Macon County, Missouri - Biographical sketches, 1910 (part 4 of 20)

The Doctor is studious and industrious in his efforts to keep abreast with the latest thought and discovery in his very progressive profession, reading all the best literature bearing on his work, and mingling freely and actively with the American, the Missouri State and the Macon county Medical associations, of each of which he is a zealous and valued member. He has acquired a thorough and comprehensive knowledge of the theory of the medical profession and has shown great intelligence and skill in the practical work of his daily rounds among his patients. He also takes an active and helpful interest in other matters of importance, being a stockholder and director of the Citizens Bank of Ethel and connected with other institutions of value in the financial and industrial life of the community. He also owns and has been conducting since 1899 a fine drug store which is recognized as one of the established benefactions and vital necessities of the town. Fortune has smiled on his efforts for advancement to such an extent that he owns in addition a considerable body of good land in the state of Wyoming, and has interests of different kinds in several places. His personal aequisitions give evidence of the vigor of his management of his affairs, his thrift in conducting his operations and his ability in making everything count to his advantage. The same qualities displayed plentifully in reference to the publie affairs of the township. and county have been of signal service to them and given him high rank as a public-spirited and progressive citizen, and made him popular and well esteemed in all portions of the county, and throughout much of the surrounding country.

Dr. Bradley has been a life-long member of the Democratic party and from the dawn of his manhood an active worker for its success in allits campaigns. He is averse to publie life, but for the good of the community has served as clerk and director of the Ethel school board for more than fourteen years. His fraternal relations are with the Masonie Order, the Odd Fellows, the Modern Woodmen of America, the Woodmen of the World and the Order of Yeomen. He has been a Freemason for fourteen years, and has ascended the mystie ladder of this noble fraternity through Blue Lodge, Royal Areh Chapter and Knights Templar Commandery and is now a Noble of the Mystie Shrine. On June 12, 1895, he was united in marriage with Miss Alice E. Hizer, a native of La Plata, Macon county, but whose parents came to Missouri from Iowa. She presides over their attractive home with a grace and dignity entirely in keeping with their elevated position in the social and general life of the community.

John F. L. Branham

Crowned with years and with the universal esteem of the people, and walking among them even yet with vigor and energy although he is ninety-one the worthy patriarchs of Macon county and is highly revered as such. The good opinion of the people, which is freely bestowed upon him, is no accidental circumstance, and is not due only to his advanced age. It is based on his real and sterling manhood, demonstrated for a long time in their midst in all the relations of life, and to his substanial contributions to the growth and development of the county, as witnessed in its edueational, moral, industrial and commercial forces, in the building and strengthening of all of which he has borne a useful part and taken a very active and serviceable interest.

Mr. Branham was born in Scott county, Kentucky, on October 5, 1819, and is sprung from heroic strains. His father, James Branham, was a native of and might have been an extensive planter in Virginia, and he was also a valiant soldier in the War of 1812. He has a taste for merchanical pursuits and gratified it by working as a stone mason in connection with the management of his plantation. As a young man, however, he left the home of his ancestors and strode boldly into the wilderness of Kentucky to make a name and establish a home for himself by his own capacity and industry. He beeame the husband of Elizabeth Landrum, a native of the state last named, and they had eight children all of whom they reared to maturity. Of these John F. L. is the only one now living. The father died in Kentucky and the mother in Macon county, Missouri.

Their son John F. L. was reared on the parental homestead in Kentucky and seeured a limited common school education in the country schools of the neighborhood. At an early age he took his part as a workman on the farm and performed his duties faithfully. After leaving school he began farming on his own account in his native eounty. But having inherited the adventurous spirit of his ancestors, in 1838, at the dawn of his manhood, he came to Missouri to look the country over with a view to repeating on its wide domain of undeveloped possibilities what his father had done on that of Kentucky. He had learned the trade of carpenter and for a short time he worked at it here, then returned to Kentueky and resumed his farming operations, diong something at his trade in connection with them.

But the Western fever that had got into his blood would not yield to any other treatment than the satisfaetion of its demands, In 1849 he eame again to this state and opened an establishment as a gunsmith in Monroe eounty. The next year he moved to Macon county and tried his hand at merchandising, which occupied him fully for five years. Then he passed three years as the proprietor and manager of a hotel in Bloomington, perhaps three years and a half. But the voice of Nature within him called him loudly to become a tiller of the soil, and he finally yielded to the call. He bought a farm and from then until 1894 he was actively engaged in general farming and raising live stock, succeeding finely in the undertaking and growing into consequence and influence among the people as the country developed and improved around him under the impulse of his spirit of progress and that of others like him.

Tn 1894 the weight of aceumulating years induced him to retire from active pursuits and pass the remainder of his days in the enjoyment of a well-earned rest and the beneficient use of the competency he had wrung from unwilling fate by his own determined energy and his skill and ability in the application of it. He then learned that there is even on this side of the grave a haven where the storms of life break not, or are felt only in gentle undulations of the unrippled and mirroring waters, and that it is a serene, a genial and hale old age, in which the tired traveler abandons the dusty, erowed and jostling high- way for a shady and but little noted by-lane in which he may enjoy unharassed and with tranquillity the splendor of the sunset, the milder glories of late evening.

Mr. Branham has not, however, been content to sit still and dream away the remaining years of his life in idleness. He is still vigorous and active and the fires of energy still burn within him with an ardor that requires exertion of some kind on his part to satisfy them. Even nt his advanced age he is yet very fond of hunting, fishing and outdoor sports, and he indulges in them freely for his own enjoyment. He was married in 1844 to Miss Lyda Jane Hockensmith, a native of Franklin county, Kentucky. They had nine children and six of them are living: Dr. George Branham of New Mexico; James, who lives in the new state of Oklahoma; and Isaae O., Katharine, Franklin and Anna, who are residents of Macon county. The wife died September 9, 1898.

In polities Mr. Branham was a Whig until near the death of the party. When is was sueceeded by a sectional party bent on the ereation of a seetional issue, he became a Democrat, and during the dark days whieh followed, when Civil war cast its withering blight over our fair land, his sympathies were with the South. He has adhered to the Democratic party ever since, but he has never accepted a political office of any kind although frequently and urgently solieited to do so. For seventy-two years he has been a devout and consistent member of the Baptist church, and since 1853 has belonged to the Masonie Order. No citizen of Macon county stands higher in the regard of the people and none is more deserving of their esteem and good will.

Orloff William Howe

Although he has been for only fourteen years a resident of Missouri and for that length of time directly connected with its industries and a contributor to its progress and development, Orloff W. Howe of Walnut township, Macon county, has been all his life a resident of the great Middle West of this country, as it is still called, and is thoroughly representative of the spirit and enterprise of that portion of the Union and the characterictics and tendencies of its people.

Mr. Howe was born in the state of Illinois in 1865, and is a son of William and Mary (Hill) Howe, the former a native of New York state, and the latter of Illinois. He therefore inherited from his parents the shrewdness, adaptability to eireumstances and resourcefulness of New England and the all-daring sweep of enterprise characteristic of the sippi valley region, and in his career he has employed all the traits of both sections with great advantage to himself and pronounced benefit to the communities in which he has lived and operated. The parents came to Missouri in 1898 and took up their residence in Macon eounty, where they were actively engaged in farming and raising stock for a number of years. "They are now living in Macon retired from aetive pursuits, but mingling serviceably in the social, intellectual and publie life of the city, and highly esteemed by all classes of its people. Of the five children born to them four are living, Edward A., Orloff W., Charles L. and Ma Nettie, the wife of B. V. James of Decatur, Illinois.

Orloff W. Howe grew to manhood on his father's farm in Illinois and secured his academie training at the distriet schools in the neighborhood. After leaving school he passed five years working at the earpenter trade, then turned his attention to farming in his native state. He cultivated the rich prairie soil of that great state with success and profit until 1896, when the vast domain across the Mississippi from his former home attracted him beyond the power of resistance, and he became a resident of Missouri and Macon county. Here he has continued his activity and his suecess as a farmer and has risen to the first rank in his business in this county. He now owns 390 aeres of first rate land and carries on an extensive and profitable business in raising stock for the markets. All of his land that is not required for grazing purposes for his large and valuable herds of cattle and other live stock, is under advanced cultivation and yielding abundantly to the faith, industry and skill he bestows upon it. He is 2 progressive farmer and studies the needs of his business in this line, as he does also in his stock industry, and applies the results of his reading, observation and refleetion intelligently to every step of every department of his work, aiming in all to secure the best results attainable, and succeeding in doing this by keeping at all times the command of the situation.

