<h3>BACK TO BEGINNINGS</h3>
<div class='unindent'><span class="smcap">I was</span> born in Huntsville, Butler County, Ohio, on December
29, 1830. That was, at this writing, more than
ninety years ago.</div>
<p>My father's ancestors came from England in 1637.
In 1665 they settled near Elizabeth City, New Jersey,
building there a very substantial house which stood till
almost 1910. More than a score of hardy soldiers from
this family fought for the Colonies in the War of Independence.
They were noted for their stalwart strength,
steady habits, and patriotic ardor.</p>
<p>Both my parents were sincere, though not austere,
Christian people. Father inherited to the full the sturdy
traits of his ancestors. I well remember that for three
years, during our life in Indiana, he worked eighteen
hours a day as a miller. For this hard service he received
only twenty dollars a month and bran for the cow. Yet
out of the ordeal he came seemingly as strong and healthy
as when he entered it.<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_2" id="Page_2"></SPAN></span></p>
<p>My mother's maiden name was Phœbe Baker. English
and Welsh strains of blood ran in her veins. Her father
settled in Butler County, Ohio, in the year 1804, or
thereabouts. My mother, like my father, could and did
endure continuous long hours of severe labor without
much discomfort. I have known her frequently to patch
and mend our clothing until very late at night, and yet
she would invariably be up in the morning by four to
resume her labors.</p>
<p>Small wonder that with such parents and with such
early surroundings I am able to say that for fifty-eight
years I was never sick in bed a single day. I, too, have
endured long hours of labor during my whole life, and
I can truthfully say that I have always liked to do my
work and that I never watched for the sun to go down
to relieve me from the burden of labor. My mother said
I was "always the busiest young 'un" she ever saw, by
which she meant that I was restless from the beginning—born
so.</p>
<p>According to the best information obtainable, I was
born in a log cabin, where the fireplace was nearly as
wide as the cabin. The two doors on opposite sides permitted
the horse, dragging the backlog, to enter at one
and then to go out at the other. Of course, the solid floor
of split logs defied injury from such treatment.</p>
<p>The skillet and the Dutch oven were used instead of
the cook stove to bake the pone or johnny cake, to parch
the corn, or to fry the venison which was then obtainable
in the wilds of Ohio.</p>
<p>A curtain at the farther end of the cabin marked the
confines of a bedchamber for the "old folks." The older
children climbed the ladder nailed to the wall to get to
the loft floored with loose clapboards that rattled when
trodden upon. The straw beds were so near the roof that<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_3" id="Page_3"></SPAN></span>
the patter of the rain made music to the ear, and the
spray of the falling water would often baptize the "tow-heads"
left uncovered.</p>
<div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG src="images/illus-013.png" width-obs="500" height-obs="291" alt="Bringing in the backlog." title="" /> <span class="caption">Bringing in the backlog.</span></div>
<p>Our diet was simple, and the mush pot was a great factor
in our home life. A large, heavy iron pot was hung on
the crane in the chimney corner, where the mush would
slowly bubble and sputter over or near a bed of oak
coals for half the afternoon. And such mush!—always
made from yellow corn meal and cooked three hours or
more. This, eaten with plenty of fresh, rich milk, furnished
the supper for the children. Tea? Not to be thought
of. Sugar? It was too expensive—cost fifteen to eighteen
cents a pound, and at a time when it took a week's labor
to earn as much money as a day's labor would earn now.
Cheap molasses we had sometimes, but not often, meat
not more than once a day, but eggs in abundance.</p>
<p>Everything father had to sell was low-priced, while
everything mother must buy at the store was high.
Wheat brought twenty-five cents a bushel; corn, fifteen
cents; pork, two and two and a half cents a pound, with<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_4" id="Page_4"></SPAN></span>
bacon sometimes used as fuel by reckless, racing steamboat
captains of the Ohio and Mississippi.</p>
<p>My earliest recollection, curiously enough, is of my
schoolboy days, although I had so few. I was certainly
not five years old when a drunken, brutal teacher undertook
to spank me because I did not speak a word plainly.
That is the first fight of which I have any recollection.
I could hardly remember that but for the witnesses, one
of them my oldest brother, who saw the struggle. My
teeth, he said, did excellent work and drew blood quite
freely.</p>
<p>What a spectacle—a half-drunken teacher maltreating
his pupils! But then, that was the time before a free
school system. It was the time when even the parson
would not hesitate to take a "wee drop," and when, if
the decanter was not on the sideboard, the jug and gourd
served as well in the field or in the house. In our neighborhood,
to harvest without whisky in the field was not to
be thought of; nobody ever heard of a log-rolling or
barn-raising without whisky. Be it said to the everlasting
honor of my father, that he set himself firmly against
the practice. He said his grain should rot in the field
before he would supply whisky to his harvest hands.
