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During the American Civil War 1860-1865, a Confederate cavalry, led by Brigadier General John Hunt Morgan, infiltrated the states of Kentucky, southern Indiana, and southeastern Ohio as a diversionary tactic to draw northern troops from eastern Tennessee. The 2,500 calvarymen passed through Gallia County, Ohio, and reached the village of Vinton on July 17, 1863. The Rebels plundered the town searching for horses, food, and forage. Near this marker, they crossed the covered bridge over Big Raccoon Creek and then burned the 120-foot structure behind them. Area residents were left unharmed and no lives were lost.
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Paul E. Brown, born September 7, 1908 in Norwalk, Ohio, and raised in Massillon, is a member of the Professional Football Hall of Fame and was one of the greatest coaches in the history of football at all levels. From 1932 until 1940, he led Massillon High School to a record of 80-8-2. He coached Ohio State to the 1942 national collegiate championship, and joined the professional football ranks in 1946 as coach of the new franchise in Cleveland. He coached his namesake Cleveland Browns to seven league championships in 17 seasons.
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The Ohio River begins at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and flows 981 miles to join the Mississippi River at Cairo, Illinois. The Iroquois called the river “Oyo” or “Ohio,” which the French translated as “La Belle Riviere,” the Beautiful River. It was an important transportation route for countless generations of Native Americans and, beginning in the 1780s, for Euro-American settlers. It was the main route to the opening West and the principal outlet for the region’s growing farm output. Congress first acted to improve navigation in 1824 and, later, by canalizing the river with a series of locks and dams beginning in 1878. River commerce has increased with industrialization, moving up to 150 million tons annually.
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One of the first industries in Marietta was shipbuilding. Due to the abundance of trees and the shipbuilding talent of the New England settlers, twenty-nine ocean going vessels were built in eight shipyards from 1800 to 1812. In 1845 shipbuilding resumed and seven more vessels were constructed. The last ship left dry dock in 1847. The first vessel built was the 110-ton brig St.Clair, captained by Commodore Abraham Whipple. Whipple was a noted Revolutionary War naval officer who escaped the British blockade in 1778 to carry important dispatches to France. He later captured ten vessels worth one million dollars from a British convoy and, in 1784, was the first to fly the American flag on the River Thames in England.
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Henry Kelsey Devereux was born into an aristocratic family on October 10, 1859 in Cleveland, Ohio. Ohio artist, Archibald Willard, chose Harry, as he was fondly known, to portray the drummer boy in one of America’s most famous patriotic paintings, “The Spirit of ’76”. At the time Willard approached him to pose, young Harry was a cadet at Brooks Military Academy. He married socialite Mildred French in 1885 and in 1910 they settled in her father’s pretentious country estate in Wickliffe, Ohio (presently Telshe Yeshiva College). His passion for harness racing and for breeding horses culminated in the organization of the American Association of Trotting Horse Breeders and his position as president of the Grand Circuit. The affluent and charitable Wickliffe resident died in 1932 at the age of 72.
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Natalie Clifford Barney was born in Dayton on October 31, 1876. Her family was wealthy and industrious, including her great grandfather who founded the Dayton Academy, Cooper Female Seminary, and Dayton Car Works. Natalie, who knew that she was a lesbian by age twelve, lived an outspoken and independent life unusual for a woman of this time period. Her openness and pride about her sexuality, without shame, was at least one hundred years ahead of its time. She published Some Portrait-Sonnets of Women, a book of love poems to women under her own name in 1900. American painter Romaine Brooks was Barney’s partner and companion for fifty years. (continued on other side)
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The Bellaire High School Clock Tower was erected in 1925 as the second town clock to be mounted on Bellaire’s public schools. C.W. Bates of Wheeling designed this tower, built by C.D. Keyser & Co. of Bellaire. The school building stretches 256 feet along 35th Street, and the tower rises 40 feet above the 3rd floor parapet of the roof. The clock faces are 6 feet, 7 inches in diameter. At the exterior corners of the bell room are 11 foot columns. The tower dome is painted red. E. Howard & Co. of Boston made the clock works and the McShane Bell Foundry of Baltimore cast the bell in August 1888. The BHS Alumni Association lighted the tower in 1998 to honor all “faithful and true-hearted” graduates of the school.
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Monteith Hall was built in 1835 as the residence of Reverend John Monteith (1788-1868) and family. Before coming to Elyria as the first superintendent of the new high school, Rev. Monteith was an educator and minister in Detroit, Michigan. He was instrumental in founding the University of Michigan, originally located in Detroit, and became its first president. William Gates, Rev. Monteith’s grandson, enlarged Monteith Hall in 1897. Monteith Hall was a station on the Underground Railroad on the route that extended from Oberlin. A tunnel, which ran from the basement of the home to the Black River, was used to help slaves escape to the shore of Lake Erie. Rev. Monteith managed the network on the southern shore of Lake Erie, and aided fugitive slaves in boarding ships to cross the lake to Canada.
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