.

Owing to the fact that most of the original owners of the township put up the price of their lands too high, the township did not fill up fast with settlers, until after 1830.

Public School Fire Drill, Chicago, Ohio

The first Sunday school in the township was held by Allen Johnson, at his house, in 1825, the pupils being Edward and Benjamin Green, Barnard Johnson, Louisa Johnson and Sarah Palmer. Johnson's assistants were Ebenezer Osborne and Zetta Green.

The people of Fitchville sought early to establish in their midst the institutions of religion and education to which they had been accustomed to in their eastern homes. There is, perhaps, not another example in the county of such an early establishment of a church after settlement, The pioneers entered the wilderness in I817, and in the summer of 1819 the first church was organized.

In early times, Hartland, Fitchville and Greenwich, were grouped together, or attached for civil and judicial purposes. Hartland was detached about 1820, and connected with Clarksfield. Fitchville was detached, in 1828, from Greenwich and organized as a separate township.

The principal cemetery of Fitchville, which occupies the summit and slope of a gently rising hill, upon the Norwalk road, in the north part of Clinton incorporation, was laid out about 1826, or the following year. Alvah Palmer, who died in 1827, was the first person buried there, and Louisa Green the second.

A number of the first settlers made their homes upon the line of the north and south center road, and this was the first route of travel upon which any labor was bestowed in the township. The next was the road running east and west through the center. The road from Wooster to Norwalk was laid out in 1826, but there was scarcely any improvement made upon it until 1832, and it was by no means easy of travel. The route most traveled by the early residents of Fitchville, when they wished to go to Norwalk or beyond, was a trail which led from Abijah Palmer's, in a northwesterly direction, to a point about a mile west of Olena, and thence westerly to the old State road, which passes through the center of Fairfield and Bronson townships.

The enterprise of running a line of stages through from Wooster to Norwalk was undertaken at this time by Union White, J. C. Curtiss, and an Ashland man. They commenced by running a two-horse hack each way twice a week, but afterwards a four-horse stage coach was put on the route by a man named Myers, to whom was also given a contract for carrying the mail. In 1834, and for many years after, the people had the satisfaction of seeing this heavy stage, often well loaded with passengers, dash swiftly or wallow slowly, as the case might be, through the settlement.

Before the people of Fitchville had a postoffice of their own, they were obliged to go to Norwalk for their mail matter. About the year 1828 the first postoffice was established in the township, Rundel Palmer commissioned as postmaster. He kept the office in his dwelling house.

The first tavern built in the township, was the Clinton House, which was named after the incorporated village of Clinton. It was built in 1833, by Hiram A. Curtiss. It was a frame building, of fair size, two stories in height. This was, for a number of years, the only place for the entertainment of the wayfarer and the stranger, and was well patronized. After Curtiss, Hiram Odell was, for a time, the landlord of this house, and he gave place to Union White and his

A few years after the building of the Clinton House, probably in 1837 or '38, Union and Daniel White, erected the large hotel since known as the Mansion House.

The Fountain House was built by Rundel Palmer for a dwelling house, bus was converted into a hotel and conducted as such by his sons, Isaac and Nathan, for five years.

J. C. Curtiss built the next hotel, the present residence of his son, S. W. Curtiss, and was its proprietor for a number of years. This house was known as Washington Hall.

The first death was that of Deborah, wife of Abraham Mead. She died July 23, 1823. Another of this family, Mary Mead, died in November of the same aged seventeen.

The Meads built the first log house, and Ludovicus Robbins the first framed dwelling. The latter was about the year 1827, upon lot seventeen, section three.

In the fall of 1830, Union White came into the township, erected a small building, and opened a store, which was the first the township. His stock was from the store of Buckingham & Sturgis of Norwalk, who had an interest in the business. In the spring of 1832, their interest was purchased by J. C. Curtiss, and the firm name became White & Curtiss. The first purchase of goods by this firm was in New York, and they were transported by the Hudson river, New York and Erie canal, and Lake Erie, to Huron, from which point they were hauled in wagons to Fitchville, at an expense of from three to four or five shillings per hundred weight. From New York city to Huron the transportation cost from one dollar and fifty cents to two dollars per hundred. The goods bought were of the kinds for which it was known there would be a ready market, such as staple groceries, and the commonest kinds of calico, sheeting, ec. Brown sheeting was sold at from twenty to twenty-five cents per yard; calico from two to four shillings, and satinet from six to four shillings. was eight cents per pound; nails from nine to twelve cents; tea from ten to fourteen shillings; pepper, four shillings; coffee, two; loaf sugar from two to two and sixpence, and whiskey from four to five shillings per gallon. There being but little money in circulation these articles were very generally paid for in deer, coon and muskrat skins and black salts, which were made from ashes by almost every family. Messrs. White & Curtiss bought these salts in large quantities and manufactured them into pearlash, which they sent to the eastern market,

The village of Clinton, within this township, was laid out in 1832, and for several years was the principal business place for the southeast part of the county, but railroads made great changes and Clinton is almost forgotten.