Charles Cross, Mayor of Sandusky 1853-56

Charles Cross was born in England in 1812. In July 1830 he, along with Dr. I. B. Ward and several other families, sailed on the packet ship Hudson from Portsmouth, England to New York. Dr .Ward went on to settle in Zanesville, but Charles Cross remained in Sandusky.

On St. Patrick’s Day in 1844 Mr. Cross was on a committee which promoted celebrating the holiday according to the principles of temperance. He was very active in the Roman Catholic Church in Sandusky. In 1853, he was elected Mayor of Sandusky, and served through 1856.  He also served as councilman, city clerk, secretary of the Board of Water Works, and Justice of the Peace. In 1874 he was the magistrate for two cases involving Rush Sloane, another Sandusky Mayor.

Mr. Cross had been widowed while a young man. One son, also named Charles Cross, became a photographer in Sandusky.

His grandson, Nicholas Charles Cross, became “Brother Sulpicius” in the Xaverian Order of the Catholic Church, having started out as a catechist at Sandusky’s Holy Angels parish.

On November 18, 1889, Charles Cross, Sr. died suddenly from heart disease. His obituary in the Sandusky Daily Register stated that “it can truthfully be said that he did not rob the public nor use office to multiply fees and increase the burden of taxes.”  He was interred in St. Joseph’s Cemetery.

To read more about Charles Cross’s trip to America, see the article “An English Colony” by Hudson C. Ward in the Sandusky Daily Register of December 3, 1889, on microfilm in the Archives Research Center of the Sandusky Library, or via the Newspaper Archive online database, available through the library's website.

Convention of the Erie County Women’s Christian Temperance Union in Sandusky

The ninth annual convention of the Erie County Women’s Christian Temperance Union was held on Wednesday, September 20, 1916 at the Congregational Church in Sandusky, Ohio.

The book, History of Erie County, edited by Lewis Cass Aldrich, states that a number of well known ladies of Sandusky met to organize a temperance league in 1879. Their object of the society was: “combating intemperance and kindred vices through Christian influences and Christian work.” By 1928, there were several area groups of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union in the various communities of Erie County, which were under the leadership of a Union Board.

Mrs. Imogene Dauch, sister in law of J. J. Dauch, was active in the W.C.T.U. from 1911 through the 1930’s, often serving as an officer of the West Huron chapter. Mrs. Dauch was the Erie County delegate to the Ohio W.C.T.U. Convention in 1929, held at Findlay. At the local convention of the Erie County W.C.T.U. in 1916, she opened the convention with prayer and Bible reading, and gave a welcoming address as well as the annual President’s message. Mrs. Dauch’s daughter, Cynthia Aulda Dauch presented a piano solo to the attendees. Cynthia A. Dauch would later become the executive director of the Visiting Nurse Association of Los Angeles. Imogene Dauch died in Sandusky in 1975 at the age of 92. Besides her work in the W.C.T.U., Mrs. Dauch was also a member of Trinity United Methodist Church, the Daughters of 1812, the National Order of the Daughters of the American Revolution, and the Huron Grange.

To read more about temperance activities in Sandusky, see this previous blog posting.

Convention of the Erie County Women’s Christian Temperance Union in Sandusky

The ninth annual convention of the Erie County Women’s Christian Temperance Union was held on Wednesday, September 20, 1916 at the Congregational Church in Sandusky, Ohio.

The History of Erie County (1889), edited by Lewis Cass Aldrich, states that a number of well known ladies of Sandusky met to organize a temperance league in 1879. Their object of the society was: “combating intemperance and kindred vices through Christian influences and Christian work.”  By 1928, during the Prohibition era, there were several area groups of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union in the various communities of Erie County, which were under the leadership of a Union Board.

Mrs. Imogene Dauch, sister in law of J. J. Dauch, was active in the W.C.T.U. from 1911 through the 1930s, often serving as an officer of the West Huron chapter. She was the Erie County delegate to the Ohio W.C.T.U. Convention in 1929, held at Findlay. At the local convention of the Erie County W.C.T.U. in 1916, Mrs. Dauch opened the convention with prayer and Bible reading, and gave a welcoming address as well as the annual President’s message. Her daughter, Cynthia Aulda Dauch presented a piano solo to the attendees. Cynthia A. Dauch would later become the executive director of the Visiting Nurse Association of Los Angeles. 

