Facts, fiction, figures

American, July 1855

Wister's Patent Wash Tub

We might have said two weeks ago, that we were in the possession of one of these tubs from the manufactory of Messrs. English & Stran of New Albany, who own the right for Southern Indiana, and who are prepared to supply orders, wholesale or retail, but we preferred testing it thoroughly before recommending it. 

It has now been in use here, three weeks, and been tried on all sorts and sizes of clothes, from bed quilts to night caps and we are authorized to say that it fills the bill, and performs all that is claimed for it.

It is simple and durable, in its construction and but little heavier than an ordinary wash tub. It will be serviceable in the family of every man who desires to lighten the burdens of his wife or daughters, but those who think everything a humbug that does not do, or lighten outdoor work, will not buy it, or if they do they will growl about it.

They can buy patent threshers or rakers or cultivators but a patent wash tub is too small a matter for them.

Let all our readers who are in the reach of Messrs. English and Stran, send for one immediately.

We learn that Mr. Doddridge, the proprietor of Wayne, Fayette, Union and Franklin, has made arrangements for  a manufactory here, and that they will be for sale in Brookville next week.

We need not urge the men who love their wives, to buy one -- they will do it without urging.

It will come with poor grace from some of them to say they can't spare $8, these hard times, when they chew and smoke more than twice that amount in a year.

Grand Island, Neb., 1901

HOUSE BURNED

And no trace found of the occupants.

Brookville -- The farm residence and all buildings belonging to Joseph Horn were burned to the ground tonight and the family cannot be found. The family consisted of Horn, his wife and four children. The fire is still too hot to determine of the bodies of the members of the family are buried under the debris of the residence, but it is believed all perished in the flames.

Moral: Insure in the Gordon Agency.*

*This was actually part of the story. The story is also a lie.

Fairfield, 1871

Brookville American, 1871

Fairfield Matters

A recent visit to the thriving little town of Fairfield impresses us with the fact that "improvement is the order of the day" there as well as elsewhere.

Mrs. Eliza Osborn is building a handsome frame residence in the eastern part of town; Dr. Ferguson has laid the foundation for a new dwelling to be shorted erected after the modern fashion, and Dr. Donough has refitted his office building in a handsome manner.

The Fairfield folks are fully up with the times in business matters generally, with the exception that some of them are not in favor of the new railroad running through their township, notwithstanding they will have a convenient depot on that road only a half hour's walk from their town. 

It is hoped, however, that they may yet see that such improvements are a benefit to any community, especially when it is known that they will be so conveniently located near a Grand Trunk Line of railroad such as the proposed new road will be.

They never built the railroad. Blame it on the town!

Rose & Loper

These gentlemen, manufacturers of buggies, carriages, etc., are steadily at work turning out a large number of the finest buggies and carriages of every style and variety.

They have a full set of hands constantly at work and continue to defy competition. Repairing of all kinds done promptly to order.

We take pleasure in thus referring to this firm, as we are confident they are among our most enterprising businessmen and fully deserve the success of which they boast.

Best buggy for your buck!

Teacher Wanted

A first-class male teacher is wanted to teach a three months' school in District No. 4, Blooming Grove Township. Address James M. Hugbell, Metamora, Ind. 

School 4 was in the southwest quarter of the township.

In case you wondered

 Cincinnati Enquirer, July 1858

The Brookville American says that a Mr. Frazee Tucker of Springfield Township in that county, was killed on Sunday last by being thrown from his wagon, which he had driven upon a bank and overturned, falling under it, while in a state of intoxication. He was about 70 years old, and wealthy.

Fell off the wagon, huh?

Cincinnati Post, March 1898

The most disastrous flood ever known here visited Brookville Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning. Both forks of the Whitewater River are out of their banks. The Whitewater Railroad and Big Four are washed away for miles. Telegraph lines and telephone wires are down through Harrison and Brookville, and houses, bridges, fences and stables are drawn toward the Ohio. Two fatalities are reported. Philip Schuh and Bert Osgood of Brookville are lost and supposed to be drowned.

There were worse floods.

Brookville American, December 1834

Hogs!! -- For the last three weeks, our eyes have been greeted with scarce anything but vast droves of the swinish multitude. Win that time, "from our own idea of things," and from the calculations of others there must have passed through this place upwards of THIRTY THOUSAND hogs, all wending their way to Cincinnati, the greatest hog market, we would venture to say, in the known world.

