Our Ice Folk who dropped their stone axes in
the river banks may have passed away with the Ice Age, or they
may have remained in Ohio, and begun slowly to take on some
faint likeness of civilization. There is nothing to prove that
they stayed; but Ohio must always have been a pleasant place to
live in after the great thaw, and it seems reasonable that the
Ice Folk lingered, in part at least, and changed with the
changing climate, and became at last the people who left the
signs of their presence in almost every part of the state."
(footnote Howell's History of Ohio.)
The great masterpiece of the Mound Builders is known as Fort
Ancient. Its colossal size, ingenuity in design and perfection
in construction give it first rack in interest among all
prehistoric fortifications, and it represents the highest point
attained by this lost race in their earth-work structures. Why
make a journey to Europe to see the old forts when we have in
Ohio one so old we have no record of its building? Truly we were
more impressed while rambling over this old fort than we were
when we entered the passages that led through Douamont and
Verdian or stood on the ramparts of Mighty Ehrenbreitstein and
gazed at the wonderful panorama spread out before us.
The works of these ancient people are said to be two or three
thousand years old. Some seem to think they were a race of red
men like those the whites found here.
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