Warren County
Local History by Dallas Bogan |
Contributor: |
Dallas Bogan on 28 September 2004 |
Source: |
The following is taken from Dallas Bogan's book, "The Pioneer Writings of Josiah Morrow." |
Return to Index to see a list of other articles by Dallas Bogan |
In the Historical Section of the remarkable New Home edition of the Dayton Daily News is a carefully compiled list of about forty of the first things in Dayton which is entitled "Firsts in the History of Dayton." From materials in my possession I have made out a singular list for the town of Lebanon--a town not as old as Dayton but the list of "Firsts" in Lebanon is not without interest and it shows at a glance the march of improvements in the town.
SETTLEMENT--Ichabod Corwin, uncle of Governor Thomas
Corwin, was the first man who made his home on ground now included
in Lebanon. He came here from Bourbon county, Ky., in March 1796, and made a
clearing and built a cabin on the ridge between the Dayton pike and the cemetery,
now in the northwestern part of the town. This was only a few months after Wayne's
treaty of peace with the Indians in August 1795. A few early settlements had
been made at Beedle's Station and some other places west of Lebanon. This date
of the first settlement on the site of Lebanon seems to be well established.
On the tombstone of Ichabod Corwin in the old Baptist graveyard we can still
read "the first settler on the place where Lebanon now stands, March A.D.,
1796."
SERMON--The first sermon of which we have a record was preached by John
Kobler, a pioneer Methodist preacher at the house of Ichabod
Corwin on Thursday afternoon at 4 o'clock August 9, 1798. This preacher
records that after preaching at Deerfield, he rode six miles further to a place
called "Turtlecreek settlement."
SCHOOL--The first school in the vicinity was opened in 1798 by Francis
Dunlevy, afterward Judge Dunlevy, in a low, rough
log house which stood near where the Water Works plant now is. It was attended
by youth from four or five miles around and among the pupils were Thomas
Corwin and A.H.
Dunlevy.
CHURCHES--The pioneers on Turtlecreek were at first chiefly Baptists and Presbyterians.
The Baptists built their first log church one mile east of the center of Lebanon
in 1798. Elder Daniel Clark,
who was the first ordained minister in the Miami valley being ordained Sept.
21, 1792 at Columbia, was the Baptist pastor at Lebanon from 1798 to 1830. He
died in 1834 aged 90 years. The Baptists erected the first church at Lebanon
in 1811 and their churchyard is now known as the old Baptist graveyard. The
Presbyterian church at Lebanon was organized about 1805 and until 1817, when
their first church edifice was erected, held meetings in groves in the first
brick court house. The Presbyterians were more numerous than the Baptists but
the most prominent of the pioneers at Lebanon were Baptists. The Methodists
organized a small society at Lebanon in 1805. It continued small until 1811
when a great revival at Lebanon made it the largest in the town. Bishop
Asbury who presided at a conference in 1815 is reported to have said
the church was the strongest Methodist society, intellectually, morally and
financially in the Mississippi valley.
MILL--The first mill at Lebanon was built on the land of Henry Taylor,
west of the site of the town on Turtlecreek about 1799 or 1800. The stream then
afforded water-power about one half the year.
TOWN PLAT--The first plat of the town was surveyed by Ichabod B. Halsey
in September, 1802. The plat contained 100 lots nearly all of which were covered
with the original forest trees and a thick undergrowth of spice bushes. There
was no demand for town lots for two or three years.
TAVERN--Tavern keeping was the first business in Lebanon, there being a log
tavern in the place when the town was laid out. This tavern was designated "the
house of Ephriam Hathaway on Turtlecreek" in the act creating
Warren county and was made the temporary place of holding courts. The first
store in the town was kept in this tavern in the summer of 1803. The town was
platted in the Northwest Territory about six months before Ohio became a state.
COURT--Francis Dunlevy,
of Warren county, the first President Judge of the Western Circuit of the state,
began the first term of the common pleas court of the county in the tavern at
Lebanon, on the third Tuesday of August, 1803. Courts at Lebanon were held in
the log tavern until the completion of a brick house in 1806.
COUNTY BUILDINGS--The county commissioners did not feel justified in erecting
permanent county buildings until the county seat was permanently located, but
in June, 1805, they contracted for a log jail at a cost of $275. It was constructed
of logs hewed one foot square, so as to lie close together and the floor was
made of the same kind of logs. This the first county building erected at Lebanon
stood on the northwest lot of the public square, that is, the one south of the
Lebanon hotel. It was completed November 30, 1804. The next year a log house,
for the use of the jailer was built in front of the jail at a cost of $75. In
1807 the commissioners contracted for a stone jail on the lot where the Public
Library now is, at a cost of $990.
BANK--The first bank in Lebanon was organized in April, 1814, under the singular
name of the Lebanon Miami Banking Company. Ten of the leading men of the town
were the first directors and .Daniel F. Reeder was the first
president. The bank issued notes for circulation in denominations of $1, $2,
$3, $5 and $10 and tickets of lower denominations than one dollar, one of which
was for 5 cents. This bank closed its business about 1822.
POST OFFICE--Lebanon was made a postoffice April 1, 1805, and William
Ferguson, a leading merchant, was the first postmaster. The office
was doubtless in the store of the merchant. The early settlers in Turtlecreek
got their mail at Cincinnati.
LIBRARY--The Lebanon Library Society was chartered in 1811 and now had a small
but valuable collection of books.
COURT HOUSE--Lebanon was made the permanent seat of justice by the legislature
February 11, 1805, and the commissioners contracted for the erection of the
first court house on April 27, 1805, at a cost of $1450. The building was to
be of brick, 36 feet square and two stories high. The lower floor was the court
room and was paved with tile or brick twelve inches square and four inches thick
and to have one fire-place five and a half feet wide. There were to be eight
windows in the lower story of black walnut frames, each with 24 glasses. This
plain building was one of the first brick buildings in Lebanon. It stood at
the northeast corner of Broadway and Main for almost thirty years and later
was the town hall.
PRINTING PRESS--In the summer of 1806 John
McLean, then just twenty-one bought in Cincinnati and brought the
first printing press in the town. From this press he afterward issued the first
numbers of The Western Star which was the first newspaper in the Miami Valley
outside of Cincinnati.
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This page created 28 September 2004 and last updated
28 September, 2008
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