Ohio History Journal

Log Architecture                                                       173

Author's Comments

The material presented in this text is a resume of six years of accumulating data

on log architecture in Ohio. It began as a photographic study of extant structures

with no end in mind save the visual recording of an almost extinct form of con-

struction. While working on various research projects for The Ohio Historical So-

ciety, this writer filed for future reference the numerous contemporary comments

on log construction which gradually came to light. As the quantity of photographs

and notes grew, it became obvious that enough data were available for a mono-

graph on Ohio log architecture. Perhaps no typological, ethnological, nor archi-

tectural problems will be solved in the succeeding pages, but the reader should

gain a firmer basis for judging the log buildings that remain and should be able

to recognize that vast amounts of fiction have been written and told about the

construction and use of such structures.

The author, as a student of historic architecture, does not pretend to be capable

of recognizing specific details of construction or design as indicative of certain cul-

tural or national typology. Also, time simply was not available to measure, draw,

and analyze all the log buildings found in Ohio. Except for the very early extant

buildings, however, it is doubtful that any log house or barn remaining exhibits

unusual or significant features that an architectural historian would be surprised

to see. If Ohio log architecture could be viewed as an entity, an "Ohio" typology

might emerge. This could be proved only by surveying log architecture and immi-

gration patterns in adjacent states. It is likely that there is an "Ohio style," just as

there is probably an Indiana, Michigan, or Kentucky typology. Only a minor amount

of such serious survey work has been accomplished in the Midwest.

In order to relate Ohio log architecture to log building throughout the world,

a background chapter on the history of such construction is included here. Most

of this information came from C. A. Weslager's excellent book, The Log Cabin in

America, which should be read by all persons interested in the subject. That both

this monograph and Weslager's contain some of the same references is due to the

fact that there are limited published sources from which to draw. In this case the

common reference was the compendium of eighteenth and nineteenth century

travel narratives entitled Early Western Travels. Several of the narratives, particu-

larly of Indian captivity, to which references are made are extremely rare and can

be found only in major libraries. The library of The Ohio Historical Society has

an excellent collection of original editions.

The county histories of Ohio contain hundreds of references to log cabins and

houses. Unfortunately, many editors copied the same sources, without giving credit,

when descriptions of a "raising" were wanted. Such excerpts imply that the events

described took place within the given county, which might be completely errone-

ous. For example, if the reader should compare pages 212-14 of George F. Robin-

son's History of Greene County, Ohio (Chicago, 1902) with the chapter entitled

"The House Warming" in Joseph Doddridge's book, Notes, on the Settlement and

Indian Wars, of the Western Parts of Virginia & Pennsylvania from 1763 to 1783

(Wellsburgh, Virginia, 1824), he would find that Robinson copied Doddridge's

account (probably from the 1876 edition) word for word without giving credit.

This leaves a very unfortunate impression, for Greene County, Ohio, in 1800 was

not necessarily like western Pennsylvania some thirty-five years earlier. Also, Rob-

174                                                          OHIO HISTORY

inson misspells two critical words, using "bunting poles" for "butting poles" and

"hard wood" for "heart wood." Even without knowing the context a reader can

imagine the semantical difficulties such changes pose.

Though county histories are of secondary importance to the critical historian,

they nevertheless are one of the few sources to record the oral traditions surround-

ing the ephemeral "frontier" and the "cabin in the woods." Because commonplace

events make dull subject matter, any unusual occurrence has tended to receive

more than its share of attention, which in turn has colored the popular view of

Ohio history to such an extent that the unusual event on the frontier has been

accepted as common to the life of each settler. However, by the time of statehood

in 1803, the settlers, rather than living under constant threat of danger from Indians

or animals, probably had an everyday routine that was very monotonous.

Hopefully this monograph bridges the gap between factual historic references

to log buildings and practical knowledge on the construction and repair of such

structures. Authentic restoration of a log house or barn is certainly possible. The

reader should be forewarned, however, that the cost of materials alone can be

staggering. Ironically, the largest expense is the logs. If logs had had such a value

150 years ago, the log building would indeed be a rarity today!

The best approach for current restoration, when a number of logs have to be

replaced, is to combine two or three buildings. Split shakes can be obtained from

most lumberyards, at least on special order; the "resawed" type is best. Sawmills

can supply board "off-falls" for roof sheathing. The Tremont Nail Company of

Wareham, Massachusetts, still makes a large variety of cut nails which are han-

dled by many firms; Horton Brasses of Cromwell, Connecticut, is one supplier.

Good reproduction hardware is available from a few sources; Ball and Ball of

Exton, Pennsylvania, is famous for its line of reproductions. They can duplicate

hand-forged hardware on special order. Several companies in Ohio are now making

"old pattern" bricks. Many paint companies can supply stains and paints com-

parable to eighteenth and nineteenth century colors: Bruning, Martin-Senour, and

Cabot, among others, offer a wide selection. The McCloskey Varnish Company

makes a fine wood preservative and floor stain. It is not the intention of the author

to endorse specific products or companies. A wide selection of products suitable

for restoration work is available (with the possible exception of hardware), and

often the only qualification governing a choice lies in what is available in a given

locality.

Perhaps second only to obtaining the logs is the difficulty in finding the correct

patterns of millwork for such items as baseboards, chair and peg rails, door and

window trim, flooring, door and wall paneling, mantels, and a seemingly endless

variety of other interior and exterior trim. Good planing mills carry a full selection

of patterns, and the old bead and ogee moldings are still available if the correct

shaper blades are used. Poplar and walnut were the common finish woods of the

first half of the nineteenth century. Today, unless a supply of walnut--or an un-

limited amount of funds--is on hand, some substitute will have to be found. Strangely

enough, even common, inexpensive poplar is difficult to obtain in Ohio. If the wood

is to be painted, as most interior trim was, clear white pine is probably the best

choice on today's market. Even under paint the grain in redwood can be undesir-

able, and the wood tends to sliver.

The problem of dating log buildings is universal. The very few ca. 1800 build-

ings in Ohio do bear some characteristics (such as eave beams and log gables) that

Log Architecture                                                        175

would date them that early even if literary evidence were not available, but the

majority of buildings are not distinctive insofar as constructional details are con-

cerned. Adding to the difficulty of dating is the fact that most of the extant houses

have been remodeled one or more times, if not completely enclosed in later addi-

tions. Post-constructional work is usually evident, unless it was done soon after the

original building was completed. It requires time to evaluate all aspects, and, unless

the structure is disused and already falling apart, it is often as difficult to find the

owner and obtain permission to investigate building details as to actually do the

work. A small amount of hand "demolition" is often necessary to get a glimpse

under the flooring or plaster. It is an axiom in the "antiques" field that nothing is

valuable until an interest has been expressed, and permission for an investigation

is often slow in coming--if at all.

A stylistic dating guide to log buildings in Ohio could probably be established

if a county by county survey were undertaken. Most of the effort would be literary,

for time is the only major factor in measuring and drawing the extant structures

(not to mention finding them). The actual dating of the buildings is dependent on

the county documents available. A date and style correlation could be compiled

from the data. Whether there is any value in such a study is academic since most

extant log houses and barns in Ohio can be dated, de facto, 1815 to 1860 without

the necessity of close examination. Perhaps more interesting would be a cultural

typology in which certain elements of construction could be traced to European

precedents. As a case in point: Although the majority of log houses in Ohio had

ladder stairs in a corner adjacent to the fireplace, a few houses built.by Germans

in northwestern Ohio at mid-nineteenth century used stoves, so that the chimney

was pulled away from the wall and the ladder stairs were behind the chimney.

Was this a modification of an older interior design found in Ohio, or was it an

innovation from Germany via recent immigrants? Perhaps the stove was moved

towards the center of the room simply to improve the heat distribution and had

nothing to do with Ohio or German typology. Such details are often mundane,

but in future years they could help solve complex ethnologic if not architectural

problems.

The author made every attempt to survey log buildings on as wide a scale as

possible in the state, but distance and time were unavoidable considerations. A

round trip of 250 miles to examine one building can be tedious no matter how

excellent the structure might be. It was soon apparent that the counties bordering

the Old National Road (U. S. Route 40) and south to the Ohio River contained

the majority of extant specimens. Consequently, the illustrations used in this mono-

graph are drawn largely from this half of the state. Since many log buildings

exhibit the same or similar characteristics, it was felt best to choose the photographs

of clearest detail, which meant that some architecturally divergent examples might

be close geographically. (Weather conditions and time of day were often critical

in obtaining good photographs.) The fact that the majority of counties in Ohio are

not represented in this work should not be taken to mean that log buildings are

rare or nonexistent in these counties.

Most of the photographs are by the author; the exceptions are indicated. A log

building can be a particularly difficult subject to photograph due to its monochro-

matic coloring, its lack of reflectance, and the often harsh contrasts of light and

shade. An exterior view of a log building surrounded by snow, or an interior view

of the dark chasm of a log barn, is a photographic horror when a minimum of

176                                                            OHIO HISTORY

equipment and speed of execution are desiderata.

Because some of the interior views were made with an ultra-wide angle lens,

they are distorted in reference to normal eye perspective. Due to the distortion,

spatial relationships are exaggerated and the rooms appear larger than they really

are. The flat lighting characteristics of a camera-mounted flash unit are not desir-

able, as some of the photographs attest, but carrying and using such a unit was

much easier than making a time exposure on a tripod. Often extraneous light was

not sufficient or at the correct angle for a time exposure. Experience proved that

the old-fashioned flashbulb was much preferable to a stroboscopic flash unit for

recording the dusty, drab interiors of log buildings. The better reflectance of light

in the red band of the spectrum was no doubt the reason. A variety of lenses and

several models of Leica cameras were used for the photographs.

There is a method to date precisely the year in which a log was cut, which prob-

ably could be used in Ohio. The science of dendrochronology is based on the study

of growth rings of a single variety of tree in a specific geographic location. The

rate of growth of a tree depends on many factors, including the site, the amount

of rainfall, and seasonal temperature variances. The amount of growth season to

season is shown by the width of the annual rings. Trees of the same variety and

in essentially the same climatic and site conditions show similar annular patterns.