All these hogs are from a small section of this state. We are told by the oldest settlers, there never were as many hogs drove through this place in one year, before, as been within the last three weeks. Some days it seemed as if the vast arena of nature's store house was filled with hogs.

Porkopolis, Ohio.

Cincinnati Gazette, May 1858

The Post office and the jewelry store, attached, in Brookville were entered by burglars on Saturday,, and $2,000 worth of watched and jewelry,  all the letters in the office carried off. Some $300 worth of stamps were also taken. 

Before robbing the office, the burglars entered a hardware store and procured the necessary tools with which to effect an entrance to the former. It is suspected that some of our city thieves were engaged in the operation.

Out-of-town crooks ... can't trust 'em.

News from afar

 

Alabama Courier

May 6, 1886

A DOG'S TRAVELS

The remarkable journey made by a faithful canine

(Brookville, Ind., Letter)

A strange story of the remarkable sense of a dog has just been related to your correspondent by Mr. John S. Russell of Springfield Township.

Some few days since Mr. Russell took the dog, which is a fine Newfoundland, to a brother in Clinton County, this state, a distance of 145 miles, leaving him, as he thought, secure, but on Friday morning as the folks were eating breakfast what should they hear but a scratch on the door for admission from their old dog, Scott, who in his gladness to see them almost talked.

But after he was given a ham breakfast, laid under a large tree near the house all day, being almost completely worn out from travel.

The strangeness of this story is, as Mr. Russell says, "a dog will always travel between sundown and sunrise," and as he arrived on Friday morning in time for an early breakfast, he most have made the whole distance of 145 miles during the night. Scott was raised on the farm he came back to, and though only a dog, evidently believes in the old song, "There is no place like home."

Muncie Star Press

May 6, 1905

ANOTHER TOWN GETS TIGHT

Marshall at Brookville issues very strict orders

(By Star Special Service)

A reform wave has struck Franklin County. A remonstrance under the Moore law with 107 signatures out of 145 voters, was filed which will keep saloons out of Fairfield Township for the next two years.

The (Brookville) marshal, acting under the advice of the prosecuting attorney, has ordered all saloons to remove slot machines and tables and to draw the blinds on Sunday. if his orders are obeyed, it will be the first "dry" Sunday in Brookville for a number of years.

Cincinnati Post

Jan. 27, 1894

Taught School in Indiana

Pierre Lamartine, the forger, was a school teacher near here up to about 1888, when he purchased a grocery in Elmwood and removed thither.

Some time ago, the Jung Brewing Company of Cincinnati, sent a note drawn by Charles Samoniel, who is a prominent hardware merchant of this place, to the Brookville bank for collection.

Mr. Samoniel refused to pay, disclaiming signature, and also all knowledge of payee of the note. This is undoubtedly Lamartine's work.

All news is good news, usually

 American 1868

Another Change

Mr. Robt. Glenn, the successful Fairfield butcher, having bought out his partner, will conduct the business at the old stand and on the old route. Messrs. Rose and Loper are putting up a new wagon for Mr. Glenn's use. Let his former friends and patrons remember that he will still be ready to supply them with the choice of the land.

Meridan (wherever that is) 1884

Scipio Demolished by a Tornado

A dispatch from Brookville says the village of Scipio, near the Ohio line, was destroyed by Tuesday's tornado. Only two houses remain, and they were badly damaged. RV Joseph Winston was killed.

American 1867

Horse Killed

As the downward passenger train on the W.W.V. R.R. was leaving Metamora on last Saturday, two horses were observed on the track some distance in front of the locomotive. Every effort was made to frighten them off by sounding the whistle, but they remained on until, in passing a curve,, one of them was struck and killed. The other one left the track near Hendrickson's.

Kansas City Times 1906

Indiana's Big Steer

Jumbo, owned by Andrew Wessel of Brookville, which is said to be the largest steer in the world, weighs 3,500 pounds, stands 18 1/4 hands high, measures 11 feet around the girth and 17 feet 2 inches from the tip of the nose to the tip of the tail.

