Winchester Township (part 13 of 30)

In politics, he is a Democrat. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He has been several times Justice of the Peace of his township and was Mayor of Peebles for three years. He was elected Township Treasurer in 1897. His children are James Nelson, partner in the furniture store of Davis & Nixon. He was married to Florence Custer. Our subject's daughter, Susan AnaDel, is the wife of Prof. Albert C. Hood, of Re>Tioldsburg, Ohio. His daughter, Cora Elizabeth, is the wife of Ira A. King, of Peebles. He has three daughters. Pearl Merrila, Ora Alice and Mary Josephine, and one son, Albert Valie, at home. David Nixon believes in doing the duty nearest him. He is a quiet, inoffensive citizen and a good neighbor. He is of easy temper and disposition, but when required to act is as firm and determined.

school teacher, and farmer. Vineyard Hill, was born December 12, 1840, on the farm now owned and occupied by him on Gift Ridge, Monroe Township. His father was Alexandria S. Nesbit, who married Miss Mary Peden, a native of Clermont County, Ohio. The Pedens were Pennsylvania Quakers, most of the family now living in West Virginia in the vicinity of Peden Island. The paternal ancestor, John Nesbit, came from Scotland to York County, Pa., in 1732. His son, William Nesbit, the grandfather of Samuel X., had a brother Alexander, who was a Captain in a Pennsylvania Regiment in the War of the Revolution. He also commanded a company in the Whiskey Rebellion.

William Nesbit married Mary Sanderson, a sister of William Sanderson, who commanded a battalion under General Wayne at Brandywine. Samuel X. Nesbit, the subject of this sketch, inherited a taste for literature and general reading which he has cultivated as opportunity would permit all his life. When eighteen years of age, his father died and upon him fell the burden of caring for his mother and six little children, and this greatly interfered with the plans of his future life. Shortly after the death of his father, the War of the Rebellion broke out, and in December, 1861, he enlisted as a private in the famous 70th Regiment, O. V. I., at Camp Hamer. He was at Shiloh, storming of the Russell House, Siege of Corinth, and was in every skirmish line of battle formed by the regiment excepting two, and although touched by balls on several occasions, was never seriously wounded. On the night before the battle of Missionary Ridge, William Hornbeck, a vidette, was charged by three cavalrymen and driven in. Samuel X. Nesbit, John Love and Sergeant Mathew Mc- Colm volunteered to assist Hornbeck to retake the post, which they did after killing one of the Rebel cavalrymen. After the war, Mr. Nesbit engaged in teaching school, which profession he followed until 1886. In 1894, his home was burned and with it his fine library, the acquisition of many years' toil. He now resides in happy bachelorhood on the old homestead in Monroe Township. He has always been a Republican in politics and a Liberal in religion.

of Vineyard Hill, was bom in Fall County, Texas, June 24, 1852. His father was Benjamin Naylor, who married Victoria Lucas, and was born and reared on the old Naylor farm on Gift Ridge. Soon after his marriage, he removed to Cincinnati, where he engaged in the mercantile business. Then he removed to the State of Iowa, and later to Texas, where he died, leaving a widow and two young sons, Clayton, and Reason B., the subject of this sketch. It was the last request of Benjamin Naylor that his widow remove to Adams County, Ohio, which she did, traveling via New Orleans. Our subject married Miss Irene Wade, daughter of LaFayette Wade, of Monroe Township, September 20, 1876. They have had born to them Quincy, Carrie, Cora, Ethel, Granville, Rosa, Izella, Benjamin, Mary and Clinton, two of whom, Carrie and Clinton, are deceased.

Reason B. Naylor now resides on the old LaFayette Wade farm near Wrightsville on the Ohio River. It was on this farm that Israel Donalson was captured by the Indians in 1792, an account of which is given in this volume. In politics, our subject has always been a Republican, and takes an active part in the affairs of his party in local matters, but he has never sought official recognition, though often requested to be a candidate on his party's ticket.

was born near Rardin, in Adams County, September 18, 1840, the eldest son of John and Ann Newman. His middle name is his mother's maiden name. He was brought up to the life of a farmer on his father's farm. He received only a common school education. He was married on the twenty-eighth of November, A. D. 1861, to Miss Sarah Johnson. To them have been born ten children, all of whom are living except one daughter, who died in April, 1899. Mr. Newman owns a large farm and is a fanner and a stock raiser. He was a Justice of the Peace of Franklin Township from 1874 to 1877, and served one year as Treasurer of the Township. He was a County Commissioner of Adams County for three years from January 2, 1894.

In politics, Mr. Newman has always been a Democrat. He is not a member of any church, but a liberal contributor to the Methodist Episcopal Church. He is a man who attracts many friends to him and holds them. He is much given to hospitality and makes all his friends thrice welcome. He is regarded by all who know him as an excellent citizen.

Biographical Sketches 829

farmer and stcx:k dealer, of Cherry Fork, Ohio, was bom, September i6, 1864, in Eagle Township, Brown County, Ohio, son of Henry and Hannah (Sprinkle) Orebaugh, of Brown County, Ohio. Jacob Orebaugh, grandfather of our subject, was a native of Virginia, where he married Rachel Fry. They belonged to the Lutheran Church and were of German origin. They came to Ohio in 1829. Peter Snider, maternal great-grandfather of our subject, came from Germany in 1746. He served in the Revolutionary War for seven years. He married Christina Sewmalt, of Kentucky. She was born in 1746, and died at the age of one hundt-ed and three years in 1849.

Solomon Sprinkle, maternal grandfather of our subject, married Elizabeth Snider, daughter of Peter Snider. She was bom in 1799, and died in 1895. In religious belief, the Sprinkles were Dunkards.

W. H. Orebaugh, the subject of this sketch, spent his boyhood on the farm, obtaining a common school education. In 1882, at the age of eighteen, he went to Missouri, Kansas and Illinois, where he remained for three years.

He was married March 13, 1889, to Lizzie Plummer, daughter of Levi Plummer, a prominent farmer of Cherry Fork, Ohio. Their children are Blanche Marie, Grace Maude, Anna Ethel, Nellie Rosetta and John Williard.

Mr. and Mrs. Orebaugh are members of the United Presbyterian Church at Cherry Fork. Our subject is a Democrat and has taken some part in local politics. He owns two good farms in Wayne Township, where he is engaged principally in handling stock. He is a heavy buyer and shipper of cattle, buying for the Cincinnati and Northern markets He is an affable gentleman, and highly esteemed by all who know him.

was bom at I^ocust Grove, Adams County, Ohio, October 3, 1853. His grandfather Enoch Osborne was a native of Loudon County, Va., and emigrated from there to Adams County. He was a soldier of the War of 1812. His father was George P. Osborne, who served his country faithfully during the Civil War. His mother was Elizabeth Early. His parents were married at Locust Grove in 1850. There were but two children of this marriage, our subject and a daughter, Emily, who married Peter Carter, but is now deceased. Dr. Osborne attended the common schools of the county and the High school at Hillsboro. He also pursued a special course in the Portsmouth High School from 1873 to 1875. He began the study of medicine with Dr. James S. Berry, at Locust Grove, in 1870, and continued it from time to time until 1878, teaching school and attending school in the meantime. He attended lectures at the Cincinnati College of Medicine in 1877, and in the Summer of that year began the practice of medicine with his preceptor, Dr. J. S. Berry, at Locust Grove, and continued with him one year. On April 14, 1878, he was married to Margaret E. Briggs, daughter of John K. Briggs, of Dry Run, Scioto County, Ohio. In February, 1879, he located at Cedar Mills* in the practice of medicine. In May, 1889, he was appointed one of the three Pension Examining Surgeons of Adams County, and served as such till July, 1893. Dr. Osborne has always been a Republican. In the Fall of 1893 he was nominated by his party unaminously for Auditor of Adams County and made the race against Dr. J. M. Wittenmyer. It was a campaign of money on both sides and he was beaten by sixty-eight votes. On January i, 1896, the Doctor removed to Dry Run, in Scioto County, where he has resided ever since and devoted himself exclusively to the practice of his profession. He is a member of the Adams County Medical Society and of the Hempstead Academy of Medicine of Scioto County. He is an Odd Fellow and a Red Man. Dr. Osborne is highly esteemed as an excellent physician and a good citizen.

