SOUTH HALF FIRST SETTLED— PIONEER SETTLERS AND LAND OWNERS— THE HANNAS— ENTERED LAND BEFORE TOWNSHIP ORGANIZATION— PIONEER[S] OF l835-38— FIRST RECORDED ELECTION— DANIEL DALE, LEADING POLITICIAN-- HANNA REJECTS DEMOCRACY— THE WHEEL OF LIFE-- PIONEER SCHOOL MATTERS— BURNETT'S CREEK POSTOFFICE— HIGH STANDARD OF MORALITY-- SMITH'S DISTILLERY OF 1840-50— VIOLENT DEATHS-- THE MORMON BRANCH OF 1842-45-- FARMINGTON MALE AND FEMALE SEMINARY-- BURNETTSVILLE FOUNDED— SHARON AND BURNETTSVILLE CONSOLIDATED-- IDAVILLE FOUNDED— DRAINAGE AND GOOD ROADS.
Jackson was one of the four townships created when White County was set off into civil divisions at the first meeting of the board of commissioners in July, 1834, and included all of its territory east of the Tippecanoe River. It assumed its present area of thirty-six square miles through the creation of Cass and Liberty townships, in 1837. and the subsequent demarcation of the eastern boundary of Union Township.
The south half of the township was first settled, as it was comparatively level, well timbered and not subject to overflow, as were the lands in the northern sections. The rich loam, with subsoil of clay, was found to be adapted to the raising of wheat especially, with corn, oats, rye, roots, fruits and vegetables following closely as second choice. As most of the first settlers were thrifty farmers from Pennsylvania, Ohio and New York, with quite a number from Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee, who usually came stocked with horses, cows and poultry, and provided with farm implements and enough cash to "pull them through until they got on their feet," they naturally selected the southern portion of the township in preference to the dreary-looking swamp lands, interspersed with high ridges, which stretched away to the north. They could not await the time when that waste would be reclaimed and brought into the market as even more productive than the tracts favored by nature.
The dispute as to priority of settlement in Jackson Township is even more lively than in the majority of such discussions, since several located in the vicinity of the present Town of Burnettsville, about 1831—Eliab Fobes, John Scott, Joseph James, Thomas Harless and Aaron Hicks. From the records showing the entries of Government lands it seems that Fobes filed a claim on land in section 25, at or very near the present site of Burnettsville, and that the Hicks tract, about an equal distance from that place and Idavilic, was not entered until June 18, 1834. Mr. James, also mentioned as one of the pioneers, selected a tract earlier in the month in section 18, on the western border of the present township.
Robert Ginn entered lands in section 10 (the only early landsman to venture into the wet tracts of the north) in May, 1830, and in May, 1836, he filed a claim in section 22. And he later became well known in local affairs.
Robert Hanna appears to have been the prime mover in the list of those who purchased Government lands in the township and afterward resided therein— they and their children. On June 21, 1831, he entered land in section 35, just north of the Carroll County line. Several of his grandsons, now well along in years, are farmers in that locality. Two of his sons, Andrew and John Hanna, became prominent residents of the township.
Andrew came with his father from Ohio in 1833; was present at the first town meeting and cast the only whig vote. He prospered as a farmer to such an extent that he became the owner of 900 acres of land, served as county commissioner, was an influential churchman, and founded Idaville.
John Hanna, the elder brother, located in Jackson Township in 1834, the year after his father's arrival, and after farming for many years became prominent in the mercantile affairs of both Burnettsville and Idaville. He also was present at the first township election, and was one of the first petit jurors of the county. He assisted in building the first schoolhouse and was considered one of the founders of Burnettsville.
