This section is taken from the book "Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Muskingum County, Ohio" by Goodspeed Publishing Co., 1892, Columbus, Ohio. It is a wonderful source for Muskingum history and seems to be a source that Ione Bradford Supplee found much informastion in. I have found some errors and contradictions but that is to be expected especially since the author seemed to have gotten much of his information from the residents of the county as well as documented records.

It was to the Falls of the Muskingum, within the boundaries of the territory that subsequently became Salt Creek township, and known and described in the United States surveys as "Township thirteen of range twelve of lands of the United States within the territory northwest of the River Ohio, and subject to entry in the land office in Marietta, Ohio," that, in the latter part of June, 1788, a party of thirty men, under the command of a United States military officer from Fort Harmar, was sent by water, with provisions and presents of goods, for the purpose of negotiating a treaty of peace and friendship with several tribes of Indians who had selected that as the place for meeting Gen. St. Clair, the governor of the territory and authorized representative and agent of the government. The location selected for conducting the negotiations was on the south bank of the river, where the town of Taylorsville now stands. These troops were ordered to the place by Gen. Harmar, commandant of Fort Harman, for the purpose of erecting a council house and the building of huts for the comtort of the men and protecting the goods against the weather. This remote spot was selected by the Indians for the purpose of the council in preference to Fort Harmar, for the reason it was nearer their own homes, and was to them a well known and favorite locality and not under the influence of a military fort. The attempt to form a treaty was a failure. The reason is given by the historian in a few words. He says: "The Indians commenced assembling from the different tribes in large numbers, especially from the Delawares. Among them was a band of the Chippewas and other Indians, outcasts from different tribes, amounting to about twenty. On the night of the 13th of July, those desperadoes crept slyly around the tents containing the goods, and fired on the sentries, ten in number, with the intention of plundering them. By this discharge two men were killed and one or two wounded. The sentries returned the fire, and the rest of the guards running to the assistance, the Indians retired without accomplishing their object. One of the assailants was killed and one wounded, The same night they killed and scalped a mulatto man, servant to Maj. Duncan, a trader who was waiting for the assembling of the tribes, with goods to barter for their skins and peltries." This action of the Indians exhibited so hostile a feeling and was so unexpected that any further attempt to secure a treaty at that time was not only regarded as impracticable, but exceedingly hazardous, and, as a consequence, the matter was for the time being indefinitely postponed. A subsequent conference was, however, held in the fall following at another place and a treaty effected.

It was in the early autumn of the year 1795, immediately on the close of the Indian war and two years before any white man was located with the view of making a permanent home on any of the territory which now constitutes Muskingum county, that under the auspices of a company formed in Marietta the manufacture of salt was commenced in this township, at or adjoining the present village of Chandlersville on the east. It was the first experiment of the kind in the Muskingum valley -- in fact the first in all the territory northwest of the Ohio river east of the Scioto valley. The discovery of salines at this point at the time it was made grew out of the fact that salt at Marietta, and at all the settlements below Marietta along the Ohio and up the Muskingum rivers, was a commodity so scarce as to be entirely beyond the ability of most persons to procure, it being retailed as high as fifty cents a quart. It was, too, an article of universal necessity, and as the demand for it must constantly increase as the population increased it was imperative upon the people to find some source of supply near at home adequate to the demand, and which would have the effect to reduce the price to an amount that all might be enabled to satisfy their necessary wants. It was understood that the Indians for an indefinite period of time had been in the habit of obtaining salt water from the salines that have existed and reducing the same to salt. Accordingly a company was sent out from Marietta for the purpose of locating those salines. After a considerable search they were discovered; by the aid of a small camp kettle the explorers were enabled to test the waters, and greatly to their relief it was found that these waters were much more strongly impregnated with saline particles than they had any reason to hope or expect might be the case. A report of the discovery was duly made to the people of Marietta by whom they had been sent on this voyage of exploration. As a consequence all the necessary appliances for making salt were called into requisition at the earliest possible day, the business of salt manufacturing commenced, and was prosecuted with the utmost energy and vigor, night and day, until the supply of the article was sufficient to satisfy the demand. The salt was for the most part conveyed to the river at Duncan's Falls on pack-horses and thence transported in canoes to Waterford and Marietta. The supplies for the employes at the works were procured at these places, and brought them in the same way.