One of the first settlements in Adams County outside of the Stockade at Manchester was made by Michael Pence, his son Peter Pence, and their kinsmen, the Roush family, together with the Bryans and Cooks, in 1796, at the * 'Dutch Settlement" in what is now Sprigg Township. These families were "Pennsylvania Dutch" and had originally settled in the Shenandoah Valley, and in the year 1795 came to the Three Islands, at Manchester, to make their future homes in the Northwest Territory. The first year of their coming to the Three Islands, they cultivated a crop of com on the lower island which was then partially cleared.

Michael Pence, the pioneer, was drowned in the Ohio River in 1807 while attempting to cross with his team at the lower ferry. He had purchased one thousand four hundred acres of land in the Hopkins Survey in Sprigg Township and was a wealthy farmer for his day in Adams County. He is buried in Hopewell Cemetery. His son, Peter Pence, who married Susan Roush in the Shenandoah Valley previous to his coming to Adams County in 1795, had among other children, a son, Aaron, bom in 1798, who married Elizabeth Moore, and who was the father of the following named children: Nathan, David, Daniel, Jacob, Francis S., Peter, Harriet, w^ho married Dyas Gilbert, and our subject. Alfred Pence, the oldest child, who was bom May 17, 1823, on the old Michael Pence homestead, which he now owns and where he resides, near Maddox Postoffice. He married Hannah Evans in 1847, ^^^ ^^^ reared the following children : Elizabeth, who married Zenous Roush ; Ruth, who married Robert Brookover; Dyas, who married Ada Parr; Rufus; Mahala, who married Lafayette Roush ; and Ida, married to Rev. A. D. Foster.

son of John Patton and Phoebe Taylor, his wife, was born February 2, 1826, in Wayne Township, Adams County. He attended the Public schools of his vicinity and was reared a farmer. He was married March 17, 1847, to Mary Ann Thompson, who was born February 28, 1827. Soon after he was married, he moved on the farm where he now resides. It was then a wilderness. It is now one of the most attractive places in the county. Mr. Patton and his wife have had six children: Marion M. Patton, born January 21, 1848. He died in the service of his country in the Civil War at Harper's Ferry, April 23, 1865, while a member of Company D, 191st O. V. I. His remains were brought home, and rest in the Cherry Fork Cemetery. A second son, J. Monroe Patton, was bom October 13, 1850. He has a separate sketch herein. A daughter, Mary

Biographical Sketceies 831

Alberta, bom January 8, 1853, died July 22, 1857; another daughter, Annabel, bom December 18, 1855, was married to John J. Cisco, November 2, t88i. They reside at Xenia, Ohio. Another daughter, Elizabeth P., bom July 11, 1858, married J. A. Renwick, January 13, 1883. He was pastor of the United Presbyterian Church at Tranquility, about four years, but is now pastor of a church at Biggsville, 111., where he has been for eleven years. The youngest daughter, Emma Z., bom January 13, 1862, was married to the Rev. J. Knox Montgomery, December 25, 1889. He was pastor of the United Presbyterian Church at Unity, and pastor at Sparta, 111., for about four years. For several years past he has been pastor of the United Presbyterian Church on Walnut Hills, Cincinnati.

Mr. Patton and all his family have their membership in the U. P. Church. He and his sons-in- law are all Republicans except the Rev. Montgomery, who is a Prohibitionist. Mr. Patton has always sought to live an upright life, fulfilling all his duties to God, to man and to his country, and that he has succeeded is testified to by all who know him. He is of the strictest integrity in all his dealings, and he is a model farmer, reading all that relates to his occupation, and putting in practice that which he deems practicable. He has been prosperous and he is prospered. He is alive to all the questions of the day affecting his occupation and the interests of the country, and with all that, has had time to take an interest in this History more than any of his neighbors. While he is related to one of the editors of this work (Mr. Evans), that has not caused that same editor, who has written this sketch, to overdraw the just public estimate of Mr. Pattons character. He deserves a great desJ of credit for remaining in Adams County, and doing what he has done for himself, his family, for the church and for the community, for he might have done like most of the other Pattons, gone West and taken up the rich prairies of Indiana, Illinois and Kansas, and been a much richer man than he is to-day, but then Adams County would have lost a citizen who has done much to elevate the community, and of whom it can be justly proud. All honor is due those men who are content to live in the places of their birth, and who labor to elevate the community and uphold the good in church and state in the homes of their childhood.

Mr. Patton is one of the best illustrations of what a citizen, who foregoes all public office and employment, may do for himself by industry, economy, diligence, and the strictest attention to agriculture, his chosen occupation, even though it is the commonest of all.

third son of John Pennywitt, was born on the old homestead on Gift Ridge, Adams County, Ohio, on December 13, 1851. He attended the common schools and assisted his father on the farm until he was a young man, when he left his home and went to Bellefontaine, Logan County, Ohio, to leam the trade of printer. In 1872, he went to Washington, D. C, and worked at his trade until the Spring of 1874, when he entered the United States Weather Service, and has remained almost constantly with that service until the present time. He served as observer of the weather at Leavenworth, Kans.; Burlington, Iowa; Pittsburg, Pa.; Buffalo, N. Y.;

Norfolk, Va. ; Sanford, Fla. ; Titusville, Fla. ; Jupiter, Fla. (at which place he superintended the construction of an observatory) ; Knoxville, Tenn. ; New Orleans, La., and Washington, D. C. He now holds a responsible position in the Climate and Crop Division of the Weather Bureau at Washington, having charge of the statistical work of temperature and rainfall data and the collection of reports pertaining to the condition of the different crops of the country. He has always taken a deep interest in scientific investigations, particularly the study of meteorology and kindred subjects.

On November 12, 1890, in Knoxville, Tenn., he was married to Miss Jennie L. Hessee, of Abingdon, Va. He has one boy, John Edward, six years of age, and one g^rl, Louise Mary, now nearly three years old.

the eldest son of John Pennywitt, was bom on the bank of the Ohio River opposite the head of Manchester Island, July 11, 1839. CHe has recently adopted the spelling of the family name here given, having been convinced that such was the original and proper method.) He received all his schooling in a log schoolhouse on the old homestead near the present site of Quinn Chapel. At the age of eighteen, he began teaching in the Public schools. At twenty-one, he "went West." When Fort Sumpter was fired upon and President Lincoln made his first call for defenders of the flag, he was one of the first to respond. He enlisted in April, 1861, at Newton, Iowa, in Company B, Fifth Infantry Regiment of Iowa Volunteers. His command was in action at New Madrid, Mo., the siege of Corinth, the battle of Corinth, Luka, Jackson, Clinton, Champion's Hill and Vicksburg, Miss., Missionary Ridge, Tenn., the Atlantic Campaign, and in many minor engagements. During his entire army service he was never in the hospital, never absent from his command, and he never missed a tour of duty. On the battle-field in front of Vicksburg his comrades chose him by an almost unanimous vote to be their company commander. This action of the men was ratified by all the field officers of his regiment, and Governor Kirkwood commissioned him Captain over the heads of both Lieutenants and the First Sergeant of his company. This is the only instance of this kind in the history of the war. He remained with his command until it was mustered out.