If a chart of this growth pattern is available, an unknown specimen can be com-

pared until its annular pattern agrees with the appropriate section in the master

chronology. Since a chronology is normally based on a living tree, the exact date

of the cutting can be established if the last growth ring (the "bark ring") is present

on the specimen.

A tree ring chronology has been established in the southwestern United States

for the Pinus aristata which covers more than seven thousand years. A chronology

based on oak now spans one thousand years in Germany, and there are hopes of

extending it to five thousand years. Since two hundred years would be more than

ample to cover the history of log building in Ohio, it is entirely possible that such

a chronology could be established for each of the several woods most commonly

found in log buildings. Fortunately, because most logs in buildings retain their

bark or waney edge, the necessary qualification for precise dating is present. (Per-

sons interested in dendrochronological dating should read chapters 7 and 8 in

Scientific Methods in Medieval Archaeology; see bibliography under Berger.)

Errors slip into every undertaking. A better example cannot be cited than on

the heading of page 933 of The American College Dictionary (New York, 1958),

where "pluviometry" is spelled "pulviometry." No doubt the present author is

guilty of worse mistakes although every effort has been made to make the text

accurate. The quotations have been checked to their original publication whenever

possible. Positive statements and conclusions were substantiated through literary

or physical evidence. A research topic such as log architecture in Ohio is open-

ended, for buildings and relative documents lurk in all corners of the state awaiting

discovery. There has to be a beginning, however, and it is hoped that this mono-

graph will result in a more comprehensive volume at a later date.

D. A. H.

DONALD A. HUTSLAR

The Log Architecture

of Ohio

1 The Antecedents of Log Construction

In order to simplify a complex subject, log architecture has been divided here into

two facets: The historical background of log buildings and the technical knowledge

necessary for their construction. Though to a large extent history and technique

are mutually dependent, it does not necessarily follow that a culture lacking the

knowledge of log building does not have the tools and technical ability required

for such a construction method. Given the proper impetus, such a culture could

quickly and easily change its mode of building from, say, framed houses to log

houses. This, in fact, was the course of events for most immigrants to the North

American colonies in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries--particularly for the

English and Scotch-Irish. Naturally, the history of log building in Ohio falls at the

culmination of this structural epoch rather than at its inception.

Though the literature on log building is not extensive, several historians have

compiled sufficient evidence from contemporary sources to prove that the practice

of building with logs, at least for domestic and not military purposes, was brought

to the United States by immigrants of Scandinavian origin who had a tradition of

log construction in their heavily forested countries. Swedes and Finns apparently

introduced log construction in the area known as New Sweden at the upper end

of Delaware Bay, about the middle of the seventeenth century. From this small

settlement the log house spread up the Delaware River into country now embraced

by the states of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Certain nationalistic traits distin-

guished the Swedish and Finnish structures, although both cultures used some

variety in their corner notching and methods of dressing the logs. They commonly

used both saddle-notched round and full-dovetailed hewed logs for walls, including

log gables. The Scandinavian fireplace was usually in a corner, with the chimney

often made of sticks and clay. Throughout Central and Northern Europe, the full-

dovetailed corner notch was common.

Following closely on the heels of the New Sweden immigrants were those from

the Germanic states who brought their own cultural traditions of log construction.

This influx late in the seventeenth century initially centered in the Delaware Valley

of Pennsylvania. The typology of log building here was as diverse as the cultural

Mr. Hutslar is associate curator of history at The Ohio Historical Society.

178                                                          OHIO HISTORY

groups from Germany. If any characteristics can loosely be termed "Germanic,"

they are a gable end or central chimney (and the consequent off-center entry door),

and either vertical or horizontal clapboarding on the framed gables. Corner notch-

ing systems were similar in Scandinavia and Germany. The shingled roof, however,

was in common use in Germany but rare in Sweden and Finland. Immigrants from

the latter countries apparently did use roof shingles out of necessity before the

Germans arrived, but their usual roofing was long, vertically placed split timber.

By the end of the seventeenth century, therefore, when the basic precepts of

log building on the European continent had been transferred to North America,

it would have been possible in most cases to identify the national origin of the

occupant of a log house by its method of construction. The next group of immi-

grants was, in large part, responsible for the diffusion of log building in the Colonies

and the subsequent loss of nationalistic typology. These people were the Scotch-

Irish--Protestant Lowland Scots who had largely resided in stone cottages in northern

Ireland for several generations before emigrating to the Colonies in several waves

beginning early in the eighteenth century. Although there were settlements of

Scotch-Irish scattered throughout the Colonies, the majority landed in the Delaware

Bay area. Naturally the immigrants near the Swedish-Finnish settlements learned

that style of log building, while those in the Philadelphia area learned the Germanic

style.

Because of the great numbers of Scotch-Irish, a migration wave began in the

Colonies, particularly to the west and south into south-central Pennsylvania, Mary-

land, Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia. Thus, by the third quarter of the eight-

eenth century, due to the availability of plentiful forests and the movement of the

Scotch-Irish, and the Germans, log building had become the common construc-

tional mode on the boundaries of colonial settlement. As a consequence, the cultural

typology of log construction became greatly diluted. The Scotch-Irish, who had no

tradition of log building, had no qualms about borrowing elements of any style of

construction which they encountered. The vast majority of log buildings found in

Ohio today are of this eclectic "style."

Log building had not been confined to the Delaware Bay area before the Scotch-

Irish arrived. However, most of the few contemporary references to log buildings

in the New England area prior to 1700 are to buildings for defense, i.e., block-

houses or garrison houses. The Dutch immigrants to New Netherland certainly

had no tradition of log building and probably very little knowledge of wood con-

struction of any kind for Holland had no large forests. The same was practically

true for the English immigrants because the great forests of England were either

denuded or under the control of the Crown by the end of the sixteenth century.

The development of England's great naval power during the century had so de-

pleted the timber resources of the island that wood became an important item of

trade between the Colonies and the parent country in the seventeenth century.

Log buildings had been known in early medieval England, but many generations

had passed and with them the knowledge of log construction, before migration

began to the Colonies. The image of the Pilgrims celebrating the first Thanksgiving

Day outside their log cabins is one of fiction, unfortunately perpetuated through

popular art. In reality, they lived in dug cellars at first, and when they built houses,

they cut timber to make clapboard buildings. Perhaps if the Pilgrims had sought

refuge in some state east of Holland, they might have gained knowledge of log

building for domestic purposes. For an exhaustive discussion of this topic, two

180                                                             OHIO HISTORY

books are authoritative: The Log Cabin Myth by Harold R. Shurtleff (Cambridge,

1939) and The Log Cabin in America by Clinton A. Weslager (New Brunswick,

1969).

Log building was known in France, though the horizontal notched log style was

less common than walls composed of vertical logs set in the ground. This style,

termed "poteaux-en-terre," existed in France as late as the nineteenth century and

was used in French settlements in the New World. The Russians built numerous

log structures in Alaska in the latter eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries,

some of which still stand. However, the Russian influence apparently did not extend

beyond the northwest coast of the present United States.

As to the North American Indians of pre-Columbian days, there is no evidence

that they ever used notched horizontal logs though there is circumstantial evidence

that they knew the use of vertically-placed logs for defense. It would have been an

incredibly difficult task to fell, hew, and notch timber using only stone tools and

fire. Several sixteenth century illustrations portray Indian towns fortified with pali-

sades. For example, Jacques le Moyne de Morgues, a member of the French expe-

dition to Florida in 1564, did several paintings showing palisaded villages. These

paintings were engraved by Theodore de Bry and published in Europe in 1591;

engraving number 30, entitled "A Fortified Village," shows a number of Indian

huts or wigwams surrounded by a vertical log wall.¹ An Englishman, John White,

did several watercolor sketches of Indians while at the Roanoke Colony in Virginia

in 1585-86. Several of his watercolors were engraved by De Bry and published in

1590. "The Town of Pomeiock" (Hyde County, North Carolina) and "The Town

of Secota" (Beaufort County, North Carolina) are shown with palisades.²

In James Smith's narrative of his captivity by the Indians (see chapter 3 for

quotation), he describes a winter hut built in Ohio near Lake Erie in the year

1755.3 The side walls were of logs laid on top of each other and held in place by

two stakes at each end--a logical solution to the difficulty of cutting and aligning

notches. The roof was made of bent branches covered with animal skins. This rudi-

mentary log building could have had Indian rather than European antecedents,

though it is unlikely it was entirely of Indian origin because the eastern Indians

had been in contact with the white man some 140 years by the time of Smith's

description. (John Heckewelder, a Moravian missionary, describes a similar struc-

ture in his Narrative.⁴) Since most Indian tribes were migratory by nature, perma-

nent housing did not have a place in their cultures until the second half of the

eighteenth century.

The three Moravian missions built during the 1770's in eastern Ohio--Schoen-

brunn, Gnaddenhuetten, and Lichtenau--contained many log buildings, some quite

large. Undoubtedly the Delaware Indians in these missions were influenced by the

methods used in these structures. On the other hand, it would be difficult to assess

the influence of the English fur traders' cabins built at Fort Pickawillany (near

Piqua) during the years 1749-52. It is certain that the Indians contributed nothing

to western man's knowledge of log building in the seventeenth century, and prob-

ably knew nothing of log structures prior to this time with the possible exception

of using logs for stockade walls.

1. Stefan Lorant, ed., The New World (New York, 1946), 95.

2. Ibid., 190-91.

3. James Smith, An Account of the Remarkable Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Colonel James

Smith ... (Philadelphia, 1834), 37-38.

4. John Heckewelder, Narrative of the Mission of the United Brethren Among the Delaware and

Mohegan Indians (Philadelphia, 1820), 298.

