PREFACE
THE greatest of English historians, MACULAY, and one of the most brilliant writers of the
present century, has said: "The history of a country is best told in a record of the lives of its
people." In conformity with this idea the of this county has been prepared. Instead of going to musty records, and taking therefrom dry
statistical matter that can be appreciated by but few, our corps of writers have gone to the people,
the men and women who have, by their enterprise and industry, brought the county to rank
second to none among those comprising this great and noble State, and from their lips have the
story of their life struggles. No more interesting or instructive matter could be presented to an
intelligent public. In this volume will be found a record of many whose lives are worthy the
imitation of coming generations. It tells how some, commencing life in poverty, by industry and
economy have accumulated wealth. It tells how others, with limited advantages for securing an
education, have become learned men and women, with an influence extending throughout the
length and breadth of the laud. It tells of men who have risen from the lower walks of life to
eminence as statesmen, and whose names have become famous. It tells of those in every walk in
life who have striven to succeed, and records how that success has usually crowned their efforts.
It tells also of many, very many, who, not seeking the applause of the world, have pursued "the
even tenor of their way," content to have it said of them as Christ said of the woman performing
a deed of mercy—"they have done what they could." It tells how that many in the pride and
strength of young manhood left the plow and the anvil, the lawyer's office and the
counting-room, left every trade and profession, and at their country's call went forth valiantly "to
do or die," and how through their efforts the Union was restored and peace once more reigned in
the land. In the life of every man and of every woman is a lesson that should not be lost upon
those who follow after.
Coming generations will appreciate this volume and preserve it as a sacred treasure, from the
fact that it contains so much that would never find its way into public records, and which would
otherwise be inaccessible. Great care has been taken in the compilation of the work and every
opportunity possible given to those represented to insure correctness in what has been written;
and the publishers flatter themselves that they give to their readers a work with few errors of
consequence. In addition to the biographical sketches, portraits of a number of representative
citizens are given.
The faces of some, and biographical sketches of many, will be missed in this volume. For
this the publishers, are not to blame. Not having a proper conception of the work, some refused
to give the information necessary to compile a sketch, while others were indifferent. Occasionally
some member of the family would oppose the enterprise, and on account of such opposition the
support of the interested one would be withheld. In a few instances men could never be found,
though repeated calls were made at their residence or place of business.
September, 1892. CHAPMAN BROS.
INTRODUCTORY
THE time has arrived when it becomes the duty of the people of this county to perpetuate the
names of their pioneers, to furnish a record of their early settlement, and relate the story of their
progress. The civilization of our day, the enlightenment of the age and the duty that men of the
present time owe to their ancestors, to themselves and to their posterity, demand that a record of
their lives and deeds should be made. In biographical history is found a power to instruct man by
precedent, to enliven the mental faculties, and to waft down the river of time a safe vessel in
which the names and actions of the people who contributed to raise this country from its
primitive state may be preserved. Surely and rapidly the great and aged men, who in their prime
entered the wilderness arid claimed the virgin soil as their heritage, are passing to their graves.
The number remaining who can relate the incidents of the first days settlement is becoming small indeed, so that an actual necessity exists for the collection and
preservation of events without delay, before all the early settlers are cut down by the scythe of
Time.
To be forgotten has been the great dread of mankind from remotest ages. All will be
forgotten soon enough, in spite of their best works and the most earnest efforts of their friends to
perserve the memory of their lives. The means employed to prevent oblivion and to perpetuate
their memory has been in proportion to the amount of intelligence they possessed. The pyramids
of Egypt were built to perpetuate the names and deeds of their great rulers. The exhumations
made by the archeologists of Egypt from buried Memphis indicate a desire of those people to
perpetuate the memory of their achievements. The erection of the great obelisks were for the
same purpose. Coming down to a later period, we find the Greeks and Romans erecting
mausoleums and monuments, and carving out statues to chronicle their great achievements and
carry them down the ages. It is also evident that the Mound-builders, in piling up their great
mounds of earth, had but this idea to leave something to show that they had lived. All these
works, though many of them costly in the extreme, give but a faint idea of the lives and
characters of those whose memory they were intended to perpetuate, and scarcely anything of the
masses of the people that then lived. The great pyramids and some of the obelisks remain objects
only of curiosity; the mausoleums, monuments and statues are crumbling into dust.
It was left to modern ages to establish an intelligent, undecaying, immutable method of
perpetuating a full history immutable in that it is almost unlimited in extent and perpetual in its
action; and this is through the art of printing.
To the present generation, however, we are indebted for the introduction of the admirable
system of local biography. By this system every man, though he has not achieved what the world
calls greatness, has the means to perpetuate his life, his history, through the coming ages.
The scythe of Time cuts down all ; nothing of the physical man is left. The monument which
his children or friends may erect to his memory in the cemetery will crumble into dust and pass
away; but his life, his achievements, the work he has accomplished, which otherwise would be
forgotten, is perpetuated by a record of this kind.
To preserve the lineaments of our companions we engrave their portraits, for the same reason
we collect the attainable facts of their history. Nor do we think it necessary, as we speak only
truth of them, to wait until they are dead, or until those who know them are gone: to do this we
are ashamed only to publish to the world the history of those whose live. are unworthy of public
record.