History's Jigsaw Puzzle

Tracking down an unwritten history is like working a jigsaw puzzle - where all the pieces are playing hide-n-seek. Spent the morning at RHS. No particular objective. I have come to realize that in this small town where everything and everyone is connected to everything and everyone else, I might as well just go through and read everything.

Adeline Axtell ( who owned the driveway parcel) continues to be a mystery - altho there was plenty about her husband - the governer of the New Mexico territory - in the Cleveland Leader, November 5, 1878. After a lengthy tale of Axtell's western adventures, there is a final paragrph referring obliquly to the Oviatts. Then this: "One place of interest, which deserves more than a passing notice, is located at the foot of the hill upon which the West village is built. It is the cider mill, where the average Richfielder imbibes enthusiasm and patriotism. In proportion as the texture of the cider approaches that of a grindstone, the Richfield citizen becomes more patriotic. Much more might be written of this place, but lack of space and a great love of my fellow man bid me forbear."

The foot of the hill would be at Oviatt & 303, by the south entrance of camp. The cider press could have been across the street where the golf course is now - but there's that odd, unconnected reference to the Oviatts. So at first I thought this was a nice little mention of a place to get apple cider. But the more LInda and I talked about it, it feels like an "insider's" code. Kind of the way gossip columns used to hint at scandals without actually making an accusation. Maybe that last line is kind of a threat.

We know there was a sawmill behind the Oviatt farm house in 1834. Which mysteriously (and frustratingly) disappeared from the town records. Did they turn it into a cider mill - as in hard cider? The more the citizens drink, the more patriotic they become - as in generally more emotional? Hmmmmmmm. Well, it's a theory. But if these guys were running an unofficial tavern - maybe that will turn up in the archeology!

As usual, anytime anyone came in, Linda asked if they had any connection with the Girl Scout camp. Turns out that the reason Ed came in was to purchase on of the wooden millwheels from Green Cottage crafters that RHS still had on hand. It further turns out that Ed is one of our camp neighbors whose property adjoins Crowell HIlaka! We had a good time talking history & the need for kids to get out into nature.

Next - up to the Kirby Company on W. 114th to look through the last box of their archives. Most of the archives had been lost or destroyed and there is almost nothing left. The staff were very friendly and they set me up in a quiet room with a good cup of coffee. Tucked in between all the 1970's photos was three versions of this old picture:

There is no label, no name. The only context is that it was in the box of company photos. So its likely a group of employees. 1920's, early 30's? The guy in the front row 4th from the left in bow tie & jacket looks like it could be Kirby, and I would suspect a couple of the other front row bow tie guys are Scott & Fetzer, Kirby's business associates. I like to imagine that this is at camp. On the dam hill. We know that the Kirby Co held at least one picnic on camp land. But if that's a shadow of Kirby House on the far left, the giant oak tree is missing. Altho maybe it can't be seen from this angle. Or maybe this is a completly generic, insignificant hillside nowhere near the camp.

Not only are the jigsaw puzzle pieces hiding, but pieces from other puzzles are mixed in at random.
sigh. :-(

Lynn

History of the Outhouse

Even more than ghosts, the favorite fear of campgrounds to the uninitiated is......................the ominous outhouse (cue scarey music).

The dead of winter seems an appropriate time to tell outhouse stories. There was always the fear of dropping critical items down the hole. Especially your glasses. Or your flashlight. Or yourself. My biggest nightmare used to be that a monster from the depths would reach up and pinch me right when I was most vulnerable. Tips for outhouse issues will have to be a subject of a later article. For now, I present a historical perspective.
- Lynn

History Snippets: The Outhouse
by Ranch Harper
The Richfield Times
July, 1991

When electricity came to Richfield many people remodeled their homes to accomodate a bathroom. One old stalwart on a farm on Broadview Road north of town positively refused to install a bathroom in his home. He didn't think it right and proper to "do your business in the same house you ate in."

Modern day campers might think the pit toilets in many of today's campgrounds are similar to the old fashioned outhouse of yesterday. We old-timers can tell you - the only similarity is in the shape of the hole in the seat........

.......A couple of local carpenters have a little experience in outhouse construction. In Richfield's back.......A couple of local carpenters have a little experience in outhouse construction. In Richfield's back yard is Camp Julia Crowell, which belongs to the Cleveland Girl Scout Council. That 400-acre camp today encompasses the old Jim Kirby estate. Jim KIrby was the inventor of today's vacuum cleaner and is the uncle of Richfield's own Virginia Baumgardner.

It was the Buell Davidson Company that went into that undeveloped back country and constructed the first primitive outhouses for Camp Julia Crowell. In those days there were no electric lines running back there among the steep clefts and rocks with spring-fed streams and rocky hillsides covered with virgin timber and brush.

Harold Davidson and Johnny Gabriel were the carpenters assigned to construct those first nessessities. Harold said there were drawings or blueprints of the basic buildings to be constructed. Everything went fine until they discovered the prints did not show any specifications for the holes in the outhouse seats - nothing to indicate size, shape, beveled or sharp edges; no specs. Well, that didn't bother Harold who though usage in his younger days had acquired a "feel" for the proper size and shape for those old time nessessities. So Harold, taking saw in hand, proceeded to cut a beautifully bevel-edged hole of the proper shape and proportions. Johnny was profoundly amazed at what Harold had done and said, "What a memory, what a memory."

Benedict, but not Julia

I was all excited because I accidently found an entry on Benedict Crowell (husband of Julia Crowell)  in the encyclopedia of Cleveland history.  It cited its source as the Benedict Crowell file at the Western Reserve Historical Society.  So the next available moment, I was at WRHS library asking for the Crowell file.  I had just a limited time (lunch hour at work), so I decided to look at the picture file thinking there'd be a wedding picture.  There was NOTHING with Julia.  It was all military.  I feel unreasonablely grumble-some over it.  The librarien suggested that I contact the Cobb family (JC's maden name).  They are a prominent family - still around - may have something.  That may be - but it would be in a collateral line.  I may someday, when I get time.  I'm still chasing down Kirbys and Oviatts.

Real Cider

Dr. Alan Lee, an archeologist, wrote this in response to a history snippet:

Lynn,

Virtually all references to "cider" in C19th America, and elsewhere in the world to the present day, mean the somewhat alcoholic fermented juice of the apple.  The insipid apple juice that Americans buy as "cider" at the grocery store and serve to the kiddies at Halloween parties, is an artifact of prohibition times.  Today, sadly, so-called cider by law is pasturized by the producer beyond all possibility of fermenting into real cider.  It is illeagal for even the owner of a small orchard to market cider that is capable of fermenting.  I say this with regret because as a boy, in the late 1950s, I helped make cider with my grandfather, using our apples and our cider press, and still recall fondly the wonderful and changing complexity of flavors as the resulting beverage slowly aged and matured.

Just by coincidence, NPR ran an article on cider just recently.  Here is a reference:
http://www.npr.org/2010/12/15/132054630/cider-winter-kitchen-s-secret-weapon

Gives a whole new perspective on "Johnny Appleseed", don't you think?

Regards,

Al