Imogene Dauch died in Sandusky in 1975 at the age of 92. Besides her work in the W.C.T.U., she was also a member of Trinity United Methodist Church, the Daughters of 1812, the National Order of the Daughters of the American Revolution, and the Huron Grange.

To read more about temperance activities in Sandusky, see this previous blog post.

Hewson L. Peeke, Lawyer and Author

Hewson Lindsley Peeke was born on April 21, 1861 in South Bend, Indiana to the Reverend George Hewson and Margaret Bloodgood Peeke. He graduated from Williams College in Massachusetts.

After teaching school in Illinois, he moved west to the Dakota territory where he was admitted to the bar in 1883. In about 1885, when his father was assigned as Pastor of the Congregational Church in Sandusky, he moved to Sandusky as well.

After being admitted to the Ohio Bar, he practiced law in Sandusky for many years. His obituary, in the 1942 Obituary Notebook (in the Sandusky Library), stated that he was known as the “dean of the County Bar Association” in Erie County. Mr. Peeke was admitted to the United States District Court in 1895; U.S. Court of Appeals in 1905; and to the Supreme Court of the United States in 1918. 

In 1902 and 1906, he ran unsuccessfully for Representative of the 13^th District, under the Prohibition ticket. He was a staunch follower of the old Prohibition Party, following the motto “The Wets Cannot Win.”

Local history was a favorite topic of his. He was the author of two histories of Erie County, A Standard History of Erie County, Ohio, published in 1916, and The Centennial History of Erie County, published in 1925. He also wrote Stories of Sandusky, which most people consider to be fictionalized accounts of people and incidents in Sandusky, Ohio. Mr. Peeke also served as the President of the Firelands Historical Society for a number of years.

An important issue in the life of Hewson L. Peeke was the idea of Temperance. He wrote a comprehensive study of the history of drunkenness in 1917, entitled:  Americana Ebrietatis: The Favorite Tipple of Our Forefathers and the Laws and Customs Relating Thereto. George Sargent, an editor from the Boston Evening Transcript newspaper praised Peeke’s book. He wrote in an article, which was reprinted in the November 20, 1917 Sandusky Register, that Peeke was “as impartial as the apostles in dealing with this subject and leaves his witnesses to be examined and cross-examined by either side. The collection of material which he has gathered gives a history of drunkenness and drinking customs in America, and while it is not the only one in the country, it is probably the finest in existence in private hands.” A copy of this unique title is in the Local Authors Collection of the Archives Research Center of the Sandusky Library.

Hewson L. Peeke died on February 17, 1942. His funeral was held at the First Congregational Church, and he was buried at Oakland Cemetery. The entire local bar association attended the rites, and the active pallbearers were: Judge E. H. Savord, Judge W. L. Fiesinger, and Attorneys Earl Webster, C.E. Moyer, James Flynn and Wilbert Schwer.

Hewson L. Peeke, Lawyer and Author

Hewson Lindsley Peeke was born on April 21, 1861 in South Bend, Indiana to George Hewson and Margaret Bloodgood Peeke. He graduated from Williams College in Massachusetts.

After teaching school in Illinois, Hewson Peeke moved west to the Dakota Territory where he was admitted to the bar in 1883. In about 1885, when his father, the Rev. George H. Peeke was assigned as Pastor of the Congregational Church in Sandusky, Hewson Peeke moved to Sandusky as well.

Hewson Peeke was admitted to the Ohio Bar, and practiced law in Sandusky for many years. His obituary, in the 1942 Obituary Notebook, stated that he was known as the “dean of the County Bar Association” in Erie County. Mr. Peeke was admitted to the United States District Court in 1895; U.S. Court of Appeals in 1905; and to the Supreme Court of the United States in 1918. In 1902 and 1906, Hewson L. Peeke ran unsuccessfully for Representative of the 13th District, under the Prohibition ticket. He was a staunch follower of the old Prohibition Party, following the motto “The Wets Cannot Win.”

Local history was a favorite topic of Hewson Peeke. He was the author of two histories of Erie County, A Standard History of Erie County, Ohio, published in 1916, and The Centennial History of Erie County, published in 1925. Another book he wrote was Stories of Sandusky, which many consider to be fictionalized accounts of people and incidents in Sandusky, Ohio. Mr. Peeke also served as the President of the Firelands Historical Society for several years.

