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One of the most influential icons of American popular culture in the mid-20th century, Roy Rogers was born Leonard Franklin Sly on November 5, 1911 in Cincinnati. He moved to this farm at age 8 from Portsmouth and lived here with his family until the Great Depression. He went to California in 1930, working as a truck driver, fruit picker, and country musician before signing a movie contract with Republic Pictures in 1937. Immediately popular, the clean-cut singing cowboy appeared in more than 100 western films, often making six or more movies a year during the 1940s. With his nearly equally-famous horse Trigger and his wife and partner Dale Evans-“the Queen of the West”-he subsequently starred in more than 100 television episodes of the family-oriented Roy Rogers Show from 1951 to 1957. A perennial hero and “good guy,” Rogers personified the mythical American cowboy who always fought fairly and lived by a strong moral code. He died in California on July 6, 1998.
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Mariah Storts Allen was Ohio’s last surviving first generation daughter of a Revolutionary War soldier. She was born August 4, 1842 in Bearfield Township and died May 2, 1933 in New Lexington. Her father, John Jacob Storts, volunteered to fight for American independence at age 13 and camped at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. Allen was a descendant of Ohio’s First Families and an Honorary Member of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR). The DAR refers to first generation daughters as “Real Daughters.”
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One of the outstanding American showmen of the twentieth century, Ted Lewis was born Theodore Leopold Friedman in Circleville to a prominent business family. Stagestruck at an early age, Lewis began performing in cabarets, vaudeville shows, and nightclubs throughout Ohio at age 17, and moved to New York in 1915. Ted opened his own cabaret in 1918. With his animated stage persona, his clarinet, and his trademark cane and battered top hat, Lewis enjoyed a wide appeal with his jazz age audiences. His “Me and My Shadow” act exemplified his popularity during the 1920s, at which time he was the highest-paid entertainer in the business. His career spanned over six decades, from vaudeville to television. Lewis died in New York in 1971.
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Presbyterian minister Hugh Stewart Fullerton asked his congregation in 1841: “Shall we endeavor to form an academy to provide better educational advantages to the young citizens of this remote community?” Predating the founding of the town of South Salem, the Salem Academy was built and opened in 1842, its stone coming from a quarry south of Greenfield. Its primary purpose was to prepare ministers and teachers for the West. Professor J.A. Lowes served as principal during the “golden age” of the academy from 1848 to 1858. (continued on other side)
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Ripley was incorporated as the village of Staunton in 1812. Its name was changed in 1816 to honor General Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, a hero of the War of 1812. In the years before railroads, Ripley was a principal Ohio River shipping center. Also important were its extensive boat-building, tobacco, pork, and timber industries. Ripley too was the home of saw and planing mills, iron foundries, and a piano factory. Such varied commerce enabled Ripley to remain vibrant throughout the nineteenth century. Although noted as a port, Ripley is best remembered as an abolitionist stronghold. Many of its citizens, including Rev. John Rankin and John P. Parker, served as conductors on the famed “Underground Railroad.” The notoriety of Ripley’s anti-slavery network perhaps eclipsed that of nearby Cincinnati, earning the town a reputation as the “Black Hole of Abolitionism.” (Continued on side two)
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General William Henry Harrison ordered the construction of Fort Winchester at the beginning of October 1812 and it was completed October 15. The fort served as a forward observation post and supply depot for the American army during the War of 1812. Until Fort Meigs was completed in 1813, Fort Winchester was the front line against the British and their Indian allies. During the siege of Fort Meigs, Fort Winchester was a rendezvous point for the troops of General Green Clay and those of Colonel William Dudley. Fort Winchester outlined the shape of a parallelogram, measuring 600 by 300 feet in size. Blockhouses anchored the four corners of the fort and within its stockade were storehouses and a hospital.
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The Society of the Precious Blood, established in Italy in 1815, began its American ministry here in Peru in January 1844, led by Swiss missionary Father Francis de Sales Brunner. Continuing the work begun by the Redemptorists at St. Alphonse in 1833, the Missionaries of the Precious Blood, or “Sanguinists,” brought spiritual support and education to German immigrants in northern Ohio. In July 1844 the Sisters of the Precious Blood, established in Switzerland in 1834, began their ministry of prayer and education here. The priests, brothers, and sisters attended to the needs of parishes across northern Ohio, and between 1844 and 1856 established nine major foundations throughout Seneca, Mercer, Putnam and Auglaize Counties in Ohio.
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With the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783, England lost the American Revolution and ceded to its former colonies land from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River. By this time, pioneer settlers had reached the eastern bank of the Ohio River, but the Ohio Country, located west and north of the river, was still considered Indian Territory. The Indian tribes desperately defended their hold on this land. On August 20, 1794, United States forces led by Major General Anthony Wayne defeated an Indian alliance at the Battle of Fallen Timbers fought near modern-day Toledo. One year later, on August 3, 1795, the largest assemblage of northwestern Indian representatives at a peace settlement signed the Treaty of Greene Ville, which effectively ceded all land south of the Greene Ville Treaty line to the Americans. The Fort Laurens site was a reference point in the Treaty line. The Ohio Country was then rapidly settled, and in 1808, Tuscarawas County was organized.
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