The tract book of the county giving the entries of Government land in Jackson Township indicates that the following also had become land owners previous to the first election for township officers held in November, 1834: Thomas McCormick, in section 33, November 23, 1831; John Scott and Thomas Martindale, in section 24, on February 8 and July 30, 1832, and William James, in section 35, on October 5th of the same year; Joseph Belen, in section 24, March 6, 1833; T. J. James, in the same section, on August 15th, of that year; Daniel Dale in section 25, August 22, 1833; James James, in section 36, January 26, 1833, and in section 11, June 4, 1834, as well as in section 18, on the same date; James Davis, in section 23, July 14, 1834; George Gibson, in section 25, September 22, 1834, and John Vinnedge, in the same section, November 17th of that year; William R. Dale, in section 26, June 18, 1834; John Tedford, on the same date, in section 31; Christopher Birch, in section 34, May 9, 1834; George Hornback, same section, May 19th, and the following, also in the same section, with dates of 1884 as given: Amos Barnes, May 29th; Allen Barnes, May 29th; Thomas Harless, October 6th; and John McDowell and Solomon Burket, same date; Thomas McLaughlin, in section 36, July 23, 1834.
The years from 1835 to 1838, inclusive, brought many of the residents of the township who joined in her progress of many subsequent years. Those who entered lands during that period fairly cover the list of these pioneers. The tract book gives them as follows: 1835--Jonathan Shull, in section 23, September 25th; Ephraim Miller, in section 24, September 4th; Delaney Marvin, in section 26, October 2d; Andrew Renwick, September 9th; Daniel I. Skinner, October 2d; Joseph D. Beers, December 2d, and Jeremiah Sullivan, December 2d also—all in section 28; James McCain, in section 31, November 12th; Samuel Smith, April 30th, and John Dille, September 1st, both in section 32; Solomon McCully, June 15th; Ephraim Chamberlain, November 7th, and James Hamill, also November 7th—all in section 33; Charles B. Hamilton, January 16th, in section 35; and James Williams, in section 36.
1836—Thomas B. Ward, July 12th, in section 13; Stephen Nutt, September 30th, in section 14; Robert Ginn, May 28th, and Thomas McCormick, October 4th, in section 15; Robert Ginn, May 28th, in section 22; Dennis Springer, November 14th, in section 23; C. J. Hand, January 26th, in section 24; Ezekiah S. Wiley, January 8th, Dennis Springer, November 14th, and William Wiley, December 5th, all in section 26; Seth Irelan, January 13th, and Thomas Beard, April 30th, in section 27; John Parr, July 15th, in sections 30 and 31; James Courtney, January 18th, John Hamill, January 19th, Andrew Hanna, February 4th, and Aaron Hicks, March 30th, in section 33.
1837—John Miller, May 31st, in section 10; James Hicks, September 27th, and A. T. Stanton, September 14th, in section 13; Lewis Shull, January 6th, John York, August 15th, and Robert Gibson, December 19th, in section 14; John Miller, May 31st, in section 15; Samuel M. Cochran, February 15th, in section 21; George B. Garlinghouse, September 29th, in section 22; John A. Billingsley, April 26th, and Andrew Hanna, January 13th, in section 26; William Burns, April 26th, William W. Mitchell, May 22d, Benjamin Durn, June 24th, and Cyrus B. Garlinghouse, September 2d, in section 27; Samuel M. Cochran, February 15th, and Benjamin Deen, April 26th, in section 28.
1838—Jeremiah Dunham, October 15th, in section 13, and William York, February 3d, in section 23.
Quite a number of those who entered lands during this formative period of the township became well known both in township and county affairs. Solomon McCully, who settled in section 33 during 1835, became one of the commissioners, and Thomas McCormick, who came in 1836 and located in section 15, nearly in the center of the township, was appointed an associate judge of the Circuit Court. Aaron Hicks, who took up land in that year in section 33, in the southern part, served as the first sheriff of the county and was its probate judge for some time. Andrew Hanna, who first became interested in lands in section 26, just west of the present site of Burnettsville, afterward became one of the founders of Idaville. Lewis Shull and John York took up tracts further north in section 14, and their families became well known both at Burnettsville and in the farming communities of section 10. The names of others who settled in Jackson Township in the decade previous to 1840 will be drawn into the current of this history as the story progresses.
