Beyond the Allegheny ranges, which are gradually broken down into
their lower foothills, and then to an almost monotonous level, the
expansive prairie lands stretch towards the setting sun. From their
prolific agriculture has come much of the wealth and prosperity of
the United States. The rivers flowing out of the mountains seek the
Mississippi Valley, thus reaching the sea through the Great Father of
Waters. Among these rivers is the Ohio, and at its confluence with the
Beaver, near the western border of Pennsylvania, was, in the early
days, the Revolutionary outpost of Fort McIntosh, a defensive work
against the Indians. All about is a region of coal and gas, extending
across the boundary into the Mahoning district of Ohio, the Mahoning
River being an affluent of the Beaver. Numerous railroads serve its
many towns of furnaces and forges. To the southward is Steubenville on
the Ohio, and to the northward Youngstown on the Mahoning, both busy
manufacturing centres. Salem and Alliance are also prominent, and some
distance northwest is Canton, a city of thirty thousand people, in a
fertile grain district, the home of President William McKinley.
Massillon, upon the pleasant Tuscarawas River, in one of the most
productive Ohio coal-fields, preserves the memory of the noted French
missionary priest, Jean Baptiste Massillon, for all this region was
first traversed, and opened to civilization, by the French religious
explorers from Canada who went out to convert the Indians.
In the centre of the State of Ohio is the capital, Columbus, built on
the banks of the Scioto River, a tributary of the Ohio flowing
southward and two hundred miles long. This river receives the
Olentangy or Whetstone River at Columbus, in a region of great
fertility, which is in fact the characteristic of the whole Scioto
Valley. The Ohio capital, which has a population of one hundred and
twenty thousand, large commerce and many important manufacturing
establishments, dates from 1812, and became the seat of the State
Government in 1816. The large expenditures of public money upon
numerous public institutions, all having fine buildings, the wide,
tree-shaded streets, and the many attractive residences, have made it
one of the finest cities in the United States. Broad Street, one
hundred and twenty feet wide, beautifully shaded with maples and elms,
extends for seven miles. The Capitol occupies a large park surrounded
with elms, and is an impressive Doric building of gray limestone,
three hundred and four feet long and one hundred and eighty-four feet
wide, the rotunda being one hundred and fifty-seven feet high. There
are fine parks on the north, south and east of the city, the latter
containing the spacious grounds of the Agricultural Society. Almost
all the Ohio State buildings, devoted to its benevolence, justice or
business, have been concentrated in Columbus, adding to its
attractions, and it is also the seat of the Ohio State University with
one thousand students. Railroads radiate in all directions, adding to
its commercial importance.
In going westward, the region we are traversing beyond the
Pennsylvania boundary gradually changes from coal and iron to a rich
agricultural section. As we move away from the influence of the
Allegheny ranges, the hills become gentler, and the rolling surface is
more and more subdued, until it is smoothed out into an almost level
prairie, heavily timbered where not yet cleared for cultivation. This
was the Northwest Territory, first explored by the French, who were
led by the Sieur de la Salle in his original discoveries in the
seventeenth century. The French held it until the conquest of Canada,
when that Dominion and the whole country west to the Mississippi River
came under the British flag by the treaty of 1763. After the
Revolution, the various older Atlantic seaboard States claiming the
region, ceded sovereignty to the United States Government, and then
its history was chequered by Indian wars until General Wayne conducted
an expedition against the Miamis and defeated them in 1794, after
which the Northwest Territory was organized, and the State of Ohio
taken out of it and admitted to the Union in 1803, its first capital
being Chillicothe. It was removed to Zanesville for a couple of years,
but finally located at Columbus.
Beyond the Scioto the watershed is crossed, by which the waters of the
Ohio are left behind and the valley of Sandusky River is reached, a
tributary of Lake Erie. Here is Bucyrus, in another prolific natural
gas region, the centre of which is Findlay. At this town, in 1887, the
inhabitants, who had then had just one year of natural gas
development, spent three days in exuberant festivity, to show their
appreciation of the wonderful discovery. They had thirty-one gas wells
pouring out ninety millions of cubic feet in a day, all piped into
town and feeding thirty thousand glaring natural gas torches of
enormous power, which blew their roaring flames as an accompaniment to
the oratory of John Sherman and Joseph B. Foraker, who were then
respectively Senator and Governor of Ohio. The soldiers and firemen
paraded, and a multitude of brass bands tried to drown the Niagara of
gas which was heard roaring five miles away, while the country at
night was illuminated for twenty miles around. But the wells have
since diminished their flow, although the gas still exists; while
another field with a prolific yield is in Fairfield County, a short
distance southeast of Columbus. Over the State boundary in Indiana is
yet another great gas-field covering five thousand square miles in a
dozen counties, with probably two thousand wells and a yield which has
reached three thousand millions of cubic feet in a day. This gas
supplies many cities and towns, including Chicago, and it is one of
the greatest gas-fields known. In the same region there are also large
petroleum deposits.
Not far beyond the State boundary is Fort Wayne, the leading city of
Northern Indiana, having forty thousand population, an important
railway centre, and prominent also in manufactures. It stands in a
fertile agricultural district, and being located at the highest part
of the gentle elevation, beyond the Sandusky Valley, diverting the
waters east and west, it is appropriately called the "Summit City."
Here the Maumee River is formed by the confluence of the two streams
St. Joseph and St. Mary, and flows through the prairie towards the
northeast, to make the head of Lake Erie. The French, under La Salle,
in the eighteenth century established a fur-trading post here, and
erected Fort Miami, and in 1760 the British penetrated to this then
remote region and also built a fort. During the Revolution this
country was abandoned to the Indians, but when General Wayne defeated
the Miamis in 1794 he thought the place would make a good frontier
outpost to hold the savages in check, and he then constructed a strong
work, to which he gave the name of Fort Wayne. Around this post the
town afterwards grew, being greatly prospered by the Wabash and Erie
Canal, and by the various railways subsequently constructed in all
directions. All this prairie region was the hunting-ground of the
Miamis, whose domain extended westward to Lake Michigan, and southward
along the valley of the Miami River to the Ohio. They were a warlike
and powerful tribe, and their adherence to the English during the
Revolution provoked almost constant hostilities with the settlers who
afterwards came across the mountains to colonize the Northwest
Territory. Under the leadership of their renowned chief
Mishekonequah, or the "Little Turtle," they defeated repeated
expeditions sent against them, until finally beaten by Wayne.
Subsequently they dwindled in importance, and when removed farther
west, about 1848, they numbered barely two hundred and fifty persons.