Ohio History Journal

LOCAL HISTORY-FOUNDATION OF OUR FAITH IN

DEMOCRACY*

 

by S. K. STEVENS

State Historian, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

It is not merely a pleasure but a genuine honor to be with you

this evening at the capital of the first great state to be carved out of

the Northwest Territory with its government framed in accordance

with the principles of that outstanding charter of liberties-the

Northwest Ordinance. Ohio has come a long way since 1803 when

its state government was launched in a tiny stone capitol building

in Chillicothe. We are all looking forward eagerly to the cele-

bration in 1953 of your sesquicentennial of statehood.

I feel an especial pleasure in addressing the annual meeting of

your vigorous and forward looking state historical society, because

there are many connections between the history of Ohio and that

of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As a matter of fact, for

many decades in the earliest history of American frontier expansion

our history virtually was inseparable. For at least half a century-

from about 1750 to 1800--the story of Pennsylvania in its growth

west of the Alleghenies is as much a story of the Ohio country

as it is the history of Pennsylvania as we know it today within

present geographical limitations. Virtually all of our dispossessed

Indians took refuge in what is now Ohio, and remained for many

years most unpleasant visitors whenever they returned to Penn-

sylvania. Our gentle Moravian missionaries carried from far away

Bethlehem in Pennsylvania the message of Christianity to the

Indians in the vast reaches of the Ohio country long before the

coming of the settler.

In the days of the later frontier there were Pennsylvanians of

another type who came to Ohio. One was Arthur St. Clair, who

left in something of a hurry the second time he passed through

Ohio, but lived to return another day as governor of the entire

*This is the text of an address delivered at the sixty-sixth annual meeting of the

Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, held at the Ohio State Museum,

Columbus, April 27, 1951.

221

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Northwest. Not long after that a small caravan of covered wagons

wound its slow and arduous way across the entire length of Penn-

sylvania from the Delaware at Easton to West Newton on the

Youghiogheny in Westmoreland County. Here the caravan halted

in the late fall of 1787 and built the boats which floated the convoy

of settlers, mainly New Englanders, down the Ohio to Marietta.

There they landed in the early spring of 1788. That was the be-

ginning of permanent white settlement in Ohio.

But peace had not settled upon that new frontier. In October

1793 one of Pennsylvania's more irascible generals, "Mad Anthony"

Wayne, moved the "Legion of the United States," into winter

quarters at the site of Greenville in the Ohio wilderness. There he

trained his men in the not gentle arts of Indian warfare, and in the

spring of 1794 set forth to destroy the power of the remaining

Indians of the Northwest. This he did with care and finality, and

a Pennsylvania general had brought peace to Ohio. Peace now

reigned all the way from the Genesee country to the Mississippi,

and settlers could move into the new American West.

Settlers meant new institutions of government, and in April 1802

the enabling act was passed by congress which permitted the or-

ganization of Ohio as a state. Thirty-five men met, at long last, at

Chillicothe to frame a state constitution for Ohio. Eight of these

men appear to have been Pennsylvanians, and there were about an

equal number from Virginia and from New England. These gentle-

men drew up one of the shorter state constitutions on record. At

least some of its features appear to have been borrowed from the

Pennsylvania constitution of 1790, especially those relating to the

judiciary. In scanning recently the pages of The History of the State

of Ohio, I note that Pennsylvania's contributions were not always

on the side of the law. It is pointed out by Dr. William T. Utter

that Pennsylvania appears to have been second only to Virginia in

furnishing residents for your first state penitentiary at Columbus.

There are many other places at which Pennsylvania history touches

that of Ohio but time forbids their recital.

I have yet a third reason for feeling a glow of pleasure at being

here this evening. It is the most basic of all the reasons. I am glad

to be here because I think that all of us are interested in a great

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and common cause. That cause is the cause of local history and

its use to enlighten and to inspire our people. Never before was

there a time when America needed more to draw upon the great

reservoir of understanding, inspiration, and soundly based idealism

which can result from a knowledge of the history of this nation.

