Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Remember the Ladies

I took time out from a wild goose chase yesterday when the trail of the elusive tax records seemed to end in the Akron library.  Right next to the useless tax duplicate indexes was a book called  "Pioneer Women of the Western Reserve".  It turned out to be a treasure.  I called Linda Flemming to see if she wanted me to xerox extra copies of the Richfield chapter for her.  Turns out that RHS already has a copy - but when she found out what I was doing , she told me to check the U of A archives down the street.  So I did, and there were the records!  For Summit county, anyway.  

I am doubly fond of the book- first for itself,  second because it brought me good luck!

Richfield Basic History Part 2

This information is from the Combination Atlas / Map Summit Co. , OH  1874
in 1809 the first white settlers came wandering in:  Bob Mays and his wife.  They came to get away from all the Yankees back east.  Mrs Mays stated that she'd rather eat raw potatoes boiled in cold water than live among Yankees.   The second white settler was Henry Mallet.  He started his own mint and manufactured hard currency to order.  Less enterprising neighbors took exception to the practise . They encouraged Mr Mallet to take his business elsewhere by torching his money factory. 
With Richfield all neatly parceled up,   it was pretty easy for four different investors to to get control over the whole place.  The town neatly split along it's major roads:   Streetsboro Road ( Rt 303) running East/West  &   Cleveland-Massillon Rd ( AKA Brecksville Rd ) ( Rt. 21) running North/South. 
Then, when there was some fear of possible Indian uprising,  one of the investors decided to sell out cheap.   Heman Oviatt from Hudson took advantage of the bargain basement pricing and bought the Northwest quadrant for  $5,000 ($1.25 per acre) in the year 1811.  {Lynn's note:  Heman had ten brothers & sisters.  Nine of them moved from CT to the Western Reserve.  Many of them moved with Heman to Richfield.  On the 1834 map; his brothers Nathaniel and Salmon are major property holders.  Heman's son O.M. was a major investor.   Salmon Oviatt had eleven children, two of whom, Uri and Mason, have large tracts.  Among the Non-Oviatts,  several were related by marriage. ex. Everett Farnham was married to Emily Oviatt}
"In the fall of 1811 there was a large increase in settlers, including Denton E. Buck.  He erected the first mill in the township, which consisted of a large oak stump hollowed out on top with a pedestal worked with a spring pole. "  
Land in the center of town was purchased for investment by John Newton.  But when settlers came from the east and saw the high cost for land at the crossroads in the center of town,  they kept right on going.  Many of them settled  a half mile further west,  starting a second town center.   For many years,  East Richfield and West Richfield maintained an informal rivalry. 
"The Indians inhabiting the town were the Wyandots and Tawas, or Ottawas; who, on retreat of Captain George after the battle of Tippecanoe, abandoned the township.  After the conclusion of the War of 1812 a party of 15 or 20 returned to their former homes;  but they were strangers to the land of their birth.  They asked permission of those holding their former homes to erect huts to protect their families. Subdued and broken hearted, they again left for the Far West.  Their homes were desolate, the deer that constituted their food destroyed, and they had to leave the graves of their fathers or starve."

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

More on Mason

Since I STILL cannot find out how old the Oviatt farmhouse is, I shall instead pass along today's history snippets .

This is from a scrapbook page.  It looks like a rough draft, and I have to question some of the accuracy.   I do not know who wrote it,  but he/she is writning about & quoting Jennie Oviatt ( a granddaughter of Fanny & Mason )

"MIss Jennie Oviatt has in her home at West Richfield, a beautiful maple chest of drawers with the original glass knobs leaded into it.  This chest was brought by her great-grandparents from Goshen, Connecticut.  Matching the chest of drawers is a hand-turned bedstead of maple made at a shop that stood on the site which is now occupied by the Girl Scout Camp. 
"Miss Oviatt and her sister Mrs Ingersall recalled how their grandfather would take cheese, which was made on his farm, by oxcart to Cincinnati to sell.  The trip took six weeks.  They relate also that dairying was the chief occupation of the early Richfielder's. The name Richfield came from the fact that a certain plant grew in the fields of pasture that afforded excellent food and tonic for the cattle and sheep. Hence the name "Richfield".

