5. Harry David Lollar - 1885-1963
Ruby Miller Lollar - 1894-1970

6. Robert Miller Lollar - 1915-1997
Dorothy Williams Lollar -1916-1990

7. Katherine Lollar Rowland - 1918-
Elden Rowland -1915-1982

The two farms that are central to our story are not the only land the six generations ever owned but they are surely the ones that most influenced their lives. The farms never had formal names, as such, but for purposes of our story will be designated as “David’s Land” and “The Ridge”:

But that is only the beginning, the nucleus of an ever-widening circle of inter-connectedness of people and places which was vital to their welfare. And before the story can really begin, by way of preface, it is necessary to try to understand who these first ancestors were, where they came from, and why they traveled those unknown miles from New Jersey to Ohio.

At this time, in August, in the year 2001-2002, all that is known about the origins of the Lollar family is that records show that David was born December 15,1767, in Queen Anne’s, Maryland, and that he was married December 15,1792, to Phoebe Dunham, in Westfield, Essex (Union) County, New Jersey.

Much more is known about Phoebe’s origins. She was born November 19, 1770, in Westfield, New Jersey, the daughter of Hannah Conger and Joseph Dunham. The Dunhams can be traced back through generations of the Cranes, and Thornhills and Bloomfields, some even say, “back to Mayflower stock 1626.” It is not the purpose of this story at this point to try to explain the intricate mysteries of the Dunham origins, more about that, an interesting story in itself, in another chapter.

Phoebe Dunham and David Lollar did not come to Ohio by themselves. They came in what might almost be considered a mass exodus from New Jersey between 1795 and 1800. Comparative peace had been achieved with the Indians in the Northwest Territory being opened for settlement around 1790 but owing to a dispute about the terms of some of their treaties, they became hostile and remained in a state of war up to their defeat by General Anthony Wayne in August, 1794; and the treaty of Greenville, July 30, 1795, brought an end to Indian trouble in Ohio.

The Dunhams and the families with whom they had intermarried made up a large segment of the group that came from New Jersey, most of them acquiring acreage to the south and east of Lebanon.

Names prominent in those farming groups within the next quarter century, and for years to come, included: Banta, Brandenburg, Dill, Drake, Fordyce, Frazee, Gallaher, Hatfield, Hathaway, Hunt, Jack, Keever, McChristy (McCristy), Monfort, Newport, Nixon, Robertson, Trimble (Tremble), as well as Dunham and Lollar (Loller, Lawler). Many of these names are still well-known in Warren County today.

They, and others, all melded into a large, extended family through being related by blood or by marriage, or by being neighbors in New Jersey or Ohio. Especially after they arrived in wild Ohio this interconnectedness was very important and delving into the records of the land they purchased gives a hint of those to whom they were closest.

Fortunately, in these years of the new millennium, Warren County court house contains records of the land between the Miamis from September 30,1794, when GEORGE WASHINGTON sold 248,540 acres (Entire Mil. Range), by U.S. Patent for consideration of $615,693.42 to JOHN CLEVES SYMMES, judge of the New Jersey Supreme Court and member of the Continental Congress, who had become an enthusiastic land developer. Thereby Washington opened Section 34, Township 5, East, Range 3, called “exceptionally beautiful farm land” to development and settlement. This is what is now Turtle Creek Township, Warren County.

On October 30, 1794, Symmes sold 87,345-1/2 acres (Entire Range) to JONATHAN DAYTON, by warranty deed for $42,897.

On May 14, 1795, Dayton sold 640 acres (whole section) to BENJ. STlTES JR., by warranty deed.

On October 14, 1800, Stites sold DAVID LOLLER 100 acres by warranty deed for $100. This was the land on which David and Phoebe established their home.