In civil life he has been at different times bookkeeper for a large manufacturing establishment in Cincinnati and for one of the largest lumber companies in Chicago; clerk in the U. S. Treasury, Interior and Postoffice Departments; Chief of Division of Railroad Statistics of the Tenth Census ; rate clerk of the C. B. and Q. Railroad ; statistical clerk of the Chicago Fire Department; editor of the Manchester Gazette, the Maysville (Ky.) Republican and Round's Printers' Cabinet, Chicago; and Washington correspondent of a large number of newspapers. At the present time he is serving as law clerk of the Department of Agriculture.

He was married August 28, 1878, to Anna Rebecca Frow, of Winchester, youngest daughter of Archibald and Eliza Frow. They have two children and reside in their pleasant home, "Seven Gables," at Glencarlyn, Va., a beautiful suburb of Washington.

Biographical Sketches 833

For several years, Captain Pennywitt has been devoting very special attention to the subject of a great national institution of learning to be located in the immediate vicinity of the National capital, a movement originated and earnestly advocated by the immortal Washington. He is the author of a memorial to Congress, presented in the Senate, February 28, 1899, by Senator Cullom, that has attracted much attention. This memorial offers the following suggestions :

(i.) The restoration to National jurisdiction of that portion of the District of Columbia (ten miles square) which lies south of the Potomac River.

(2. ) The founding of a city upon this reacquired territory, to be dedicated to the cause of learning and to be known as the city of Lincoln.

(3.) The establishment within this city of a great National institution of learning to be known as the University of Washington and Lincoln.

He expects to devote the remainder of his life to the development of this great project which has been described as "the fitting climax to all that has been done for education during the Nineteenth Century/' and as "an undertaking worthy of the foremost nation on earth, and of the most progressive age of human history."

liveryman, of Manchester, was born February iq, 1856, on a farm about three miles above Manchester, and is a son of Reuben ' Pennywitt and Jane Cooper, his wife. He was educated in the Public schools of Manchester, and was engaged in the lumber trade with his father until 1882, when he engaged in the feed and livery business, which he has since followed with success. April 24, 1881, he married Miss Laura Kimble, daughter of Henry Kimble. He has a son, Reuben Roy, bom January 19, 1882, a graduate of the Class of '99 of the Manchester High School, and a daughter, Mary Roxana, bom December 17, 1895.

In politics, Mr. Pennywitt is a Republican, and is a member of the Methodist Church. He has held many local offices, and is one of the substantial business men of Manchester.

was born September 26, 1861, three miles above Manchester, in Adams County. His father was Mark Pennywit, and his mother's maiden name was Sarah Cooper. He was educated in the Public schools of the county. Politically, he has always been a Republican. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Rome. He came with his father, Mark Pennywit, to Rome on September 18, 1880, where he engaged in business with him until the death of the latter on June 18, 1885, after which he conducted the business himself, which was a saw, planing and grist mill. In April, 1888, Mr. Pennywit's mill and all its contents were burned. There was no insurance whatever and the loss was quite heavy. Mr. Pennywit, with characteristic energy, built the same year on a somewhat larger scale. He manufactures flour, meal, and dressed and undressed lumber of every description. 53a

He lives in the parental home with his only unmarried sister, Eugenic Pennywit. His other sisters are Artemesia Godfrey, Mary H. Roberts, and Martha J., the wife of E. A. Crawford, editor of the W^st Union Defender.

Mr. Pennywit is a gentleman of the highest character and integrity, and scrupulously exact in all his dealings with his fellow men, and has the highest respect and esteem of all with whom he cames in contact. He is one of the foremost business men of the county. He and his sister have a delightful home, surrounded by all the comforts and conveniences of life, where it is a pleasure for their friends to meet them.

was born January 8, 1840, on Gift Ridge, Monroe Township, Adams County, Ohio. His father was Reuben Pennywitt, who has a separate sketch herein, and his mother's maiden name was Jane Cooper. His mother was born in September, 1816, and is still living. Reuben Pennywitt and wife had nine children, eight of whom are living. One died in infancy. Our subject is the eldest child of his father's family. He attended school on Gift Ridge, and his entire education was obtained in the common schools. His father was a builder of boats and a lumberman. Mr. Pennywitt began steamboating at the age of eighteen. He continued in steamboating for a short time, and was engaged in the lumber business until the fourth of July, 1861, when he enlisted in Company I, 39th 0. V. I., for three years. He served until the twenty-fourth of August, 1864, when he was mustered out at the expiration of his term of service. He was never in the hospital and was never disabled while in the service. He was in every battle in which his regiment was engaged and never received a scratch.

On returning from the army, he folowed the lumber business in Manchester for two or three years. In 1867, he re-engaged in steamboating, beginning as a watchman on the steamboat Robert Moore. He has continued in the same occupation ever since, and has served as second mate, mate, pilot, and master. He was master on steamboats in the Southern trade, notably the Courier and the Stella Wild, and others, for over ten years. He has resided in Manchester ever since the War. Since 1877, he has been engaged on the Ohio River on the Pomeroy and Pittsburg boats. For the last five years he has been a mate on the Pittsburg and Cincinnati line, on the Hudson and the Virginia. He has been engaged on not fewer that two hundred different steamboats during his career as a steamboatman.

He has always been a Republican, and has been a member of the Methodist Protestant Church at Manchester for the last eight years. He was married June 21, 1869, to Miss Matilda C. Fleming, daughter of Alexander Fleming and granddaughter of James M. Cole. He has had three children: Edith C, born May 31, 1870, the wife of F. A. Mc- Cormick of Manchester; Rufus C, bom June 5, 1872, a physician in the city of Dayton, located at 134 South Ludlow Street, where he has been four years. He had a daughter, Pearl C, bom July 8, 1878, who died September 7, 1891. Our subject has but one grandchild, Rufus, son of F. A. and Edith McCormick, born December 9, 1891.

Biographical Sketches 836

Captain Pennywitt is noted for his modesty and his substantial worth. One always knows just where to find him ; and when found, he can be depended upon. He is as different from the traditional old-time steamboat mate or master, as day is from night. His friend David Dunbar says that one can ascribe all good qualities to him, and then fall short of his real merits. He maintains the high character for honor and integrity set by his ancestors ever since they have been known to Adams County. They would have died for conscience' sake and counted it glory, and our subject is not a whit behind them.

was bom on Brush Creek in Adams County just below Jacksonville, near Pristoe's, April 7, 1846. His father was John Platter, and his mother, Mary Davis, a daughter of John Davis. When he was six years of age, his father moved one and one-fourth miles east of Peebles, where our subject resided until he was twenty-five years of age. He obtained a common school education, and in 1871 he engaged in the mercantile business at Locust Grove. He resided there in the same business until 1881, and then he moved to the location of the town of Peebles. He built the first business house in Peebles, being the warehouse now occupied by J. F. Wickerham. After locating in Peebles, he engaged in the grain business for four years, and then took up the hardware business, which he has followed ever since. For several years he was in this business with his brother-in-law, James C. Copeland, but now Mr. Platter has the business alone. He has one of the largest business houses in Peebles and does very extensive business in hardware, farm machinery, wagons, etc. He enlisted in Company I, 141st Ohio Volunteer Infantry, May 2, 1864, and was discharged September 3, 1864. He is a Republican, and as such was a candidate for Auditor on that ticket in 1874, but was defeated. He was a member of the School Board of Franklin Township for several years. He has served as a member of the Peebles Council for three vears, and of the village School Board for four terms. He is a member of the United Presbyterian Church at Peebles, and has been an elder in it since its organization.