" The [John] Brown family was not held in very high esteem by their neighbors and their fortunes were anything but but good while living in Richfield.  Here, John Brown became bankrupt and in that process was stripped of everything but a few articles the court decided nessessary for their maintainence.  Among the things they were allowed to keep were:  eleven Bibles and testaments, one book entitled "Beasties of the Bible", one "Church member's guide", two mares, two cows, two hogs, three lamps, seven sheep, nineteen hens, and three pocket knives.  All their other belongings went under the auctioneer's hammer."

end of quote. This is me talking again.   I was pretty skeptical about Mason spending six weeks hauling cheese to Cincinnati.  As if Cincinnati can't get cheese from any place closer.  How realistic is that?  I mentioned this to Dr. Lee, the archeologist. He actually supported the Miss Jennie quote!!  Very shocking.  But the reasons are - Cincinnati, being on the Ohio river, was a major port for moving products to St. Louis, the major jumping off place for anyone traveling out west.  Anyone traveling a long period of time would need provisions, but there were very few foods that could be kept without spoiling.  Cheese was one.  Whiskey was another. 


Therefore, there was a HUGE market for cheese and whiskey.  It was not at all unreasonable for farmers in the Western Reserve to turn their crops into these two products.  The money they got for them made travel time well worth it.   

However - Miss Jennie was born 14 years after Grampa Mason died.  So any recollecting she did was of  Grandma Fanny talking about him. 

On the plus side :   The foundations of the shop are still there.  

Thursday, November 5, 2009

The Quest Continues: One Good Deed

Since I have been going around complaining that I can't find out the date the Oviatt Farmhouse was built, historically-savvy people have told me to check the property tax records. A sudden increase in valuation means a building was added. Property tax has been around here since the 1820's. Summit county wasn't established until 1840 - so I'd have to check Medina County records. Then it occured to me that before I look for taxes, I ought to check there for the deed transfer.

Medina County's deeds index was a huge old book, about 2 feet tall and pages 15 inches across , with all the property transfers in Medina County from 1818 to 1843. Rough alphabetical order. There were TONS of Oviatts: Benjamin Oviatt, Mason's grandfather who was a Revolutionary War soldier; Salmon Oviatt, Mason's father whose house is still standing on Rt. 303 just east of Broadview; Heman Oviatt, the rich uncle; plus various other uncles, cousins, and one aunt. There were also tons of now familar names from the histories I've been reading recently: Newtons, Nortons, Farnhams and Hudsons. Sometimes the parcels swap around between the main charactors. No Mason to be seen. Whatever else he may have been, Mason Oviatt was NOT a major player in the real estate market. A little note at the bottom of the last column refers back to another page. There's a bunch more "O" entiries out of order. Three quarters of the way down the page is our man.

Mason bought the land from his parents for one thousand dollars. The deed starts out with a hello to anyone reading the document. If you have read this email so far, the message is for you, from April 5, 1836: " To all persons to whom these presents shall come, greeting." Then it gets all legal. The western boundary of the land went all the way to the Hinkley border. It measured one hundred and one acres. Although the land had been owned jointly by Salmon and his wife Mary, the title only transfers to Mason, not Fanny. You have to wonder why. Did her in-laws not like her? Were they trying to make sure her relatives, the Carters and the Farnhams (who were big wheels in town) never got control of it? Was Mason opposed to having Fanny on the deed?

Whatever the reason, it wasn't an oversight. I was surprised at how many women were listed in the index holding their own property. Plus, the ammendment to the deed transfer certifies that the county recorder made sure that Mary was included in the deal - that she understood the legal issues and that she was OK with them. This appears to have been part of his routine function:

 " Personally appeared before me - Salmon Oviatt & Mary Oviatt his wife who acknowleged that they did sign and seal the forgoing instrument, and that the same is their free act and deed, And I do further certify that I did examine the said Mary Oviatt separate and apart from her husband and did then and there make known to her the contents of the forgoing instrument and, upon that examination she declared that she did voluntarily, sign, seal, and acknowledge the same and that she was satisfied therewith.
- Martin Chittenden, Justice of the Peace // Recorded June 3rd 1837 //
Oviatt Cole, Recorder.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

History research: Basics and Beyond

Here is some very basic historic/geographic info in case anyone wants to also research camp lands.  There is some that has to be done by going on site somewhere and sifting through old records.   A lot can be done via internet.   But  the most interesting will be done from talking to the descendants of the many families who lived on our land.   And those descendants can be anywhere.    
 