However, that homestead on Bee Run was not the first land David and Phoebe owned in Ohio. On December 7, 1797, they purchased from John Stites Gano Esquire (who now enters the story as a third land developer from New Jersey) the entire 40 acres of Lot #10 in the “plan of forty-acre lots adjacent to the town of Deerfield (now South Lebanon) on the Little Miami” in what was then called Hamilton County, although the State of Ohio would not be formally organized for another five years. This was designated Section 2, Township 4, East, Range 3, now Union Township.

On November 12, 1800, they sold the 40 acres adjoining Deerfield to James Armstrong and Samuel Armstrong. Selling price was $200, double the amount David had paid for it just three years before. This probably means that a cabin had been built on the land and that David and Phoebe’s first residence in Ohio was on that 40 acres. Their first three children that survived - Elizabeth, Moses and Nancy - were probably born there.

The sale of the 40 acres was “signed, Sealed and acknowledged in the presence of John S. Gano and Benjamin Stites” and states that “the said David hath hereunto set his hand and seal at Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Territory of the United States, west of the River Ohio, the day and year above written together with Phoebe his wife.” Recorded by Ignatius Brown 22 June, 1807. (Although the sale was dated November 1800 it was not recorded until 1807; probably at that time to settle David’s estate - because David Lollar died April 4, 1807).

As influential as land developers may have been in David and Phoebe Lollar’s coming to Ohio, her family, the Dunhams, undoubtedly were more involved. Before David’s Phoebe, there was another PHOEBE DUNHAM, the first of a long list of Phoebes in that family.

The earlier Phoebe was born April 17, 1755 and married JACOB TRIMBLE, a Revolutionary War veteran, on July 2, 1775, at the home of her brother, Elisha, in Essex County, New Jersey. In 1795 they moved to Hamilton County, Ohio, the part that became Warren County. It is believed that this earlier Phoebe was the aunt of David’s Phoebe, and the Trimbles were undoubtedly a close and vital part of the young Lollar family in years to come.

In fact, Jacob Trimble was Administrator of David’s estate. In a packet of yellowed bits of paper in the Archives of the Warren County Court House are numerous receipts given Jacob Trimble for money paid out for the support of David’s children ranging from 1807 up into 1811. Another slip of paper in that packet reads:

“I Promise to pay to Aaron Trembles on order the sum of Eleven Dollars and fifty five Cents five months after date for value received. Witness my hand this twenty-fifth day of one thousand and eight hundred 1800” signed David Lollar (in what is believed to be the only extant signature in his own handwriting). Aaron Trimble was Jacob’s brother.

A quotation by Linda Tremble Schwartz on the Internet on April 8, 2001, from Journey through the Past, Curryer Genealogy and Family History, says: “Jacob Trimble, and his wife, Phoebe Dunham Trimble, together with their ten children as well as Phoebe Dunham’s sister’s family, moved to Ohio from New Jersey in the autumn of 1795. They traveled part of the way in a flat boat down the Ohio, wintered in Fort Washington (now Cincinnati), and the following spring purchased a tract of land in the dense woods of what later became Turtle Creek Township in Warren County, Ohio. They found themselves surrounded by Indians and wild beasts, and were without mills, stores, or other conveniences.”

On October 24, 1800, nineteen days before David and Phoebe sold the 40 acres adjacent to Deerfield, an indenture was written transferring their 100 acre homestead to them by Benjamin Stites. This land is on what is now Cook Road, just outside of Lebanon, and, after two hundred years as productive farmland, it is now being made into a residential development called Catalpa Ridge.

