Day 5:

We spent the night at the Grand Lafayette Riverboat Hotel.  This hotel is on the Historical register. It is 110 years old. We had breakfast in the "gun room" which displayed antique long rifles.

The early pioneers arrived at Marrietta which was the first settlement in the Ohio area. The Ohio Company founded Marrietta with the intent to sell land to the military servicemen and other pioneers.

Our first stop of the day was at Campus Martius Museum. This museum focuses on the early settlers and early life of Marrietta.

This is the original house of General Putnum, one of the founding fathers of Marrietta.  Putnum's house was part of the first stockade.

In the museum is the original land office where the pioneers came to purchase their land from the Ohio Company.  

We were able to walk into the land office and stand in the place where Christopher Herrold payed $250 for 200 acres.  

Here is the table where the paperwork was sign and payment made.  SO COOL to be in the same space imagining the interactions and the collective energy of the moment. 

After visiting the land office we decide to see if we could find the paperwork.  So we went to the courthouse.

This is us at the Court House. You have to look in a book of lists by name and date. Then it tells you to the number of another book and which page number. We found two contracts showing what Christopher bought. (Interestingly Christopher was going by the nickname "Stophel" during the time of the  purchase. We made copies of the land contracts.

Our last adventure of the day was to the Ohio River museum. Here we learned about the early settlers means of transportation and tools the would have had. We have learned talking with our Herrold cousin that Christopher and Martha started out on a raft down the river to Fort Pitt (Pittsburgh). At Pittsburgh, they changed to a flatboat and floated down the Ohio River to Marrietta. In the stories about Christopher and Martha's travels, it talks about the two men loading the canoe. Through discussion and knowing that John Herrold was a miller, we believe Christopher could have had mill tools. We had trouble envisioning putting all that in a canoe. We thought maybe it really was a keel boat. Then we saw the canoe. It was HUGE!!

Qualities we love about Christopher and Martha:

• Courageous
• Tenacity
• Hungry for a better life
• Hard working partners