A Very Short History of the Deep River Church

I came across this article in the May 14, 1975 issue of the Hobart Gazette about the Christian Church of Deep River, whose original building is now the Deep River County Park visitors' center.


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It's interesting that the old-timers of 1975 did not remember Contractor Abel, unless he was one of the volunteers mentioned. But I believe he and his family belonged to the German Lutheran Church in Hobart, so it isn't likely that he was volunteering his services to the Deep River church.

The article does me a favor by explaining the "Willing Workers," as I was unclear about its origin. I have seen that ladies' aid society mentioned numerous times in the early 20th-century newspapers (for example, a 1922 social column previously posted announced their fund-raising sale and supper). The earliest such mention I can find in my notes was in June 1906,[1] so I guess the 1975 old-timers' memories were off by just one year. Which is remarkably good.

I only wish the article were clearer about the location of the dance hall! [6/24/2026 update parsonage/dance hall identified]


The photo of the Sunday School class includes some familiar names as well as some I have scarcely looked into.

Mrs. Flora Maxwell, presumably the Sunday-School teacher, had been born into an old Ross Township family, the Sturtevants, and had married Douglas Maxwell. Thus Olive Maxwell, in the first row, was her stepdaughter.

We already know of Philip Waldeck and his untimely death. Through his mother, he was a cousin of Clarence Maybaum ("Maybawm" is a mistake).

George Casbon, born in 1897, was a child of Thomas and Ella Casbon[2] and lived in a brick house on the north side of what is now 73rd Avenue (later owned by the Buchfuehrers).

Raymond Wood was the son of William and Martha Wood, and a great-grandson of John and Hannah, who founded the village of Deep River. The "Ford agency in town" mentioned in the article was run by William and Raymond.

Floyd Yager was born in 1897 to George and Anna. The extended Yager clan has already furnished considerable material for this blog, from Floyd's eccentric uncle, Fred, to his elegant brother, George Jr., but Floyd himself seems to have led a pretty quiet life. His family's farmhouse on 73rd Avenue is still standing.

Now we get to the less familiar names.

I believe that George Sandburg's father, John, bought Huffman's mill in 1903, and his mother, Lucy, had been a Baker.[3] George remained a Porter County resident through the 1940 Census, but by 1950 had moved with his wife to Tennessee, where he is buried.

Thus far I have indexed the surname Ditlow only in connection with "South of Deepriver" social columns (1921 and 1922). Raymond and Cecil Ditlow were brothers, born into a Union Township farming family. This 1942 article about their parents' 50th wedding anniversary gives a little of the family history …


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"Mr. and Mrs. Abe Ditlow Celebrate Golden Wedding," Vidette-Messenger (Valparaiso, Ind.), 21 Sept. 1942.

.. as does their father's 1947 obituary:


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Vidette-Messenger (Valparaiso, Ind.), 17 Mar. 1947.

Raymond and Cecil are both buried in Mosier Cemetery.

As for the surname Riley, I have found it several times in my notes, in connection with minor social news, and once it got into the blog, but I am confused about the relation of the various Rileys to one another, if any. The Riley in this photo, Marion, was the daughter of Edwin Stanton[4] and Rose (Miller) Riley and was born in 1897. In 1917 she married Reid Peck and lived out the rest of her life in Valparaiso. She, too, is buried in Mosier Cemetery.

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[1] "Thursday, June 21st, from two to four o'clock, there will be a ten-cent Tea served by Mrs. B.H. Wood at Deepriver and by other members of the Willing Workers society on Mrs. W.M. Waldeck's lawn. Everybody invited. Mrs. Casbon, President." "General News Items," Hobart Gazette, 15 June 1906.
[2] Per his entry on Findagrave.com, his middle name was Perry — the maiden name of his grandmother.
[3] The surname appears as both "Sandburg" and "Sandberg." Since George himself used "Sandberg" when he signed his WWI draft card, I will be indexing it that way.
[4] He seems to be variously referred to as "E.S.," "Edwin S.," and "Stanton," which contributes to my confusion.