Log Architecture                                                        181

2 Log Construction in Ohio

General History

Most early log buildings were erected as temporary structures because they pro-

vided the best solution to the immediate need for shelter in an area where proc-

essed building material could not be obtained quickly. Other types of temporary

shelters--tents, wigwams, lean-tos, caves, dug cellars--also were used throughout

the settlement period, which actually spanned the seventeenth, eighteenth, and

nineteenth centuries, depending on locality. The kind of shelter chosen varied with

the need of the resident, who, according to early observers, fell into one of several

categories of distinctive types of persons found on the frontier. Early writers who

perceived that a pattern of civilization had early developed on the frontier included

Francis Baily, in his Journal of a Tour in Unsettled Parts of North America, in 1796

& 1797 (London, 1856), and William Blane, in An Excursion Through the United

States and Canada During the Years 1822-23 (London, 1824).

The first arrivals on the frontier, the backwoodsmen, were sustained by living

from the land and trading with both Indians and white men. They required only

the rudest shelters, perhaps wigwams or lean-tos of branches. The squatters, who

were the first families, needed more stable housing--rough-finished cabins. The

third group, the pioneers, wrested homesteads from the wilderness but kept moving

as they followed the frontier. Appearing in Ohio by the late 1780's, the pioneers

left a legacy of cleared land to their successors, the settlers, who improved the land

and built permanent houses. For the squatters, the pioneers, and the settlers, the

log cabin quickly and simply filled their immediate need for a secure home.

Since for the most part the trans-Appalachian area, including the Ohio Country,

was heavily timbered, building material was readily available for constructing a

house, barn, and outbuildings. On the other hand, the forest was considered the

pioneers' greatest enemy for it sheltered the Indian and predatory animal and pre-

vented sunlight from reaching agricultural crops. The removal of as many trees as

possible was a necessity for the pioneer farmer. Consequently, the oft heard phrase,

"the cabin in the clearing," which evoked a certain romanticism even by mid-

nineteenth century, was based on a less poetic reality.

"Who built the first log structure in Ohio?" is just one of the many unanswer-

able questions that face historians. Perhaps it was the French fur traders who were

engaged with the "western" Indians on the shores of Lake Erie early in the seven-

teenth century. According to The Jesuit Relations,⁵ the network of Indian missions

had been extended to the territorial boundaries of the Erie Nation, the "Nation

of the Cat," by 1642. Also, the missionaries had known something of the nation

previously through information provided by French fur traders. The French began

to trade with the Miami Indians at their main village, Teewightewee Town (the

same site as Fort Pickawillany, near Piqua), about the year 1690. If the French

were not the first to build log structures in Ohio, it was probably the English fur

traders at Fort Pickawillany, who erected log huts between 1749 and 1752. It is

known through contemporary documents that they built a vertical log stockade and

5. Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents ... 1610-1791, Reuben Gold Thwaites, ed. (Cleveland,

1898), XXI, 191 ff.

182                                                               OHIO HISTORY

a blockhouse.⁶ This fur trade post was attacked by Ottawa Indians, led by one

Langlade and a few fellow French fur traders, in the spring of 1752. Captain Wil-

liam Trent described in his Journal the smoke rising from the burning traders'

"houses."⁷ These "houses" were probably very similar to structures erected by the

English traders at Fort Michilimackinac (Michigan)--low cabins of small round logs

set over shallow cellars, in which the furs and trade goods were stored. Perhaps

the earliest specific comment on a log building in Ohio is from Smith's narrative

of his capture during the French and Indian War, referred to earlier. As with the

traders' huts, the Indian wigwam which he described in 1755 was atypical of the

log structures being erected in the eastern Colonies.

The period between the French and Indian War and the advent of the Moravian

missions is somewhat of a "dark age" in contemporary literature relative to the

Ohio Country. There is no doubt that squatters did settle within the present boun-

daries of Ohio during this period, particularly in the major river valleys. An itinerant

preacher and gunsmith by name of Moses Henry supposedly settled in Chillicaathee,

a Shawanese Indian village (now Frankfort, Ross County), in 1769. It is possible

he built a log house; at least as an easterner he should have had the knowledge

to do so. We know the Shawanee were living in log huts in Chillicaathee by 1772.8

During the Revolutionary War meat hunters for the Continental Army came

into present northeastern Ohio from Pennsylvania and many squatters entered the

territory to escape the conflict. It is unlikely that the hunters built permanent shel-

ters, but the squatters certainly did. Their settling on Indian land disturbed the

natives so greatly that continental troops were sent to dislodge the squatters by

burning their cabins and cultivated fields. The first such expedition took place in

the fall of 1779, when sixty troops of the Eighth Pennsylvania Regiment under

Captain John Clarke crossed the Ohio River at Wheeling. Several expeditions fol-

lowed, without great success, prior to the spring of 1785, when Ensign John Arm-

strong and twenty men toured part of eastern Ohio expressly to warn off the squatters.

They encountered and were told of hundreds of families, not only in the eastern

part of the territory but throughout what is now Ohio. Not only was the popula-

tion greater than six years previously, but it was so well settled that the squatters

had apparently organized their own government in the spring of 1785; "governor

William Hogland, west of the Ohio" is mentioned in the Pittsburgh Gazette, Sep-

tember 29, 1787.9

There are many references, particularly in military correspondence, to squatters'

"huts," "cabins," and "houses." Undoubtedly among the great variety of types of

shelters was the log cabin, made of either round or hewed logs. It is possible that

some of these structures still exist in eastern Ohio, though proof would be hard

to find.

The oldest known, datable building in Ohio (with the possible exception of the

Ohio Land Company office) was erected shortly after part of present Ohio was

officially opened to settlement by the Ordinance of 1787. This extant structure is

the Rufus Putnam house in Marietta, which originally was a section of the fortifi-

cation known as Campus Martius, built by the Ohio Company beginning in 1788.

6. William Trent, Journal of Captain William Trent, Alfred T. Goodman, ed. (Cincinnati, 1871),

43-44, 91.

7. Ibid., 85.

8. David Jones, A Journal of Two Visits Made to Some Nations of Indians (New York, 1865), 56.

9. Randolph C. Downes, "Ohio's Squatter Governor: William Hogland of Hoglandstown," Ohio

Archaeological and Historical Quarterly, XLIII (1934), 273.

Log Architecture                                                      185

The French botanist Andre Michaux, who visited Gallipolis in 1793, later wrote

that "The houses are all built of squared logs merely notched at the ends instead

of being Mortised."11  This is an interesting statement for it shows that Michaux

was familiar with a mortised style of building--probably not unlike that used at

Campus Martius--and, in fact, he may previously have visited Campus Martius.

Also, this method of corner framing was in use in French military construction,

with which he was no doubt familiar. It is surprising that he had not seen more

examples of the notched corner; at least he implies that such a method was unusual

to him. Assuming that Michaux's "houses" were the same as Putnam's "huts," it

is puzzling to note that they were constructed of hewed logs. Putnam's outline of

spartan finishing details indicates the use of round logs. By 1802, when Michaux's

son visited Gallipolis, most of the French settlers had moved away, leaving "about

sixty log-houses, most of which being uninhabited, are falling into ruins."12

Even though the first half of the 1790's was a period of Indian warfare in Ohio,

some settlers continued to enter the territory. Many of these people were probably

drawn to the area because of the conflict, knowing there was always a market for

goods and produce where military operations were being conducted. Once the

Treaty of Greene Ville was concluded in 1795, the Great Miami River Valley was

settled with amazing speed. Many soldiers and militia who had been with Clark

and Wayne in the campaigns stayed to take up residence. Among the buildings

erected in Dayton at this period was Newcom's Tavern (1796-1797-1798, depend-

ing on source), which may be the oldest documented log structure in Ohio--assum-

ing that the Putnam house is atypical of domestic log building. Though now

removed from its original location, the tavern still stands in Dayton.

Earlier log buildings may exist in the state, although documentation of such

structures is extremely difficult because construction techniques changed little from

the eighteenth into the twentieth centuries. There is a log house at the south edge

of Waynesville, Warren County, that could predate the 1797 founding of the village,

though the evidence is circumstantial. However, it is probably the oldest log house

still inhabited in Ohio. Another extant, early documented log building is a tavern

built by John Treber on Zane's Trace, Tiffin Township, Adams County, in 1798.

Treber was a gunsmith who, in a way, was forced into the tavern business because

so many travelers stopped at his house. The present structure is part log, part stone.

The Ohio Land Company office at Campus Martius Museum in Marietta is a

plank wall structure that dates between 1788 and 1800, depending on the source.

The company records mention the construction of an "office" in 1788, but it would

seem logical such an "office" was not needed until Campus Martius was placed

on sale in 1795. Near Steubenville is a log building which was a combination home

and federal land office built by David Hoge in 1801. Zachariah DeWitt settled just

east of Oxford, Butler County, in 1805. His two story log house, probably built

that year, is still standing, an exceptionally well-finished structure. John Johnston,

federal Indian agent, had a log house and barn built on his land at Piqua, Miami

County, in 1807-08. The barn, now owned by The Ohio Historical Society, is the

largest double-pen structure in Ohio known to this writer. Each pen is approximately

thirty feet square. The hewed plate is in two sections, one section being 15 inches

11. Andre Michaux, "Travels into Kentucky, 1793-96," in Reuben Gold Thwaites, ed., Early

Western Travels (Cleveland, 1904), III, 34.

12. Francois Michaux, Travels to the West of the Alleghany Mountains . . . (London, 1805), 100.

Log Architecture                                                      187

became the catchphrase that bound together the most divergent political factions

in the western states and elected Harrison to the presidency. In actuality, Harrison's

only connection with a log cabin was that a one room log house had been incor-

porated at the eastern end of his North Bend home when it was enlarged. Though

Harrison never claimed to have been born in a log cabin, he did nothing to dispel

the image created in the campaign.

Not only did the 1840 campaign set a pattern for several generations of politicians

--for to have been born in a log cabin became tantamount to success in politics--

it began the mystique of the log cabin. Real log cabins were placed on running

gear and paraded in many towns. An amazing number of objects, from handker-

chiefs to Staffordshire tea services, were decorated with a log cabin and a cider

barrel. The log cabin became a symbol of "the good life," real or imaginary, to

tens of thousands of persons in the United States of 1840. To aging pioneers it

represented their youth, hope, ambition. To the young, it was a symbol of the

accomplishments of their parents and grandparents, often made in the face of great

odds, and was a spur to their own achievements.

