Clark County, Ohio

History and Genealogy



The Pioneer and his Times


From 20th Century History of Springfield and Clark County, Ohio by Hon. William A. Rockel
Chicago: Biographical Publishing Co., 1908


The pioneer was an entirely different kind of person, and came to the new country with entirely different objects in view. He usually brought his family with him, if not, he married in his proper station. He was a patriot and respecter of persons, a believer in religion, and an encourager of the cause of education. The first thing that he did was to build himself a home, and the ownership of the home has always been regarded as one of the great safeguards of American liberties. Very often he came from the colonies across the mountains in a wagon bringing all his belongings with him, and while he was putting up his humble log cabin his family lived in the wagon. The log cabin of the pioneer was a structure peculiar in its arrangement and architecture. There was what is known as the single and double cabin, but the single cabin was the one usually constructed. This had at one end a large fireplace chalked up with mud, where brick or stone was not available. At each side, in the middle of the cabin there was a door. These doors were very often placed in the middle of the cabin, for the purpose of taking the horse through in drawing large logs into the house that were put in the fireplace. These cabins usually did not have an upstairs, but if they did, sometimes the stairway was on the outside. The roof was made of clapboards, that is, a thin board split out of timber about three or four feet in length. The logs out of which the cabin was constructed were notched at the corners to fit into each other, the spaces in between were filled with mud, or daubed, as it was then styled. If a floor was made in the cabin, it was made of logs split in two, which were called puncheons. The door was fastened by a latch inside and a string was passed through a hole up above to the outside and all that was required when they wished to lock the house was to pull in the string.

A good many people of this generation have not seen the real log cabin. The double log cabin was merely two cabins put together end to end. As a rule one room was all that the cabin contained, unless some additions were put to it. In this age of convenience we can hardly realize how the pioneer lived. If he wished to read, provided he was able, and if he had anything to read, his light at night was furnished by the burning of a pine knot, or if he was dwelling in more luxury, he might have a grease lamp or possibly a tallow candle. If the good housewife forgot to keep the fire going, considerable difficulty was experienced in making a new one by the friction method of rubbing sticks together or that of striking flint, or if neither one of these methods were successful, possibly a live coal might be carried from a neighbor's.

If a new garment was required, flax was to be raised which had to be "broken" and the fibers woven into homespun, or if garments for winter were desired the wool had to be carded and then spun and knit into the desired articles, such as womases, stockings and suspenders. If the flour bin was empty, the husband would take his horse, throw a sack of wheat over his back and proceed to the mill, sometimes possibly fifty or seventy-five miles away, give his toll and receive flour. If new articles for the house were wanted, trips to Dayton or Cincinnati were required. Money was a thing that was hardly known. The pioneer lived largely by way of barter and exchange. To keep the time of day they usually watched the course of the sun. Clocks were a rarity. One that now would cost a dollar was then worth an ox. If they did not have shoes to wear to church they went bare-footed, and yet with all these inconveniences they lived perhaps as happily as the average man of today. After the spot of ground was cleared and cabin reared, the ground was fitted for cultivation. Among the first things that were planted were trees of the fruit-bearing variety, and one of the first luxuries of the early days was cider. Root beer was also a favorite beverage, and home-brewed ale; and the community was not settled long before there appeared a "still" in the neighborhood. The scarcity of money for articles necessary in good housekeeping or good farming made the pioneers dependent upon each other and perhaps more friendly and sociable in their way than the people of the later and more advanced civilization. In the erection of their cabins and other buildings, a social gathering was usually made and all came in to lend a helping hand. So in making clearings it was a usual thing to have a log-rolling and when all was through with, ending in a good social time. Necessity made them inventors of many of their needed articles. Sugar was made from the sap of the sugar tree, while honey was found in bee trees. The bear and the deer before their final extinction furnished food. One of the earliest animals which proved useful to the pioneer was the hog, the mast in the woods furnished all his needed food, and he required little other attention.

The pioneer by necessity was a jack of all trades, but principally he was an agriculturist. His acres of land, fitted for that avocation, were few, yet from the rude implements at hand it was sufficient to take up all his time and ingenuity. Instead of plowing his land with a gangplow drawn by four spirited horses, breaking two furrows at once or possibly a larger number from an immense plow drawn by a traction engine, he broke his soil with a "jumper" and one horse, or possibly a wooden side-board plow drawn by oxen. When he cut his wheat, his sickle and himself were the implements employed. When he threshed it, he used the flail or tramped it out with the horse or ox. Cleaned it by shaking it with a wooden fork or with a sieve held in his hand. After the sickle came the cradle, then the reaper, where the grain was raked off by hand; then the self-raker, followed by the dropper; this by the marsh harvester which was a machine carrying two men upon the platform who bound the sheaves of wheat as it was elevated up to them; after this came the self-binder using wire for binding material, until today we have the binder with twine. The same advance can be noticed in the culture of corn, first a rude mark was made upon the ground with some kind of a plow, and the grain was dropped and covered with a hoe, afterwards it was covered with a plow, called a straddler or straddle-jack, then came the drill, where by drilling one row, the corn being let out by press of the thumb; then the two-horse planter, on which a person sat and dropped the corn, up to our present machine, where it is planted in blocks by means of a check-roller or wire.

The pioneer often combined the trades of cobbler and blacksmith with that of his other trades. If he did not perform these trades for the use of others he did a great deal of his own work. The blacksmith was one of the most useful callings for the pioneer of the vicinity. His place of business was usually combined with a general repair shop for almost everything that was used in the house or upon the farm. The collection in the Historical Society Rooms of this county will repay a visit from anyone, containing as it does specimens of the many rude implements and utensils that our pioneer fathers and mothers were required to use. Theirs was a different age from ours. We could no more cany on our present state of civilization with the meager instruments and implements they had at hand, than they could have performed the required duties of their time with what we have on hand at the present time.







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