DARLING'S INTERVIEW
Pg. 145

     JAMES H. DARLING, then living in the west, visited this county a few years before his death, and while here he called upon me and furnished the following facts about the pioneers:  "My father's name was Timothy DARLING. He came to Ohio in1815 from Wood county, Virginia, and settled on Pigeon creek, where Coalton now is.  Jackson county had not been organized then.  My mother's maiden name was Elizabeth COOK, and she was a sister of Nancy Cook, who married John JAMES, after whom Jamestown was named.  I had two brothers and three sisters, viz: William Derrick, Barsheba, Elizabeth C. and Aurora.  Barsheba married Isaac BROWN, son of Nathan BROWN.  Aurora married Charles LOVE.  Elizabeth C. died unmarried, and was the first person buried in the Jamestown cemetery.  I was born December 30, 1813, and was only two years old when my family moved to Ohio.  My father soon purchased the property now known as the HIPPEL place, and there is where I grew up.  I used to come to Jackson to Sunday school in the old Court House.  There were two salt wells here that I remember.  A man by the name of ALDRIDGE had a salt well near the old Horse creek bridge, and GIVENS' salt well was on GIVENS' Run.  There were only four houses of any size in Jackson then.  There was the old MILLER house on Main street, a brick house.  The house of RICHMOND stood where the Orange Furnace property was afterward.  RICHMOND was killed by a falling tree in a storm near RUNKLE's bridge.  There was the Hooper HURST house.  It stood on the point on Main street, not far from where the RUF property is now.  The DONNALLY House was the first hotel here and stood on Water street, opposite the HATTON residence.  This hotel was afterward called the WARREN House.  There were a great many log cabins here and nearly all of them were strung along Salt creek below Water street, and were called Poplar Row.  The salt boilers  lived in them.  I remember that the old GIVENS' house stood near Fulton Furnace.  I used to go to a horse mill near Berlin, owned by Zephaniah BROWN.  It stood near the Cross Roads.  We would take our own horses to work the mill.  I also went sometimes to Jared STRONG's mill, on Salt creek.  It stood near where BIERLY lived afterward.  I think Jared STRONG came to Jackson from the neighborhood where Wilkesville is now.  Jared STRONG was the first representative of this county.  He had three sons that I remember, Jared, Stephen and Jehiel.  Jehiel was killed when his father was in Columbus attending the Legislature.  He was riding horseback, going to the house of McKINNISS to a frolic.  It was winter time and the creek was out and the water frozen.  When hear Jacob SELL's house, his horse fell and injured him and he died.  His father did not reach home until after his death, I remember going after salt once to Judge GIVENS' salt works on GIVENS' Run.  Salt was measured and not weighed then.  They stopped making salt on account of the scarcity of wood and the failure of the salt wells.  The salt that I got was white.  My father, Timothy DARLING, died in 1830.  I was married in 1833 to Rachel HOWE.  She died last winter in Kansas.  She was a sister of Tacy HOWE, the wife of Peter BUNN, the pioneer.  He owned the old cemetery south of Jackson.  They began burying in it at a very early day.  Charles O'NEIL is buried there.  I remember when he died.  He was county treasurer then.  He had one child that I remember, Mary O'NEIL, and my wife used to play with her when they were little girls.  O'NEIL's widow married Vincent SOUTHARD afterward.  One of the old citizens buried in the old cemetery was Dr. MUSSETT.  I new Daniel PERRY, the ex-sheriff.  He was a carpenter, and died in Jackson township.  I knew George W. HALE, Stephen VAUGHN and Joseph W. ROSS.  Rev. David C. BOLLES was a preacher, and I remember his death.  He has a box vault in the old cemetery.  (Rev. David BOLLES died Apr. 20, 1840, aged 47 years. - Ed.)  I have heard of Jonathan GILKESON and John RUNKLE, but never saw them.  The stars fell in 1833, the year I was married.  The stars fell all night, like drops of rain.  The great flood occurred in Jackson Dec. 10, 1847.  There was a stranger drowned on the Athens road, near where Tropic Furnace is.  I knew James HUGHES, the man who started the Standard, well.  He married a sister of William MATHER and went west.  Henry ROUT was an old settler, and lived on Salt creek.  John JAMES was my uncle.  He came here from JAMES Island, in the Ohio river, near Marietta.  John D. JAMES was his only son.  Daniel HOFFMAN married my cousin, Julia JAMES.  He lived where the GIBSON House stands now, and had his store where the STERNBERGER Building stands.  He sold out the Salt Lick Reserve for the state.  Mrs. Elihu JOHNSON, Mrs. Alexander MILLER and Mrs. Andrew LONG were three other cousins.  Muster Day was an important event in early times.  Jared STRONG, Captain KINCAID, George W. HALE and others used to be officers.  General muster was held usually about the middle of September.