600 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
so, selfishly snatched the laurel from the brow of Governor Tod on this occasion. But in the light of history it now appears as an exhibition of blind cowardice. The same thing was attempted with Governor Curtin in Pennsylvania, a state of equal importance, under exactly similar circumstances. Curtin, having absolute control of the republican state organization, was able to prevent himself from being robbed of the nomination and was re-elected by a tremendous majority. He was tendered a first-class mission to take him out of the contest, and it is likely that Tod would have been offered some similar inducement had he been a regular republican. As it was, when Chase retired from the cabinet in 1864 President Lincoln tendered to Governor Tod the portfolio of secretary of the treasury, an honor which was promptly declined. Of course Governor Tod, always courteous unless forced to act without consideration, plead broken health and the necessity to give some attention to his personal affairs as an excuse for refusing this appointment; but the first excuse was rather overdrawn and nobody who knew David Tod would for a moment believe that he would permit his private business to interfere with an opportunity to serve his country. There is, however, not the least reason to suppose that Tod held Lincoln accountable, for he knew that Mr. Lincoln was a man of pure motives and felt secure in his friendship. It is probable that he blamed the coterie around the president who, viewing politics from a distance and without any real opportunity to understand the people, preferred to sacrifice any man, no matter how heroic may have been his service, rather than take chances of political defeat that would unavoidably have meant great injury to the Union cause and their own political prospects.
For eight years after his return from Brazil, in 1851, David Tod devoted his energies to the prosecution of business and demonstrated that he was not only a man of broad vision, sound judgment and untiring energy, but also that he was able to inspire in others his own enthusiasm in the development of his community and its natural wealth. During this time he gave much attention to railroad enterprises, coal mining and ironmaking, in all of which he achieved success and helped others to do so. He was unconquerable in his determination when convinced that he was on the right course, and this quality stood him and his community in good stead when he undertook the development of coal mining. It was only through his persistence and his persuasive powers that the boat owners on Lake Erie could be persuaded to test Brier Hill coal and thus establish for that commodity a market which soon made the Mahoning Valley a hive of industry, laying at the same time, in the wealth thus created, the firm foundations of its later industrial greatness.
Soon after his return from the Brazilian mission, he persuaded the directors of the Cleveland & Ma-honing Railroad that it would be suicidal to direct the course of that road in such a way as to pass by the City of Youngstown, as they had proposed during his absence to do because considerable stock had been sold in Poland and Southern Mahoning County. He also urged that work on the project be hastened, and this was done, the road being completed as far as Youngstown in 1856. In 1859 David Tod became president of this road upon the death of Jacob Perkins, and held that office until his death.
In 1859, largely through the efforts of David Tod, the Akron Manufacturing Company was removed to Brier Hill, where it formed the foundation of the Brier Hill Iron & Coal Company, now the Brier Hill Steel Company, and then as now one of the most important industries of the Mahoning Valley. He was connected with many other enterprises, both industrial and financial, and was during the remainder of his life one of the most popular and certainly the most honored citizen of Youngstown.
This brief reference to the achievements of David Tod might be expanded into a volume were all of his activities fully recorded. It sheds some light on his ability and energy, his patriotism and his vision, all exceeding that of most men. It remains to be said that he was personally a man of culture, genial and magnetic, with the power of making and holding friends. He was not a finished orator, but as a public speaker few men could surpass him in the ability to convince and lead. In a physical sense he was a handsome man, not above the average height, but graceful in carriage and dignified in bearing. His open, winning countenance and bright smile, with his piercing black eyes and black hair, made him a notable figure in any gathering. He was a brilliant conversationalist when in the mood, but was also a deep thinker and at the same time inclined to reserve. He made warm friends and kept them, and his sense of justice and right was among his strongest characteristics.
Finally, Governor Tod was a man who loved culture, refinement and the pleasant things of life. In his earlier years he was often accused of extravagant habits, his ideas of the things necessary to personal comfort and the enjoyment of life being somewhat at variance with the simple habits of the people about him. In later life he delighted in lavishing upon his family the luxuries and comforts that appealed to him, and his wife and children were his chief solicitude. He had been also greatly devoted to his parents. His grandson, John Tod, in a modest and altogether admirable sketch of his illustrious ancestor, dwells upon the fact that David Tod paid for the farm occupied by his father and mother, built them a comfortable house and bought them the first stove they ever had. After his business affairs began to prosper he improved the old homestead at Brier Hill until it became a shrine of domestic happiness and a center of neighborly sociability never to be forgotten, and later erected a mansion in the City of Youngstown where his daughters, Grace and Sallie Tod, dispensed a beautiful hospitality for many years.
Governor David Tod died at Brier Hill November 13, 1868, as a result of apoplexy. His funeral provided an occasion for the expression of the love and respect in which he was held by the people of Youngstown and the Mahoning Valley. It was attended by many persons of prominence, but the most inspiring feature of the pageant was the presence of more than 20,000 people, chiefly his friends, neighbors and men who had worked in the various industries with which he had been connected, all of whom viewed his passing with a sense of almost personal loss. He left behind him abundant evidence
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 601
of a useful life, and took with him into the beyond honor, esteem and personal affection such as is the portion of few men.
CHARLES NEWTON KIRTLAND was one of the grandsons of that famous character of the old Western Reserve, Judge Turhand Kirtland. While he did not resemble his grandfather in the matter of far reaching enterprise and public leadership, his career bulked large in his home community of Poland, where he managed successfully extensive farming interests and where he expressed in his relations with his home and his neighbors those solid virtues generally associated with the Kirtland name.
Members of the Kirtland family are found recorded in the affairs of some of the oldest New England communities, particularly with Saybrook, Connecticut. Turhand Kirtland was the son of Constant and a grandson of John Kirtland was born in 1755. He visited the Western Reserve of Ohio as early as 1798, and was agent for the Connecticut Land Company. He helped John Young lay out Youngstown, also surveyed the townships of Burton and Poland, and acquired extensive land holdings in Trumbull and other counties. He made his home at Poland, and in 1798 he laid out the second road in the Western Reserve, running from Poland to the mouth of Grand River. He served as state senator in 1814, and was known as Judge Kirtland because of his twenty years service as justice of the peace. He accumulated a handsome property and left a large family to enjoy its use. His children were by his second marriage, to Polly Potter, who died at Poland in 185o.
His son Henry Turhand Kirtland was born at Wallingford, Connecticut, November 16, 1795, and died at Poland February 28, 1874. Charles Newton Kirtland, a son of Henry Turhand Kirtland, was born on the old homestead at Poland October 22, 1839, and died May 27, 1901. During his boyhood his health was delicate, and at the age of fourteen he had to give up his studies in Poland Academy. Health and strength were restored by the outdoor work and pursuits of the farm, and he spent his active life as a farmer. He inherited a part of the old homestead, and at one time owned 500 or 600 acres, part of it in Poland Township and some in Columbiana County. For a number of years before his death he was vice president of the Poland Bank. Charles N. Kirtland was a very strong republican and exercised a great influence in politics and local citizenship. The attractive- home where some of his family still reside was built about 187o. He married for his first wife Julia Ellen Fitch, who died in December, 1879. She was a daughter of William and Julia (Kirtland) Fitch, and her mother was a daughter of Frederick and Mary Kirtland, who settled at Parkman in Geauga County, Ohio. Ellen and her sister Lucy were teachers in Boardman, where they married brothers, William and Edward Fitch. At Mrs. Kirtland's death she left two children by her first marriage, Elmour Fitch and May Julia Fitch. Elmour Fitch is a Civil engineer, connected with the American Bridge Company at Beaver, Pennsylvania. He married Susan McMillan Heasley, of an old family of Poland Township. May Julia Fitch became the wife of Harry Gault Gibson, who lives on the original Henry T. Kirtland homestead, and they have two children, Martha Ellen and Charles Kirtland Gibson.
In September, 1883, Mr. Kirtland married Martha Fawcett, of Salem, Ohio, daughter of William and Elizabeth (Test) Fawcett. Her father and her grandparents came from Virginia in pioneer days. Her father was for many years a farmer and stock man at Salem in Columbiana County. Of the two sons born to Mr. and Mrs. Kirtland, only one grew to maturity, Louis Augustus, who lives on part of the old homestead near his mother and is connected with the Youngstown Securities Company. He married Martha J. Sands, of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a daughter of Rev. J. D. Sands, a minister of the United Presbyterian Church of that city.
Mrs. Kirtland is active in woman's clubs and in church work, is a cultured and refined woman, showing many traces of her Virginia ancestry. The Kirtland home is a beautiful one, equal to many fine residences in Youngstown, but greatly enhanced by its attractive rural surroundings. While it is away from the dirt and noxious gasses of the industrial valley, being five miles south of Youngstown, the locality is rapidly attracting a high class of home-seekers, and many acres of the old Kirtland farm are being appropriated for the homes of people whose interests are largely in Youngstown.
JOHN F. LINDSAY, M. D., whose work as a physician and surgeon at Youngstown has been attended with a growing reputation and who is a member of the staff of the Youngstown Hospital, is one of three brothers who have made names for themselves in this profession, while both his father and grandfather were able doctors in their generation.
Dr. John F. Lindsay was born at Salineville in Columbiana County, Ohio, December 14, 1877, son of Dr. John A. and Maria (Connell) Lindsay. Dr. John F. Lindsay is a graduate of the Salineville High School, spent three years in a literary and scientific course at the Ohio State University, and in 1902 graduated from Western Reserve University, receiving his Doctor of Medicine degree forty-six years after his father. For two years he remained in Cleveland as an interne in St. Vincent's Hospital and then for five years practiced with his father in Salineville. On the death of his father he moved to Youngstown, where for over ten years he has carried on a general practice: He is now associated with Doctors Morrison, Turner and Bunn. Doctor Lindsay was honored with the office of secretary of the Mahoning Medical Society in 1916, and is also a member of the State and American Medical Associations. He is a Mason and belongs to Al Koran Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine of Cleveland, Ohio. He is also a member of the Odd Fellows fraternity.
JAMES G. PARDEE. During the eight years that he has been pushing a business of his own James G. Pardee has seen his firm and business affairs wonderfully prosper and expand until the Pardee-Ellis Company, of which he is president and treasurer, is one of the important wholesale and jobbing concerns that have their home in the Youngstown District.
602 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
Possessing long business experience, thorough commercial training and a personality that has won friends everywhere, James G. Pardee has every equipment for success. He was born on a farm at Guys Mills in Crawford County, Pennsylvania, July 26, 1882. The Pardees are of French Huguenot stock and for several .generations the family lived in Connecticut. Mr. Pardee is a son of J. H. and Margaret (Watson) Pardee, who are still living on their fine farm in Crawford County, the father at the age of sixty-seven and the mother at sixty. J. H. Pardee besides being a successful farmer has taken a prominent part in the democratic party in his county, serving as a member of the Democratic County Committee. He is an Odd Fellow. Mrs. Pardee is a member of the Congregational Church.
James G. Pardee, the oldest of seven children, attended the country schools of his native county, and spent two years in the State Normal at Edinboro. He was a teacher for two years in country districts, and going West served as principal of schools at Sheldon, North Dakota, three years. Mr. Pardee became a resident of Youngstown in 19o7, but for five years was on the road as a traveling salesman representing the J. R. Thomas Company. He acquired an extensive trade acquaintance and built up a sound business reputation for himself. Leaving the road, in company with J. H. V. Ellis he organized the Pardee-Ellis Company. They started a business at 224 West Boardman Street, and in a very short time hall to build on adjoining property in order to meet the requirements of the growing trade. The firm are wholesale dealers and jobbers in a wide range of specialties, notions, woodenware, galvanized ware and stationery, and they do a business over fifty miles around Youngstown, both in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
May 22, 1907, the year he came to Youngstown, Mr. Pardee married Edna Coburn, a daughter of John and Matilda Coburn of Townville, Pennsylvania. Three children have been born to their marriage, John, Margaret and James.
Mr. Pardee has always been deeply interested in the civic life of his community. His home is at Pleasant Grove. He is a member of the Chamber of Commerce, the Credit Men's Association and the United Commercial Travelers. In Masonry he is affiliated with Western Star Lodge, the Royal Arch Chapter and Council at Youngstown, St. John's Commandery, Knights Templar, Lake Erie Consistory of the Scottish Rite, and Al Koran Temple of the Mystic Shrine.
WILLIAM THOMAS HARDESTY, vice president, general manager and one of the founders of the Trumbull Steel Company of Warren, was closely identified with and a part of the industrial history of the Mahoning Valley for forty years, and at the time of his death he was one of the best known iron and steel men in Eastern Ohio and Western Pennsylvania. He was not a native product of the valley, but from boyhood his life was spent amidst its haze and smoke—smoke which his mills helped to make—and it was here that he worked out his successful and honorable career.
Mr. Hardesty was born at New Lebanon, Pennsylvania, on January 7, 1857, and he was in the sixth generation of his branch of the family in America, his ancestors having come over from England in the early part of the eighteenth century and settled in Pennsylvania. His parents, William Thomas and Barbara (Overmoyer) Hardesty, were born in Pennsylvania, the mother having been of Holland-Dutch descent. William, the father, became a stationary engineer, and following the close of the Civil war he brought his family to the Mahoning Valley and located at Mineral Ridge, where he became engineer in the coal mines. A few years later he became engineer at the old Falcon Iron and Nail Mills at Niles, and removed to that city, where he and his wife spent their last days.
When young William Thomas Hardesty was a boy of ten years he became "bread-winner" as a delivery boy for Jonathan Warner (I), who was then operating a general store at Mineral Ridge; when he was twelve years old he began to learn engineering under his father at the Falcon Mills ; when he was twenty he succeeded his father as engineer, and a few years later he was made chief engineer of the Falcon Mills, during which time, and long before and afterward, they were owned by the Arms. In 1901 the Falcon Mills were purchased by the United States Steel Corporation and Mr. Hardesty was made superintendent, and in 1904 he was promoted division superintendent by the United States Steel Company and given charge of a number of its important plants at different points in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Back in 1898, while still with the Arms interests, Mr. Hardesty, with others, built at Niles what was known as the New Process Galvanizing Plant, but later sold it to Boston interests. That was Mr. Hardesty's first venture into business on his own account, made while he was still with the Arms interests his loyalty to the old company up to that time and even later holding him with his first employers.
In 1900 Mr. Hardesty and Jonathan Warner (II) bought the Struthers Mill, which they later sold. In 1904 Mr. Hardesty, Mr. Warner and W. H. B. Ward bought the Empire Iron & Steel Mills at Niles, Mr. Hardesty becoming general manager, and under his able management the plant was more than doubled in size and production. In 1910 the Empire Mills were sold, and Messrs. Hardesty, Warner and Ward began the promotion of the great Trumbull Steel Company at Warren. In 1912 ground was broken and Mr. Hardesty directed the building of the plant from the time the first spadeful of earth was turned in the excavation to the day when the machinery was started. He became general manager and vice president of the company, and credit for the success of the plant, which continued from the beginning of operations to the time of the death of Mr. Hardesty, and in a measure since his death, is generously accorded him and his. able management by his business associates.
Mr. Hardesty's death occurred at his home in Warren on May 7, 1914, and his passing away was regarded as an irreparable loss, not only to his business associates, intimates and friends, but a loss to the industrial interests of the entire Mahoning Valley. His was a strong but unostentatious, if not retiring, nature, yet his genius in mechanics and
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 603
organization and the results he secured made of him a conspicuous figure in the industriql world. His mechanical skill was generally recognized as far back as 1892, and when the first tin-mill in this country was built at Niles, in that year, he was given the responsibility of rolling the first sheet of tin turned out by that plant, an event which is epochal in the industrial history of America.
Mr. Hardesty was a man of strong characteristics, and perhaps the strongest of these was his sense of loyalty to all with whom he was associated in a business and personal way. As a workman he was loyal to his employers, and when he became an employer he was loyal to his men; and to the last named trait, perhaps, was due his remarkable success in the handling of his workmen, for they, recognizing his loyalty to them, returned to him a full measure of loyalty, which resulted in complete harmony between office and mills. He was likewise loyal to his business associates and his friends, all of whom repaid his steadfastness with a devotion which lasted through life. His warm-hearted and genial personality won for him and held the true friendship of true men who esteemed his friendship as a privilege.