Mr. Howe is also one of the leading stockholders in the Elmer Creamery Company, and is conneeted with other enterprises of value to the eounty and its people. In their welfare he has always been deeply interested from his arrival in the county, and to the promotion of it he has devoted both intelligence in council and great energy in action. In politieal faith he adheres to the Republiean party with loyal and unwavering devotion and is ever ready to serve his party along wholesome lines of development with his utmost ability and best judgment. He has rendered the people excellent service as a member of the school board for a number of years. In fraternal life he is allied with the Order of Modern Woodmen of Ameriea and in religious connection with the Missionary Baptist ehureh. Both his lodge and his chureh

In 1891 Mr. Howe was united in marriage with Miss Alice M. Alexander, a native of Illinois. Of the ten children born to them five died in infancy. Those living are Harry O., Nellie, Myrl W., Forest E. and Opal M. an infant, all of whom are still living at home and adding brightness and cheer to the family circle. The home is a favorite resort for the hosts of friends of the family, who find ita center of refined and gracious hospitality and of all the courtesies and amenities of life, The parents are held in the highest esteem wherever they are known, and regarded throughout the county as fine exemplars of all that is strong, useful and worthy in American citizenship.

Born and reared to the age of seven years in the great state of Pennsylvania, where his father's family had been domesticated for generations, and where its members were participants in many of the countless industries conducted with conquering enterprise in that enormous bee hive, Samuel G. Beatty of Walnut township, this county, seems to have acquired by inheritance and absorbtion the salient characteristies of its people, as he has exhibited them on many a field of endeavor and in many places in other parts of the country, and with the usual results of material advantage to himself and substantial benefit to the people around him.

Mr. Beatty's life began in Washington county, Pennsylvania, in 1860, and he is a son of Benjamin and Sarah M. (Gladden) Beatty, the father of the same nativity as himself and the mother born in Jefferson county, Ohio. They had nine children and seven of them are living: Edwin, who resides in Alaska; Park B., whose home is in Oregon; Samuel G., who has lived in several states and still has interests in at least two; James W., an esteemed citizen of Montana; U os G, who lives in Kansas; Frank W., a prosperous and progressive resident of Oregon, and Fannie, the wife of J. J. Dye of Macon county. They are distributed over an enormous extent of eountry and engaged in a variety of industries, but wherever they are and whatever they are doing, they are exemplifying in their daily lives the lessons of thrift, uprightness and industry they received by precept and example around the parental fireside, and multiplying in their activity the fruits of worth and integrity, as their forefathers did for generations before them. Their mother died in 1905. The father is still living and has

Samuel Gladden Beatty grew to manhood on the family homestead in this county and secured his academie training in its distriet schools. He then followed a course of special training in the Jacksonville Business College from which he was graduated. After leaving that institution he taught in the publie sehools two years, and at the end of that period went to Colorado, where he engaged in mining for fourteen years, and was successful in the venture. He still owns a silver mine in San Juan county, that state, whieh is very produetive, and also has an interest in a gold mine in another part of the state.

At the end of his mining period he returned to this state and again located in Macon county. Once more he turned his attention to farming and in this profitable but often very exacting occupation he has been actively at work ever since. He owns and cultivates 460 acres of land, and, in connection with this industry, also carries on an extensive and flourishing enterprise in general stock-raising. He takes a very active interest and a leading part in publie affairs as a Democrat, being always ready to assume the harness as a wheelhorse in the service of his party, and although by no means desirous of the honors or emoluments of publie office, has served as road commissioner six years for the good of the township. While living at Creede, Colorado, he served as coroner for a number of years and also as a justice of the peace. Fraternally he is allied with several benevolent associations, among them the Masonie Order, the Odd Fellows, and the Modern Woodmen of America. He is deeply interested in the welfare of all his lodges and helps to promote it by every means at his command. Everything to which he puts his hand receives an impulse to enlarged activity, and in matters involving the progress and improvement of the township and county, and the enduring welfare of their people, he is partieularly aetive, broad-minded and enterprising, giving much stimulus by the wisdom of his counsel and following that with an energy in action that accomplishes a great deal itself and sets in motion helpful forces in others by the force of its influence and example.

Mr. Beatty was married in 1897 to Miss Ella D. Witt a native of Platte county, Missouri. They have one child, their son Samuel G., Jr, who is now eight years old. The parents stand well in social circles and are recognized as helpful forces in the activities of all the intellectual, moral and spiritual agencies at work in the community. They are animated by lofty ideals of citizenship and daily duty, and they strive to realize these in all their relations in life. The people who know them hold them in cordial regard, and the community in general in whieh their aetivities are employed, esteem them highly as fine examples of high-toned and useful American manhood and womanhood.

John Michael Surbeck

Although a native of the land of William Tell and Arnold Winkelreid, and proud of its inspiring history, majestie seenery and pure and progressive government, John Michael Surbeck of Elmer, this county, is earnestly devoted to the land of his adoption and profoundly grateful for the opportunities it has given for the exercise of his rare faculites of aggression and good judgment in business and his lofty and exemplary characteristics as a citizen. He believes in American institutions and does all in his power to raise and keep them up to the highest standard of excellence. All of the sixty-five years of his life that have passed have been spent in this country, and he may therefore be elassed almost wholly as an Ameriean produet. Mr. Surbeck was born in Switzerland on October 12, 1844. His parents, Jacob and Elizabeth (Ochnar) Surbeck, were also natives of Switzerland, and their forefathers lived in that country for many generations. They brought their family to this country in 1852 and took up their residence in Toledo, Ohio. The father engaged in farming in that neighborhood, winning his way to prosperity and worldly comfort, rearing his family with a view to tlie enduring welfare of all its members, and gaining the confidence and respect of the people in a marked degree. He died in 1875 and his widow passed away in 1883. She also was highly respeeted by everybody who had the benefit of acquaintance and association with her. They were the parents of seven children, all of whom are living: John C., Jacob, Elizabeth, John Michael, Barbara, George and Samuel.

John Michael Surbeck was brought to the United States by his parents when he was eight years of age. He grew to maturity and was edueated in "Toledo, Ohio, and for a time condueted profitable farming operations in the vieinity of that eity. In 1868 he came to Missouri, where the ravages of the Civil war were still visible and the country was just beginning to show the first fruits of its rejuvenating spirit. He believed that with the increasing prosperity and growing greatness of the state his own fortunes might be profitably linked and share the same benefits. On his arrival in this section he located in Macon county, buying land near Elmer in Walnut township, and here continuing extensively the farming and stock-raising industries he had begun on a small seale in his former Ameriean home. He is still pushing his progress in these lines of produetion and steadily expanding his enterprise to larger dimensions and more considerable returns. At this time he owns more than 1,800 acres of good land, the greater part of which is in an advanced state of cultivation, and is considered the most substantial and progressive citizen of Elmer.

All the fiscal, industrial and economie interests of the township enlist his cordial attention and have his effective assistance for their promotion toward the highest and most fruitful development; and the moral, intellectual and social agencies at work in the community look to him for aid with confident expectations and are never disappointed. He was one of the founders of the Elmer Exchange Bank and has served as its president from the beginning of its history. Under the impulse of his enterprise it has thriven, steadily increased its business and more and more firmly established itself in the confidence and regard of the people. Its wise and liberal policy has made it a source of great benefit in the improvement of the town and township and given it an excellent name and a host of friends in other parts of the county.

Mr. Surbeck adheres to the Republican party in political affairs and does yeoman service in its behalf. He is averse to official life and has no desire for either the honors or the emoluments of publie station, but he believes firmly in the principles of his party and feels that it is his duty to do all he can to help them to supremacy in the control of the government, local and general. Still, he never allows partisan interests to darken his vision or stay or direct his hand in reference to local matters in which the enduring good of his community is involved, but looks to that alone in determining his course in connection with them.

In June, 1868, Mr. Surbeck was united in marriage with Miss Eva Dorothy Sorge, a native of Ohio. They have seven children: Elizabeth, Villa, Frank K., George M., H. C., Tress and John L. In their several localities, pursuits and stations in life they are all exemplifying in their daily lives the lessons given them by admonition and example around the family hearthstone, and doing their parts as progressive and productive citizens of the country. The parents are not known where they are not esteemed, and the number of their admiring friends is eoextensive with that of their acquaintances.