He was married to Mary Copeland, daughter of Chambers Copeland, in 1867. Her father emigrated from Ireland, and was among the first settlers in Adams County. His widow, Salome Tener Copeland, is stillliving. Our subject has five children, two sons and three daughters; Raymond, Winifred, Anna, Susan, and Blanche, all living.

son of Philip and Hermena Pfeifer, was born in Buda-Pesth, Hungary, October 12, 1824, and died Febmary 28, 1899, ^^ Blue Creek, Ohio. In boyhood, he clerked in a dry goods store in his native city, and when the Rebellion of 1847 came on, he enlisted as a soldier in the Army of Freedom. After this he fled to Germany to save his head, and joined the German army. In 1849, he came to the United States and took out naturalization papers in 1856. He enlisted in the service of the United

States, October 30, 1861, First Ohio Light Artillery, Sergeant of Battery L, and was honorably discharged October 31, 1864, at Cedar Creek, Va.

He married Laura Jane Freeland, daughter of Edward and Sarah Wales Freeland, January 25, 1859. She was born July 8, 1841, and died March 30, 1887. There were born to this union Edward W., Minnie, James A., Fannie B.» Frank, who died in infancy, and Clara F.

James A. Pfeifer, born September 5, 1865, son of Samuel Pfeifer, is now in the general merchandising business with his brother-in-law, Albert Jones, at Blue Creek. He is an active, thorough going business man, and the firm is doing a thriving business.

of Cherry Fork, is a lineal descendant of John Patton, of Virginia. His father was Nathaniel Patton, of Hanshaville, who married Ann Thompson, daughter of Daniel Thompson, of Adams County. The subject of this sketch was born on the old Patton homestead at Harshaville, October 13, 1850. Being of strong and robust frame during his boyhood days, and for over tv/enty years after his majority and marriage, he lived the busy and toilsome life of a farmer. He received the rudiments of an English education, the best it afforded, in his home district country school, and later he attended the old academy at Cherry Fork, in its better days, under the tuition of Professors Coleman and Smith.

October 8, 1872, he was united in marriage to Miss Sarah J. Allison, daughter of David Allison, of Spring Mill, Center County, Pa. This marriage was a happy one, uniting as it did two old and respectable families, many of whose descendants are scattered throughout the Ohio Valley, and recognized as active, honorable men and women.

In the Spring of 1893, Mr. Patton purchased the farm implement and hardware business (and drug store) of Morrison Bros., of Cherry Fork, and removed there with his family, where he now conducts the above named business. From his well known integrity and upright dealing with men, he has built up a business interest reaching into the country for miles about him.

His family consists of Mary Maud, who married Frank E. Kirkpatrick ; Maggie Anna, who married Charles H. Morrison ; Clyde, a promising young man engaged in business with his father; and Lorena and Sarah Helen, yet at home.

In politics, Mr. Patton is a Republican, having held many offices of trust in his native township. He and his family are earnest supporters of the U. P. Congregation at Cherry Fork.

liveryman, of West Union, born December 28, 1857, is a son of Frederick Pflaumer, as the name was originally written, who was a native of Wurtemburg, Germany, and who came to America at the age of eighteen years. He first worked as a blacksmith and afterwards became a prosperous farmer near the Mt. Leigh Church in Scott Township, this county.

Biographical Sketches 837

John F. Plummer is one of the best and most widely known citizens of Adams County. He was reared on a farni, where he was taught industry and frugality, and after attaining his manhood, he followed the occupation of farmer till his thirty-fourth year, when he disposed of his farmmg interest, and removed to Winchester, at which point he conducted the well known hostelry - the Plummer House - formerly the old Parker House. In November, 1895, he took up his residence in West Union, where he conducts a large livery and feed stable. In 1898, he also engaged in the undertaking business with O. C. Robuck. He is at present a trustee of the Wilson Children's Home. In poHtics, he is a Democrat of the old Jeflferson school, in accordance with his ideas of simplicity, frugality and honesty. He and his accomplished wife, formerly Miss Nettie E. Custer, a near relative of the gallant Gen. George Custer, are both devout members of the Presbyterian Church of West Union, Mrs. Plummer began teaching school at the remarkably early age of thirteen, and was one of the first in her profession until her marriage, December 28, 1887. She is one of the brightest mathematicians in the county. Mr. Plummer is a member of Adams Lodge, Knights of Pythias, No. 484., of Winchester. He has one son, Harry C, born September 12, 1897.

was born December 16, 1844, near Buena Vista, in Scioto County, Ohio, the son of Henry Prather and Mary Rape, his wife. His mother was a sister of the late William R. Rape, of West Union.

Our subject was the second child of their marriage. His father removed to West Union, when he was about two years old, and resided there until the year 1865. In that year his father, Henry Prather, removed to Manchester, Ohio, and started the daily omnibus line from Manchester to West Union, the first that was ever run, going to West Union every morning and returning in the afternoon to connect with the evening boats. William attended the schools in Manchester until the twenty-fourth of October, 1863, when he enlisted in Company E, 91st Regiment, O. V. I., at the age of eighteen years, for a period of three years. He was promoted on June i, 1865, to the office of Quartermaster Sergeant of the regiment which he held until he was mustered out on the twenty-fourth of June following. At the time he enlisted he left the school room to become a soldier. He was a conductor on the street car line in Louisville, Ky., from 1865 to 1867. In that year, he married Miss Rebecca Shriver, daughter of Joseph M. Shriver, of Manchester. He located there and engaged in the stove and tinware business. He continued in that business at Manchester until 1894, when he removed to Portsmouth and engaged in the wholesale tinware and crockery business under the name of the "Portsmouth Tinware Company," with John K. Peyton, Charles H. Zeigler and James W. Queary, his partners. He continued in that business in Portsm.outh until 1898, when he returned to Manchester. Since 1898, he has been a traveling saleman for The James McDonald & Son's Company tinware and metal house of Cincinnati. He has a family of seven children, all living, as follows: Robert M., a dentist at Fort Worth, Texas ; William Byron, city sales- man, in Cincinnati ; Mary, the wife of Frank Gilfillen, a contractor, living in Northside, Ohio; Kate, the wife of A. F. McColm, a telegraph operator for the C. H. & D. Railroad at Carthage, Ohio; Mabel, the wife of Frank Cady, of Maysville, Ky. ; Grace, the wife of Charles C. Burt, a traveling salesman for the Drew-Selby Shoe Company, of Portsmouth, Ohio, and Nellie, who is at home.

Mr. Prather is a member of the Presbyterian Church and a Royal Arch Mason. He has always been a Republican. He is a good citizen, respected and highly esteemed by all who know him.

was born in Hillsboro, Ohio, in 1831, a son of Thomas E. Purdy and Eliza Wilson, his wife. Robert Purdy's grandfather was one of the first settlers of New Market, and was a native of Sharon Valley, Pennsylvania. He died in 1888 at the age of eighty.