The first recorded election in Jackson Township was held at the house of Daniel Dale, on the present site of Burnettsville, November 7, 1834, and the following cast presidential ballots: Jonathan Shull, Ephraim Million, Lewis Shull, James Courtney, Robert Hanna, Ezekiel S. Wiley, Joseph James, Eliab Fobes, George Gibson, Hugh Courtney, John Gibson, Joseph James, John Morris, Joseph Winegarner, Allen Barnes, George Hornbeek, William Wiley, Aaron Hicks, John Hanna, John Smith, John Lowery, William Gibson, Stephen Nutt, Robert P. Gibson, William Price, John D. Vinnage, William R. Dale and William James. Of these twenty-eight votes, twenty-six were cast for the Van Buren, or democratic electors, and two for the Harrison, or whig ticket. At the time of this election, which is the first recorded as having been held in the township, voters were legally entitled to cast their ballots anywhere in the county of their residence, so that the foregoing list is not a true index of settlers in Jackson Township, although many names are recognized as actual residents.
Aaron Hicks was the first justice of the peace elected after the organization of the county and the township, and to Daniel Dale was accorded the privilege of naming it. As he was a staunch Jacksonian democrat, he named it accordingly. It was Mr. Dale's house which was the political center of the township for a number of years and, as per the order of the county commlssIoners, most of the early elections were held there. In 1837 and 1838 the poll lists show the following new names: Dennis Pringer, Enos H. Stewart, William W. Mitchell, Solomon McCully, Madison Reeves, Lewis J. Dale, Jephtha York, Thomas McLaughlan, Andrew J. Hanna, Silas Gitt, Alexander Hornback, John A. Billingsley, Samuel Smith, John Street and James T. Mitchell.
The township continued to be overwhelmingly democratic, and at one of the early elections the whigs were able to marshal only Andrew Hanna as a supporter of their ticket in Jackson Township. Dale and the other good democrats tried to induce Hanna to make their vote unanimous, but the lone whig was firm and cast his ballot as his conscience dictated, and he enjoyed his brief triumph in 1840, when Harrison was elected President, but died in office after only a few months of service. Old settlers used to smile at the sanctity of the ballot box, as gauged by the accommodations furnished by Brother Dale, which consisted of an old weather-beaten hat over which was spread a handkerchief— sometimes gay, but never any too clean. The Dale house in which these early elections were held stood for many years unmoved and almost unchanged.
Joseph James, whose homestead was in section 18, in the western part of the township, first appeared on the records as a land owner in 1831, which is given as the year of his actual settlement. He had a large family, several of them small children, when several other pioneers took up claims previous to 1834. The inference is that some one of his babies was the first child born in Jackson Township, although the first record of a birth is that of Alexander Barnes, in February, 1835, and George H. Mitchell, deceased, of Idaville always claimed this honor. Two of Mr. James' children also appear to have died previous to December 2, 1835, when Amos Barnes, the father of Alexander, passed away. His was the first death. The family had lived in the township about a year.
In the spring of 1836, John D. Vinnage and Rachel Gibson were married, the first couple to be united in the township. Thus the wheel commenced to revolve of marriages, births and deaths.
In other respects, the year 1836 was an uneventful one. In that year the first schoolhouse in the township was built near what is now the southeast corner of Burnettsville—a log cabin, like all of its kind in those days—and William Dale was selected to teach the children of the neighborhood. It is said that even before this first regular schoolhouse was thrown open, a vacant house in the southeast quarter of section 33, near the Carroll County line, had been occupied with a small class under the instruction of James Renwick. But that arrangement lacked the permanency attached to the schoolhouse of 1836.
The second schoolhouse in the township was built about 1842, and stood on the farm afterward owned by Thomas Barnes. Among the early teachers in that house were William Barnes, Melinda Noah and Henderson Steele.
The third schoolhouse was built about 1847 on Solomon McCully's land, in the same neighborhood, and George Hall was the first teacher. followed by Joseph Thompson, George Barnes, John Bright, Ashbury Shultz, William P. Montgomery and Josephus Tam.