It is appropriate to note that, at least for the eastern half of the country, by 1840

the rigors of frontier life had been overcome enough to allow such a romanticized

view of pioneering and log cabin life to develop. The War of 1812 had denoted

the beginning of the end of the "frontier" period in Ohio. After 1815 the rise of

urban centers, growth of industry, and development of agriculture progressed at an

amazing speed. The traditional basis of pioneering--agriculture--first felt the effects

of mechanization in the late 1830's and ten years later, agricultural periodicals were

implying that a farmer was backward if he was not making use of the various

machines available to him. Ceding of the last Indian reservation in Ohio in 1842

really marked the end of the state's frontier. No wonder, then, that the older gen-

eration felt a certain longing for the less complex days of the "log cabin in the

clearing."

That the end of the frontier period in Ohio did indeed arrive about 1840 is no

better evidenced than in the following excerpt from the Western Courier and Piqua

Enquirer:

HUSKING PARTY . . . . We like to recur occasionally to the customs and pastimes of our

ancestors. . . . We know that these may, at first view, appear rude and forbidding--that the

sensibilities of the fashionables of the present generation would be shocked at the bare

idea of a Quilting Frolic--an Appleparing, or a Husking Party. . . .

This sounds much like current rhetoric, but it was published November 18, 1837.

Though the original article may have been reprinted from another newspaper, the

fact that the description could be applied to western Ohio in 1837 reinforces the

conclusion that the end of an epoch had been reached.

Although log building continued throughout the century in Ohio, the reasons

for its continuance were relative to each specific site. By mid-nineteenth century

the log house had become confined to the rapidly disappearing unsettled areas and

to the less economically successful sections of the state. By then sawed timber could

be obtained throughout Ohio and the frame house had become the standard, rea-

sonably priced housing. Before settlement had become general throughout the

state, the easiest method of constructing a log building had been to erect it in the

midst of a forest, so that the logs did not have to be moved far to the building

site. However, once the overall forest covering Ohio had been broken into small

190                                                          OHIO HISTORY

Paulding, and Sandusky. No log houses were located in Ashtabula County, and

less than one percent of the houses were log in each of the counties of Ashland,

Paulding, and Sandusky. In Monroe County, 15.8 percent of 2,029 houses were

log; and in Adams County, 11.3 percent of 2,269 houses were log.

It is tempting to take the average of houses per county, roughly 88, times the

number of counties in Ohio, 88, to obtain a vague idea of the number of log houses

in use in the state--7,744. This is probably as good a generalization as any obtain-

able. What the total would be in 1972 is even more vague, though obviously it

would be lower--and probably much lower even if all log structures were counted.

However, a survey of Athens County in progress in late 1971 turned up a sur-

prising total of 97 log buildings. As a comparison, an 1810 census of Cincinnati

listed 232 frame houses, 55 log houses, 37 brick houses, and 14 stone houses; of the

total, approximately 13 percent were log.16 This proportion was probably true for

most urban areas in early nineteenth century Ohio. Of course, the presence of

sawmills and craftsmen in such areas affected the type of housing erected.

In 1972 the remaining log structures are primarily in the southern half of the

state. The southeastern quarter probably has more buildings than the southwestern

quarter, but older buildings are more frequent in the latter area. Some very fine

log barns are to be found in the east-central region, in and around Guernsey

County. The principal routes of migration into and through Ohio should indicate

where to look for early buildings--and such, indeed, seems to be the case, for the

most consistent distribution of buildings lies along the old routes, such as Zane's

Trace and the National Road, and in the various river valleys which terminate at

the Ohio. Possibly many of the main Indian trails, such as the Grand Council

Trail through central Ohio, would show a similar pattern of settlement if the routes

could be accurately determined.

Dating Buildings

Dating log buildings is a most difficult task, for if no private records exist, the

only public records that might give a clue are the tax duplicates and they seldom

yield much information. One of the old standard methods of dating a structure,

particularly of log, is to give the building the same date as the original land grant

or purchase. This method gives problematical results at best. (A scientific method

of dating is discussed in the author's comments.)

Most of the log structures seen today date from between the War of 1812 and

the Civil War. A few changes which seem to have taken place in log building in

Ohio during this time span are helpful in giving approximate dates to an undocu-

mented structure. Even though a great variety of corner notching systems were

known, the two common styles in Ohio were the "steeple" or "inverted V" notch

and the "half-dovetail" or "freezeproof" notch. Until approximately 1825 (and it

must be understood that there is no method of establishing a precise date), the

steeple notch was used almost exclusively on all buildings regardless of function.

In structures from the second quarter of the century, the steeple notch is rarely

found on a house--unless it was intended that the house should have siding. Use

of the steeple notch did remain predominant for barns and outbuildings through-

out the rest of the century. Beginning about 1825 or slightly later, the half-dovetail

16. Liberty Hall (Cincinnati), November 13, 1810.

194                                                              OHIO HISTORY

3 Contemporary Descriptions of Log Buildings in Ohio

Indian Housing of the Eighteenth Century

There are several descriptions of Indian housing in Ohio in the eighteenth cen-

tury, though references to log buildings are rare. One of the earliest and best reports

is given by Colonel James Smith in his small book, An Account of the Remarkable

Occurrences in the Life and Travels of Colonel James Smith, During his Captivity

with the Indians in the Years 1755, '56, '57, '58 & '59. The log "cabin" which he

described was built west of Cleveland near the mouth of Black River in the winter

of 1755-56. Smith lived in this structure while he was held captive by a mixed group

of Indians, primarily Caughnewagas but including Delawares and Wyandots.

They made their winter cabin in the following form: they cut logs about fifteen feet long,

and laid these logs upon each other, and drove posts in the ground at each end to keep

them together; the posts they tied together at the top with bark, and by this means raised

a wall fifteen feet long, and about four feet high, and in the same manner they raised

another wall opposite to this, at about twelve feet distance; then they drove forks in the

ground in the centre of each end, and laid a strong pole from end to end on these forks;

and from these walls to the poles, they set up poles instead of rafters, and on these they

tied small poles in place of laths; and a cover was made of lynn bark, which will run even

in the winter season.

* * * * * * *

At the end of these walls they set up split timber, so that they had timber all round, except-

ing a door at each end. At the top, in place of a chimney, they left an open place, and for

bedding they laid down the aforesaid kind of bark, on which they spread bear skins. From

end to end of this hut along the middle there were fires, which the squaws made of dry

split wood, and the holes or open places that appeared, the squaws stopped with moss,

which they collected from old logs; and at the door they hung a bear skin, and notwith-

standing the winters are hard here, our lodging was much better than what I expected.¹⁷

A very similar structure was erected by the Delawares at Captives' Town (Antrim

Township, Wyandot County, Ohio) in December 1781. David Zeisberger, the famous

Moravian missionary, described it as "a structure of poles laid horizontally between

upright stakes, the crevices being filled with moss."¹⁸ This structure, intended as a

church, was built "in less than a fortnight." Since the details of the winter cabin

and the church are essentially the same, it is possible that the cabin was the product

of the few Delawares among the Caughnewagas. By conjecture, this style of log

building was probably a version of the white man's log house constructed in a fash-

ion commensurate with the tools the migratory Indians wished to carry. Smith

refers to the Indians using their "tomahawks" to cut the logs and peel the bark.

These tomahawks were probably what are referred to today as "squaw axes," smaller

versions of the poll-less European ax. The upright stakes used to support the walls

could easily have been driven with a large stone. Actually, there is nothing about

these structures that would require the use of iron tools, but it is debatable whether

such cabins were known by Indians before the onset of western civilization.

David Zeisberger wrote a history of the North American Indians while he was

living at the Moravian missions in present Tuscarawas County, Ohio, in 1779-80.

He commented on Indian housing:

17. Smith, loc. cit.

18. Edmund de Schweinitz, The Life and Times of David Zeisberger (Philadelphia, 1870), 529.

196                                                               OHIO HISTORY

among historians, amateur and professional, and has led to much misinterpretation.

Unfortunately, it is often impossible when reading old documents to decide which

meaning was intended.

If any Indian nation was in a position to use and spread log building, it was

the Delaware. They were descendants of the Lenape Nation, western Indians who

had moved to the Susquehanna and Delaware rivers and the Delaware Bay area

well before the white man arrived in North America. The Delawares on the Schuyl-

kill River moved to the Susquehanna in 1709 because of pressure from the Five

Nations to join in warfare, first against the French, then against the English. (Thomas

Dungan, former governor of New York, had sold the lands of the Susquehanna

River Valley to William Penn in January 1696.) By 1728 the Delawares were com-

plaining about a colony of Palatine Mennonites settling on Indian land in Mont-

gomery County, Pennsylvania. These early movements of the Delawares can be

traced in H. F. Eshleman's book, Lancaster County Indians (Lancaster, 1909), which

is a compilation of various colonial documents. The Delawares subsequently moved

slowly to the west, many in close alliance with the Moravian missions in Pennsyl-

vania and then in Ohio in the 1770's and 1780's. Some of the Ohio Delawares

went on to Canada, where their descendants are still living. Throughout these moves,

the Delawares were in the precise geographic locations to learn log building tech-

niques from the Swedes and Finns in the seventeenth century and from the Germans

in the eighteenth century. Most of the nation, but not all tribes, were known to be

"peacemakers," who seemingly stayed near the European settlements. Consequently,

their nomadic habits and Indian customs were subjected to enormous pressures of

change.