I want to keep everything I say about this subject upon a highly

practical level. I could quote for you, from some of our greatest

statesmen and orators of the past, moving and high sounding state-

ments about the value of history. We have had plenty of philosophy

about the meaning and value of history, but we have had too little

action and accomplishment.

I may be wrong, but it seems to me that as a nation we need

today something to which we can anchor our faith in America. As

a people we are given to hysteria and emotionalism in a period of

great crisis when we should be doing hard, sound thinking. I hardly

need mention the events of the last two weeks as an indication of

this peculiar emotional instability. It is so great as to become

frightening. When I pick up the paper and read that it appears,

on a basis of public opinion polls, that the single speech of a

deposed general of the army of the United States has completely

reversed the national thinking on vital matters of foreign policy,

which cannot safely be left to emotional reactions, I confess that

I am a bit disturbed. It is little wonder that our major European

allies openly express the feeling that they wish we would determine

policy with our minds and not our hearts.

On every side we hear discussion of the degree to which the moral

fiber of society, business, and government have deteriorated. On

every hand we witness evidence of government by pressure groups,

each seeking to forward its selfish policies at the expense of the

national interest as a whole. It would be difficult to say that the farm

interest, the labor interest, the business interest is the worst in this

respect. Even our teachers have fallen into the habit of lobbying

and mass sending of telegrams to influence public officials and

legislative bodies. I do not mean to criticize any group or any interest

for seeking to advance its cause, but it does seem to me that we

must somewhere draw a line between what is good for all the

people and what is the selfish interest of a few. If we examine the

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224    Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly

public utterances of our representatives in the congress of the United

States, how often can we say with honesty and sincerity that our

senator or our congressman is speaking in the interests of America

rather than in the interests of his own personal ambitions or the

buttering of the bread of some pressure group which he seeks to

conciliate.

In my humble opinion the true spirit of democracy was never

burning more feebly in our nation than it is today. We need a new

spirit of dedication to national unity. We need a new spirit of

dedication to the immortal philosophy of self-government which

Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg on a cold November 19th, four-

score and seven years ago, characterized as "government of the

people, by the people, for the people." But where are we going

to get that spirit? Are we going to get it from the lips and the

leadership of some strong man in a military uniform? Are we going

to get it from the lips and the leadership of some second Huey

Long--the demagog and professional patrioteer who inflames the

passions of the people and makes false promises?

I do not think we are going to get it-or at least we should not

get it--from any other source than from within ourselves as a

people. As a matter of fact, we cannot get it from any other source,

if we are to preserve even the semblance of "government of the

people, by the people, for the people." As a nation, we MUST under-

take a process of self-education and re-dedication to the principles

of our great American heritage as a free people. I can see no other

way in which we can hope to capture that vital spark of under-

standing, of appreciation, of veneration--if you please--of the

principles of democratic living. I think we must do it today, because

we are in the midst of a world in which our whole concept of

government, society, and general progress is at war with alien

ideologies which assume that the future of world civilization can

be built upon almost opposite principles. And what is even more

important, the entire body of thought which is opposed to ours is

being taught every day to millions of people. In my opinion we

have more to fear today from the fact that millions of people in

Russia and the satellite countries of Russia are being educated

in a new way of life than we do from their soldiers and weapons.

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I think we could win a battle of weapons because of our superiority

in technological and scientific skills. I am not at all sure that we

can win the war of ideas unless we achieve a miracle of re-dedication

of purpose and learn to live and to act as a people genuinely

believing in the art of democracy as a way of life. We need to

learn and to practice more of the mechanics of sound government

based upon the concept that government is truly "for the people,

by the people," and not for gamblers, racketeers, selfish farm, labor,

or industrial interests, or indeed any interest but that of all the

people. We need to learn and to practice more of the principles

of basic humanitarianism and social justice and to apply them to

the problems of our social democracy. In the world of business we

need to learn the art of cooperation and promotion of common

interests, avoiding cutthroat competition and rampant selfish in-

dividualism. Businessmen, farm leaders, and labor leaders need

education in the principle that democracy is not only government

of, for, and by the people but an integration of economic life and

interests. We can have an economy which is of, by, and for the

people's interest rather than one which is run on a basis of "grab

and take" by whatever interest seems to be the strongest at the

moment. We have great superiority in the skills needed to build and

operate machines of peace and war. We are badly in need of de-

veloping the vital skills which are essential to living in a modern

society and economy, and in operating a government which expresses

the true interests of all the people.

