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Garfield Was
a Boat Hand
AKRON & SUMMIT COUNTY
Karl
H. Grismer,
Summit County Historical Society,
Akron, Ohio c. 1950 p 118-119
In general, the
boat hands on the canal were a rough, tough lot. But there was one
young fellow who was more than a little different from the others.
Jim Garfield was his name.
In the summer of
1848 young Garfield, a native of Cuyahoga County,
got a yearning to become a seaman. He tried to get a job on
the Great Lakes but no one would
hire him. So he persuaded his cousin,
Capt. Amos Letcher, to
let him become a driver on the canal boat
Evening Star.
With Jim cracking the whip, the boat left Cleveland for
Pittsburgh, carrying 50
tons of copper ore. Ten days later he was
promoted to the job of bowsman and his pay was boosted to $14 a month.
The
Evening Star
entered the P.
&
O. at Akron early in September
and returned
a few weeks later loaded with coal. More than a few old timers proudly
related in later years that they met Garfield while he
was passing
through and were much impressed by his demeanor.
Maybe so.
Other old timers
said that Jim, being a good Christian lad, abhorred
fisticuffs. Some of the boat hands called him a coward. But one day a
swaggering bully rushed him—and young Jim knocked him
cold. Thereafter, 'tis said,
Garfield became something of a hero.
Jim didn't remain a
boat hand long. Before he got back to Cleveland
he was stricken with malaria, the curse of the canal boaters, and
had to give
up his waterway career. Nursed back to health by his mother, he entered Geauga Seminary, soon
afterward became a teacher,
and from then on began
climbing the ladder of fame. His biographers
said that even after he
became President he enjoyed recalling his canal
boat days.
When the P. & O. was
opened, Akron manufacturers who shipped their products east
enjoyed a slight advantage over those located at
other points along the Ohio Canal. The Akronites had to
pay only the P. & 0. toll;
the others had to pay toll on both canals. The saving
for the Akron men was not great but in a highly competitive
market
it
helped them get business.
Akron and Summit County, Karl H. Grismer. Summit County Historical
Society, Akron, Ohio, c. 1850. P 118-119
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