The comments by Smith on Indian log building in Ohio could refer to the Del-

awares; certainly the group at Captives' Town were Delawares. At Easton, Pennsyl-

vania, in July of 1757, Delaware Chief Teedyuscung made the following request

of the governor of Pennsylvania:

And as we intend to make a Settlement at Wyomen, and to build different Houses from

what we have done heretofore, such as may last not only for a little Time, but for our

Children after us; we desire you will assist us in making our Settlements, and send us

Persons to instruct us in building Houses....21

The village of Wyomen was near present Wilkes-Barre. The request was granted;

ten cabins, 10 by 14 feet, and one cabin, 16 by 24 feet, were built. These "cabins"

were constructed of hewed, dovetailed logs. In September 1768, according to Zeis-

berger, the village of "Garochati on the Pemidhannek" [river] in western Pennsyl-

vania had "houses built in various styles...." The account continues:

Some are weather boarded block-houses and have chimneys. Some are two story houses,

having a staircase on the outside. These houses have a tower-like appearance, because they

are not more than fourteen feet in length and in breadth. All the work on them was done

by Indians and, considering that they have very crude tools, the structures are very credit-

able to the builders.²²

The previous year, September 1767, Zeisberger had visited Friedenshuetten,

Pennsylvania:

21. [Charles Thomson], An Enquiry into the Causes of the Alienation of the Delaware and Shawanese

Indians from the British Interest (London, 1759), 115-16.

22. Archer Butler Hulbert and William N. Schwarze, eds., "The Moravian Records, Volume Two,

The Diaries of Zeisberger Relating to the First Missions in the Ohio Basin," Ohio Archaeological and

Historical Quarterly, XXI (1912), 82.

198                                                               OHIO HISTORY

in the windows and a Bell, a good plank floor with two rows of forms. Adorned with some

few pieces of Scripture painting, but very indifferently executed. All about the meeting

house is kept very clean.25

Both Zeisberger and John Ettwein described the house of Chief Netawatwes at

Gekelemukpechunk (present Newcomerstown, Tuscarawas County), the capital of

the Delawares. Zeisberger states that, in 1770, Gekelemukpechunk "was a large and

flourishing town of about one hundred houses, mostly built of logs."²⁶ He was the

guest of Netawatwes, whose house had a shingle roof, board floors, a staircase, and

a stone chimney. When Ettwein was at the village in 1772, Netawatwes still had his

"well built house of nicely squared logs, with a shingle roof."²⁷

By the third quarter of the eighteenth century, Indians other than the Delawares

were building log structures in Ohio. The Shawanese village of Little Chillicothe

(present Oldtown, Greene County) was attacked by a company of militia under

Colonel John Bowman in May 1779. A white prisoner of the Shawanee described

the village at the time of the attack:

Northeast of the center of the town stood the council house-a large building, said to have

been sixty feet square, built of round hickory logs, one story high, with gable ends open

and upright posts supporting the roof.... There were several board houses or huts in the

south part of the village--some ten or twelve.

?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ??

[During the attack] the men reached the board shanties on the south; and at once began

the work of plundering, giving the savages ample time to fortify themselves by fastening

securely the door of the huge building they had congregated in.28

Since Bowman did not risk an attack on the council house, one must assume that

it was well constructed and easily defended. The remains of this building supposedly

were still visible in 1840.

In 1772, the Reverend David Jones described the Indian village of Chillicaathee,

which stood on the present site of Frankfort, Ross County. In this Shawanese vil-

lage the houses were made of logs, but apparently in a haphazard fashion: "Nor

is there any more regularity observed in this particular than in their morals, for

any man erects his house as fancy directs."²⁹ In the Reverend Oliver M. Spencer's

narrative, Indian Captivity, there is a description of the English fur traders' village

known as "The Glaize," which stood at the junction of the Auglaize and Maumee

rivers at the present site of the city of Defiance, Defiance County. In 1792 this post

consisted of "five or six cabins and log houses." The residence of one George Iron-

side was "a large hewed log house, divided below into three apartments."³⁰ These

"apartments" were used, respectively, as a warehouse, store, and dwelling. There

was also a small stockade enclosing two log houses--one a storehouse and the

other a residence.

Spencer provides an excellent description of an Indian bark cabin belonging to

an Iroquois "priestess," Cooh-coo-cheeh, living with the Shawanee in northern Ohio:

Covering an area of fourteen by twenty-eight feet, its frame was constructed of small poles,

25. Nicholas Cresswell, The Journal of Nicholas Cresswell, 1774-1777 (New York, 1924), 106.

26. De Schweinitz, op. cit., 366.

27. Kenneth G. Hamilton, John Ettwein and the Moravian Church . . . (Bethlehem, Pa., 1940),

261-62.

28. "Bowman's Expedition . . . ," op. cit., 454-55.

29. Jones, loc. cit.

30. Oliver M. Spencer, Indian Captivity (New York, 1834), 90-91.

Log Architecture                                                            199

of which some, planted upright in the ground, served as posts and studs, supporting the

ridge poles and eve [sic] bearers, while others, firmly tied to these by thongs of hickory

bark, formed girders, braces, laths, and rafters. This frame was covered with large pieces of

elm bark, seven or eight feet long, and three or four feet wide; which being pressed flat,

and well dried to prevent their curling, fastened to the poles by thongs of bark, formed

the weather boarding, and roof of the cabin. At its western end was a narrow doorway,

about six feet high, closed, when necessary, by a single piece of bark placed beside it, and

fastened by a brace, set either within, or on the outside, as occasion required. Within,

separated by a bark partition, were two apartments, of which the inner one . . . was occu-

pied as a pantry, a spare bed room, and at times as a sanctuary .. .; the other . . . was in

common use by the family, both as a lodging, sitting, cooking, and eating room. On the

ground, in the centre of this apartment, was placed the fire; and over it, suspended from the

ridge pole in the middle of an aperture left for the passage of the smoke, was a wooden

trammel... .31

Certainly bark had been a traditional building material among the Indians before

their familiarity with the white man, though the use of roofing shakes by the latter

might have altered the Indian method of overlay or size of their roofing material.

Bark roofing on an Indian log cabin is mentioned by John Brickell in his short

article entitled "Narrative of John Brickell's Captivity Among the Delaware Indians."

Brickell, who was captured in 1791, spent that summer with one "Whingwy Pooshies"

and his wife somewhere on the Auglaize River near the Maumee towns; Brickell

and Spencer were quite close geographically at about the same time. Brickell made

the following comments:

Our cabin was of round logs, like those of the first settlers, except the roof was of bark and

it had no floor. It consisted of a single room with a French made chimney of cat-and-clay.

The door was made of hewed puncheons....32

It is most enlightening that Brickell related the round log cabin to "first settlers";

he certainly implies that two styles of construction were recognized, round and

hewed log. His reference to a cat-and-clay chimney as being "French" in style is

the only such comment found by this writer. There is no reason to think the English

settlers in New England in the seventeenth century learned such a style from the

French. Perhaps the continuity of such a building practice was stronger among the

French traders and settlers than the English, et al., by the end of the eighteenth

century. However, in William Nowlin's interesting book, The Bark Covered House

(Detroit, 1876), the cat-and-clay chimney is called "Dutch."³³ Since the Nowlin fam-

ily was from eastern New York state before settling in Wayne County, Michigan,

in the mid-1830's, the designation "Dutch chimney" was probably of New York

origin. Inasmuch as Brickell felt the cat-and-clay chimney was French and Nowlin

thought it was Dutch (German, one presumes), there is every reason to suspect

that this method of construction was so established in the United States that its

true origin had been forgotten--if ever known. Obviously, some ethnic groups, or

certain small communities, continued the use of the stick chimney well into the

nineteenth century.

The preceding quotations are a sample of the few contemporary descriptions of

Indian log housing found in and near the Ohio Country in the eighteenth century.

It is obvious that the Indians in direct contact with western civilization quickly

31. Ibid., 78-81.

32. John Brickell, "Narrative of John Brickell's Captivity Among the Delaware Indians," The

American Pioneer, I (February 1842), 47.

33. William Nowlin, The Bark Covered House (Detroit, 1876), 90.

Log Architecture                                                           201

in this chapter. More specific details of construction from contemporary sources are

included in chapter 4.

Thomas Worthington, an Ohio governor and United States senator, built a

double-pen log house on his estate at Chillicothe in 1801-02. This "Belleview" grew

to be more than eighty feet long before the family moved into the presently exist-

ing stone mansion known as "Adena." The name "Adena" was later applied to a

certain prehistoric Indian culture, of which remains were found on the estate. If

Worthington had continued to live in the log house on that site, we might now have

the "Belleview Indians" rather than the "Adena Indians."

An excellent description of Worthington's log home, "Belleview," is given by his

daughter, Sarah, in Private Memoir of Thomas Worthington, Esq.

Our first habitation there [... our temporary dwelling at Adena, to which my parents had

removed in 1802] was very comfortable, and in several of the rooms there was even an air

of elegance apparent. It was built of hewed logs, filled between the timbers with stones and

plaster, whitened with lime within and without. Two large pens, as they were termed, in

the interior about eighteen feet square, a story and a half high, were first raised at about

twenty feet from each other. The space between was weather-boarded and plastered within.

This was the drawing-room, duly adorned by pier-glasses . . . and the old mahogany and

cherry tables and chairs brought from Virginia. The old fashioned brass andirons bright-

ened the fire-place. The room was well carpeted, and the windows were hung with the

prettiest of white curtains, trimmed with fine netting, the work of my mother and other

relatives. On one side of the parlor was my father's library, which was furnished with a

bed, for hospitality. On the other side was my mother's room. Then followed a range of

inferior construction, for the dining-room, kitchen, and rooms for the servants--all with

half stories above, which served as bed rooms for the family, store rooms, etc.34

??  ??  ??  ??  ??  ??  ??

This house . . . extended, in its length of seven or eight rooms, in nearly a direct line on

the lawn some thirty yards below the steps leading to the hall door of the present residence,

the library being the southernmost and nearest the steps.35

This was undoubtedly the best finished and furnished double-pen log house in

Ohio in 1802. It provides contrast to the usual descriptions of the rough accommo-

dations found in most log cabins, which were meant to be temporary structures.

