Neal Valley Grange

compiled by Teresa Martin Klaiber

September 2011

On a hot muggy day the last shred of dirt and trash was shoveled from the old smoke house on the Sexton, Klaiber property, Garner, Boyd County, Kentucky.  The smoke house had yielded tons of papers, cards and documents, full of silverfish it was still a joy of discovery for this genealogist.   As we literally scraped dirt from the floor a corner of a paper caught my friend’s eye.  Everything stopped as I gently brushed away the dirt and carefully lifted the delicate paper.  With this final act the smokehouse gave up its biggest, oldest, most precious document.

“Resolution in favor of Brother Mark Sexton. Diseased. November 16^th 1877.  At a meting of the Neal Valey Grange No. 1340 it was resolved whereas it has pleased the all wise  Creator to call one of our beloved brothers Mark Sexton from time to eternity on the 21^st day of October 1877.  Resolved that Neal Valey Grange has lost a worthy member of our order and who was devoted to the cause the seat that he once occupied and our hall is now vacant. His wife has lost a devoted husband and his children a pious and affectionate  Father.  Resolved that while we bow to the will of our divine Father we deply regret the loss of our brother Mark Sexton and hereby simpathise with the bereft widow and children. Let us console ourselves that when we will mete Brother Mark Sexton where all will be joy and separation will be no more.  Resolved that the members of Neal Valey Grange – No 1340 weare the badge of mourning for thirty days. Resolved that we tender one coppy of the above resolutions to the widow and children and one to be reserved and kept by the Grange.  R. F. Rice, Wm. R. Webb, J. W. Shortridge.” [All spelling and punctuation as created in original handwritten resolution.]

Mark Sexton is buried on the farm overlooking the smokehouse.  Actually he was re-buried in Klaiber Cemetery after his remains were removed from Bell’s Trace, Lawrence County 16 years after his death.

“Powell Sexton of Garner passed thru Bolts Fork yesterday with the remains of his father who died 16 years ago and had been  exhumed and buried in the family graveyard beside his wife who died a short time ago.” [Big Sandy News, Nov 10, 1893]

Now I was holding a handwritten memorial to this gentleman.  The fact that there was a Grange in our area sent me on a quest.  Where was Neal Valley Lodge #1340 located?  While Granges are still extremely active and part of the heartbeat of Ohio  the history of Kentucky Granges is limited and slowly being lost.  

I started with a simple search for Neal Valley.  There is no Neal Valley in Boyd County, Carter and Lawrence County.  All three counties were counties that Mark Sexton had resided in and paid taxes in during his life time.  There is a Neal Valley mentioned in Selections from Morgan County History, Volume 1 [page 309].  Located at West Liberty, 300 acres were purchased in 1840 by Peter Kelly Neal [1804-1869] for 75 cents an acre.    Neal had migrated from Scott County, Virginia accompanied by two sons Bill and Harrison Neal.  Mark Sexton lived with his father Elisha Sexton in Scott County, Virginia in the early 1800’s.    But there is no indication that Sexton resided in Morgan County.   And to date this writer has not found anything written about a Neal Valley Grange in or near West Liberty and Neal Valley.

The next step was to contact the National Grange.  They have no record of a Neal Valley Grange No. #1340.  The National Grange was founded in 1867 to help rehabilitate the Civil War divided rural farm areas.  Histories of the Grange state that by 1874 there were 6000 Granges.  The Granges had been active for ten years when Sexton died.  The first Kentucky Grange was in Todd County in 1871.  The organization formed a corporation in 1875 with a bill passing the Kentucky Senate [Journal of the Senate of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, 1875, General Assembly, page 807].

Known as the Patrons of Husbandry and commonly called the Grange their objectives included maintaining laws, reducing farm expenses and fighting against the credit system.  According to Greg McKee, North Dakota State University, in his recently published Early Cooperatives the Granges even had stores to serve their members where they sold groceries, clothing , farm equipment and supplies. Members consisted of male and female, husband and wives.  All members of the Grange had to be interested in husbandry.

