CHAPTER VII.

Indian Trails and Public Highways.

It is well known that the degree of civilization to which a nation has attained may be judged by the number and quality of her means of communication and transportation. In the zenith of her power, ancient Rome built a superb system of communication for the empire, radiating from the "city of the seven hills" to all important points in the provinces. In the sixteenth century the Spaniards found in Central and south America an admirable system of solid and durable roads, which were built centuries before the coming of the invaders; almost equaling the famous Roman roads were those built by the Incas in Peru and by the Aztecs in Mexico and Yucatan.

The earliest roads of the United States in historic times are the Indian trails. In large measure, these primitive lines have been followed as settlement has advanced from the Atlantic seaboard westward. The early turnpike built through New York, the Erie Canal opened in 1825 and the great New York Central railway follow closely the ancient war-trial connecting the confederate nations of the Iroquois from the Hudson tot the foot of Lake Erie. Michigan was traversed in all direction by the trails of the Indians and their numerous paths in Genesee county bear witness that here was a region important before the advent of the white man. In pressing their way through the lands of the county from one township to another, the settlers constantly found the lines marked out by the Indians the most expeditious and, later, many of them were made the lines of township roads.

Among the chief Indian trails of Genesee county was the great trunk line for travel north and south, having its terminal at Saginaw and Detroit. It came into the county on section 35, town of Grand Blanc, from Holly in Oakland county, passed through the township of Grand Blanc where the Saginaw road now is, and entered the township of Burton on section 32. Thence it crossed sections 30 and 19, passed through the present city of Flint and crossed the river at the Grand Traverse of the Flint. It divided into two trails north of the river, one running along the eastern bank of the river to Saginaw, and the other towards Mr. Morris, following the highlands, thence to Pine Run and Farranville, and left the county from section 3, township of Vienna. The swampy nature of the lands of the county in early times made the ridges and highlands the natural lines for the minor trails.

By an early writer the trials of the valley of the Saginaw river have been likened to a fan spreading out in various directions from the lower valley and reaching the headwaters of various affluent streams. There is not great uncertainty as to the exact location of the these trails, but one ran from a place up the river near Geneseeville southward on the watershed between Kearsley creek and the stream that enters the river on section 18, of Richfield. This trail passed across near the springs on section 35 of Genesee, and crossed Kearsley creek on section 2 of Burton, circling eastward on the watershed between Kearsley creek and Gilkey creek, coming into Grand Blanc on section 1, and crossing the main trial at Grand Blanc; thence it ran through sections 16 and 21 nearly along the state road to Oakland county, thence into Fenton, terminating at Long Lake. Another trail followed the watershed between the two streams that enter the river, one on section 27 and the other on section 36 in Flushing township, and, following the watershed through Flushing, Clayton and Gaines townships, it crossed the Shiawassee river where the road now crosses on section 26, coursed around Lodbell's lake into Argentine township and thence across the corner of section thirty of Fenton.

These were probably the principal trials across the county of Genesee during the time of the Sauks and down to the time of the coming of the whites. Of these, the Abbott history says:

"The present county of Genesee was crossed in various directions by Indian trails, which by being traveled for years by themselves and their ponies had become hard-beaten paths worn into the soft soil in some places to the depth of more than a foot. The principal of these was the "Saginaw trail," which was the Indian road from Saginaw to Detroit. Its route lay through Genesee county from Pewonigowink up the Flint river to its southern bend, thence south by way of Grand Blanc and the Big Springs (Oakland county) to Detroit. The place where it crossed the Flint was known as the Grand Traverse, or great crossing place, a mane probably given to it by Bolieu, the French trader. A beautiful open plain lying in the bend of the river, on the north side and contiguous to the crossing, was named, in Indian, Mus-cat-a-wing, meaning 'the plain burned over.' This is now in the first ward of the city of Flint. A part of it had formerly been used by the Indians as a corn field, and it was always a favorite camping ground, as many as fifteen hundred of them having been seen encamped on it at one time by people who are still living. Over this trial, too, for many years after the first settlers came to Genesee county, thousands of Indians passed and repassed annually, the thong always being particularly large at the time when they went down to receive their annuities. These yearly payments were made in the early times by both the United States and the British governments; the latter was usually paid at Malden. The amount paid there was fifty cents a head to Indians for all ages from the red patriarch of ninety years to the papoose upon its mother's back. On these occasions, therefore, every member of the tribe took the trail to be present at the muster for pay. After a time the British payments ceased and the United States adopted a plan of paying at inland points to avoid the demoralization which resulted from vast collections of Indians at Detroit. These interior payments were oftenest made at Saginaw, but on one or two occasions they were made at Pewonigowink. The money was silver coin and this was brought up from Detroit on pack horses. two boxes of one thousand dollars each, weighing one hundred and twenty pounds, slung on each side, were a load for a pack horse. The party (generally consisting of an interpreter and sub-agent) made its way twenty miles per day and slept out in the woods without fear, though without firearms. The journey occupied four days from Detroit to Saginaw.

