Miami Trace High School - Mitra Yearbook (Fayette County, OH)

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TPCccupU In the middle of the 18th century Ohio was almost entirely covered with forests of oak, walnut, sycamore, maple, chestnut, and beech with an undergrowth of lesser shrubs of dogwood, wild plum, crab apple, redbud, papaw, blueberry, and raspberry all intertwined with heavy hanging grapevines. Through this virgin forest occasionally led a long, cool aisle breaking out upon a maze of tall swamp grass in such clearing, as the Pickaway, Sandusky, and Darby Plains, or the Great Buffalo Swamp (Buckeye Lake) and the Black Swamps. These paths through the dense woods, that later served the Indians and pioneers, were made by animals in search of food, salt licks, or fresh water. When the Mound Builders and Indians came to what is now Ohio they found, ready made, a road system which would serve for their land travel. These numerous Indian paths or trails called traces (Todd's Trace, Zane's Trace) transversed the state in various directions. These trails were the highways of the lndians--the thoroughfares over which they journeyed on their business of the chase or of war, just as people now pursue their travel and traffic over graded roads. Indians did not wander aim- lessly through the woods, but followed these well defined paths. One such path was the Miami Trace. A trace is a way followed or a path taken. Thus, appropriately, our new school should be called Miami Trace. From the forest creatures who established it-- Through the Indian warriors who named it-- To modern man who has improved it-- The name Miami Trace” has a glorious past, present, and future.