The Columbus Dispatch

Stagecoach­es open Ohio to commerce, travel

- As It Were

It was a turbulent time. Between 1815 and 1865, America grew at a ferocious pace. President Thomas Jefferson always argued that government should be small and humble. He then proceeded to double the size of the United States with the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. Then, his successor James Madison yielded to the claims of Warhawks like Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun that war with Britain was inevitable and Canada was ours to take.

The War of 1812 proved Clay and Calhoun wrong. Canada remained in British hands. But Clay and Calhoun took pride in noting that America’s “west” was now free of British traders and most of the American Indians who once lived in Ohio.

This was true as far as it went. And soon it only meant there was something of a “land rush” as settlers poured over the mountains to the rich and cheap land to be found in Ohio. It was a time of rapid change with Columbus created in 1812 to be a new capital city in the heart of the state.

But new residents soon learned that while the land was rich and productive of huge amounts of “hogs and hay,” it was very difficult to get from place to place in a land with few roads of any kind.

To meet the needs of hard-pressed travelers, the new state soon became home to entreprene­urs of transit. As early as 1814, U.S. Rep. James Kilbourn announced that certain “post roads” had been establishe­d to carry mail through the state. But this was carriage by horsemen — often young boys — and was not public transit by any means.

A later history of central Ohio noted a

major change: “The distinctio­n of providing the first wheeled transport and mail service through Columbus belongs to Philip Zinn, a native of York County, Pennsylvan­ia, who came to Ohio in 1803.

Before quitting his native state, Mr. Zinn had conducted one of the ‘mountain ships’ by which produce and goods were exchanged across the Alleghenie­s.”

In short order, some other residents of the capital city saw the emergence of wheeled transport as a way to make some money. Among them was William Neil, who arrived in Columbus in 1818. He came to Urbana in 1815 with his

young wife Hannah to establish a bank. That did not work, and he came to Columbus. He built a sizeable log tavern across from the main entrance to the Statehouse. Leaving his wife Hannah with the tavern, he went into the stagecoach business.

In 1822, Neil joined with former Columbus Mayor Jarvis Pike and bought out Zinn to go into the stagecoach trade. Along the way he joined with stagecoach operator Henry Moore of Wheeling and soon was using a variety of tactics — some ethical, some not — to build his business. He was eminently successful. By 1840, if you boarded a stage to go anywhere north and west of the

Ohio River, you could be sure that at least part of your fare went to William Neil. He soon became known as “The Old Stage King.” His 300-acre farm 3.3 miles due north of Columbus would one day become the home of The Ohio State University.

The golden age of the stagecoach in central Ohio was from 1830 with better roads to 1860 with the arrival of railroads. In 1885, a young writer named Lida Rose Mccabe wrote a small book called “Don’t You Remember” with an account of a stage coming into Columbus. Since she was only 18 at the time, this account was a bit of a creation. But it did describe an early era.

“As the capital drew near, our restlessne­ss and impatience became intolerabl­e; and when a coach came up beside us, Beecher called out to the drivers, who were engaged in conversati­on, ‘Let us try your mettle boys. We will make up a purse for the man who first enters the town. … Crack! Crack! went the whips — away we dashed. … The mud flew in great heaps, and louder and louder lashed the whips, while the drivers fairly shrieked as they urged their foaming horses to greater speed. Soon the fine farms bordering the Scioto were lost in the distance, and in a shorter time that it takes to tell you, we galloped into the bustling town of Columbus. Reining up at the old National Hotel, on the present site of the Neil House, the wager was unanimousl­y awarded to ‘Yankee’ Cook.”

William Neil and his partners sold their stagecoach lines in the 1840s to stage companies in Iowa and put their profits into railroads. Lida Rose was born in 1865 and did not live through the adventures she described, but she knew people who did. She told their story and soon would tell others as well. In 1898, she became the first female reporter to tell her story directly from the Klondike Gold Rush. She told many others until her death in 1938 in New York. Some of her best stories were those early ones of early days in the town where she was born.

 ?? LIBRARY OF CONGRESS ?? This 1880 lithograph from the Krebs Co. of Cincinnati shows a stagecoach crossing a bridge.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS This 1880 lithograph from the Krebs Co. of Cincinnati shows a stagecoach crossing a bridge.
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 ?? ?? Mccabe
Mccabe

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