I have only one recollection of ever tasting any alcoholic
liquor in my boyhood days.</p>
<p>I did, however, learn to smoke when very young. It
came about in this way. My mother always smoked, as
far back as I can remember. Women smoked in those
days, as well as men, and nothing was thought of it.
Well, that was before the time of matches,—leastwise,
it was a time when it was necessary to economize in
their use,—and mother, who was a corpulent woman,
would send me to put a coal in her pipe. I would take
a whiff or two, just to get it started, you know, and this<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_5" id="Page_5"></SPAN></span>
soon developed into the habit of lingering to keep it
going. But let me be just to myself. More than forty
years ago I threw away my pipe and have never smoked
since, and never will smoke again.</p>
<p>My next recollection of school days was after father
had moved to Lockland, Ohio, then ten miles north of
Cincinnati. It is now, I presume, a suburb of that city.
I played hooky instead of going to school; but one day,
while I was under the canal bridge, the noise of passing
teams so frightened me that I ran home and betrayed
myself. Did my mother whip me? Bless her dear soul,
no! Whipping of children, both at home and in the school-room,
was then about as common as eating one's breakfast;
but the family government of my parents was
exceptional for that time, for they did not think it was
necessary to rule by the rod.</p>
<p>Because my mind did not run to school work and because
my disposition was restless, my mother allowed
me to work at odd jobs for pay instead of compelling me
to attend school. This cut down my actual school days
to less than six months. It was, to say the least, a dangerous
experiment, and one to be undertaken only by a
mother who knew her child better than any other person
could. I do not by any means advise other mothers to
adopt such a course.</p>
<p>In those days apprenticeship was quite common. It
was not thought to be a disgrace for a boy to be "bound
out" until he was twenty-one, especially if he was to be
learning a trade. Father took a notion he would bind
me out to a Mr. Arthens, the mill owner at Lockland,
who was childless, and one day he took me with him to
talk it over. When asked, finally, how I should like the
change, I promptly replied that it would be all right if
Mrs. Arthens would "do up my sore toes," whereupon<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_6" id="Page_6"></SPAN></span>
there was such an outburst of merriment that I never
forgot it. We must remember that boys in those days
did not wear shoes in summer, and quite often not in
winter either. But mother put an end to the whole matter
by saying that the family must not be divided, and it
was not.</p>
<p>Our pioneer home was full of love and helpfulness.
My mother expected each child to work as well as to
play. We were trained to take our part at home. The
labor was light, to be sure, but it was service, and it
brought happiness into our lives. For, after all, that
home is happiest where every one helps.</p>
<p>Our move to Indiana was a very important event in
my boyhood days. This move was made during the
autumn of 1839, when I was nine years old. I vividly
remember the trip, for I walked every step of the way
from Lockland, Ohio, to Attica, Indiana, about two hundred
miles.</p>
<p>There was no room in the heavily laden wagon for me
or for my brother Oliver, aged eleven. It was piled so
high with household goods that little space was left even
for mother and the two babies, one yet in arms. But
we lads did not mind riding on "Shank's ponies."</p>
<div class="figright"> <ANTIMG src="images/illus-017.png" width-obs="318" height-obs="450" alt="On the corduroy road." title="" /> <span class="caption">On the corduroy road.</span></div>
<p>The horses walked so briskly that we had to stick to
business to keep up with them. We did find time, though,
to throw a few stones at the frisky squirrels, or to kill
a garter snake, or to gather some flowers for mother and
the little ones, or to watch the redheaded woodpeckers
hammering at the trees. The journey was full of interest
for two lively boys.</p>
<p>Our appearance was what might well be called primitive,
for we went barefooted and wore "tow pants" and
checkered "linsey-woolsey" shirts, with a strip of cloth
for "galluses," as suspenders were at that time called.<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_7" id="Page_7"></SPAN></span>
Little did we think or care about appearance, bent as
we were on having a good time—and that we surely had.</p>
<p>One dreary stretch of swamp that kept us on the
corduroy road behind the jolting wagon I remember well;
this was near Crawfordsville, Indiana. It is now gone,<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_8" id="Page_8"></SPAN></span>
the corduroy and the timber as well. In their places
great barns and comfortable houses dot the landscape
as far as the eye can reach.</p>
<p>One habit that we boys acquired on that trip stuck
to us all our lives, until the brother was lost at sea. When
we followed behind the wagon, as we did part of the time,
each took the name of the horse on his side of the road.
I was "Tip," on the off side; while brother was "Top,"
on the near side. Tip and Top, a span of big, fat, gray
horses that would run away "at the drop of the hat,"
were something to be proud of. This habit of Oliver's
walking on the near side and my walking on the off
continued for years and through many a mile of travel.</p>
<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_9" id="Page_9"></SPAN></span></p>
<div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG src="images/illus-019.png" width-obs="500" height-obs="285" alt="Plowing through the oak grubs on the Wabash." title="" /> <span class="caption">Plowing through the oak grubs on the Wabash.</span></div>
<h2>CHAPTER TWO</h2>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />