From the Files of the Kosciusko County Historical Society

Editor’s note: This is a retrospective article that runs a few times a month on InkFreeNews.

Information for this retrospective series is courtesy of the Kosciusko County Historical Society.

1895 — Revra DePuy founded the DePuy Manufacturing company, makers of fracture appliances, in 1895.

The first plant was at the corner of Columbia and Center streets in Warsaw.

DePuy pioneered the metal splint industry by introducing wire splints, which were a vast improvement over the old barrel-stave type of wood splint used previously.

At the start of the business, the plant employed only five or six employees.

1885 — Three famous authors lived in or near Warsaw in their youth.

Theodore Dreiser, author of “An American Tragedy,” lived in Warsaw for four years, from 1885 to 1889. His family moved here when he was 14 and he attended school at West Ward, living across the street from the school, and at Warsaw High School.

Dreiser returned to Warsaw for a visit in the early 1900s, finding that most of his friends were no longer here.

He died Dec. 28, 1945, seven years before “A Place in the Sun,” based on his novel “An American Tragedy,” won an Academy Award.

His brother, Paul Dreiser, was a famous songwriter; one of his compositions was the Indiana state song, “On the Banks of the Wabash.”

James Whitcomb Riley, who was later to become the noted “Hoosier Poet,” spent his youth as an itinerate sign painter and lived in Warsaw at several different times.

Years later as president of the Midwest Writers’ conference, which met in the old Winona Hotel, and as a chautauqua lecturer in the auditorium, he made frequent visits to Winona Lake.

Riley was born in Greenfield Oct. 7, 1849, and died in Indianapolis July 23, 1916. He is buried in Crown Hill Cemetery, Indianapolis.

Ambrose Bierce, once described as “America’s one genuine wit,” lived for some time with his brother, Gus, on a farm southwest of Eagle Lake near Warsaw.

At the age of 17, he worked as a “printer’s devil” on the old Northern Indianian, Warsaw’s early newspaper, living with the editor and his wife.

Falsely accused of theft, Bierce left Warsaw and never returned.

He later fought in the Civil War and attained fame as a journalist and writer of short stories, using a style similar to that of Mark Twain.

In 1916, he left his post as editor of the San Francisco Chronicle and went to Mexico, where he disappeared.

1858 — It appears that about the time of the Civil War, or possibly a little later, a county library was established in Warsaw. Just where this was located is not known; however, after 1858, Warsaw had a good three-story brick schoolhouse at the southwest corner of Market and Detroit streets, and it is quite likely that the first library open to all the public was started here by 1885.

After the Civil War, Capt. John N. Runyan started a reading room in the second story of the Phoenix Block in January 1867.

A school flourished from 1851-1876, known as Mrs. Cowan’s Seminary, and it included one of the best small libraries in town on South Detroit Street near South Street.

Jane Cowan was one of the leading educators of the community for 25 years and was held in the highest esteem. She died in 1876.

– Compiled by InkFreeNews reporter Lasca Randels