“The agreement was that Newcom should pay Edgar six shillings (seventy-five cents) per day for cutting and hewing the logs for the ‘best house in Dayton,’ to front on Main and Water Streets, and Edgar for his board agreed to furnish Newcom the carcass of a deer once every week, retaining the skin. This was full payment for his board and lodging. In order to comply with this part of his contract without breaking a day’s work, my father would rise early, hide in the bushes on this side of the river at Main Street, and watch for the deer to come down to the river on the north side for their morning drink, when, choosing the best-looking one, he never failed to drop him. He would then, with his canoe, bring his week’s board across the river before breakfast....” [Illustration: Main room of Newcom Tavern contains long table at which early travelers were served. Utensils in the fireplace include a griddle, pots of various types and, visible at lower left, a bread toaster that could be moved up to the hot coals by a long handle. Board at right of the fireplace holds rifle, powder horn and bullet mold. Items in the Tavern are appropriate to Dayton’s earliest years, although not all of them were actually used by the Newcom family. Fireplace facing was rebuilt with original stones, which probably came from Miami River bed.] [Illustration: View of the Tavern on its downtown site, from across the Miami River. Steele high school is at right, Memorial Hall at left. Picture was taken sometime between 1910 and 1918, because Memorial Hall was built in 1910 and the Engineer’s Club, built in 1918 on the southeast corner of Monument and Jefferson, is not yet in evidence.] Elsewhere in his book, Edgar tells us that Newcom was born in Ireland in 1771, and came to America with his parents in 1775. The family first settled in Delaware, then moved to the vicinity of Middletown, Pa. In 1794, Newcom and his wife, the former Mary Henderson, migrated to Cincinnati—and thence to Dayton. Of their arduous northward journey, historian Edgar wrote: