Mrs. Sams’ name was Charlotte Dunlop Wever Sams, and if the name Wever rings a bell, her parents were Caspar Willis Wever and Jane Catharine Dunlop Wever. And if the name Caspar rings a bell, Charlotte’s older sister, Catharine Willis Wever, married William Oliver Collins and their first-born was Caspar Wever Collins.

Ladies and gentlemen, since we’ve spent some time as of late visiting the year of our Lord 1874, let’s take a few moments to observe the Fourth of July with Mother Thompson, Sarah McDowell, the Rev. Dr. William Jasper McSurely, John Calvin Van Pelt, the local temperance crusaders and others around Highland County.

Ladies and gentlemen, Monday, May 30, 2016 is Memorial Day, a day which was also observed on Monday, May 30 in the year of our Lord 1881. Before we pause to remember those who served and sacrificed this coming Monday, let’s take a step back in time to see how Memorial Day, then called Decoration Day, was observed in Hillsboro 135 years ago.

Ladies and gentlemen, as we left the year of our Lord 1874 last week, former New Vienna saloon owner John Calvin Van Pelt was in Hillsboro meeting with local temperance crusaders like Eliza Jane Trimble Thompson and many others.

Temperance crusader Eliza Jane Trimble Thompson meets John Calvin Van Pelt, the ex-saloon keeper who had previously been known as "the wickedest man in Ohio," on a cold, winter's morn in Hillsboro back in 1874.

Around noon on a sunny day in the year of our Lord 1874, bells were ringing in the town of New Vienna. Local saloon keeper John Calvin Van Pelt, who had earned the sobriquet of the “wickedest man in Ohio,” had announced to the New Vienna temperance crusaders that he had made a decision regarding his establishment, the Dead Fall Saloon, and would reveal his resolution that afternoon.

People closed up their places of business and rushed from all part of the town toward John Calvin Van Pelt's depot. An immense crowd of men and women assembled before the scene of so many prayers and songs. Each looked at the other, and wondered what was going to happen next.

Within a fortnight after the Temperance Crusade was inaugurated in Hillsboro, three or four of the leading counties in Southern Ohio were taken by storm. It was written that as fast as the news could be carried to neighboring towns, they caught the spirit and began the crusade of prayer and song. At one point, the “eyes of the whole country” began to be turned on New Vienna.

Among the leaders developed during the early days of the crusade was Mrs. Henry Foraker, one of whose sons, Joseph B. Foraker, afterward was governor of and senator from Ohio. Mrs. Foraker was a serious, almost solemn-looking woman and as quiet and home-loving a woman as ever knitted away a long winter evening by the fireside.