Betty's Historical Writings

05/07/2026

10/01/2025

THIS IS WBQR'S MINUTE FOR HISTORY #65
(Written and Presented by Betty Jaynes Clawson @ 1991)

Here are some little tidbits of information from here and there.

At one time there was 1,000 acres of virgin pine in Logan Township, Fountain County. It was the largest pine grove in the state, and by 1845 most of it was cut down and used for flat boats.

If you're under 50 years of age [in 1991] . . . did you know there was a white frame hotel with a picket fence around it where the theatre building in Williamsport now stands, and that it was there until about 1940?

If you're still younger . . . did you know that Williamsport was one of the few towns with a brick house in the center of town? It also had a picket fence around it. Sometimes it was a private dwelling, at times meals were served there, and at one time it was a rooming house. The last person to reside there was Ella Pitcher. The house was torn down in the 1960s.

Did you know the Redwood Bandits operated in Warren County on Redwood Creek sometime after 1830 and that the Horse Thief Detective Association was formed to break up the horse thieves and counterfeiters of Redwood?

Did you know that during prohibition the Rice & Miller Gang operated out of the house (Lee Van Reed home) that the Community Hospital evolved from? There was a tunnel from the house to the garage. And as late as 1947, machine gun mounts were still in the dormer windows of the attic. When the gang had mechanics work on their cars in Attica (they were very nice vehicles), one of them would remain in the car with a Tommy gun [.45 caliber Thompson submachine gun] across his lap while the mechanic worked.

More tidbits another time . . .

09/03/2025

THIS IS WBQR'S MINUTE FOR HISTORY #64
(Written and Presented by Betty Jaynes Clawson @ 1991)

Quarries (Page 4)

More on area stone quarries.

W.P. Carmichael and others operated the stone quarry at Williamsport. The Wabash railroad later transferred their business to him. My family home in Williamsport is supported by a stone foundation from this quarry. You can pretty well judge the age of a house by looking to see if the foundation is real stone or cement. This stone quarry was located in the area of the Williamsport Falls which, as you know, is the highest falls in Indiana.

Red sandstone was quarried in Warren County north of Blackrock. There were two stone quarries opened on Shawnee Creek, one of them was red sandstone and the other was white sandstone. The white sandstone trimmings on the Farmers & Merchants State Bank in Attica came from the quarry at Table Rock. There was a red sandstone quarry southwest of the Portland Arch area. In the 1890s contractors from Lafayette took much stone out in the Riverside area, and many buildings in Lafayette and Danville are made from this stone. Rostone of Lafayette was originally a Riverside company where they crushed stone and formed it into large, thin stone plates. The Art Deco Devon Theater in Attica is covered with Rostone.

J.W. Whicker was so familiar with the quarries and the stone cutters that he could tell who had done the lettering on a headstone just by looking at it.

This ends our quarry report.

09/03/2025

09/03/2025

THIS IS WBQR'S MINUTE FOR HISTORY #63
(Written and Presented by Betty Jaynes Clawson @ 1991)

Quarries (Page 3)

The Wabash Railroad purchased 40 acres of land later known as Stone Cut and opened up a large quarry in Logan Township in Fountain County. I don't see a date, but this must have been in the 1850s or '60s. Maybe even later. Stone Cut is located east of Riley Field, the Attica airport at Radio Materials Company. The railroad ran a switch up the hollow to the quarry and erected a large boarding house. Lewis Town was the foreman, and his wife ran the boarding house. They employed, at one time, from 75 to 100 men in this quarry. And all the stonework on the Wabash railroad for many years came from this quarry.

It was superseded by Stinas Barnhart, who first began contracting in a small way with the company and whose honesty and splendid work won for him a reputation so that finally the Wabash railroad, recognizing his work and his knowledge of the business, turned their contracts over to him.

Whicker says he opened a quarry on the Barnhart place across the river along the C & E I tracks. This would be in Warren County, but I don't know the location of this one. He operated it until the stone quarry was opened at Williamsport. The Shideler dam in Warren County, that I have mentioned before, was built by this Mr. Barnhart using stone from his quarry.

More on quarries next time.

09/03/2025

THIS IS WBQR'S MINUTE FOR HISTORY #62
(Written and Presented by Betty Jaynes Clawson @ 1991)

Quarries (Page 2)

We continue with stories about quarries and their importance in the Fountain/Warren County area.

In his book, Sketches of the Wabash Valley, J.W. Whicker tells about how many in his family worked in the area quarries. His uncle Luke Whicker had a stone quarry on Pine Creek near the Schideler Mill in Warren County. The 1966 Warren County History book calls this the Pine Grove Mills at Jonathan Shideler's dam in Liberty Township. (We also have two spellings of Shideler's name here.)

Another quarry mentioned was on the Riverside road just outside of Attica up the hill from where Dan Leif [1991] now lives. Gus Leif owned near there at the time. The stone taken out of this quarry was a very good quality of sandstone. Much stone was taken from here for the Wabash & Erie Canal aqueducts and locks. Whicker states that in 1916 that stone in the canal was still in perfect condition after all the years of use. The Wabash railroad for a while used stone taken from this quarry and later from a quarry of freestone near Riverside.

Next time we'll talk about Stone Cut in Logan Township, Fountain County.

09/03/2025

THIS IS WBQR'S MINUTE FOR HISTORY #61
(Written and Presented by Betty Jaynes Clawson @ 1991)

Quarries

The first settlers in this locality were satisfied with the log cabin, but it was not many years until they began to have desires for more substantial dwellings. With the advent of the up-and-down sawmill operated by water power, the settlers began building more substantial houses and barns, and their frame houses and brick houses made more substantial foundations necessary. Soon they began operating stone quarries in the various parts of Fountain, Warren, Tippecanoe and adjoining counties to secure stone for foundations.

One of the first quarries in the vicinity of Attica was about one mile west of Riverside, across the road and railroad from where William Hysong now lives [1991]. Rev. James Killen operated the quarry on a large scale, but his particular business was making tombstones. In almost every cemetery in western or northern Indiana there are tombstones that were made in this quarry. And many of the young men in the Bethel neighborhood learned to be stonecutters in Killen's quarry.

After the advent of the canal, marble came into use as tombstones, and the Killen quarry no longer could be worked profitably.

Another quarry operating at this time was in Warren County between where the Martin Geeding property now is on the Independence Road and the Attica bridge on 41 and 28.

More on quarries and their importance next time.

09/03/2025

Over a dozen years ago, in May of 2013, I began publishing on this FB page writings that my mom, Betty, prepared for her "Minute for History" radio presentations on WBQR in the early 1990s. Somehow I got sidetracked in August of 2015 and didn't finish posting. If you scroll back, you'll find 61 posts, but she did nearly 150 presentations. I've been encouraged to share these informative historical accounts for Attica's 200th celebration, so it's inspired me to begin again with sharing her writings . . . some 35 years after she wrote and delivered them.

09/03/2025

In celebration of the 200th anniversary of Attica, IN … along with posts from others, Mom’s historical writings pertaining to Attica will be posted here:

In September of 1990 my mom, Betty Jaynes Clawson, began researching, writing and reading a "Minute For History" segment on the Attica radio station WBQR. My dad, Dale Clawson, recently found her...