Jim and Ellen are my grandparents.

Jim Elected Republican County Chairman

In August, Jim began a new chapter in his life.  The Eagle of August 22, 1893 featured the following news article:

“Mr. Jas. E. Whipple of this place was elected Chairman of the Republican County Central Committee replacing James G. Mallory who will run for the office of county treasurer in the fall election.  Mr. Whipple is a native of Vinton and one of the most active Republicans.  For the most part of his life he has lived in Indiana, and for two or three years previous to his removal to Vinton took an active part in county politics.  He holds the responsible position of City Clerk.  He is a good executive officer, and is a splendid successor to Mr. Mallory.  He will make an active, stirring campaign.” (more…)

James and Ellen are my grandparents.

The Family Moves to Vinton, Benton County, Iowa

Jim arrived in Vinton the end of September 1888 to visit his Whipple relatives and to assess the opportunities available to him were he to move his family there.  It was his first trip back in 29 years.

He stayed with his uncle Cyrenius, who by then was one of the leading farmers in that section of Iowa.   He also met with his uncle Henry and his married Whipple aunts Angeline McKinley, Eliza Kearns, and Luana Edmonds, along with a host of cousins.  By then, his cousin William P., Cyrenius’s oldest son, had been practicing law and selling real estate in the county for many years and along with his brother Milo was an active member of the Republican party.  Apparently convinced Vinton would be a desirable new home for his family, he purchased William’s real estate business and moved Ellen and Blaine there. (more…)

James E. Whipple and Ellen Thompson are Blaine’s grandparents.

Launches The Journal in Cayuga, Indiana

Sometime prior to 1887 Jim worked for the Clinton Argus writing Eugene news and a column entitled “The Old JEW” (James E. Whipple).  When the Clinton Siftings ceased publication in May 1887 Jim purchased its equipment and type and founded the Cayuga Journal in Cayuga, Indiana on May 14, 1887 with John Wigley as typesetter and financial help from H.O. Peters, his former employer.

The Cayuga Journal was a six column paper with pages one and four boilerplate and pages two and three hand set type of local news items and advertising.  It was published on Saturdays.  As editor-publisher, Jim said the paper would be “independent in all things and neutral in nothing.”  He included a number of opinion columns in the initial issue including:

“We expect to make the Cayuga Journal a purely
local paper devoted to the interests of Cayuga, Eu-
gene, and the surrounding country.   Partisan opinions
will not be allowed to enter its columns, although the
editor’s devotion to his Party is as firm as ever, and
personally he will work for the success of that Party.

We invite short, spicy locals from contributors, but
long-winded articles from verbose contributors to
be assigned to the privacy of the waste basket.   In
short, we intend to make a first class local paper.

We will be greatly pleased to receive the approba-
tion of the public, and if you can give us a certifi-
cate of approbation in the shape of a one dollar bill
we will be still greater pleased and will also send
you the Journal for one year. (more…)

My grandfather, James Ezekiel Whipple, son of Union Civil War veteran Lucien and great (6) grandson of Matthew, Jr., was born 3 September 1857 on a farm southeast of Vinton, Benton County; Iowa and died in Vinton 14 May 1914. He married 1 April 1881 at Georgetown, Vermilion Co., Illinois Ellen Thompson, daughter of John and Rebecca (Campbell?) Thompson. During his business life, he was an insurance and real estate broker,  a newspaper editor and publisher,  a city and county officer, active in many civic organizations and the Republican Party of Benton County.  He served in Cuba during the Spanish-American War and  retired as a Major in the Iowa National Guard.

His middle name honors his mother’s father, Ezekiel Sheward of Eugene, Vermillion County, Indiana.  Lucien moved the family back to Eugene in the fall of 1859 where their five children were raised. (more…)

This is the final post on Lucien Whipple family and includes details on Sarah’s death in June 1898 and Lute’s in May 1904.

For reasons unknown to the author, the Whipples returned to Eugene after only two years in Kansas. They more than doubled the purchase price of their farm, which they sold to Rosa Chrisman for $800.00 on September 1, 1870.

Lute purchased a home in Eugene from F. B. Ragland for $350.00 on January 3, 1871. He did resume farming and became a Patent Right Agent and followed many lines of work until retiring in the late 1890s. How the family was impacted by the depression that began in 1873 is unknown.

He was employed in 1873 to help build the Eugene covered bridge which still stands today.  He conducted the Eugene Federal Census in 1880, ran a meat market in 1894, and was named Town Marshal in 1895. When the town voted to dissolve its corporate entity March 28, 1896, his law enforcement career ended. He also participated in home talent plays and was in the cast of American Born presented by the Alexander Dramatic Combination in February 1885. Admission was 15 cents for children, 25 cents for adults, and 35 cents for a reserved front seat. Proceeds were to benefit the Eugene Brass Band.

