Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1886-07-22
"REMINISCENCES.
THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE OLD NATIONAL
PIKE.
Through the Swamp" Brought TO Light BY the
Main Street Natural Gas Ditch.
The Talk Among Old
Timers.

The digging of the Manufacturers COM
pany's pipe trench along Main street, both
north and south of Twelfth street, has
brought to light the bed of the old Nation
al pike which ran down to and across the
creek to Eoff7s ferry, on the South Side,
some forty or fifty years ago, and the throw
ing out of the rocks comprising the foun-
dation of that part of the old National
%thoroughfare has revived not a few stories
of I've olden TYNE" in the minds OF citi-
zens who were young men and boys in the
DAYS when Wheeling was a scattered and
picturesque hamlet-a stopping place for
the statesmen and politicians in their peri
odical fittings back and forth between the
then West and the National capital on the
shores of the Potomac. Quite a crowd OF
these old timers were congregated at the IN
tersection of Main and Twelfth streets a
day or two g and as they watched the
busy workmen in the gas ditch throwing
out the earth and rocks, they fell to talk
ing over events which transpired away
back in the thirties, and quite an acrimO-
Nous dispute finally arose out of the diff
~ferences in their recollections. The old
topography OF the ground upon which that
portion of the city lying south of Tenth
street and north of the creek
is built, was sketched in n
verbal way, and old landmarks To-
Gated, the talk being listened to with deep
interest by those of the younger genera
tions who mingled with the Sray-beards
who had the floor. 1t was agreed that the
ground through which Main street now
II from George r. Taylor's dry goods
store south to the creek, was 4 swamp, the
level of whose surface wa. six or eight feet
below the present surface of the street,
which swamp, as it extended south toward
Fourteenth street, widened out to and be-
yond Market street until its edge struck
the high bluff which ran down from what
is now Chaplinc street. This swamp was
skirted on the north and east by
a high bluff, the remains of n portion OF
which were to be seen at the old City Hall
lot, at the Simms boarding house, corner
of Fourteenth and Market streets,
across the street at the Merchant residence
and also, some twenty years ago, at the
corner of Eleventh and Main streets, where
the old Zane house stood, on top OF the
stone wall. This much the ~disputantS
concurred in without q dissenting voice,
but when SimOnides fell to describing "A
deep ravinc which, he said, crossed Main
street, ut right angles, about where
the st. James alley now is, Artemidorus
and some of tho others fell upon
him, and the dispute became warm.
He of the ravine recollection, In
sisted that he was right, and that Il stone
and brick arch or culyert spannct 1t, near
John II. Halls saddle store, for thcpaSsa9c
of vehicles. Finally the majority voted
the ravine a myth, and then all hands fell
to talking over an early engineering event
the same being the deep ditch dug once
upon a time from 4 point
somewhere about the Samuel Laughlin
residence, on Chaplinc street, south Us far
as Seventeenth street, which was TO dram
that other swamp which ran from the old
Armstrong, Coen Il Co. planinSmill south
eastwardly to near the Hope hose house.
The ditch was duly completed, and Il great
crowd assembled from all the country
round TO see the wild rush of water into
the creek, but there was nary rush. Before
the pent up flood had gone 0ne hundred
yards it was swallowed up in the gravel
bottom of the trench, and the sight-secrs
returned to their homes in Il disappointed
frame of mind.
We never hear of these "reminiscences of
the old days, but we regret that the tOpog-
raphy of early Wheeling had not been COM
mittcd to paper in the form Of a map or
diagram. 1t would often be handy, and
always valuable aud interesting.