It was in the latter part of this year, during the month of December, that the adventure of Capt. William Davis and Juda Ford occurred. They were employed at the works, the former acting in the capacity of foreman or manager, the latter an intelligent young man of nineteen years of age, a laborer there, and also acting in the capacity of book-keeper. The supply of provisions at the works became well-nigh exhausted, and it became necessary that a new supply should be ordered. This could only be done by going or sending to Waterford and Marietta, and as the river was closed by ice it was necessary to go by land. Accordingly these men determined to make the trip and started for Waterford by a direct route through the woods, without any trace or marked trees to guide them. As the works had only been in operation for a brief period, the intercourse between them and their base of supplies had thus far been conducted entirely by water, the overland route as yet not being opened. These men having expected to reach their destination in a single day, the distance being only thirty miles, the only outfit they provided was one blanket, a single charge of gunpowder, a flint, a jack-knife, a piece of tow string for tinder, and a couple of pounds of venison. Not being familiar with the woods they hired a hunter as a guide to pilot them to the headwaters of Meigs creek. He accompanied them a few miles on the way, and, after giving directions as to the route, returned. The men mistook the directions given them, and instead of reaching the headwaters of Meigs creek wandered over to the waters of Mills creek, down which stream they traveled until night overtook them. The day was cloudy and exceedingly cold, the thermometer at Marietta ranging from twenty-two to twenty-four degrees below zero. Instead of going south as they supposed, they had been all the day traveling north. As night came on they succeeded, with the materials they had at command, in striking a fire in the bark of a dry tree, and encamped for the night. The following day the sun appeared and they saw the mistake of the preceding day and commenced retracing their steps. They wandered about until the second night overtook them in the wilderness. This was passed as was the first night. Now their venison and their means to obtain a fire were all gone. On the morning of the third day they came upon a small stream bearing a westerly direction, down which they determined to go. Suddenly and unexpectedly they saw smoke ascending through the branches and tops of the trees. They were not long in reaching the works and with frozen hands and feet received the greetings of their companions from whom they separated more than two days before. And here we leave them.

Before the discovery of the Salines by the white man, the stream uniting with the Muskingum river at Duncan's Falls was called Salt creek. By whom this name was given the main stream is not known. That matter is involved in obscurity. But it was undoubtedly given because of the Salines on the east branch, which by the men at the works were called "White Eyes," and probably on the supposition that this east branch was the main and not a tributary stream. The name "White Eyes" was given this branch of Salt creek on which the Salines were situated in honor of George White Eyes, a young Indian who had been educated at Dartmouth College by the United States Government as a token of respect to his father, a Delaware chief of that name, who had ever exhibited friendship for the whites. This young Indian had spent sometime at Waterford when the first settlement was there made. He had befriended the white settlers on several occasions, was quite a favorite with them and was personally known to some of the employes at the works. The stream bore the name above given it for quite a number of years, but of late, within the memory of man, the name has been transferred to another branch of Salt creek running in a westerly direction across the northern portion of the township. The branch of the stream first called "White Eyes" and joining it about a half mile below Chandlersville, was called by the men at the works, "Williams' Fork," in honor of the adventure of Williams and Ford as related above. The name the stream still bears.