Was a Grange active in the Boyd County area or did Sexton belong elsewhere? A diary entry by William Lewis Geiger states a Grange met at Cannonsburg in February 1875.  No name of the Grange was cited.  The Grange closed in Boyd County 15 October 1884 when the Kentucky Democrat printed 

“Bolt’s Fork Oct. 9….Grange met last Saturday…We are informed that the Grange met at the Hazlett school house, last Saturday and distributed their little trinkets among the few members and finally closed up their business for good.” 

 Bolt’s Fork is on the Boyd/Lawrence County line.

The signers of the resolution include John W. Shortridge, a farmer residing in Lawrence County, Kentucky in 1880.  William R. Webb also resided in Lawrence County, a farmer, about 62 years old when he signed the resolution.  R. F. Rice is probably Robert French Rice born on Garner then Carter County  in 1840 [later Boyd County]  and died 30 April 1919 in Lawrence County.  He served in Company K of the 40^th during the Civil War.  His obituary appeared in the Big Sandy News 30 April 1919.

 The Kentucky Historical Society has a small fragile pamphlet in the Special Collections from the Minutes of the Kentucky State Grange, 1874 [G30 G757].  At least 21 counties are cited, mostly in central and western Kentucky.  One statement did catch my eye: “…deputies assigned to form new Granges visited almost every county in the state…”  The booklet states that the state organization has 60 subordinate Granges.   

The State meeting was held at Louisville.   The secretary of the National Grange, Oliver Hudson Kelley resided in Louisville, had been a clerk at the Bureau of Agriculture and was a founder of the National Grange.  In 1875 he wrote Origin and Progress of the Order of the Patrons of Husbandry.

One of the resolutions put to vote during the state meeting in 1874 reads: “Resolution on horse thieves. Whereas in many places in the Commonwealth horse thieves have become troublesome and annoying to people…resolved Patrons of Husbandry that each subordinate Grange…appoint a committee of sufficient number to serve such times…to assist brother Granges…by pursuit or otherwise whose property has been stolen…”  And another resolution allowed Subordinate Granges in any county to appoint a deputy who would be empowered to organize Granges within his own county and “also in counties where none exist…”

Did Neal Valley in Morgan County have a subordinate Grange that sent a deputy to Lawrence County and Boyd County?  The pamphlet goes on to state that there were 212 delegates in attendance with all counties represented accept a few counties including the following in Eastern Kentucky: Boyd, Elliott, Floyd, Greenup, Johnson.  The delegate from Lawrence County is listed as O. D. Botner.  Oliver  D. Botner was a farmer born in Virginia and resided in Louisa, Lawrence County.  He served in Company G of the 14^th during the Civil War. He died 14 June 1913 [KY D. Cert #16394] and is buried in Pine Hill Cemetery at Louisa.  

In 1879 The 2^nd Annual Report of the State Bureau of Agriculture, Horticulture and Statistics in Kentucky,  reported that there were numerous county Granges with several hundred subordinate Granges and that a great many held monthly meetings in different counties reporting quarterly to the State Grange.  The Journal of Proceedings of the National Grange of Patrons of Husbandry reported  for Kentucky the same year that the subordinate Granges within the state were not reporting as they should have.  And an interesting final comment for Kentucky was “…a fair proportion of the members of the subordinate Granges are ladies, those Granges are in the most flourishing condition.”

While researching any clues to Neal Valley Grange I did discover another Grange tie to Boyd County, Kentucky.  On 8 July 1878 Thomas Clark Atkeson [some mis-spell it Atkinson] married Cordelia Meek the daughter of Zephania Meek [editor of the Central Methodist]  at Catlettsburg, Boyd County, Kentucky [Boyd Marriage book 6A-230].   The newspaper reported the marriage in the 13 July edition “ married…at the residence of the bride’s father by Rev. JF Medley, T.C. Atkeson of Buffalo, WV to Cordelia Meek, oldest daughter of the editor of the Central Methodist. After marriage they resided at Buffalo, West Virginia.  Two years later Thomas Clark Atkeson joined the Grange in West Virginia.  For twenty-four years he was Master of the West Virginia State Grange and eight years was Overseer of National and eventually became a member of the Executive Committee. Atkeson wrote  The Semi-Centennial History of the Patrons of Husbandry in 1916 and included biographical sketches.    He wrote the following about his wife:

“Mrs. Atkeson has been a devoted wife and mother, and has been very largely responsible for her husband’s success by her helpful encouragement.  She served one term as Ceres and two terms as Pomona in the National Grange, and has held the same offices in the State Grange….”   