The good roads movement, which has assumed such proportions in recent years, may be said to have begun in 1822. The old Indian trail from Detroit to Saginaw, by way of Royal Oak, Birmingham, Pontiac, Waterford, Holly, Grand Blanc and the Grand Traverse of the Flint, had served for the traffic of the Indians and the early traders and as bridle path for the earliest white explorers, who followed it in their explorations.

In 1822, the unrest of the Indians growing out of their dissatisfaction with the treaty of 1819, and their divided allegiance between the English and the Americans, caused the government to establish a military post at Saginaw. Two companies of the third United States Infantry, under Major Baker, were transferred from Green Bay, Wisconsin, to Saginaw, and the necessity of supplying this post made it imperative top improve the old trail. This was done by detachments of the soldiers, under the command of Lieutenants Brooks and Bainbridge. When their work was completed, it was so cut out and leveled that horseback travel in summer and sleighs in winter were possible. The old trail then ceased to be a trail and took upon itself the dignity of a road. It is said by one of the old chroniclers, that the soldiers built a bridge across the Flint, but if they did it was temporary and soon ceased to be usable for the purpose intended.

The garrison, not withstanding the skillful attendance of the post surgeon, Doctor Pitcher, found the place so unhealthy that is was withdrawn in the fall of 1823, and with its departure the need that had caused the betterment of the road ceased and it fell into decay.

While the garrison was at Saginaw, a contract was let to John Hamilton and one Harvey Williams to transport the supplies for the troops from Detroit to Saginaw. These two, with Ephraim S. Williams and Schuyler Hodges, went over the new road in the winter of 1822-23 with three sleigh loads of supplies. They had to put all three teams of oxen to one sled to get it across the river and up the banks.

With the coming of settlers the need for road repair being imperative. The terminus at Saginaw was a place of importance as the Indians there were expert fishermen and the trout they took were in demand by the settlers. In 1831 the sum of one hundred dollars was raised by popular subscription for the purpose of cutting out the road from Flint to the Cass river.

On November 15, 1831, John Todd, tavern keeper at Flint, Phinneas Thompson, and Albert Miller, school teacher of Grand Blanc, started out with axes, a tent and supplies for two weeks on their backs, to do the work. They moved out northward a few miles and camped, cutting back a day and then ahead a day, and then moving their camp again. At night, as Miller afterwards related, they were serenaded by wolves that gathered in large bands about the tent at night. While at Birch Run, Miller thoughtlessly left his leather mittens outside the tent and in the morning they were not to be found; the wolves has eaten them. Reaching the Cass river they made a raft of ash logs cut out of trees on the river bank and crossed.

The section of the road south from the Flint was not so well treated, for in 1832 Mr. William McCormick, who came over it from Detroit., characterizes the road from Detroit to Royal oak as the worst he had ever seen. He also says that the portion of the road from the old Indian trading house of Rufus W. Stephens, at Grand Blanc, to the Flint river, was only a sleigh road cut through the woods for winter use, and in many places not passable for wagons because not wide enough. Soon afterwards, he was called to go down the river as escort for a young lady who was to visit friends at Saginaw, and, with Colonel Marshall, of Flint, they accomplished the route in two days by drawing the canoe over the riffles in many places where the water was too low for free navigation.

The territorial roads built previous to the admission of Michigan as a state were practically all built to connect Detroit with Chicago and St. Joseph, and all of them, . with the one exception of that from Rochester to Lapeer, ran south of Genesee county.

W. R. Bates, of the golden Jubilee history, says that the road from Detroit to Saginaw by Flint was surveyed in 1826, but that it did not reach Flint until 1833. The road map of the land commissioner of the state, which gives the territorial roads, doe not include this one in question; it would seen that the road because a highway de facto, by its transition from an Indian trial to a road by the work of the soldiers, and that its further betterment depended more upon the voluntary aid of the settlers along the line.

The :Emigrants and Travelers' Guide," published at Philadelphia in 1834, contains a map of Michigan territory, and only one highway is designated in Genesee county, the one from Detroit to Saginaw, marked "Government road."

