“At the age of twelve Dio was as large and mature as ordinary boys of fifteen. His mind was remarkably active; so were his movements. He could do anything he desired to do with more rapidity than any person I ever knew. When accustomed to committing to memory he could read a page in a book once, close the book, and repeat it all. He had an investigating, inquisitive mind. He liked miscellaneous reading, but did not relish digging into study. He learned a great many facts, but did not read many books thoroughly. He was enthusiastic in everything in which he engaged. He developed as a child a talent for declaiming, even before he could read much, and as a youth he engaged in debates and talked on temperance.... He was cheerful and full of fun.... At the age of twelve Dio left school and went into a cotton factory in Clarksville, near Auburn, where he remained perhaps six months, working some sixteen hours a day and receiving from $1.25 to $2.50 a week in orders on stores in Auburn. After this he worked in Wadsworth’s hoe, axe, and scythe factory for about two years, attending school at intervals.... “At about the age of fifteen he began teaching school in our district. He surprised the patrons with novel ways of teaching and managing the school. Heretofore the masters had moved around the room with ferule in hand, always ready to deal a blow as occasion might offer. The young teacher discarded the whip and went to singing, and for a change he would march with the children into a piece of woods near the schoolhouse, and sometimes, after the children got tired, he would allow them to play hide-and-seek. Dio continued teaching near home for a year or two, and when eighteen years of age he went to what was then Lower Sandusky, now Fremont, Ohio, and organized a select school. Here he began the study of Latin and Greek, and the classes which he soon formed in them, as well as in algebra and geometry, kept him hard at work with his own studies in order to keep well ahead of his pupils. The school was patronized by most of the leading citizens, and gave so great satisfaction that in a few months some of them volunteered to erect a handsome school building. They obtained an act of incorporation, naming it, in compliment to Mr. Lewis, ‘The Dioclesian Institute,’ and the new quarters were occupied just before the close of the school year.”