Miss Skinner afterward, became Mrs. Perry, and is still living in the city with her son-in-law, Hon. H. B. Payne.

Among my recollections are those of crossing the Cuyahoga river in 1809 to visit my brother Timothy, who had moved to Columbia. I used to cross in a scow and go through the woods. There were no houses then on the west side of the river, and after leaving its bank it was twelve miles through the woods to the first house which was in Berea, then known as Watertown. Mr. Hickox was the first settler in Berea. He froze to death one day while returning home from the city. Then it was eight miles to the next house at Columbia Center.

There was a terrible time here when Hull surrendered. After the landing of troops at Sandusky following his surrender, the impression got abroad that the British and Indians had landed at Sandusky and were about to make a clean sweep of this section. A messenger was sent flying eastward with this intelligence, and everybody started in wild haste to get away from the invaders. Our family packed up and started eastward with the rest, leaving father with the other men to fight the enemy. We met a company of militia under Captain Parker coming. westward to repel the supposed foe, and the whole cavalcade was at first thrown into alarm because Parker's militiamen were supposed to be Indians. We reached Willoughby by daylight the next morning, and were then overtaken by a second messenger who relieved our fears and apprehensions by informing us that the troops which had landed were our own and not the enemy's. This cavalcade then turned about and started back to the homes which had been deserted the day before. Mother would not believe the news at first, but went on to Painesville before she recovered from her alarm and was willing to again turn her face homeward.

CLEVELAND IN 1816.

The following statement is substantially given as it fell from the lips of Mrs. Philo Scovill, the widow of the late Philo Scovill of Cleveland. Mrs. Scovill is well known to the citizens of Cleveland as a lady of great moral worth. She was born December, 27, 1800, and came to Cleveland in 1816. Her maiden name was Jemima Bixbe. She met

Mr. Scovill for the first time in Cleveland, and married him February 19, 1816. Mr. Scovill was a druggist, and one of the leading and most enterprising citizens of Cleveland. He was born at Salisbury, Ct., Nov. 30, 1791. His father was a millwright and had taught him the use of tools. He soon sold out his drug store and adopted the vocation of a master builder. At the date of his marriage Cleveland contained less than 150 inhabitants.

Mrs. Scovill, who is now nearly eighty-five years old, has a vivid recollection of the little village of Cleveland as it appeared in 1816, and remembers the localities of most of its citizens. When she came, many stumps and uncut bushes disfigured the public square, as it was called. Its only decoration, in the way of artistic taste, was the log jail, the upper story of which was used for the county court room. The land south of Superior street to the river was used for a cow pasture and was thought to be of little value. Alonzo Carter, the son of the brave pioneer Lorenzo Carter, occupied a farm on the west bank of the river nearly opposite the foot of Superior street, and kept a ferry boat for the accommodation of passengers crossing the river. Noble H. Merwin, who was a tall man, over six feet in height and of fine proportions, kept a hotel on the southwest corner of Superior street and Vineyard lane. Nathan Perry, the father-in-law of our Senator Payne, kept a drygoods store on the opposite corner of Superior and Water streets, where the great stone bank building is now located. Among those few who occupied the south side of Superior street, east of Merwin's hotel, were Joseph Webb, baker; Peckham & White, tailors; Gear & Walworth, hatters; Hackett & Ackley, carpenters; Philo Scovill, druggist; Doctor David Long, who lived in a log house built for Governor Huntington; Ashbel Walworth, a man well known in early times; Deacon Daniel Kelley, the father of Alfred, Irad and Judge Thomas Kelly, and Stephen A. Dudley, a merchant. A log hut, known as the "barracks," in which a family by the name of Kent lived, displayed its attractions where E. I. Baldwin's store now stands. A man by the name of Morey kept a hotel on the corner of Superior street and the park, where the Forest City House now is. Horace Perry, the county clerk, lived on the corner of the park and Ontario street. The carriage shop of Widow Dewey and son, occupied the south side of Euclid avenue, where

the convent is now located. On the north side of Superior street, going west from the park, about midway, was located a hotel kept by George Wallace, afterwards owned and occupied as a hotel by Michael Spangler. On the east corner of Superior and Bank streets, where the Mercantile National Bank now is, stood the old Commercial Bank of Lake Erie, Leonard Case, cashier. This was the first bank established in Cleveland. On the opposite corner stood Uncle Abram Hickox' blacksmith shop, with the sign "Uncle Abram works here." On Water street, resided the widow Carter, wife of the pioneer; Judge Samuel Williamson, Doctor Donald McIntosh, Captain Levi Johnston, Phineas Shepard and Captain John Burtiss, with a few others. Alfred Kelley, the lawyer, occupied a brick house at the foot of Water street, near the bank of the lake.

