Dover High School - Swirl Yearbook (Dover, OH)

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CRinSOD GR€Y HISTORY OF TUSCARAWAS COUNTY —INDIAN AFFAIRS— A century and a half ago the Ohio Valley was a vast wilderness. The silent night was interrupted only by the howl of the wolf, the melancholy moan of the owl or the shriek of the frightful panther. The day was possibly even more solitary than the night. The noise of the wild turkey, th ' croaking of the raven or the tapping of the woodpecker did not enliven the dreary scene. The Indians were the only human inhabitants: four tribes predominating within the limits of what is now known as the commonwealth of Ohio; namely-the Wyandottes, Delawares, Shawnees and Ottawas. The Wyandotes dwelled along the Sandusky and Miami rivers, the Delawares occupied the valleys of the Muskingum and Tuscaraws. The Shawnees lived in the region drained by the Scioto and Maumee rivers, and the Ottawas in the regions near the head waters of the Sandusky and Maumee rivers. The Ohio Indians were rather sojourners here than permanent inhabitants. Their chief occupation was hunting and fishing and was temporary in character. Their tribal nations were with the six nations of the Iroquois. All the tribes had practically the same tribal government though they differed in many details. In their social organizations generally there were four groups—the family, the gens, the tribe, and the phratry. The family was the household and comprised persons who occupied one lodge or wigwam. The gens were composed of kindred of the same blood in the female line. A tribe was a body of kindred and to be a member it was necessary to belong to some family. The phratry pertained to medical and religious rites and observances. The sachem of the tribe was chosen by the chiefs of the gentes, and presided at their grand councils in which the head of each household and all the leading men of the tribe took part. The wife or squaw had her separate property which consisted of everything in the wigwam except the implements of war and the chase. Each gens had a right to the services of all the available male members of the tribe in avenging wrongs committed against them and in supplying game. The chief crops cultivated and gathered from the forest consisted of corn, beans, peas, potatoes, nuts and berries. Their great annual occasion was the green corn festival. At this festival they feasted themselves with plenty and also made offerings and did homage to the great Spirit for his blessings. They also named their children that were born in that year. Indian names were always significant and indicated the totemic clan to which persons bearing the name belonged. None of the Indians had a written language but they had a name for everything they could see, hear, or feel. They conveyed their thoughts by symbols painted on prepared skins from the inner bark of the white-birch. The Tuscarawas valley was indeed an ideal possession for the Indian. It abounded in everything that made their hunting grounds attractive. The plains were sparsely timbered but in places the oak and hickory grew. The river valeys were wilder and contained a more luxurious growth. Paye six DOU€R 1926

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cRimon - grg y When the Indians first occupied the Ohio Valley they may have travelled only on rivers and lakes. When they turned inland we can be reasonably sure that they found the ready made and deeply worn routes which for years before the coming of the Indian, were used by the mound builders and originally made by the mastodon. The famous Muskingum trail entered the northeastern part of Tuscarawas county, crossed the great trail leading from Fort Pitt to Detroit at the place where the Big Sandy now enters the Tuscarawas, descended on the west side of the river, crossed Sugar Creek near the present site of Dover, crossed Stone Creek at its mouth and followed Frye’s Creek to the present site of Port Washington, thence turned westward on the hills toward Chili in Coshocton county. From this old time highway, near the present village of Bolivar, is seen the rise of ground which marks the site of Fort Laurens. Farther down the river at Goshen lies the dust of the heroic Zeisberger. From this trail could also be seen the quiet hamlet of Schoenbrunn, famous for its chronicles of heroism and suffering, and the now historic Gnaden-hutten. The Indian occupation of the Ohio Valley being more temporary in character than permanent, as before stated, there were in consequence but few Indian villages within the present limits of Tuscarawas county. The ancient Senaca capital, Tuscarawas, located near the site of the present village of Bolivar, at the time of Heckewelder’s visit there in 1762, was inhabited by Delawares, and seems to have been built long before the coming of the white man. Further down the river were Beavertown, about eight miles north of Dover, the Ottawa capitol, an old town below the mouth of Sugar Creek, Three Legstown, at the mouth of Stillwater, King Beaver’s hamlet, near the present Gnadenhutten, Gehelemukpechuk Delaware capitol fifteen miles south of the “Big Spring,” King Newscom-erstown, at the site of the present town of that name, Old Wyandot town. White Eyes’ hamlet, Custaloga’s town and White Woman’s town, making twelve in all, and each in its day the scene of Indian glory or captive’s suffering. Of Christian towns there were Schoenbrunn, old and new, Gnadenhutten, Lichtenau, Salem, and Post’s Mission House, each in its day the scene of Christian suffering and heathen persecution. U ii=. —THE MORAVIAN MISSIONS— The advent of the Moravian Missionaries into the Tuscarawas Valley is an era in pioneer history. The devotion of these missionaries to the cause in which they risked their lives, the persistency with which they clung to it through dangers and privations, their zeal and perse-verence in their unselfish efforts to evangelize the Indians of the valley and their steadfast friendship for the American colonists, will forever stamp them as among the noblest benefactors of the human race. The pioneer missionary in Ohio was Rev. Christian Frederick Post. In 1762, in company with John Heckewelder, then about nineteen years of age, he left Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and came to the headwaters of the Tuscarawas, where he had built himself a small cabin on the banks of the river above the present site of Bolivar. Late in the summer of 1762, Post accompanied by Shingash, the greatest Delaware warrior of his time, went to Lancaster to attend an Page seven DOl CP . 199,6