Page:History of Richland County, Ohio.djvu/663

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��HISTORY OF RICHLAND COUNTY.

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��CHAPTER LXVII.

CLEAR CREEK TOWNSHIP.*

Its Formation, Boundaries and Physical Features — Antiquities — Earl/ Settlers and Settlements- Mills — Churches — Schools — Savannah.

��PRIOR to June 4, 1816, Mifflin Township was eighteen miles long, from north to south, and six miles wide. At that date, two- thirds of this territory, being the northern part, was organized into a township called Milton. This territory was again divided by a line through the center, east and west, October 15, 1818, and the north half called Clear Creek. Thus Clear Creek was formed out of the north half of Milton, at the date above mentioned, and was originally six miles square. Upon the formation of Ashland County in 1846, Clear Creek was again divided, four tiers of sec- tions on the east being included in Ashland County, the other two tiers remaining in Rich- land. This last division reduced the township to its present dimensions — four by six miles. That part of it which remained in Richland was enlarged and called Butler. Clear Creek was surveyed and subdivided into sections in 1807, by Maxfield Ludlow, who, with James Hedges, surveyed a large part of the country in this vicinity. Ruggles Township lies imme- diately north of it, and Orange east. The southern part of the township is described by the surveyor as second rate ; other parts, how- ever, as fine farming land.' It was originally cov- ered with all the different species of hard wood.

The center of this township forms the di- viding ridge between the head-waters of the Mohican and those of the Vermillion Rivers, the latter stream rising in a beautiful little lake that lies near the eastern center of the town- ship, on Sections 13 and 14, called Savannah


 * Now in ABhland County, formerly in Richland.

��Lake. The surveyor found this lake bearing northwest and southeast, and two Indian trails leading in the same general direction across the township— one bordering the lake on the south, and the other north of the lake, crossing the northeast corner of the township.

Clear Creek possesses more relics for the archaeologist than any township in Ashland County. The nature of the soil in the vallejs enabled the Mound-Builders to erect earth- works, the remains of some of which are yet visible. When Mr. John Bryte settled on Sec- tion 26, nearly half a centur}' ago, he found an earthwork, in shape a square, very few of this shape being found in Ohio. The east and west sides were about three hundred feet, and the north and south sides two hundred feet long. At that time, the banks were about three feet high, and twenty feet wide at the base ; large trees were growing upon them. There was a gateway upon the southwest side, leading to a fine spring. The plow has nearly obliterated the ancient work. Half a century ago, when Mr. Thomas Sprott settled on Section 35, he found a vei-y old and curiously constructed mound. It stands in the midst of a ten-acre field, a large elevation of ancient glacial drift, composed of rounded, well-worn bowlders, gravel, sand and light loam ; lifts its head about one hundred and twenty* feet above the sur- rounding valleys. The country around differs from it in soil. The surface on the top, from north to south, is about one hundred and twenty- five feet long, and from east to west, about one hundred feet, and level, with the exception of two mounds about twenty -four feet apart.

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