The Highland weekly news. [volume] (Hillsborough [Hillsboro], Highland County, Ohio) 1853-1886, 1871-11-30
Highland County Ohio Thursday, 30
InI,nnr AnnIeseeI.

him in the Territory of Ohio, in
1901, with a one-horse load of ap-
pie seeds which he planted in vari-
tous places on and about the borders
of Licking Creek, the first orchard
thus originated by him being on the
farm of Isaac stadden, in what is
known as Licking county, in the
State of Ohio. During the five sue
ceeding years, although he was un-
doubtedly following the same strange
occupation, we have no authentic
account of his movements until we
reach a pleasant spring day in 1906,
when a pioneer. settler in Jefferson
county, Ohio, noticed a peculiar craft,
with a remarkable occupant and Gu
rious cargo, slowly dropping down
with the current of the Ohio river.
1t was "JOhnny Appleseed," by
which name Jonathan Chapman was
afterwards known in every log-cabin
from the Ohio river to the Northern
Lakes, and westward to the prairies
of what is now the State of Indiana.
With two canoes lashed together he
was transporting a load OF apple
seeds to the Western frontier, for the
purpose of creating orchards on the
farthest verge of white settlements.
With his canoes he passed down the
Ohio to Marietta, where he entered
the Muskingum, ascending that riv-
er until he reached the Walhonding,
or White Woman Creek, and still
onward, up the Mohican, into the
Black Fork, to the head of naviga-
ton, in the region now known as
Ashland and Richland counties, on
the line of the Pittsburg and Fort
Wayne Railroad, in Ohio. A long
and toilsome voyage it was, as a
glance at the map will show, and
must have occupied a great deal of
time, as the lonely traveller stopped
at every inviting spot to plant the
seeds and make his in fant nurseries.
These are the first well authenticated
facts in the history of Jonathan
Chapman, whose birth, there is good
reason for believing, occurred in
Boston, Massachusetts, in 1775. Ac-
cording TO this, which was his own
statement in one of his less reticent
moods, he was, at the time of his
appearance on Licking Creek, twen-
ty.six years of age, and whether inn
PEELED in his eccentricities by some
absolute misery of the heart which
could only find relief in incessant
motion, or governed by a monoma-
MIA, his whole after-life was devoted
to the work Of planting apple-seeds
in remote places. The seeds he
gathered from the cider-presses of
Western Pennsylvania; but his ca
noe voyage in 1906 appears to have
been the only occasion upon which
he adopted that method of transport
ing them, as all his subsequent jour
neys were made on foot. Having
planted his stock of seeds, he would
return to Pennsylvania for a fresh
supply, and as sacks made of any
less substantial fabric would not en-
dure the hard usage of the long trips
through forests dense with under
brush and briers, he provided him
self with leathern bags. Securely
packed, the seeds were conveyed,
sometimes on the back of a horse,
and not unfrequently on his own
shoulders, either over a part of the
old Indian trail that led from Fort
Duquesne to Detroit, by way of Fort |
Sandusky, or over what is styled, in |
the appendix to "Hutchin's Histery
of Boquet's Expedition in 1884" |
the "second route through the will
derness of Ohio" which would re-
quire him to traverse a distance of
one hundred and sixty miles in a
west-northwest direction from Fort
Duquesne in order to reach the Black
Fork of the Mohican.
JOHNNY APPLEsEED's HUMOR.
We must not leave the reader IN
der the impression that this mans
life, so full of hardships and perils,
was a gloomy and unhappy one.
There is an element of human pride
in all martyrdOm, which, if it does
not soften the pains, stimulates the
power of endurance. Johnny's life
was made serenely happy by the
conviction that he was living like
the primitive Christians. Nor was
he devoid Of a keen humOr, to which
he occasionally gave vent, as the fol-
lowing will show. Towards the lat
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