Notable Individuals
Honorable Ross Buchanan---2306 Empire Rd SW
Ohio House of
Representative-1923-1927
Helped break the Japanese code to end WW II.
Honorable
John H. Tripp
John was born July 6, 1820 on his father’s farm which is now
Hustonville, Pennsylvania. Due to financial hardship the family moved
from Pennsylvania to what is now Carroll County, Ohio. Having attended
some of the finest schools in Cannonsburg, Pennsylvania when Mr. Tripp
was sent to the district school. The teacher, Richard Dandy, felt John
was at the teacher level, not a student and sent him home. There John
learned orthography, reading, arithmetic, and penmanship from his father
for four years. At night he would read what books he could find, such as
Rollin’s Ancient History and Hallam’s Middle Ages. When he
turned 18 in the fall of 1838 he attended the select school of Prof.
John P. Grewell near Hanover in Columbiana County. (Prof. Grewell became
a physician and literary gentleman in Oskaloosa, Iowa.) After three
years, John Tripp returned home and began reading law in the office of
Gen. E. R. Eckley. During
the winter of 1841 - 42 Mr. Tripp taught at North Union School where
most of the full grown young men of the township attended.
In
1843, he was appointed by the Supreme Court, at Steubenville, to
practice law. He partnered
with Gen. Eckley who was then State Senator. In 1845 he was elected
prosecuting attorney and served two terms. Five years later he was
elected Representative to the State Legislature. He ran for Probate
Judge in 1851 but was beaten by A. W. Morrison. He ran against Judge
Morrison in 1854 and won by several hundred votes. He was re-elected to
the position in 1857.
During this time, in 1853, Mr. Tripp and William McCoy purchased
the Free Press. They ran the paper until they sold to Jacob
Weyand in 1857.
Mr.
Tripp retired in 1861 and went into the law practice with B. F. Potts.
When Mr. Potts joined the Union forces during the Civil War Mr. Tripp
stayed to run the office. He was appointed, unbeknownst to him, by Gov.
Tod as draft-master for the county. When the appointment came he did his
job and drafted men from each township. He took about one hundred men to
Camp Mansfield and another 25 to various other locations.
Upon his return Gov. Tod wanted Mr. Tripp to accept a
lieutenant’s commission to which Mr. Tripp declined claiming his
inflammatory rheumatism would prevent him of being of proper service.
His four brothers did however join.
He continued in the law practice with various partners and in
1881 purchased from S. J. Cameron the other half interest in the Free
Press. He spent two days
a week helping with the editing of the paper until his death.