In the eventful year of 1836 a postoffice was established to accommodate the settlers of the township, who had largely concentrated in its southeastern sections in the neighborhood of what is now Burnettsville. It was called Burnett's Creek (named after the stream which waters the eastern half of the township), and William R. Dale was appointed postmaster, thus continuing the importance of the family name. The postoffice was located at Farrnington, now Burnett's Creek, and it is still thus designated, although the village is incorporated as Burnettsville.
From very early times the type of the communities in Jackson Township was fixed as one of morality and religious conformity. The pioneer settlers largely belonged to the Seceders' Church and strictly enforced morality among their members and children. The first meetings of the sect, known as the Christian Church, were held at the house of Alexander Scott near Farmington, or Burnettsville. The Methodists commenced to organize classes about 1837 and, at a somewhat later day, the Baptists. In the early '40s, members of the Associate Reformed and kindred churches formed societies at what is now Idaville; so that at a very early date, Jackson Township was noted as a section of the county which was especially moral and religious, if not austere in its type. Drunkenness, carousing, swearing and fighting, which were so prevalent in some other sections, were uncommon in Jackson Township, and the few saloons opened were not supported, and never have been to any extent. In fact, the high standard of conduct fixed so early has been, on the whole, well maintained.
In the early '40s two events occurred to especially stir the moral sense of the communities of Southern Jackson Township; the first was the establishment of a distillery and the second, the planting of a branch of the Mormon Church. About the year 1840 Samuel Smith set up a small still on his land, about a mile southwest of where Idaville now stands and near enough the Carroll County line to draw custom from its people. He bought or bartered small quantities of corn whieh he made into whiskey, his orders from the Jackson Township people consisting in great bulk, of stock for vinegar and liniment, bitters to ward off the ague, and the straight liquor for snake bites and general emergencies. Notwithstanding the scandal it produced among the strict disciplinarians of the township, the distillery was operated by Smith until his death in 1850.
A number of violent deaths have occurred in Jackson Township which have caused much excitement and justly so, as some of them were in the nature of horrors. In the spring of 1860, Albert Burns, a man somewhat past middle age, who had resided on his farm two miles north of Burnettsville, for several years, shot his wife, from whom he had once been divorced; attempted to kill her youngest child whom he disowned, and then, after having placed two chairs between his wife and the fireplace that his victim night not get into the fire in her death struggles, turned the weapon upon himself. His death was probably instantaneous. The wife and mother lived until the following morning.
In 1877, a bartender at Idaville named Richard M. Herron, was found dead, his face and clothes covered with blood, about two miles east of Monticello. John Kelly, proprietor of the saloon at which he was employed and John Toothman, whom he had displaced as bartender, were arrested on the charges of having murdered Mr. Herron. The victim, after he received his injuries, stopped at the house of John M. Shafer, three miles east of Monticello. At the time he was covered with blood, but proceeded on his way. That was the last seen of him until his body was discovered about two days afterward. A nolle pros was entered as to Toothman, and he became a witness for the state against Kelly, who was convicted of manslaughter, and sentenced to the penitentiary for six years. He obtained a new trial, which resulted in a sentence of eighteen years. Mr. Herron was an old soldier and some of his relatives yet live in White County.
About 1855 William Crose shot himself about a mile southwest of Idaville. It is believed he committeed suicide while in a state of religious excitement.
In 1854 Silas Tam was killed by lightning just outside of Burnettsville. About 1861 a conductor named Anthony had his leg terribly crushed by a freight train, in consequence of having his foot caught in a frog, and died at the house of Alexander Rodgers, Idaville. In the following year three men were severely injured by the derailing of a train east of that place, one of whom died within a day.
About the summer of 1870, Daniel Leslie was killed by lightning, which struck the postoffice. The bolt also tore the boots from the feet of James C. Hutchinson, so that he had to wear felt slippers for several weeks because of the soreness of his feet.