Peeke wrote acomprehensive study of the history of drunkenness in 1917, Americana Ebrietatis: The Favorite Tipple of Our Forefathers and the Laws and Customs Relating Thereto. George Sargent, an editor from the Boston Evening Transcript praised Peeke’s book. He wrote in an article which was reprinted in the November 20, 1917 Sandusky Register that Hewson L. Peeke was “as impartial as the apostles in dealing with this subject and leaves his witnesses to be examined and cross-examined by either side. The collection of material which he has gathered gives a history of drunkenness and drinking customs in America, and while it is not the only one in the country, it is probably the finest in existence in private hands.” A copy of this unique title is found in the Local Authors Collection of the Archives Research Center of the Sandusky Library.

Hewson L. Peeke died on February 17, 1942. His funeral was held at the First Congregational Church, and he was buried at Oakland Cemetery. The entire local bar association attended the rites, and the active pallbearers were: Judge E. H. Savord, Judge W. L. Fiesinger, and Attorneys Earl Webster, C.E. Moyer, James Flynn and Wilbert Schwer.

Mandolin Clubs in Sandusky

An article in the December 2, 1920 issue of the Sandusky Star Journal reported that Mr. H.L. McCullough, a math instructor at Sandusky High School, had recently established two Mandolin Clubs. Club members varied through the years, and included both adults and high school aged students. Pictured in the musical group above are: Carroll Post, mandolin; Verna Murphy, mandolin; Ella Aust, mandolin; Edwin Aust, guitar; and Mr. H.L. McCullough, guitar. In the early 1920s, members of the Mandolin Clubs provided musical entertainment for school events, church services, and for meetings of several area civic organizations. On February of 1921 a quartet from the Mandolin Club performed at a W.C.T.U. meeting in honor of the memory of Francis Willard, a well known temperance leader who had died on February 17, 1898. Live musical entertainment was an important part of the social life of Americans in the nineteenth century and early twentieth century.

Constitution and By-Laws of the Cadets of Temperance

The Neptune Section, No. 45 of the Cadets of Temperance of the State of Ohio was organized in Sandusky, Ohio on January 20, 1848. The constitution and by-laws of the Cadets of Temperance were printed by D. Campbell & Sons, located at Water Street in Sandusky. The Cadets of Temperance was a youth organization associated with the Sons of Temperance. Hewson Peeke wrote in the book, A Standard History of Erie County, that the Sons of Temperance group was active in Sandusky as early as 1844. They had their meetings in the Hubbard Block at the foot of Columbus Avenue in downtown Sandusky (shown here circa 1850).

Article II of the Constitution of the Cadets of Temperance read:

No member shall make, buy, sell, or use any spirituous or malt liquors, wine or cider, except they be administered to him for medicinal purposes, by his parents, guardian, or physician; nor shall he use tobacco in any form.

The Rules of Order were quite strict:

The leader of the Neptune Section of the Cadets of Temperance was to be a member of the Sons of Temperance, and he was known as the Worthy Patron. The Cadets were to be young men between the ages of ten and seventeen years of age. However, boys of other ages and young ladies were allowed to be elected to honorary membership. In an 1867 letter, Mark Twain wrote that he once joined the Cadets of Temperance, but left after only three months of membership. (He liked the scarves they wore, but not their strict morality!)

In 1849 a meeting was held at the Congregational Church for the purpose of organizing a Temperance League for the ladies of Sandusky. There were nineteen women who were active members, and five women who were supporting members. Later their group became a chapter of the W.C.T.U., the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. To learn more about the history of temperance activities in Sandusky, see chapter 26 of A Standard History of Erie County, by Hewson L. Peeke.

“Bells of Victory” Temperance Songs

The Good Templars had a lodge in Bloomingville, Ohio in the late 1800’s. The International Organisation of Good Templars was founded in the nineteenth century as a fraternal organization which promoted temperance. The Bloomingville Lodge was Number 156.

The Sandusky Register reported on December 11, 1894 that the Good Templars of Bloomingville were to hold a “Conundrum Supper” on December 13. A prize was to be awarded to the person who gave the correct answers to three conundrums.

