JOSIAH HEDGES

     AMONG the most remarkable of the leading pioneers of Seneca county, was Josiah Hedges, the founder of Tiffin.  He was born Apr. 9, 1778, near West Liberty, Berkley county, Va., and throughout his whole life preserved the characteristics of the true Virginian.  He left his father's home at an early age, with a determination to carve out his own fortune.  The first enterprise which he undertook on his own account, was a trading excursion to New Orleans on a flatboat, laden with fruit, which he floated down the Ohio river from Wheeling to New Orleans.  The voyage lasted six weeks.  He finally settled in Ohio in 1801, one year before it was admitted as a state, and located in Belmont county, where, for a number of years, he was one of the most active and prominent citizens.  He was the first sheriff of that county, and for a number of years clerk of the court.  He next engaged in the mercantile business at St. Clairsville.  His capital was limited, but was slowly and surely increasing by prudence and sagacity - firm traits in his character that never forsook him through life.
     In those days, merchants in the west were wont to purchase their goods in Philadelphia, journeying across the Alleghany mountains on horseback, and carrying their specie in their saddle bags.  In 1819, he opened a branch store in Mansfield, having as a partner his brother, Gen. James Hedges.  Soon thereafter he removed from St. Clairsville to Mansfield.  In 1820, he made a journey to Fort Ball, in this county.
     His natural foresight very soon suggested to him the possibility of a speculation, and he immediately decided to enter the land opposite to Fort Ball, on the right bank of the Sandusky river.  Here the county seat was located soon thereafter, in the heart of the town that Mr. Hedges caused to be platted immediately after his purchase of the land

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CHANGE
 

     The law of change is stamped ..............

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near Esq. Bloom's residence.  He married a Mrs. Staley, a widowed sister of Dr. Kuhn, who had several children, of whom the late Mrs. McFarland, formerly the wife of my venerable and distinguished friend, Dr. McFarland, was the oldest.  She was a beautiful woman, highly accomplished and much esteemed.
     It is a most remarkable fact that Tiffin, in former days - yes, and all along until quite recently - had more beautiful women to the number of population, than any other town in Ohio, and the fact was generally conceded all over the country.  The town became famous on that account.
     Mrs. Thomas Ourand is also a daughter of Mr. Campbell.  The

     Mary is now, and for a long time has been, the happy wife of Mr. Jonas Neikirk, of Republic.
     Next west of Mr. Kridler, lived Jacob Huss, the saddler, and next west to him, David Bishop.  William D. Searles bought out Bishop, and started a tin-shop at that place.
     Guy Stevens carried on the mercantile business close by, and south of Ebert's.  He afterwards took, as a partner, Daniel Dildine, Esq., the present venerable justice of the peace, of Tiffin.  They also started the first foundry in the county.  It was located at the end of Monroe street, close by the river, and occupied the north end of the lot where Esq. Dildine now resides.

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     In 1837, a man by the name of Louis Bredoon, a hotel keeper in McCutchenville, had a short cannon cast at this foundry to be used at the coming Fourth of July celebration.  He came after it with a wagon on the 24th day of June, and all hands concluded to try it first.  They put the piece on the running gear of a wagon and loaded it very strong.  It exploded, and played havoc all around.  A piece of the iron struck Mr. Burdoon on the forehead and crushed in the skull from his left eye brow up to the hair.  He was picked up unconscious, and carried to Goodin's hotel, then kept by Michael Hendel, where he soon after died.  Dildine had several ribs broken; one Watson had a leg broken; other men were injured more or less.  The wagon and the front door of the foundry were demolished, and pieces of the cannon were found great distances away.  There has been no cannon foundry in Tiffin since. is.  We buy all our guns of Krupp.

     William H. Kessler carried on the tailoring trade in Fort Ball, and

     It is impossible to remember all the old settlers here, and the names of those that occur are only jotted down.  Many of those on the Fort Ball side have already been named.  There, also, lived Gen. H. C. Brish, Valentine and George Knupp, Andrew Love, William Johnson, George Ragan, Curtis Sisty, Levi Davis and Nicholas Leibe.  Mr. Sting, the father of C. H. Sting, also built and carried on a little brewery, on Sandusky street.  Leibe, Coonrad and Baugher married three sisters.  Of these six, Mrs. Coonrad, alone, is living.   They were the daughters of a widow lady, Mrs. Staub, and sisters of the once popular John Staub and Dr. Staub.
     Among the early settlers of Tiffin were a few families from Germany,

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PHILIP SEEWALD

Was born on the 26th day of September, 1799, in Sippersfeld, in the Bavarian Palatinate, Germany.  He was the oldest son of Ludwig and Sophia Seewald.  His father was a man who resembled Henry Clay of Kentucky very much.  Both gentlemen happened to be in Tiffin on a visit at the same time, and it was a common remark how much they resembled each other.  The mother of Philip was a Correll, and descended from a long line of school teachers in this village.  Louis (Ludwig) Seewald was a wagon maker by trade, and Philip worked in the shop of his father as soon as he was old enough, and learned the trade.  He was a natural genius, and when he was drafted into the Bavarian army he applied all his leisure hours to the study of the watch and the natural sciences.  When he returned from the army he wa a good watch maker, and very handy at any curious workmanship in iron.  He married the oldest daughter of Henry Lang, above named, and a few years thereafter emigrated, with his family, to the United

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States and settled in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he opened a jewelry shop.  When the Lang family came, in 1833, they stopped at Pittsburgh until Seewald and his family united with them, and then both families came to Tiffin together, where they arrived on the 18th day of August, 1833.
     The early settlers will remember the jewelry store of Seewald, in the large, hewed log house, on south Washington street, in Tiffin.  The front end was devoted to jewelry, and the back part to gunsmithing.  Her he lived until about 1843, when he bought from John Goodin the lot where the Rust block now is, and where he lived the rest of his days.
     He never made the English language a study, and spoke it very brokenly; but he built up a good trade with his skill and general reputation for honesty.  By close application to his books he became well versed in general history and the popular sciences of the day.  He was naturally a thinker and investigator; he took nothing for granted, and discarded everything that lacked a cause.  He was firm in his judgment, and able to defend any position he took.  His mind naturally lead him to the bottom of things.  While he never obtruded his conclusions on anybody, he was strong in the defense of them when once formed.
     His wife died on the 8th day of February, 1843.  Three of their children born in Germany, and the rest of them in this country.  They had eight in all, of whom three sons and two daughters are still living.  Louis Seewald, the jeweler, is the oldest son; William lives in New Mexico, and Philip, the youngest, in Hudson, Michigan.  The boys were all jewelers.  The oldest daughter is Mrs. Oster, and the youngest Mrs. Spindler, both residing in Tiffin.
     Philip Seewald was a short, robust, compactly built man, very strong and muscular.  He had a very large head, that became bald early; well proportioned; large, fleshy nose; deep set blue eyes; strong, manly features.   His head was so large that he could find no hat large enough in the stores, and had to send his measure to Cincinnati.  He was about five feet six inches high, and weighed, when in his best days, near 200 pounds.  As years began to make him restless, he left his business in the hands of his son Louis, and made up a lot of instruments with which he built tower clocks.  The clock in the tower of the court house is one of them.

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     Thus he spent the afternoon and evening of his life, ever busy, reading or making something useful or ingenious.  He was widely known as the principal watchmaker in Tiffin, and as a man of strict, unflinching integrity, highly esteemed by everybody.  He died on the 30th day of October, 1878, aged seventy-nine years, one month and four days.