It was in the year 1797, that Captain John Chandler, a native of Connecticut, but at the time a citizen of Rutland county, Vermont, inspired by the enthusiasm that animated large numbers of New England people to remove to Ohio, and allured by the glowing descriptions which reached New England of the richness of the soil and the magnitude of the productions for which the Ohio country was becoming celebrated, became one of a company of fifteen families, organized in New Ipswich, New Hampshire, under the general direction and leadership of General Rufus Putnam as agent of the Ohio company for the purpose of emigrating to this western wilderness. This was only one of numerous companies organized throughout the New England states in like manner and for a like purpose at about the same period of time. The company of which Captain Chandler became a member on its arrival in Ohio made their first permanent landing in the part of Balpre, now known as Newbury township, the most southerly township of Washington county.

Here the company first planted a settlement but it was not destined long to remain so. It began very soon to disintegrate. It was composed of too many inharmonious elements. The families separated, some going in one direction, some another. Some sought a home in one locality, some another. Captain Chandler remained two years and then determined to go elsewhere. He explored the region of the upper Muskingum and the valley of the Licking. Like many others he probably entertained a prejudice against selecting a home along the valleys of the larger streams. The fear was generally indulged that the atmosphere where the forests were so dense as along the larger streams, must necessarily be filled with malaria and that as a consequence sickness must there prevail. Hence many of the pioneer settlers located on the high grounds when the rich bottoms along the larger streams could have been as easily secured. After much wandering and weighing in his own mind the relative merits different localities possessed for a permanent residence, he finally selected the "White Eyes" branch of Salt creek as the locality where he would spend his future years. He had now passed the meridan of life and had reached that period in human existence when the shadows lengthen as the years increase. Hence the importance of a judicious selection must have been uppermost in his thoughts. His choice was probably determined by the surroundings and the fact that all indications favored it as a healthy locality. Here, too, were established a salt-works for the manufacture of salt which had been operated by the Marietta company for a series of years with a constantly increased production. The locality was one that seemed to be favorably situated for becoming a business center,and as the population increased and the country developed trade relations must become a matter of no small importance. Besides it was on the direct and shortest route of what must become the chief highway between Zanesville and Marietta.

It was in the spring of 1799 when Captain Chandler with his family landed here In this White Eyes valley. What was the situation? He had no home to which he could come; no home to protect his family from the elements; not even a shed whereunder, for the time being, he could find shelter. What a contrast it presented to that Vermont home he had left only two years before! How must all have seemed to the mind of this intelligent and experienced man! What were the emotions of this heroic pioneer as he looked about him and into the faces of that gentle and devoted wife and of that family of bright and active-minded children who had accompanied him into the depths of the wilderness!

Captain Chandler's family consisted of nine persons -- himself, his wife, two sons that had nearly reached a man's estate, two in their boyhood years, one a lad of six or eight years, an infant son and a daughter some nine or ten years of age. It was the first business to secure a place of shelter and, for the time being, what might be called a home. This was speedily accomplished. Within three days he and his boys, with the aid of such of the men at the works as could be spared, had a cabin erected and comfortably prepared for occupancy, and of sufficient size to afford ample accommodations for all the household. It very soon became the home of peace, comfort and contentment.

As soon as the cabin home was prepared so as to afford comfortable protection to its inmates, and shelter was provided for the oxen and the few domestic animals he possessed, Captain Chandler and his boys, with an unfaltering industry and energy, commenced the work of preparing the land for cultivation by clearing away the undergrowth of the forest and "girdling" or deadening the trees around and in the neighborhood of his cabin home. The wild became a garden. At the end of the first season enough was secured of grain and vegetables, and provender for stock, to supply over into the succeeding year enough and to spare.

The Chandlers were all active and could work with advantage at almost anything they undertook. They were, too, for the most part, artisans. They could as readily apply their hands to mechanical pursuits, and with as quick a perception as to the manner of doing, as to the preparation of the land for cultivation. Captain Chandier, in his boyhood days, had practiced, more as a pastime than as an employment, the business of blacksmithing. His boys readily caught the business of smithing, as they did the use of the plane, the saw, the chisel and the mallet, and as a consequence, at odd spells, on rainy days, and at times when out-door employments could not be pursued, with the aid of such mechanical instruments as they had at command, they were enabled to make almost any article of every day use that required mechanical skill in its construction. This aptitude in the use of tools proved of great advantage to them during the after years when the settlement was developing.