He received a common school education, and at the age of seventeen began the study of medicine with Dr. J. W. Washburn, of New Market, Ohio, with whom he studied for five years, and in that period attended lectures at Starling Medical College in Columbus, Ohio, from which he graduated in 1858.

In the same year he was married to Ella Santee, daughter of Samuel Santee and Margaret Browne, his wife, and after the lapse of all these years, her hair is still as black as a raven's wing, as it was when the Doctor married her, and she is as young in spirit as forty-one years ago. In 1859, ^^ practiced one year in connection with his preceptor, and in i860 located in Bradyville. On August 11, 1862, he enlisted as a Private in Company E, 91st O. V. I., and served until February 18, 1863, when he was discharged by order of the War Department. He need not have enlisted as a private, and could have served as a surgeon, but he gave his services to the country as an ordinary soldier, though for a part of his service he acted as a hospital steward, being detailed for that service. On his discharge from the Ninety-first, he returned to his home and practice. On August 21, 1864, he enlisted as a Private in Company H, i82d O. V. I., for one year, and served until July 7, 1865. Ag^in he might have gone as a physician, but went as a private. We take it his reasons were purely patriotic.

He practiced medicine in Bradyville from i860 until 1880, when he removed to Ellsberry in Brown County, where he remained for three years. In 1883, he located in Mowrystown, Highland County, and remained a year. He then returned to Bradyville, where he has since resided and where he expects to remain till, to use a nautical phrase, after Admiral Dewey, "he is sunk by Death's superior weight of metal."

Dr. Purdy has had nine children, six of whom survive : Margaret, wife of Philip Flaugher, of Lexington, Ky. ; Mary E., wife of Oscar Clark, of Kokomo, 111.; Thomas, Letha, Ed^ar and Clifton. He is a Republican and is proud of it. lie was Coroner of Adams County from 1891 to 1893. He is proud also of his record as a soldier and well he may be for he is the only man we have found in Adams County who was content to serve his country twice as a private when he might have served it as a surgeon. He is a member of George Bailey Post, G. A, R., at Aberdeen, Ohio, and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Bradyville.

The Doctor takes life easy. His record is about made up and he has found nothing in it to be ashamed of. He has been a very useful man; always ready to respond to every professional call, regardless of color, race, or previous condition of servitude, or otherwise. He has done a great deal of good in his community. He rests his religious faith in the grand old Methodist Church, his political faith in the Republican party, and having done his duty as patriot and citizen, with the philosophy of Marcus Aurelius and the faith of St. Paul, he is ready to meet the Last Enemy whenever required.

was born April 4, 1846, in Greene Township, Adams County, Ohio. His father was James Pitts, a native of Lewis County, Kentucky. His mother was Keziah Tucker, a native- of Ohio. He was the youngest of four children. He was reared on a farm, and attended the District school. His father died when he was but ten years of age and he was thrown on his own resources. As a youth, he worked on a farm and drov6 teams for farmers in Scioto and Adams Counties in the vicinity of Buena Vista.

When the war broke out, he was fifteen years of age, but he was wild to go in. He was too young, but he gave his age as sixteen, and was accepted. He served until September 11, 1364, when he was discharged by reason of expiration of term of service. He left much broken in health, and on reaching home had pneumonia, typhoid, and remittent fever successively, and was given up to die. He ran away from his doctor as soon as he was able to travel, and on February 17, 1865, he re-enlisted in Company C of the 81 st O. V. I., his former regiment, and was made company wagoner. He served until July 13, 1865, when he was mustered out, as the war v/as over. He came home a second time much broken in health, and it took him some time to regain his strength. As soon as he was able, he went to teaming. On May 29, 1871, he was married to Miss Mary A. Young, daughter of Thomas Young, of Greene Township, Adams County. He and his wife went to housekeeping in Buena Vista, and resided there a year. Mr. Pitts was bom a trader, and moved to near Rome, Adams County, where he resided for two years, and then moved back to Buena Vista and engaged in teaming and farming. He bought the Flagg farm near Buena Vista, and lived on it until 1878, when he sold it to William J. Flagg.

He then bought the Lorey Adams farm, consisting of one hundred and seventy acres, two miles north of Rome, on the Mineral Springs road, and resided there until 1882, when he sold it and purchased the Solomon B. McCall farm near Buena Vista. He resided there until 1886, when he sold it to Richard Young and bought two farms from Judge Ousler, in Greene Township, in Adams County. He moved on to the one where Judg-e Ousler had had his residence, and residled there until February, 1890, when he traded his farms for lots in the city of Ports-

He enjoys the distinction of being almost the only man who went into the army at the age of fifteen, and came out at the age of nineteen, in July, 1865, having served nearly four years. He has two children: Elya Eleanor, former wife of Henry Kept, who has a daughter Myrtie, aged six years; and William, his son, aged fifteen years.

Mr. Pitts has always maintained the most amicable relations with all his neighbors wherever he has dwelt, and could go back and live pleasantly at any of his former homes. He is of an agreeable and obliging disposition, but he cannot refuse a trade when it is offered; and yet, with all his trading, he has made and saved money ; and he is an exception to the rolling stone adage, if moss therein means money. In his political faith, he is a Democrat, but he has never sought or held office, nor has it sought him. He is a teamster by occupation, and follows it diligently. He is not a member of any church, but believes in the religion of humanity. He tries to meet every duty in life with a cheerful disposition, and so far has succeeded. He hopes to continue his bravery of spirit till he shall be called hence.

farmer, residing near Peebles, Ohio, was born July 5, 1854, near Newport, in Adams County. His father was Ralph Peterson, a native of Brown Couty, whose father, Ralph Peterson, came from the State of New Jersey. The name is Swedish, and Ralph Peterson's ancestors came to this country originally from Sweden.

Our subject's mother was Drusilla A. Wilson. Her father, Ralph Wilson, born in Pennsylvania, was in the War of 1812, and had nine brothers, all of whom were soldiers in the same war. He had five sisters. Our subject attended the common schools of his vicinity and early displayed a thirst for learning. He attended several Normal schools in the county, began the work of teaching in 1873, ^md continued it for ten years, working on the farm in the Summer months. From 1883 to 1885, he was engaged in merchandising at Dunbarton, Ohio, with J. W. Rogers, under the firm name of Rogers & Peterson. In 1885, he went to farming on the farm where he now resides, and has followed that occupation ever since. He was Clerk of Meigs Township from 1892 to 1896.

Mr. Peterson is not a member of any church, but believes in the broad religion of humanity. He is one of those with whom it is pleasant to meet and converse, and after meeting him one feels that he has met a fellow man whom it is a pleasure to know. He possesses much magnetism and he aims to do good to all with whom he associates and makes those persons feel he has benefited them. He is always ready tc learn and equally ready to impart his information in a way to give pleasure to his hearers. In his political beliefs, he is a Democrat. He is a citizen, honest, industrious and upright, whose life can always be cited for good and whose place in the community is for usefukiess. He is a prudent and safe counselor, an obliging and considerate neighbor. As a friend, he is faithful and true. His convictions on any subject are strong and not easily changed. With all these good qualities fully known and understood, he is highly esteemed among his neighbors and in the circle of his associates.

