The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-06-07


The Wabash river is to Indiana like a sash tied
around mans body from left to right and
though it is 500 miles long its part in the settle
ment of the State has been greater as a drain and
fountain than as highway.
Indiana had no such comprehensive railroad as
the Illinois Central to act a great forked tree
in the State and fill it with boughs and twigs of
population The national road which the gov
eminent built far into Ohio was taken up and
carried along subsequently, but notSn time to
be OF much benefit to new community. with
the railroad spirit coming so swiftly onward IN
the rear
In 1926 the Governor said in his message: ''We
must strike at. the internal improvement of the
State, or form minds to remain poor and I'M
acquainted with each other"
No road begun from Lake Michigan
through indianapolis to Madison on the Ohio I'M
til 1880. Two years later canal was opened
from the Wabash to Lake Erie. The panic of
1887 came when Indiana had just launched
comprehensive system of canals.
Until about thirteen years before the great
civil war the State was unable to pay the inter
est on her internal Improvement debt. The
first railroad in the State was from Madison to
Indianapolis and it opened IN 1871; this ROAD
was meant to be the chief inlet to the State from
the region of Cincinnati and the Ohio river In
| 1853 railroad was opened from indianapolis to
Louisville. The Fort Wayne & Chicago rail
road stopped in Ohio good while, and was not
opened through to Chicago until 1858. The Ohio
& Mississippi railroad, passing through southern
Indiana, was not opened until the brink of the
Rebellion; by 1857 it was running to Vincennes,
but was not ready for traffic to ST. Louis
until 1860. The Northern Indiana railroad,
connecting the Lake Shore with Chicago,
1880 more than forty three hundred miles of
railroad, and since that time her mileage has
! increased. The consequence has been the
sprnging up of new towns in every portion of
| the State, and, perhaps more than any State in
the Union, Indiana has been created and peopled
| by her railroads.
| Indianapolis itself was only laid out in 1921,
and the public offices were not established there
until 1926 and the State-house, recently de-
stroyed, was not opened until 1884, when it cost
$50, 900. The present county court house of In
dianapols cost $150O000 rises eighty
one feet from the ground is three
stories high and is 275 feet long, and it's tower
is 200 feet high. The great Union Depot in that
responding to it's continental uses, will be of
the chief human centers in the West.
OLD vINcENNEs.
To comprehend the origin of Indiana one
must go to the old city Of Vncennes, which is
said to have been founded as early as ITO, on
the Wabash river, some seventy-fve miles from
its mouth. Until 1913 this post, fort and town
was the capital of Indiana There can still be
seen the executive mansion Of the first Gov
ernor William Henry Harrison 1t is narrated
CnaG In Lne yarQ OF CnlS mouse, WHICH SCdnuS
unon the slopng river bank, Tecumseh. the eel
ebrated Indian organizer, had resolved to kill
Harrison by assassination, in the midst of
council which was held there.
The city occVpies healthful plain, adapted to
fruit and many of the houses retain the old
French appearance; many of the people not only
look like Frenchmen of either pure or mixed
blood, but they speak the French Ian
guage, and French immigrants have set
tied at Vincennes within our own time
The old cathedral in the place, with its grave
yard and conventual surroundings, is worth
visit. 1t is said that M. de Vncennes, who gave
name to this place, was killed by the Chickasaw
Indians. His wife could only make her mark.
though she was a daughter of the wealthiest cit
izen of Kaskaska, which was the French empo-
rum of the upper Mississippi. Vincennes is
older than Savannah, and of the age of Trenton,
N. j., and, if its date be correctly stated it is
eight years older than New Orleans. 1t had
been in the English occupation about sixteen
years when the Kentuckians occupied it, in
1779 under General George Rogers Clark,
whom many consider the true founder of Ken
lucky.
Nearly five years afterward the Northwestern
Territory was presented by Virginia to the
United States. and General Harmar and General
St. Clair both visited Vincennes, which was
visited by distinguished foreigners. Volney, the
traveller, wrote an account of it, and in its vi
| cinity established notable English settle
| ment in Illinois by Burbeck and Flower, both
| authors and men of intrepid moral courage.
General Harrison, though historically assigned
| to the State of Ohio began his more Independent
| public life in Indiana In Ohio he had been the
| territorial subordinate of Governor st. Clair.
| In Indiana he was himself the Governor at the
| early age of twenty seven; the youngest son of
| one of the signers of the Declaration of
Independence; he fought against the Indians
in the West under Schuyler and Wayne and
won a captaincy; and he commanded Gin
cinnati when it was frontier fort. Identifying
himself with the new West by marriage and
property interests, he was sent to Congress as
delegate. His Tathern-law, Mr.. Symmes, Of
New Jersey, controlled million acres OF land at
one time on the Little Miami river, and finally
had patented to him near 3l20OO acres, upon
which stands Cincinnati and the most populous
portions Of Ohio and Indiana.
Harrison lived at Vincennes about twelve
years, and when we became second time
gagged in war with England, he was made
brigadier-gener and at the close of that war
was returned to Congress from Ohio The re-
mainder Of his life, about twenty seven years,
was spent in Ohio, but very close to the Indiana
line.
Harrison was not only the first Governor of
Indiana but he was the chief warrior of that
State and the battle of Tppecanoe, which he
fought at Tecumseh's own settlement, became
political battle-cry, which carried him into the
presidency.
1t having been said that he was a very or
binary man, who lived in log cabin and drank
hard cider, these imputations were the signal
for the first appearance of the Northwest in ag
RreSSlFo pOllGlcS
The President did not live long enough to
make much impression upon the country, but
his administration might have saved this coun-
try, had he remained to control it, many of the
missteps which brought upon US a great civil
war, as the Vice president who obtained his
term became subordinate to Mr.. Calhoun with
his sensitive and aggressive policy concerning
slavery.
Harrison is believed to have been a descendant
of the regicide, who was hanged, drawn and
Quartered for having aSSented to the death of
King Charles l. and for having that monarch in
his personal custody. 1t is related in the State
Trials that this Harrison slapped the face of the
executioner who had started to disembowe him
after ne had already been hung on the galows
His speech upon the gallows was one of the
main influences to give succession and fortitude
| to the Puritan republican cause which ultimate
| " drove the Stuarts out of England.