THE MYSTERIOUS INDIAN ROCKS OF BROWNS ISLAND

                                          THE PETROGLYPHS OF THE UPPER OHIO VALLEY

                                    

                                                                   

            The age-old adage regarding art says that every picture tells a story, but regarding the Indian Rock art of the Upper Ohio Valley, every picture portrays a mystery.

            The native American representations are called petroglyphs, which are crude images of wildlife, humans and symbols scratched or pecked into the surface of large flat sandstones lining the shores of the Ohio River and other sites across the country.  Some of the more renowned local petroglyph sites include Smith’s Ferry, Babb’s Island, old Dam Number Eight and the head of Brown’s Island, although evidence suggests, the two-mile mid-water flood plain could have centered four different petroglyph sites.

            “Rock Art chronicles the long histories, the hunting ceremonies, and the religions of diverse native peoples, “wrote James D. Keyser and Michael Klasser in Plains Indian Rock Art.  “They reveal their relationships with the spirit world and record their interaction with traditional enemies and the earliest Europeans.”

            Native Americans considered boulders prominent features of the landscape, and the Ohio, itself a Native American name, meaning river with whitecaps, or just simply beautiful stream, was a major route of transportation and trade centuries before the first Europeans arrived.

            Archaeologists have often calculated the time periods when the Native Americans etched their work in rock, ancient peoples ranging from Hopewell, Adenas, woodland and modern Indians, but often have been left with only educated guesses of the true artists as in the case of the late James L. Swauger of Ohio State University, who studied the local petroglyph sites in 1969.

            “Babb’s Island is the only site investigated in Ohio which holds water bird figures,” Swauger wrote in Petroglyphs of Ohio.  “It’s affinities are with Brown’s Island in W.V. and Smith’s Ferry in Pa.  The generally more sophisticated artistry of the carvings on these sites, as well as their common possession of water bird figures suggest a ‘school’ of petroglyph artists working along this 30-mile stretch of river.”

Swauger also theorized that the local rock art could be attributed to Mongahela Man, also called proto-Shawnees from 1200 a.d. to 1750 a.d.

Work by Charles Whittlesley suggests otherwise.  Or perhaps he knew of a site other than the Brown’s Island one, recorded in the archaeological ledgers as site 46HK8.  Whittlesley noted in the American Antiquarian and Oriental Journal that Newburgh founding father Michael Myers “saw from the south shore of the river, opposite the head of Brown’s Island, an Indian at work on the flat rocks.  He shot the Indian, and, getting to the island on a raft, he saw effigies of animals, among them that of a deer which the Indian had partly executed.”

Using the Deer Rock incident as conclusive evidence, Whittlesley went on to write.  “It is nearly demonstrated that they are not the work of the Mound Builders unless that race and the historical Indian are one.”

Indeed, on the last page of Dr. E. R. Giesly’s epic poem about Myers, Stalwart Auver, is a drawing of a boulder with 1797 on top, and below this date are several crude drawn images.  What they represent is indistinguishable because of the poor quality of print.

One petroglyph site overlooked by Swauger was thought by antiquarian James McBride to be situated above the old Half Moon Farm on the West Virginia side.  On July 4, 1838, McBride crossed the river from Cable’s Eddy, present day Pottery Addition.

“We found the rock lying on the Virginia side of the river.  It lies about three feet above low water mark, having a flat surface of about nine feet by seven inclining a little toward water.  It is of hard stone, and all over the surface are various figures cut and sunk into the hard rock.  Amongst these figures are rude representations of the human form, tracks of human feet representing the bare foot and print of toes as if made in soft mud, tracks of horses, turkeys and a rabbit.  Several figures of snakes, a turtle and other figures not understood.”

During that period existed another landmark bearing the title “half moon,” a wing dam opposite the head of present-day Hancock County and perhaps the petroglyph about which McBride wrote sat farther north than the farm on the big bend of the river.

“One (carving) represents a wild turkey and is about life size,” wrote Joseph B. Doyle in History of Jefferson County.  “Stretched across its neck, apparently in flight, is a wild goose with neck extended at full length.  The heart of the goose is indicated by a small circle, with a line extending to the head.”

Other figures carved into this rock included a fox, a bear and some outlines of feet.  Doyle wrote that the rock bearing these figures stood at the upper entrance of Holliday’s Cove, now downtown Weirton.

One of the prominent Indian carvings upon the Brown’s Island site that James L. Swauger had investigated were two sand hill cranes approximately four meters square.  Curiously, like one goose at the Half Moon site, the heart of one crane is represented by a small circle with three lines running to the neck.

