12 - Recollections of Life in Ohio, from 1813-1840 by William Cooper Howells

Recollections of Life in Ohio is the autobiography of William Cooper Howells (1807–1894), father of novelist William Dean Howells. Born into a Welsh family of woolen mill owners, William Cooper emigrated with his family to America in 1808—at a time when Britain forbade skilled tradesmen from emigrating. Their expertise in mill machinery made them invaluable in the developing industries of Ohio, where they settled in 1813. This was a world of small-scale industries, frontier farming, barn-raisings, corn huskings, peach brandy, and itinerant preachers like Johnny Appleseed. The Howells family, originally Quakers, became fervent Methodists, and William Cooper wrestled with the meaning of religion at camp meetings while also helping with farm and mill work. His memories include curing tobacco, wrestling snakes, grubbing stumps, and serving as “corner man” at barn raisings. He later became a printer, journalist, and, in the 1870s and 80s, a U.S. consul in Quebec and Toronto. His son described him as “a very close and critical observer, both of nature and human nature, and equally a lover of both. He was not a poet in the artistic sense, but he was a poet in his view of life, the universe, creation.” This memoir remains a fascinating glimpse into U.S. frontier life.