A historical marker, located at 109 W. Bridge St., Rockford, explains John Chapman's local influence.

The reads reads:

Shanesville,

Shanes Crossing.

Rockford

Anthony Shane, a "métis" of French-Ottawa ancestry, began work as an interpreter at Fort Defiance in 1795. In 1814, the U.S. Congress granted him 320 acres of land and he platted his town, Shanesville, south of the St. Mary's River in 1820. Opening a store, Shane traded with the nearby Shawnee Indian reservation and during their forced removal to Kansas in 1833, Shane migrated with them where he remained as an interpreter until his death in 1834. William Hedges, who leased land to John Chapman to establish an apple nursery, began as a clerk in Shane's store and later opened his own establishment. Hedges served Shanesville as Postmaster, Colonel of the Militia, Commissioner, Justice of the Peace, and Associate Judge. Shanesville changed its name to Shane's Crossing (1866) and finally to Rockford (1890).