The life of a country physieian in a new country is one of great privation and hardship, and its difficulties are not occasional or sporadic, but continuous and unavoidable. He is obliged to forego almost entirely his own comfort in providing for that of others, and dare not give much consideration to the condition of the weather or the conveniences of travel. Neither is a night of rest vouchsafed to him after a day of toil with any degree of certainty. Sickness and death respect neither circumstances nor conditions, neither calm nor tempest, neither day nor night, and the physician in a sparsely settled country, who has the territory largely or wholly to himself, is their slave and must ignore all outward bearings just as they do. His life requires heroie qualities and constant devotion to duty, and it is greatly to the eredit of American professional life that these qualities have seldom, if ever, been found wanting in this class of publie benefactors.

One of the finest illustrations of their possession and use in the service of a large extent of country in this part of the world is furnished. by the professional career of Dr. J. F. Gross of Callao in this county. For more than forty years he has devoted himself with assiduous industry to the study and practice of medicine in Macon county, giving the people excellent professional service and exemplifying all the time and in all the relations of life the best attributes of a lofty, progressive and broad-minded American citizenship. And that his career is appreciated is fully shown by the high and universal esteem in which. he is held and the unvarying respect and consideration with which he is treated by all classes of the people.

"Dr. Gross was born in Randolph county, Missouri, on April 15, 1842, and is a son of Noah and Mary (Sears) Gross, natives of Kentueky. The father was born in the Blue Grass state in 1816 and came with his parents to Missouri in 1818. They were thus pioneers in two states, having been born and reared in the Carolinas and migrated from there to Kentucky in early life. They located on a farm in Randolph county of this state and there redeemed a tract of wild land from the waste and made it over into a comfortable home with the aid of their ehildren whom they reared to maturity on this rugged frontier. Their son Noah, the Doctor's father, was married in 1839, and he and his wife became the parents of eleven children. Seven of these are living: Dr. J. F., the immediate subject of these paragraphs; G. W.; Bettie, the wife of George W. Talbott; Sarah, the wife of Rufus Goodson; J. H., T. J., and Minnie, the wife of Jesse Truitt. "The father died in February, 1901, and the mother on January 23, 1904.

Dr. J. F. Gross grew to manhood on his father's farm and took an important and helpful place in the performance of the labors it entailed on all the members of the family. He attended in an irregular way for a few years, and only during the winter months, one of the four country schools in the county, which were at that time the only educational institutions of any kind it could maintain, and thus aequired the rudiments of an academic education. But he was diligent and studious, and so far succeeded in the acquisition of knowledge that when he left school he became a teacher and followed that occupation for a time. He then engaged in farming until 1861, when he joined a Company enrolled by Captain Hallock for service in the Civil war, enlisting at Macon. His company was soon at the front and served first year of conflict between the sections of our then distracted country it saw considerable active and perilous service. It took part in many notable battles, among them those at Carthage, Lexington, and Wilson Creek, and also engaged in countless skirmishes and minor conte

After the war the Doctor returned to Macon county and ag engaged in farming. In 1869 he began the study of medicine under the direction of Dr. Josiah Gates of Laplata and a little later entered the Eleetrie Medical College in St. Louis. After receiving his degree he began the practice of his profession in White township, Macon county, where he remained three years. At the end of that period he moved to Independence township, and during the next sixteen years was actively engaged in a general practice throughout the county with headquarters in that portion. He then took up his residence at Goldsberry, and for fifteen years stood at the head of his profession in that region, leading in both his standing as a physician and in the magnitude and activity of his practice.

As the burden of years inereased on him Dr. Gross felt more and more a longing for the quieter life of a farmer, although it was not to be expected that a physician so active as he had been and so eminent as he had become would be allowed to retire entirely from practice. But he determined to make the effort to gratify his desires as fully as he could, and aeeordingly he returned to his former township and loeated on the farm there on which he is still living, eontinuing his practice in compliance with the wishes of the people and carrying on extensive farming operations to gratify his own. His farm comprises 160 aeres of excellent land and handsomely supports his extensive stock industry besides yielding to the skillful husbandry bestowed upon it by the Doetor and his son abundant erops of general farm produets. It is one of the best and most desirable in the township.

On December 24, 1863, Dr. Gross was united in marriage with Miss Clarissa Stedman, a native of Wisconsin whose parents moved from Ohio to that state. Of the eight children born of this union six are living: Eugene Chesterfield, who resides in the state of Wyoming; A. D., who is deputy sheriff of Macon county; Nora P., who is the wife of H. Thurman of New Mexico; John B., Loren E., who is also a resident of Wyoming; and Evart E. The father has been a life-long Demoerat in political faith and adhesion and has always taken a very aetive part in the work of his party. While not an office seeker in any sense or to any degree, he served three years as township clerk and has been a member of the school board for more than twelve. His interest in the welfare of the people and the development and improvement of the township and county has been constant and serviceable and is highly appreciated. In religious affiliation he has long been closely connected with the primitive Baptist church, and for many years has been one of the most helpful and interested members of the congregation to whieh he belongs. "The Doetor has well nigh completed the three score and ten years assigned as the ordinary limit of human life by the saered writer, but he seems by no means near the end of his vigor. He is still hale, hearty and active, and would seem to have many years of usefulness yet in store for him. And that he may have is the universal prayer of the people among whom he lives and labors, by all of whom he is very highly esteemed and cordially venerated.

Pushing his own interests with assiduous industry, good judgment and enterprising spirit, and looking after those of the community with ardor, progressiveness and fine breadth of view, Clark Herrin, one of the successful and prosperous farmers and stock-raisers of Liberty township in this county, is justly regarded as one of the county's most useful and representative citizens. He is, moreover, a native of the county and has passed all the years of his life, so far, among its people, mingling in their councils, taking part in their publie life and contributing to the expansion and power of their industries. In all the relations of life he has shown that he has the best interests of the township and county of his home at heart and is earnestly devoted to the substantial and enduring welfare of all their people.

Mr. Herrin was born in this county in 1847. His father, James S. Herrin, was born and reared in Kentucky and came to Missouri to live in 1840. His grandparents came to this country in their early married life from Germany and took up their residence in Kentucky when that state was still a part of the great undeveloped West and much of it yet bore on its face the rugged aspects of Nature in her condition of primal wildness. It was a part of their destiny to help to smooth that rough face and reduce that wild condition to subjection, to bring the rich and responsive soil to systematie produetiveness and render it fragrant with the flowers and bounteous with the fruits of eultivated life. "They did their part with zeal and fidelity, and in his turn their son repeated on the virgin soil of Missouri what they had accomplished on that of Kentucky. Before leaving his native state he was united in marriage with one of its fair daughters, Miss Rebecca Truitt, who aided him greatly in planting their new home in a region strange to them, and gave tó the duties of the household, remote from all their former ties and associations, the same diligent care and selfsacrificing devotion that he bestowed upon those of the field and stock range. "They had ten children, three of whom are living: Melvina, the wife of Benjamin Williams who died in November, 1909; Millie, the wife of Joseph Agee; Clark, the immediate subject of this sketch; and Rebecca, the wife of H. B. White. "The mother died on August 7, 1866, and the father on March 2, 1876.

Clark Herrin grew to manhood on his father's farm and took part in the eultivation of it from an early age. When he could be spared from its exaeting labors, during the winter months of a few years, he attended the country school near his home, and in this he obtained all the scholastie training he had opportunity for. Soon after leaving school he began farming on his own account and re g live stoek in connection with his farming operations. He has ever since been aetively and profitably engaged in these pursuits, and it is sufficient proof that he has been successful to state that he started with nothing but his own ability and determination to win, and that he now owns and cultivates over eighty acres of good land, which he has brought to a high state of productiveness and has improved with comfortable and commodious buildings and other necessary structures; and to add that his stock industry has grown from a very small beginning to proportions of magnitude with a corresponding inerease in profits and value. All he has he has acquired through his own industry, capacity and skill, without the aid of favoring eireumstanees or any special bounty of fortune. He seized his opportunities,as they eame and made the most of them for his own advantage, trusting nothing to chance, but doing his own duty fully in every particular in connection with his work. By this means he has risen to the first rank among the skillful and progressive farmers of his township, and his example has been a stimulus and a help to many others.

Tn the publie affairs of the region in which he lives he has always taken a very active and helpful part for the good of the community. No undertaking of value in which the welfare of the people has been involved has been without his active aid, and all his efforts have been governed by intelligence, wisdom and breadth of view. He has served the people faithfully as a member of the school board for more than five years, and in many other ways has contributed to their substantial benefit and advaneement. His political allegiance is given firmly to the Demoeratie party and he is at all times zealous and active in its service, doing what he can to promote its success and further the interests of its candidates, although he is not himself desirous of holding office. In church connection he is a member of the Missionary Baptist church, and to that also he gives a due share of his time and service. In 1871 he was married to Miss Drusilla White, a lady of Macon county nativity and parentage. They had six children three of whom are living, their daughter Minnie, their son Ellis and their daughter Margaret, who is the wife of Joseph Bealmer. The mother of these children died on April 3, 1909.