The very fact that a building was made of logs did not mean that it had to be

crude in construction or in furnishings. Most permanent log houses and barns were,

in reality, well made and finished. Whereas the log cabin was a part of the

wilderness-epic in Ohio, the log house represented established settlement. There is

truly a difference between living in a house built of logs--and a log house. The first

implies necessity, primitiveness; the second, a conscious choice. A sophisticated

family from the East might well build a rough log house simply because they ex-

pected to begin a brick or stone house as soon as help and material were available.

Conversely, another family might be content to exist in a log cabin due to indo-

lence or the expectation of moving with the frontier. This "indolence" was noted

by the eastern traveler, Cyrus P. Bradley, in his "Journal" in June 1835, when he

wrote of the log cabins in Pickaway Township, Pickaway County:

Many wealthy farmers, who are worth fifty thousand dollars and who both occupy and rent

vast tracts of rich and profitable territory, are content to live and die without comfort and

34. [Sarah Anne Peter], Private Memoir of Thomas Worthington . . . (Cincinnati, 1882), 34-35.

35. Ibid., 50.

Log Architecture                                                          203

he wished he had the skill of a Mrs. Trollope in his writing. However, there is no

doubt his descriptions are accurate, for his critical eye was not tempered by any

romanticism. The following description of log houses found between Marion and

Sandusky was made about June 13, 1835:

There are occasional huts located in these unhealthy situations [wet prairies], and here and

there an open log-shed adjoins one of these cabins, in which is kept a fresh team of horses

for "the stage." We entered one house--'twas a new one--properly a log-house--the logs

being roughly hewn and notched at the ends and a place being left for a window sash. It

was all in one room, about two-thirds of which has a raised floor, of timber chopped down

to about three inches in thickness. At one end, was a large fireplace, on the bare ground and

the kitchen utensils were hung around it. The chimney, as is invariably the case, was out-

side of the building, of sticks of wood built cob-house fashion and plastered with clay--

the oven of clay and brick is a separate structure, out doors, and erected upon wooden

blocks. . . . We took the liberty to peep into the first structure, the "old house," for this

which I have been describing is the second step towards grandeur, and one more than most

of these settlers make, which looked rather forlorn in its dismantled, inglorious condition.

. . . This structure is called the cabin and is the settlers' primitive residence--composed of

rough, unbarked logs, heaped up as we build log fence, with a hole to crawl in, and per-

haps another for a window. First in the scale, is the cabin, then the log-house, then the

frame building, and then brick . . . . Specimens of all these, as they have been in turn

occupied and deserted, may be occasionally seen on the farms of some industrious and

enterprising farmer.38

It might be added that Bradley saw little to admire in Ohio, probably because

of the enormous contrast between the New England he knew and the emerging

settlements in the young state. In admiring Mrs. Trollope, Bradley reveals himself

as a pretentious and rather naive interpreter of the world about him.

The double-pen log building, as described by Worthington's daughter, was a

standard solution to the problem of achieving the maximum of space with a mini-

mum of material and effort. The references to such houses in Ohio are common,

but no extant examples are known to this writer; surely a few still exist. The double-

pen log barn can still be found, however, at least throughout the southern half of

the state. The double-pen arrangement was ideally suited to the functions of a barn

in the nineteenth century (see chapter 4). Fortescue Cuming wrote of two double-

pen buildings, a house and a tavern, in his Sketches of a Tour to the Western

Country [1807-09]. The double-pen structure was admirably suited to a tavern, and

many have been described in Ohio.

Four miles from hence [Cambridge, Ohio] through a hilly country, brought me to Beymer's

tavern, passing a drove of one hundred and thirty cows and oxen, which one Johnston was

driving from the neighbourhood of Lexington in Kentucky, to Baltimore ....

The drover with six assistants, two horsemen, two family wagons, and the stage wagon,

put up at Beymer's for the night, so that the house which was only a double cabin, was

well filled. . . .

I had a good supper and bed, and found Beymer's double cabin a most excellent house

of accommodation. . . .39

Cuming's other stop at a double-pen house was not as successful as at Beymer's:

Indeed we were not permitted to enter the eating room, but with a sort of sullen civility,

were desired to sit down in an open space which divides two enclosed ends from each

38. Bradley, op. cit., 246-47.

39. Fortescue Cuming, Sketches of a Tour to the Western Country . . . (Pittsburgh, 1810), 206-08.

Log Architecture                                                         207

best to eradicate it. The beginning of farm mechanization in the late 1830's meant

that the farmer could cultivate many times the acreage he was accustomed to till-

ing by hand. As a consequence, most large timber in farming areas disappeared.

It is easy to see, as the nineteenth century progressed, how log building retreated

to the areas of the state unsuited to large-scale farming or industry. Economically,

the agricultural and industrial areas of the state could afford more regal architec-

ture than that of log. Also, the large timber remaining was more valuable for mill-

work than to use in log structures.

Though photography was being practiced in Ohio in the 1840's--Alexander C.

Ross of Zanesville is credited with the first efforts in 1839-40--it is unfortunate that

only a few photographs showing the landscape are known to exist from this period.

The camera would have pictured the landscape as it was, not as an artist wished

it to be. Since much of the literature of the 1830's and 1840's is devoted to advice

on landscaping and home decoration, we must conclude that the villages and coun-

tryside presented a very unkempt appearance. One daguerreotype "snapshot" taken

in Granville late in 1849 shows the hill on which Denison University now stands

as completely barren; instead, the ground was covered with wood debris. The per-

spicacious Blane had a comment on this aspect of the American temperament:

An American has no idea that any one can admire trees or wooded ground. To him a coun-

try well cleared, that is where every stick is cut down, seems the only one that is beautiful

or worthy of admiration.

All the land in the immediate neighbourhood of Cincinnati is without a tree upon it.

This is the case with all American towns; . . . When the Americans improve in taste, this

indiscriminate destruction of the fine trees will be regretted, . . .44

Foreign travelers were particularly aware of the desolate quality of the landscape

in comparison to England and Europe. In Charles Dickens' American Notes for

General Circulation (London, 1842), he described his trip through Ohio, offering

many comments on the barrenness of the countryside. Captain Basil Hall, who

wrote of log houses in his Travels in North America, in the Years 1827 and 1828,

implied the same desolation as noted by Dickens:

The houses are generally left unpainted, and being scattered about without order, look

more like a collection of great packing boxes, than the human residences which the eye is

accustomed to see in old countries.⁴⁵

Since many of the English travelers carried certain prejudices against the former

Colonies, their writings often stirred up storms of protest in the United States--

such as Dickens' serialized book, The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

(London, 1844) which presented a whimsical view of an Englishman trying to settle

in an uninhabitable frontier Eden. The area described could well have been the

"English Prairie" in Illinois, for the author must have been aware of the writings

of Woods, Hulme, Blane, and other English travelers. Dickens denied any mali-

cious intent, which is undoubtedly true. However, it is interesting to speculate that

if we citizens of the United States of 1972 were transported back in time to the

first half of the nineteenth century, our reactions would probably be similar; a

person is conditioned by his own environment--social, political, economic, and, one

might add, aesthetic.

44. Ibid., 125.

45. Basil Hall, Travels in North America . . . (Edinburgh, London, 1829), I, 130.

208                                                             OHIO HISTORY

4 The Technique of Log Construction

The Cabin and the House

Though today opinions vary as to just what was meant by "log cabin" and "log

house," and the current tendency is to call all log buildings for human habitation

"log cabins," there is no doubt distinctions were made in the eighteenth and nine-

teenth centuries, just as they were in the use of "blockhouse," referred to earlier.

This writer favors the description written by Thaddeus M. Harris in his Journal of

a Tour into the Territory Northwest of the Alleghany Mountains; Made in the Spring

of the Year 1803.

The temporary buildings of the first settlers in the wilds are called Cabins. They are built

with unhewn logs, the interstices between which are stopped with rails, calked with moss

or straw, and daubed with mud. The roof is covered with a sort of thin staves split out of

oak or ash, about four feet long and five inches wide, fastened on by heavy poles being laid

upon them. "If the logs be hewed; if the interstices be stopped with stone, and neatly plas-

tered; and the roof composed of shingles nicely laid on, it is called a log-house." A log-

house has glass windows and a chimney; a cabin has commonly no window at all, and only

a hole at the top for the smoke to escape.46

Harris, who was in the Ohio Country at the right time to see log construction at

its most plentiful, was obviously interested in such buildings and made an effort

to be accurate in his description. On the basis of Harris' semantical distinction, the

log cabin has become extinct in Ohio (at least, none has been reported as extant)

and only the log house remains. This is true probably because log cabins were ex-

pected to serve only a few years. It would be interesting to know if the furore over

the log cabin during the Harrison presidential campaign really referred to these

primitive structures only, and whether log houses--in which thousands of Ohioans

resided in 1840--were coincidentally houses built of logs. Considered in these terms,

the log cabin really was the symbol of the frontier to the citizen of 1840 who was

recalling an era twenty-five to fifty years before.

The distinction between cabin and house was indicated also in the writings of

John Johnston, federal agent at the Fort Wayne Indian Agency in the first decade

of the nineteenth century. At that settlement, all the buildings--of various sizes and

usages-were log. The following descriptions are taken from an annual report com-

piled by Johnston on September 30, 1804: The Indian agent's house of hewed logs

was 28 feet long, 24 feet wide, and two stories high, and had a shingle roof. A

large brick chimney stood at the west end. Each story had a fireplace, four windows

of twelve lights, and two "apartments." There was a stone-lined cellar under the

entire structure. The "Indian House," apparently for overnight visitors, was 25 feet

long by 20 feet wide and one story high. It was built of rough logs and had a

"clawboard" roof, and a chimney of "cat and clay" on the south end. The public

store was built of hewed logs 40 feet long (no width given), was one and a half

stories high, and had a shingle roof. It had two rooms, sales and storage; the up-

stairs was for corn and "lumber." (Lumber, in this definition, means "surplus or

disused articles.") The doors and windows were double-bolted. The agency had many

outbuildings which were not detailed; these included a smokehouse, chicken house,

46. Thaddeus Mason Harris, Journal of a Tour into the Territory Northwest of the Alleghany Moun-

tains . . .  (Boston, 1805), 15.

