Sheep numbers have changed since pioneer times

I am a reader. I often have two books in process at the same time; one upstairs and one downstairs. I read a variety of genres so I don’t get them confused. Daniel Boone and Tim Conway, Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Yogi Berra, Andrew Jackson and Trooper, a bobcat, a slave girl and Churchill and Trump.

The "Daniel Boone" television show theme song said Daniel Boone was a big man. He was actually about 5’ 8”, but he stood erect and wore a hat with a crown so he would appear taller. He lived mostly in Kentucky during the time of the Revolutionary War. This was the time of a bloody chapter in American history as the white settlers pushed their way into American Indian land and the Indians fought back with the help of the British. This bloody chapter continued on through the settling of the west.

I’m writing this piece on Independence Day so I am waxing philosophic. Would my family and I have been on the side of the Revolutionists? Would my family and I have packed up to move west into Ohio knowing what dangers might lie ahead? My ancestors came into Ohio at the beginning of the 1800s.

A friend of mine, a retired university professor, asked me if I knew that most of the wool for Union uniforms came from Ohio and Indiana. I did not know.

The first Merino sheep were brought to Muskingum County by Seth Adams. Adams was a merchant in Boston and imported some Merino sheep in 1801. He decided he wanted to move his family west. They came first to Marietta. Then he purchased 2,000 acres at the mouth of Wakatomaka Creek near Dresden in 1806. In 1807, his hired man brought a flock of 25 to 30 of his Merino sheep to Dresden from Massachusetts by way of Pittsburgh, Wheeling and Marietta.

There had been common sheep in eastern United States, but the Merinos imported by Adams and other merchants improved the wool quality so much that, as they multiplied, they were in great demand. At that time wool was the fabric of choice. Most of the wool from this area went to woolen mills in Steubenville.

The number of sheep in Ohio in 1870, the peak year, was 4,928,635. In Muskingum County, the number in 1860 was 86,356 and 1870 was 145,954. Ohio inventory for 2017 was 127,500. Muskingum County for 2017 had 3,509. Lots of change in 150 years.

Iris Eppley is a member of the Farm Bureau Council.

This article originally appeared on Zanesville Times Recorder: Sheep numbers have changed since pioneer times