Achieving this is essentially a problem of education, and that

cannot be denied. That is why the writers of modern textbooks in

the social sciences for use in our public schools are placing such

great emphasis upon teaching those things which express the essence

of good citizenship and people living together in harmony and a

spirit of mutual interests. However, back of all our efforts there

should lie a larger use of our American history as a means for

acquiring a deeper and more appreciative understanding of just

what America IS. I hasten to emphasize that by this statement I

do not mean that we need to use history to glorify the past in

terms of any narrow concepts, as is the philosophy of many of our

so-called patriotic societies. Nor do we need to use it to confirm the

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226     Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly

shibboleths of "free enterprise," "rugged individualism," and the

like, though all of these principles and their true bearing upon

our American life would be revealed.

Those of us in the field of local history in particular, if we are

to make effective use of that history in this national effort at self-

education which I propose, need to adopt to the fullest the modern

concept of history as constituting the full story of the LIFE OF THE

PEOPLE. History is not simply past politics, or wars, or Indian

skirmishes and massacres. Our organizations must not exist to

perpetuate that narrow concept of history, but accept the full

definition of history as something which pertains to all activities

of the people and all our institutions and ideas. We need also to

cut completely loose from the flavor of antiquarianism and ancestor

worship which at one time characterized the field of local history.

This last is vitally important. The musty flavor once characteristic

of the whole field of local history still lingers in the minds of many

laymen. I am afraid that a majority of our average citizens and

our schoolmen think of state and local history in terms of dark and

musty museums, and records in the custody of forbidding per-

sonalities not at all anxious to be bothered by anyone who wished

to see or use them. They think of historical society activity in terms

of meetings, attended entirely by elderly persons, descended from

the first families, listening to an abomination called "papers," by

means of which the members tell each other from time to time

about the glories of their respective families.

Fortunately, this not not a true picture of modern local historical

society activity. There are, I am sorry to say, a few societies which

still retain the basic characteristics of the antiquarian and genealog-

ical fringe. There are many more which are alive to all the impli-

cations of the true nature of history and are developing effective

programs for its fullest possible use. Something is happening to

the entire field of local history in America. Local history is coming

to be understood as living history and possessing a dynamic, human

flavor which commands the attention of all people. Few state his-

torical societies are doing a better job of demonstrating the possi-

bilities inherent in a shift to a new and dynamic concept of local

history than your own Ohio State Archaeological and Historical

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Society. There are many ways in which such an organization today

reaches the people with a vital, forceful, living message about their

heritage as Americans. It is done through the printing of books

and pamphlets; through the preservation and development of

treasured historical shrines; the marking of historic sites; the crea-

tion of modern, living museums of history; the use of the great

media of public information such as the press, the radio, and

television; and in many other ways.

Now what can all of these things do to aid in the process of

establishing a new faith in our democracy? How can they contribute

to a broad education of the American people in the true meaning

of our institutions and ideals as a free people? I think the answer

lies in the proper understanding of a very elementary principle

well known today to most people in the field of teaching. The

principle is this: In order to interest anyone in anything it must be

brought to them in such a way that it is close to their personal

understanding and knowledge. It is the philosophy of John Dewey,

which rocked the entire world of education several decades ago,

that individuals learn through doing and that the educational

process should be part of the experience of living.