Cordelia was about 10 or 11 years old when her father Zephania Meek moved from Johnson County, Kentucky to Catlettsburg.   Cordelia and Thomas Clark Atkeson are buried in Atkeson Cemetery, Putnam County, West Virginia. {For those interested Ceres is a degree in the Grange and named for the Goddess of Food Plants.  Pomona is the fifth degree administered by the Grange.}

The University of Kentucky houses the Guide to Kentucky Patrons of Husbandry Records 1873-1939.   It was very disappointing after reviewing the minutes and records that only a scant few Granges with emphasis on Christian County and Church Hill are in this collection.  There was no mention of Eastern Kentucky Granges.  Cornell University, Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections houses a Guide to the National Grange of the Patrons of Husbandry Records 1842-1994.  The summary states that it includes the personal papers of Oliver H. Kelley, founder and first National Secretary.  But a review of the box descriptions shows no descriptive information for Kentucky Granges.

A list of National State and Local Commericial Organizations in 1903 does list a few Granges throughout Kentucky, none in Eastern Kentucky.  The Grange number’s are three digit not the four listed for Neal Valley.

These tiny pieces of information do not answer all the questions.  All involved with the resolution do have ties with Lawrence County and at least two, Sexton and Rice, have ties to Garner, now Boyd County.  But it does not answer if Neal Valley was the Grange that closed at Hazlett School House.  Hazlett School House was located just a few miles north of the Lawrence line and considered part of Bolt’s Fork.  

This file has remained open on my office desk for many years now as I continue to find tid bits that add to the history of our area.

"God Willing, And the Creek Don't Rise"

compiled by Teresa Martin Klaiber
1 March 2011

As I sumped my Eastern Kentucky basement, on the last day of February, and watched Long Branch of Garner Creek hurdle through my property before heading down our road to Garner Creek, I received word of an emergency just a few miles away.

Thanks to the heroic efforts of our wonderful emergency services, a woman's life was saved after her car plunged and submerged in the cold February waters on Four-Mile and Trace. Barbara Groves car lost control negotiating the wet road. Many locals said prayers for her and today the news said she was released from the hospital. My heartfelt wishes for her speedy recovery. My sincere praise for the many trained volunteers that are dedicated in protecting us here in Boyd County.

While discussing this with my family we remembered another rescue turned recovery exactly fifty years ago, February. Long Branch, Garner Creek, Trace Creek and many other small tributaries dump into the East Fork as it heads toward the river.

On February 22, 1961 Mildred Burns Banks and her sister Mary Burns Webb were returning from a visit at Kings Daughters Hospital along Route #180, very near Boyd County High School. The car "failed to negotiate a curve... ricocheted off a tree down a 10 foot embankment, crashed into a bridge abutment and flipped over in the water." Due to the heavy rains of East Fork it was described as at least five feet higher than normal and murky.

Both sisters were laid to rest in the Jeremiah Burns Cemetery on Route #3.

The sisters were issues of Jeremiah Burns [18 April 1858 VA-24 Jun 1932] and wife Minnie V. Kinner [1869-1946]. Their grandmother was Elvira J. Hogan who married Harvey Kinner.

It never ceases to leave me in awe when the rains start in our neck of the woods. The creek glistens with a pretty musical lilt on most days. I love to walk along the edge looking for treasures and watching the multitude of life that exists along and in it. Then as the water washes down the cliffs it is only a matter of sometimes minutes before it becomes a raging, dangerous power of nature.

The creek has always played a role in the development of the area. The creek bed along Garner was the path and roadway when the area was first developed. The road still follows its twists and turns. You can not tame it. The Clyde Ross Farm moved the creek to make way for more profitable fields. So did the Klaibers but when the rain starts you can still see the water struggling to use the old creek path.

We have many personal creek stories. We tell people that are visiting that they might want to leave when the rain starts or stay longer than expected. Those that don't listen turn back and sit a spell. It goes down as fast as it comes up.

