Ohio History Journal

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EDITORIALANA

EDITORIALANA.

VOL. XXVIII. No. 2.

APRIL, 1919.

TEMPERANCE AND CHURCH-BUILDING IN PIONEER DAYS

ON THE WESTERN RESERVE.

By JUSTUS NEWTON BROWN, OBERLIN, OHIO.

In the fall of 1826 my mother's father, Rev. Joseph Edwards, re-

moved from Manlius, New York, where he had been pastor of the Pres-

byterian church, to Greenfield, Huron County, Ohio. The next year he

preached the first sermon ever preached by an ordained minister in the

township of Ripley, in the same county, to a congregation consisting of

seven families.  In 1828, when he removed to Ripley, less than two

dozen families had settled there. When he had been there something

over two years, he organized the first temperance society in the town-

ship. It consisted of the members of his own family and its constitution

ran thus:

"This society shall be composed of the parents and children and such

other members of our family as shall hereunto subscribe their names.

In forming the constitution we pledge ourselves to observe the following

rules:

"1. We will use no ardent spirits ourselves, nor suffer the use of

them in our families, nor present them to our friends, or those in our

employment, unless in cases of extreme necessity for medical pur-

poses.

"2. Those of us who are or hereafter shall become heads of fami-

lies solemnly agree to teach our households the principles of entire

abstinence, and to use our best endeavors to obtain their signatures to this

constitution.

"3. A copy of this constitution shall be pasted in our family Bible,

to which our children (if any) shall be often pointed as the act of their

parents, and we solemnly enjoin it on them, as they revere our memories,

sacredly to regard these our sentiments." The constitution was signed

by my grandfather and every member of his family, eight in all, in the

order of their ages.

As an outgrowth of this temperance society, another was soon

formed with which nearly all the families in Ripley united. Its meetings

were held at the log cabins of its members until log school-houses were

built, which furnished better accommodations for public meetings. That

society continued to grow until it numbered more than a hundred mem-

bers. In writing for the Firelands Historical Society a short time before

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