When the Connecticut Land Company had title to the Western Reserve,  they parceled up the land by dividing it up into squares - 6 miles on a side.   They called those the Townships.    Townships were then divided up into smaller grids - 10 squares to each side called sections.   When people bought the land,  they bought it sight unseen.   Based on the numerous early land transfers in the Medina Recorders' Office; it seems that once people found their designated land,  they were just as likely to exchange it as keep it. 
 
Land was measured by chains (roughly 80 feet) and links.  They also described direction in some way that makes no sense to me.  89.5 degrees east seems redundant, but OK /// 89.5 degrees west makes no sense.   RHS is checking with a surveyor to see if he understands what this means.  Also - instead of metal surveyors pins, most of the Richfield boundary markers consisted of "post and stones" .   Early surveyors were aware that posts would be relatively short-lived.  But they had to use was they had handy.  To lenghthen the span of usefulness,  they piled up stones around the base of their post.  We think one of Spazz's kids may have found one such pile when we were looking for the Green Cathedral - but there's no way to know for sure.  
 
Needless to say,  I'm a bit fuzzy on on exact parcels,  but luckily for us, the section numbers are clearly evident on the early maps and listed on the early title transfers.  Crowell Hilaka consists of sections 16 and 25.  The western edge is shaved off by Oviatt Rd.  The Driveway runs all the way across section 17 and the tip of it at Broadview sticks out a little into section 18. 
 
On a map,   the land is a rectangle standing on one end.   Historically,   the property boundaries ended up dividing the land into thirds.   Don't know why. But I can see it happened that way.
 
In 1834,  the property ownership was:
North third:  Nathaniel Oviatt  ( who also owned a large chunk of surrounding land )  and  S. King  ( he had just the one strip)
Middle third:  Salmon Oviatt   (who had a house in the midddle of town plus assorted scattered parcels)
South third:  Mason Oviatt
Driveway: Welton:
 
in 1856: 
North third :  Nathaniel Oviatt
Middle third (plus the strip formerly occupied by S. King) :  Robert Gargett
just south of that:  a strip owned by Welton  
South third:  Mason Oviatt
driveway : Welton
 
1874:
North third:  Milton R. Freeman ( plus large adjoining chunks)
Mid third :  James Sammons
South third: Mason Oviatt
driveway:  Adeline Axtell
 
Supposedly Freemans sold to the Neals,  but I found an atlas from 1881 saying that Milton Freeman had moved to Michigan, and his daughter Hattie was living in the family farmhouse with her new husband Milo Halliwill, and they were running the place.   I also found some fuzzy title transfers from JAMES KIRBY  to Claire Neal!    He wasn't supposed to be up that far North!  A puzzlement.
 
I do not know ANYTHING about most of the people in the middle -  but it does seem to me that the presence of these historic mid-property owners indicates that SOMEWHERE in camp must be the remains of some other old houses.   One of our current service team members, Lynne Carter,  says that her father used to work for Ohio Edison and helped clear the gas cut.  They did not find anything of archeologic interest there.  So - we can rule that location out.   But if anyone wants to take on any of these other families as a research project,   that would be great because I'm too obsessed over  Mason and Fanny Oviatt to deal with anyone else. 
 
Some possible leads:   LInda at RHS mentioned, when I brought up these other names,  that the Gargett's  were the family that had the famous murder.  But she assured me that the murder did not take place on camp land.   There is some scandalous possible link between the Sammones and Mr Freeman.  The 1881 atlas says Milo Hallliwill's father Joseph was a famous sheep expert.    I'm telling you we should install some sheep at camp - Or sell little Halliwill sheep dolls. As for Adeline Axtell  - owner of our driveway in 1874 - I never heard of before yesterday. But her husband has a sketch in the 1881 atlas.  It seems they were a typical second-generation pioneer family.  She went out with him to California in 1851, and while out there, he picked up a law degree & got into politics.  He was governor of Utah territory 1875  [the Mormons were settled in, but hadn't yet renounced polygamy at that time],  then New Mexico, then back to Ohio.  Hmm.  we might be able to work that into something:  "The Adeline Axtell Memorial Driveway"