“Left home at 10:30 … after an unmercifully long delay in Ashland, Ohio arrived at midnight near Lima, Ohio. Arrived at Chicago at 8:57 a.m.”
— Nov. 21, 1872 diary entry, Alexander Smalley
The diaries of a young farmer who resided in the brick home where my sister and her husband of 52 years raised their family, continue to interest me each time I read his entries.
This bachelor Ohio farmer who was clearly proud to be an American, enjoyed traveling from home nearly every autumn after harvest to see parts of the United States and see friends and family scattered to faraway places.
On this 1872 trip by railroad to Chicago, he writes, “Have put in the day very agreeably looking through the burnt district. Tis all built up again, far more splendid than before.” Smalley is spending time with John, most likely a relative who lives in Chicago.
On Nov. 25, “Miss Hattie Linder called a short while. Have not fallen in love yet, that I know of,” he writes, though a few days later he admits that musically, “she don’t do so bad.”
Alexander travels on to Indianapolis to have work done on his leg brace, and attends the Indiana state legislature, a metropolitan concert, a glass works and foundry. He takes a new type of train to Dayton, Ohio, noting, “Great Caesar! What riding, so fast!” Smalley describes dining on fine oysters while in Dayton and “enjoyed a nap in the grand parlor of the Bechtel House.” He arrived back home in Ashland County, Ohio on Dec. 7.
As 1872 closes out, he writes, “Forcibly reminded that but little has been accomplished, either morally, mentally or financially. Tis decidedly a very unpleasant thought, but time once spent can never be regained.”
Smalley’s older sister, Lydia, had visited in October from her Iowa home, bringing her four youngest children. He mentions that she appeared “well worn out from the long trip.”
In January, 1873 he writes, “Received sad news that sister Lydia could not live any length of time. Received another dispatch tonight for someone to go out. Sister Kate will start early in the morning.”