The Mormon Society, or branch, continued to proselyte from 1842 to 1845, when its members scattered, several of them joining the migration to Nauvoo, Illinois. Their bishop, Alva L. Tibbetts, organized his converts at a private house about three miles north of where Burnettsville is situated, and within the following three years gathered a membership of sixty-five, of whom about two-thirds resided in Jackson Township. Three families whose homes were within its limits joined the migration to Nauvoo; one of them returned to the home neighborhood in Jackson Township, after an experience of two weeks which tended to sober, if not subdue; another crossed the Mississippi into Iowa, when the Mormons were expelled from Nauvoo in 1846, and the third followed the general exodus to Salt Lake City. During the existence of the branch near Burnettsville, the Mormons established a cemetery two miles north of Idaville in which several interments were made.
In 1852, two years before Burnettsville was platted, and while the locality was known as Farmington, the famous Male and Female Seminary was founded by Isaac Mahurin. Aaron Hicks and William York, Joseph Thompson and Elijah Eldridge were its first trustees. The Farmington Male and Female Seminary, as it was called, became quite noted as an educational institution, as has been more fully described in the chapter devoted to such matters.
In March, 1854, Franklin J. Herman, a settler of 1839, laid out the Town of Burnettsville on his and, in the northwest quarter of section 25. The original plat comprised thirty-eight lots, and in 1855, Prudence Dale, widow of William Dale, made the first addition to it, a tract of sixteen lots.
Mr. Herman, the founder of Burnettsville, served as justice of the peace for twenty-five years and died in 1861, one of the most respected citizens of the township. He was the father of eleven children and several of his descendants have been identified with Burnettsville and its progress. One of the sons, F. A. Herman, was its postmaster for a number of years.
In 1860 Thomas Wiley and James B. Eliott laid out the Town of Sharon near the northern limits of Burnettsville. As it was a station on the new railroad known as the Logansport, Peoria and Burlington (now the Panhandle of the Pennsylvania Company), the new town grew rapidly, the business interests of Burnettsville being soon transferred to it bodily. In 1864 the postoffice of Burnett's Creek was moved from Burnettsville to Sharon, and later the two villages were consolidated under the name of the old town. As stated, it is still Burnettsville town and Burnett's Creek postoffice, but Uncle Sam, through his postal department, may in time correct the incongruity.
In July, 1860, Andrew Hanna, John B. Townsley and John McCully, all pioneers of the township, also laid out another town on the Panhandle line three miles west of Sharon, or Burnettsville. At first it was called Hanna, but the name was soon changed to Idaville. The original plat was on the northwest quarter of the southeast quarter and the northeast quarter of the southwest quarter of section 28 and comprised twenty-two lots; the first additions to it were made by Mr. Townsley in 1865. Idaville has never been incorporated as a town. It has suffered, both by storm and fire, the conflagration of 1902 destroying the business portion of the village.
Burnettsville and Idaville are pretty towns, and, as centers of trade and banking, are supported by a prosperous country both to the north and south. Burnettsville has a slight advantage in population and business, and both are pleasant, homelike places.
Jackson Township is practically an agricultural section of the county, and contains about one-ninth of its entire population. Its northern sections have been artificially drained through several large systems of ditches which are carried through Liberty and Union townships to the Tippecanoe River; so that at least half of the township, which was originally considered waste land, has been reclaimed and brought under productive cultivation. Its only natural waterway is Burnett's Creek, which drains its central, eastern and southeastern portions into the Wabash River.
In the matter of good roads, although Jackson Township is not foremost in the movement, much progress has been made in the construction of highways of macadam or gravel, so that few farmers are now inconvenienced when they desire to market their produce. The township is bonded for nearly $35,000 on this account, the indebtedness being apportioned as follows: Personett Road, $1,920; Brown, $4,000; Reiff, $3,800, Mortz, $4,800; Bryan, $11,550; Bishop, $4,140; Harvey, $4,700.