Remember When: Everything seems to have come up (Forest) Roses!
Believe it or not, flour, beer, a floral company, a fur company, a termite control company, a book, a school building, a street, and a cemetery are just a few of the companies, locations, and items that were or are now named “Forest Rose.” Readers of my generation and older are smiling because they know why. Younger local readers may remember “meeting” Forest Rose in a local history class. However, many living in Lancaster today, do not know why, or have not even asked why, there is a Forest Rose cemetery, avenue, and school. If they have noticed, they brush it off as a “coincidence.” It is more than a coincidence. It is a saga filled with mysteries yet unsolved, and first shared in a story that was printed as a pamphlet in 1848, 175 years ago.
Hervey Scott published “A Complete History of Fairfield County, Ohio” in 1877. In it he retells “A Tragic Story of Mount Pleasant,” a story Gen. George Sanderson had delivered before the Lancaster Literary Association in March 1844. Scott knew Emerson Bennett, an author living in Cincinnati at that time, and sent him a copy of Sanderson’s story, the story that would become the book “Forest Rose.”
Scott wrote in 1877: “Many will remember the thrilling little story of “Forest Rose,” which made its appearance in the county something over twenty years ago, in pamphlet form…Perhaps no novel, or romance, of its class, ever attracted more attention, or was more widely circulated. It is still in the market, and new editions are being called for. The Mount Pleasant scouts and the rescue at the Cold Spring was the text of Forest Rose. It was written by Emerson Bennett.” Thomas H. Smith wrote about 100 years later in the introduction of the 1973 edition of “The Forest Rose,” (p. XXXII, Ohio University Press): “For nearly 25 years Bennett was one of the foremost romantic adventure writers in the U.S.”
Bennett’s story written in 1848 was titled “The Forest Rose: A Tale of the Frontier,” and was first published as installments in “The Columbian and Great West” newspaper before it was printed as a book in 1850. Bennett (1822-1905) then wrote a preface dated Sept. 1, 1852 to a revised edition of the book in which he stated: “…all the improbabilities you may meet in ‘Forest Rose,’ are facts—facts handed down by tradition, and now recorded in historical collections of the time and places referred to.”
By 1920 this announcement appeared (31 Jan. 1920 Daily Eagle, p.2): “A revised edition of Forest Rose, the most complete ever published and containing a biography of the author…has been placed on the market by H. E. Gillespie, bookseller on W. Main St…has more than tripled the sales of any book in the past 50 years in Fairfield County…and is based on historic facts, coupled with love, romance and adventure.”
The book’s popularity was influenced by a poem and a motion picture. The poem “Forest Rose,” was written and published in 1902 by John Alfred Jacobs (1838-1915) of Carroll, Ohio. Lancaster’s Exhibit Theatre opened in 1908 at 150 E. Main St. in what is today Art & Clay. George Law purchased the theatre early in 1910, and installed a “mammoth glass mirror screen” that measured 10 X 13 feet and cost nearly $1,000 to install (11 June 1912, Daily Eagle). This may have been the reason Law secured the first release of the film for Lancaster, OH to show on Nov. 29, 1912.
The Thanhouser Co. sent this response to George Law: “We have your esteemed letter of July 20th. We intend to produce “The Forest Rose,” very shortly, and are pleased that you are interested in the subject. Thanking you sincerely for your expression about our company…Thanhouser Co., Edwin Thanhouser, Pres. The film was made in Cauddebackville, NY. “Great Crush” was the headline in the Daily Eagle on Nov. 30, 1912. “The Forest Rose…broke all previous records, hundreds crowding into the place to see this thrilling, realistic reproduction of the famous battle of Albert Maywood and Lewis Wetzel on Mt. Pleasant and the rescue of Rose Forester from the Huron Indian’s camp at the foot of Standing Stone…the jam was so great that at times the street was blocked…2641 paid admissions at the doors and there was a continuous performance from 1:30 o’clock in the afternoon until 11 o’clock at night.” (Visit Thanhouser Company Film Preservation, Inc. for more movie information and reviews: https://www.thanhouser.org )
If that was not enough publicity, in 1948 (100 years after Forest Rose was printed) the headline was “Forest Rose Lives Again in Lancaster.” This was a serialized radio program, with dramatized episodes as a presentation of “The Ohio Story,” Ohio Bell Telephone Co.’s “three-a-week” on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday radio offering. It was broadcast from the Lancaster High School auditorium.
Thanks to the Lancaster Business and Professional Women’s Club of Lancaster, copies are “still in the market.” In 1959 this organization re-published the book and have kept right on re-publishing as needed. If you are inspired to re-read, or read Forest Rose for the first time, it is available for purchase or can be borrowed from the public library.
Readers may contact Harvey at joycelancastereg@gmail.com
This article originally appeared on Lancaster Eagle-Gazette: Remember When: Everything seems to have come up (Forest) Roses!