210                                                              OHIO HISTORY

lent autobiography, Recollections of Life in Ohio by William Cooper Howells,

father of the well-known author, William Dean Howells. The Howells family settled

in Jefferson County during the War of 1812.

The farmers lived simply. They were all in about the same social condition, and nearly

equal as to wealth . . . . The houses and improvements depended upon the length of time

they had been on the place. A man who had just settled was not expected to have much

of a house, or other buildings. The first care was to get up what would do, and this was

usually a good sized log cabin of round logs, covered with clapboards; that is, split pieces,

four feet long and six inches wide, and weighted down on the roof with logs. A barn of the

same materials was built . . . . Such barns . . . were mostly made by putting up two log

pens--say eighteen feet square, that is, all the logs eighteen feet long--at a distance of about

eighteen feet apart; the pens were carried up to about twelve feet high, when logs were

placed so as to connect the two pens under one roof ....49

?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ??

The best farm houses were made of hewn logs, that is, logs flattened to a regular thick-

ness. These were notched together, so that they nearly touched each other in the wall. The

interstices were filled with pieces of wood, in a rough way, and then, for a good house,

this "chinking" was plastered over with a good mortar of lime and sand, on the inside and

outside of the wall . . . . The corners of the house were trimmed down, and doors and

windows cut through the logs and cased up . . . . A good house would have a shingled

roof, a brick chimney and well laid floor above and below. A very common house floor,

as well as barn floor, was made up of what were called puncheons--that is, thick slabs split

out of logs, hewn on the face and edges and cut to a level beneath . . . . Our new house

had this kind of floor. It was of hewn logs, but had a clap-board roof.50

References to a puncheon floor are quite common; and though many must still

exist in Ohio, this writer has heard of only one example. Even as early as 1800

dimensioned lumber for most building purposes was being sawed by the fledgling

Ohio milling industry. The gristmill and sawmill proprietors, who were among the

first settlers, were apparently dependent only on adequate water sources. General

Benjamin Whiteman moved his milling operation from Dayton to the falls of the

Little Miami River (Clifton, Greene County) in 1805 because, in his opinion,

Dayton was becoming too crowded with mills. Such comments are, of course, rela-

tive in time and geographic location. There were in Ohio in 1805, large, developing

urban and agricultural areas, as well as completely unsettled land and the remnants

of several Indian tribes. Thus one man could complain of oversettlement while

another decried the Indians and the wilderness. This adds confusion to the "tem-

porary" cabin versus the "permanent" house controversy in terms of dating, for

obviously they existed simultaneously.

There is considerable contemporary literature on the construction of log build-

ings which describes techniques used. One aspect of construction, however, is always

missing from the accounts--that of the methods and terminology of corner notch-

ing. Since two types of interlocking corners predominated in Ohio, the steeple and

the half-dovetail, perhaps this detail was simply taken for granted because it was

regarded as commonplace. Certainly corner notching was just one of many tasks

connected with the raising of a log building and, though it seems complicated today,

was probably accomplished more quickly than other aspects of the construction. It

would be helpful to know the jargon of corner notching. Possibly additional infor-

49. William Cooper Howells, Recollections of Life in Ohio ... (Cincinnati, 1895), 154.

50. Ibid., 118.

Log Architecture                                                           213

something like staves, about four feet long, from four to six inches wide, and about one-

third of an inch thick. Instead of being nailed, these staves or clapboards were generally

confined in their place by heavy timbers, laid at right angles across them, giving the roof

a unique and rough appearance. A door-way and windows were made by chopping out

the logs of proper length and hight [sic] before laying them up, so as to make suitable aper-

tures . . . . The floors (when any were used) were made of short, thick plank, split from

poplar, walnut, or oak. In some cases, the more wealthy settlers had the logs hewed on

the inside, and the puncheon floor hewed and planed . . . . Finally, the spaces between the

logs were filled with timber, split like fire wood, from some soft tree, and made impervious

to wind and rain by daubing the cracks with mud.52

The Harris, Doddridge, and Walker descriptions are quite similar considering

they were written over a sixty-six-year span (and assuming no borrowing of notes

occurred). Walker mentions as tools an ax, auger, and saw, though the building

he describes really did not need the latter item; Doddridge adds the frow and

broadax. It is worth noting that an ax alone was sufficient to make a rough cabin,

though probably most settlers had an auger and many owned a saw. The broadax

and hand adze were also common tools. With the addition of a frow and nails, a

well-finished log house could be constructed. The ax and auger were really the

basic tools for a reasonably well-constructed house. (Chapter 5 describes tools and

their uses in greater detail.)

Walker's description of the method used in forming window and door openings

was atypical in log construction, though it may reflect a certain typology. The com-

mon method of constructing these openings is given by John Woods:

A door-place, of the usual size, is cut through the logs, and two pieces of wood are nailed

or pegged up to the ends of the sawed logs, to keep them in their places, and to serve for

door-posts; . . . The windows are made in the same manner as the door-places.53

Woods also describes the doors and windows used in such openings:

The doors are generally made of cleft boards, nailed or pegged on some ledges [battens],

with wooden hinges, made in the following manner. A piece in the back part of the door

is left longer than the door, and enters a hole in the sill; and at the top of the door a piece

is also left to rest against the top of the door-place, which is covered with a piece of wood,

either nailed or pegged over it. The windows are always sash ones; the usual size of the

glass is eight inches by ten; the windows are sometimes made to open with hinges, and

others to slide backwards and forwards, while others take out and in. When the doors are

made of sawed boards they have eight or ten panes of glass in them, and then it is seldom

there is any other window in the cabin.⁵⁴

Woods is describing the common board and batten door, but with a wooden hinge.

On one vertical edge of the door a board, usually heavier than the rest, extended

a few inches above the top and bottom edges for a hingepost. The ends of this

board were shaped as round as possible. The bottom of the hingepost fit into a hole

in the sill or threshold. The top was encircled by a separate piece of wood fastened

to the door lintel. The author has seen several examples of this type of door hing-

ing still in use in Ohio, but only on barns.

Woods's comments on windows in Illinois apply to Ohio, though glass sizes might

have varied slightly. The use of door-lights in Ohio log cabins and houses may not

have been as common as Woods found in Illinois, however. Certainly examples

52. Charles M. Walker, History of Athens County, Ohio (Cincinnati, 1869), 115-16.

53. Woods, op. cit., 276.

54. Ibid., 277.

Log Architecture                                                           215

and fire upon the enemy. Of windows we had but two, containing only four panes of glass

each, in openings so small, that any attempt to enter them by force must have proved fatal

to an assailant.55

By implication the windows were limited in size for purposes of defense and not

for lack of glass.

Francis Baily, an exceptional observer, was at Columbia in the spring of 1797.

In his Journal he describes the residence of one Dr. Bean:

His house was built of logs, as all the houses in these new settlements are, and consisted

of a ground floor containing two rooms, one of which was appropriated to lumber [storage]:

the other served all the purposes of parlour, bedroom, shop, and everything else; (though

there was a little outhouse, where they occasionally cooked their victuals, and also washed);

and it did not appear as if it had been cleaned out this half-year. There were two windows

to throw light into the room; but there had been so many of the panes of glass broken,

whose places were supplied by old hats and pieces of paper, that it was very little bene-

fited by the kind intention of the architect.

??

When the time drew nigh for us to retire to rest, we were shown to one corner of the

room where there was a ladder, up which we mounted into a dismal kind of a place with-

out a window; but instead thereof, there were a number of crevices between the logs, which

had never been filled up . . . . the wind blew so strong, and there were so many holes in

the room, that we were incommoded by a continual current of air the whole night . . . .56

To Dr. Bean, at least, the presence or absence of a few panes of glass must have

been of little consequence. What is interesting is that he did have two glazed sash

windows, which attracted Baily's interest not because of their uniqueness for Ohio

in 1797, but because numerous panes were broken.

As with the controversy over window glass versus oiled paper, discussion on the

fireplace and chimney and all their variations has generated a great deal of fact

and fiction. There are perhaps four variants that could be used in cabin or house:

1) An open fire on a dirt floor with a smoke hole in the roof; 2) an enclosed wooden

firebox lined with clay, mortar, brick, stone, or some combination thereof; 3) a brick

firebox, and 4) a stone firebox. The last three categories might be found with one

of three types of chimneys: 1) Stick and clay, in common jargon "cat-and-daub"

or "wattle-and-daub"; 2) brick, and 3) stone. All these systems were used in Ohio.

Obviously the open fire would have been found in only the most primitive of cabins,

particularly those of the squatters prior to 1787. The wooden firebox and "catted"

chimney are mentioned too often in literature to classify them as rarities in Ohio,

though their use was generally confined to the very early settlements. Due to the

high fire hazard involved with such fireplaces and chimneys, their replacement was

guaranteed as soon as brick could be fired or suitable stone found and laid.

John Woods gives a good description of a lined, wooden firebox and stick chim-

ney, but since his text refers to sketches, it will be paraphrased.57 Most fireplaces,

at least in Ohio log buildings, were placed at one of the gable ends, with the chim-

ney exterior to the structure. An opening was formed through the wall as described

earlier in this chapter. Enclosing the opening on the exterior was a three-sided fire-

box of round or hewed logs, the ends notched into the wall of the house. A stone

or clay hearth laid inside the firebox extended through the opening into the interior

55. Spencer, op. cit., 14.

56.  Baily, op. cit., 198-200.

57. Woods, op. cit., 276-77.

216                                                             OHIO HISTORY

of the house. The inside of the firebox was lined with clay or mortar, or stone or

brick. (Woods's example was lined with stone set in clay.) A chimney was built on

the firebox using small sticks laid in the same fashion as the walls of the house--

without notching, however. This stick chimney was thoroughly daubed with clay.