Vital statistic records in the Warren County court house are not as specific and reliable as the land records. But it seems definite that David and Phoebe had nine children, at least one of them born in New Jersey, the second possibly born on the trip to Ohio. These two died in infancy. Children’s name and their dates of birth and death follow:

NANCY- b August 20, 1793, in Westfield, New Jersey, d February 17,1796 JONATHAN - b January 9,1795, d March 22,1795

ELIZABETH - b February 28,1796 in Warren County, Ohio, d October 1864 MOSES - b November 12,1797 in Warren County, d 1852, in Warren County, Ohio

NANCY - b March 20,1799, in Warren County, d in Mercer County, Ohio JOSEPH - b October 18,1800 in Warren County, d December 19,1869, in Randolph County, Indiana

ELISHA D, - b May 28,1802 in Warren County, d August 5,1865 in Champaign County, Ohio

POLLY - b June 28, 1804 in Warren County, d September 6,1882 in Warren County

PHOEBE - b July 13,1806 in Warren County, d May 24,1850 in Warren County

Notes: There are two girls named Nancy: it was the custom in those times to name a second child after one that was lost at an early age. Moses, first in the line of six generations listed on page 1, was the first to take over the homestead after the death of the parents. Elisha D., who became a doctor in Mechanicsville, Ohio, used the spelling of Lawler. Some records show the birthplace of the last child, Phoebe, as Salem Township, perhaps meaning David and Phoebe had gone to be with Phoebe’s brother Joseph Dunham; baby Phoebe was but nine months old when her father died at age 40, just twelve years after arriving in Ohio.

Perhaps Joseph Dunham was the most helpful influence in the young Lollar family’s life. Joseph was Phoebe’s “big brother,” oldest of her seven siblings, four years older than she. The Dunhams had land about two and a half miles away from David and Phoebe in the western edge of Salem Township, in the direction of the Millgrove Community on the western bank of the Little Miami River, an important link in transportation at that time. In three large, heavy Millgrove Ledgers kept in the vault of the Warren County Historical Society there are numerous records of purchases made by Joseph Dunham in 1819 for items such as 100 pounds of flour, a quire of paper, an ink stand.

About Millgrove, Beers History of Warren County says: It contained a grist and sawmill, a dry goods store, and a paper mill - the latter giving employment to a number of hands. For many years, a thriving village, but after the construction of the Miami Canal, about 1845, the manufacture of paper was discontinued, because the river mills were not able to compete with the mills along the canal. The post office was discontinued in 1845. All that remains now is a bridge over a narrow spot in the Little Miami River, indicating that same spot was the site of the ferry when Millgrove was a thriving community.

After the death of David Lollar, it was a legal requirement that guardians be appointed for his children. The two guardians appointed in May 1807 were Phoebe Lollar and Joseph Dunham. That guardianship was in effect until April 21, 1823, when a handwritten document was attested by all of the children and their spouses says that

“We the undersigned children and heirs of David Lollar dec’d do hereby certify and make known that we have settled with Joseph Dunham and Phoebe Lollar who were appointed our guardians and that said Joseph & Phoebe have paid over to us the full amount of the personal estate of said deceased that was coming to each of us as the children and heirs of said David Lollar, dec’d for which we have likewise given our receipt. And also that we are fully satisfied with the conduct and management of our said guardians and hereby as fully as in our power release them from all further accountability to us.”

By the time of this settlement the youngest child, Phoebe, was 17 years old and in less than a year would be married to a neighbor, Thomas Hunter. And the first Phoebe Dunham Lollar, after being David’s widow for six years, would already have been married for ten years to Charles McChristy, another neighbor.

Another family that were surely closely connected to David and Phoebe Lollar were the Drakes, in particular, Peter Drake, and his wife Rebecca. There is indication that a Drake married a Dunham back in New Jersey and this will be explored further in the chapter on the Drakes. Over the years there were many Peter Drakes. The one we are most concerned with is the one who purchased lots 16, 17, 18 and half of Lot 1 in Deerfield, when David bought “entire Lot 10.” This Peter was born in New Jersey around 1750, making him just old enough to be a mentor to David, and a more financially secure one. Real estate records show that he later bought tracts in what became Turtle Creek township not too far distant from where David bought his 100 acres on Bee Run. Peter died in 1808 “while erecting a house.” This first Peter’s grandson (another Peter Drake) married David’s granddaughter Mary Ann (daughter of David’s first son Moses) in 1831.