Page 16 - An Early History of Paw Paw Township-Final-R

History of Paw Paw Township, Michigan - Part 2

From: History of Berrien and Van Buren Counties, Michigan
With Illistrations and Biographical Sketches
of Their Men and Pioneers.
D. W. Ensign & Co., Philadelphia 1880
Press of J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia.

PAW PAW VILLAGE

The first settlement in the present township of Paw Paw was made upon the
site of Paw Paw village in the year 1832, when Rodney Hinckley located upon
a farm in the northern portion of the present village. In that year, also, Pierce
Barber, of Prairie Ronde, began the erection of a saw-mill on the river at the
west end of the village. Mr. Barber soon sold his interest in the mill to Job
Davis and Rodney Hinckley, who, however, soon disposed of it (in 1833) to
Peter Gremps and Lyman J. Daniels.

THE PEOPLE

These gentlemen came hither on a prospecting tour in that year, bought the
mill property, improved it, purchased considerable land in the vicinity, and
laid out upon it a village which they called Paw Paw. Daniels lived in
Schoolcraft, and at no time became a settler in Paw Paw. Gremps, who came
from the Mohawk Valley, in New York, to find a mill site in the West, returned
to his home after purchasing the Paw Paw property, and did not settle
permanently on his new possessions until 1835, when he moved into a cabin
just west of the saw mill. Edward Shults, Mr. Gremps' nephew, came out from
New York with his uncle, and worked for the latter in his saw mill.

While Mr. Gremps was absent in the East, his partner, Mr. Daniels, was busy
looking after the saw mill and devising means to further the interests of the
new village. He thought there ought to be a tavern, especially as the Territorial
road was likely to pass through Paw Paw, and so one day in 1834, on meeting
in Schooleraft Daniel O. Dodge, who had been teaching school in those parts,
he offered to give him an entire block in Paw Paw, and build a board house for
him, if he would come on and keep tavern in it. Dodge agreed, and in the
same year opened an inn, which became one of the most famous in this part
of the State. Meanwhile, Enos L. Barrett had located land north of the village,
but lived in a board shanty on one of Gremps' village lots. David Thorp was

- 14 -