He was one of the organizers and the first Vice President of the Total Abstinence Society, dubbed the Reformed Roosters, organized in February 1886. His son Jim was the Society’s first Secretary.   He was also an organizer of the Eugene Chapter of the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) and elected its Colonel.  The Whipple School was built in 1881 on land he owned. Between 1881 and 1909, it had 13 teachers, including his granddaughter Clara Fultz who taught the 1911-12 school year. In the fall of 1909 only the first five grades were taught and it was closed in 1920 and the building was advertised for sale in 1923. (more…)

Lute returned to farming in Eugene for the next three-and-a-half years and undoubtedly followed with interest the purchase of Alaska from Russia in 1867 and the protracted disagreements between President Andrew Johnson and the Republican Congress in 1867-68.

Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania, chairman of the powerful Ways and Means Committee, was among the most radical and anti-southern members of Congress.  He opposed all of Lincoln’s and Johnson’s measures to deal leniently with the former Confederacy.  On February 24, 1868, he asked the House to remove Johnson from office, calling him a “great political malefactor.”  The House drew up 11 Articles of Impeachment, nine about the Tenure of Office Act, one condemning the President’s speeches, and one an omnibus denunciation.  His trial by the Senate ended May 16 with a 35 to19 vote for conviction, one short of the necessary two-thirds majority.  Seven Republican senators voted for acquittal because they believed party politics, not impeachable offenses, motivated the trial. (more…)

When Lute and Sarah Whipple, my great grandparents, returned to Eugene from Iowa, events that led to the Civil War were evolving. In February of 1860 Sen. Jefferson Davis of Mississippi introduced Resolutions in the Congress to allow slavery in the territories and to require the government to protect slave-holders already there.

Delegates from eight states walked out of the Democratic National Convention in April in Charleston, S.C. when the pro-slavery platform was rejected. When the remaining delegates were unable to agree on a presidential nominee the Convention adjourned to Baltimore and in June nominated Sen. Stephen Douglas of Illinois after anti-Douglas delegates walked out.

This was followed by a Convention of southern Democrats in Baltimore which nominated Vice President John C. Breckenridge and adopted a pro-slavery platform. Republicans nominated Abraham Lincoln on the third ballot in Chicago in May and adopted a platform to allow slavery in the states and to prohibit it in the territories.

The main campaign issues were slavery and sectionalism. Only Douglas made an effort to broaden his appeal by campaigning in all sections of the country. Despite various southern spokesmen making it clear that Lincoln’s election would result in succession, he won with a plurality of popular votes and a majority of Electoral College votes. For the first time in its history, the country elected a nominee of a Party that declared that “the normal condition of all the territory of the United States is that of freedom.” A State Convention in South Carolina voted to secede from the Union in December. (more…)

Lucien Whipple my great grandfather was born 6 February 1834 in Hartford Township, Licking Co., Ohio and died 13 May 1904 at Newport, Vermillion Co., Indiana.  He married 26 October 1856 in Vermillion Co. Sarah Sheward and lived most of his life in Eugene, Vermillion Co.  He was a Patent Right Agent, Town Marshal, took the U.S. Census in 1880 and fought in the Civil War with the 6th Indiana Cavalry.  He fathered three sons and two daughters.  He was known as Lute as an adult.

The period from 1816 to 1825 was one of unprecedented immigration to Indiana.  When it was admitted to the Union in April 1816, the Indians still claimed two-thirds of its area.  The Indian’s western boundary was Vermillion county and extended northeast to Greenville, Ohio.  However, in 1818, nearly all land south of the Wabash river was purchased from the Indians. (more…)

According to Lucien, the Whipple’s youngest child, the family moved to Logansport, Indiana in 1839 and to Eugene, Indiana in 1840. The author has been unable to find a Logansport source showing the family lived there. There is no question that the family moved because it was not in the Licking county U.S. census of 1840. Nor was it in the Vermillion, county, Indiana census that year. The move to Logansport was probably caused by the financial panic of 1837.

Logansport, located between the Wabash and Eel rivers, may have offered Enoch an opportunity to practice the trade of cooper. The lands in and around Logansport were not acquired by the U.S. government until a treaty with the Miami and Pottawattomi Indians was signed in late October 1826. The area at that time was a dense forest where only Indians and wild beasts lived. In March 1828 Gen. John Tipton, the Indian agent, moved his headquarters there from Ft. Wayne and later that month the original plat was laid out between the rivers. The town was named for Capt. Logan, the Shawnee chief who lost his life while attesting his fidelity to the white people in November 1812. “Port” was added as a suffix because the town was located at the junction of two rivers. Corner lots sold for $75, “in” lots for $50. Most lots contained enough lumber to construct a house. (more…)

It is not known whether Enoch completed their log home before or after their marriage. It would have been small, roughly 16 x 20 feet.  If a slab floor was included, foundation logs would have been set upright just inches above the level of the smoothed earth at the four corners.  The base logs were set on these.  There were no blueprints to follow but neighbors with know-how were on hand to help in the raising.

The logs were hoisted ever higher, one above the other, until 20 were raised on each of two sides and 16 on each on the other sides.  An expert notcher was at each corner to notch the logs and sophisticated chopping took place where the doorway and windows were placed.  Smaller length logs were placed at the top of the walls at each end, pyramiding to a high point upon which was laid the ridge pole.  Poles were then placed in succession down the pyramid or triangle to the eaves and covered with shakes. (more…)