William V. Corbin

On this land of many climates, comprehensive resources and almost boundless possibilities, Nature has bestowed her treasures with unstinted prodigality and in endless variety. But she exaets her price for them, and does not yield them up to any, however ardent their desire, unless they pay what she demands. This eomprises industry, skill, endurance and the commanding might of mind. It embraces both technieal and praetieal knowledge and energy in the application of both, with what has aptly been called "the passion of great men," patience in waiting for results. In the measure in which men or communities possess these attributes and place them in action she is free with her bounty and well pleased to dispense it.

William V. Corbin of Independence township is one of the resolute and determined men of Macon eounty who have found the way to her storehouse and wrung from her a liberal share of its contents. He is a self-made man in the best sense of the expression, having made his own way in the world without the aid of favorable cireumstances or outside aid of any kind, and in doing this has displayed the qualities of head and heart that Nature has held her gifts in reservation for. Such men are always a credit to themselves and a benefit to the communities in which their activities are employed. They do things of value and by their influence and example they awaken and set in motion produetive forces in others.

Mr. Corbin was born in Macon county on October 4, 1865. His parents were James and Millie (Mayhew) Corbin. The father was a native of Kentucky, and eame from that state to Missouri in early life. They were progressive farmers and useful citizens here, repeating in the soil of Missouri the serviceable performances of their forefathers on that of Kentucky. Both died in this county in 1874. They were the parents of six children five of whom are living: Cytha, the wife of J. S. Butler; William V., the immediate subject of this memoir; Emma, the wife of R. Posey; Lou M., and Etta, the wife of Willard Buster.

William V. Corbin eame into being a few months after the elose of the Civil war and passed his boyhood amid some of the scenes of the desolation it wrought. The times were hard in all that section of the eountry that was just beginning to recover from the waste of its resources and the paralysis of its energies occasioned by sanguinary seetional strife. and the bare necessaries of life were often difficult to obtain. There was therefore but little opportunity for more than the most elementary schooling for the children of the depleted border, and this was all that young Corbin was able to get in the way of scholastie training. His share of even this was small and his chance of securing any was of short duration. He left school early and began to earn his own living and aid in the support of the family by working on the farm. In a few years, through his industry and frugality, he got a. start and was able to begin farming for himself. He has been engaged in this industry, with stoek-raising as an allied business, ever since, and has been very successful in his efforts. He bestows on his farm work and his stock industry all the labor and eare his energetie nature impels him to, and he applies his attention to them in a systematie and progressive manner. His farm embraces 160 acre: id is all under advanced cultivation except what is needed for grazing purposes, and it is also well improved with good buildings and fully equipped with the most approved modern appliances for the work that has to be done on it. It is one of the most valuable and desirable farms of its size in the township.

While working out his own progress Mr. Corbin has not neglected that of the locality in which he lives. He has been one of the foremost men in the energetie and practical support of every worthy enterprise for the improvement of the county and the benefit of its people. In publie affairs he has at all times taken an earnest and serviceable interest, doing excellent work in behalf of the cause of publie education for fifteen years as a member of the school board, and in many other ways adding the force of his influence and his inspiring example to the agencies at work for the genera! weal of the region around him. In

Mr. Corbin has been married twiee. In 1889 he was united with Miss Sula B. Shaver, a native of Macon county. They had two children, their son William H. and their daughter Vear M. The mother of these children died in 1896, and in 1897 the father was married to Miss Mealia Steele, who, also, was born and reared in this county. "Three ehildren have blessed their union, their son Arthur and their daughters Lottie and May, all of whom are members of the family circle and attending school.

Farmer, merchant and publie official, and making an excellent record in each line of action, John D. Epperson of Independence township well deserves the high reputation he has as a man of sterling worth and a citizen of pronounced progressiveness and usefulness. The greater part of his life to the present time has been passed in Macon county and in productive industry among its people. He has shown that he is a man of resources and ability, and he is esteemed by his fellow citizens accordingly.

Mr. Epperson was born in Putnam county, Missouri, in 1857, and in a son of John B. and Lucy (Bunch) Epperson, natives of Kentucky, but long residents of this state. They were well-to-do farmers here, as their forefathers were in the state of their nativity, and they gave encouragement and active aid to every project which they deemed worthy for the development and improvement of the locality in which they lived. The father died in 1888, and the mother is still living. They were the parents of eleven children, nine of whom are living: James M., John D., Joel B., William O., Sarah F., the wife of T. C. Doggett, Alonzo F., Walter D., Gilbert B. and Edith, the wife of Howard Doggett. In their several localities and lines of endeavor they are all adding to the wealth and importanee of the country and giving estimable examples of good citizenship.

The family is not without the dramatic element in its history. Mr. Epperson's maternal grandfather, John Bunch, was a colonel in the Mexiean war and bore himself gallantly in many of the brilliant battles of that short but decisive international conflict, and, like most of the others of our soldiers who survived it, eame home erowned with the plaudits of the whole American people for the manner in which they had vindicated the honor of our country and added to the glory of its citizen soldiery.

John D. Epperson attained his manhood on his father's farm and secured his education at the country schools in its vieinity. He expected to be a farmer all his life, and deemed it best to devote himself to his chosen vocation at the earliest practicable date. Therefore, if he had any strong desire for more extensive scholastic attainments, he put them resolutely aside and turned his attention to farming as soon as he vompleted the limited eourse of instruction available to him in the great "university of the people," the common schools. But he did not close his eyes to opportunities in other lines of productive usefulness, and after farming and raising stock exclusively for a number of years he beeame a merchant, also, in 1901, locating at Ethel and handling poultry and produce. Two years later he entered upon a larger enterprise in the mercantile world, engaging in general merchandising at Cottage. He was connected with this business there for three years and then returned to farming, in whieh he has ever since been actively and profitably oeeupied. His farm comprises sixty acres and, in connection with its advanced eultivation, he earries on a very comfortable and successful business in raising live-stock for the general markets.

Like all other good citizens who have the welfare of their country at heart, Mr. Epperson takes an active part in polities. He is a Demoerat and a wheelhorse in the service of his party. It has found his serviees worthy of high appreciation and himself eapable of refleeting eredit on it and benefiting the publie in the discharge of official duties of importanee and responsibility. He has been deputy assessor of the county for over five years and a member of the school board for more than three. He also served as road overseer nearly four years, and was recently eleeted a justice of the peace, but declined the office. His fraternal connection is with the Modern Woodmen of America and his religious affiliation with the Primitive Baptist church. His lodge and fhe congregation to whieh he belongs in his church receive a due share of his attention and both acknowledge the value of his service in all their worthy undertakings.

In November, 1875, Mr. Epperson was united in marriage with Miss Elizabeth King, a native of Macon county, as her parents were, also. By their marriage Mr. and Mrs. Epperson became the parents of three ehildren, but only two of them are living, Stella B., who is the wife of James Enyeart, and Calla M., who is the wife of J. R. Sunderland. The parents and their daughters all stand high in the regard of the people around them and well deserve the esteem in which they are held. They are publie spirited and progressive in behalf of their township and county, liberal and judieious in the support of all good enterprises, and zealous in efforts to augment and intensify the power of all commendable agencies at work in the communities of their several homes.

Judge Matthews, the subject of this sketch, is a scion of one of the sterling pioneer families of Missouri, which fine old commonwealth has represented his home from the time of his nativity to the present. He was born on a farm in Randolph county, this state, on the 14th day of July, 1847, and is a son of Richard Newman Matthews and Minerva Grundy (Phelps) Matthews, the former of whom was born and reared in Fauquier county, Virginia, a member of one of the old and honored families of that fine old commonwealth in which was eradled so much of our national history, and the latter of whom was born and reared in Oldham county, in the state of Kentucky. They were married in Randolph county, in the state of Missouri, and made their home from that time in Randolph county, where the father became a successful agriculturist and merchant and a man of prominence and influence in his section. Richard N. Matthews was originally a Whig and later a Democrat in his political allegiance, but he never desired or held publie office. He was a member of the Masonic fraternity. He was born October 12, 1812, and passed the closing years of his life in Randolph county, this state, where he died July 19, 1894, at a venerable age. His cherished and devoted wife was born September 22, 1822, and was summoned to eternal rest August 16, 1887, and their two sons survive them, the subject of this review being the younger. Robert H. is a resident of Cairo, Randolph county, Missouri, and is engaged in farming.