Before two years elapsed Captain Chandler had opened and placed under cultivation a large and productive farm. But the farm and farming operations were not enough. Ambitious, energetic and restless spirits required something to be feed upon more stimulating and exciting than that afforded by agricultural employment. It was at this juncture of affairs that negotiations were entered upon looking to the sale and transfer of the Salt Works still owned and conducted by the Marietta company to Captain Chandler and sons. In due time such sale was effected and the transfer of the works made. The new proprietors immediately went into possession and took charge of the business. Thus far, as the entire population of the neighborhood consisted only of a single family it was a matter of indifference who owned the works or who conducted the business of salt manufacturing. But now it was different. The time had come when an increase of population in the neighborhood was anticipated. As a matter of course, all new comers would have a desire that the advantages to be derived from the conduct of the business, if any, should inure to the common benefit of the people of the neighborhood. This part, too, as it should become generally known, would have the effect to attract population. The works, therefore, when the new proprietors acquired possession, thenceforward became known as "Chandler's Salt works." The business was too, under the new management prosecuted with renewed energy and vigor and for all there was in it. It was from these works that the people along the Muskingum river and at Marietta, and for a distance of many miles along the Ohio above and below Marietta, for quite a number of years, obtained this article of universal necessity. It cannot be ascertained that a single employe of the Marietta company during the entire five years that Company owned and managed the works, remained for any considerable time in the employ of the new company, or became a pioneer or a settler in the neighborhood. A new set of men were on hand to take their places. Only the names of a portion of these can now be recalled; and of these memory and tradition are alike at fault as to when and with a single exception whence they came and how long they were thus engaged. It is only known they were there some portion of the time during the six or seven years the Chandlers conducted the salt operations. The names now recalled are those of John Hopper, Daniel B3ane, William Cunningham, William Newell, John Dixon and David Forebush. Though single men, nearly if not quite all became pioneers and identified themselves with the people of the neighborhood in clearing away the forests for cultivation. They deserve remembrance as the advance guard of the civilization that was to follow. It was now 1801, Zanesville and Putnam were each becoming points of some consequence and promised to be important towns. A post route providing for carrying the mail once a week each way, had been established between these points and Marietta, although on the entire line from Zanesville to Waterford there was not a Post Office for the reason there was not a single inhabitant resident on the line except at the Chandler's Salt works. This post road was little more than a bridle path, but the travel over it was becoming quite constant and was rapidly increasing. Accordingly the "Chandler settlement," as it was now being called, began to arrest attention. Comers and goers were frequent. The roads to Zanesville and Duncan's Falls, especially the latter as it was the road on which the traffic to and from the Salt works was conducted, soon became much traveled highways. A new order of things was now about to be introduced.

There is no record as to who were the first pioneers to succeed Captain Chandler in this new settlement, who next to him were entitled to the honor of being the first to commence here the demolition of the forest. The arrivals became quite frequent. Several families came at about the same time. Among the first to arrive were John Briggs, of Pennsylvania, Johnson Brewster, of Vermont, a brother-in-law of Captain Chandler. About the same time came George Clapper from Pennsylvania and William Dixon, from Ireland, and Abraham Mercer, of Virginia. All these men had families and were here before 1804. In this year came Daniel Bliss another brother-in-law of Captain Chandler, and a native of Massachusetts, with a family, including himself, of nine persons. He was a physician and the only physician in the settlement for more than twenty years. Then came during the four or five years that followed, Peter Sarehett, Jacob Crumbaker, Jacob Wilhelm, Thomas Brady, Joseph Culbertson, and others whose names are not at command. All these men had families, -- they were pioneers and became what might be called representative men of the neighborhood. They all came to make husbandry their pursuit. A little further along came Robert Linn, and David Peairs, natives of Pennsylvania, Isaac Wartenbee from Virginia, and Welcome Ballou, from Massachusetts, and John Finney. All these persons were accompanied with their families. Other pioneer settlers followed and at the end of the decade the population of the township had increased to several hundred. It was, too, a rapidly increasing population, not confined to a single neighborhood, but scattered over the entire township.