was born at Mossgrove, County Cork, Ireland, November, 1816, where his family had resided for generations. His father, James Quarry, was a descendant of one of Cromwell's officers. His mother's maiden name was Jane Shorten. Her home was at PuUerwick, and often visited by the Wesleys in their visits to Ireland. Rev. Quarry was raised an Episcopalian and was baptized and confirmed in that church. In his boyhood, he enjoyed the advantages of the common school system in Ireland, but later on, when it entered his mind to preach, he was sent to Bandon, where he devoted himself to studying and teaching for eight years. In 1843, he united with the Methodist Episcopal Church and was licensed to preach. In 1844, after the death of his father, he concluded to emigrate to America, and he left Ireland on the fifth day of May, 1845, in the sailing ship "Virginia," with his sister. They were five weeks on their voyage to New York City. They came direct to Cincinnati, arriving there on the eighth of July. The following December, Bishop Hamlin sent Mr. Quarry to Patriot Circuit. In September, 1846, he was admitted on trial to the Ohio Conference, and from that time on he labored in the ministry in the Methodist Episcopal Church until 1879, when he retired from active work. In this period, he was preacher and pastor in twenty-one circuits and stations, first in the Ohio Conference, and afterwards in the Cincinnati Conference, and that without vacation or intermission. In 1852, while on the Lockland charge, on the ninth of September, he was married to Miss Harriet Elizabeth Bagby, who was a true helpmate and co-worker in all his ministerial labors, but especially in the Sunday School, where her natural talents found their best adaptation and the greatest success crowned her efforts.

In 185 1, and again in 1873, he was located at West Union, the last time remaining there until 1876, when he located at Felicity, in Clermont County.

April 7, 1890, Mrs. Quarry was stricken with paralysis, and, after a short illness, died. The years of Rev. Quarry's life after this event were years of great physical suffering, but filled with hope and rejoicing. His home was one where his hosts of friends loved to go with words of comfort and encouragement. On February 9, he passed away after twelve days' sickness, with La Grippe.

Rev. Quarry was a man who was loved by all who knew him. He was a true Irishman and one of the best types of his countrymen. In his preaching, he was enthusiastic and earnest, and very successful. He and his wife are lovingly remembered by all their old friends in Adams County.

of Waverly, Ohio, is one of the foremost educators and one of the best teachers in Southern Ohio. He was born on the twenty-fourth of January, 1870, the sixth son and eighth child of Stephen Re)molds and Maria Moore, his wife, near where the town of Peebles is, on the old Dunbar farm. His mother was a daughter of Newton Moore, one of the most successful of the Brush Creek farmers. His father was an extensive farmer and stock raiser and was very successful in each of those occupations. Our subject attended the common schools near his home until 1887, when he attended the school at Lebanon, Ohio, and graduated in the Scientific course in 1889. He began his career as a teacher in the Fall of 1889, ^^^ f^w have accomplished as much as he in ten years. From 1889 until 1892, he taught District schools in the Fall and Winter in Adams and Scioto Counties.

In the Summer of 1890 and 1891, he taught a Normal school at North Liberty,Ohio,in connection with Prof. J. W. Jones. In the Summer of 1892, he read medicine with Dr. George F. Thomas, at Peebles. From the Fall of 1892 until June, 1895, ^^ was principal of the High school in Manchester. In the Summers of 1893, 1894 and 1895, he taught Summer schools at Manchester in connection with Prof. J. W. Jones. In the Fall of 1895, he was elected Superintedent of the schools at Manchester, and served until June, 1899. I" ^^^ Summer of 1896, he taught a Normal school at Manchester. In the Summer of 1898, he taught a Normal school at West Union in connection with Prof. J. E. Collins. In the Sum.mer of 1899, he attended the Summer postgraduate course at the Ohio Wesleyan University at Delaware, Ohio. In the Fall of 1899, he accepted the position of Superintendent of the schools at Waverly, Ohio.

In December, 1895, he was granted by the State Board of School Examiners a Common School Life Certificate. In December, 1898, the same Board granted him a High School Life Certificate. Eighty per cent, of the teachers who taught in Adams County in the years 1898 and 1899 had been pupils of his in the County Normals, or Summer schools. In 1897, he was one of the County School Examiners of Adams County. Mr. Reynolds is a Free Mason. He is a member of the Blue Lodge and Chapter of Manchester, and of the Commandery in Portsmouth. He is also an Odd Fellow and Knight of Pythias and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.

Prof. Reynolds is a man of strong personality and exceptional attainments in the branches of learning he has studied. His perceptions are quick and keen. He is a disciplinarian and an organizer of rare ability. His influence for good, wherever he has taught, has been remarkable. His administration of the Manchester schools has been the brightest in their history. While the work in the common branches under his supervision was well carried on, he introduced new subjects of study and infused in his pupils a love of them and enthusiasm in the pursuit of them. Since his location at Waverly, he has become largely instrumental in the founding of the Riverside Tri-County Teachers' Association and is its President.

Biographical Skktches 843

He has tireless zeal and energy in his chosen profession. He puts his whole soul into his work, and makes the tedious pursuit of learning attractive, delightful and interesting. He possesses strong will, wonderful energy and is full of confidence in his plans and projects. He has a fine constitution and excellent health. He has a sound mind in a sound body and conserves all his mental and physical forces. His carreer as a teacher fairly begun will be one of the best and most brilliant. He is a Democrat in his political principles, believing in "government of the people, by the people and for the people."

It was upon the twenty-fourth day of February, 1870, that Walter Ellsworth Roberts received the first block from Time with which to build the structure of his life. He has not yet built with "massive deeds and great," nor with "ornaments of rhyme." Though fully as well has he built with the high prize of life, that crowning fortune of a man, which is to be born with a bias to some pursuit which ever finds him in employment and happiness.

He was the youngest son of a family of eleven children, born to Isaac and Lucinda E. Roberts. His ancestry will be found in the sketch of Lincoln J. Roberts, his brother. His parents, with two children, came from Virginia to Adams County, Ohio, in 1851. They purchased land in the northern part of Winchester Township, where the subject of this sketch was born and where he still resides. His childhood days were spent much the same as those of most boys upon a farm, where many people think that what boys do on a farm is of no consequence. A careful observer would see, as Charles Dudley Warner has so well expressed in his book, "Being a Boy/' that "a farm without a boy would very soon come to grief."

His education was received in the District school which he attended until seventeen year? of age. He then attended the North Liberty Academy and the Garret Biblical Institute of Evanston, Illinois, where his standing in his classes was always good, having never received a grade under ninety per cent, in anv study.

He united with the Seaman Methodist Episcopal Church on February 23, 1893, and v/as licensed a local preacher by the Quarterly Conference of Winchester charge in January, 1894. He has twice been chosen to represent liis local church in the Lay Electoral Conferences, the first in 1895, at Hamilton, Ohio, and the next in 1899, ^^ Dayton, Ohio. He has taken an active part in the Farmers' Institutes of the county, having been elected President of one session of the Institute at North Liberty, Ohio. Since 1895, he has been prominently identified with the Sabbath School work of the county, having charge of the

Normal Department, and was the first Normal Secretary elected in the county. In November, 1898, at Russellville, Ohio, he assisted in organizing a Normal Department in the Sabbath School work in Brown county, and enrolled the first student in that county, Mrs. Sallie Webster, a missionary to Santiago, Chili, S. A.

Mr. Roberts is actively engaged in farming, having an attractive and delightful home on a farm of two hundred and twenty-six acres. He is a constant reader and a great lover of books. His library is one of the largest and best in the county, and all who call at Greenway Farm will be most hospitably received and entertained and find in Mr. Roberts a gentleman of delightful social qualities.

of Washington C. H., Ohio, was born June 7, 1839, at Mt. Leigh, in Adams County. His father was Joseph Rothrock, and his mother, Sarah McKinney. They were from Mifflin County, Pennsylvania. He grew up on his father's farm, and after learning out at the District schools, attended the North Liberty Academy, and afterwards at Lebanon, Ohio.