The early desire of better facilities for transportation, and the lines of communication most urgently needed by the settlers of Genesee after the states was formed, are reflected in the action of the first Legislature of Michigan from 1835 to 1848, which authorized the paying out and establishing of a number of state roads. Among routes authorized for Genesee county, were the following:

1. from Grand Blanc through the county seat of Lapeer to the mouth of the Black river, in St. Clair county.
2. From Flint through Lapeer and Romeo to Mr. Clemens.
3. From Flint to Ann Arbor.
4. From Flint through the towns of Atlas, Groveland, Brandon and Independence, to Pontiac.
5. From Flint through the Miller settlement, Shiawassee Town and Hartwellville, to Michigan village, in Ingham county.
6. From Flint through the town of Gaines to Byron.
7. From Flint through Coruma, to Lansing.
8. From a point on the Saginaw turnpike about fourteen miles north of Flint, through Flushing, Murray Mills and Brighton to Ann Arbor.
9. From Fentonville to Brighton.
10. From Fentonville to Byron, in Shiawassee county.
11. From Fentonville to Springfield, in Oakland county.

To authorize roads, however, was not to build them; many of these roads "laid out and established" by the Legislature on paper were not for many years made ready for travel, and some of them were not built at all in the way originally intended.

Road making, other than the state roads above described, began in the activities of James W. Cronk and R. J. Gilman, road commissioners of the township of Flint, which then included the present township of Clayton, Flushing, Montrose, Vienna, Mt. Morris, Thetford, Flint, Genesee and Burton. On June 15, 1836, these two commissioners laid out ten roads, which were numbered one to ten inclusive, and were as follows:

Road number one ran across the country from the Lapeer line on the east to the Shiawassee line on the west, its eastern terminus being the northeast corner of section 1, township 8 north, range 7 east, and its western and northwest corner of section 6, township 8 north range 5 east. This road is now the Frances road, except the eastern six miles between Forest and Richfield towns--those towns being then a part of Lapeer county. This Frances road therefore, has the honor of being the first recorded road in the county.

Road number two ran from the northwest corner of section 6, township 7 north, range 5 east, east on township line six miles and a half to quarter stake on north side section 6, township 7 north, range 6 east. This road is now the Potter road between Flushing and Clayton, extended half a mile eastward.

Road number three is described as running from southeast corner of section 1, township 7 north, range 5 east, to southwest corner of section 6, same township, six miles, this now the Beecher road, through the town of Clayton.

Road number four began at the southwest corner of section 6, township 7 north, range 6 east, and ran one mile east, thence south five miles, along the section line ending at the southeast corner of section 31, in the same township. The first mile of this road is now part of the Beecher road. One mile of the north, and the south five miles of this road, were discontinued by the commissioners of highways, December 7, 1850; the other four miles are not now used as a highway.

Road number five ran south five miles from the southeast corner of section 5, township 7 north, range 6 east, on section line, and is now the northern part of the Linden road, in the township of Flint.

Road number six, commencing at the southwest corner of section 7, township 8 north, range 7 east, ran thence east three miles on section line, and formed three miles of the Stanley road in the township of Genesee.

Road number seven commenced at the southwest corner of section 6, township 8 north, range 7 east (the center of the village of Mr. Morris), and ran thence six miles east along the section line, and is now the Mt. Morris road across Genesee township to the Richfield Line.

Road number eight was the present Bristol road across the township of Burton.

Road number none was that part of the center road from Frances road to the Stanley road and half a mile farther south, in the township of Genesee. This road now passes through Geneseeeville and departs from the section line on which it was laid out to accommodate itself to the surface of the river valley.

Road number ten, the present Hemphill road, just north of the county farm, one mile and five chains long, had its western terminus in the "Sagana" turnpike, and its eastern at the quarter stake between sections 29 and 30, township 7 north, range 7 east, (Burton).

On July 25, 1836, James w. Cronk and Charles McLean road commissioners of Flint, laid out four more roads.

Road number eleven was the present Vienna road across Thetford, running through Thetford Center and East Thetford.

Road number twelve is now the Wilson road across the township of Vienna.

Road number thirteen is now the Dodge road across the township of Vienna.

Road number fourteen runs from the center of Clio due south on the section line to the town of Mt. Morris, a part of the Clio road.

On August 3, 1836, commissioners Charles McLean and R. J. Gilman laid out number fifteen, from a point on the "Sagana" turnpike, east to the quarter stake on the east side of section 24, township of Vienna, a distance of fifty-seven chains and sixty-seven links. This is now that part of the Smith road in the township of Vienna.

On September 20, 1836, road commissioners James W. Cronk and R. J. Gilman laid out three more roads.

Road number sixteen, from the quarter stake on the south line of section 30, township of Genesee, east forty chains, thence north on section line forty chains, and east on the subdivision line twenty chains. This is now part of Pierson street, Lewis road and a short unnamed road in the township of Genesee.

Road number seventeen was the present Calkins road across the township of Clayton.

Road number eighteen is now the county line road between Genesee and Shiawassee counties, along the west bounds of Clayton.