We have been teaching history in our schools and colleges for

generations with the pious hope it would contribute to citizenship

by enlarging the perspective of the individual and teach him the

fundamentals of the American story. Yet periodically someone

makes a survey and comes up with the startling conclusion that

the average product of our schools and colleges and the average

American simply knows nothing about America's history. Part of

this sad result has been due, no doubt, to the date and fact method

of teaching, which has made history very dull and dry. More of

it, I am convinced, is due to the effort to tell America's story in

terms of broad, sweeping generalizations and descriptions which

deal with America as a whole. After all, we are a huge country,

and when we try to do this it becomes terribly thin. The life blood

literally is squeezed out of history. It becomes something very

remote from the understanding and personal experience of the in-

dividual. In short, in our teaching of history we violate all of the

fundamental theories of the learning process.

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228    Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly

I am positive that the answer to the use of history as a means

of building what we might term a national morale or spirit lies

almost entirely in the local field. Let us explore this thought a little

more fully. The morale or spirit of a nation must be based upon

a state of mind. It includes a conscious sense of necessity of certain

united effort and sacrifice under certain conditions. The lack of this

sense seems to me to be a major matter of concern in this nation

at this moment. There are times when politics and like distractions

must be thrown out the window. There are times, and this is one

of them, when we need AMERICANS and not Republicans and

Democrats to develop and to carry into execution certain great

national decisions and policies.

Now in terms of our thinking as a people this national spirit

should include a conscious sense of the superiority of our basic

ideals and institutions as opposed to those with which we are in

conflict. This sense of superiority should not be based upon self-

glorification but upon a deep understanding of what freedom means

to us in terms of our heritage as a people. We are faced today

with certain serious problems. We are in an undeclared war which

promises no end. We face long years of crisis in world situations

on a truly global scale. Because we actually are not at war, the

stress and strain upon opinion and feeling is greater by far than

under actual conditions of war as in World War II. The pressure

of necessary governmental regulations affecting every man, woman,

and child is apt to increase. There will be increasing scarcity of

things common to our everyday lives, and there must be some re-

duction of our boasted American standards of living. There will

be an increasing and continued burden of taxation produced by the

so-called emergency. Furthermore, in the long struggle with com-

munism, there is no prospect that these strains will ease for many

years. They may easily last through our lifetime.

Our enemy has fixed purposes and a program of dictated regi-

mentation of the minds and actions of the millions under its control.

We must admit that our enemy believes consciously in the superiority

of its way of life and its objectives. We dismiss too lightly at times

as propaganda the statements of communist leadership. We are

dealing with people who have something of fanatical devotion

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Local History                     229

to their principles as they see them. It doesn't matter to them that

we do not see things the same way. But it should be a matter of

concern to us.

Our great problem is just how are we going to develop the same

will to triumph, the same faith in OUR CAUSE. What is our faith?

It can rest upon only one thing and that is a belief in the superiority

of the democratic ideal, which is the product of the last two cen-

turies of western European civilization and of which we stand as

the major product and most powerful custodian. It is on this faith

in our democratic ideals and institutions, resting upon fundamental

concepts of human freedom and individualism, that we must rest

our entire cause in the modern world. I think we need as a people

a considerable indoctrination in just what are the fundamentals

of the democratic way of life. Where can we better begin that

process than at the local level? Where better can we relate the

past, with its lessons, to the experience and the understanding of

our people? Edward Everett once said, "How is the spirit of a free

people to be formed and animated and cheered but out of the

storehouse of its historical recollections." That statement still holds

good.

It is to the history of our democracy that we must turn to under-

stand it sufficiently to animate and arouse our spirit as a people.

Somehow it must be made clear to Americans that the rights and

the privileges of our democratic way of life are not simply to be

taken for granted. They are in danger. We need a spirit of collective

action to defend them and to absorb the stresses and strains of the

present and the future, necessary to defend the free way of life on

a global front. We must grasp the fact that such things as free

public schools, freedom of worship, of expression, and opportunity

are not ours by accident but the product of long years of slow

struggle, leadership, sacrifice, and even death upon the part of

heroic men and women of past generations.

