Anybody asks you where the town of Fairfield was located, tell 'em Google Maps has not forgotten.
Wednesday, February 15, 2023
Tuesday, February 14, 2023
Locating Loper
Updates are always fun.
There were dozens of companies making wagons, carriages, carts, Phaetons and anything that needed to be pulled. The most notable ones were the Studebakers in South Bend and the McFarlane empire in Connersville.
It is Connersville where Loper's world gets interesting. Our 2015 essay on that is
We have learned where Loper set up his display room in Connersville in 1883 and where it was located 5 years later. The Huston Hotel at 4th and Central in Connersville was one of several such emporiums in the day, thriving as it would and entertaining a world of at least local substantive self-prominence.
No idea why Loper moved his business to a different spot, but he did. Marked on the map in yellow are the two major locations taken from a 1887 Sanborn map (Indiana University).
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The rest of this is more interesting for different reasons. The Connersville Times, in publishing news of Loper's death in March 1904, spared no sap.
"George Loper, of Fairfield, was called away from Earth last week, his funeral took place on Thursday. Verily the Shadowy Reaper has been busy in in the past year reaping the golden grain."
Theo. Dickerson penned these classic paragraphs.
We're as mad as hell, and we ain't gonna take this
In the infamous year of 1914, there was
apparently outrage in Fairfield and along the way, in Bath.
“It is known that quite a sentiment
exists throughout these fair bailiwicks to become a part of Union
County, because it is alleged the sections in question have been
discriminated against continually, led by the Commissioners and other
officers of the county who play politics by catering to the other
townships where the bulk of the voters reside, who are a part of the
machine or oligarchy in control. The facts are well known to all discerning persons and have existed for many years.”
According to published reports, the fair citizenry of those two townships were fed up with being mistreated by Franklin County government and were determined to secede and become part of Union County. This was quite prosperous news in Liberty and Connersville, although the Brookville 'media' ignored it as fake news.
In April of that year, the Liberty and Connersville papers reported:
The areas the identified were “filled for the most part with foreign-born citizens and their families that make up the bulk of that big Democratic vote that helps put the judicial candidates over. A religious question is involved too.”
To summarize, the area was southern Franklin County, populated by a large number of German-heritage Catholics or Lutherans, none of whom were found in any significant number in the northern part of the county.
Springfield Township also had a beef in the fight but they fell short of advocating for secession.
Fairfield and Bath townships had an affinity to southern Union County, both papers concluded.
What tripped the trigger?
“Recently the people in Fairfield Township were turned down cold on a petition for an improved pike. The bulk of county money goes into the “Dutch” settlements.”
A degree of bigotry? For sure. A shining moment to illustrate disdain for politics? Clearly, yes.
It never went beyond that and it's not clear who agitated for it in the first place. Most likely a couple of prominent farmers.
The Liberty position on this:
“Union County would welcome them with open arms and give them the 'square deal.' They belong to us by right anyway. They're our kind and besides, we need them.”
Union County was carved out of northern Franklin County in 1820 and much of that area's early history is joined in heritage in Harmony and Liberty townships south of Roseburg and Billingsville.
The boundaries never changed and the roads probably never got any better.
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