Poorhouse...the story of Columbiana County

Above is a single panorama 17 inches long broken into three parts left to right of the inmates at the county home in 1914. Courtesy of the Columbiana County Archive and Research center. 

A view of the farm dated "Late 1880's" on the back. Courtesy of The Lisbon Historical Society.

The men's dormitory as it looks today.



For probably the last 8 years or so I have become strangely fascinated with the County Poorhouse in Lisbon. I can remember exactly the first time I drove by it. The red bricked structures just looked sad, like something that was intentionally forgotten and left to die. I will never forget that. In a sense maybe they were left to die. From then on I began to do research on the internet about county poorhouses. I searched county by county but it seemed that there was so little information about the one in our own county. I knew that these were institutions and probably places of despair from what I was researching. After very limited internet searches I knew there had to be more information available somewhere. A number of years later I was pointed in the direction of the Archive Center in Lisbon. That is where things really took off. The good volunteers there had the same fascination as I did about our county home and began locating old photos and the late Carroll Bell's research work for me (which by the way is awesome). From that I was able to finally track down what was left of the handwritten original county home ledgers dating back to 1830. Nobody had known what happened to them. They were listed as being stored in Columbus but a small footnote listed two cardboard boxes in storage at the Youngstown Labor Museum. Part of these records were microfilmed back in the early seventies but the film was almost impossible to read. Unbelievably they turned up. After many phone calls and a visit to The State of Ohio Research Center in Youngstown, the gracious director there allowed me to go through and photograph everything they had in those boxes page by page with no restrictions. Keep in mind that these were documents that were over a hundred and fifty years old and very fragile. I would go over once a month and spend a Saturday afternoon going through each book. I then edited it and organized it for the center in Lisbon. The Lisbon center indexed everything and made books of the information. There were a tremendous amount of hours volunteered by many of us to make this information available for genealogical research. A vast amount of information has been uncovered about the County Home. Not everything was originally microfilmed. Every aspect from how it operated to the history of the people that lived there was documented. It wasn't a place that you wanted to end up at all. In fact the very mention of the word "Poorhouse" seems to draw an unfavorable response in any generation especially the older generation. Any mention of the poorhouse usually brings a strange look to their faces. 

 This is the beginning of a series of articles about our county home. I will start with a brief history of the buildings and move on to the people that lived there. That is the story I really want to tell. Even today the Poorhouse still carries with it a stigma, a reaction,  God forbid our relatives were committed there. There is a "hope it wasn't my ancestor" reaction when you talk about it to other people.  It shouldn't though. We all came from our past no matter what. I want to know where I came from and so should you.  I will use names and photos unrestricted because there is no shame in what these people went through and no shame from where we came from. With my rough estimate of well over 3000 people buried in unmarked graves at the property, I think that their story needs to be told above all else. Most of the stories are sad but some are just truly amazing. These were the people that built our county and produced many generations to follow but somehow slipped away from our memory or public record. Over the next few months I hope that we are going to take a look at who they actually were and tell their story. I think that you will come to the same conclusion that I have. That every human life lived had a purpose no matter the despair or success. Even if that success is forgotten and comes 186 years later.. 

In the very early years of our county there was a need to handle the very unfortunate that lived among us. People that had nobody and very little means of supporting themselves needed help from those that lived here that could ease their burden. Some were sick or deformed and could not work to support their families. It was a very different world back then. There were no social safety nets so to speak. People had to look out for one another. Early on the state recognized this need and developed a system roughly modeled after the workhouses of old England. Basically a place where the impoverished could have a place live but had to work to maintain living there. Poorhouses or farms where people lived as their own community so to speak. The able bodied were expected to work to sustain a living at these houses and the sick relied on care paid by the county taxes. These houses or farms were normally overseen by an appointed director (and his wife) who then hired help to take care of what the inmates couldn't. Most of the time the inmates did the farming, cleaning, and the cooking. These were self sufficient places to a certain degree.
Ohio poorhouse laws date back to 1805 but after a slumping economy caused by the war of 1812 changes were made in 1816 permitting county commissioners to build and operate poorhouses.

The original county home was roughly 1 mile south of the present county home structures. This would have put the original farm house near the current day Robert Bycroft school.  There is no clear record of how long this farm or the farmhouse on the property was used as such though. There are no records prior to 1829 on the property being used to house people. The record shows however that there were at least 9 people moved to a 200 hundred acre farm with one farmhouse that was bought for $3,100.00 at the present site it is now. By now the state made all counties have a board of directors to make purchases and decisions about their poorhouses. This farmhouse was renovated by Andrew Scott for $92.00,  paid for by the county. They were also ordered to dig a new well or "wall the inside" of the old one by these same directors. Once the commissioners were in charge impeccable records were kept by the directors in cash books. Everything from shoes being made to cattle being purchased was recorded.

Andrew George dug the well by hand. Very dangerous work that took him several months to do. He was paid $68.50.