It is my belief we must start the process of rekindling the

American spirit right at the local level. In terms of the better

application of the fundamentals of political democracy, it begins

with the improvement of the government of our towns, our counties,

our cities, and our states. In terms of the use of our history as a way

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230     Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly

to animate the spirit of a free people, we need also to begin right

at home. We have our great national heroes, but there are Ohio

and Pennsylvania heroes. There are men and women who have

lived and worked to develop every institution and ideal which is

a part of our American heritage whose lives never made the

Dictionary of American Biography. But in terms of the contributions

they made to forwarding those ideals and institutions, they are no

less great. Inevitably, when the historian sketches in broad strokes

the picture of the American past, there are only major figures which

appear in the foreground. Back of them, some not appearing at

all in the picture, are thousands of men and women who lived no

less heroically and fruitfully in building the solid foundations of

our great heritage. Those lives are full of drama and accomplish-

ment. They are, if we know their story, a rich source of inspiration.

Knowledge of them can mean more to us as citizens of the states

and communities in which we live and in which they lived than the

lives of those who dominated the national scene.

So much for the realm of what we might term biographical his-

tory. In the more general field of history as the story of the growth

of institutions, ideas, and our general social, economic, and cultural

progress, the history of our American states and communities is

both universal and unique. Our local environment and history are

the mirror in which are reflected every aspect of our history as a

nation. Here are to be observed-and what is more important,

understood--the processes through which we built a nation out of

a wilderness. As a matter of fact, an adequate understanding of

our local and environmental historical backgrounds can advance

not only national understanding but also international understanding

as well. It is local history which shows in molecular detail the

processes of social growth and evolution. Just as the botanist

examines the cell structure of a plant to study its growth, so should

we approach the study of history as a means of understanding the

nation's heritage.

Using this approach to history, it is possible, through the medium

of local history, to use it as a powerful force in the molding of

a spirit of sound nationalism in America. Every democratic ideal

for which we are fighting today is embodied somewhere, someplace,

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Local History                    231

in the history of Ohio and its counties and towns. The story of

steady progress in evolving democratic processes of government, the

growth of culture, and the spirit of human freedom as expressed

in the rise of a free press, free schools, religious freedom, and the

spirit of free inquiry, along with the growth of free economic

enterprise, are all found in the same place.

In view of this situation, this is not a time to limit our activities

in the field of state and local history. It is rather a time to expand

them and to spend more time and funds on those projects which

bring history to the people. Rather than closing any single historical

shrine, we should redouble our efforts to preserve more of them

and to increase the usefulness of those which we have in order that

they may become living reminders of our heritage. Rather than

slowing our progress of research and publication, we need to expand

them, so that our people may become better acquainted with the

splendid traditions of our past. Rather than closing our historical

museums, we should open wider their doors and enrich their

exhibits. We need to make use, especially, of all the great channels

of modern education and communication of ideas to bring state

and local history directly to the children in our schools and to the

average citizen. Courses in the history of the respective states are

becoming popular, and I believe it is a good place to start building

a true understanding of history. Such courses need not be provincial

in the sense of glorification of the history of any one state. They

will not be that if we keep before us a realization that the true

purpose of state history is to portray more clearly the scope and

meaning of American democratic processes. Great state and local

anniversaries need to be taken advantage of to produce a great

outpouring of popular interest in the history of our states and

their subdivisions. The pageantry and color of such occasions are of

incalculable value.

There is evidence on every hand that the great majority of

Americans are more history minded today than ever before. It is

evident in the vogue of the historical novel, the historical motion

picture, the uses of history in advertising, in the newspaper and

magazine, and in radio. This interest can never be satisfied and

directed into the development of sound national feeling by using

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232    Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly

again and again the well-known national themes and characters

of our history. This latent interest can be made the basis for at-

taining these objectives if we feed it with the vast reservoir of

American local history which lies in every state and every com-

munity. From that use we can arouse that spark of pride, that

glimpse of what America means in terms of its past, which will

make a better American out of an Ohioan, with a broader and

sounder grasp of what is included in the phrase-the American

Way of Life.

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