Mr. Hardesty was united in marriage with Luella Coombs, who was born in Brookfield, Trumbull County, the daughter of Newell E. and Diana (Musser) Coombs. Her father was also born in Brookfield, the son of a pioneer family which furnished soldiers to all the early wars of the country. Her mother was born in Pennsylvania and was a direct descendant of General Musser (Mercer) of the Revolutionary war, in which war served also Ensign Ebenezer Coombs, a maternal ancestor of Mrs. Hardesty. To Mr. and Mrs. Hardesty one daughter was born, Daisy, who is now the wife of Harold Stevens, of Niles, member of the well-known Stevens family of the Valley.
THOMAS J. EVANS. While he has been busily engaged in the practice of his profession as a dental surgeon at Youngstown for the past twenty years Doctor Evans has used both his profession and his civic interests to identify himself with other causes. He is a member of the City Board of Health, a former official of the State Dental Society, and is a former president of the Youngstown Dental Society.
Doctor Evans was born at Wilkesbarre, Pennsylvania, on Christmas day of 1876, son of Dr. Daniel and Annie Evans. His parents were both natives of Wales, came to this country when young and were married at Scranton, Pennsylvania. Dr. Daniel Evans achieved distinction, although he began his life in the coal mines. He was actuated by a deep scientific spirit, and his ambition was directed toward medicine. After some years of employment in the hard coal fields of Pennsylvania from his savings he was able to attend college and graduated from
the Baltimore College of Physicians and Surgeons. He practiced at Nanticoke and New Castle, Pennsylvania. He became a pioneer in the use of the X-ray, and in later years specialized in that field. His death in 1914, at the age of sixty-five, was the result of burns received while doing experimental work with the X-ray. He was a member of the Lawrence County Medical Society, one of the first members of the Radiograph Society, took an active part in politics as a republican and with his wife was a member of the Welsh Congregational Church. His widow is now living at Nanticoke, Pennsylvania, at the age of sixty-five. Doctor Evans was also a member of the Knights of Malta, the Knights of Pythias and the Improved Order of Red Men. The three children now living are: Dr. Thomas J.; Arthur, connected with an iron plant at Woodlawn, Pennsylvania; and Jay R., in the automobile business at Buffalo, New York.
Thomas J. Evans attended a high school at Nanticoke, the Harry Hillman Academy at Wilkesbarre, and prepared for his profession in the Dental School of Philadelphia, graduating in 1899. The following year he came to Youngstown and for twenty years has practiced in one location, at 127 West Federal Street. He has much of the scientific spirit of his father, loves his profession, and has done much to advance the interests and welfare of dentistry in Ohio. He is a member of the staff of the City Hospital and is in charge of the Dental Clinic at the Mazda Lamp Works.
Doctor Evans became a member of the Health Board of Youngstown in 1920. He was the leading spirit in the movement to bring about compulsory vaccination in the Youngstown schools. Doctor Evans is a republican, is affiliated with the Masons and Odd Fellows, and a member of Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church. He married in 1899 Miss Agnes Van Fossen. Their two daughters, Isabel and Ethel, are both graduates of South High School and are now students at the Ohio State University.
JOHN W. MORRISON, SR. While his interests as a business man were widely dispersed, John W. Morrison, Sr., for many years made his home at Youngstown and married into one of the prominent old families of the Mahoning Valley.
He was born at Brandywine Hundred, near Wilmington, Delaware, September 26, 1826, son of Robert Morrison and of Scotch-Irish ancestry. The Morrisons were related and closely allied with the Carter and Clayton families of the East. One from these families to achieve special distinction was Powell Clayton, former governor of Arkansas and United States ambassador to Mexico. John W. Morrison at the age of fourteen went with a relative, the owner of a sailing vessel, around Cape Horn to the gold fields of California. He had previously begun an apprenticeship as a blacksmith and machinist in the Baldwin Locomotive Works at Philadelphia, and while in California he was employed at his trade, there being a great demand in the West for his expert knowledge and skill. After his return East he was in Ohio, also operated a commission business at St. Paul, Minnesota, shipping by river to New Orleans.
He met his future wife, Kate Everett, while she was visiting relatives in the West. He followed her back to Youngstown, and in 1858 they were married. During the Civil war John W. Morrison worked as a machinist in Government shipyards, and was in New York employed on the famous gunboat Monitor. In later years he had a number of interests in Youngstown, an was a mine operator in Brazil,
604 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
Indiana, and at Collinsville, Illinois. He also built several streets in Youngstown.
Kate Everett, his wife, was born at the old Everett homestead at Griffith and Federal streets October 8, 1834. For many years she exercised a great influence in the life of the Mahoning Valley as an educator, having begun as teacher of a country school at the age of sixteen. She was connected with the schools of Youngstown, and in later years was a leader in civic affairs. Her father was Peter Everett, who came to Ohio from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, while her mother was Mary Dabney, born at the Dabney homestead at Westlake Crossing. Mary Dabney was the daughter of the original settler of Youngstown, Nathaniel Gardner Dabney, who married Kate Kieffer. Nathaniel Gardner Dabney was a graduate of Harvard College, and came West to take charge of land he had purchased from the Connecticut Land Company. He acquired extensive tracts of land in what is now the growing City of Youngstown. He expected to engage in business here, but the death of his partner interfered with his arrangements, and subsquently he and his wife settled down to farming.
John W. Morrison, Sr., died in 1907. He and his wife had four children, John W., Jr., Sallie, deceased, Katie, deceased, and Agnes.
Agnes Morrison, who like her mother has been deeply interested in the civic life and social welfare of her home city, is a graduate of the Rayen High School, and during 1887-88 attended the Miss Johnson School for Young Ladies at Boston. While in the East she became acquainted with Samuel Waterman Luce, and they were married December 22, 1891. Samuel Waterman Luce was born at Boston March 28, 1867, son of Samuel Waterman and Harriet (Blake) Luce. His father was a prominent Boston merchant and for many years went twice annually to Europe as buyer for his firm. S. W. Luce, Jr., was a graduate of the Boston High School, and after the death of his father was in the service of the great Boston mercantile house of Russ, Cobb & Company. He was a man of the highest New England ideals and culture, and his many friends regarded him as a nature's nobleman. After their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Luce settled in Youngstown, where he was engaged in the coal business. They built the home on Madison Avenue where the family now reside. Samuel W. Luce, Jr., died December 31, 1918. He was survived by two sons, Everett Blake and Morrison Waterman Luce. The former is a graduate of the Rayen High School, spent two years in the Ohio Mechanical Institute at Cincinnati, and for eight months was in France connected with an evacuation hospital near the battle line. The son Morrison is still in school. Mrs. Luce is an active member of the Presbyterian Church.
JAMES FRANKLIN ELDER, M. D. A physician and surgeon of Youngstown since 1911, with practice largely confined to special lines, Doctor Elder also enjoys the title of captain as a result of his service in the Medical Corps during the World war. He is a man of exceptional attainments, and has had a varied service and experience during his professional career.
He was born at Darlington, Pennsylvania, April 25, 1878. His grandfather, William Elder, was a native of Scotland, as was also his wife. He became known as founder of the Elder Woolen Mills on Little Beaver, near Cannelton, Pennsylvania. Prior to the Civil war he was an active abolitionist, and was a conductor on the underground railway and assisted many a negro slave in his escape to freedom.
The parents of Doctor Elder were Samuel Rankin and Mary (Cook) Elder, both natives of Beaver County, Pennsylvania. His father was born in 1839 and died in 1907, while the mother died in 1909, at the age of seventy-two. Samuel Rankin Elder though largely self taught became a scientific gardener, orchardist and farmer of more than ordinary ability, and for a number of years performed a valuable service in connection with experimental stations and agricultural extension work in Pennsylvania. He cast his first vote for Lincoln, in 186o, and was an elder in the Seceder Presbyterian Church. Samuel R. Elder and wife became the parents of three children. William since 1902 has been engaged in the citrus fruit business at Los Angeles. The only daughter, Jennie, died at the age of forty-two in 1911.
James Franklin Elder graduated from the Greersburg Academy in his native state and finished his medical course in the University of Pittsburgh in 1900. Since then he has taken a number of post graduate courses in New York and Chicago. He made a special study of urology and dermatology. He began practice at New Brighton, Pennsylvania, in 1908 removed to Jefferson, Ohio, and in 1911 to Youngstown. Doctor Elder is a member of the staff of St. Elizabeth's Hospital. He was medical examiner of one of the local draft boards from September, 1917, until January, 1918, and then accepted active duty in the army as a medical officer with the rank of captain at Camp Cody, New Mexico.
Doctor Elder is an official of the Mahoning County Medical Society and a member of other organizations. He has always been interested in athletic sports and the development of games and pastimes and is a member of the City Boxing Commission of Youngstown. He is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason, has his Shriner membership in New Mexico, is a republican, and an active member of the Third Reformed Church.
In 1900 Doctor Elder married Miss Mame Fisher, of New Castle, Pennsylvania, daughter of Scott and Martha Fisher. Mrs. Elder's great-grandfather, William Fisher, was a pioneer settler in the vicinity of East Brook, Lawrence County, Pennsylvania, and operated the first woolen mill in that locality. Dr. and Mrs. Elder have two daughters, Frances Jane, a graduate of the South High School of Youngstown, and now attending the University of Pittsburgh, in the department of household arts; and Esther Rae, attending the grade schools. A son, Paul Rankin, is deceased.
THE SMITH FAMILY. The Smith brothers, John F. and Harry H., well-known and progressive farmers of Boardman Township, owners of the Shadeland Dairy in that township, have the distinction of being descendants of the first white man to settle in that section of the county. Their great-grandfather came into the county when it was inhabited only by Indians, his neighbors being two Indian families. He lived to within six years of
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 605
becoming a centenarian, and on his ninetieth birthday was presented with a family Bible, which has since been passed down to the head of each generation and is now in the possession of John F. From that Bible much of the data herein given has been gathered.
William Smith, the pioneer in Ohio, was born in Pennsylvania on December 20, 1784, of parents who had come to the United States from Ireland. William was only eighteen years old when he married, soon after which he and his wife, Mary, left Pennsylvania and came through the wilderness into Ohio. He secured a tract of wild land now included in Idora and Mill Creek Parks, but it was then totally undeveloped, in fact he was the only white man in the neighborhood when he and his wife settled in the woods, and he began to build a log cabin within sight of the spring on the hill. Eventually others came into Youngstown township, and long before the death of William Smith the wild land he had come to when it was merely a hunting ground for Indians had become cleared and productive land, classed with the most fertile acreage in the vicinity. From the time of his first coming into Ohio, in the first years of the nineteenth century, until his death in 1870 he lived on the one farm in Youngstown Township; and as the years passed and the section became well populated by people of his own race he came to be known for his strong Christian character as much as for his rigid ways in general. He was one of the founders of the Covenanters Church in that vicinity, and throughout his life conscientiously observed the strict tenets of that faith, holding family worship and adhering rigidly to the sacredness of the Sabbath. In all his dealings, and in his every thought and action, William Smith was honest and straight-forward; and his own strength in that respect sometimes caused him to be impatient with others who were weaker and deviated from the straight way. But he was generally fairly dealt by and was generally esteemed for his high moral standard and steady, wholesome life. He lived a vigorous useful life of ninety-four years, death coming to him on April 19, 1878. He had been a widower for forty years, his wife, Mary, having died on December 8, 1838. They were the parents of nine children, including three spinster sisters who remained in the old home and cared for their father until within a few years of his death. The daughters were: Jane, who died at the age of fifty-six years; Nancy, who died in 1876, aged seventy-two years; and Polly, who also died in 1876, aged sixty-five years. Of the other children, Elizabeth married a man named Geddes, and died in 1881; and James, grandfather of John F. and Harry H., was born on March 21, 1808, and died on January 3o, 1873. He was reared under the rigid and wholesome conditions that prevailed in the Christian and pioneer home of his father and mother, and he remained at home until he married his second wife, soon after which he purchased the Robbins farm and built the residence in which Ett Smith, a former county surveyor, now lives, and regarding whose life further detailed reference has been written for inclusion elsewhere in this current historical work of the Mahoning Valley. James Smith first
Vol. III-14
married Mary Gibson, who bore him two children, William and Finley. William is deceased, but Finley now lives in Colorado. Their mother, Mary (Gibson) Smith, died when William was only three years old, and their father, James Smith, later married Harriet Croley, who bore him six children: Hannah M., who married David Houston; Nancy, who never married; James, who died when fifty-five years old; Joseph, who lives at Pleasant Grove ; George, who is deceased; and Ett, the former county surveyor before referred to.
William, son of James Smith by his first wife, Mary Gibson, lived practically all his minor life with his grandfather and maiden aunts. William was deaf from birth, and his education was obtained at an institution for the deaf at Columbus, Ohio. It was there that he met Carrie Butler, who was destined to become his wife. She was from Licking County, Ohio, and had been deaf since her third year. She was two years younger than William, and they were married when he was twenty-nine years old. Their early married life was spent in the home of William's grandfather, and there they remained until the death of the latter in 1879. Soon afterwards William bought a nearby farm, and it remained the home of the family until his death, which came suddenly on November 10, 1917, he having been killed in an automobile accident near his home. His widow still lives in the old home, in quiet comfort. Deafness did not apparently handicap William Smith very seriously; at all events he was a successful farmer who made a comfortable competence by honorable dealing and industrious application to farming. The early years he spent in his grandfather's home were reflected in his commendable traits, and he was much respected in the township. Politically he was a republican, although he does not appear to have taken a very close interest in political movements. Four children were born to William and Carrie (Butler) Smith: Lottie, who married Henry Baldwin, of Boardman Township; Lida, who married F. C. Pew, of Uniontown, Pennsylvania; John F. who was born on October 3o, 1876; and Harry H., born December 15, 1878.
The two sons constitute the firm of Smith Brothers, owners of the Shadeland Dairy Farm in Boardman Township. The brothers have been business partners since early manhood, and are both alert, up-to-date farmers, well representative of the younger generation of progressive, successful Mahoning County agriculturists. Their farming indicates that they have been students of modern scientific farming, and they have had notable success. They maintain a large herd of good milch cows, aiming to keep the herd at about fifty head ; and they to some extent enter into the retailing of milk, delivering to south side residents. Both are married and live in desirable residences only a short distance apart. To some extent both have entered into the public affairs of the township and county, although both give their time mainly to the affairs of their dairy farm. They are republicans in political allegiance, and Harry H. is a member of the township School Board. Both are consistent members of the South Side Presbyterian Church.
John F., the elder brother, married Edna Dut-
606 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
terer, daughter of Obadiah and Elizabeth (Otto) Dutterer, of Boardman Township. Her father is a prosperous farmer in Boardman Township and formerly lived in North Lima, where Edna was born. John F. and Edna (Dutterer) Smith are the parents of two children, Mary Elizabeth and William Otto, both of whom attend the local school.
Harry H. Smith married Alice Blackburn, and they have two children, sons, Howard H. and William John Thomas.
ANTHONY ONORATO. While Anthony Onorato is active head of a business whose annual volume of sales runs into the millions, he began his career in this country as a waterboy at 75 cents a day and had achieved only a modest degree of success when he came to Youngstown some fifteen or sixteen years ago.
Mr. Onorato was born in the Italian province of Campobasso, March 18, 1865. This province is about 100 miles southwest of Rome and about the same distance northwest of Naples. Many of his people for years had been skilled stone cutters. His parents were Joseph and Catherine Onorato, and his father was a contractor in building construction and also a dealer in building material and coal. His death at the age of seventy-seven, was the result of an accident.
Anthony Onorato attended night school in his native land and at the age of fifteen joined a party of about fifty Italian people who were coming to America to better their conditions. His first work as a waterboy was done in Cleveland, Ohio, when he carried water to the big force of men engaged in building a trestle for the Nickel Plate Railway. Later he worked for 75 cents a day on a farm at Bellevue, clearing land. Leaving Ohio he went out to Colorado, joined a railroad construction outfit as a waterboy, and having in the meantime gained some knowledge of English, acted as interpreter. He was a table waiter in a restaurant in Colorado, and on returning to Ohio found work in a fruit store at Zanesville at $5.00 a month and board. He did all he could to learn the business, saved his money and at the end of two years bought the store, paying his modest savings and giving a promise for the balance of $500 as it was earned out of the business.