The Chandler grist mill was built prior to 1807 and was burned in 1811--1812. Llewellyn Howell built the second mill, and it is said Silas Robinson was his partner in the enterprise. Sometime between 1815 and 1818 Samuel McCune had a saw and grist mill on Big Salt creek. Zachary Chandler's tannery was started about 1810, and William Scott's distillery in 1814. Bernhard Brewster opened a store in 1812. John Stevens and John Moore were also early merchants. Zachary Chandler kept a tavern in a frame building as early as 1815. He was succeeded in this enterprise by a Mr. Cuberday, and during his occupancy the building was burned. Robert Linn opened his house for the accommodation of the public about 1820. There was no professional blacksmith in the township until 1810, when Jerry Joseph came. The next disciple of Vulcan was William Moore, known as "Old Bung My Eye." from a song he often sang. Dr. Daniel Bliss, the pioneer physician, came in 1812. Salt Creek Baptist church was organized in 1811. The first church was of hewn logs and had the dignity of two stories and a gallery. The Methodist Episcopal church at Mansfork, grew out of a class organized as early as 1812 by Rev. James Watts. William Knox began his labors at Chandlersville in 1816. Chandlersville and Sugar Grove appointments were formerly in Norwich circuit, and in 1869 were joined with Fairview and Duncan's Falls appointments, and known as the Duncan's Falls circuit. Presbyterianism took root here in 1814, when the first organization was formed. A small frame house was the first edifice of this denomination at Chandlersville. The present brick church was built in 1834. The United Brethren church dates its organization back to 1857-1858.

It was about the year 1805 that John Chandler, third son of Captain Chandler, still quite a young man, erected, or caused to be erected, the first mill in the township. Its site was on the creek about a mile below the salt works. As the mill stones were procured in the neighborhood and it contained no bolting chest, its use consisted principally in grinding corn. This was an important event in the history of the neighborhood.

The Chandlers conducted the business of salt manufacturing for the period of between six and seven years after they first came into possession of the works. They then disposed of the same to John, Peter and Thomas Sarehett. On the 15th day of February, 1809, the General Assembly of Ohio passed a law creating or appointing an agent to superintend and lease these works. Previous to this date no such officer existed. Accordingly under that act a lease of the works for the period of three years was effected with the Sarehetts. Again on the 20th day of February, 1812, the general assembly of the state passed an act authorizing the further leasing of the works to the same parties for the period of seven years, granting to the lessees the additional privilege of enclosing 80 acres of land adjoining for pasture and fuel purposes. On the expiration of this lease no further action was taken by the state looking to its renewal. Owing to the fact that in numerous other localities, by boring wells deep into the rocky strata salt waters of much greater strength and in much larger quantities had been secured, these works as property possessed little value. For this and other causes they were abandoned.

The territory which became known as Salt Creek township was described in the United States surveys as "Township 13 of Range 12, of lands of the United States situate in the State of Ohio," and as such passed into the market as other Congress lands. Section 31 was situated on the south of the river and on it the village of Taylorsville now stands.