A dear friend reminded me yesterday about the saying "Turn around, don't drown." We tend to think our cars are strong. I attempted - just once -to follow another vehicle as the waters were coming up. The back wheels rose and I began to feel like I was floating - gunning it the tires grabbed and I was lucky.

We tend to think of April showers but February seems to be the start of our flood "season." One hundred and thirty years ago, 23 February 1881 the Independent wrote "The iron bridge at Hood's Fork has been washed out by the recent floods, and turned clear over."

On 22 February 1883 the Independent reported "high water, everything flooded at Catlettsburg." At Rockville, Lawrence County the news reported "The river rose here within 18 inches of the rise of 1862 and 4 inches higher than 1875."

Then on Valentines Day, 14 February 1884, the paper reported that the 1884 flood "beats the record. Nothing like it since Adam's Noah!" The paper does not talk about the outlaying areas just the towns along the Ohio and Big Sandy. It must have been just as hard on the tributaries.

Before my readers ask why would anyone live near areas prone to the ravages of nature - the answer is simple. It is God's country and it is all part of God's plan. We continue to try to harness it. I grumble about my wet basement. Then hero's save a life and the sun comes out and I once again hear the lilt of the gentle stream and know I am where I belong.

Sandy Furnace And It's People

compiled by Teresa Martin Klaiber 2010

For many years I have collected tidbits about Sandy Furnace. During a conversation with Ann Sutherland the other day, she mentioned she could recall standing at the John D. Ross Cemetery, and possibly see Sandy Furnace when she was a child. I closed my eyes to visualize the scene and together we decided if you climbed to the highest point just beyond the cemetery and looked down into the bottom lands, with the foliage gone, you probably could see remains of Sandy Furnace.

With the sun gleaming, today, I decided to see just how far the old Furnace was from John D. Ross Cemetery, located on Route 773, more commonly known as Bolts Fork Road to us locals, at the edge of Boyd County. By the road it is exactly 2.8 miles from the cemetery gate to Sandy Furnace located at 23330 Bolts Fork Road. While standing in the sun and humidity my mind began mulling over why the Kentucky Historical Marker was over 3 miles away from the actual furnace. I turned around and drove the meandering beautiful bottom farm land of Bolts Fork to Route #3 where the historical marker has been placed on the main thoroughfare. I am sure they meant well by putting it where most traffic would pass. Over the years I have practically memorized the wording knowing that besides placement of the sign, there was a much larger story.

Furnaces were prevalent in Greenup County and the northern edge of Boyd County and scattered in Carter County. But Sandy Furnace is tucked on the southern edge of the county far from the other producing furnaces. When built it was still in Lawrence County, Kentucky. Much has been written about area furnaces but very little has been compiled on Sandy Furnace. The longest general description was written in Donald Rist's publication Iron Furnaces of the Hanging Rock Iron Region in 1974. Rist had done a little more research than is posted on the Historical marker but gives the same simple basic information that the furnace was built in 1853 by Young, Foster and Company which included Dan and John Young, William Foster and Irwin Gilruth.

Interestingly both the historical marker and Rist lead one to believe that Sandy Furnace ceased operation in 1854 or shortly thereafter. This was not the case. Nor do these tiny blurbs give the general reader the feeling of just how many people in the community were involved or benefited from the Furnace. I can stand on the ridge of our farm nearly 5 miles away and see the indentations in the woods where ore was dug out. If I close my eyes I can imagine the oxen sledding the ore over the ridge, following the creek, struggling up and over Jack and finally arriving at the furnace.

The Geological Survey of 1856 talks about the ore beds being one hundred and five feet higher in the hills. It does not talk about the distance or the many farms that were tapped for the ore. According to the Survey Sandy Furnace was producing seven tons of iron in twenty-four hours and was then hauled to a depot at Catlettsburg and was "twenty-two miles, by the course of the stream, above the mouth of the East Fork of Little Sandy."