The next stage in his career began in 1888, when he entered business with a cousin in Chillicothe, Ohio, remaining there three years. In the meantime he bought out his partner, and continued the business altoegther for six years, selling out for $4,000. From 1894 until 1902 Mr. Onorato was in the wholesale fruit business at Columbus. Impaired health caused him to sell out and he spent a year in California recuperating. Returning to Columbus, he again engaged in business, but with disastrous results through the trust he reposed in a dishonest associate.
When Mr. Onorato came to Youngstown he rented from Mrs. Bonnell the block originally occupied by the Youngstown Dry Goods Company, and here opened a wholesale fruit establishment. He was the first fruit merchant in Youngstown to handle car lots of California fruit. The business gradually became a wholesale grocery. Already a prosperous business man, he took stock in the Youngstown Macaroni Company, and a year later became president of the concern. At that time its yearly business did not exceed $85,000, though now this is one of the largest companies of the kind in America, its annual volume of products being valued at $2,500,000.
Mr. Onorato was one of the chief builders of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church in Youngstown, was also a large contributor to the building of the Abbruzzi Hall, and no one in proportion to his means did more to support the Government and the auxiliary war work. Mr. Onorato has had a number of setbacks in his career, and his prosperity is therefore the more satisfying. During the floods of 1913 his losses reached $50,000, but the bank came to his aid with credit and he was soon re-established.
In 1888 Mr. Onorato married Miss Lily Yarhaus, of Waverly, Ohio. Two daughters and a son have been born to their union: Recelba, who is the wife of J. F. McFadden of Youngstown, and they have one child, Rita Mary; Hazel; and Walter, the only son, who left the University of Michigan at the beginning of the World war and saw seventeen months of service in France. He is now with his father in the Youngstown Macaroni Company. Mr. Onorato acquired American citizenship in 1888, and through all the years has been a steady supporter of the republican party.
HARRISON W. LINDSAY. After reviewing the records of the Lindsays in Youngstown it is possible and appropriate to say of them that in the three generations they have been people of distinctive constructive energy and spirit, and their lives have found expression in substantial achievement that has advanced many interests besides their own. One of the men representing the present generation is Harrison W. Lindsay, a prominent real estate dealer and developer in the city.
His grandfather was William Lindsay, whose career deserves more than passing mention in any account of Youngstown. He was of Scotch ancestry, but was reared in Central Ohio by a German family and learned to speak that language. More than three quarters of a century ago, in 1843, he came to Youngstown, and was identified with the city for over thirty years, until his death in February, 1876. A carpenter by trade, he operated a planing mill at what is now Doud Alley and Front Street. Into this mill he introduced the first smoothing machine or planer west of. Pittsburgh. This was one of the earlier among the mechanical inventions that are now employed in the dressing of lumber and the production of what is known as "mill work" entering into at least half of all building construction. The placing of this machine in the Lindsay mill aroused a great deal of opposition and action hostility on the part of the carpenters of the valley. Up to that time lumber was dressed chiefly by hand labor and on the spot, and a machine for doing the work was resented because it would take away much of the employment of carpenters. William Lindsay was also interested in the foundry at the corner of Boardman and Basin. This foundry worked up pig iron which was transported on canal boats from Pittsburgh. In addition to his lumber and planing mills Mr. Lindsay became interested in the business of buying and selling real estate and improving it
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 607
with buildings. He built a home for his family at the corner of Basin and Front and another at Walnut and Front, and these old houses are still standing, landmarks of the residence district of a former era. William Lindsay's chief business misfortune was due to a timber land deal. The title proved defective, and he lost a large part of his fortune. It gave him a great deal of trouble and possibly may have shortened his life. William Lindsay was one of the noble characters of early Youngstown. He was a very active member of the First Methodist Church and a devout Christian and exercised a great influence over many of the local citizens. Up to that time there were a number of atheists in the town and he was always willing to meet them in discussion and always got the better of the argument by asserting that it was best to live the life of a Christian even if there were no hell or heaven.
William Lindsay married first Elizabeth Chapman, and by this union there was born one child, Sarah Jane, who became the wife of George Hornicle. Mr. Lindsay married for his second wife Mary MacDonald, and they had eleven children : William, Mary E., Albert R., Eveline, Gilbert, Catherine, Tressie, Josephine, Hetty, Charles and Grant.
The son Albert R. Lindsay, who was born on Canal Street in Youngstown August 9, 1850, is still living. He was educated in the local schools, worked as a carpenter with his father, and about the time of the panic of 1873 secured employment in the Lake Shore roundhouse at $1.20 a day. He was given several promotions, becoming locomotive engineer, and served in that capacity until permanently disabled in a collision. After that he conducted a grocery store at 801 Wilson Avenue. Albert R. Lindsay married Olive B. Vogan, who was born at New Castle, Pennsylvania, and died June 17, 1901. She was the mother of two sons, Harrison W. and Clarence D. The latter married Miss Maybell Weaver. He is engaged in the wholesale produce business in Youngstown, Ohio.
Harrison W. Lindsay, who was born at Youngstown March a, 1876, acquired his education in the Wood and Rayen Street Schools. Out of necessity he practiced a system of getting an education which is now highly commended under a plan known as continuation schools. He attended school for half a day and the other part of the day he spent working in the Euwer store. Mr. Lindsay was a schoolmate of several prominent Youngstown people, including Fernley and William Bonnell, Helen Arms and others. After leaving school he assisted his father in the grocery business at 801 Wilson Avenue, and at the age of twenty-two he began selling real estate, chiefly residence property on the east and west sides. He soon entered the building end of the business and has erected many houses and sold them to individual owners. His business has been a growing and profitable one for the last fifteen or twenty years.
September 9, 1897, he married Jessamine Moore, daughter of David T. Moore, of a well known family of the Mahoning Valley. Her father was at one time county commissioner. Mr. and Mrs. Lindsay were for nine years affiliated with Grace Methodist Church, but are now members of the Trinity Church. Mr. Lindsay, like his grandfather, has accepted all the opportunities presented to work for the betterment and advancement of his home city. He was one of the founders of the Lincoln Club and chairman of the organization when it succeeded in having the East Side bridge built.
SAMUEL K. HINE, a chemical engineer by profession, has given his technical skill and his executive ability to the benefit of one of the most important industries of the Mahoning Valley, the Ohio plant of the A. M. Byers Company at Girard in Trumbull County. His connection with this industry, of which he is now manager, covers a quarter of a century, and his connection with the iron and steel industry of Ohio has been practically continuous from the time he completed his technical education.
He has the heritage of two pioneer families, Hine and Kirtland, in Mahoning and Trumbull counties. He was born at Poland, Mahoning County, August 4, 1867, son of Samuel and Emma C. (Kirtland) Hine. His grandfather, Judge Homer Hine, a Revolutionary soldier, was graduated from Yale College in 1797, and about the opening of the nineteenth century came to the Ohio Western Reserve. His homestead included the present site of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern yards in Youngstown. Judge Hine for many years was prominent in public affairs, and represented Mahoning County in the first Legislature of Ohio, for many years was a justice of the peace, and was prominent in the abolition movement in the early half of the nineteenth century, assisting many slaves on their way to freedom. He was more than eighty years of age at the time of his death.
Samuel Hine finished his education in the Western Reserve Academy and for many years was a merchant at Youngstown and Hubbard and moved to Poland to give his children the educational advantages of that center of culture. He died in 1893, at the age of seventy-seven. He also wielded much influence in local politics, was a stanch republican, but never sought or held office.
His wife was a representative of the Kirtland family of which Judge Turhand Kirtland became the most conspicuous and influential member in Trumbull County in the early days. Judge Kirtland was an agent of the Connecticut Land Company, and purchased large tracts within the borders of the Western Reserve. His name is closely associated with the settlement of several townships and with the civic interests and public affairs of the locality and period. Emma C. (Kirtland) Hine was a daughter of Billius Kirtland, who maintained his home in Boardman Township of Trumbull County. The first wife of Samuel Hine was Ellen Montgomery, who was survived by two children, C. D. and Mary, the latter the wife of James Phelps. Mrs. Emma C. (Kirtland) Hine survived her husband more than twenty years, passing away in 1914, at the age of seventy-two. She was the mother of five children: Samuel K., the oldest ; Ellen L., who at her own expense went to France as a Y. M. C. A. Secretary after the United States became involved in the World war; Alfred B., who prepared for college at St. Paul's School at Concord, New Hampshire, afterward graduated from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and is now vice president of the firm McKel-
608 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
vey-Hine of Pittsburgh; Homer H., who took a preparatory course at Cheshire, Connecticut, afterward attended Case School of Applied Science at Cleveland, and is now in the building supply business at Seattle, Washington; Charles P., who also attended the Cheshire School, was graduated from Yale University one hundred and one years after the graduation of his paternal grandfather, was admitted to the bar in his native state, and is now practicing successfully at Cleveland as a member of the firm Thompson, Hine & Flory, and has served as assistant attorney general of Ohio under Hon. Wade Ellis.
Samuel K. Hine enjoyed the distinctive advantages of Poland schools during his early youth, and in 1892 graduated from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute of Troy, New York. For a brief time after returning home he was assistant engineer of the tin mills which had been built by the Arms family at Niles, also was chemist for the Mahoning Iron Company, from March, 1893, to February, 1895, was at Leetonia as chemist for the Salem Iron Company, from February, 1895, to September, 1895, was with the Ohio Steel Company and in September of the latter year became chemist for the company in the Girard plant and filled that office until 1901. Then for a time he was consulting chemist in addition to his duties in a partnership at Cleveland, but in 1902 returned to Girard as superintendent of the Ohio Iron Company's plant, and on the death of J. A. Kennedy in 1903 succeeded the latter in the office of general manager. In that position he has continued to the present time, the title of the corporation in the meantime having become the A. M. Byers Company.
Mr. Hine is also president of the Trumbull Banking Company, vice president and a director of the North American Steamship Company, is a director of the Bruhl Mining Company and the Fort Henry Mining Company, a director of the Youngstown Foundry & Machine Company and a director of the Trumbull Savings & Loan Company of Warren. Like all other members of the Hine family he is a staunch republican, and during the World war was president of the War Board of his home city of Girard. He is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and the Order of Elks.
April 10, 1913, Mr. Hine married Miss Alma Steel Paige, of Painesville, Ohio. Mrs. Hine is a prominent figure in activities at Girard and a communicant of St. Luke's Protestant Episcopal Church at Niles, Ohio. She was chairman of the Girard branch of the American Red Cross, which made a record for good work during the World war.
CLARENCE D. LINDSAY. Any business can become as big as the spirit and the enterprise of the man behind it. For example Clarence D. Lindsay some twenty years ago started out to gain patronage in Youngstown and the Mahoning Valley through the sale of some specially prepared horseradish which he manufactured on his own premises. Success encouraged him, and he began expanding and growing, and is today one of the leading wholesale dealers in fruits and produce in Eastern Ohio.
Mr. Lindsay is a member of a notable Youngstown family, grandson of William Lindsay, and son of Albert R, and Olive B. (Vogan) Lindsay. Some of the interesting particulars in the career of his honored grandfather and parents are given on other pages of this publication.
Mr. Lindsay, who is a brother of Harrison W. Lindsay, was born April 26, 1883, at the family home at 737 Shehy Street. His father conducted a small grocery store at 801 Wilson Avenue. The son was educated in the Shehy Street School and put in much of his time when not in school in his father's store. He began business for himself in 1901, in the modest enterprise briefly noted above, and gradually branched out into the wholesale fruit and produce business, and now handles the trade requirements of many of the retailers throughout the Mahoning Valley. Mr. Lindsay was in business at the old location, 801 Wilson Avenue, until 1915, when he moved to his present establishment at 259 West Commerce.
He married Maybell Weaver in 1909. She was formerly a resident of Coalburg, Ohio.
MRS. MARGARET CRANDALL, widow of the late Nelson Crandall, whose life and character entered so closely into the business affairs of Youngstown, as described on other pages, resides at 1003 Ford Avenue in Youngstown.
Mrs. Crandall bore the maiden name of Margaret Pabst. She was born in Baden Weinheim, Germany, May 29, 1855, and was twelve years of age when her parents, George and Barbara (Roll) Pabst, came to America. The family lived in Cleveland, Warren and Youngstown. Miss Pabst became the wife of Nelson Crandall in 1893. She was active with her husban in the Trinity Methodist Church. Nelson Crandal had been an active member and librarian of the old Methodist Church on Front Street, which subsequently became Trinity Church.
JAMES E. DYE. An important business supplying the great Youngstown District with butter and other dairy products is the Youngstown Creamery Company, the manager of which is James E. Dye, an expert butter maker and creamery operator, who has spent practically all his active life in this one line of business and who came to Youngstown recently to take charge of the local business.
Mr. Dye, who is regarded as one of the able young business men of the city, was born on a farm at Orrville, Ohio, September to, 1886, son of James E. and Jane (Douglas) Dye. He grew up on his father's farm, and while attending the district schools and the Orrville High School had a varied line of duties at home, doing the chores, milking the cows, and also working in the fields. Soon after he left the farm and finished his education Mr. Dye became connected with the business in which he is an expert as a result of long and practical experience. His first employment was with the Sumner Company, and the Youngstown Creamery Company is a branch of that larger concern. They were manufacturers of butter and dairy products. Mr. Dye learned the business thoroughly, at first driving a team in the country, buying cream and butter fat from farmers. He held other positions with the company and finally was made manager of the cream-
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 609
ery department. The Sumner Company has four large establishments at Akron, Canton, Salem and Youngstown. The business at Youngstown was established by Frank Page, and on his death Mr. Dye came to Youngstown in 1919 to take charge of the business and also has a financial interest. Their Y C brand of butter is widely known and used all over the Youngstown District. The company also does a general jobbing business handling butter, cheese and other products, the trade territory being in Ohio and Western Pennsylvania.
Mr. Dye married, September 3o, 1906, Miss Etta Balmer, of Canal Fulton, Ohio. Their four children are Frank E., Carl, Esther and Harry. The family are members of the United Brethren Church.
JOHN X. WADSWORTH. It has been the good fortune of Warren to have as citizens a group of men who while striving to gain something for themselves have at all times been willing to give their personal service as well as their means to the betterment of the city and its institutions. To the unselfish efforts of such men is due the rapid growth of Warren during the two last decades. A general consensus places John X. Wadsworth, president and general manager of the Wadsworth Feed Company, in this group of progressive men. He has always evinced that broad-minded and public spirited disposition which makes for progress and city building, and for nearly twenty years he has been a factor in the business, civic and social life of the city and has contributed his full quota to the building up and betterment of the community.
Mr. Wadsworth is descended from two old New England families, both of which settled in the Western Reserve at an early day. His paternal grandfather, Xenophon Wadsworth, was a native of Connecticut, while the maternal grandfather, John Smith, was a native of Massachusetts, and both brought their families in ox-carts from New England to the Western Reserve, settling at Windham, Portage County, in pioneer days. Both lived out their lives at Windham, and are buried in the old Windham cemetery.
Elmer D. Wadsworth, son of Xenophon and father of John X., was born in Connecticut and was but a boy when he came with the family to Windham. He followed farming in Portage County for a number of years, and then removed to Garrettsville, Ohio, where he became extensively engaged in cattle raising, which he continued until his death in 1890. His wife was Emaline, daughter of John Smith, the pioneer. She was born in Massachusetts and died at Garrettsville in 1892.
John X. Wadsworth was born at Windham, Ohio, but was reared and educated at Garrettsville. As soon as he was old enough he became his father's assistant in the cattle business. In 1894, four' years after the death of his father, he engaged in the meat business at Garrettsville, remaining there five years, and then removed to Cleveland, where he continued in the same line of business until 1902. In April, 1902, he came to Warren as junior member of the firm Patton & Wadsworth, feed merchants. From that time he has been a forceful figure in the business and civic affairs of the city. In 1908, having acquired a controlling interest in the business of Patton & Wadsworth, he reorganized and incorporated the business as the Wadsworth Feed Company, with himself as president and general manager. The beginning of the Wadsworth Feed Company was modest, but its business grew from year to year, its facilities were improved to meet a steady growth, and in 1917 a 190-barrel flour mill plant was added for the manufacture of hard and soft wheat flour, corn and buckwheat. As evidence of the company's growth it may be said that the volume of its annual business in 1908 was less than $15,000, while that in 1919 was over $500,000.