Petroglyphs at Smith's Ferry, Pennsylvania.  These flat rocks abounded on shoreline before submerged by modern dams.

Sandhill cranes petroglyph of Brown's island.

Could this petroglyph site and the other three be one and the same or four separate sites?  Perhaps even archaeologists will never know because these sites and the others along this 30-mile stretch of history have probably been permanently submerged with the erection of the modern high-rise dams.

THE NATION'S FIRST WORLD WAR I MONUMENT

                                   TORONTO, OHIO LAYS CLAIM TO THIS DISTINCTION

GUIESSEPPI MORETTI

THE COUNTRY'S FIRST WORLD WAR I MEMORIAL

                                   

                       

            Despite its Canadian name, Toronto, Ohio has always been a city of patriotism and fierce national pride as currently displayed by its array of American flags lining its streets.  But never was Toronto’s patriotism more fervid than when it unveiled the nation’s first monument dedicated to the American soldiers and sailors who had fought in World War I.

            It was November 11, 1919, Armistice Day, one year after hostilities of the great war had ended that as many as an estimated 12,000 to 15,000 people amassed in Toronto streets, which were decorated with patriotic colors from one end of the river-edged town to the other.  These spectators watched a parade of 3,000 marchers, led by 250 soldiers, sailors and marines, trailed by the Toronto band, various civic organizations, as well as 800 school children all carrying tiny American flags.

            After the paraded concluded, the soldiers marched to town square where the War Commission awarded the servicemen bronze medals and made a few speeches, and then the honored defenders and public dignitaries crossed Market Street to the First Presbyterian Church where they ate a chicken diner prepared under the direction of Mrs. Mary Hanna and assisted and sponsored by the Daughters of America.

            After diner, the servicemen stepped outside under mild mid-autumn weather across to town square as the shadow of the five-ton statue canted eastward under the two-o’clock sun.  A large white cross now loomed on a platform before the veiled monument and standing before it were eleven girls clad in white, clasping a red rose, each girl representing the ten fallen sons and one fallen daughter of the Toronto area.

            The crowd of 3,000, settled and quiet, watched with eager anticipation a Miss McClean draw the cord encasing the ten-foot high monument that many of them had personally contributed to financially.  As Miss McClean swept her arm toward the glistening bronze statue, the crowd erupted into resounding applause.

            Present at the unveiling was Guiesseppe Moretti, whom the Toronto War Board had commissioned to sculpt the monument, of which the artist stated, “It represents the glorious liberty with the American soldiers and sailors by her side.”

            Moretti, 62 years of age at the ceremonies, was an Italian émigré who had gained fame in America for his public monuments cast in bronze and marble, most notably his work “Vulcan” in Birmingham, Alabama, still the largest cast iron statue in the world.  Other important works of his included the Stephen Collins Foster memorial and the entrance to Highland Park in Pittsburgh, where he had resided much of his life.

            Moretti was known as an eclectic personality who always wore a green tie.  Undoubtedly he was wearing his trademark color as he stepped off the podium, standing before the towering five-ton memorial he had completed in just six months.

            Next United States Congressman Benjamin Frank Murphy took the platform.  Murphy, a Republican representing the district, won election for six successive terms.  He gave a brief speech of welcome to the crowd and servicemen and then introduced keynote speaker William D. Upshaw, recently elected by Georgia voters to Congress.

            A son of a Confederate soldier and a staunch Southern Baptist, Upshaw was a strong supporter of the temperance movement, so much, in fact, he was known as the “driest of drys.”  Prior to his election to Congress, Upshaw served as vice president for the Anti-Saloon League and was instrumental with making prohibition a Georgia law by 1907.

            Upshaw, suffering from a spinal injury that occurred at age 18, and now 52, leaned upon crutches as he addressed the crowd with his passionate deep Southern drawl.  “I congratulate Toronto, Ohio on being the first community in America to erect and dedicate a monument to the glory of the living and the memory of the dead who fought for the safety of America and for the living of the world.”

            After several minutes of continued praise for the town’s patriotism and for its being a role model as an American melting pot, Upshaw segued into sermonizing upon the other war that was threatening the individual’s freedom.  “…in order that America may be kept clean for them—for those who come back to us in buoyant manhood or stagger back to us maimed or blind, reaching out their hands for encouragement from the nation for which they offered their all.  We have learned that if it required a sober citizen to live well and teaching this vital lesson to the nations now new-born in their freedom from autocracy, but still shackled by the slavery of drink, is America’s new mission to the peoples who have been set free.”