“Bells of Victory” was a songbook written by J. H. Tenney and E. A. Hoffman. Here is a song from the “Bells of Victory” songbook:

Father Joseph P. Machebeuf, Pioneer Priest

Joseph Projectus Machebeuf was born in France on August 11, 1812. A history of the Holy Angels Church, published in 1976, states that Father Machebeuf was ordained by the Bishop of Clermont, France in December of 1836. After hearing an address by Bishop J. B. Purcell, Father Machebeuf and Father J. P. Lamy followed the call to serve in the Catholic churches of the United States. Father Machebeuf served as a missionary to Catholics in the Northern Ohio area. He began his duties in Sandusky on January 1, 1840, and he is considered the founder of Sandusky’s Holy Angels Church. Mathilda Cassidy, born October 28, 1840, was the first infant baptized by Father Machebeuf. During the first half of 1841, Father Machebeuf had participated in three First Communions, three marriages, twenty confirmations and he had one hundred ten communicants on Easter Sunday. The cornerstone for Holy Angels Church was laid on October 13, 1841, and the church was completed in 1845.
Hewson Peeke wrote in his 1916 edition of A Standard History of Erie County, Ohio, that during the Cholera epidemic of 1840, Father Machebeuf secured a home to be used as a children’s home for the children left orphans during the epidemic. Catherine Bissonette, from La Prairie, Sandusky County was the matron of this home. The 1850 Census for Erie County, Ohio lists a “Projectus Maschbuff,” along with a female named Mary, an adult male, and four children named John Sheibley, Fanny Mahoney, and Barney and James McCormick residing on the west side of Sandusky. An article on the February 22, 1883 Sandusky Register gives an account of Father Machebeuf’s strong teachings on temperance. When Father Machebeuf would hear of one of his parishioners “getting on a spree and neglecting to support his family, he used to arm himself with a rawhide and finding the chap in a saloon, he could then and there draw forth the rawhide and give him a sound flogging. It is said he was never resisted and that the priest’s unique temperance lecture was in more than one case effectual.”

In 1850 Father Machebeuf left Sandusky for the western United States. He worked as a missionary priest in New Mexico and Colorado, and he was appointed Bishop of Denver on August 16, 1868. Willa Cather based the character of Father Joseph Vaillant in her 1927 book Death Comes to the Archbishop on the life of Father Joseph P. Machebeuf. Mount Machebeuf was named after Father Machebeuf, and Bishop Machebeuf School is considered a top school in Denver, Colorado.

Two biographies of Father Joseph Machebeuf are found in the genealogy collections of the Sandusky Library: Life of the Right Reverend Joseph P. Machebeuf, by Rev. W. J. Howlett, and Death's Deceiver, by Lynn Bridgers. Father Joseph P. Machebeuf died on July 10, 1889, and he is buried in Mount Olivet Cemetery in Jefferson County, Colorado.

Temperance Activities in Early Sandusky

According to an early Western Reserve Historical Society Tract (in 1888), the first temperance society in Huron County was organized by F. D. Parish in 1831. (Sandusky was located in Huron County until the creation of Erie County in 1838.)

Hewson L. Peeke’s History of Erie County contains an entire chapter devoted to temperance activities in Erie County. He states that in the 1840s the “Sons of Temperance” and the “Washingtonian Total Abstinence Society” were both organizations that were opposed to the use or manufacturing of intoxicating beverages.

A joint parade was celebrated on St. Patrick’s Day in 1844 by the local members of the “Sons of the Emerald Isle” and the “Washingtonian Total Abstinence Society,” followed by a dinner at the Mansion House. On June 10, 1847, the Sons of Temperance had a parade in Sandusky, with members coming from Sandusky, Castalia, Mansfield, Mount Vernon, Tiffin, and Republic. An estimated 300 members marched in the parade.

On the night of August 7, 1849, a meeting was held at the Congregational Church for the purpose of organizing a Temperance League. There were nineteen women who were active members, and five women who were supporting members. Later their group became a chapter of the W.C.T.U., the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. (The opening page of their book of minutes from 1879 is shown above.) The women gathered regularly to pray, sing, and make plans on how to spread the message of temperance throughout all sections of the community.

Mrs. M.F. Cowdery (above) was a founding member of the Temperance League in Sandusky. (This portrait shows her, circa 1895, when she was a founding member of the organization that eventually became the Library Association of Sandusky.)

Ohioans were very involved in the temperance movement in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. There is a museum devoted to the Anti-Saloon League (whose origin is traced to Oberlin in 1893) at the Westerville Public Library.