In civic and social affairs Mr. Wadsworth is prominently active, and whenever and wherever he is called upon he always renders his full share of service to all worthy movements having for their object the betterment of community life. He has served as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Packard Park Commission since it was organized; is an active member of the Warren Board of Trade; is an enthusiastic member of the Warren Rotary Club, and was the club's delegate to the National Convention of Rotary Clubs held in Salt Lake City in June, 1919; is president of the Warren Automobile Club, and was its delegate to the National Convention of Automobile Clubs held at Atlantic City in June, 1919; is a member of the Order of Odd Fellows; a member of the First Presbyterian Church ; and is a director in the New Warner Hotel Company.
During the period of the great war he was busily identified with its patriotic program of service to the government, taking part in the different campaigns for raising funds and securing maximum results in home war work.
As a business man Mr. Wadsworth has demonstrated his ability as the guiding genius of the Wadsworth Feed Company. As a citizen he leaves nothing to be desired, while as a man his genial, warmhearted and wholesome personality has won a secure place in the hearts of his intimates and gained for him the respect and admiration of his fellow citizens.
On November 25, 1885, Mr. Wadsworth married Lura A. Holden, who was born at Charlestown, Portage County, daughter of Edwin and Emma A. (Dickinson) Holden. Her father was born in Charlestown, son of Joseph Holden, a native of Hawley, Franklin County, Massachusetts, who moved from the old Bay State to Portage County in pioneer days. Edwin Holden took his family from Charlestown to Garrettsville in 1884, and is now a citizen of Warren at the age of eighty-four. The mother of Mrs. Wadsworth was born ht Chester, Connecticut, and died at Charlestown, Ohio, in 1872. To Mr. and Mrs. Wadsworth were born a son and a daughter, Louis M. and Ruth Marie.
Louis M. Wadsworth, who was born at Garrettsville November 9, 1888, was educated in the Warren public schools, in the Ohio Northern University at Ada, and leaving college in 1907 entered business as a salesman for the Wadsworth Feed Company. From 1911 to 1914 he was in charge of the company's receiving elevators at Van Wert, Ohio, and since 1914 has been secretary-treasurer of the corn-
610 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
pany. September 23, 1908, he married Mabelle Wannamaker, who was born at Warren, Ohio, October 12, 1891, daughter of Charles E. and Elizabeth (Biggers) Wannamaker.
Ruth Marie Wadsworth, who was born at Garrettsville May 4, 1895, on July 17, 1914, became the wife of William Tudor Brangham, of Warren, assistant general sales manager of the Falcon Steel Company at Niles. Mr. Brangham was formerly connected with the Trumbull Steel Company, first as foreman of the shipping department of the tin house, and then advanced by stages to special representative of the company's claim department, from which he resigned to go with the Falcon Steel Company. Mr. and Mrs. Brangham have one daughter, Ruth Jane, born September 17, 1915.
DENNIS T. PETERS. Considering his initial capital and the few years he has been in business, Dennis T. Peters has achieved extraordinary success as a real estate operator at Youngstown and in other sections of the Mahoning Valley. Undoubtedly he has the genius of a born real estate man, enabling him to foresee and carry out large plans that fit in with the rapid growth of population and the increase of industry in this section of Ohio.
Mr. Peters was born at Niles February to, 1891, a son of John and Rosa (Chicketelle) Peters. His parents were both natives of Italy and the Chicketelle family have been residents of Niles for many years. John Peters came to the United States at the age of twenty-one, and was in the grocery business on Valley Street, near Valley Mills, until 1915, when he retired with a competence. He is a republican voter and a member of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church. After the death of his first wife he married Mary Fusco, of Niles. Dennis is the only son of his father and mother, and his father by his second marriage has two children: James, a schoolboy; and Rose, wife of Samuel Giurdullo, proprietor of a steamship agency on West Federal Street.
Dennis T. Peters, while he had good opportunities for an education, did not waste his leisure hours, spending them mostly in his father's store. He attended the Oak Street School and later the Excelsior Business College, taking a night course. When he was twenty years of age his father gave him a modest capital of $2,000. That was the capital he used to enter the real estate business, and he handled his first proposition with the skill of a veteran. He soon secured a tract of ground on the east side, near the mills, paying $4,000 for it. H. C. Kennedy advanced him the $2,000 to complete his payment. This is known as the Woodcrest allotment and. was subdivided and sold by Mr. Peters to mill men, the tract yielding a total of $15,000 when the sales were completed. The first year he was in business Mr. Peters sold 200 houses. His first office was at 43 Central Square, and he is now established in well appointed offices in the Dollar Bank Building. He is senior member of the firm Peters & McBride.
During the last five or six years Mr. Peters has been actively identified with a number of allotments and additions to Youngstown and also at Warren. He had most of the handling of the real estate and housing development at Steelton, associated with the Realty Trust Company. He sold 500 lots in that industrial community. He also handled the Bolin Hill property at Warren and has built many houses. He was affiliated with Alfred Liebman in the development of the Hawkins farm in the west end of Youngstown.
November 5, 1914, Mr. Peters married Miss Madeline C. Fusco, daughter of John Fusco. Mrs. Peters is an accomplished musician and well known in local musical circles. Two sons were born to their marriage, John D. and Paul. The latter died at the age of thirteen months. Mr. Peters is an active member of the Real Estate Board of Youngstown, is affiliated with the Elks and is a republican voter. He has always been interested in the cause of the church and was especially influential in the promotion of the welfare and upbuilding of the parish of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. He served as assistant secretary and also as secretary of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Building Company.
HENRY FRIEDMAN. Successful business men are not rare at Youngstown, but possibly few have advanced their fortunes more rapidly and solidly than has Henry Friedman, who is a prominent real estate dealer of this city. In his numerous undertakings he has shown rare sagacity and business penetration, and beyond his personal success the city has greatly profited through his progressive public spirit.
Henry Friedman was born on East Wood Street, Youngstown, Ohio, February 14, 1883, and is a son of Isaac and Kate (Greenwald) Friedman, highly esteemed residents of this city. Isaac Friedman was born in 185o at Budapest, Austria-Hungary, and when twenty years old came to the United States. He came to Youngstown as a clothing peddler, and on deciding to locate here he opened a shop on Canal Street, his first customers being the farmers of the Mahoning Valley. They found they were dealing with a trustworthy young man and his fortunes soon increased to such an extent that he was able to open a store with a complete stock of clothing at No. 425 East Federal Street. Mr. Friedman continued to do business there for the next fifteen years, at which time he retired from the clothing line and embarked in business as a grocery merchant at No. 139 East Federal Street, where he carried on a large trade until 1915, when he retired entirely from active business life.
After establishing himself at Youngstown Mr. Friedman returned to Europe for a short visit, during which he was married to Kate Greenwald, who was born at Budapest in 1855. They have six children, namely: Sam, who owns a department store at Struthers, Ohio; Emma, who is the wife of Albert Leopold; Dorothy, who is the wife of Max Brunswick; Sadie, who is the wife of Doctor Loewit ; Rose, who is the wife of Sidney L. Geiger ; and Henry, who is the third in order of birth. Isaac Friedman and his wife are members of the Children of Israel congregation.
Henry Friedman attended the Wood Street public school in boyhood, after which he went into his father's store and continued to be associated with him until the latter retired from business. Reared in a careful, frugal home and under the discipline of a sagacious, farseeing father, he had learned
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 611
many of the basic principles of a successful business life, and when opportunity came he proved their value.
It was in 1914 that a business concern at Youngstown, known as the Wilda Grocery, became embarrassed and an auction sale was called in order to satisfy debts. As a casual visitor Henry Friedman strolled in, having neither intention nor capital to embark in business, but that his business ability was recognized and his personal standing in the city considered reliable was manifested to him in a surprising way, when the main creditor of the Wilda concern suggested that he buy the stock, and furthermore offered time for his payments. Thus Henry Friedman became the owner of the first cut-rate grocery store at Youngstown. He took charge of the business with enthusiasm, put in operation plans of his own and within three weeks had sold enough goods to pay for the stock. With this as a beginning he continued in the grocery line for four and a half years, his enterprise resulting so successfully that other lines of business expansion became possible. Mr. Friedman became one of the substantial builders of Youngstown, marking each prosperous business year by the erection of a solid addition to the business section of the city. The first of these creditable buildings was the North Side postoffice structure and the drug store adjoining, followed in quick succession by the Friedman Block just to the south; the Friedman Annex; the Rauple meat market, the Hamiltons grocery store and a tailor shop, all on Elm Street. In the third year after embarking in business he bought two properties on Florencedale Avenue, to the east of the postoffice, and in the fourth year, with other construction work, he purchased the Wendell Apartments and the Carolyn Apartments.
In the meanwhile the great war came on and Mr. Friedman gave more in loyal service to his native land than many are aware. During its entire progress he worked as a dollar a year man, as a member of the United States secret service. Although numbered with the city's capitalists, Mr. Friedman has never entertained the idea "resting on his oars" that has appeared to appeal to many individuals, but on the other hand, as soon as released from obligations of war times he turned his attention again to the business field and embarked in the real estate line, establishing his office in the Mahoning Bank Building. He has consumated some very large deals, a notable one being the sale of the old Y. M. C. A. Building for $252,000. He is a member of the Real Estate Board. It is not only his remarkable business ability that has made his career conspicuous, but it is because Mr. Friedman enjoys the respect and esteem of his fellow citizens and commands their confidence. He belongs to the order of Odd Fellows, and is a faithful member of Rodef Sholem congregation.
EDWARD GODFREY MILLER. Throughout his residence at Warren, covering more than twenty years, Mr. Miller has been general manager of the Warren and Niles Telephone Company, and has made his office an instrument of direct service and benefit to all the patrons and users of the company's service.
Mr. Miller, who is a man of varied business experience, was born at Latrobe, Pennsylvania, October 22, 1861, son of Jacob H. and Elizabeth (Eberhardt) Miller. Both the Miller and Eberhardt families have been identified with Pennsylvania for several generations. Both parents died at Warren. Edward G. Miller was educated in the public schools of Allegheny, Pennsylvania, and began his business life in 1890 as a product clerk in the Carnegie Union Iron Works, now the Carnegie Steel Corporation at Pittsburg. Then successively he was a clerk in a wholesale clothing house at Pittsburg, was general contract agent for the East End Electric Light Company of Pittsburg, and managed a department store at McKeesport. Returning to Pittsburg, he entered the telephone industry in 1893 as service engineer of the Keystone Telephone Company. He therefore had a practical and technical knowledge of the business when he came to the Warren and Niles Telephone Company in 1898. Since 1899 he has filled the post of general manager, and during his administration the equipment and service have been practically transformed, and everything possible has been done to bring the business to an ideal efficiency.
In 1917 a merger plan was worked out and consummated between the Warren and Niles Telephone Company and the Bell Telephone Company, whereby the former bought all of the Warren interests of the latter. During the time between 1917 and 1920 the business of the Warren Telephone Company had such a rapid growth, both in local service and in long distance work, that a large and more comprehensive equipment was necessary. A new three-story granite block addition was put up, thereby increasing the floor space over one hundred per cent and allowing for enlarged equipment, doubling the former capacity, and also made arrangements providing for the comfort of the girl operators by large recreation rooms.
Mr. Miller is a member of the Ohio State Telephone Association and the United States Independent Telephone Association. He is identified with several social organizations at Warren, including Old Erie Lodge No. 3, Ancient, Free and Accepted Masons, Independent Lodge, Knights of Pythias, Warren Board of Trade and the Trumbull Country Club. His wife, Katherine F. Rowand, is a daughter of Arch H. Rowand, a prominent Pittsburg attorney and ex-clerk of courts of that city. Mr. and Mrs. Miller have two daughters, Elizabeth, wife of George F. Konold, Jr., of Warren; and Catherine R., a student in Wellesley College.
DONALD A. MCVEAN is one of the younger executives developed out of- the great iron and steel district of the Mahoning Valley, and is secretary of the Gillen-McVean Company of Youngstown.
He is a son of the late John McVean, who died April 22, 1919, after having given a service of more than half a century to the old Brown-Bonnell Company or Valley Mills at Youngstown. The story of his life is adequately told on other pages of this publication.
Donald A. McVean was born on Valley Street in Youngstown, August 8, 1884. He acquired his early education in the parochial schools of Immaculate Conception parish, and at the age of seventeen followed in his father's footsteps, learning the machinist's trade at the old Valley Mills. For six years he was on regular duty with that industry, and then
612 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
turned his attention to other lines, being a partner in the establishment of the Gillen-McVean Company. This corporation, of which he is secretary, is one of the well known firms in Youngstown, undertakers, furniture dealers and real estate brokers.
April 26, 1908, Mr. McVean married Agnes L. McCormick, daughter of Patrick and Margaret McCormick. Mrs. McVean was a very lovely character, as exemplified in her home life and among a large social circle. She died January 28, 1920, leaving one daughter, Jane. Mr. McVean is a member of the Sacred Heart Catholic Church, and is affiliated with the Knights of Columbus.
FRED W. MARKSTROM AND HENRY R. SCHMIEDENDORF comprise the Mahoning-Trumbull Realty Company, one of the new and progressive organizations in the real estate field in Youngstown and the Mahoning Valley.
Mr. Markstrom was born on Wayne Avenue in Youngstown, August 13, 1895. His parents are Lars A. and Emma Markstrom, who when young people emigrated from Sweden, were married at Pittsburgh, and have lived at Youngstown for the past thirty-five years. Lars Markstrom became an iron worker, was employed as a welder in mills at McKeesport, Pennsylvania, and for years was connected with the Brown-Bonnell plant, continuing with it when it was taken over by the Republic Iron and Steel Company. He is now sixty years of age' and his wife fifty-five, and besides his home owns considerable valuable property in Youngstown. The family are members of the Trinity Methodist Church. There are four children: Hilda, wife of Helmer Marklund, of California; Walter, a resident of Youngstown, was with the Three Hundred and Thirty-Second Infantry in many battlefields in France and lost a leg at Verdun; Fred W.; and Adolph A., an automobile mechanic at Youngstown.
Fred W. Markstrom received his early educational advantages in the South Avenue School and at the age of thirteen went to Lorain, Ohio, where he attended high school two years, for a short time was in the South High at Youngstown and took a course in Hall's Business College. After leaving school he was employed in the office of Homer S. Williams until engaging in the real estate business with E. A. Hegg. Their partnership continued four years, at the end of which time Mr. Markstrom became associated with Mr. Schmiedendorf and established the MahoningTrumbull Realty Company. Their first quarters were in the Wick Building, and they were among the first tenants in the Home Savings & Loan Building on West Federal Street.
Mr. Markstrom is a member and director of the Youngstown Humane Society, and is identified with the Trinity Methodist Church, while his wife belongs to the Central Christian Church. In Masonry he is affiliated with Youngstown Lodge No. 615, Free and Accepted Masons, the Royal Arch Chapter, Buechner Council, Royal and Select Masters, and St. John's Commandery, Knights Templar. October 14, 1916, he married Geneva Stran, of Youngstown. They have one son, Paul.
Henry R. Schmiedendorf, the other member of the Mahoning-Trumbull Realty Company, was born on a farm in Canada, December 28, 1872, son of John and Mary Schmiedendorf. His father was from Mecklenburg, Germany, and his mother from France. Mr. Schmiedendorf received his education in Canada and left the farm, to learn the cabinet maker's trade. For several years he lived in Michigan, employed by the Crab-Sparrow Lumber Company, and was also in the northwestern states for several years. For a time he was in Buffalo with a firm manufacturing hardware specialties, and had his first experience in the real estate business in Buffalo. He has been a resident of Youngstown since 1915, and is a well informed and highly capable man in his special field.