As the end of the first decade approached, the inhabitants residing on this territory began to discuss the subject of a township organization. Accordingly on the 9th day of March, 1808, as the journal of the commissioners of Muskingum county discloses, sundry petitions were presented the board of county commissioners then in session; asking for the creation of certain townships. Among those petitions so presented was one from citizens of Salt Creek township according to the established survey. The journal says "the boundaries of the townships were established and the townships received." No time was fixed for the election of township officers as the statute required, and no election of officers ordered. Under this order of the commissioners it cannot be found that any further action was taken. Again, December 12th, 1808, it appears in the journal entry of that date, that "the petition of sundry inhabitants of Township 13 Range 12, was presented the board, praying an election be ordered to elect three trustees and a treasurer of that township." The journal says in response to this petition, "granted and order for election sent out by John Chandler." This was still an incomplete order and it does not appear that any action was taken looking to its execution. Again, March 8, 1815, more than six years after the last proceedings were had, this journal entry again appears: "A petition from a number of inhabitants of Salt Creek township was presented praying that the original surveyed Township number 13, Range 12 be erected into a township to be called and known by the name of Salt Creek township, and it is ordered the above township be established." Although this last order was incomplete, looking to what were the requirements of the statute in relation to the organization of townships, as no further action upon the subject seems to have been taken by commissioners, it may be taken that this concluded all that was done towards the erection and establishment of this township; and that its civil and political existence may be regarded as commencing on this last date.

The first mutilation of the territory of Salt Creek township as created in March, 1815, grew out of the establishment and organization of Wayne township in 1826. By the action of the county commissioners of the date of March 6th of that year, so much of the said orginally surveyed Township number 13, Range 12, as was contained in sections 6, 7, 18, 19, 29, 30 and 32, were detached from Salt Creek township and became a part of Wayne township as created of the date last aforesaid. This action of the commissioners was a matter of deep interest to all the people residing on the territory so detached, and by the most of them the action so taken was asked. Again, by the action of the county comissioners of the date of the 20th day of December, 1839, section 13 of Salt Creek township, as before stated, situated west of the Muskingum river and embracing the village of Taylorsville, was detached from said township and made a part of Harrison Township. This action of the commissioners was also asked by the citizens of the detached territory for the reason they were separated from the township to which they belonged by the river, and were further cut off from their own township by a portion of Wayne that formerly belonged to Salt Creek township. These are all the territorial changes in the township from what it contained as first established.

Hitherto, previous to entering on the second decade of the settlement, the daily routine in each family, year in and year out, had been much the same. But now visible changes began to be more and more apparent. The single room cabin with its outer wall decorated with the skins of the coon, fox, wolf, dcer, bear, and other wild animals, began to disappear. It was fast being supplanted by the new two-story hewn log dwelling. Residences of a still more pretentious character also appeared, and before this second decade had closed, stone, brick and frame dwellings, of six, eight and ten rooms each, could be seen in several parts of the township, farm houses that would to-day be creditable to any portion of Muskingum county.

New industries other than farming began to spring into being. Trades, though on a somewhat small scale, yet adequate to the demand of the community, were introduced. The first mill erected was enlarged and improved by the aid of new machinery, so as to convert it into a general flouring mill, and a saw mill attachment added. Two tanneries were put in operation, one a half mile north of the present village of Chandlersville by a man named James Austin, and the other, the pioneer of the tannery, conducted in the present stone building in the village, by Samuel Chandler. Other smaller trades, in those days conducted in rural communities, followed, but they no longer exist.

It was during this, the second decade of the settlement of this township, that the people were first enabled to introduce somewhat the habits and customs that attach to social life; habits and customs that belonged to the communities whence they came. That complete isolation to which they had been subject only now existed to a limited extent. These pioneers were an intelligent body of men and women. They mingled together on occasions varied and numerous. They were friends, sympathic and helpful. The same spirit of sociability dominated old and young. The outgrowth of all these new conditions became manifest. During the decade there were no less than eighteen marriages in the township. The contracting parties were in every instance the son and daughter of a pioneer and were themselves pioneers. This, too, was a period of great material prosperity among all the people of the township, and this fact, coupled with what has just been narrated as having taken place, afforded "confirmation strong" of the correctness of the Malthusian theory as to population.

