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Sadie Jackson Gierhart was born on November 11, 1883 in Montgomery Township of Ashland County, two to three miles east of Ashland, near the Middle Rowsburg Road.
Sadie Jackson Gierhart attended school at what was then called Roseberry School, later renamed Addisonian Hill, in Montgomery Township. Among her teachers were Mr. McAdoo and Charlie Chapman, who both later became judges, and Harry Hess who later worked in the Farmer’s Bank in Ashland.
Sadie graduated after the eighth grade and went to work in the advertising office of Hess and Clark.
Working with her in the advertising office of Hess and Clark were Gertie Plank, the Schultz girls, the Wilson girls, and Blanche Exbenshade. Sadie earned $2.50 a week and worked from eight until six Monday through Friday and from eight until five on Saturday: “We were tickled to death when Saturday came to go home at five.”
She lived with her sisters on Cleveland Avenue (near #310). She remembered that they first paved Cleveland Avenue while she and her sisters lived there. They also at this time paved over the cobblestones of Main Street.
The day the Opera House burned she and her fellow workers at Hess and Clark went down to watch the fire.
Sadie remembered a “big hole in the ground” when they started to build the Home Company Building.
Sadie has lived in her house at 513 East Main Street since 1913. When she and her (first) husband moved there, the street out that way was not paved yet.
They bought the land from Francis Holbrook. It was then farmland. A vacant cornfield stood where the Armory stands today. Jonas Freer’s folks lived in a big house down on the corner of East Main and Holbrook where Osborn School is today.
Sadie remembered the Hemmingway Hotel: “Someone took us from school to eat at the Hemmingway Hotel. It was the first time we ate away from home.”
Sadie bought groceries from Wes Landis, Harry Leman, Curt Moore on West Main, and from Hal Heltman whose store was on the northwest corner of East Main and Union Streets.
Sadie remembered going to Fred Bockley’s movie house on West Main. Here she paid a nickel to watch a silent movie.
Sadie has always been a Lutheran. She remembered Rev. And Mrs. Smith and their daughters Sarah and Dorothy.
Sadie bought clothes and material at Kunkle and Good’s dry goods establishment on Main Street across from Center Street. This store was operated by her Uncle Chris Kunkle.
Shinn’s also had a dry goods store up near the Mecca Pool Room on the corner of Church Street. And Bowman’s had a dry goods store in the southeast part of Main Street.
Sadie remembered buying her first coat at Kunkle and Good’s. The coat cost seven dollars. All her other coats had been hand-me-downs. She was very proud of this coat which she bought herself while working in the office at Hess and Clark.
Sadie was married in the Lutheran parsonage on Cottage Street.
Ed Swinegin worked for Hal Heltman. “If I would sing for Mr. Heltman, he’d give me candy. Mr. Heltman would pick me up and set me on the counter and want me to sing for him and I thought that was fun. He was a nice man.”
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