JOSEPH HENRY SCHNURRENBERGER, M. D., graduate in medicine of the Medical Department of the Western Reserve University, class of 1892, and since practically that year one of the respected and widely-known physicians of Mahoning County, in possession of a wide practice centering from Austintown, is of a family which was early in the Mahoning Valley. The Schnurrenberger family was originally from Germany. Doctor Schnurrenberger is a grandson of Conrad Schnurrenberger, who was born in Wurtemberg, Germany, and when eighteen years old came with his parents, John and Barbara (Haller) Schnurrenberger, to America, and to Ohio. Conrad settled in Greenford, Green Township, Columbiana County, now, however, in Mahoning County, and there married Elizabeth Baker, who was born in Jessamine County, Kentucky, daughter of Lewis and Elizabeth (Zimmerman) Baker, who eventually also settled in Greenford. Capt. Joseph Zimmerman was the grandfather of John L. Zimmerman of Springfield, Ohio. Conrad Schnurrenberger was one of the pioneers of Green Township, for the land he took possession of when he married was in the original or wild state, and their early married life was spent in a log cabin, in which John, father of Dr. Joseph H., was born. Conrad lived to old age in industrious development work, clearing gradually an extensive tract. He was eighty-four years old when he died, and he was buried in the cemetery in the center of Green Township. The old farm is still in the possession of one of his descendants. Conrad Schnurrenberger had three sisters: Barbara, who married Christian Rinkenberger, a neighboring farmer; Hannah, who married George Trucksess and died near Columbiana; and Catherine, who became Mrs. Behringer, and died in Marion County, Ohio. Conrad was a man of strong religious fervor, and for very many years was a member of the Church of the Disciples of Christ. He died on April 12, 1885, ten years after the death of his wife, Elizabeth Baker, whose death came in August, 1875. They were the parents of seven children : Mary Barbara, who died in the old home in 1917, at the age of eighty-four years, unmarried; John, father of Dr. Joseph H.; Lyman, now living in retirement in Washingtonville, Mahoning County, and more regarding whose life has been written for inclusion elsewhere in this history; Solomon Baker, who was a farmer in Green Township, but died when only thirty-two years old; Joseph C., who became the owner of the parental home and for twenty-five years was in partnership with his brother Lyman in the raising of Shorthorn cattle and sheep, became somewhat prominent in local and county
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 613
politics, was elected to the office of county treasurer, but his time, however, was given almost wholly to farming, and his life of seventy-one years was spent almost entirely on the old Schnurrenberger farm in Greenford, where he was born in 1843 and where he died in 1914; Elizabeth Ann, who lives in Springfield, Missouri, and is the widow of Charles Price; and Ellen, who died in childhood.
John, second child of Conrad and Elizabeth (Baker) Schnurrenberger, was born in Greenford, Green Township, Columbiana County, in the log cabin originally built by his father when the land was first taken over by him, and his early life was passed under somewhat similar conditions to those which prevailed in the average pioneer settlement. He was able to obtain very little schooling. He attended the local schools, but they were open for practically only the winter months, and the standard of education was not very high or very comprehensive. However, as he passed through manhood he was more or less a student, and came to be considered a well-posted and capable man of affairs. He took intelligent, indeed prominent, part in public questions, and gained the respect and friendship of many people. By calling he was a craftsman, a carpenter and cabinet maker, and he worked industriously throughout his life, which was passed mainly in Greenford village, where he died when fifty-six years old. He married Eliza Jane Zimmerman, who bore him two children, but she died when Joseph Henry, the elder child, was only four years old. The other child was Lewis V., and after the death of their mother, John Schnurrenberger was both father and mother to them, and successfully reared -them through their years of infancy. The boys attended the local schools, and eventually grew to manhood.
Joseph Henry, elder child of John and Eliza Jane (Zimmerman) Schnurrenberger, was born on the old Schnurrenberger farm in Greenford, Green Township, about a mile north of Washingtonville, on August 5, 1865. After passing through the local schools he was able to enter upon higher education, and eventually to enter the medical school of Western Reserve University, from which, in due course, he was graduated with the class of 1892, with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. Classmates of his were Doctors Miles, of Salem, Veach, of Youngstown, and also Doctor Yost. Soon after he had obtained his medical diploma Doctor Schnurrenberger began to practice medicine in Austintown and the vicinity, and during the twenty-eight year of his professional practice he has become widely known throughout the county. He has a large practice in the surrounding country centering from Austintown, and is well regarded in the profession. He holds membership in many professional societies, including the American Medical Association and the State and County Medical Societies, and he has also during his life found a very practical and healthful hobby in his interest in farming. He owns a fine farming property of 200 acres, formerly known as the Gilbert farm, and the doctor has been quite successful in dairy and general farming.
Doctor Schnurrenberger was married in 1903 to Maud A. Gilbert, daughter of John A. and Margaret (Troxell) Gilbert, the latter a daughter of Mrs. Rebecca Snyder, who lives nearby. Mrs. Snyder is the great-great-grandmother of Genevieve Schnurrenberger, the infant daughter of Gilbert Miles Schnurrenberger, son of Dr. Joseph H., and a photograph of much historic note is that recently taken of the five generations, Mrs. Snyder, her daughter Margaret, her granddaughter Maud, Mrs. Schnurrenberger, her great-grandson Gilbert M. Schnurrenberger, and her great-great-grandchild Genevieve. Doctor and Mrs. Schnurrenberger are the parents of two children: Gilbert Miles, who is a partner with Paul Wilcox in a garage and automobile business at Austintown, and John Armand, who is still in school.
ROY WESTOVER. Thirty years of age, Roy Westover has had an unusual variety of business experience, and a few years ago his interests and inclination led him into the field of real estate, where he has shown his best forte. He has handled an immense volume of property in the aggregate. He is also a member of the firm Westover Brothers, who besides doing a large business in real estate are proprietors of the Stag Hotel at Youngstown.
Mr. Westover was born on the Arrel Farm, south of Lowellville in Mahoning County, October 7, 1890, a son of Allen and Kezia (Hoon) Westover. The Westovers were pioneers in the Western Reserve from Connecticut. Kezia Hoon was born at Deerfield in Portage County. Allen Westover and wife are still living, their home being in Youngstown, Ohio. They are Methodists. Allen Westover for a long period of years was a successful farmer.
Youngest of six children to reach mature years, Roy Westover acquired his early education at Kansas Corners, worked on a farm for two years, to the age of sixteen, and was then an employe of different steel plants until wog. The next five years he was a brakeman with the Pennsylvania Railroad Company and for two years a yard conductor for the Erie Railroad at Youngstown.
His first acquaintance with the real estate business was as a member of the sales force of Harry Gugenheim, selling residential property. For a year he was in partnership with Edmund McDonald, selling all kinds of real estate, and in April, 1919, branched out in business for himself with offices in the Dollar Bank Building. In this brief time the business done by him reaches the imposing total of more than $2,000,000 in value. Recently he formed his partnership with his brother L. G. Westover, another prominent business man of the Mahoning Valley, and they opened the new Stag Hotel in the Maloney Building, conducting that in connection with their real estate operations. Mr. Westover's specialty has been the buying of houses and rebuilding and remodeling prior to selling to new owners. Mr. Westover is a member of the Real Estate Board and has served as a member of its committees. He is independent in politics, and his chief public interest is in the general' welfare of Youngstown.
CLEMENT A. RUKENBROD. The health and comfort of a great city are largely dependent upon certain agencies that provide necessary commodities, and one of the most important is that which secures and dis-
614 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
tributes ice. Comfortable modern urban life can scarcely be imagined deprived of this article, not only as a household necessity, but in the wider field of economics as the preservative of meats, vegetables and fruits in transportation or storage. The modern use of ice has made possible the general enjoyment of the products of the earth from every clime, providing in the United States a varied diet that could in no other way be secured. In those sections where natural ice can be procured in abundance in season the cutting and storing provides employment for an army of hardy workers, and the, payroll of such big companies as the Crystal Ice Company of Youngstown amounts to a vast sum. The successful management of such a large enterprise demands the careful attention of an able business man, and' the company has just such a man in Clement A. Rukenbrod.
Mr. Rukenbrod was born at Leetonia, Columbiana County, Ohio, November 3o, 1889, and is a son of William H. and Elizabeth (Wagner) Rukenbrod. William H. Rukenbrod was born fifty-eight years ago on the old family homestead near North Lima in Mahoning County. His parents, Solomon and Mary Rukenbrod, still live there, the former of whom was born in Pennsylvania in 1836. William H. Rukenbrod followed farming for a number of years before moving to Youngstown, in which city he was long associated with J. W. Parkin in the transfer business. In later years he returned to the farm, and he and wife still live there. She is a daughter of Andrew Wagner, who is a member of one of the old Mahoning County families, his farm lying on the Poland Road.
Clement A. Rukenbrod spent his early school days at Youngstown, being a pupil of the Front Street Public School, and later was graduated from the high school at North Lima. In 1907 he returned to Youngstown, and in the following year entered the employ of the Crystal Ice Company as collector, and has continued in a business relation with this company ever since, receiving promotions from time to time until he was appointed manager. The plant of the company is situated at West Lake Crossing.
On May 30, 1913, Mr. Rukenbrod was united in marriage to Miss Ruth H. Diser, who is a daughter of Darwin and Sarah Diser, of New Springfield, Ohio, and is a sister of Oscar Diser, a prominent attorney at Youngstown. Mr. and Mrs. Rukenbrod have two little daughters, namely : Jane Louise and Sarah Elizabeth. The family belong to Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church. Mr. Rukenbrod is a very active member of the Chamber of Commerce, and belongs also to the Credit Men's Association, these connections being indicative of his standing in the business field. His political sentiments make him a republican.
JOHN GAULT is a citizen whose influence has been widely impressed upon Mahoning County. This is true notwithstanding the fact that his chief interests have been centered in Jackson Township, where his life of eighty-four years has been lived. While the management of a productive farm has been his chief responsibility, his interest has extended beyond his own home to the improvement of schools, the establishment of good roads, the efficiency of public service both in township and county, and to every moral advantage of the community.
The Gaults were among the first families of Jackson Township. An uncle of John Gault, Andrew, was the first white child born in the township. The Gaults were also closely related by marriage with the Ewing family. In Pennsylvania, where the early history of the family belongs, the great-grandfather of John Gault joined the colonial forces at the time of the War of 1812, and was a personal friend of General Washington. The grand-father's name was Robert Gault, a native of Washington County, Pennsylvania. In Moo he settled in Jackson Township in the Western Reserve, became a soldier in the War of 1812, and died in October, 1814. His wife was Charlotte Bowman, also a native of Pennsylvania.
The father of John Gault, also named Robert, was born in Ohio, but spent his life chiefly in Mahoning County, where he died in January, 1892. In 1834 he married Marjorie Ewing, who was born in 1816 and lived on one farm in Mahoning County for over seventy years. Her father, John Ewing, was a native of Ireland, came to America in 1800, and in 1804 to Mahoning County.
John Gault was the oldest of twelve children, a complete record of whom is briefly sketched elsewhere. John Gault was born in Jackson Township, December 27, 1836, had a district school education, attended Canfield Academy, and for half a century has lived on his farm twelve miles west of Youngstown. That farm comprises 166 acres, and for a number of years past has been under the management of a tenant. In former years Mr. Gault gave his farm a reputation as the home of some high class. Durham cattle.
Those familiar with public improvements in that section of Mahoning County say that the fine system of improved highways now found in Jackson Township are due in no small measure to the influence and effort of John Gault. He has had some official connection with local or county affairs since young manhood. In the early days he served on the school board, and in 1882 was elected a county commissioner and re-elected in 1885. For some twenty years he has filled the office of justice of the peace, and was only recently re-elected. He has attended many state conventions of the republican party as a delegate. He is a member of the Grange and practically a life-long member of the Presbyterian Church. Mr. Gault was a close friend and admirer of the late Hugh A. Manchester, Canfield's banker, and one of the county's most advanced men. Mr. Gault has been associated with many others of the old leaders in Mahoning County. Pe is well read and informed, and is a most genial and companionable gentleman.
In September, 1861, Mr. Gault married Louisa M. Johnson, a sister of Judge J. R. Johnson of Youngstown. She was killed in a railroad accident in September, 1888. In 1890 Mr. Gault married Mrs. Sarah Jane (Davis) Sampson, who died in 1899, and for his third wife he married Mrs. Margaret J. (Copeland) Armstrong. Mr. Gault has three children, all by his first marriage, and took special pains to give them good educations and adequate preparation for lives of usefulness. Joseph Grant, the oldest, was born December 27, 1863, completed his education
615 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
in the Ohio Normal College at Ada, and for a number of years has been one of Ohio's prominent farmers and hog raisers. His home is near Columbus in Union County, where he makes a practice of growing about 200 acres of corn every year and send hundreds of hogs to market annually. He married Cora Bennett, and their children are John B., Howard and Mary L. Lulu Olive Gault, the only daughter, received a thorough classical education in Hiram College and is the wife of Rev. J. E. Lynn, of Boulder, Colorado. Rev. Mr. Lynn was formerly a Disciples minister at Warren, Ohio. Mr. and Mrs. Lynn have three children, Emerson, Rachel and Gault Lynn. George Francis Gault, the youngest child, was born August 9, 1879, was educated in the Rayen High School and the Ohio Normal University at Ada, and is a successful civil engineer connected with the Pennsylvania Railroad at Richmond, Indiana. He married Floy Henry. They have two children, Marjorie A. and Arthur D.
CIRO SAULINO gained his first experience in business in his native country of Italy, spent a number of years in the great South America City of Buenos Aires, and for the past seventeen years has been a resident of Youngstown. He is now a well known banker of the city, his place of business being at 382 East Federal Street.
Mr. Saulino was born in Agnone-Campobasso, Italy, February 21, 1875. His father, Nicholas Saulino, was an Italian merchant and died in Italy in 1902. The widowed mother afterward came to Youngstown and died here December 21, 1912.
Ciro Saulino acquired a high school education in Campobasso, and as a boy was given the benefit of training in his father's place of business. With his father's consent and advice he went at the age of fifteen to Buenos Aires, and remained in South America ten years, chiefly engaged in clerical work. He then returned to Italy and in 1903 with a brother and two sisters crossed the Atlantic to Youngstown.
Mr. Saulino is a painter by trade, a vocation he learned after coming to America, and followed it until 1912. For one year he was an employe of the mercantile establishment of Agnone & Company, and the B in 1913 opened his bank, foreign exchange and steamship agency. His business ability, personal integrity and large acquaintance have been the means of his building up a very flourishing business.
Mr. Saulino was unable to speak a word of the English language when he came to Youngstown. He overcame that handicap by attending night school at the Y. M. C. A., and the earnestness that prompted him to acquire American speech and methods of business has been characteristic of his solid American citizenship ever since. He votes independently in local elections, but in national politics is a republican.
In 1906 Mr. Saulino married Elizabeth Saulino, a native of the State of Ohio. Their four children are Angela, born in 1908; Nicholas, born in 1913; Florence, born in 1916; and Ciro, Jr., born in 1918. The family are members of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church.
JOHN D. MCCAMBRIDGE. Many years as a merchant, accumulating property interests, and the faithful and effective manner in which he discharged his duties to his home, community and all those with whom he had business relations, were distinctive facts in the career of the late John D. McCambridge, whose death, on March 22, 1920, was widely mourned in Youngstown.
He had spent about fifty years in that city. He was born at Pittsburgh, January 3, 1862, son of James and Mary (McAfee) McCambridge. His father came from County Antrim, Ireland, at the age of fifteen, grew up in Pittsburgh, where he married and where his wife was born, and in 1869 brought the family to Youngstown. James McCambridge was a skilled iron and steel worker, and for many years was 'a puddler in the Cartwright and Brown-Bonnell mills. He and his wife for years were faithful members of St. Columba's Catholic Church. In 1910 the parents removed to Cleveland. The father died in April, 1915, at the age of eighty-four and the mother on March 25, 192o, aged eighty-two, dying just three days after the death of her son John.
John D. McCambridge was the oldest of eleven children, six of whom are still living. He acquired his early education in St. Columba's parochial schools, and as a youth left home and went West to Leadville, Colorado. On returning to Youngstown he became an employe of the grocery department of the McKelvey Department Store, but after three years formed a partnership with Frank Riggenbaugh. They located their store at Watt and Boardman streets, and their partnership continued with uninterrupted prosperity and service for twenty years. Later their business was moved to East Federal Street near Watt. In the meantime Mr. McCambridge had been investing his surplus in a number of parcels of property in the neighborhood of his store, and when he finally retired from his mercantile partnership he gave his time to handling his private affairs. His many friends and neighbors, not only American born but those of foreign parentage, had implicit faith in his good judgment and integrity. He was exceedingly charitable, ready to help out those in misfortune, and had unbounded faith in the great future of Youngstown as an industrial city. For a number of years he was associated with E. M. Muldoon in the real estate business.