Richard S. Matthews, to whom this review is dedicated, gained his preliminary education in the schools of his native county, and in the furtherance of his academic training he was matriculated in MeGee College at College Mound, Macon county, in which well-ordered institution he continued a student for four years, and graduated from that institution. After leaving college he became a teacher in the same college for three years. In the meanwhile he had taken up the study of law, during the summer vacations, and read law wider the effective preceptorship of Judge John W. Henry and Col. John F. Williams of Macon, Missouri, and in August, 1873 he demonstrated his eligibility for and was admitted to the bar of his native state, upon examination before Judge George H. Burkhart, of Randolph county. On the 1st of the following month he opened an office in Macon, and here he soon built up a satisfaetory professional business. He gained a large and important clientage and he today controls an enviable practice both as a trial lawyer and counselor. He has been a close and appreciative student and has ever given much care to the preparation of his cases, being fortified by broad and exact knowledge of the science of jurisprudence and showing marked versatility and power in the applieation of such knowledge. He s continuously given his attention to the aetive work of his profession, and for thirty-six years has been actively engaged in the practice of law at the City of Macon, and he stands today as one of the able and representative members of his profession in this section of the state, where he has ever maintained an inviolable hold upon popular confidence and esteem, having ordered his course according to the highest prineiples of integrity and honor.

Judge Matthews has been active in the promotion of the cause of the Demoerat party and is one of its recognized leaders in his county. In 1878 he was elected judge of probate, and he continued incumbent of this office for three consecutive terms, representing a period of twelve years. He handled the affairs of the office with great ability and diserimination and his record in the same redounded to his eredit and to the efficiency of service in this important branch of the County government. While Judge of the Probate Court he continued the practice of law in other eourts. He also served twelve years as school direetor of Macon, and he has ever given his aid and influence in support of all that has touched the best interests of his home city and county. He is the owner of a considerable amount of produetive land in Macon and Randolph counties and gives a general supervision to his farming interests. He is largely interested in horticulture, and has given it considerable attention. He is president of the Citizens' Bank of Macon and also of the Macon County Abstract Company. His material aceumulations represent the tangible results of his own well directed endeavors, and his success has been achieved through worthy means, so that he has never been denied the fullest measure of popular confidence and esteem in the community whieh has so long represented his home and to whose progress he has contributed his due quota. He is not a member of any secret order or society. Both he and his wife are members of the Cumberland Presbyterian church and are active in the various departments of its work as well as liberal in the support of its collateral benevolences.

On the 21st of August, 1872, was solemnized the marriage of Judge Matthews to Miss Martha Armada Gilstrap, who was born and reared in Macon county and who is a daughter of Col. Abner Lee Gilstrap and Julian Ann (Cook) Gilstrap, who here continued to reside until her death. Her father was a prominent lawyer of the state, and filled a number of official positions of trust and honor. Miss Martha Armada Gilstrap, to whom Judge Matthews was married, went to and was a graduate of the same college as her husband. Judge and Mrs. Matthews beeame the parents of four children, concerning whom the following brief data are entered: Orlow Bertrand, who was a graduate from Cumberland University, in Tennessee, with the degree of A. B., and who had been admitted to the bar of Missouri, died soon thereafter of typhoid fever, on the 7th of October, 1897, at which time he was twenty- Tour years of age; Otho F. is one of the representative younger members of the Macon county bar and is associated with his father in praetice, and is a graduate from the same university as his brother, Orlow B. He was married to Miss Mary Alby Anderson, of Palmyra, Missouri, December 25th, 1901. She is a descendant of one of the old and honored families of Missouri. Corinne and Richard Lee remain at the parental home. Richard Lee is a young business man, with good education and business qualifications. After finishing his studies in the Macon Publie School he went to Missouri Valley College, and afterwards attended the State University at Columbia, Missouri. Corinne, graduating from the Macon High School, completed her edueation in Monticello Seminary at Godfry, Illinois.

James Thomas Mathis

Although neither a pioneer himself nor the son of one, James T. Mathis, whose farm of over 100 aeres, loeated in Independence township, is one of the model country homes of Macon county, had noted pioneers among his ancestors on both sides of the house, and inherited | their spirit of endurance, self-saerifieing industry, conquest and improvement. He has contributed essentially and substantially to the development and enriehment of the region in which he has his home, and through its advancement to the progress and aggrandizement of | the whole state.

Mr. Mathis is a native of Macon county and was born on December 10, 1879. His parents, John and Elizabeth (Hall) Mathis, were also born and reared in this eounty, and here they passed the whole of their married life, the father ending his days in August, 1883, amid | the scenes of his useful labors and rich in the esteem of the whole people. He was a farmer and a very active man in connection with everything in which the enduring welfare of the township and county ) were involved. His father was born and reared in North Carolina, and moved from that state to Kentucky in his early manhood. He was married to a Kentucky lady, whose family had been domestieated in the state for one or two generations before her birth. In 1890 she was married a second time.

James T. Mathis was the only child of his father, and grew to manhood on the parental homestead. He obtained his education in the eountry schools in the neighborhood of his home, and as soon as he left school began farming, for a time with his father and afterward on his own account, continuing his operations in this line of activity until 1907, when he started the mercantile establishment of which he is still ihe proprietor and enterprising manager. He still owns his farm, however, and oversees its eultivation and also gives his personal attention to the thriving live-stock industry conducted on it. His store is located in the progressive village of Cottage, and is in keeping with the wideawake and enterprising. people of that neighborhood who patronize it. Mr. Mathis holds high rank as a very energetic and thoroughly up-to-date merchant, keeping his stock at all times up to the full requirements of the community and condueting all his dealings with the utmost fairness and propriety.

The farm interests and the mereantile engagements which require the attention of Mr. Mathis are extensive and exacting, and he gives them all the most careful and intelligent attention, neglecting nothing in connection with them that good business management demands. But he does not allow them to wholly engross him, or put away from his view the interests of the community in a general way. Every undertaking in which the progress and elevation of the township and eounty are involved has his earnest, aetive and stimulating support, whether it be connected with the industrial, the moral, the mental or the civil and social life of the community. In polities he is a Democrat of firm convictions and is always zealous and effective in the service of his party. He is at this time (1910) its county committeeman for Independence township and his leadership in that section is recognized as wise and potential. As a member of the school board for over six years, and during most of that period its elerk, he rendered excellent and highly valued service to one of the most esteemed and useful publie institutions the people have, the publie school system. In fraternal life he is prominently connected with the Modern Woodmen of America. On December 24, 1899, he was married to Miss Morah Scott, a native of this county, where her mother also was born, the father being a

The interesting subject of this brief memoir belongs to a family whose members have borne important parts in the later history and development of Macon county and have met every requirement of duty in publie and private life with fidelity, capacity and breadth of view. They have shown ability to advance their own fortunes in a way that has commandéd the approval and admiration of the people around them, and at the same time have exhibited an intelligent and broadminded interest in the general welfare of the community of their home, which has been fruitful of good results to it and in the highest degree ereditable to them. A short history of the family will be found in a sketeh of Edgar Snow, which appears elsewhere in this volume.

Charles T. Snow is a brother of Edgar Snow. He was born jn Kalamazoo, Michigan, in July, 1862, and came with his parents to Missouri and Macon eounty in his boyhood. He obtained his academie training in the publie schools of the village of Economy and St. James Academy, of Maeon, and, after completing it, engaged in farming for a few years. Mercantile life presented many attractions to him and laid strong temptations in his way. In 1884 he surrendered to its persuasiveness and joined his brother, E. O. Snow, in general merchandizing. The partnership lasted until December 1, 1887, when Charles T. sold his interests in the business and returned to the cultivation of his farm. This embraces 395 aeres and is well improved and provided with every appliance for its systematie and vigorous eultivation according to the most approved modern methods. Mr. Snow is uneeasing in his industry, wise and prudent in his management and very progressive in his enterprise. And the returns from his husbandry are commensurate with the outlay of time, energy and intelligence he makes to secure them. In connection with his farming operations he ez : on an extensive and profitable industry in raising live-stock for shipment to the Eastern markets, in which his produet has a high rank and an excellent reputation. He is also a stockholder in the Atlanta State Bank and connected with other institutions of value to the community.

In addition to taking a very earnest interest and a very helpful part in the loeal publie affairs of the township and county, and doing all in his power to promote the substantial welfare of both, Mr. Snow has a deep and intense solieitude for the good of the whole country. He is a Republiean in political relations and always manifests his interest in the success of his party by ardent and effective efforts to aid in bring- ing that about. He rendered the township excellent service for more than ten years as a member of the school board and an intelligent and studious devotion to the welfare of the schools. Another way in whieh he has been of signal service to the people has been as president and one of the promoters of the Union Telephone Company, whieh has been developed under their management to the highest degree of efficiency and become one of the prime necessaries of daily life to the business, social and domestic interests of the territory throughout which it operates.

