John Merrill

August 5: The first electric traffic control lights installed in Cleveland

On this day in 1914 the American Traffic Signal Company installed the first electrically control traffic signal system on the corner of East 105th Street and Euclid Avenue in Cleveland Ohio. This was the beginning of a series of inventions used to help motorists, pedestrians, bicyclists and carriages to safely navigate through an intersection. Prior to this a police officer would stand in the middle of a busy intersection and hold up either a stop or go sign.

James B. Hoge’s design still included a traffic policeman, but instead of standing in the middle of the intersection he had a little enclosure similar to what people of a certain age remember as a phone booth. From this little booth, the police officer could detect backups and alter the traffic flow. He also had a connection with the local fire departments and could activate a steam whistle to alert pedestrians and vehicles that an emergency vehicle could be coming through the intersection at any moment.

Hoge’s traffic signal didn’t have the red / green lights we know, but instead lighted signs that said either MOVE or STOP. The entire system was extremely complicated and did not catch on. Variations of traffic controls were beginning to be seen across the country. In 1922 another Cleveland resident, Garrett Morgan Sr. applied for a patent that was a manually controlled signal that had lighted semaphores as well as a colored light in the center that was red for stop and green for go. Morgan’s idea was not widely implemented, but, Garrett actually sold his patent to a new start-up company named General Electric for the price of $40,000– not bad when the average income in 1922 was just over $3,000 per year. General Electric would go on to mass produce traffic lights for the entire country that would incorporate Mr. Morgan’s color lights housed in a 4-sided box.

Speaking of traffic lights, inside Ohio’s Small Town Museum in Ashville, the oldest continuously operating traffic light that has been in operation since 1932, but it was retired from service in 1982 when, due to its configuration of only one light that changed colors, color blind folks couldn’t distinguish between the red and green light changes.

Ashville's Continuously Operating Traffic Signal — Ashville’s Continuously Operating Traffic Signal

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Aug. 4: George Armstrong Custer and 7th Cavalry Attacked by Sioux

By John Merrill

Custer Memorial statue in New Rumley, Ohio, site of Custer's birthplace. — Custer Memorial statue in New Rumley, Ohio, site of Custer’s birthplace.

August 4, 1873: A man born in the Appalachian foothills of eastern Ohio, a man who had received praise from the President of the United States as a Civil War cavalry officer, was now relegated to guard duty for a survey party laying out the route for a 3rd transcontinental railroad. This route however, would take it through hostile Sioux lands. Custer was anxious for a fight and looking for one. It had been 2 years since he and his men had been in a fire-fight, yet for most of this assignment it had been uneventful.

For a time Custer and his scouts had seen Sioux in the distance but never close enough to engage. Years later, Sioux survivors would related how they had been testing the cavalry to see if they would engage. And, according to their accounts, they always failed the test. But on this day in 1873 and a scouting party from a large group of Sioux being led by Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull, had attacked a scouting party from the 7th Cavalry.

When alerted of the attack, Custer threw everything he could into the skirmish and the Sioux quickly retreated. During the skirmish, one cavalrymen and one Sioux warrior were killed. The consequences of this brief engagement would play heavily a few years later when these same combatants would meet each other along a river in South Dakota known as the Little Big Horn.

For Custer, the engagement reinforced his idea that the Plains Indians were poor fighters, and likely to run when faced with a superior foe. For the Sioux leaders Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, they confirmed that the American cavalry leader was impetuous that would engage at the slightest provocation. These initial assessments would both be confirmed three years later.

July 29: First School House in the Ohio Country

By John Merrill

School sessions among the Delaware had already commenced beginning in February of 1773, but on this day of that year Moravian Missionaries completed the first school house west of the Allegheny Mountains. This school house was located in Schoenbrunn Village, one of several Moravian settlements created in the Tuscarawas Valley that also included Gnadenhutten, Lichtenau, Salem and Goshen. Eight years later a brutal massacre occurred at Gnadenhutten.

Recreated school house room at Schoenbrunn Village.

The Moravians were eastern European Christian missionaries that sought to bring Christianity to Native groups originally in Pennsylvania, but they also moved into Ohio. One of their distinctions from other missionary groups in North America, is the fact that all of the missionaries in the field had to learn the Native American’s language, teaching them in that language.

Three years after building the schoolhouse, David Zeisberger published a spelling book for his Delaware pupils. In time Zeisberger translated the dictionary, sermons, hymn books and liturgies into the Delaware language. Part of his educational program included teaching the Delaware children personal hygiene.

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July 20: Last Moments of Eagle

By John Merrill

July 20: He had gone through 1000s of simulations preparing for this moment. His craft the Eagle, was approaching the surface and the alarms were sounding multiple problems. Back on land the men in the control room had no answers that could solve all the problems before his craft crashed into the field of boulders. His on-board flight computer was sounding a glaring warning that it couldn’t handle the job. He was on his own.

apollo-11-lm-1-2 — The Eagle Lunar Module (LM) after it separated from the Command Module.