Photos of a cash book and the entries made. 400 feet of oak probably used for flooring and a record of the first superintendent's pay for the care of the paupers.

These were the very early days of poorhouse. As the years went by the number of inmates increased. Of course the need for more buildings were needed. Ohio legislature changed the name from "Poorhouse" to "County Infirmaries" in 1850. By 1919 they changed them to "County Homes".  Attendance here was rather small. For many years as the farm expanded their farmed acreage did as well. We are talking a garden to sustain a few dozen people to now growing feed for the cattle. During the upstart of the home many other people were taken care of off of the farm. Known as "Outdoor Paupers" these were indigent people in the many towns across the county. Normally each town had a liaison, a business owner or clergy person who knew the needs of the unfortunate. These problems could range from children being raised by a widow to a neighbor or family member taking care of a disabled child. Most of the time food or goods were donated at the discretion of the liaison. The county would receive a bill or receipt for the cost of the help. A lot of these expenses listed are for the care of the Outdoor Paupers, even the burial expenses if they had no next of kin. Money was paid to transport paupers to the poorhouse from the outlying cities and townships. In later years train fare was paid for paupers that were discharged to go to live with a family member further away than Columbiana county. The county didn't always shoulder the cost though. Many prominent business owners provided the charity out of their own pockets and never billed the county at all. 

A written report in 1835 to the commissioners and published on June 12th 1835 in the Ohio Patriot read as follows:

Expenses

House repairs: $135.02 1/4

Clothing and bedding for paupers: $158.10

Provisions: $216.06 1/4

Labor and Maid hire: $100.50

Stock purchased for the farm (animals): $106.40

Household and kitchen furniture: $60.13 1/2

Funeral expenses and coffins (made in house): $16.72 1/2

For removing and transporting paupers to poorhouse: $7.17

Superintendent's salary: $192.00 (year)

Stationary (ledgers):  .72¢

Dr. George McCook (more on him later) 4 amputations and 

39 visits :  $120.00

Dr. Leonard Hanna (consultation fees in two cases) : $15.00

Raised on the farm:

107 bushels of Wheat
300 bushels of Oats
325 bushels of Corn
180 bushels of Potatoes
1900 pounds of Pork
300 pounds of Beef
   5 bushels of Onions
12 bushels of Beets
300 heads of Cabbage
75 pounds of Wool
  8 tons of Hay

Manufactured on the farm:

62 yards of Linsey (Woolsey)
42 yards of Linen

As you can see if it wasn't made on the farm by the inmates it was made by the local people of New Lisbon. Everything from wooden combs and buttons to a Blacksmith going out to the farm. Everything was done in house or made by the villagers. Goods raised on the farm were traded for things that could not be made by them.

       This 1860 map of Ohio shows the poorhouse and infirmary property outside of Lisbon.
        Courtesy The Library of Congress.


Sometime between 1830 and 1850 there became more of a need for the poorhouse to keep the sick and mentally handicapped. With the local population growing more and more people were winding up at the poorhouse. Keep in mind in those days mental retardation and epilepsy were not very well understood. Often labeled "Idiotic" or "Insane" adults as well as children were sent to the poorhouse because of these ailments. All were kept together. Local doctors could tend to the sick there ( ones with fever or consumption) a form of TB which at times ran rampant through the county. The treatment of mental handicaps and or illness was usually crude. This created a problem of overcrowding and under staffing. On top of this local newspapers sensationalized everything they could for political purposes. Depending which board member they backed or the current superintendent that was in charge dictated how they would report the conditions at the farm. When people died there if there was no next of family (Usually not) they were buried on the property. Given the lack of a formal graveyard (until the 1870's) paupers were just buried around the farm itself. Almost always in unmarked graves.

  
 In this report from 1860 each column shows the number of admitted and discharged for the year. Totals for men and women with how many died at the institution that year are also shown. The most staggering number though is the second to last. It was the total number of minors kept there month by month. Roughly at any given time there were up to 13 children housed with the adults in the poorhouse/infirmary.

The totals of what the farm had and produced for the same year. As you can see the amount of livestock on the farm greatly increased by hundreds. Also note the clothing and bedding that was made for the inmates there. Other cash books from that year show private individuals that worked making these items and what they were paid. Not everybody on the farm could sew or make shoes. Most of the time people from New Lisbon were paid to make those things. Locals also sold and or traded cattle to the poorhouse.

So in the early years of the poorhouse things seemed to run fairly smoothly. Although there was no running water or indoor plumbing the very few people that were there made the farm work as the state intended. The farm was able to self sustain itself to some degree. They started out with roughly 9 or 10 people and after twenty years the population grew to 80 to 90. In the next part we will take a look at the growing need to handle the sick and mentally disturbed of our county and the problems created by this growing need. The confined space and the overwhelming lack of knowledge proved to be too much for the poorhouse to handle.