^^im^^mw ;« sJu- Cincinnati, 0. SPENCER 8c CRAI&PRINTIN& WORKS. ^ T ^3=*^ DESCRIPTION BIRDSEYE VIEW [iieriiiaaiiira FROM CINCINNATI JO CHATUNOOGfi.. -^ 1 & I& B m m m m ^J 1^® ^ GIVIKG ITS HISTORY AXD A GENERAL DESCRIPTOX OF THE TOWNS AND VILLAGES, (B III Q a ES, T UJsfJIELS, &c. THROUGH WHICH IT PASSES; DESCRIPTION AND RESOURCES OF THE COUNTRY, AND A GENERAL Guide to Business Houses AA^n PLACES OF INTEREST IN CINCINNATI, AND POINTS ON THE SOUTHERN RAILWAY. ARRANGED AND COMPILED BY ECHO. V /t/oGz/y4 CINCINNATI: Spencer & Craig Printing Works, 169 and 171 Race Street, 1S76. ^=^- PREFACE. The opening of the Cincinnati Southern Railway will always be considered an epoch in the history of Cincinnati and points on the line of the road. Few have any idea- of the magnitude of the enterprise; they know the cost of the road, in figure^, and to some it may seem enormous, but how m.any have any conception whatever of the immense develop- ments being made by opening this great highway of public travel. In Ohio and Indiana on the north and leading directly to Cincinnati are 6000 miles of railway, south of Tennessee and converging there are 4000 miles ; and this railway will be as the neck between them. It is esti- mated that the extent of country which will thereby become a market for our manufactures, and from which we shall draw its special products, embraces an area of about 200,000 square miles, equal to four times the State of New York. In this vast territory there are a number of cities and large towns with no eastern or northern city so accessible as Cin- cinnati. We have undertaken to collect and arrange from statistics and various other authentic sources, a brief but interesting history of Cincin- nati, the Cincinnati Southern Railway and notable points on its line. We have quoted freely from Mr. Collins' excellent work on K^eniucky; also from various reports, ^c, issued by the Board of Trustees. A portion of our space will be devoted to advertisements, and we feel assured that the work will commend itself to advertisers as a valuable m.edlum. It will reach every description and class of business through- out this immense tract of country. When it is remembered that this country is comparatively new; that first advertisers will gain a prestige which it will be impossible for others to undermine, the importance of being first to introduce your business to the people is apparent. We call the attention especially of Business and Professional men, Hotel Pro- prietors and Manufacturers to this. Believing that a great want of the people has been met, we submit this work to the Public. For full particulars, rates of advertising, ^c, apply to Spencer Sf Craig Printing Works, 169 ^ 171 Pace St., Cincinnati, 0, DESCRIPTION AND BIRDSEYE VIEW ^ THE ^yiHciiitiJtli ^:poiitiieri| |!i.(Uiirai|, (jllil T is more than thirty years since the question of connecting Cincinnati by a railroad, through the States of Kentucky and Tennessee, with the States of the South lying beyond the Cumberland Mountains, began to be discussed. The importance of such means of communication has always been acknowledged, but the difficulties and cost of the route have prevented private capital hitherto from succeeding in the enterprise, although several attempts have been ma(]e. During the late, civil war, so necessary to its operation appeared a direct transit through this part of the country, that the War Department ordered a survey of the route, and but for the sudden termination of the war, a railway would have been built by the United States Government. Pressed by an increasing demand for its manufactures from its natural market, the South, and requiring in return the products of that fertile region, the city of Cincinnati has undertaken to accomplish in the only available way at command, what has become an urgent need to its citizens. The General Assembly of the State of Ohio, passed acts authorizing the construction of a railway by the city through a Board of Trustees, between two termini, one of which should be Cincinnati, the other to be named by the City Council, which designated Chattanooga. Said Trustees were empowered to borrow funds for the purpose, and to issue bonds therefor in the name of the city, with ample powers as to the time and place of paj'nient. The country which this railway traverses, is rich in agricultural products — the blue grass region of Kentucky is widely celebrated. It has many small towns and centers of population, which only need the facilities of the road to be largely increa.sed. The Cumberland Hills are full of immense deposits of coal and iron. • In Tennessee there are already several furnaces dependent now upon uncertain stages of water communication which will be vastly increased by railway means of transport. And it is noteworthy that every mineral road in the United States, is a paying road. But the chief purpose of this enterprise is to connect the system of railways north of the Ohio, with the system in operation south of Tennessee, to which hitherto the mountains and a sparsely settled country have been barrieis. In Ohio and Indiana on the north and leading directly to 2S COVINGTON ADVERTISEMENTS. CHIMNEY ROCK, KENTUCKY RIVER, VIEW OF BANK LICK, KENTON CO., KY. CINCINNATI SOUTHERN RAILWAY. and has many fine dairy farms, for the supply of the Covington and Cincinnati markets. The hinds along the Lexington turnpike are of very superior quality. Independence is the original County