He is a full-blooded Shorthorn, is just past the 4-year-old mark and is still growing taller and gaining in weight. The steer is so gentle that it is often ridden by Mr. Wessel's little son. Jumbo has been taken to a few fairs in Ohio and Indiana and  has attracted the attention of many people.  He was raided by P. Ewell of Franklin County, Springfield Township.

Democrat 1903

Bottle Found

During the freshet of May 25,1902, a bottle was thrown in the East fork of the Whitewater river about a mile south of Fairfield by Misses Minnie and Pearl Bourne and Misses Lillie and Eleanor Phenis.

It was found Jan. 20, 1903 about 68 miles below Louisville, Ky., about forty feet up the bank of the Ohio River, by S.R. Lyon.

Democrat 1902

A Card

I hereby desire as publicly as may be, to state that those men, who told that I used either whisky or furnished money to influence any vote, are unprincipled, dirty liars and that I am fully responsible financially and personally for this statement.

James R. Johnson

Fairfield, Ind. 

1879 -- you needed to be there then

Connersville, 1879

Fairfield News

Fishing parties,  croquet parties, and moonlight buggy rides are all the go, and by the by, they tell a pretty good one on a party of five who went fishing one afternoon recently.

Charles Mason, a dashing young gent from Cincinnati, has caused quite a flutter among a certain class of the youthful feminine population for a week past. 

For Several weeks past the Fairfield Flouring Mills have been running night and day on custom work alone, in order to supply its large army of customers.

Wednesday night of last week, some scoundrel stole two sets of farm harness, one set of buggy harness, one saddle and a nearly new farm wagon belonging to a man named Coe, living three miles southeast of this place.

There is talk afloat of reorganizing the Fairfield baseball club this summer.

The store room in Odd Fellows Hall has been newly fitted up, painted and calcimined, and is now occupied by R.L. Irwin for a dry goods store.

Rev. R.N. John will conduct services next Sabbath morning and evening at the Ireland Universalist Church.

Elder Cox held services Saturday and Sunday last at the Baptist church west of town.

George Loper is this week taking a dozen or more new buggies from his shops here to his branch salesroom in Connersville.

The pedagogues of Harmony Township met last Saturday and held in interesting institute.

Host Doyle of the Fairfield House announces a ball for Friday evening, Dec. 23. Smith's string band of Fairfield furnishes the entertainment. 

William Organ, agent for W.T. Bowers, of Liberty, has been in our midst selling pianos and organs. That crossbred dog came near giving him away one night recently.

Miss Belle Holland is entertaining the chicken pox.

John P. Hanna, south of town, captured an 8-pound carp in a tree top. The river was on a boom last week, delaying the mails.

Weird is what makes news

 

Anyplace, Nebraska -- March 1910

FEARED TO MOVE THE 'BODY'

Nearly let woman freeze in snow while waiting for the coroner.

Misconception of the coroner's law nearly caused Miss Olive Sanders of Brookville to be frozen to death in a snowbank. In a warm room, the "dead" woman came back to life.

Miss Sanders' sister missed her from the house and found her, seemingly dead, lying in the snow in the barnyard. Neighbors were called and stood in a ring around the body, consoling the weeping sister and all possessed with the notion that none dare touch the dead until the arrival of the coroner.

It took two hours to get the coroner to the Sanders place. He viewed the body and it was carried into the house and the undertaker called to prepare for the burial. At this stage, Miss Sanders revived.

(She finally died in 1951.)

Democrat, June 1907

REMONSTRANCE

Prevented Allen Lewis from getting a license -- Fairfield will continue dry.

The County Commissioners were in session. A remonstrance containing the names of two-thirds of the voters of Fairfield Township prevented Allen Lewis of Fairfield from being granted a liquor license. Philip Meyer of Brookville was successful in securing the license, although an effort was made to prevent it being granted.

(Fairfield, to the end, never had an active liquor license.)

American, November 1908

'Nether Two-Legged Pig

Lurton Roberts of Route 1 probably had the most interesting show here last week. It was a two-legged pig.  It had only two front legs and count get about with ease, balancing the body. There are no evidences of any attempt to grow legs, the body being perfectly smooth. Th pig is a pet, having ben cared for by Mr. Roberts since its birth.  It is well worth 10 cents to see this freak of nature.

(Pickled pig's feet.)