For nine years, while a boy and a youth, he was a conductor on the Underground Railroad, and helped two hundred slaves to freedom. He entered the service of his country October 6, 1861, as a Private in Company B, 60th O. V. I., a year regiment. His brother, Philip, was Captain of the company. . He was in the battle of Cross Keys and at Harper's Ferry. On June 25, 1863, he enlisted in the Second Ohio Heavy Artillery, Company B, and was made a Sergeant of the company, August 5, 1863. He was promoted Second Lieutenant and assigned to Company I, December 28, 1864. He was mustered out August 23, 1865. He took up his residence at Winchester, Ohio, and began to trade in cattle.

On the seventeenth of August, 1867, he was married to Miss Effie J. Davis. He has a son, Frank, who is married and. has one child. He is conducting a steam laundry at Washington C. H. He has a daughter, Anna, who resides with her father.

In 1884, he removed from Winchester, Ohio, to Washington C. H., where he has ever since resided. He is a Republican. He was born a Presbyterian and is a member of the church at Washington C. H., and a ruling elder therein.

He is genial and cordial in his disposition, ready to make friends and able to hold them. He is always interested in young people and desirous that they shall enjoy themselves. He is a man of strong business integrity and great fairness, honest and reliable in all his dealings. Those who know him best, admire him for his strong Christian character, his devotion to religious convictions and to his church. He is wise in counsel, gentle in manner, devoted to duty and lived his faith merchant, of Bentonville, was born in Sprigg Township, December 29, 1842, on the farm now occupied by Michael Smith. His grandparents, Michael and Mary Frye Roush, were married in Shenandoah County,

Biographical Sketches 846

Virginia, in 1794, and removed to Adams County, in 1796, settling on the above mentioned farm. Michael Roush was a millwright and he built and ran a "horse mill," common in early times. It is remarkable that when Mr. Roush came to Adams County that stone was so scarce that he drove all the way down Suck Run without finding a wagon load for pillars for his house and used locust blocks instead, some of which may be seen under the old house to this day. Robert S. Roush, the father of our subject, was born September 6, 1814, at the old place. He married Mary Ann Hook, in 1837, the fruits of which union were Dobbins, Elizabeth, James Polk, Michael, Thomas H., John H., Franklin P., William W. and George W. Mr. Roush, the subject of this sketch, received a limited education in the common schools of the township, and has given his attention mostly to farming until the last three years since which tim^ he has been engaged in the dry goods and grocery business in Bentonville. He was married October 15, 1863, to Caroline B. McNulty, daughter of Asa McNulty, of Brown County.

The children born to them are Ida M., married to Thos. Sinniger, of Bentonville; Anna, married to James Sinniger, of Aberdeen, Ohio; Eh'za Jane, married to W. J. Plaugher, merchant, of Bentonville; George C, married to Bertha Shipley (deceased), daughter of Milton Shipley, and Frank, married to Identic Smith. Mr. Roush is a Democrat of the old school, although he has never taken any active part in politics, preferring to give his whole attention to his business, at which he has been moderately successfully. He was elected Treasurer of Sprigg Township in i8i99 without any solicitation on his part. Mr. Roush is known far and wide as a man upright in all his dealings and is rated "good" as a merchant in Bradstreet's.

of Blue Creek, was born in the city of Glasgow, Scotland, in 1835. His mother's maiden name was Emaline Whittelsey, of the well-known family of that name in the days of Robert Bruce. In 1840, he came with his parents to the Territory of Michigan, and grew to manhood on a farm in that State. He studied at the University of Michigan, and at the beginning of the Civil War entered the Union Army with the Barry Guards of Ann Arbor. He was with McCIellan in the Peninsular Campaign, and received his first wound at Malvern Hill. He had his horse shot under him at Antietam while bearing dispatches from Gen. Bumside to Griffin's Park of Artillery. He was wounded a second time at the first battle of Fredericksburg, and again under Hooker at the same place. In the Summer of 1863, ^^ ^^as on detached duty at Louisville, Kentucky, being no longer fit for field service on account of wounds. Was discharged in the Fall of 1863, and settled in Kenton County, Kentucky, and resumed the practice of medicine. In 1875, he came to Jefferson Township, Adams County, Ohio, where he still resides and has a large and lucrative practice in his profession. He married Mary J. Taylor, a very intelligent and estimable woman. They have no children.

He received a good common school education and worked on his father's farm until his marriage with Miss Ella Jackson, in 1876, a daughter of Samuel Jackson and his wife, Catherine Kirker, of Liberty Township. He has, since his marriage, been engaged in farming and stock raising and is one of the wealthy farmers of Sprigg Township, owning one of the finest farms in that region. ' In 1897, he was nominated as the unanimous choice of his party, on the Democratic ticket for Commissioner, and was elected in November of that year, which position he is now filling to the satisfaction of his political friends, and the tax payers of the county in general. Mr. Roush is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Bradyville and is trustee and steward of that organization; and also of Brady Lodge No. 624, Knights of Pythias. He is descended from the Roush family of the old "Dutch Settlement" in Sprigg Township, one of the pioneer families of Adams County.

of Blue Creek, better known as "Buck'' Rowley, the "Bard of Blue Creek Valley," is a native Buckeye, having been born at Syracuse, Meigs County, Ohio, May i, 1858. He spent his boyhood days in Middleport, and when in his teens removed to Pittsburgh, Pa., where he took up the occupation of steamboatman on the Ohio, and later made round trips from Pittsburg to New Orleans. Here he developed that free and easy manner so characteristic of "Buck" Rowley. Here he learned to take care of himself when men became turbulent, and here he learned to love nature, and to appreciate her grandeur, when all was silent, save the plashing of the wheels, as the boat cut the surface of the mighty Father of Waters. In December, 1877, he came to the beautiful Blue Creek Valley in Adams County to visit a brother residing there, and he was so impressed with the region that he determined to make it his future home. A year later he married Miss O'Ella Waters, who shared his joys and sorrows till her decease in March, 1899. She bore him four children, two boys and two girls.

While not learned in books, nor skilled in art, the stronger natural ability of "Buck" Rowley asserts itself in many ways. He has accumulated a competence, is a power in local politics, and has earned scMne prominence in a literary way.

He is recognized in the volume titled "National Poets of America," by giving space to some of his compositions, and terming him in a biographical sketch, "The Soldier Poet."

of Seaman, Scott Township, Adams County, was bom June i, 1865, in Winchester Towniship. His great-grandfather, Stephen Roberts, was born in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, August 29, 1762. He moved into Fairfax County, Virginia, when a child. There he married Deborah Williams, who was a member of the Society of Friends. They had eight children, six sons and two daughters, all of whom grew to maturity, married and reared families. John Roberts, the third child, was the grandfather of our subject. He was bom August 29, 1772. On the thirteenth of April, 181 3, he enlisted in Captain Loudon Osborne's Company of the Fifth Regiment, Virginia Militia, and served for six months in the vicinity ' of Norfolk, Virginia. In the general call of 1814, he was again in the service and saw the British fires in the conflagration of Washington. He staid one month in the vicinity of Baltimore, and was one of the defenders, and had he remained in that vicinity, would, no doubt, have been one of the famous Society Defenders. He came to Adams County in 1835 and died there.