The planning and building of Sandy Furnace began in 1848. When John and Daniel Young of Hamilton County, Ohio began with mortgages on the tract of lands on Bolts Fork. William A. Foster and his son Henry were witness to the transactions. William A. Foster along with Theodore Royer began the task of buying up right of ways, timber and ore for the execution of an iron furnace. The deeds are a roll call of those families living at what would shortly be called Sandy Furnace, complete with its own post office. Lawrence County deeds were executed with Henry Morris, Thomas Coburn, William Messer, Madison Stewart, William McCormack, Ellis Taylor, William Brumfield, John D. Ross, James Prichard, William Webb and James Stanley.

John Foster had six sixteenth, Dan two sixteenth, William A. Foster three sixteenth and Irwin Gilruth three sixteenth interest in the furnace.

William A. Foster was already settled in Lawrence County and is not to be confused with William Foster, just several years his elder, who was working at the furnaces in Greenup County. Both were from Pennsylvania.

William A. Foster was settled in Lawrence County prior to the formation of Sandy Furnace. He ran for town trustee in May 1846 in Louisa but appears to not have stayed in town long. William Ely writes about William A. Foster in his Big Sandy Valley. Ely stated that William A. Foster had come to the area with a Pennsylvania Company and is "favorably known in Catlettburg" and had "first made his appearance in Sandy as store keeper for the company." The 1850 Lawrence County, Kentucky census shows William A. as a merchant along with his family including Henry who is listed as clerk and Irwin Gilruth giving occupation as a merchant from Ohio.

Theodore Royer was living in Hamilton County, Ohio in 1850 having married Elizabeth Young. He gave his occupation as a merchant and was also born in Pennsylvania. They migrated to Ann Arbor Michigan and in 1880 he gave his occupation as a retired manufacturer. Mrs. Louie Lovett [DAR #15022], Elizabeth Royer Slauson [DAR 14364], and Adaline Katharine Gross [DAR 14363] were all lineal descendants from the Royer and Young family.

Foster sold most of his interest to Young in 1850 and by 1860 was comfortably living in Catlettsburg listing his occupation as a clerk, owning property. By 1870 he lists his occupation as a retired dry goods clerk.

John Young and his wife Caroline never lived in eastern Kentucky. In 1850 They sold all their interest in Sandy Furnace to William Moore Patton which gave Patton controlling interest. Patton was born in 1803 in Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania. He had been involved in Vesuvius Furnace in Lawrence County, Ohio and Pennsylvania Furnace in Greenup County. He settled in Catlettsburg and the Patton's went on to own many varied concerns in the area.

Rist tells of the fall of the furnace stack in the summer of 1853 and advertisements in the Ironton Register for 25/26 stone cutters at the furnace. The 1856 Geological Survey talks of coarse sandstone which was over lower limestone "employed as hearth-stones for the furnace." By the time of WPA days there is only one known actual rock quarry in Boyd County located on this compiler's farm. Driving along the bottom land of Bolts Fork I am sure there are many hidden areas that were chiseled out and now overgrown.

By the time of the 1856 survey Patton had sold his controlling interest to William Wurts then of Hamilton County, Ohio. William along with several brothers were also from Pennsylvania and had interest in several area furnaces. A biography of William Wurts was published in Kentucky, A History of the State in 1888. Wurts lived until 1876 and died in Mason County, Kentucky.

The furnace was still active in 1859 when The Iron Manufacturers Guide to Furnaces and Forges...was written by Lesley. Lesley describes that Sandy Furnace makes a very liquid iron from the ores and that the bed was about 5 feet under sandstone "high in the hills" regarded as the "highest workable bed in Carter and Lawrence."

My active mind understands that these powerful manufacturers came into our area and created a living beyond the small poor farming interests. Some stayed like Foster and Patton. Some left legacies in our area and across the river in the iron region of Ohio.

It was hard labor intensive work from the cutting of timber to the digging of ore. The feat of hauling the raw goods to the furnace and the final product taken to the terminals had to be grueling. Stone masons were needed and furnace hands were in demand, animals had to be maintained, all of which helped put food on the table in the Bolts Fork area. A community was created and the deeds that purchased the timber and ore rights are more descriptive than any other historical local document of the time.

The furnace is fallen in now, hidden by a modern home built directly in front of it. Standing in the sun in the middle of Bolts Fork Road, quiet all around, not a person in sight, yet the history is so loud I can hear it. Close your eyes maybe you can share the view with me.