Mr. McCambridge was a democrat, and had no ambition for office. This lent special contrast to the fact that the announcement of his appointment as a jury commissioner appeared the same morning of his death. He was a district deputy and grand knight of the Knights of Columbus, and was also a stockholder in the Home Building and Loan Company.
In May, 1886, Mr. McCambridge married Elizabeth Bonner, daughter of Charles Bonner of Pittsburgh. She died in 1891. Mr. McCambridge is survived by two daughters. Marie is the wife of Jacques Stanitz, chief engineer of the Youngstown Pressed Steel Company, and they have one child, John B. Helen is the wife of George Harper, an artist at Detroit, 'Michigan, and they are the parents of four children, George, John, Mary and Charles.
CLARENCE F. ERB. It is a normal and commendable ambition to have a business of one's own such as will properly represent the fruits of experience and cumulative skill. It was this ambition that led Clarence F. Erb in 1911, after several years of prac-
616 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
tical training and experience as a machinist in the larger industrial plants around Youngstown, to open a little machine shop in a room 14 by 20 feet.
The Erb Machine Shop today at 722 West Madison Avenue has a complete equipment and orders for more business than it can turn out. Mr. Erb is now erecting a brick building adjoining, 45 by 115 feet, and that will give him facilities for increased business.
Mr. Erb was born at Vienna in Trumbull County, Ohio, June 4, 1886, a son of Michael and Lydia (Thomas) Erb, the former now fifty-seven and the latter fifty-four years of age. His father was born at Coalburg, Ohio, and his mother in Belgium. The father has spent his life as a coal miner and farmer, and they are now living on a farm just east of Church Hill, being members of the church in that community.
The oldest of four children, Clarence F. Erb attended school at Vienna and at the age of sixteen began an apprenticeship at the machinist's trade in the Ohio plant at Youngstown. He was also employed at Valley Mills, in the Sheet and Tube plant, the Truscon plant and the Youngstown Foundry. He accepted every opportunity to improve his knowledge and skill, and then, in 1911, chiefly on the capital of his skill, opened his first shop.
Mr. Erb is a member of the Engineers Club of Youngstown. He married, at Pittsburgh, Miss Helen Matthews, of Youngstown. They have four children : Wick, Robert, Margaret and Clarence.
THOMAS W. HARDESTY, one of the leading residents of Jackson Township, Mahoning County, Ohio, is a retired business man of Youngstown, and he has invested an appreciable amount of money in making for himself in Jackson Township a comfortable country estate. His bungalow-residence is on a site he himself chose on the Ravenna brick road, about nine miles to the westward of Youngstown, and the thirty-four acres of land he owns have been very considerably improved in fertility since he entered into possession. He is a man of generous characteristics and marked public spirit, and has made many friends in the township.
He was born in Perry Township, Mercer County, Pennsylvania, on June 8, 1858, the son of Hugh. D. and Harriett (Russell) Hardesty, and grandson of Thomas and Margaret (Thompson) Hardesty. Thomas Hardesty for the latter part of his life was one of the early forge men at Akron, Ohio, where most of his children, including Hugh D., were born. He died in 1847, but his widow survived him for thirty years, and was ninety-six years old when she died in about 1877. Thomas and Margaret (Thompson) Hardesty were the parents of eleven children, ten of whom were sons. The daughter died in early life, but the ten sons all reached manhood, and after the death of their father most of them as they grew into manhood set about the business of life self-reliantly and scattered to widely-separated parts of the country. Indeed, there is little or no trace of the subsequent activities of some of the sons. One son, Frank, became a prominent manufacturer in St. Louis, Missouri, and acquired much material wealth by his successful operation of iron furnaces in that city. Three of the sons, Hugh, Daniel and William, remained together for some time, and the greater part of their lives were spent in Ohio, in Mahoning and Chenango counties. The three were connected with ironworks. William lived at Niles, Trumbull County, and his son, William T., became part owner of the Struthers Mill and also the mill at Niles, and later he was identified with the Trumbull Steel Works at Niles. He was a man of inclination to mechanics, and evidently had good business ability, for he steadily advanced in business responsibility until in the latter part of his life he was a factor of some consequence among the leading iron manufacturers of Ohio. He died a wealthy man about five years ago. Daniel died near New Castle, Pennsylvania, having latterly been connected with furnace plants in that part of Pennsylvania.
Hugh D. Hardesty, father of Thomas W., was born in Akron, Ohio, and associated as his father was with iron making enterprises, it was only to be expected that most of his sons should also take up that profitable industry. Hugh learned the trade of blacksmithing and ironworking at Sharpsville, Pennsylvania, and shortly after the Civil war associated with Thomas Pollack at Briar Hill in the old Eagle Furnace. In 1867 Walker Kennedy built a block furnace at Haselton. Hugh Hardesty worked as blacksmith in the starting of that furnace, and went later with Kennedy to Struthers, Mahoning County, Ohio, where the latter constructed other furnaces. Hugh Hardesty was furnace keeper at Haselton prior to coming to. Struthers, and had the same responsibility in the new plant; indeed, he continued in that capacity with the Kennedy enterprises for many years, going to a Kennedy plant at Sharpsville, Pennsylvania, after some years at Struthers. Later he became identified with the Brown-Bonnell Company at Youngstown. Eventually he retired from such occupations, and for some years prior to his death was to some extent interested in a sawmill enterprise his son John conducted at Milledge, Pennsylvania. It was in that place that Hugh D. Hardesty died in his sixty-eighth year. He had married in Mercer County, Pennsylvania, but was for many years a widower, for his wife died in 1869, while they were residents of Haselton. Three of their children reached manhood. Regarding the life of Thomas W. more follows. Arthur was connected with coal mining and oil producing industries for the greater part of his life. He associated with his brother Thomas W. in operations in the oil section of Pennsylvania for some time, but later was superintendent and subsequently general manager for important coal mining undertakings in West Virginia. John, who owned a sawmill in Pennsylvania, died in Hillsville, that state.
Thomas W. has worked with his father in Struthers and Youngstown, but in 1875, in company with his brother Arthur, went to Parker's Landing on the Allegany River, Pennsylvania. There he spent four years as a tool dresser and driller of oil wells. Returning to Youngstown in 1879, he became connected with the Brown-Bonnell Company. Two years later he went to Haselton, and there remained until 1884, having well-paid work as a puddler in the furnace plant of Andrews Brothers of that place. Then he returned to Youngstown and acquired the
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 617
Hub Hotel on Mahoning Avenue. He was the proprietor of that hostelry until 1903. Then he built the Imperial Hotel on the corner of Boardman and Front streets, opening the hotel in 1904 and conducting it for six years. In 1910 he retired altogether from business and leased his hotel, which he recently sold. For more than twenty-five years he was one of the reputable hotel proprietors of Youngstown, and has very many friends in that city. Since 1910, however, he has lived in the country, to some extent taking to farming pursuits as a hobby. In 1916 he acquired the tract of land upon which he now resides. It is about nine miles from Youngstown, but for six years of his life in the country he was somewhat nearer Youngstown. On his first country home he executed many improvements, some of them quite elaborate, but the estate was smaller than he desired, and he eventually bought the larger tract he now owns in Jackson Township. He was first influenced in seeking to own it because of its attractiveness as a building site, the land itself being unattractive. The tract was covered with stumps and briars, and the soil was much impoverished. But during the four years from then to the present Mr. Hardesty has brought a great change. The land is now in good tillable condition, and upon it he has built a fine residence of the bungalow type. He has one of the few flowing artesian wells in the county, and he has found health and enjoyment in converting the neglected tract into its present fine state of fertility.
As a public-spirited citizen Mr. Hardesty has upon many occasions given evidence of his sincerity and his generosity. He has closely followed public affairs, and has given material and personal assistance wherever possible. He has a good reputation both in Jackson Township and in the City of Youngstown, where he has many close friends. He was one of the charter members and the first treasurer of the Junior Order of American Mechanics in Youngstown.
In 1879 Thomas W. Hardesty married Harriet M. Lewis, daughter of Richard Lewis, now deceased. Her father was killed in a mining accident at the coal mine he owned at Nebo, below Struthers, Ohio. Her mother later married John Williams, who was also connected with coal mining. Of the children of Mr. and Mrs. Hardesty only one reached majority, their son Charles L. He is an attorney having graduated from the law school of the University of Pennsylvania. He is also a graduate of the Western Reserve University of Cleveland. He lived with his father in Youngstown until 1907, and at one time was connected with the Youngstown office of the Standard Oil Company. In 1907 he went to Roswell, New Mexico, where he remained for four years. Latterly he had responsible connection with the Industrial Efficiency Department of the Republic Rubber Company, the department being responsible for the increase in productive efficiency of that corporation's plants. He is now factory employment manager of the plant. He is a Mason, an Independent Order of Odd Fellow, an Eagle and Woodman of the World. Charles L. Hardesty married Anna Jones, of Sharon, and they have three children, Charles L., Marion and Charlotte.
DAVID C. HAMILTON. It is by a record of twenty-seven years that David C. Hamilton has identified himself with the industrial affairs of the Mahoning Valley. For many years he was in the mills, and is now secretary and treasurer of the Concrete Stone & Sand Company.
Mr. Hamilton was born at Plain Grove, a country town in Lawrence County, Pennsylvania, June 14, 1868, a son of David and Susan (Offutt) Hamilton. His father was the son of parents born on the Isle of Man, and his own birthplace was the ground made historic as the scene of the battle of Gettysburg. While he was a youth his people moved to Western Pennsylvania, and when the Civil war came on he served in the Round Head or One Hundredth Pennsylvania Infantry, and did some gallant service, participating in the seven days' battles around Richmond and in other campaigns. In Western Pennsylvania he was a farmer and stock raiser, and took much pride in raising good horses and other livestock. He was an influential man in the republican party and enjoyed personal association with such Pennsylvania leaders as Boies Penrose and Matt Quay. At his death, in 1908, he was seventy-eight years of age, while his wife passed away in 1906, at the age of seventy-five. Of their nine children, six sons and three daughters, four sons and three daughters are still living, David C. being the fifth in age. His two older brothers became successful physicians.
David C. Hamilton attended country schools and spent three years in Westminster College at New Wilmington, Pennsylvania. It was in 1893 that he went with the Falcon Iron Works at Niles earning $1.15 a day at common labor. Later he was put on the shears, and altogether spent seventeen years as a sheet shearman, seven years at Niles and ten years with the Youngstown Sheet & Tube Company.
Mr. Hamilton became identified with the Concrete Stone and Sand Company in 1910, and as secretary and treasurer has had an important part in making that a valued industry of the Mahoning Valley. Out of his experience and mechanical skill he has developed some machinery for making concrete forms, and these machines are now being distributed in all parts of the country. During the war Mr. Hamilton was engaged in war work, having charge of much building at the steel works of the Schwab plant at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
Mr. Hamilton is a member of the First Presbyterian Church of Youngstown, and his only lodge is his own home. He married in 1900 Miss Bessie Wick, daughter of William H. Wick. She was born in the Freeman 0. Arms home at Youngstown. They have six children : Grace Louise, David R., Alexander R., Carolyn, Margaret and Robert Bentley.
SAMUEL S. HINELY is one of the veteran merchants of Youngstown, and has been connected with the grocery and meat business of the city for thirty years. He is now senior member of Hinely Brothers, grocers and meat merchants at 711 West Rayen or Westlake Crossing.
Mr. Hinely was born on a farm near the state line in Lawrence County, Pennsylvania, October 19,
1867, son of John and Christina (Elser) Hinely, the former a native of Lawrence County and the latter of
618 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
Stuttgart, Germany. John Hinely spent his active life as a farmer and stock raiser, and he and his wife are members of the Lutheran Church at Petersburg. Of their ten children six are living, Samuel S. being the oldest.
Samuel S. Hinely spent his early life on a farm, attended the Hopes country school, and was a young man when he came to Youngstown and entered the service of H. D. Kaercher, then a grocery merchant at Westlake Crossing. He also acquired a practical knowledge of the butcher trade in the old Falls Avenue slaughter house. Mr. Hinely in 1896 opened a modest stock of groceries and a retail meat market, and later his brother Edward R. joined him, and they have since seen their business grow and prosper until their trade now covers practically the entire city.
Mr. Hinely married October 28, 1892, Miss Nettie Burrows, daughter of George Burrows, who was a Union soldier in the Civil war. Mr. and Mrs. Hinley have two children. Their son, George R. Hinely, was with the colors at Camp Sherman during the World war. The daughter, Pearl, is the wife of Arthur McCracken. George R. Hinely and Mr. McCracken are now associated in the real estate business with offices at 339 West Federal Street. The family are members of Grace Lutheran Church, Mr. Hinely being a member of its board of trustees. He is affiliated with Robert E. Johnston Lodge, Knights of Pythias.
JOSEPH G. MCCARTNEY. The McCartney family of Coitsville recently had occasion to celebrate the centennial anniversary of the family's coming to the Mahoning Valley. Through the century that has just passed many of the name have played their worthy parts in the farming, industrial and civic life of the community. The last survivor of the second generation of the family in the Mahoning Valley was the late Joseph G. McCartney, who died March 10, He spent all his life in Coitsville, where some of his descendants still occupy the old homestead farm. On that farm he was born July 10, 1834, son of James and Elizabeth (Maxwell) McCartney. His father was born in County Fermanagh, Ireland, October I, 1791, and his mother in the same county November 13, 1793. They were married October is, 1815, and in 1817 came to America and for two years lived at Philadelphia, where James McCartney followed his trade as a shoemaker. In 1819 he moved to Youngstown, where he worked as a shoemaker, conducted a brick yard, made the material and erected one of the first brick houses in the city, at the corner of Federal and Walnut streets, and subsequently bought land in Coitsville Township and moved his family into the log house where Joseph G. McCartney was born. In 185o a very substantial brick residence was erected on his farm, and Joseph G. McCartney as a boy helped in its construction. James McCartney died April 16, 1869, and his wife on April 14, 1865.
Nine of the ten children of James McCartney and wife reached mature years. All are now deceased. Sarah, who became the wife of George Braden, has a daughter, Mrs. Philip Haas, living at Youngstown.. Eliza Jane, who became the wife of Thomas Noble, has a daughter, Mrs. S. L. Clark, of Youngstown. Johnston McCartney, a resident farmer, Mercer, Pennsylvania, married but left no children. Lucy' Ann was the wife of Abram Kline, and a son, Frank Kline, now has his home at Church Hill. James H. died in Texas, leaving a family. Isabella was first married to Arthur Young and later to Thomas Burns, and left no children. William died in Colorado, where some of his family reside, his son Dr. Frank McCartney being a resident of Denver. Mary became the wife of Silas Fankel and left no children.
Joseph G. McCartney spent his active life on the homestead farm, following the business of general farming and dairying, and eventually laid out part of the original quarter section into a number of lots which he named Marion Heights, in honor of his granddaughter, Marion McGeehan. His life was one of great industry and devoted to agriculture. He was also a man of much influence in his community. He was a pioneer in the prohibition movement, and did much to discourage the sale and use of liquor in his community, and also lent his influence to the woman's suffrage cause. For nine years he served as a justice of the peace of Coitsville Township, and was an active member and official of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
December 13, 1865, Mr. McCartney married Miss Mary Milligan, who was born in Coitsville, September 25, 184o. She was a member of an old and prominent family of the Mahoning Valley Her father, James Milligan, was born in Ireland and came to the United States with his parents at the age of twelve years. He was a son of John and Margaret Milligan. At the age of twenty-one James Milligan married Catherine McGuffey. Her name introduces the noted McGuffey family of Coitsville, especially distinguished by William Holmes McGuffey, the scholar, educator, author and compiler of the series of "McGuffey Readers" which were used as part of the instruction in public schools of America from coast to coast for many years, and influenced several generations in their literary tastes.