            Ironically, Upshaw’s visit to the Gem City failed to influence the citizens’ attitude toward consumption of alcoholic beverages because a little more than 50 years later in 1970, a poll conducted by “Time Magazine” listed Toronto the city consuming the most alcohol per capita in the United States.

            In 1932, Upshaw ran as presidential candidate for the Prohibition Party against Franklin D. Roosevelt, who favored the repeal of prohibition, and was overwhelmingly defeated.

William D. Upshaw

Lamplight Assisted Living Coming to Toronto soon.

            In 2004, the Soldiers and Sailors Monument was restored by the Toronto Beautification Committee and accepted in the National Register of Historic Places.

KAUL FIELD REVISITED

HISTORIC SPORTS VENUE OF TORONTO, OHIO

                  Hallowed is the ground where the glinted steel spikes of summer and autumn once trod in the north end of Toronto.

This small piece of earth, Kaul Field, where the bowling alley currently sits parallel to the 1100 block of Fifth Street, served as home field for some of Toronto’s most revered sports heroes, including Pick Nalley, Gabby Kunzler, Clarke and Gordie Hinkle and Hook Comer.

         Soon after the turn of the Twentieth Century baseball became vogue in the Gem City, with a semi-pro team, the Toronto Athletic Club, dominating most local nines.  At Kaul Field, the TAC hosted other semi-pros from the area and sometimes others of higher caliber.

         “The Pittsburgh Pirates came barnstorming into town along with Honus Wagner,” John Petras said.  “I can’t remember who won, but yes they did play in Toronto.”

         Petras, now resides in Royal Oak, Michigan, is the son of John Petras Sr., who was a member of the TAC before World War I and played alongside Pick Nalley, Wenzel Straka and other founding fathers of baseball in the Gem City.

                At the end of the 1918 Pittsburgh Pirates' season, Bill Mekechnie dropped out of baseball and moved his family to little Toronto where he took up a position of sales for Kaul Clay.  He also set up a grocery in the Daniels Building.  The following year, Mekechnie became player-coach for the Toronto Athletic Club and convinced no retired Pittsburgh Pirates legend Honus Wagner to play games for Toronto on weekends.  Both would eventually be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.

Honus Wagner

         A wooden fence enclosed Kaul Field then, but sometime around the 1920s the only wooden structure remaining was the grandstand framing the home plate area at the site approximately where the cul-de-sac is today on Fifth Street.

         It was this period that Toronto resident Tom McKelvey remembers well.  “Kaul Field was used for baseball in the summer and football in the fall,” McKelvey said.  “We had church leagues five nights a week, Monday through Friday.  Every church had a team.  The best team was always St. Francis, who we called back then the Mickeys”

         McKelvey also has fond memories of the semi-pro football club, the Toronto Tigers, when professional football was at its infancy and germinating in northeastern Ohio.

         “The Toronto Tigers played their games at home in the fall months in front of good crowds,” McKelvey said.  “The train pulled in across the field and the opposing players and fans stepped off; then walked to the field.”

         According to McKelvey, the Toronto Tigers and their opponents played with fierce competition, locals occasionally being replaced by ringers--college athletes playing for dough under aliases.

         “I heard two Ohio State players came in playing for 100 or 200 dollars.  Fats Henry came in from Washington and Jefferson.  Henry would later play for the Canton Bulldogs and become inducted in the Hall of Fame”

         Some of the Toronto standouts included the Ferris brothers and Hook Comer.  Comer had a short stint at fullback with the Canton Bulldogs alongside Henry and the great Jim Thorpe.

         Toronto High School also staged its football games at Kaul Field prior to 1930.  McKelvey’s father, Tom Sr., took young Tom to watch his first game, a match-up between Toronto and Warwood.

         “There were no lights back then,” McKelvey said.  “The games were held in the afternoon.  There were ropes stretched along the sidelines to keep us from coming onto the field.”

         Kaul Field was used for other endeavors beside sports during that era.  McKelvey said a traditional ox roast was held at the grounds around Thanksgiving Day.

         “I remember the kids from the north end ice skated in the winter there,” Vince Exterovich, a 1942 THS graduated said.  “There was a pond, actually a marshy area that froze over during the winter.  Mostly north end kids skated there.”

         Exterovich resided at Sixth Street back then, considering himself a south ender.  Today, the line separating the two ends of the Gem City runs east to west along Main Street, making the southern end larger in area than the older north.  All of Sixth Street today is located what is considered the north end.