Maneuvering around the Chevy-sized boulders was using up precious fuel and there was no fuel stations closer than more than 238,000 miles. Commander Neil Armstrong was used to difficult if not impossible situations and staying calm when any normal person would have frozen. He could see the dust flying up around his craft. He knew he was close, then his Lunar Module Pilot, Buzz Aldrin called out “Contact light…” The first words sent back to blessed Earth as Apollo 11 made initial contact with the dusty surface. Three seconds later the Lunar Module was on the surface of the moon. Armstrong said, “Shutdown.” Aldrin replied, “Okay, engine stop.”

Charlie Duke, the Mission Control officer back in Houston confirmed the event, “We copy you down Eagle.” After checking a few more switches, Armstrong replied “Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.” Charlie then replied, “Roger Tranquility, we copy you on the ground. You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We’re breathing again.”

Neil Armstrong with his helmet removed, but still in his dust-covered suit inside the LM. — Neil Armstrong with his helmet removed, but still in his moon dust-covered suit inside the LM after exploring the lunar surface for the first time.

Breathing again for good reason. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin had just 45 seconds worth of landing fuel on board when the engines shut down—45 seconds from failure to success. The boy from Wapakoneta, Ohio who had overcome difficult situations all his life, had just converted a difficult situation into one of the greatest achievements in modern technology– it happened on this day in 1969.

On August 7, 2009, an act of Congress awarded the three astronauts (Commander Neil A. Armstrong, Commander Lunar Module Pilot Edwin E. Aldrin, Jr., and Command Module Pilot Michael Collins) a Congressional Gold Medal, the highest civilian award in the United States.

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June 3: The Birth of REO

By John Merrill

In the mid 1960s a group of rockers formed the band R.E.O. Speed Wagon. It was a great live-performance band known throughout the Midwest. I personally saw them play at a bar in Champaign, IL in the late 60s and was impressed, but that name R.E.O. Speedwagon I just couldn’t figure out what it meant. Neal Doughty, one of the early band members came up with the name. While attending UofI in Champaign, one of his classes in electrical engineering was on transportation history. There he saw a work-horse of a truck that had been around for a long time. Not only could it haul stuff like nothing else, but its framework also powered many fire engines. The name of that beast was the REO Speedwagon, a name that dates back to the early 1900s.

The name REO Speedwagon, was the name given by its founder to his line of trucks. REO was the man behind the name: Ransom Eli Olds.

1897 Steam Powered Pirate on Florida beach being driven by Eli

On this day in 1864 Sarah Whipple Olds gave birth to Eli in Geneva, Ohio. His father, Pliny Olds, was a blacksmith, pattern-maker and a steam engine builder. Five years after Eli was born, he sold his business and home, took those proceeds and moved to Lansing, MI where he opened a successful steam and gas engine business. In time Eli joined his father and continued to build engines.

Eli would go on to first build some highly efficient steam engines, but he also saw the benefits of both gasoline and electrical powered engines. On August 21, 1897, he founded the Olds Motor Vehicle Company in Lansing, Michigan and began building horseless carriages, some powered by steam, others by gasoline, and also electrical powered. Two years later the company was bought by Samuel Smith who moved the new company to Detroit. Eli was made vice president and general manager of the company.

reo-speedwagon-1915 — 1915 REO Speedwagon Advertisement

This was a short lived arrangement and in 1904 Eli left the company and formed the REO Motor Car Company. Eli would in time go on to create his special line of trucks that he called the REO Speedwagon.

May 26: Colonel Crawford Moves Toward Ohio Country

By John Merrill

We were in the final years of the long drawn out American Revolutionary War. General Washington was afraid the British and their Native American allies would soon open a third front to the west of the American colonies. To prevent this he asked his long-time friend retired Colonel William Crawford who had only retired from active military service the year before to head a group of 500 volunteers into the Ohio Country.

Crawford was familiar with the Ohio Country. He had accompanied the younger George Washington many years before down the Ohio River on a survey expedition. Many years later he helped build Fort Laurens in northeast Ohio.

Sandusky Plains Battle Site Memorial — Sandusky Plains Crawford Capture Site Memorial

Crawford’s Expedition into the Ohio Country was to suppress a suspected stronghold of Wyandots along the Sandusky River using a surprise attack that he hoped would catch them off-guard. Unfortunately, British spies hand informed the British of the large expedition marching west from Fort Pitt and Native Americans from around Detroit moved south to reinforce the Wyandots. To complicate this expedition, many of the volunteers making up Crawford’s expedition had taken part in a massacre of Christian Delaware that had returned to their Moravian village where the militia captured them thinking they were part of a raiding party that had killed a young girl of a pioneer family. Although the massacre included killing all of the Delaware, one young man escaped the carnage by slipping out of the cabin and into the woods during the night. He would later identified some of the men involved in the massacre.

As Crawford’s expedition approached the Sandusky Plains on June 4 they encounter a combined force of Shawnee, Delaware and Wyandot. At the end of the first day of the engagement, the Americans seemed to have control of the field. The next morning a British force of Rangers reinforced the Native Americans. This tipped the scales in favor of the British and their Native American allies. Crawford sensing the balance had shifted, decided to withdraw his force south. A sudden attack by the Native Americans forced Crawford’s men into an unorganized retreat.

During the confusion of the retreat, Crawford’s horse collapsed and he was captured along with a few other men. After several days of extreme torture, Colonel Crawford was burned at the stake.

Crawford County was later named for the executed soldier.

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