The Kimball graphic. (Kimball, Brule County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1905, 1885-12-18
The Early Settlement of Ohio.

Inc flOneef aSSOClaClOn OF buClet
and Warren counties, o., held their
reunion at Monroe, a few days ago,
and had Senator John Sherman for
orator, getting thereby an excellent
speech concerning the settlement of
Ohio. A great many aged men were
present and the occasion was very
interesting. Senator Sherman thought
not enough literary usehad been made
of the great story of the settlement of
the West, which he called one of the
srandest epics in the history of man
kind. The senator described the his
tory OF the disposition OF the lands OF
the northwestern territory among the
states, whose conflicting claims under
royal grants where hard to reconcile;
and finally Connecticut and Virginia,
which claimed a great portion
OF the whole region now Ohio,
where given reserves, and the rest
OF the territory was parceled out
by sale and grant to cities, corpora
tions and individuals of other states.
Connecticut's @western reserve" COW
cred all north Of the 41st parallel run
ming 100 miles west OF the Pennsyl-
vania line; Virginia's reserve included
all lying between the Scioto and Little
Miami, and these regions were settled
mainly by citizens of those states.
John Cleaves Symmes of New Jersey
got his million acres between the Big
Miami and Little Miami; the first set
tiers were revolutionary soldiers and
their sons; New Jersey had been es-
pecially the battlefield OF the revolu-
ton. Her people We're generally inn
poverished, ridden over and raided,
necessarily, by both armies, and it
was the children Of New Jersey main
ly that naturally settled upon the
lands purchased by Symmes. The
leading names of these settlers are
still well known names in New Jersey.
The Ohio company OF Massachusetts
headed by Gen. Rufus Putnam, bought
that region lying about the mouth OF
the Muskingum, and it was by Massa-
chusetts colonists that the first settle.
ment was made in Ohio at Marietta,
opposite Fort Harmer where st, Clair
made his treaty. Pennsylvanians
settled the lands Immediately
west OF the boundaries OF their
W state south of the Con-
necticut reserve. New York wanted
no western land, nearly ali her own
territory was in the possession Of In
dian tribes and she had enough to do
at nome. ''These events" said Sena-
tor Sherman, "all occurred before the
adoption OF the constitution, so that
the wilderness of Ohio may be said to
have been the camDin.sground, from
all the states, of the soldiers OF the
Revolution and their descendants, for
there We're but few immigrants to this
country then fromforeign lands. 1t is
this mingling of the best blood of the
older states on the soil OF Ohio that
has given to our population its pecu-
liar type of character andhas made it
as intelligent and hardy and thriving
a people as n be found anywhere in
the world" What the speaker said
concerning the history OF the Miami
valley settlement, much of whose hard
pioneer work has been done within this
century, so that many OF his hearers
well remembered the trials and hard
ships of the early days, is very briefly
reported, i'll fact little more than al
luded to. Hetold OF the time when his
parents journeyed from Philadelphia
to Plttsburg, and thence westward by
boat,-his mother, with an infant on
her lap, riding all the way through
be described the struggle they had for
bare subsistence in the wilderness, in
such terms that, the reporter says,
"the whole audience was visibly af-
iected, and tears were not few" And
yet John Sherman's eloquence is not
usually OF the tear-drawing sort.