Iowa state bystander. [volume] (Des Moines, Iowa) 1894-1916, 1911-05-19
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father, John Simpson, also went from
Pennsylvania to Ohio about 1919. In
the autumn of 1923 the Grants re-
moved to Georgetown, the county seat
of Brown. This remained Ulysses
home until at the age of seventeen he
went to West Point
The year after the birth of Ulysses
Jesse set up<a tannery of his own in
Georgetown, which was situated In a
wilderness of oaks that provided
abundance of tanbark. Jesse Grant
was strong in body and mind, nearly
six feet high, with large head and
strong face. He was essentially New
Englander, was fond of arguing, and
was much criticised in the commu.
nifty because of his dogmatic nature
and his northern prejudices. The vii
lage consisted of 20 houses, placed
about the court house square. On all
sides around the village were forests,
except where clearings had been made
for the fields; these were still filled
with stumps. The manners of the peo-
pie were rude. The houses were
small, with low ceilings, bare walls
and little furniture. They were modi.
fed woodsman's cabins, with outside
chimneys and a lean-to kitchen be-
hind. The citizens were plain peo-
pie, but they despised foolish pride,
and they ridiculed the name Jesse
had given his son and changed it into
Useless" The boy had been named
Hiram Ulysses; the first name was
dropped and s. was afterward adopted
by Grant as the initial of his mothers
name, Simpson.
The father was always extremely
fond of his boy and excited the ridi-
Guile of his neighbors by prophecies Of
his greatness. The Ohio schools were
then very Indifferent; they were sup
ported by subscription, and a single
teacher would have thirty or forty
scholars, from little ones learning the
"A, B, Cs up to girls and boys of
eighteen studying reading, writing and
arithmetic. From the age of five or
six until seventeen, Ulysses attended
the subscription school of Georgetown,
except during the winter of 1867,
when he attended school in Marys-
vile, KY, and the winter of 1899,
when he studied at a private school
at Ripley, Ohio. He was not studious;
both winters were spent going over
the same old arithmetic, of which he
knew every word before.
His father was, from the boys
earliest recollection, in comfortable
circumstances for that time and
region. His great desire was for the
education of his children; so Ulysses
never missed a quarter from school.
He had to work, however, as every
one labored in that region then; his
father not only carried on the manu-
facture of leather and worked at the
trade himself, but also owned and
farmed some land. Ulysses hated the
tanning business, but was fond Of
farming and of all employments in
which horses were used. When
Ulysses was eight years old he began
hauling from the farm all the wood
used in the house and shop; he could
not load it on the wagons, but he
could drive and the choppers would
load, and someone at the house would
unload. In the woods he was willing
to help strip the bark from the trees
and to set fire to stumps and brush
piles, but the tannery was repulsive
to him; he would not scrape nor even
handle them.
In ten years Jesse Grant had be-
come one of the prosperous citizens of
the town; he had built brick house
and owned a carriage. When Ulysses
was ten years old he used to drive a
team all alone to Cincinnati, 40 miles