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- : - : - : - : - : - : - : - : - : - : - : - : - : - A HARVEST OF PRIDE AND PROMISE By Charles N. Lindquist Copyright 1990 (Note: The following is excerpted from the above book. Links to city web sites are included.) THE EARLY SETTLEMENTS: TECUMSEH The first settlement in Lenawee County was Tecumseh. A surveyor, Evans came to the county in 1823 to look the land over. Evans noticed a substantial flow of water where now Evans Creek flows into River Raisin. He knew the first settlers would need a sawmill and then a gristmill, and he thought a mill could be built there. Austin Wing, a lawyer, was a cousin to Evan's wife. Wing drew up papers for the partnership of Wing, Evans and Brown, and began to buy land suggested by Evans. Evans idea was to bring settlers from New York to what became Tecumseh. There were about 20 people in the first group of settlers, including Ezra Blood, George Spafford, and the Turner Stetsons. Stetson was a blacksmith which made him especially useful to this pioneer community. By the end of 1824 there were about 50 people in this Tecumseh group. While Evans platted the village, naming it after the noted Shawnee warrior, Tecumseh, General Joseph Brown (1793-1880) had an interview with Governor Cass in Detroit during which he argued for Tecumseh's becoming the county seat. Other (people) worked on roads, houses, a dam, and a sawmill located up by the Fall (along with rough-log schoolhouse in which Mary Spafford taught school that first winter). The next year the settlers began to build a gristmill, and plowed and planted the few acres they had cleared the previous year. On the Fourth of July 1826, the villagers held a great celebration featuring plenty of gunpowder and a French fiddler from Monroe. About this time Captain Merritt of Tecumseh was asked where he lived. "Tecumseh," he said. "Where is that," he was asked. "It is thirty miles from Monroe and forty miles beyond God's Blessing," was the answer. Through constant effort, Tecumseh continued to grow. By 1830 the population of Tecumseh Township stood at 771, about the same as that of the other two townships, in Lenawee, Logan (in which Adrian was located) and Blissfield. City of Tecumseh website BLISSFIELD The second community founded in Lenawee was Blissfield. Harvey Bliss and family … had been living ten miles up the Raisin River from Monroe since 1819, and trekking another 20 miles upsteam did not deter them even though the land they took up had extensive swamps to the south and east. Also, the forests along the river were almost impenetrable all the way to Petersburg. Natural obstacles were severe, though, and growth was slow. By 1830 only 150 lived in this entire eastern and southeastern part of the county. Even so, a schoolhouse went up in 1827, and the Methodists and Presbyterians were holding religious services in members homes by the same year. In addition, Mrs. Giles was a fine nurse and doctor, supplying medical assistance to the entire area from Adrian to Petersburg for 14 years. Village of Blissfield Web Site ADRIAN Adrian was the third community to be settled. It came along in 1826 thanks to 23-yesr old Addison Comstock. In 1825 Comstock bought 640 acres where Adrian now stands, with the goal of developing the land into a profitable community. Comstock built a sawmill by 1826 and by 1829 he and his father-in-law, Isaac Deane, had built a gristmill. In 1828 Comstock laid out and platted the village, called Adrian by his wife, Sarah, in honor of the Roman emperor Hadrian. Comstock was helped considerably in all his efforts by his father, Darius, who had come to Lenawee in 1825 and had settled about four miles north of Adrian along Valley Road. City of Adrian Web Site LENAWEE COUNTY: By 1830 Lenawee was off to a good start, with a population of more than 1,400 and a number of able leaders. The county acquired the name "Lenawee" in 1822. Lewis Cass, the territorial governor, was responsible for the name, which came from the Shawnee word Lenawai. To the Shawnee, the word meant "men" or "the people." Cass probably used it as a way of showing interest and respect for one of the tribes the whites were supplanting in the Old Northwest. In the 1830s the county grew even faster. By 1834 the population was up to 7,911. Three years later it had grown to 14,878, and still they came. By 1840 Lenawee had a population of 17,889, making it the fourth largest county in the state. Only Wayne, Washtenaw, and Oakland counties were larger. Although roads were important to the development of the County, the Comstocks and others used the opening (of the Erie and Kalamazoo Railroad, from Toledo, Ohio to the navigable waters of the Kalamazoo River) to get the state legislature to move the county seat from Tecumseh to Adrian in 1837. Tecumseh might be the fourth largest city in the state, but Adrian was already sixth and getting its steam up. Ohio refused to allow Michigan to become a state until the boundary line between the two, running almost 70 miles from Maumee Bay west to the Indiana border, was settled to Ohio's satisfaction. This led to The Toledo War of 1835 in which Joseph Brown, of Lenawee County, played a major role. |
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