General Notes

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After Armstrong's siblings moved to Linn County, Iowa, he remained in Belmont County, Ohio .  Although he did own land in neighboring Wayne Township in Monroe County.  Armstrong married Lavinia and they lived on the old Varner homestead at Somerset.  Armstrong ran a planning mill on the bottom of Flag Run. He built a "mill race" for water to run downhill from the spr ing to the creek.  The race was lined with flagstone on the top, bottom and both sides, then covered with soil.  The site of the mill had been an Indian campground where Indians came every fall to skin animals, dry the skins, and make jerky and Pemmican for the winter.  There was also a salt lick nearby.  The Varners let the Indians come in peace.  They would exchange ideas about planting corn and other good farming ideas.

After Armstrong's death, his bachelor sons, Howard and Clel, and their spinster sister Ruth , lived there in the original home until their deaths.  They made a colorful trio.  Howard and Clel Varner were very stern old men who wore "old-time Quaker hats," though they belonged  o the Church of Christ.  Children were afraid of the brothers who kept unwanted visitors out by threatening to shoot anyone who intruded on their property.  Old Clel was so tight, he drove a 1912 car for eighteen years then sold it for fifteen dollars.