seat, eleven miles south of Covington ; incor- porated in 1842 ; population in 1870, one hundred and thirty- four. But the necessities and convenience of the people have gradually invested Covington also with nearly all the advant- ages of the County seat, it being the place of record of all conveyances of property in and near its limits; and the longest terms of all the courts, as well as terms of the U. S. District Court for Kentucky, being held here. Covington is situated on the Ohio River, immediately at and below the mouth of the Licking River (which separates it from Newport), and opposite the great city of Cincinnati, Ohio. It is built upon a beautiful plain, several miles in extent; and the principal streets were so laid off as to present the appearance of a prolongation or continuation of those of Cincinnati. Population at the present time about 32,000. It has a large and beautiful Court House and C'ity Hall, twenty-four churches and four banks. The population of Kenton County was 7,816 in 1840, when it was organized, and at the present time about 45,000; its area is 96,453 acres, value j^er acre $14.95 in 1846, in 1876 $50.00. LUDLOW, KENTON CO. Ludlow, the first point on lea\ ing the Ohio River, has a population of 2,000, which is on the rapid increase, as it is practically a suburb of Cincinnati and should it obtain a side footway over the railway bridge, people will at once flock over from the bustling and noisy Queen City, for quiet homes near their places of bus'ness. There is a large yard for standing room and switching located here, a great deal of grading has made a long and beautiful plain or table-land, on which is located a commodious Freight and Passenger Depot, a round house and various other buildings, here, too, is the incline plane leading down to the Ohio River, thereby connecting our road with the large commerce carried on upon its rolling waters. Dayton, Newport, West and South Covington, Ludlow, Bromley, &c., all face Cincinnati, and at no very far distant date, will, be consolidated, their combined population nearly 100,000 ; there is ample room for doubling this popula- tion, and no better investment or speculation can be found than vacant ground in and near these places. But we will not tarry, going on southwardly, we next come to three master-pieces of iron trestle work, one on an easy curve, the other two on tangents or straight lines, and four crossing Hor.-e Run and two branches of Pleasant Run. This was also let to the Keystone Company, for about $85,000. Next we come to ;:|l CINCINNATI ADVERTISEMENTS. CINCINNATI SOUTHERN RAILWAY. bushels of corn, 83,354 of wheat, 1,030 of barley and 281,645 pounds of tobacco ; showing that the county may be considered in a flourishing condition. The first town near the railway is Florence, lying a half mile to the westward, by j)ike it is nine miles from Covington and six miles from Burlington ; it was incorporated 1830. Still onward we come to the cross- ing of the Louisville 8hort Line K. R. This we glide over on an iron through span bridge, one hundred and twenty-six feet long, cost $66.25 per foot, built by the American Bridge Co., after which we enter WALTON eighteen miles from our starting point. A little farther on and we again enter Kenton County, crossing a corner of which we are rushed into Grant County, formed in 1820, out of the western part of Pendleton County ; it was the sixty-seventh formed in the State. In shape it is a parallelogram, nearly a square, twenty-two and a half miles from north to south and twenty miles from east to west. It is situated in the northern part of the State, and bounded north by Boone and Kenton Counties, east by Pendleton, south-east by Harrison, south by Scott and Owen, and west by Owen and Gallatin Counties. The streams are Eagle Creek, which flows northward through the western part of the county and finally empties into the Kentucky River, and its tributaries, Clark's, Arnold's and Ten Mile Creeks; and on the eastern side of the County, Crooked, Fork Lick, and Grassy Creeks, tributaries of the Licking River. The face of the County is undulating, seldom hilly ; the soil north of Williamstown, along the Dry Ridge and the arms of the Ridge is very rich, south of that place it is thin, but in the western part moderately good. Wheat, corn, oats and hogs are the largest productions. The crops of the county in 1870 were 155,950 pounds of tobacco, 700 pounds of hemp, 1,509 tons of hay, 612,079 bushels of corn, 34,059 bushels of wheat, 1,631 bushels of barley, it also contained at that time 4,255 horses, 431 mules, 5,217 cattle, 8,000 hogs. The population ranged as follows : 9,529, 1870 ; 8,356, 1860 ; 6,531, 1850; 4,192, 1830; 2,986, 1830; 1,805, 1820. Its area is 136,891 acres, valued in 1846 at $4.60 per acre; in 1870, at $14.92. The highest number of slaves ever held, numbered six hundred and ninety-six in 1860. From these facts gath- ered carefully from past statistics the reader can readily judge of the standing of the County. Five minutes will now bring us from the County line to Crittenden (named after the Hon. John J. Crittenden), on the turnpike eleven miles north of Williamstown by pike, and twenty-five miles south of Cin- cinnati ; established in 1831, population in 1870 was two hundred and ninety-five, present five hundred ; contained at mm ■^m - -ts^^iaiiisk LUDLOW AND WILLIAMSTO WN ADVERTISEMENTS. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 014 611 414 3 i