Huffman's Mill

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Notes on the back of this photo suggest it was taken on October 8, 1938.
Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

Until a few weeks ago I had no idea that the site of another historic mill lay only about a mile beyond Wood's Mill. One Saturday at the Hobart Historical Society museum, someone came across the photo shown above, with "Huffman's Mill" scrawled across it, and none of us knew anything about Huffman's Mill. So of course I asked Eldon Harms if he knew where it had been. Not only did he know, but he was able to direct me to the spot where it had stood, as we drove out there together.

Its site was just over the Porter County line on N 750 W, a scant half-mile south of Route 30. The mill had stood on the east side of the road, on the north side of Taylor Creek — which, these days, is a barely perceptible rivulet, marked by no sign, and in fact I had some trouble even learning its name. (Another local historian theorizes that the conversion of surrounding land from wilderness to farmland caused the creek to silt up.) Anyway, it wasn't the creek's direct flow that powered the mill; the creek was dammed to form a mill pond.

Below, I have tried to identify the mill (and mill pond, but that is really dubious) on a 1939 aerial photo:


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Image courtesy of the Indiana Geological Survey, I.U. Bloomington.

For decades before either of these photos were taken, this site had housed a mill operation.

The August 18, 1936 issue of the Valparaiso Vidette-Messenger, a special edition in honor of Porter County's centennial, included a history of Union Township compiled by Wheeler High School history students and instructors (transcribed here) stating that in 1861 David Hardesty built the Cascade Mills on this site.

Written in 1882, Porter and Lake Counties (Goodspeed/Blanchard) had this to say about it:

The Cascade Grist-Mills were built by David Hardesty, on Taylor Creek. They were built about fourteen years ago [i.e., 1868], on to a small brick mill which was constructed by him eighteen or nineteen years ago [i.e., 1864 or 1863]. The structure is some 18x40 feet, and two stories high. He put in two sets of buhrs, and, at that time, had the only overshot wheel in the county.

Consulting some of the old Union Township plat maps, we find the mill marked.

For example, here it is in 1876 (and you can see a drawing of the mill circa 1876 here):


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From http://www.inportercounty.org/Data/Maps/UnionTownshipMaps.html, courtesy of Steven R. Shook.

The mill is marked on the 1895, 1906 and 1921 maps as well. On the 1938 map, the mill itself is not marked, but the "Huffman Mill Pond" is:


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From http://www.inportercounty.org/Data/Maps/UnionTownshipMaps.html, courtesy of Steven R. Shook.

The next available map, from 1969, does not show mill or mill pond. The mill building still stood, but it wasn't operating as such. This clipping, from the Hobart Herald of January 50, 1955, shows the building being used for storage:


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

The remark about Levi Huffman dying of his injuries in 1900 is probably based on oral history. Here is Levi's obituary from the Hobart Gazette of January 9, 1903:


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He was buried in Mosier Cemetery.


Six photographs of the abandoned mill building were shot in 1981 by Daniel Kleine, who was kind enough to give me high-resolution scans of his photos.


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All photographs by Daniel Kleine. Used with permission.

I don't know when the mill was demolished. Today there is no trace of it.


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Photograph by Ansel Adams.
… Just kidding. Photograph by me.

Lillie and Alice

Today, just two grave markers, for two of the flu victims we read about yesterday.

In Hobart Cemetery, Lillie Rose Scholler's grave:


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Not only do I not know, I do not even have any far-fetched theory as to why the year of her death is wrong.

She lies next to her parents …



… not her husband. Calvin, as we now know, went on to marry again.


Lillie Rose at the age of 18, from the Hobart High School Aurora yearbook for 1909. Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

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In the quiet little Woodvale Cemetery, Alice Baker Shoup's grave:



She, too, lies next to her parents. I do not know if her husband remarried.

Her obituaries tell a little about her family. She was George and Harriet Baker's daughter, and thus William's sister. Her other siblings were George Jr., Robert (listed as John R. in the 1900 Census), Mrs. Thomas Keene, Mrs. Schuyler Hardesty, Mrs. John Sandberg and Ada Baker. The 1900 Census gives the three married sisters' first names as Lizzie, Alice and Susan, but I don't know which became which "Mrs."