Mr. Scovill erected, in 1826, a hotel on the north side of Superior street, a little west of the present Johnson House. It was a large three story frame building and was regarded in those days as a magnificent structure. It was kept as a hotel by Mr. Scovill and wife, for many years, and was especially famous for its neatness, good order, and sumptuous fare. Its enviable reputation was largely due to the care and skill of Mrs. Scovill, the landlady. Mr. Scovill accumulated a handsome property. He died June 5, 1876. The fruit of the marriage was two sons and one daughter, who still survive him. Mrs. Scovill has accomplished a great work in her day. She is a practical lady of the old school; believes in works as well as in othodoxy, and has led an exemplary life. She and her husband were active in securing the establishment of the Cleveland Protestant Orphan asylum and in promoting its welfare. It was the influence of Mrs. Scovill, mainly, that founded and endowed the Trinity Home, for aged and destitute ladies. She has ever been liberal and considerate in bestowing charities on the deserving poor. She has seen great changes in the city of Cleveland since 1816, a change from log cabins to palaces, a change from one hundred and fifty souls to nearly two hundred and fifty thousand. She now awaits with Christian hope and patience a change from this wearisome earth-life to a life of serenity and spirituality beneath a holier sky.

HOW IT WAS.

BY GEORGE WATKINS.

I was born in the town of Chatham, Middlesex county, Ct., in 1812. My recollections of Cleveland date back to 1818, when my father Timothy Watkins, moved into a log house on Euclid avenue. Five other families came at the same time. Four settled on the west side. These were the families of Josiah Barber, Seth Branch, Martin Kellogg and Thomas O. Young. We came with ox teams, and it took five weeks to make the trip. It was sixty-seven years the 23rd of July, 1885, since we arrived in Cleveland. There were but seventy-five persons all told in Cleveland in 1818.

I was then nearly 7 years old. The appearance of Cleveland at that time is as indelibly fixed upon my mind as though I had seen it yesterday ; but when I call to mind the members of each family of pioneers, I find that I am the only one living of that little western-bound caravan and almost the only living representative of this part of the town at that time. Then I realize that a great many years have passed and that my eyes do indeed behold a great city, with scores of churches and schools and great marts of trade, where as a child I only saw rude homes and an almost unbroken forest.

My first recollection of a school-house was of one on Fairmount street, and a second, a block log house on Giddings avenue. This was built in 1822 and I began to attend there the same year. The building was about 15x20 feet. It was called a block house because the logs were hewn on both sides. It was lighted by five windows. The old stone

fireplace was six feet across. On three sides of the room was a platform seven or eight feet wide and about one foot high. An upright board was placed a foot or so from the edge of this platform. Here the little children sat, the board serving for the back of their seats. On the platform and against the walls at the proper height was the writing desk of the older pupils.

This desk was continuous around three sides of the

room.

The seats, like the desk, were of unplaned slabs, which ran parallel with the desk. When it was writing time the boys and girls had to swing their feet over and proceed to business. We wrote with a goose quill, and every morning the master set our copies and mended our pens. Theodore G. Wallace was my first man teacher and Margaret Kidd my first woman teacher.

We had school but three months in the year, in the winter, and it was no small labor to get ready for this comparatively short time. Everybody was poor, there was no money in the country.

Mother spun the yarn and then wove the cloth for our clothes; then it was taken to Newburgh and fulled and colored, and brought homeand made up for us. Each year father killed a beast. The skin was taken to the tanner's, and put in the vats, where it lay one year. It was dressed in November, and then our shoes were made. Everybody intended to have the children ready for school about the ñrst Monday in December.

This opening day was a great event in the backwoods of Cleveland in 1822. The organization of the school would seem a little strange now. The teacher was chosen not so much from his knowledge of books as because he had no other business. He was paid the enormous sum of $10 a month and boarded himself. It was often a hard thing to raise even this $10 to pay him.

On the first morning, just at 9 o'clock, the new teacher stepped to the door and shouted, "Boys and girls come into school." We obeyed promptly. The next command was issued, "Now take your seats," which we proceeded to do. Then we were classed. The first class were those in the English Reader, the second in the American Preceptor, the third in the New Testament, the fourth in Webster's spelling-book. We read all around, class by class, before recess; and after, we read again and spelled, standing on the floor. It was a great honor to be at the head and keep there three or four days running. We had neither grammar nor geography in any school I ever attended. The arithmetics were Daboll's, Adams' or Pike's, just as the children happened to have. Such a thing. as an arithmetic class was unknown. Each scholar who studied that branch worked in his or her seat; when he could not do a sum help was asked from the teacher, who was often puzzled. No one went farther