The early pioneers and settlers of Salt Creek township were for the most part a religious people. They had been religiously educated. They had been accustomed during the years of their childhood and later on in early manhood and womanhood to attend upon church services, and many of them had been church members. Those who came from the New England states were all of Puritan stock, and had been educated in the Congregational faith and mode of worship. But as the religious faith and the politics of the church were quite different things, they cared little for the latter, so they could entertain their convictions as to the former. Those who came from Pennsylvania and New Jersey were generally Presbyterians, or had been so educated, and as their doctrinal belief was much the same as that of the Congregationalists of that day there was no difficulty in the two assimulating under the Presbyterian faith and mode of worship. Other denominational creeds and beliefs were represented among the first pioneers. Of course coming into a new country where such a thing as the stated preaching of the Gospel was unknown, all naturally became luke warm and apparently somewhat indifferent to their church vows. But withal, the religious impressions they had received in their earlier years could not be wholly eradicated, and these had the effect to restrain and hold in subjection the passions that otherwise, under the circumstances, might have gained the control of their action. Hence the Sabbath was distinctively observed as a day of rest if not of worship, more so than in densely populated communities. The desecration of its sacred hours, no matter how, was rarely known, and when known the entire community would frown upon the act. Whenever it was announced there was to be preaching in the neighborhood, no difference by whom or of what denominational creed, all made it a business as well as a duty to attend the services. And until churches were organized such continued to be the custom of the neighborhood.

Of the soldiers of the war of 1812, the writer has only been enabled to obtain the following names: Samuel Chandler, John Clapper, William Cunningham, Joseph Linn, Samuel Bliss and Dr. Daniel Bliss. The latter engaged in the service as surgeon for a limited time only and until another could be secured to take his place. Bliss, (Samuel,) was discharged at the end of two months because of sickness. Cunnigham was killed by the lndians in the battle of Mississinawa on the Wabash. Chandler in this engagement exhibited so courageous and conspicuous a daring, that on the close of the war he was tendered by the department at Washington the office of Major in the regular army of the United States. This honor he declined. The others on the expiration of their respective terms of service returned to their homes.

The pioneers of Salt Creek township took a large interest in the establishment of schools and the education of the youth of the neighborhood. To nothing can their descendants point with a greater degree of pride than to the high character these schools maintained. The first brick school house in Muskingum county was erected in this township. It was a large and commodious structure capable of comfortably accommodating sixty to seventy pupils and provided with desks and other necessary appendages of the school room equal to any of the present day. The first five male teachers, commencing with the winter of 1823-24, who conducted schools successively in this building were all graduates of American colleges. The structure was erected and finished throughout by private subscription. The first circulating library in Muskingum county, containing about 150 volumes at first organization, for that matter, with two exceptions, the first in all southeastern Ohio, was established in this township, and so this organization was kept up until the establishment of Sunday school libraries about 1830.

The foregoing constitutes, very briefly, an account of the principal events in pioneer life in Salt Creek township. Of what has subsequently occurred it is not sufficiently known, at least to the present inhabitants, to render any narrative thereof in this connection unnecessary. The population of the township at the different decennial periods since its organization, and the names and dates of the commissions of the several postmasters may be a subject of interest and are herewith given. Population 1820, 967; 1830, 1,190; 1840, 1,252; 1850, 1,215; 1860, 1,158; 1870, 1,138; 1880, 1,141; 1890, 1,148. Postmasters, Salt Creek, John Chandler, October 1, 1814; John Stevens, January 31, 1829; Nathaniel Chapman, August 3, 1832. Name of the office was changed to Chandlersville January 12, 1843. Chandlersville, Nathaniel Chapman, January 12, 1843; Isaac Brittain, December 3, 1845; Llewellyn Pierce, June 19, 1849; Isaac Brittain, July 16, 1853; Thomas W. Crumbaker, May 31, 1861; William E. Ferguson, March 27, 1869; Israel C. Robinson, August 9, 1869; 0. H. P. Crumbaker, October 19, 1870; John W. Ludman, September 27, 1889. Duncan's Falls P. 0. was established July 24, 1837.