IV Edwin M. Stanton

On December 19, 1814 Edwin M. Stanton was born in a small native brick house at 516 Market St. It was the birthplace of the most famous of all Steubenville residents. The house was demol- ished for the building of busy shopping district of the city. Steubenville was then the village of 800 or 900 inhabitants. Stanton's father was a poor doctor. Edwin took a job in a book store so to earn money for going to Kenyon College in 1831. Then the next year he left the college to earn enough money to complete his education. Stanton then went to Columbus to work at a bookstore that was opened by his old employer. There he was deep- ly interested in the practice of law. He had become high strung. Abraham Lincoln and Edwin Stanton first met as defense counsels in McCormack Reaper Case. When Lincoln became 16th President of the United States during Civil War, he appointed Stanton Secretary of War. Stanton had a beautiful home at the corner of Third & Logan Sts.

Hon. E. M. Stanton opened a circulating library in his home. On the early forties group of men established an "Institute" for literary and rules and memberships were issued for borrowing books. This little collection was called the "City Library of Steubenville" It was placed in new Odd Fellows Hall where it flourished and re- mained until turned over to Carnegie Library on 1902. Andrew Car- negie remembering his days as a messenger boy in Steubenville man- aged the money of the construction of a public library on South 4th St. that opened on 1902.

Stanton's home then became the showplace of the city before it fell prey for giving way to High Street Thoroughfare. Stanton died on 1869 and was buried in Oak Hill Cemetery in Washington, D.C. His family were buried at Union Cemetery in Steubenville. On the northern part of Steubenville is Stanton Blvd. probably named after Edwin Stanton. It is next to LaBelle Ave. where we used to live. Our family's good friend, Helen Holiday, lived on Stanton Blvd. all her life. She was also a teacher at Stanton School on the corner of 4th and Dock Sts. She then became a principal of that school. My sister, Eleanoras a little girl, was a student there. The school was later demolished for the building of Steubenville High School. Sometimes we all were invited to Helen's house for dinners mostly buckwheat cakes with sausage. Daddy always teased Helen whom we called "A". There was,also, Stanton Park up on Route 7 where Eleanor and I as teenage girls went swimming quite often. It was razed for the paving of divided highway. When "A" became very ill, she stayed at Mrs. Zeis's (former Mrs. Alexander Sharp) house at 425 Franklin Ave. around the corner from our house until her death on about 1950.