Road number nineteen seems to have been partly recorded by the commissioners, but the record was erased, and on September 7, 1827, the then commissioners, James W. Cronk and John L. Gage, in order to keep up the consecutive numbering of roads, laid out a road and gave it number nineteen, as follows: Beginning on the east line of section 12, twenty-two chains, and twenty-five links south of the northeast corner of said section 12, in township 7 north, range 5 east, thence west nineteen chains and eighty-five links. The record is attested by Orrin Safford, town clerk. This road was in north part of the city of Flint.

Road number twenty, laid out September 20, 1836, by commissioners Clark and Gilman, is, or rather was, a road within the present city limits and in this record we find the first mention of Saginaw street. the road commenced "at the stake in the center of 'Sagina' street, from which the section corner of section 17, 18, 19 and 20 in township 7 north, range 7 east, bears south nine degrees east, twenty-nine chains; thence south fifty-one degrees west, ten chains and fifty links on Shiawassee street, thence north thirty-nine degrees west, two chains and thirty-four links to a stake, from which a white oak eight inches diameter, bears north seventy-six degrees west, twenty links; thence south fifty-one degrees west, ten chains to a stake, from which a oak bears north forty-five degrees west, sixty links; thence south six degrees east four chains to a stake, from which the quarter stake standing on the south line of section 18, bears north fifty-two degrees east, four chains and ninety-two links."

Road number twenty-one, laid out September 20, 1836, by commissioners Cronk and Gilman, was the south three miles of Center road, in Burton, running from Maple Grove road north to Mill road.

Road number twenty-two, laid out September 20, 1836, by the same commissioners, was the one mile of the Lennon road between sections 19 and 30, townships of Flint.

Road number twenty-three, same date as number twenty-two, ran from the southeast corner of section 33, township of Flushing, north five and a half miles on the section line. This road as it now exists conforms to the description above only in two places.

Road number twenty-four, of the same date as number twenty-two, is the road running north from the village of Flushing to the Stanley road and a half mile east of Stanley road.

Road number twenty-five, of the same date as above, is three and a half miles of elm road between Mt. Morris and Flushing, from the north line of those townships.

Road number twenty-six, of the same date, is the Stanley road from road number twenty-four east seven and a half miles, to the "Sagana" turnpike.

Road number twenty-seven, of the same date, is the section of the Bristol road running from the Shiawassee county line east eight miles through Clayton into Flint township, to Otterburn.

Road number twenty-eight, of the same date, is the Lennon road from the Shiawassee line nine miles east through Clayton to the middle of Flint township.

Road number thirty, same date, is the river road on west side of the Flint river from the southwest corner of Mt. Morris to the north line of Flushing.

Road number thirty-one, of the same date, is the linden road from north line of Mr. Morris to the south line of same, and south by the set-off, half a mile into township of Flint.

Road number thirty-two, same date, was the Corunna road from Shiawassee county to Smith's reservation. This was afterwards included in the northern state road of 1838.

Road number thirty-three, same date, was the Calkins road east from Clayton two and a half miles to Smith's reservation.

Road number thirty-four, of same fate, was the Webber road across Mr. Morris, from Francis road to the Potter road.

Road number thirty-five, same date, was a section of the Pierson road four and a half miles west from section 25 in Mt. Morris.

Road number thirty-six, same date, is the Jennings road across Mt. Morris, from the Frances road to the Potter road.

On October 10, 1836, Commissioners Cronk and Gilman laid out roads thirty-seven to forty, inclusive.

Road number thirty-seven is the Morrish road from Swartz Creek, six miles south.

Road number thirty-eight was a road from southeast corner of section 34, Clayton, north six miles on the section line. The south mile of this road is now part of the Seymour road, and the north, two miles part of the Marshall road; the other three miles do not seem to have been opened.

Road number thirty-nine was to run from the southwest corner of section 34, township of Clayton, north on the section line six miles, The south three miles of this road is now part of the VanVleet road; the other three were not opened.

Road number forty is the Mt. Morris road west from the center of the village of Mt. Morris, eight miles.

On October 29, 1836, Commissioners Cronk and Gilman laid out the Dodge road across Thetford as road number forty-one.

Road number forty-two, of November 8, 1836, was a road of the early day from the "Sagina' turnpike, eastward to a point near the first of Smith's reservations; its exact location is now difficult to define.

Road number forty-three, of march 20, 1837, laid out by commissioners Cronk and Gilpin, included a section of the Potter road, also of the Richfield road and western road.

Road number forty-four, same date as forty-three, is the road running north and south through the middle of section 3, township of Burton, to the Ritchfield road in township of Genesee.

Road number forty-five, laid out March 28, 1837, was the first road laid out by commissioners with reference to the plat village of Grand Traverse; it commences in center of Detroit street, where North street intersects it, and runs north thirty-four degrees east to section 1, etc.