In 1884 Mr. Snow was united in marriage with Miss Laura E. Moody, who was born, reared and educated in Macon county. They have had two children, but the only one living is their son, Raymond M. Like his parents, he is well esteemed in all parts of the county, and, like them, he shows in his daily demeanor a cordial interest in the welfare of the region in which his lot has been cast and all the lofty attributes of the best American citizenship, as all other members and connections of the family do. In the spring of 1910 he moved to Atlanta, where he now makes his home.

From the time when he was two years old, F. L. Reynolds, now one of the energetic and enterprising merchants of Economy, and also a prominent and progressive farmer of Lyda township, has been a resident of this county. He was born at Galesburg, Illinois, in 1874, and was brought by his parents to Missouri and Macon county in 1876. He is a son of Stephen and Mattie (Franklin) Reynolds, the former a native of Ohio and the latter of Illinois. They had four children and three of them are living, Simeon, F. L. and Sadie, the wife of H. Ferguson, of Iowa. The father was a Republiean in his political relations and at all times took a very active part in the campaigns and eouncils of his party. He was a blacksmith in oceupation and for years conducted one of the best known shops in the county. It was located in Atlanta and laid a very large extent of the surrounding country under tribute to its trade, for the proprietor was known far and wide as an excellent mechanie, and also as a citizen with a store of worldly wisdom and a cordial and helpful interest in the affairs of the whole region in which he was conducting his business. He died in 1899, having survived by seven years his wife, who passed away in 1892.

Their son, F. L. Reynolds, was reared in Atlanta and obtained his education in its publie sehools. After leaving school he at once took up the struggle for advancement among men for himself, working could employ usefully, and wasting no money in frivolity or pleasure. | Mis progress was slow and painful for awhile, but as soon as he got a start he was able to put his reserve force in action and then the advance beeame more rapid, regular and productive. It has been stendy and continuous ever since, bringing Mr. Reynolds into greater and greater prominenee as a man and eitizen and establishing him more and more firmly in the regard and good will of the people all around him. They saw that he was a man of thrift and enterprise, and they soon learned that he had a strong and abiding interest in whatever concerned the substantial and enduring welfare of the township and county, or the progress and comfort of its inhabitants.

Mr. Reynolds now owns and cultivates 110 acres of superior land and is extensively engaged in raising stock. He is also connected in a. leading way with the mercantile life of the community as a produce and eommission merehant of high rank and great activity. In his politieal faith he leans to the Republican party, but is rather independent. He always takes an earnest interest in political affairs and is an energetic worker for the side he favors; but the good of the community is his first consideration and party interests come afterward, if at all. Fraternally he is connected with the Masonic order, the Wood- | men of the World, and the Modern Woodmen of America. The religious tendencies and activities of the family are manifested through Mrs. Reynolds' membership in the Baptist chureh and her husband's liberal support of the worthy undertakings of all denominations. Her maiden name was Mattie Wells, and she is a native of Macon county. and a daughter of Illinois parents. Her marriage with Mr. Reynolds took place in 1899, and they have three children, Tyneth, Luran and Arnice. All that Mr. Reynolds is as a farmer, business man and citizen . he has made himself. Fortune never smiled on him unless he compelled her to by his spirit and enterprise, and he has never enjoyed political favors of any kind, for all his life he has steadfastly refused to accept a publie office of any kind. He is, altogether, a self-made man and creditable to the community in which he lives.

From his early youth, William Henry Miller, who is now prominent in the industrial and publie life of Economy and Lyda townships, in this eounty, has been obliged to make his own way in the world, and do it under circumstances that for years were not only unfavorable but decidedly adverse. He became an orphan in his childhood by the death of his father, but being the only child of his parents, it might have been supposed that he would have his pathway through life smoothed for him and receive substantial aid in his progress along its upward course. Fate decreed otherwise, however, and threw him on his own resources at an early age. It is to be said to his eredit that he aecepted her challenge and lifted her gage of battle in the spirit in which it was delivered. He took up the burden of life for himself cheerfully and has borne it vigorously, judiciously and successfully.

Mr. Miller is a native of Monroe county, Missouri, where he was born on November 6, 1859. His father, William Miller, was also a native of that county and was making a good record as an enterprising and progressive farmer when death laid low his hopes and ended his labors when he was but twenty-five years of age. The mother, whose maiden name was Melinda Goodding, assumed the burden of rearing their only child, William Henry, with the ardor of a faithful and devoted spirit, but her resources were unequal to her desires in the matter, and, although she did the best she could under the circumstances, it was not enough. Her mother was a native of Macon county also, and before the Civil war was in comfortable cireumstances, owning extensive property and a number of slaves, The war left her almost destitute and her offspring with next to nothing. The Miller household was therefore dependent on its own exertions and met its crisis bravely. As soon as the son was able he began to provide for himself, and in the meantime the mother was married to a second husband.

The son secured what education he could at the free fountain of the publie schools, and when he left school worked for a time on the farm and in the saw mill belonging to his stepfather. He learned the trade of blacksmith, and in 1885 started a shop of his own. He won his way from the beginning by very slow and toilsome advances at first, but on a smoother way and with greater progress a few years later. He is still carrying on his blacksmithing establishment in Economy, and is also engaged profitably in farming, the operations of the farm being largely conducted by his young son, who, although but a boy, has the spirit of a man and has exhibited a man's capacity for work and management, too.

Mr. Miller trains with the Democratie party in political affairs and is one of its most effective and ineessant working members. He takes an earnest and judicious interest in the local affairs of the township and village of his home, and gives all the aid in his power to promote the interests of the people who live in them. During the last six years he has been a member of the school board and part of that period its president. Fraternally he is connected with the Modern Woodmen of America and in religious affiliation with the Baptist church. On November 6, 1898, he was united in marriage with Miss Ada Wells, who was born and reared in this county. They have three children, Emmett, Ruth and Ralph, all living at home, attending school and assisting in the work of the farm and the household. Among the people of Economy and Lyda township Mr. Miller stands high as a mechanie, a farmer and a citizen. In all relations he is conscientious and upright in the performance of his duties, with earnest consideration for the general weal, as well as for his own advancement.

This gentleman, who is now serving as mayor of Callao, the office having sought and taken possession of him much against his will in April, 1909, is one of the most esteemed and influential citizens of Macon county. He was engaged in merchandising from his early manhood until a very recent date, and since leaving that department of human endeavor, has been cashier of one of the leading banks in this part of the state. In each field of labor he has exhibited fine capacity. great enterprise and a sterling worth that have brought him universal commendation and raised him to a position of leadership among the people. He has also labored for the general good while pushing his own affairs with success, and been one of the potential factors in promoting the development and improvement of the township and county.

Mr. Morrow is a native of Callao, where he was born on October 24, 1855. He is the son of Jefferson and Minervia (Summers) Morrow, a brief account of whose useful lives will be found on another page of this work. The son grew to manhood and obtained his education in the locality of his birth, and as soon as his limited schooling was completed began the struggle for advancement among men as a merchant at Barryville, in this state. He was also postmaster of the town for eleven years. In 1899 he sold his interests at Barryville and moved to Callao, where he started a new mercantile enterprise under the name and style of Morrow, Pillers & Goodrich, of which he was the head for over nine years. On February 1, 1909, he sold out to his partners, Messrs. Pillers and Goodrich, and bought the stock of I. B. Jones in the Bank of Callao, of which he became the cashier on June 1, 1909. The bank has been a flourishing and progressive institution from its start, and it is certain that its pace in business will not be slackened and its ele-

Johnson Morrow

In addition to the active business which occupies him in connection with the bank, Mr. Morrow owns and conducts the operations of a large farm on which he carries on a profitable industry in general farming and raising high grade Jersey cattle. This enterprise has contributed essentially to elevating the standard of cattle in the county and helped to bring the industry of stock-growing, as it is carried on in this locality, into general notice and good esteem throughout a wide extent of the surrounding country. Mr. Morrow's herd is one of the best in the state and products of it are eagerly sought by purchasers from many widely scattered localities.

In polities Mr. Morrow adheres steadfastly to the Democratie faith and shows the strength of his convictions by active service in behalf of his party. But he is himself very averse to official life and prefers to aid in advancing the cause which he defends and advocates from the honorable post of a private station, fighting for its welfare among the militant soldiery of its rank and file. His feelings and desires in this respect were overborne, however, in April, 1909, when against his will and over his protest, he was unanimously elected mayor of Callao. Taking the wishes of his fellow citizens of the town as a command and imperative call to duty, he accepted the office, and, by his wise, straightforward and enterprising administration of its aff: soon fully justified the faith that was so freely and feelingly expressed in his election.

