Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 258, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 October 1919 — INDIANA AS SEEN BY GREELEY, 1853 [ARTICLE]

INDIANA AS SEEN BY GREELEY, 1853

STORY OF FAMOUS VISIT TO HOOSIER STATE RESURRECTED. An article in Sunday’s Indianapolis Star concerning Horace Greeley tells of the condition of the country in this community during his time and will be of interest to Jasper county people. Horace Greeley came to Indiana in October, 1853, to deliver a lecture at the state fair, the second fair of the kind held under the auspices of the state board of agriculture, the first having been held in Indianapolis in 1852. Mr.. Grpeley at this time was 42 years old and widely known, and twelve years before had founded the New York Tribune. The talk at the state fair over, Mr. Greeley returned to Indianapolis, through which city he had passed enroute to Lafayette and there lectured. Of his adventures on leaving Indianapolis to go to LaPorte, where he was also called to lecture, he has left an interesting account in a letter written from South Bend on October 18, 1853, as follows-:

—“1 left New York bn Monday morning of last week, reached Lafayette via Erie railroad," Buffalo City, .the steamboat ‘Queen of the West’ to Cleveland, and the railroad thence to Galion, Bellefontaine, and Indianapolis, at noon Wednesday. Having given the residue -of that day and all the next to the state agricultural fair and fulfilled the engagements that drew me to Indiana, I returned to Indianapolis on" Friday morning, spoke there in the evening and started back via Lafayette on Saturday morning, to fulfill a promise to speak on the evening of that day at LaPorte, where I should reach the Northern Indiana and South Michigan road, and set my face homeward. How we were delayed on our way back to Lafayette, and how, on reaching that smart"young village, I was misled, by the kind guidance of a zealous friend, into waiting for the northern cars at a place half a mile distant from wheije they then actually were; how I at last broke over all assurances that they always started from this point, and must come here before leaving, and made (for their out-of-the-way station just in time to be too late—it were a fruitless vexation to recall. “Suffice it that at noon I stood on the platform where I might and should have been twenty minutes before, just in time to see the line of smoke hovering over the rapidly receding train. to realize that any seasonable fulfillment of my promise to LaPorte was now impossible and to learn that the next regular train would leave on Monday, and take me to LaPorte just two days after I should have been there. I wandered back to the village, in no enviable mood, to telegraph my mishap to LaPorte, and had the privilege of cooling my heels for an hour and a quarter on the steps of the while the ; operators " Were leisurely discussing and digesting their dinner. They came at last, just too late to enable me to stop the sending of a carriage eleven miles from LaPorte to meet me at Westville; and I retraced my steps to the out-of-town depot, to see what chance remained or might turn up. “As quite a number had been deceived and, left as I was, owing to the recent change in railroad arrangements, the agent said he would send out an extra train that afternoon if he could procure an engine; but none came in that could be spared, and at 4 o’clock our extra train was adjourned to next morn- : , the telegraph office to appra iso La Porte that I would speak there for temperance the next (Sunday) evening, and then walked over-to the Bramble House and laid in a stock of sleep for future contingencies. “I was at the depot in ample season next morning; but the train that was to start at 10 did not actually leave till noon, and then with a body entirely disproportioned to its head. Five cars closely packed with live hogs, five ditto with wheat, two ditto with lumber, three or four with livestock—returning from the fair, and two or three cattle cars containing passengers, formed entirely too heavy a load for our asthmatie —engine, which—had obviously seen its best days in the service of other roads, before that from New Albany to Michigan City was constructed. Still, we went ahead, crossed the Wabash, passed the Tippecanoe battle ground; ran our engine partly off the track and got it back again; and by 3 had reached Brookston, a station fourteenmiles from Lafayette-with a fair prospect of traversing our whole ninety-odd miles by the dawn of Monday morning. “But here we came to a long halt. The engine was in want of both wood and water and neither was accessible. So our engine was detached and ran ahead some five miles for water and still farther for wood, and a weary two hours were tediously whiled away before, its "It came at last, hitched op and - ——*

started us, but before it had moved us another half mile the discharge -cock—of the boiler—blew out, letting off all our wateF an~d~steaiß' and rendering us hopelessly immovable for -hours to come. _ “We got out to takean .observation. The village of Brookston consists of three" hQUsefL_and nobarnF with a welL.(almost dry) for the use of the railroad; but neither of the houses is a tavern, nor more than one story high; and their aggregate of accommodation fell far short of the needs of the hungry crowd so unexpectedly thrown upon their hospitality. Two or three more houses of like or inferior caliber were gleaming in the rays of the setting ■un at various distances on the prairies ; but these were already surfeited with railroad hands as boarders, not to speak of sick women and children in nearly every one; for disease has been very rife this season on these prairies. Still, a friend found an old acquaintance in one of the nearest residents, whose sick wife spread a generous table forthwith for as many of us as could sit around it; and, having supped, we turned out on the prairie to make room for a family party, including two women, one of them quite sick. Our conductor had started a handcar back to Lafayette in quest of the only engine there —a weak old one needing some repairs before it could be used. It was calculated that this engine would be up about 11 o’clock and would then drag us back to Lafayette to spend the remainder of the night, and take a fair start in the morning. This, I, for one, had resolved not to submit to, though the only altefhative was a camp fire on the prairie. “But now a bright thought struck the engineer, for which I think he was indebted to my good angel. He “recollected that a good engine was stationed at a point named Culverton, forty-three miles ahead, andhe decided to take a hand car and make for this, .so-Wat "OTf bow" should have two strings to it. The handcar was dragged over the rough prairie around our long train and launched—l following with my carpet bags, on the lookout for chances. In a trice it was duly manned; I had coaxed my way to a seat upon it, and we were off. “The full moon rose bright over the eastern woods, as, with the north star straight ahead, we bade adieu to the embryo city of Brookston.” The rest of his letter tells of their adventures on the handcar. Their course lay across the east end of Grand Prairie. The ground traversed was nearly level, often marshy and for the most part clear of wood. He finally reached Culverton, -ana f rbin Were wiW the use of handcar finally reached Westville and from there journeyed to LaPorte,, where he delivered his lecture.