         “The south end wasn’t developed in those days,” McKelvey said.  “It was mostly farms and Sloane’s.”

         During the Forties and the Fifties, with the emergence of Little League at newly built Memorial Park and the development of the south end with its new schools, Kaul Field was reduced to a sandlot until it ceased to exist at all with the construction of Toronto Lanes around 1960.

T-formation from the Toronto High School band on Kaul Field.

1913 Toronto Athletic Club

         “The field was very important,” McKelvey said.  “It was our arena.  Kaul Field was the center of ououtdoor sports for Toronto back then.”

1940s Aerial Photos of Toronto

The former Jeddo, Ohio and Follansbee Steel.  Note the village of Jeddo across from the north of the mill and the farmland before the construction of S. C. Dennis School.  At the lower left of photo are remnants of the dam once as the Dike.  It ran diagonally from the tip of Brown's Island to just downstream from the mouth of Jeddo Run.

South end view of Toronto Power Plant where a town once named Calumet sat.  At top of picture, barely discernible is Dam Number 9.

The former Stratton Clay works sat where the present day Lime operations of the W.H. Sammis Plant are.  Just left of center is Stratton Heights, minus the park.

Overhead few from north of old Toronto Power Plant and old Route Seven.

At lower left just showing is old St. Francis Convent across from new convent built around 1960.  Also, below old overhead bridge are houses standing along Railroad Street and a chemical plant on lot where present fire hall stands.  Prominent along lower Jefferson Street are vacant lots.  Note across the river is East Toronto, still with residencies.

Farewell to old Clarke Hinkle Field

Clarke Hinkle

Members of 1970 team, left to right: Joe Chadwick, Bob Petras, Dan Baker, Larry Hughes.

Pre-game gathering

Red Knights Forever

View From South End 

Ron Paris Jr., Ron Paris Sr., Head Coach Ralph Anastasio

Bob Chadwick, THS Class of 1974 and West Point graduate.

Chuck Walker, late 60s guard and linebacker.

Brian Zorbini, running back, early 90s.

Red Knight mascot leading the final charge.

HALL OF FAME CITY

      It's neither Cooperstown, New York nor Canton, Ohio, but few towns the size of the Gem City can claim that five professional hall of fame athletes once called the ball fields of Toronto, Ohio home.
      Receiving his first shot of professional football here at the old Kaul Field was Wilbur "Fats" Henry, an All American lineman from the College of Washington and Jefferson.  "Those were rough and tumble days," the late Tom McKelvey said about the 1920s.  "Doc Kilgus was the owner of the Toronto Tigers and was trying to build up the team with outside players.  One of those was Fats Henry, fresh out of college."
      Henry would go on to play and coach for the Canton Bulldogs, and in 1926, he brought up Toronto native John Comer for one game.  Wearing number 3, Comer carried the ball once for one yard, giving him the distinction of being Toronto's first professional football player.
       Henry is both a member of the College Football Hall of Fame and the National League Hall of Fame.
       The Gem City athlete to next join the professional football ranks was Clarke Hinkle, after whom the high school stadium is named.  Carl Snavey, his coach at Bucknell University said of the Lackawanna Express, "Without a doubt, the greatest defensive back I have ever coached."  Hinkle became a three-time All American at Bucknell and then went on to play with the Green Bay Packers from 1932 to 1941, a period this fullback-linebacker became the NFL's all time leading rusher with 3,860 yards.
      In 1964, the NFL enshrined Hinkle in Canton and the NCAA in 1971.
      Two decades later, continuing the proud gridiron traditions of Toronto was Don Sutherin, a 1954 graduate of THS.
       Sutherin, of course, is best remembered for kicking the winning field goal of the 1958 Rose Bowl for Ohio State, but, locally, he and fellow classmate George Deiderich have the distinction of being the only two future professional football players to have paired at THS at the same time, from 1949 to 1953.  During their senior season, the two future Canadian Football League players performed on a squad that produced four wins, four losses and one tie.
      The New York Giants drafted Sutherin as a defensive back in 1959.  He played for the Giants part of that season and then played with the Pittsburgh Steelers the remainder of the year and the 1960 season.  Sutherin then took his talents north to the Hamilton Tiger Cats and played in the CFL for 12 years, participating in eight Grey Cups, his team winning four.
      By the time he retired, Sutherin held 18 CFL records.  He was inducted into the CFL Hall of Fame in 1992.
      Toronto contributed to the Baseball Hall of Fame, as well.  Pittsburgh Pirate shortstop Honus Wagner often brought several teammates to barnstorm against local clubs.  He also played for the Toronto Athletic Club.
      In The Era of Elegance author Walter M. Kestner wrote, "Wagner, in the twilight of his years of his career, played in Toronto where he alternated with Lawrence Hughes on the all star team managed by Doc Kilgus."
      Kilgus also recruited for the all star squad Boston Red Sox outfielder John Bates and Chicago Cub catcher Tom Needham, both from Jefferson County.
      One hall of fame athlete who did get away from the Gem City was Rollie Fingers, whose father George played for Class D Williamstown in the Mountain State League in 1938.
      The Fingers family resided at 601 Clark Street.  Around when Rollie was ten years old, father George, fed up with working at Wheeling Steel in Steubenville, decided to move the family to California.
      Rollie went on to play 18 seasons in the major leagues, pioneering the role of closing pitcher while recording 341 career saves.
      He was inducted into Cooperstown in 1992.