A brief statement of the genealogy of the McGuffey family may appropriately be introduced at this point : Alexander McGuffey, founder of the family, died in 1855, at the age of eighty-seven. His first wife, Anna Holmes, died January 20, 1829. His second wife was Mary Dickey, who died in 1892, at the age of ninety-nine. The children of the first marriage were: William Holmes McGuffey, named above; Jane, who married Henry Stewart; Henry: Anna, who became the wife of Nehemiah Harris: Mrs. Betsy Neil; Asenath, who became the wife of John Rayney ; Alexander Hamilton and Catherine, the mother of Mrs. McCartney. Alexander McGuffey and Mary Dickey had the following children: Harriet, who married John Love ; Margaret, who married Andrew Dunlap; and Nancy, who died unmarried. Of these Mrs. Margaret Dunlap is a widow still living at Sharon, Pennsylvania ; Mrs. Harriet Love, a widow, lives with her sister at Sharon. Descendants of Alexander McGuffey by his first wife still living are Hamilton Harris, whose home is between Poland and Youngstown ; Sarah, a daughter of Mrs. Henry Stewart, who is the widow of Robert Wallace and is living at New Castle, Pennsylvania;
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 619
and Mrs. Joseph G. McCartney, now living on the McCartney homestead in Coitsville.
The children of James Milligan and Catherine McGuffey were: W. J. Milligan; Sarah, who married her cousin, P. McGuffey ; Mary, Mrs. Joseph G. McCartney; Isabelle, who became the wife of William Smith, of Coitsville; Margaret, who married Ira Mariner, of Coitsville; Alexander, who never married. A daughter of William J. Milligan is Mrs. Bessie Ernst, wife of a Youngstown attorney.
Joseph G. McCartney and wife had six children : William, Matilda, Bessie, James, Adaline and Minnie. Minnie died at the age of fifteen. William became a civil engineer, finishing his education with the degree of C. E. in the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at Troy, New York. Is 1895 he married Carrie A. Jones of Troy, New York. Of this marriage there is a daughter, Gertrude Elizabeth. Matilda, a graduate of the Rayen High School at Youngstown, became the wife of Thomas McGeehan, and after his death, which was in 1917, became the second wife of W. H. Reed. One daughter by the first marriage, Marion McGeehan, now lives in Marion Heights, the place being named by her grandfather for her. Bessie, like her sister Matilda, attended the Rayen High School and taught school for a time. In 1893 she became the wife of Dr. Osborne Yost, who died in 1905. She later built a home on what was once part of the old farm. She has two children, Harold and Marjorie. The son James, who now lives on the old homestead, was associated with his father in the dairy business before the latter's death, and continued the dairy business for a time, but later, in 1920, became associated with the other members of the family in the development and sale of the homestead farm under the name of the McCartney Realty Company. In 1897 he married Lora B. Wilson. Adaline is the wife of Indice Small, an expert buyer and dealer in rugs, carpets, etc., at Youngstown. They built a home and now live on what was once a part of the McCartney farm. Their four children are Josephine, Martha, Robert and James McGuffey.
Louis K. MAUSER. The business by which the name Mauser has been longest identified with Youngstown is stone contracting and building. Louis K. Mauser was for many years a partner with his father in that business, but now gives his chief time and attention to the Mauser Warehouse Company, of which he is general manager.
His father, the late Christian Mauser, was born in Wuertemberg, Germany, where he learned the trade of stone cutter. As a young man with limited means he came to this country and the first summer he worked at his trade for wages. Thrifty, with a desire to get a little capital, he failed to collect his wages and allowed them to accumulate, and later his employer heat him out of the money due. The following winter he worked on a farm for $6.00 a month and hoard. Springtime brought him employment at his trade, and this time with better results. Eventually he became a stone contractor, and laid the foundation for many of the larger plants of Youngstown. He built the first Dollar Bank Building, the Renner Building, the Pabst Brewing Company's plant, the foundations for the first Market Street bridge, the East End bridge, and in connection with his business operated a well equipped stone quarry at Austintown. His business brought him substantial prosperity and he was a well known man of affairs for many years. He' gave employment to a large number of workmen, and some of them achieved business success of their own. Christian Mauser died in 1909, at the age of sixty-three. He was an official member of the Lutheran Church at Champion and Wood streets, and a republican in politics. He married, at Youngstown, Lucinda Krum, who was born on a farm near New Middletown, Ohio, and is still living at the age of seventy-three. Their family consisted of two sons and three daughters : Emma, wife of Fred Kirchner ; Louis K.; Alice, who died at the age of fourteen; Bertha, wife of James Price, who is a rougher in the McKeesport Mills; and August, at home.
Louis K. Mauser was born at Youngstown, February 5, 1874, and received his first schooling in the Oak Street School, also attended the German Lutheran parochial schools, and is a graduate of the Wood Street School. After completing his education he was in business with his father until the latter's death. The Mauser Warehouse Company's plant occupies the site of his father's old stone yard. Mr. Mauser is an active member of the Warehouse Association and the Chamber of Commerce, and is a member of Grace Lutheran Church.
GEORGE F. TURNER, present city engineer of Youngstown, is a graduate civil engineer, and has had nearly twenty years of active experience in his profession.
He was born at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, January 13, 1882, a son of Rev. James D. and Rebecca J. (Murdock) Turner. His parents were also natives of Pennsylvania, his father born at Wilkinsburg and his mother at Pittsburgh. Rev. James D. Turner was a graduate of Waynesburg College, later attended and graduated from the Allegheny Theological Seminary, and became a United Presbyterian minister. He served altogether in three pastorates, one in New York, one in Cincinnati and one in Pittsburgh. He died in 1898, at the age of sixty, and Mrs. Turner died in 1917, aged sixty-five. George F. Turner, who is next to the youngest in a family of eight children, attended the grammar and high schools of Pittsburgh, and graduated as a civil engineer in 1903, from the University of Pittsburgh. For five years he was with the engineering department of the Pennsylvania Railway, largely engaged in construction work. Part of the time he had charge of the track elevation in Chicago. On leaving the Pennsylvania Company he came to Youngstown and became associated with E. S. Smith in a professional partnership. Mr. Smith was also county surveyor, and Mr. Turner served as his deputy for a number of years. As a firm they had much to do with the construction of modern highways throughout Mahoning County. Mr. Turner's professional services were also engaged by the Mahoning and Shenango Light & Power Company, particularly for underground conduit work. He was appointed to his present post as city engineer in 1920.
He married Vesta W. Weigle in 1907. She is a daughter of David Weigle of Coraopolis, Pennsylvania. Their three children are Mary R., James D. and George F., Jr. Mr. and Mrs. Turner are mem-
620 YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
bers of the South United Presbyterian Church, and fraternally he is affiliated with Doric Lodge No. 690, Free and Accepted Masons, at Sewickly, Pennsylvania, and with Ashlar Chapter at Youngstown, Ohio.
DELLA M. WALKER, M. D., now of Salem, Ohio, a graduate with the baccalaureate degree of Wooster College, and a graduate also of the Women's Medical College of Pennsylvania, of which college she holds the degree of Doctor of Medicine, is one of the principal representatives of this generation of the Walker family of Poland, Township, Mahoning County, which family has place among the pioneer families of the Mahoning Valley. Dr. Della M. Walker still owns the old Walker homestead settled by Josiah Walker, her grandfather, and upon which her father, Isaac, was born in 1819.
The Walker family is colonial and early republican days was resident in Pennsylvania, and Josiah Walker before marriage came into Ohio from Western Pennsylvania. He acquired a tract of wild land in Poland Township, built a log cabin, and then returned to Pennsylvania to marry Nancy Polk, of the same family as that which gave to the nation James Knox Polk, eleventh President of the United States. Josiah and Nancy (Polk) Walker lived for many years in the log cabin the former had built in Poland Township, but eventually he built a dwelling which is still standing on the farm. Josiah died in 1853, and his wife, Nancy, in 1859. They were prominent Presbyterians, in fact Josiah Walker was one of the founders of the original church of that denomination in Poland. He helped to build the original church. The frame of the second church building was purchased by his son. Isaac when a new church was built on the site of the old, Isaac Walker using the frame of the second church for the purposes of a barn on his own farm, where it may still be seen. Josiah and Nancy (Polk) Walker were the parents of several children, of whom Isaac, father of Dr. Della, was the youngest. The children were : Joseph, who never married, lived his whole life of eighty or more years on the old Walker farm in Poland Township, his maiden sister, Jemima, taking over the duties of housekeeper in his home. Maria, who married Samuel McCullough, lived her whole life in Poland Township. She had two children, Josiah and Samuel McCullough. Joseph, Alexander and Jemima bequeathed their portions of the parental estate to their younger brother, Isaac, father of Della, who in turn inherited the property, which she still owns. Alexander, third child of Josiah and Nancy (Polk) Walker, died unmarried at the age of seventy-four years. Agnes Jemima also died unmarried, and in old age lived with her younger brother, Isaac.
Isaac Walker, youngest child of Josiah and Nancy (Polk) Walker, was born in Poland Township on November is, 1819, and died on October so, 1900, aged eighty years. His death occurred in Poland. The original farm was secured by Joseph through purchase and inheritance. Alexander had a farm nearby, and adjoining it was that of Isaac. The three farms comprised about one section of land. The brothers were all good farmers and were large sheep raisers, Isaac breeding his sheep in such a way that the wool always brought the highest market price. They were also quite enterprising, and owned the first sawmill in the township. In its early years of operation it was in such demand that it was necessary to keep it running night and day, the night shift being divided between them. The three brothers, although owning separate farms, were to all intents and purposes in business partnership, and loyal to each other in all things. They were hard workers, never yielding to fatigue until the task upon which they were engaged had been accomplished. In 1871 Isaac's house was razed by fire, the loss being only partially covered by insurance. He replaced the dwelling without loss of time. The brothers prospered in their enterprises, and, being of thrifty disposition and steady habits, they in time accumulated much substance and were stockholders in banks, railroads and the like. The greater part of these estates in course of time were inherited by Isaac, he being the youngest and the last survivor of his generation. For the last ten years of his life Isaac Walker lived a comfortable retired life in Poland Village, until his death in 1900. His life had been most industrious, but he was never active in politics. He attended mainly to his own business, helped where he could, unostentatiously, and also was one of the most substantial and reliable of citizens. In his last years he was one of the largest land owners in the neighborhood, and one of the directors of the Poland Bank. He was a consistent Christian, and took active part in church work. For the greater part of his life he was an elder of the local Presbyterian Church.
Isaac Walker lived for forty years in the married state. His wife, whom he married in March, 1860, was Rebecca Edna Steuart, daughter of Robert and Rebecca (McClellan) Steuart, the former the son of William and Rebecca Steuart, pioneers in Coitsville Township. Rebecca Edna Steuart, who became Mrs. Walker, was born in Coitsville Township on September 29, 1827, and died in Salem on June 20, 1918, eighteen years after the death of her husband. At her death she closed a record of sixty-eight years of church membership in the Poland Presbyterian Church. One of her sisters, Amanda Bishop, mother of George Bishop of Poland Township, is still living at Struthers, with her daughter, who married Doctor Wallace. Isaac and Rebecca Edna (Steuart) Walker had only one child, their daughter Della M.
Della M. Walker has had quite a noteworthy career. Her parents afforded her every educational facility, and she made commendable use of her opportunities. She took the course in letters at Wooster University, graduating therefrom with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. Resolving to qualify for entrance to professional life, and choosing medicine, she proceeded from Wooster to the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, at Philadelphia, and took the medical course at that college. As so many other medical students of her sex have found, she probably As-covered that the curriculum at the Woman's College was more rigid in its pre-medical requirements for matriculation, and more comprehensive in its requirements for graduation than was customarily required at other medical colleges for men. It is an historical fact that, in general, medical colleges for women, or at least those situated in the eastern states, had a more rigid and comprehensive course than had col-
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 621
leges for male students, and in some cases the course was longer, so that invariably the woman doctor after graduation was the equal, if not the superior, in medical theory of the male graduate. Miss Walker in due course graduated and gained the degree of Doctor of Medicine, and after much clinical observation and practice in the wards of Philadelphia hospitals she returned to her home state and opened an office for general practice in Salem, Ohio. Until her health failed she continued to practice medicine in that vicinity, and is widely known and much esteemed in Salem. She has always been interested in Poland Township, and in farming life and environment, and she still owns the ancestral farm of the Walker family. She has also many properties in Salem. Her residence there is probably the most desirable in the city, and in it she dispenses sincere and unstinted hospitality to her friends, which are many. She has many of the commendable traits of her father, and is and always has been especially active in church work. She has been a member of the Presbyterian Church since her girlhood, and has been consistent in her support of it and in her personal work in its interest.
THORNTON BROTHERS COMPANY have recently Completed and put in operation at 234 Belmont Avenue one of the largest and most complete laundry establishments in the Middle West. Aside from the mechanical equipment much of the reputation of the business is due to the skill and long experience of the men at its head. The manager is Jesse Thornton, and two of his brothers are associated with him.
Charles Thornton, a member of the Thornton Laundry Company, was associated with the Pullman Company as night agent at the Chicago & Northwestern depot, Chicago, Illinois, for fourteen years. Previous to this he was with the Youngstown Sanitary Laundry Company for fourteen years. Upon the organization of the Thornton Laundry Company he became one of the firm. He married Melisse Merriman, and has two children. Alice married R. J. Carl and they have two children, Charles and William. Helen K. is at home.
Both the Thornton and Hamilton families have long been identified with the upbuilding of the Ma-honing Valley. . The parents of Jesse Thornton were William and Julia (Hamilton) Thornton. His father was of Scotch-Irish ancestry, and was born in the Mahoning Valley. He was a man of strong and decided character, and by occupation he was an engineer in coal mines at Wethersfield, Thornhill and other places. He died in 1905, at the age of seventy-six. He was a member of the Masonic order, and it is a singular fact that he took his first degree in Masonry when a young man, and then there elapsed forty-five years before he qualified for his second degree, but he died before it was taken. He was a republican voter. His wife, Julia Hamilton, was a daughter of Eli Hamilton, whose people came from Eastern Pennsylvania. She died in 1914, at the age of seventy-six. All of their five children are living: Anson, who was born in .1857; Caroline, who is Mrs. John H. Davis, of Youngstown; Carroll, a former mayor of Youngstown whose career is reviewed elsewhere in this publication; Charles, associated with the Thornton Brothers Company ; and Jesse.
Jesse Thornton was born in Youngstown, July 3,
Vol. III-15 1868.
He and the other children all obtained their education in the Crab Creek School. His brother Anson as a young man became a locomotive fireman with the New York Central Railway, and was in the railroading service twelve years, being an extra engineer at the end of the time. For three years he was shipper for the American Sheet and Tube Company, and then went with the Youngstown Sanitary Laundry, when that establishment was housed in the old Belmont Avenue Methodist Church. For seventeen years he was in the grocery business at North Avenue and Madison Street, and then became a member of Thornton Brothers Company when it established its big new plant at 234 Belmont Avenue. He is a member of the Masonic order. He married Inez Corl.
Jesse Thornton after leaving school became a draftsman in the office of Herman Kling, an architect, and three years later with his brothers Carroll, Anson and Charles began operating the Youngstown Laundry. He was actively associated with that institution for twenty-five years, until the Thornton Brothers Company was organized, when he became a member of the firm. Mr. Thornton married Mamie Poole, and they are the parents of three children, Marjorie, Harold and Carroll.
CHARLES P. MELVIN. A man of distinctive and forceful individuality, Charles P. Melvin, president of the Melvin-Lloyd Company, has for several years been conspicuously identified with the development and advancement of the great industrial interests of Youngstown, laboring with a never varying energy and concentration of purpose that have won him a place of note in manufacturing circles. A son of Samuel J. Melvin, he was born December 3, 1868, on a farm n Washington County, Pennsylvania.