His fraternal affiliations are with the Free Masons and the Knights of Pythias, and his religious allegiance is given to the Christian chureh. Tn the good work of all these organizations he is zealous and serviceable, and in each his membership is highly appreciated. But his assistance is not given only to the organizations in which he holds membership. His hand is open and his influence is freely exerted in behalf of every worthy enterprise in which the welfare of the people, or any part of them, is involved. Every commendable undertaking for the improvement of the community has felt the impulse of his quickening spirit and known the guidance of his excellent judgment, and these have been bestowed freely without regard to circumstances, whenever the matter in hand has seemed to him worthy of his aid. In 1889 he was united in marriage with Miss Melissa E. Vernum, a native of Callao and daughter of John A. and Lucy (Spicer) Vernum, both now deceased. Seven children have been born in the household and all of. them are living. They are: Anna, the wife of P. E. Pease, of Callao;

Samuel F., who is also a resident of Callao; and Charles W., Helen G., Paul, Vivian and Virginia, who still brighten the parental home with their presence and help to make it one of the pleasant and characteristic social centers of the town.

Combining in his make-up the sturdy characteristies of the Welsh. people and the enterprise and all-daring determination of America, and in his experience a knowledge of the customs, habits and methods of thought, together with the industrial pursuits and political aspirations of the people in different parts of the country, and in his own special training the aequisitions gained in several pursuits of varied character, Theophilus Jones came to his present location and occupation well prepared for its exactions and capable of holding his own in any condition or under any requirements. In his prosperous and productive eareer he has shown that his training was not wasted on him, and the seeds of it fell on fruitful ground.

Mr. Jones is a native of Luzerne county, Pennsylvania, a region filled with strenuous industrial life and distinguished for the enterprise and progressiveness of its people. He was born there on February 21, 1844, and there he grew to manhood and secured his education, attending the distriet sehools and the university at Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. He is a son of Thomas and Elenor (Williams) Jones, natives of Wales, the former born and reared in the southern part of that eountry and the latter in the northern part. 'They came to Missouri in 1870, and here they passed the remainder of their days. They had a family of seven children. Three of them are living: Edward I, Anna, the wife of E. G. Snow, of Atlanta, and Theophilus. The mother died on July 26, 1885, and the father on January 24, 1890.

After leaving school he was engaged in the mercantile business for a few years, finally settled at Vienna, in Macon county, Missouri, and has been in the farming and stock-raising business ever since. In this dual pursuit in the agrieultural interests of the county, he has ever sinee expended his efforts and of it he has made a very gratifying success. He is now the owner of about 200 aeres of good land, all of which is under advanced cultivation, except what is devoted to grazing his stock, and all yielding abundant returns for the labor and intelligence bestowed upon it.

The affairs of his township and county have greatly interested Mr. Jones and he has given them close and careful attention. The welfare of the region around him and that of the people who inhabit it are prime considerations with him and at all times command his most earnest and energetic attention. For this reason he has not allied himself with any political party specifieally, but has kept himself free to support the policies and candidates in whose success he has believed the best interests of the publie were vitally involved. But this independence has not stayed his hand with reference to publie affairs or lessened his energy in seeking to secure what he has considered the best results in every election. He has been a justice of the peace since 1878 and a member of the school board more than thirty years, He was married in January, 1876, to Miss Edna E. Snow, a native of Kalamazoo, Michigan. They became the parents of three ehildren, Owen W., Edith R. and Paul L., all of whom are living. "Their mother died on August 12, 1908.

Owning and cultivating 300 acres of land, except what is reserved for grazing purposes, and carrying on his farming industry and his extensive live-stock business with an enterprise and vigor that commands success and compels large returns for his outlay of diligence and intelligence, Fisher H. Rice, of Independence township, is one of the leading agriculturists of Macon county, and both in his contributions to its general wealth and consequence and his fine example and helpful influence in its publie life, is justly regarded as one of its most worthy and representative citizens. His life to this time has been passed in the county, and here, also, his father lived and labored from his birth to his death, and his grandfather spent his best and wisest years.

Mr. Rice was born in Maeon county on November 13, 1873, and is a son of John W. and Maria (Hayden) Rice, the former of Kentucky and the latter of Kentucky ancestry, but both born and reared in this eounty. They had four children, Fisher H., Sadie M., the wife of James Montgomery, Rosie and William T. All four are living and exemplifying in good citizenship and general usefulness the lessons they received by admonition and example at the parental fireside. The father was a Demoerat in his political views and always took an active interest in publie affairs and the eampaigns of his party, rendering it effeetive service and enjoying in a marked degree the confidence and esteem of both its leaders and its rank and file. He was a justice of the peace Tor many years, road overseer for several terms and a member of the school board for nearly a quarter of a century. He died in December,

Fisher H. Rice was prepared for the battle of life by careful training at home and a limited extent of academic instruction in the country schools of the neighborhood. The home training included a full measure of participation in the farm work of the homestead, and this was immediately useful in giving him strength and suppleness of body and independence and self-reliance of spirit. It was permanently serviceable in giving him intimate practical knowledge of the lines of industry in which his life was to be spent, and so, when he left school and soon afterward began a farming and stock-raising industry of his own, he was well qualified and equipped for the undertaking. He farmed for a number of years and then conducted a harness-maker's establishment at Ethel for two years. In 1897 he sold his interest in the harness factory and since then has devoted his whole time and energy to farming and his live-stock interests, except what has been demanded in helping to push forward the general progress of the community and promote the general welfare of its people. In all things pertaining to these he has done his full part as a good citizen, and his efforts in their behalf have been highly appreciated by those who have had the benefit of them.

In political relations Mr. Rice is anchored firmly to the Demoeratie party and he is energetic and loyal in his service to it. But he has at all times steadfastly refused to consider overtures to become a candidate for political office himself, always preferring to serve the publie from the honorable post of private citizenship. On August 22, 1900, he was married to Miss Anna M. Johnston, a native of this county. They have one child, their daughter, Alba, who is now (1909) eight years old. The parents mingle freely in the best social circles and are universally esteemed.

John W. Thurman

From the dawn of his manhood until a or two ago, when he retired from all pursuits of strenuous activ' John W. Thurman, of |. Independence township, was one.of the most energetie and progressive farmers of Macon county. His operations were not as extensive as those of some other farmers in the eounty, although they were considerable, but they were of a high character, advanced in method and fruitful in good results for him and the general progress of the region in which they were conducted. Mr. Thurman is a native of Kentucky. He was born in 1844, and was brought to Missouri when less than a year old. He grew to manhood in this portion of the state and has mingled with its people all his years to this time. He therefore began his farming and stock-raising industries with considerable knowledge of what was required to develop them to their utmost possibilities, and he has applied his knowledge with assiduous industry, good judgment and comprehensive breadth of view. His success is, therefore, the logical outcome of ability and intelligence applied skilfully to eireumstances and conditions whose eapabilities and requirements were well understood from the start.

Mr. Thurman is a son of Samuel and Emma (Lee) Thurman, natives of Kentucky, who eame to this state in 1845 and followed farming for a livelihood unti! death ended their labors, the mother passing away in 1888 and the father in 1900. They had thirteen children, but only three of them are living now: James T., John W. and Franeis E. Having arrived in this part of the country while it was yet on or near the frontier, with all its forms of government and civil institutions still erude and unsystematized, the father was called upon to take an important part in publie affairs in the locality, and he won general esteem and approbation for the valuable serviees he rendered in this respect, and his name is held in appreciative remembrance among all elasses of the people.

His son, John W. Thurman, grew to manhood on the family homestead and performed with ability and fidelity his full portion of the labor it entailed upon the household. He attended the country schools of the neighborhood when he had opportunity, and thereby seeured a fair common school education. The higher walks of academie acquirement were not open to him, as he lived in a region in which the conquest over nature was not yet wholly won and the necessity for continuing the struggle with vigor and unceasing attention left small chance for other pursuits. But he aequired enough of mental development through book learning to serve his needs, and as he had already seleeted farming as his occupation for life, as soon as he left school he began to move toward an enterprise of his own in this great field of labor. For a few years longer he remained with his parents and assisted them on the family farm. Then he began operations for himself, and in these he was successful from the start. His progress st was, of course, slow and his struggles were arduous. But he was persistent and, after a time, the reults were larger and the advance toward comfort and consequence became more rapid. He now owns 239 acres of fine land and has his farm well improved and thoroughly equipped with the most approved implements of husbandry. His live-stock industry is also extensive and profitable. It is conducted with vigor and intelligence, as all his undertakings are, with the best results always in view and all efforts bent toward securing them.