As long as the clay or mortar daubing held intact, the fireplace and chimney were

reasonably safe. A variant of this style of fireplace used a double-walled firebox of

plank, with the interior space filled with clay. Since the inner wall of wood burned

away as the fireplace was used, the clay was hardened, which provided a fireproof

lining. There is a painting by Marcus Mote (1817-98) entitled "Mary Craig Dunlevy"

at Glendower (house) in Lebanon, which shows a brick-lined wood firebox. Mote

could well have used an extant fireplace for his model. The firebox bricks are not

neatly laid, but have fallen away at the sides. A chain and hook for hanging a kettle

can be seen in the upper center of the hearth. The brick lining rises only about

half the height of the firebox, and logs or plank can be seen above it. (Unfortu-

nately, the painting is in such poor condition that the above details do not show

clearly in a photographic copy.)

The sizes of fireplaces varied considerably, but from a practical viewpoint most

were too large and inefficient for heating and too small for cooking. Count Rum-

ford (Benjamin Thompson--actually an American) wrote extensively on the fire-

place at the turn of the nineteenth century, particularly on the inefficiency of the

large deep firebox, but apparently his comments did not alter traditional practice

except in urban areas where architect-builders were at work.58

Rumford recommended a very shallow fireplace with the sides and back slanting

to reflect as much heat as possible into the room. This, of course, was not a cook-

ing fireplace. He devised the "Rumford roaster," an oven-like brick stove with

built-in kettles, for cooking. Various devices were both handmade and commer-

cially manufactured for cooking at an open fireplace--the crane is the best known

today. This type of fireplace necessitated a deep hearth for a work area while cook-

ing, for the kettles and skillets required varying degrees of heat which could be

achieved only by their careful positioning or by manipulation of the fire itself, so

that when needed, a small quantity of coals could be scraped from the fire onto

the hearth (a good description can be found in Nowlin).59

Most of these fireplaces had mantels, either a completely framed unit fastened

to the wall or simply a shelf composed of a board resting on pegs. Though early

cooking fireplace mantels are not common today, the author has seen a few in Ohio

from the first quarter of the nineteenth century. They are invariably very high, 6 to

6 1/2 feet, because the shelf had to be above the work area. Original mantels are

often found to be burned away where the vertical sides meet the hearth.

Between 1855 and 1859 General Roeliff Brinkerhoff of Mansfield wrote a series

of articles on the history of Richland County for his newspaper, Mansfield Herald.

Many of these articles were reprinted in another Mansfield newspaper, The Ohio

Liberal, in the 1870's. The following description of log cabin building was written

in February 1858, from material given to Brinkerhoff by one James Sirpliss "and

others," and is taken from the 1876 reprint. It is a good account complete with

terminology, though the article has a multitude of grammatical and typographical

errors with which the reader must contend, such as calling the logs supporting the

eaves "cave beams" and "cave bearers." The word "cave" is probably a typograph-

58. Benjamin Thompson Rumford, Count, Essays ..., 4th ed. (London, 1798-1802), 3 vols.

59. Nowlin, op. cit., 92.

218                                                                OHIO HISTORY

ical error, for Spencer uses the term "eave bearers." "Chinking" and "chunking,"

and "clapboard" and "clawboard" are no doubt dialectical variants.

As a general thing log cabin raisings presented a general attendance, the settlers turning out

en masse, especially when it was understood that there was to be on hands for ready use a

quantum sufficit," of the extract of corn or rye. This was an important consideration in those

days of rustic simplicity . . . . Another important consideration among many of the settlers

was the position in which the edifice should stand. This position was due north and south,

the better to observe the rising and setting of the sun, and for marking the hours in which

they were to be called from labor to refreshment.

A primal log cabin is composed of logs, puncheon clap boards, with stone or wooden

chimneys, and oiled paper window lights.

After the erection of the cabin, the next operation is the putting on of the roof and the

completion of the chimney. Instead of shingles, the roofs were laid with clap boards which

are that kind of lumber and somewhat resembles staves out of which barrels are made,

being split with an instrument called a frow.

Puncheons are planks made by splitting logs, into several slabs of certain thickness. These

answered for flooring boards, tables, benches, &c. The cave beams are those ends and logs

which project over to receive the butting poles, against which the lower row of clap boards

rest, in forming the roof.

The trapping is the roof timbers composing the gable ends; and the ribs are those logs

on which the clap boards are placed.

The trap logs are those of unequal length lying above the cave bearers, and form the

gable ends of the building upon which the ribs rest. The weight poles are those small logs

laid on the roof, which keep down the clap boards to their proper place.

The knees are pieces of heart timber placed above the butting poles, successively to pre-

vent the weight poles from falling off.

The next process after the erection of the cabin, is the chunking and daubing process,

and in this operation the chimney is completed.

On entering the cabin, the first, and indeed an important consideration was the construc-

tion of bedsteads .... Holes were made in the logs, . . . and poles inserted therein; the

projecting ends were then fastened to suitable uprights by means of withes made out of bark.

Cross poles were then laid across from side to side, and fastened down in the same manner.

In most cabins, ladders, consisting of several rungs, were used instead of stairs and were

the means by which the younger members of the family ascended the upper part of the

cabin to rest during the night . . . . The second floor . . . was laid with clapboards, without

being made fast, so that they were easily displaced, and consequently, those who slept up-

stairs, were constrained to move over them cautiously, from fear of being precipitated upon

the puncheon floor beneath them.60

The alignment of a cabin or house "north and south" was a general practice,

particularly when there were no roads or topographic features suggesting a differ-

ent positioning. The most logical reason for doing so was to get as much sunlight

as possible into the structure--through the windows, if any, and the door, which

would normally be to the front, or south.

A more erudite account of a raising was given in an address by Henry B. Curtis

in September 1885.

In the first place you must realize, if you can, that the work to be done was usually at the

60. Roeliff Brinkerhoff, "The History of Richland County," The Ohio Liberal (Mansfield), 1876.

Log Architecture                                                     221

of 18 feet; certainly mechanical leverage and/or animal power was required. White

oak is rated at 47 pounds per cubic foot at 12 percent moisture content. Probably

these plate logs were much higher in moisture, but using the above rating, the 60

foot section would have weighed approximately 4,406 pounds. (When this plate was

removed during restoration, it was estimated to weigh between 2,500 and 2,700

pounds.)

Although Curtis was certainly aware of various distinctions in the quality of con-

struction of log cabins, he does not apply the term "house" to the better finished

structure. He uses, rather, "primitive form" and "improved form." He does imply

that the primitive cabin was intended to last fifteen to twenty years, or until the

pioneer was permanently established on his land. This estimate fits well with the

supposition that such structures were most common between the end of the Indian

Wars and the War of 1812. Because of the unsettled conditions on the frontier dur-

ing this period--the continued threat of Indian warfare and war with Great Britain,

the uncertainty of treaty and private property boundaries--there is no doubt many

families financially able to erect substantial houses and barns did not do so simply

because of fear of losing them. The loss of a few log buildings was negligible in

comparison to what would be incurred if more finished structures were destroyed.

According to Brinkerhoff and Curtis, whiskey was a prime necessity at a raising.

The custom must have been an old one. Doddridge mentions an all night "house

warming" after a raising, which must have included a bit of drinking, and Baily

mentions the fact when he was at the site of Waynesville, Warren County, in March

of 1797:

The next morning nothing was to be heard but the noise of the axe resounding through

the woods. Every one who was expert at that art was gone out to cut down trees to build

our friend [Samuel Heighway] a house, and before night they had got several of the logs

laid and the house raised several feet. They all joined cheerfully at this work, but then it

was expected that our friend should not deny them the use of the whiskey barrel in the

meanwhile, which makes it come as expensive as if you were to hire so many men to do

it for you . . . .62

The last sentence is particularly revealing, for it does imply a considerable quantity

of whiskey was consumed; the number of settlers in the community could not have

been very large in 1797.

Nails were a scarce commodity for most pioneers, though they were available if

one could afford both their cost and the transportation charges. Although there

were nail cutting and heading machines in the 1790's, production could not meet

demand for many years and the ubiquitous nailrod remained in common use for

at least the first quarter of the nineteenth century. However, Putnam could order

"cut nails" for his house in 1796, Worthington had them available for his log house

in 1802, and Johnston used them for roofing in 1808. The earliest large scale use

of machine-made nails was for shingling, followed by house siding. The number

of nails needed for the 232 frame houses counted in Cincinnati in the 1810 census

would have been prodigious. These houses had to have been built during the same

period of time implied by Curtis and Brinkerhoff, namely, the turn of the nineteenth

century, yet the majority of owners of these houses could not have been as affluent

as Putnam, Worthington, or Johnston. The mass-produced nail must have been

available wherever there was transportation. Here again is an example of the ephe-

62. Baily, op. cit., 207.

222                                                             OHIO HISTORY

meral quality of the frontier in Ohio.

The present city of Chillicothe was the site of early settlement in Ohio, where

many houses were erected before 1800. On September 25, 1923, the Daily News-

Advertiser described in some detail a log house that had been torn down to make

way for the newspaper's new press building. By reputable evidence the house was

standing in 1800 and had been sided and plastered prior to 1820 when a brick

house was built adjoining it. The article states, in part:

When the workmen began demolishing the one-story frame structure in the rear of the brick

portion it was found to be an ancient weatherboarded log cabin. The cabin was built of

hand-hewn, squared logs [of beech], as solid as the day they were put in. The interstices

between the logs were filled with short blocks of wood and the "chinking" was of clay.

The rafters supporting the roof were poles about five or six inches in diameter squared on

one side and with the bark left on the rounded side. At one end they were notched to fit

together at the ridge and were fastened together with wooden pins driven through augur

[sic] holes. The sheeting of the roof was split boards. There was a brick chimney about ten

feet wide in the base, and clay was used instead of mortar. The old open fireplace was over

five feet wide.

Later on the structure was weatherboarded on the outside and plastered inside. Hand-

split hickory laths were used fastened to the logs with hand-wrought nails. There were no

nails used in the original work on the cabin ....

Originally there was a rear room to the cabin and a porch on the west side.63

The reporter was really describing a well-built log house which had been pre-