Born in the Keystone State in 1839, Samuel J. Melvin acquired an excellent education when young, and when, in 1861, the tocsin of war rang through the land he enlisted in Company A, One Hundredth Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, in which he served three years and nine months, first as a private, but was later incapacitated and served as a clerk and dispatch rider, rendering valuable service to his country. In politics he was first a republican, and later was a vigorous worker for prohibition, making speeches and in other ways advancing the cause of temperance. Deeply religious in thought and feeling, he first united with the Wesleyan Methodist Church, but afterward became affiliated with the Protestant Methodist Church, in which he was a faithful and valued worker. He spent his last years in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, dying in 1914, at the age of seventy-five years. His wife, whose maiden name was Helen M. Hanlin, was born seventy-three years ago, and is now living in Pittsburgh. Of the five children born into their home one, William, died when ten years old, and four are living, as follows: Charles P., of whom we. write ; G. S., a salesman in Pittsburgh; and Mary G. and Alice G., living with their mother.
Having acquired his elementary education in the rural schools of his native country, Charles P. Melvin, at the age of nineteen years, went to Pittsburgh, and there learned the pattern maker's trade, which he followed in that city for ten years. Coming then to Ohio, he located in Coshocton, remained six years
622 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
and was one of the organizers of the Coshocton Iron Company. The ensuing seven years Mr. Melvin was associated with William G. Park at Monongahela City, Pennsylvania. Locating then in Bellefonte, Center County, Pennsylvania, he had charge of the Lingle Foundry until 1907.
Coming in that year to Youngstown, Mr. Melvin was with the Youngstown Bronze & Iron Foundry Company, now the Mahoning Foundry Company, and was engaged in manufacturing pipe balls out of cast iron until 1912. With George P. Lloyd and G. S. Melvin, his brother, he organized the firm of Melvin-Lloyd Company, Incorporated, and became its president. In addition to doing a general line of machine work the firm made a specialty of manufacturing moulding machines, their plant being on Decker Street. Mr. Melvin has since devised, and the company has received a patent on, a laundry stove that has won favor with the public, and which is in great demand in various parts of the country, the firm having constantly on hand large orders to fill. In 1916, owing to its large and ever growing business, the company purchased its present property on Irving Place, and is continuing work with the same good success.
Mr. Melvin married Florence Chambers of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a daughter of James F. Cham- bers, who worked on the editorial staff of several Pittsburgh papers and who died in Youngstown, Ohio. Mrs. Chambers, whose name before marriage was Ione Dillon, belonged to one of the old and honored families of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where her birth occurred May 26, 1844. Religiously Mr. and Mrs. Melvin formerly belonged to the chapel located on Market Street, where Mr. Melvin was choir leader for several years, but they are now members of Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church.
JOHN ANDREW MACKEY. A member of a family that has been identified with Vienna Township of Trumbull County for 115 years, John Andrew Mackey has given a good account of his own career, identified with farming operations and with public spirited participation in local affairs. For seven years he was a director of the County Agricultural Society, having charge of the Domestic Arts Hall and other displays. Mr. Mackey's home is at Payne's Corners, a historic place in Vienna Township, located ten miles north of Youngstown, ten and a half miles east of Warren and five miles west of Sharon.
He was born in Howland Township, "half way between his present home and Warren, January 23, 1855. He is a son of James S. and Olive S. (Anderson) Mackey. His grandfather was Andrew Hugh Mackey and his great-grandfather was also Andrew Mackey, who, with his wife, Mary Murray, and their three sons came to Vienna in 1805. The early ancestry of the family was Irish. Andrew Mackey died in Trumbull County, October 20, 1820, having survived his wife about three years. Andrew H. Mackey was born in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, about 1779, and his wife, Jane (Scott) Mackey, was born in Chester County, that state, in 1792. Andrew H. Mackey died in 1859 and his wife in 1875. He acquired the old homestead, but increased it and at the time of his death owned 300 acres. The old home stead of Andrew H. Mackey joins the place where John A. Mackey was born. The original homestead went to his son Allison, and from the latter to his niece, Linden A., a sister of John A. Mackey. She still owns it.
James S. Mackey spent all his married life on the farm where his son John A. was born. He was a quiet and industrious farmer and never sought public office, thought, like others of the family, he voted as a republican. His wife, Olive Anderson, who died on the old homestead when about seventy years of age, was born in Liberty Township, a daughter of Robert Anderson, who spent his life as a farmer in that township. James S. Mackey died December 24, 1913, at the age of eighty. In his family were five daughters and two sons: Mary Jane, who married Frank Jamison and lived at Emlenton, Venango County, Pennsylvania, where she died at the age of fifty; John Andrews; Margaret N., who first married Joseph Flynn and is now the wife of Doctor Kuhns of Emlenton, Pennsylvania; Linden A., mentioned above, a professional nurse; Grace D., who lives at Boise, Idaho, widow of John Morrison, who came out of Indiana, Pennsylvania, was a lawyer, and became prominent in the history of Idaho, serving as its first republican governor, and his widow was a school teacher before her marriage and is now teaching music at Boise. The two younger children of James S. Mackey were Hiram and Olive, the latter the wife of Stanley Bosworth of Cleveland, while Hiram left Ohio as a young man and is a railroad engineer living at Denver, Colorado.
John Andrew Mackey beginning at the age of eighteen spent four years learning the blacksmith trade under George Pound at. Vienna. For a year he was a commercial salesman for a paint house and then for five years was engaged in installing lightning rods, largely in eastern states.
December 17, 1884, he married Cornelia M. Payne, daughter of Ichabod B. and Betsey (Vinton) Payne, of Payne's Corners. A brief sketch of the Payne family is published elsewhere. After his marriage Mr. Mackey lived on the Payne farm for three years with his wife's mother, following which he was a resident for fourteen years in the agricultural community of Fowler Township. He then bought the Gilmer farm in Newton Township, but after seven years there returned to the Payne homestead in the spring of 1910, and for the past decade has been operating this old place with much success.
While farming is his chief business, Mr. Mackey has at different times taken the lead in community affairs. He served two terms as township trustee and both in office and privately has done much to educate his fellow citizens to the value of good roads. He has served as a member of school boards in three townships, Fowler, Newton and Vienna, and was one of the first to agitate for centralized schools. He is affiliated with Warren Lodge No. 29 of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and is a charter member of Vienna Tent of the Knights of the Maccabees and served as its commander four years. Both he and his wife are members of the Rebekahs at Newton Falls, and she has held all the chairs in the local lodge. Mrs. Mackey was secretary of the local
YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 623
Red Cross during war times. She is a member of the Christian Church.
Mr. and Mrs. Mackey have two children: Helen Payne, the daughter, is a graduate of the Newton Falls High School, attended the Ohio University at Athens, and was a teacher until her marriage to C. W. Waldorf, a building contractor of Youngstown. Mr. and Mrs. Waldorf have two children, Geneva and Ruth. Ichabod Scott Mackey, the only son, is an electrician with the Youngstown Sheet & Tube Company. He married Edith Coy. Mr. and Mrs. Mackey's children represent the sixth generation of the Payne descendants on the farm at Payne's Corners.
SOLOMON PAYNE was a pioneer of Trumbull County whose name is preserved in the locality in Vienna Township known as Payne's Corners. He was born in Connecticut August 23, 1783, and died in Trumbull County, October 22, 1857. He married Polly Gates, who was born in Connecticut, July 7, 1790, a daughter of Theophilus Gates.
Solomon Payne was one of the first Connecticut men to come to the Western Reserve. After the death of Theophilus Gates he and his wife brought her mother to their home, and when she died October 21, 1857, she was in her hundredth year. The children of Solomon Payne were: David R., born May 23, 1808, on the old Payne homestead and died October 29, 1851; Almon L., born July no, 1810, and died July 29, 1840; Chloette, born January 18, 1813, and died May 20, 1833; Elihu, who was born July 3, 1815, and died April 20, 1864; Mrs. Sally L. Russell, who was born April 19, 1819, and had celebrated her sixty-fifth marriage anniversary before her death; Theophilus G., born December 4, 1821, and died April 24, 1869; Ichabod B., deceased; and Edwin W., who died in infancy.
The house that is still standing and is occupied by Mr. and Mrs. John A. Mackey was built by Solomon Payne about 1830. The barn was constructed in 1801, being the second frame barn in the township. The original deed to this homestead is still carefully preserved by Mrs. Mackey.
Ichabod B. Payne was born on the old farm February 18, 1824, and died January 18, 1882. He acquired the farm from his father, increased its area, and was not only a successful farmer but a very fine type of citizen. He held nearly all the township offices, serving as justice of the peace for many years, and was a county commissioner at the time of the building of the county jail at Warren. A tablet on that building gives his name among other commissioners. He was a republican, and an active member of the Disciples Church at Payne's Corners. His mother was one of the organizers of that church, and he received his first religious instruction there and remained constant in its membership. The church and cemetery are opposite the old Payne farm, and Ichabod B. Payne and his wife are both buried in the cemetery. Ichabod Payne married Betsey J. Vinton. They were the parents of four children: Jerusa P., wife of Dr. Benton Williams, of Cleveland; Almon Wallace, a retired farmer at Sharon, Pennsylvania, and owner of a portion of the Payne homestead; Ellen Grace, wife of M. A. Hood, of West Farming ton; and Cornelia M., who was born at Payne's Corners, November 11, 1859, and is the wife of John Andrew Mackey.
HOWARD W. JONES, who is president and treasurer of the Youngstown Store and Office Fixture Company, spent a number of years with the Fairbanks Scale Company and acquired an expert knowledge of all the technical processes involved in the manufacture, repair and maintenance of these delicately adjusted mechanisms. For many years he has been a scale expert, and was employed in that capacity by the Pennsylvania Railway Company and also by one of the large steel plants in Youngstown before he engaged in his present business. The Youngstown Store and Office Fixture Company handles all kinds of fixtures for stores, meat markets and offices, including lines of refrigerators and meat coolers. The business is located at 23 North Champion Street.
Mr. Jones was born at Wheeling, West Virginia, September 8, 1877, son of John W. and Louisa (Long) Jones. He was only a boy when his father, who was a building contractor, died. John W. Jones was born at Washington, Pennsylvania. The mother was born at Wheeling, West Virginia, and is still living, at the age of sixty-five. Howard W. Jones began to make his own living at the age of thirteen, working for 5o cents a day in a hinge factory. He was sixteen when he went to Pittsburgh and entered the service of the Fairbanks Scale Company as shipping and receiving clerk. A few years later he went into the shops. During his eight years with the company he became thoroughly proficient in the mechanical side of the industry. On leaving the Fairbanks Company he was employed by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company on the western division, with headquarters at Fort Wayne, Indiana, and traveled all over the lines supervising the installation, repair and maintenance of the railway scales. On removing to Youngstown Mr. Jones was employed by Thomas McDonald at the Ohio Works as scale expert, and while still in the service of that corporation in 1914 he began business on his own account in the store and office fixture line, under his individual name, H. W. Jones. In 1915 his business was reorganized as the Youngstown Store and Office Fixture Company, of which he has been president and treasurer. Besides the large store at 23 North Champion Street this company has a warehouse in the rear, with complete assembling plant. The business has had such favorable progress and growth that in the near future it is planned to engage in the manufacture of store fixtures. This is the only concern of its kind between Cleveland and Pittsburgh, and the company does an extensive business all up and down the Mahoning and Shenango valleys.
Mr. Jones is a valued member of the Chamber of Commerce, of the Kiwanis Club, is an Odd Fellow and is affiliated with the Epworth Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1911 he married Miss Lula F. Forward, daughter of Philo and Emma Forward, of Cortland, Ohio.
BENTON M. HECKERT. A fine representative of the self-made men of Youngstown, and one of its prosperous and popular merchants, Benton M. Heckert, whose store is located at 581 Mahoning Avenue, has the distinction of being the longest established mer-
624 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY
chant on the avenue, his predecessors in that line having either died, moved away or retired from active pursuits, and just here it is well to add that he has been constantly at his post since opening his store twenty-one years ago, not having lost a day. He was born in Butler County, Pennsylvania, in 1876, a son of John Q. and Sarah Heckert. His mother died in 1886, and six years later his father, who was a carpenter, passed to the life beyond, leaving him an orphan at the tender age of fifteen years.
Thrown almost entirely upon his own resources thus early in life, Benton M. Heckert found employment in the oil fields of his native state, earning money by the hardest kind of labor, and by wise saving and prudent expenditure accumulated a sufficient sum to pay his way through the Prospect Normal and Classical Academy, and after his graduation from that institution taught in the Butler High School for four years. Coming from there to Youngstown, Mr. Heckert worked a few months for the Carnegie Steel Company, being employed in the office of the Ohio Works. In 1899 he established himself at his present location, and in the management of his mercantile affairs has met with distinguished success, by his honest and upright dealings and close application to the details of his business having won a large and lucrative trade.
Mr. Heckert married in 19o8 Miss Tillie Weir, a daughter of John Weir, and into the household thus established five sons have made their advent, namely: Howard, Charles, Carl, Donald and Ralph. Politically Mr. Heckert upholds the principles of the republican party by voice and vote. Religiously both Mr. and Mrs. Heckert are affiliated by membership with the Westminster Presbyterian Church.
NELSON M. RICHARDS, of Cortland, Trumbull County, is consistently to be designated as one of the representative men of industry in the Mahoning Valley, for to him mainly has been due the development of the important milling industry there conducted by the Richards & Evans Company, of which he is president and general manager. A proper conception of his achievement in this connection may be gained by reference to the description of the company and its business on other pages of this history of the Ma-honing Valley.
Mr. Richards was born at Parkman, Geauga County, Ohio, October 7, 1859, and is a son of Nelson M. and Cynthia F. (Downing) Richards, The father was born at Raga, New York, and was a boy at the time of the family removal to Troy, Miami County, Ohio, where he was reared to adult age. He came to Trumbull County and established his home on a farm near Cortland in 1869. Here he became a successful stock-grower and dairy farmer, and a citizen of no little prominence and influence in the community. During a period of ten years he was engaged in the mercantile business at Cortland, where he was living retired at the time of his death in 1886, when sixty-nine years of age, his widow having likewise attained to the age of sixty-nine years. She was a daughter of Rev. Russell Downing, who became a clergyman of the Methodist Episcopal Church and later of the Presbyterian Church, in which latter ministry he held pastoral charges near Cleveland and in Ashtabula County, the closing period of his life having been passed at Windsor, that county, where he died at the patriarchal age of ninety-four years. Nelson M. Richards, Sr., was one of the most liberal and public-spirited citizens of Cortland, was a republican in politics, and it was largely due to his influence and financial generosity that the present edifice of the Congregational Church at Cortland was erected, both he and his wife having been zealous members of this church. They became the parents of five sons and four daughters, of whom four sons and one daughter are living at the time of this writing, in 192o.
Nelson M. Richards, Jr., acquired his youthful education in the public schools, principally at Cortland, and in the early period of his business career he was for two years associated with his father's mercantile enterprise at Cortland. For three years thereafter he was a traveling salesman, and he then established at Cortland a feed store. It was from this modest enterprise that he developed the splendid industry now represented in the milling operations of the Richards & Evans Company, and of the successive stages of progress due record is made in the resume of the inception and growth of this company elsewhere in this work. His energy and progressiveness have not been confined to his personal business, but have been equally manifest in his civic attitude, for he has taken deep interest in all things touching the welfare of his home village and county, his civic loyalty having been shown in six years' service as township trustee, an equal period of service as a member of the villlage council, and by service as a member of the Cortland Board of Education. He is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and the Knights of Pythias, and he and his wife are zealous members of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Cortland, in the Sunday school of which he was teacher of a class of young men and women for fully a quarter of century.
The year 1882 recorded the marriage of Mr. Richards to Miss Ida Burrows, of Cortland, and they have three children: Lola is the wife of Rev. Garfield Morgan, pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church at East Saugus, Massachusetts; Oliver M., who is now secretary and treasurer of the Richards & Evans Company, of which his father is president, was graduated in Oberlin College, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts, after completing a classical course, and as a member of the College Glee Club he toured through many states of the Union, his active connection with the Richards & Evans Company having been initiated in 1907, when he assumed charge during the absence of his father in Colorado, his interest in the enterprise having been such that he decided to maintain permanent alliance therewith; and Walter Scott Richards, youngest of the three children, was for two years a student in Oberlin College and was a member of the junior class in Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, where he met a tragic death by drowning in Cayuga Lake, when twenty-three years of age.
THE RICHARDS & EVANS COMPANY, merchant millers and grain dealers at Cortland, Trumbull County, represents one of the important and well ordered industrial enterprises of the Mahoning Valley and