RETURN TO THE CORNER MARKET

1935  Advertisement from old Victory Market

Melhorn Dairy sold not only its own products, but also that which you purchased on the typical corner market of the period. 

Barnum's Stores, Fourth Street, early 1900s

      The corner market, like penny candy inside glass counters, has long disappeared from Gem City neighborhoods, but has left sweet memories and a rich history.
      With the development of Toronto during the late 1800s came the arrival of the neighborhood market, its numbers increasing as the town expanded southward, peaking during the 1950s and 1960s when nearly 8,000 people inhabited the river town.  As many as 20 small markets were in business during that period, usually family owned and operated, the family often residing in the same building that contained the store.
      From Romey's, Karaffa's and Brem's in the north end to Calabrese's and Didd's at the south, a Toronto resident could walk within a few minutes to purchase bread, milk, lunch meat and other daily groceries.  One street, Federal, had three such stores-Frank's, Wasyk's and Smitty's--on three successive city blocks.
      "Most families had only one car back then," said Mike Swaykus, who was owner and manager of the former Mike's Market, where now sits the empty Olive Branch.  "While the father worked, the kids or mother could walk to a store to get whatever they needed."
      Karaffa's Store, catty-corner from the present Tucker's Tavern, was the small grocery with which the Swaykus family dealt when Mike was growing up.
      "My family had an account there," Swaykus said.  "I remember my mom would call Karaffa's and order a pound of bologna, a rump roast or a bag of potatoes, and Joe Karaffa would deliver them to our home on any day of the week.  My mom would always settle the bill on pay day.  That kind of thing is a thing of the past."
      Handshake accounts and home deliveries are two childhood memories for Liz Fedash, who lived on the 900 block of Loretta Avenue, where Katz's was the neighborhood grocer from the 1930s to the 1950s.
      As a teenager during the late 1940s, Fedash cleaned the Katzes' upstairs apartment and worked filling orders at Calabrese's, then located at Pierce and Wentworth.
       "Katz's was like a general store," Fedash said.  "They sold produce, meats and penny candy.  They were really nice people.  Many times my mom needed milk on Sunday, and they would open the store for us.  You don't get that kind of service today.
       "When I went to pay my family's bills, regardless of how much we paid, Mr. Katz would always give me a bag of candy," she continued.  "The Katzes would always send us gifts on Christmas, which I thought was especially nice since they didn't celebrate Christmas because they were Jewish."
      Friendliness was also a familiar trait with the Calabrese family, for whom Fedash worked filling orders.
      "They took call-in orders.  They sold meats and produce and beer by the cases and delivered all over town," she said.
      Vince Exterovich, who grew up on Sixth Street during the 1930s and early 1940s, described McClane's on the same street as "a very small store where you could buy some canned goods and bread."
      He also mentioned Russell's on Findley, north of the old Roosevelt School and and the Victory Market on downtown Fourth Street.  "They were very friendly," Exterovich said of downtown store owners.  "They would always speak to me."
      Just north of downtown was the old Ralph's Golden Crown Store, which the Swaykus family purchased in 1976 and renamed Mike's, a store with a name that reflected the first-name basis values of the traditional corner market.
      "I can honestly say at one time I knew half the people in town by their first names," Swaykus said.
      He attributed the demise of the corner market to the ownership of more than one family vehicle and the competition with franchise markets.
       "The small grocer started declining in town during the 1970's," he said. "Families could then drive to look for better prices."
      Mike's, the last corner market in town, went out of business in 1998.