Within a short time recently Mr. Thurman has given up all strenuous activity, giving over the management of his farm and stock interests to others while he finds oceupation for his mind in looking after affairs in which he is interested that do not require intense physieal activity. He is one of the stockholders and directors of the Bank of Atlanta and has other interests in the industrial and financial institutions of the community. In political faith he is a Democrat, and, while devoted to his party in loyal allegiance and faithful service, has always refused publie office of any kind, except that for the good of the community he consented to serve as one of the school trustees for a period of eight years. During the last eighteen years he has been an active member of the Order of Odd Fellows, and for a much longer time one of the zealous and energetie working forces in the Southern Methodist ehureh. In March, 1874, he was married to Miss Paulina Bennett, a native of Schuyler county, Missouri, and a daughter of Virginia and North Carolina parentage. Four children blessed the union and brightened the family eirele: Luvella, now the wife of J. F. Seney, Harvey, Ezekiel and Ira.

James H. Elliott

As a representative man among the promoters of one of the leading industries of Macon county, James H. Elliott, of Independence township, has an elevated and firmly fixed place in the publie esteem and well deserves it. He is one of the leading farmers of his township and eonducts his operations in the most progressive and enlightened way. They are profitable to him because by his skill and enterprise he makes them so; and they are beneficial to the region around him because they contribute to its wealth, prosperity and influence, and also because the force of his stimulating example produces and quickens activity and progress in others.

Mr. Elliott was born in Macon county in 1872, and is a scion of good old Kentueky families, whose farming operations on the fertile soil of. the Blue Grass state helped its progress toward its present high state of development, commercial greatness and political influence for several generations prior to the advent of any of their members into the industrial life of Missouri. Mr. Elliott's father, George Elliott, aecompanied his parents from their Kentucky home to Missouri when he was a boy. The family located in Macon county, and here he grew to manhood and became a farmer. He is still living and still actively engaged in tilling the soil and raising cattle and other live-stock. He was married to Miss Sarah Herrin, and they became the parents of four children, Cora, the wife of Thomas Tate, James H., George and Ada, all of whom are living.

James H. Elliott has passed the whole of his life to this time in Macon county, the boyhood and youth on his father's farm and the mature years on one of his own. He secured a limited education in the country schools - all that their facilities and his opportunities could give him - but it has served his purpose well and been of great service to him. It taught him the value of intelligence and how to get it, and the lesson has not been lost upon him. He has been a man of reading and reflection, especially in the line of his business, and has a considerable fund of general information, with special acquisitions concerning agricultural life and the live-stock industry, in both of which he is energetically engaged. He has a fine farm of 120 acres, not far from the town of Atlanta, and in its condition of advanced development, rieh produetiveness and high state of improvement it is very ereditable as a product of his enterprise and wisdom, good taste and breadth of view, and is also ereditable to the township in which it is located as one of its representative country homes.

Mr. Elliott is in no sense an empirie or an experimenter in any sentimental significance. But he has intellectual hospitality and welcomes every new idea that seems commendable to him and gives it a chance in use to prove its value. He is progressive in his farming and his stock-breeding, and endeavors to keep abreast with the most advanced thought and discovery in both lines of endeavor. He is progressive for the community, too, as well as for himself, and omits no effort he is able to make in the way of promoting its welfare and progress. As a member of the local school board he has been of great service to the people, and in all other ways he has looked upon their best interests as elosely allied with his own. In polities he is an active . working Democrat, eager for the success of his party and zealous in its serviee. In 1894 he was married to Miss Myrtle Bealmer, a native of this county, but of Kentucky ancestry. They have one child, their son, Ernest, who is attending school. The parents stand well in social life, are regarded as worthy of all esteem in every attribute of their citizenship, and are looked upon as among the most useful of the township's population.

All Maeon county men who have won distinction are entitled to have their record set forth in any work that claims to be in any sense an account of the lives of the county's progressive men, and the means and efforts by which its development and progress have been achieved. No work of the eharaeter of this publication would be complete without some mention of Dr. A. T. Still, the founder of the osteopathie school of medical treatment and now head of the American Sehool of Osteopathy at Kirksville, Missouri, whieh was chartered by the state in 1894. Like other men who broached a new theory in science which disturbs long established beliefs and old prejudices, Dr. Still was obliged to win his way to success and popular approval through tribulations and opposition that sometimes amounted almost to persecution. But he felt that he had conceived something of great value to mankind, and he persevered in his efforts to make it known and established its worth in spite of all opposing forces, and he is now firmly fixed in popular esteem as the discoverer of a new system and one of its most accomplished and capable practitioners to be found in the whole country.

Dr. Still was born in Lee eounty, Virginia, August 6, 1828, and is a son of Rev. Abram Still, a Methodist minister and doetor of medieines, who moved his family to New Market, Tennessee, in 1834. "There Dr. A. T. Still became a student at Holston college, in which he continued the scholastie training he had begun in a little log sehoolhouse in his native state. In 1837 the father was sent by the conference to which he belonged as a missionary to Missouri and moved his family to this state, making the journey overland with teams and consuming seven weeks in the trip. He located in Macon county, where he was one of the first settlers. He traveled all over the country, new and traekless as it was, preaching the gospel to the people in his ministerial capacity and tending the siek as a doctor, in both lines of activity doing a great deal of good. He founded seven churches in this wild territory and was the pastor of all of them. He took up a large traek of land near Barnesville, in Independence township, and a few years later built on it a large two-story house of hewed logs, which was one of the most commodious and imposing in all this region at the time, and was so well built that, although it is more than sixty years old, it scarcely shows any signs of age or wear.

Andrew T. Still

some time in a primitive log building, although a new one, about one mile west of Barnesville, and was successful in the work. Among the men who have since risen to prominence that attended his school is Dr. J. F. Gross of Callao, a sketch of whom will be found in this work. In 1849 Dr. Still was united in marriage with Miss Mary Vaughn, a sister of "Aunt Fannie" Edwards, who now lives in Macon. She died September 29, 1859 leaving one daughter, Mrs. John Cowgill now living in Ottawa, Kansas, and in 1852 he moved his family to Kansas, where he practiced medicine in company with his father, having prepared himself for the profession while teaching school and afterward. He also farmed while living in Kansas and took part in everything of publie importance which oeeurred in the region of his home. His praetiee was mainly among the Shawnee Indians, with whom he was on very friendly terms. On Nevember 24, 1860 Dr. Still contracted a second marriage, the lady of this choice being Mary E. Turner. Four children of this union are still living, and all reside at Kirksville, Missouri.

Dr. Still always had a deep and abiding interest in the welfare of the country, and when the Civil war broke out he promptly followed his political convictions to the battlefield and fought for them as valiantly as any soldier in the service. After the war he renewed his activity as a physician and farmer and also operated a saw mill some time and continued to grow into prominenee among the people. He was a member of the committee appointed to loeate the University of The M. E. Church at Baldwin, Kansas, and being skillful as a carpenter and builder, he helped to saw the lumber and put up the buildings of this institution. He also served in the Kansas legislature in 1857-58.

For a number of years before making any announcement of his theory of healing diseases without medicine, to which he gave the name of osteopathy, he was a diligent student of it in all its bearings. At length he announced it and began to teaeh it. He then traveled from place to place in Missouri, praetieing his theory and making many vemarkable cures. Some of these appeared so remarkable to the people that they attributed supernatural power to him and became afraid to say aught against him lest he do them some harm. But he persevered in his efforts and in time overcame all opposition and gained a large number of followers. He established a school at Kirksville and had students from all parts of the country, and this finally expanded into the present American School of Osteopathy, the parent institution of the new school of medicine which he founded, and which now has zealous praetitioners in every state and almost every county in the United States.

The main building of the institution is a large and well arranged structure which eost more than $80,000, and is well adapted to the uses for which it was erected, also an up-to-date hospital at a cost of over $75,000. The school is flourishing, and the man who founded it is living in comfort after so many trials, in high esteem after so much obloquy in a handsome residence after passing many years of his earlier life in log cabins, many of which he helped to build. His life record is the old story of opposition to truth which has not been long established, persecution of faith which the world has not tested, misrepresentation and abuse for doing good in a manner that is new to the publie. Its later chapters are, however, different from those in the lives of many martyrs, for they record triumphant success and complete yindication from all that was ever said in the earlier parts, and the general acceptance of views which searcely anybody would tolerate when they were first made known by the practical genius who thought them out.