Coshocton County Ohio villages

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WAKATOMIKA

Wakatomika Never Had Official Beginning � The Village Just Grew

Although never endowed with a formal beginning as a village, little Wakatomika in Washington Township has fared about as well as many of the countries communities - better than some which have long since passed into the realm of ghost towns.

There is no town plat on file at the courthouse and no act of the state legislature to prove that Wakatomika exists � but Wakatomika seems to go serenely on its way with no need for such documentary evidence of its place in the county.

The town probably got its start as a white community a little more than a century ago in the days of the Revolution Wakatomika was a thriving Shawnee village but was burned to the ground by the expedition of Maj. Angus McDonald in July or August of 1774.

The first road through Washington Township was the Owl Creek Road, which entered Muskingum County and ran northwest into Bedford Township. The old Newark road, running east and west, intersected the Owl Creek Road in the exact center of Washington Township, and to this intersection Wakatomika probably owes its existence.

By 1850 there were enough signs of a community for Charles Houser to open a general store, a blacksmith soon followed and Wakatomika at least a name on a few maps.

Long before these happenings, however, there was a school near the present village site. The First seat of education was launched on the old Lemuel Kinsey farm, a crude log cabin built without nails of iron of any kind. The first school mater was a Yankee named John Hilliand and he is called an excellent teacher in the brief notes of the recorded history of the locality.

Hilliard was followed by another Yankee, Joseph Harris and history is a little less kind in its record of his abilities.

A little later on Abraham McClain held school in a private home for a term or two. A school was then built near the home of Thomas Hardesty and was taught by Bradley Squires between 1815 and 1820. Peter Remington from Rhode Island lasted for one school term and was followed by Robert Reed, a Pennsylvanian.

With the growth of the village a frame school building was erected on the site of the present building. The frame structure was replaced by a neat brick building used for many years by Herb Penick on his farm as an apple storage house. The property is now owned by the Joe Chaney family and used for the same purpose.

Some of the more recent Wakatomika teachers include Howard Price, later an undertaker at Roscoe, Israel Cooksey, Charles W. Maston, former state senator who was killed in an auto accident on the Lake Park road, Henry Ashcraft, probate Judge of Licking County, Clyde Sproull, later postmaster at Tunnel Hill and an early stockholder in The Tribune, William Daugherty, Clay McConnell, former county auditor and deputy auditor Bert McKee, former Coshocton mail carrier, G. G. Bryan, Miss Darner, R.L. Gilmore, Frank McConnell, and Jennie Smailes.

With the building of Union School in 1936, Wakatomika School passed out of existence as did all the local schools in the district. The village school was always a grade school, advanced education in the past having been obtained in the high schools of Dresden, West Carlisle and West Bedford.

Also preceding the indefinite start of Wakatomika as a village was the inauguration of religious activity in the region, the Tomika Regular Baptist Church having been organized Jan. 5, 1828, by Elder Amos Mix in the home of William R. Thompson with only three members, James and Elizabeth Brooks and John Howell. Immediately after those three, the church took William R. Sarah and Mary Thompson as members.

Several years later a log church was built and in 1845 the present frame structure was constructed.

An �indenture� recorded in Vol. 7 of the county�s deeds shows that in 1834 William R. and Sarah Thompson sold three quarters of an acre to Bradley Squires and William Davis, trustees of the Baptist Church in Washington Township, for $10.

Men who perform ministerial services for the Tomika Regular Baptist congregation have include Elder Mix, J. Frey Sr., William Mears, L. L. Root, L. Gilbert, H. Sampson, J. Frey Jr., S. West, R. R. Whitaker, B. Allen, E.B. Smith, J.W. Reed, A.W. Odor, E. Frey, J.C. Skinner, C.C. Tussing, John Wright, and L.R. Mears.

A year-�round Sunday school was organized in 1872 with James M. Smith as superintendent succeeded by David Frey. The church membership was at its peak a hundred years ago with 75 in the congregation. By 1881 it was only 60 and declined rapidly until it passed out of existence about 50 years ago.

The church building was purchased by the Wakatomika Grange for a meeting in 1913 and was sold to E.W. Nethers in 1936. It was now owned by the Chaney�s and used to store machinery.

Wakatomika became a freight and passenger station on the C.A. and C railroad when that line was built though from Trinway to Killbuck in 1885 and that community advantage lasted 50 years until the roadbed was washed out in several places in the flood of 1935.

Produce, apples and peaches formed the principle outgoing freight, with as many as 12 cars of apples being shipped in a single day.

A distillery �to save the peach crop from rotting� was built at Wakatomika in the �90s by Sam Seigrist, Coshocton distillery operator, and for a couple of years cases of brightly-labeled bottles of peach brandy were another frequent shipment from Wakatomika to points on the C.A. and C.

W.A. Clark was the station agent for many years. P.S. Maston and Stuart McGinnes were early postmasters.

Various grist mills, cabinet shops, distilleries and the other small industries typical of the pioneer communities had been launched in the vicinity of Wakatomika but none flourished except the carriage shop of Darius Wright.

Mr. Wright came from a similar enterprise in West Carlisle, to erect a large building in Wakatomika for the building of carriages and wagons for the neighborhood. The carriage shop lasted from 1857 till about 1870, when Mr. Wright moved to Warsaw and the business was closed.

A blacksmith shop was conducted in connection with the carriage shop and another early smithy in the village was Samuel Fry. George Way probably blacksmith longer than any other in Wakatomika. His son, Jake Way, was associated with his father for a time and was the last blacksmith in the village.

Charles Houser, as stated previously was the first storekeeper. He was succeeded by several men who remained for brief periods and then Isaac Piersel brought out the only store and opened it for a number of years.

Other merchandising in Wakatomika since that time have been P.S. Maston, William Hamilton, Stewart Richcreek (later a Coshocton Grocer), Aretus Wright, E.W. Nethers, P.L.Thomas, William Hill, Mr. Selders, Nellie Way and Harry Heck. Mr. Heck�s widow still lives in Wakatomika, but is not operating the store. Mrs. Florence Barcus has operated the Way [Greg Said:] store since she bought it about two years ago.

Some of Coshocton county�s communities have a tenacious way of clinging to life when no apparent reason for existence seems to remain. And so Wakatomika� s future may stretch out as far as it�s hazy beginnings go back into the distant past.

Contributed by: Leone Hines, Sheila Barr Helser
Transcribed by: Gregory Preston