The Newark journal., 1913-01-17
SOME SIDELIGHTS
 ON EARLY HISTORY
We'll Known Citizen Tells Inter- esting Story of Early Days
 in This Section

J. A. Greenhaw, who lives a few miles east of Newport in the Vil- lage creek neighborhood, and who spends quite a good deal of his time here with his daughter, Mrs. J. E. Porter, is perhaps one of the best posted men in this section, with regard to the traditional his tory and folklore concerning the early settlement of this country.
 He has been a close student and a great thinker aud is able to point a moral from many of the occurrences incident to the early settlement of this country.
 He knows many of the Indian traditions and can relate the de- tails of quite a number of occur. rences.that have made local history both in Independence and Jackson counties.
 For instance, Journal reporter learned from him a few days ago that Newport, instead of being a comparatively new town, is one of the oldest settlements in Jackson county. The original Newport, however, was a short distance be- low the present site of the town of Newport, but there was a settlemnt and boat-landing there known as Newport as far back as 75 years ago. Litchfield, located about three miles east of Newport, was the county seat. From there the coun- ty seat was moved to old Eliza beth and later to Jacksonport.
 In those days, there was little written or printed history and peos pie depended entirely upon the narrative. A mans word carried considerable more weight than 1t does now. People loaned money to a man then merely upon his verbal promise to pay 1t back at a stated time, and few people ever failed to keep a promise. There Is a fine illustration of this in an incident related by MT. GreenhaW in regard to a man who was tried during one of the early terms of court at Litchfeld, and was sen- fenced to hang. Court was held sometime in the early spring, and the man, who was married and had a family, had started a crop. Court came on and he was convict ed and sentenced to hang. The date of the execution was fixed by the court for some time late in the summer, in order that the con- demned man might finish his crop, and the court released him with out bond, only exacting from him promise that he would return and surrender himself to the sher- if before the time appointed for his execution. True to his prom ise, the condemned man went home, finished his crop and return ed and surrendered to the sheriff to be hanged. The condemned man was very fond of squirrels, which were plentifulin those days, and on the morning of the day he was to be hanged, he suggest ed to the sheriff that they go out and kill some squirrels for dinner. The sheriff consented, and seeur- ing a couple of flint-lock rifles, one of which he gave the condemned man, the two went out and killed a number of squirrels which the sheriff had cooked just to the mans liking and together they en- joyed a fine squirrel dinner. After dinner was over, the condemned man announced that he was ready to be hanged. The sheriff sum- moned his deputies and a doctor, and the party proceeded to the rude scaffold which had been erected at a convenient place near by, and the condemned man was duly executed according to the mandate of the court.