Isaac Roberts, the father of our subject, was born in Loudon County, Virginia, August 16, 1818. He was taught the necessity and dignity of manual labor. As a boy, he was apprenticed to a millwright in Washington County, Maryland, for three years and learned that trade. He afterwards worked at it for years and made money.

On October 18, 1846, he was married to Lucinda E. Wince, of Loudon County, Virginia, the daughter of Philip and Catherine Shaffer Wince. Mr. Roberts came to Adams County in 1850. He had eleven children, but he lost two sons and a daughter in childhood. He died in 1885.

Our subject attended the District schools, and attended the Normal school at Lebanon in 1881, 1884 and 1885. He began his career as a teacher in Adams County, and taught, when not attending school, until 1897. He was a resident of the city of Portsmouth in 1896 and 1897 and engaged in the grocery business in the Kendall Building. The business was not suited to his taste and he gave it up. From 1897 to 1899, he has been a teacher. He owns a farm of one hundred and thirty-five acres on Buck Run in Scott Township, where he resides, and the writer having seen it, wonders why he ever left it for the city of Portsmouth, but does not wonder that he left city life and went back to the farm. He has as fine a farm and well equipped as any one would care to look upon. He owns another farm of one hundred and seventy acres in Winchester Township.

He was married May 11, 1887, to Miss Irene Chaney, of Hillsboro, Ohio, daughter of Adam L. Chaney. He has three children, Irving, aged ten years ; Ralph W., aged four years, and Virginia, aged two years. His name indicates his politics. He was named for the two Presidents, Lincoln and Johnson. He is a member of the Methodist Church at Seaman, and is surrounded by everything which could make life agreeable and happy, and if he is not happy, it is not on account of outward conditions. He is a man of the highest character and principles. He was and is a successful teacher, a loyal citizen, and a prosperous farmer.

miller, of Manchester, Ohio, was bom June 2y, 1847, in Sprigg Township, Adams county, Ohio, son of William and Margaret (Edgington) Roush. Michael Roush, great-grandfather of our subject, was a native of Pennsylvania, and came in 1796 with the Pence and Bowman families to established the '*Dutch Settlement," in Sprigg Township. Parmenus, son Michael Roush, married Catherine Smith and raised a family of nine

William, the eldest of these, is the father of our subject. He was born April i6, 1824, and was married to Margaret Edgington, in 1849. She was the daughter of Azariah Edgington, of Sprigg Township. William Roush has been a very prosperous farmer, and is noted for his liberality in contributing toward the support of the church. He and his wife are members at Union, near Bentonville. The children of William and Margaret Roush are : Laura Ann, wife of D. C. Beam, of Bentonville, Ohio ; Nancy Jane, wife of Hiram E. Pence, of Manchester, Ohio ; Mary Catherine, wife of Rev. H. Allen Gaskins, of Manchester, Ohio; Alexander, the subject of this sketch; Frank, of Bradyville, Ohio, Commissioner, of Adams County ; Pangbum, of Coyville, Kansas ; Aaron, of Manchester, Ohio ; Robert, of Bradyville, Ohio ; and Sherman, of Manchester, Ohio.

187 1, to Olivine Pence, daughter of David Pence. David Pence was drowned while bathing in the Ohio River at the mouth of Crooked Creek. By this marriage were bom two children: Harvey, bom September 16,

1872, cashier, of the Burnet House, in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Lillie, who married Walter Wilson. Mr. Wilson has charge of the coal office of Mr. Roush. Mrs. Roush died July 15, 1878, and on October 21, 1879, Mr. Roush married Mrs. Caroline Ellison, widow of John Ellison, of Manchester, Ohio.

Our subject remained on the farm until 1872, when he removed to Manchester, Ohio, and engaged in the grocery business. In 1882, he entered the milling firm of Oliver Ashenhurst & Son, and since 1888 has had the entire control of the mill. Besides the mill, he carries on an extensive business in coal and salt.

Mr. Roush is one of the most enterprising citizens of Manchester, and is always found taking an active part in any project calculated to' build up the business interests of the community. He is a member of Hawkeye Tribe 117, Improved Order of Red Men, at Manchester, Ohio. Also a member of 827 I. O. O? F., Encampment, No. 203, at Manchester, Ohio. In his political views he is a Democrat was bom April 28, i860, near West Union, Ohio. His father was Thomas Robuck and his mother Margaret Haines. He was educated in the common schools. He is by occupation a carpenter and undertaker.

He is a member of the Presbyterian Church and a Republican in politics. He was married to Miss Margaret Simeral, October 30, 1884. He has been a member of the Town Council, and is at present a member of the West Union School Board. He is a young man, energetic in business and well thought of by his neighbors. He is at present engaged in the undertaking business with John F. Plummer, and has by careful and upright business methods established a reputation that reaches far beyond the limits of his native county. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity.

Biographical Sketches 849

was born at Berea, Kentucky, December 26, 1868. His father, William Robe, was a native of Ohio, born August 10, 1847. He enlisted in Company F, 59th O. V. I., on the sixteenth of September, 1861, and was discharged on August 15, 1862, by an order from the War Department. He enlisted again, December 18, 1863, in Battery F, First R^ment, Ohio Volunteer Light Artillery, and was mustered out July 27, 1865. Our subject's mother's maiden name was Elizabeth Burdette, born in Berea, Kentucky, in 1848. He was educated in the common schools and began the study of medicine with Dr. O. B. Kirpatrick, of Cherry Fork, Ohio, at the age of eighteen. He attended the Miami Medical College of Cincinnati, in the Winters of 1889 and 1890, and at the Starling Medical College, Columbus, Ohio, in the Winters of 1890 and 1891. He graduated from the latter in the Spring of 1891. He began the practice of medicine with Dr. E. M. Gaston, at Tranquility, on the first of April, 1891. On the first of June, 1891, he located at Youngsvilie, Ohio, where he remained until the first of April, 1897, and that Spring he took a post-graduate course at the Miami Medical College. He located at Peebles on the first of November, 1897, where he has remained in practice ever since. He was Coroner of Adams County, Ohio, from 1894 to 1897, and was appointed one of the Pension Examining Surgeons of the county in November, 1898, which office he still holds.

As a boy and man he p)ossessed and possesses a love of good horses. This taste was acquired while a resident of Kentucky. He has a high sense of honor and justice. In this he much resembles his grandfather Burdette and his kinsman, Sir Francis Burdette, of England, who preferred rather to go to the Tower tlan to make any compromise with wrong.

What success Dr. Robe has obtained has been based upon a course of right and duty and not upon diplomacy. His motto has been "not expediency, but right,'' and he has lived up to it all his life.

Solicitor General of the United States, son 6i Samuel and Sarah Ann (Kelvey) Richards, was bom at Ironton, Lawrence County, Ohio, March I5» 1856. His father, Samuel Richards, was bom near Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, February 6, 1814, and died at Ironton, Ohio, June 30, 1891. He was of Welsh-Quaker descent, being a great-great-grandson of Rowland Richards, who was bom February 9, 1660, settled in Fredyffrin Township, Chester County, f Pennsylvania, about 1686, and died in 1720. In 1824, Samuel Richards came overland with his parents to Mt. Pleasant, Jefferson County, Ohio, and in the forties moved to Lawrence County, where he lived the rest of his life. He was one of the founders of Ironton, being for nearly thirty years the Secretary and General Manager of the Ohio Iron and Coal Company and the Iron Railroad Company and the two corporations which laid out and built up that town. Sarah Ann Kelvey was bom in West Union, Adams County, Ohio, October 9, 1827. She married Samuel Richards at Burlington, Ohio, September 15, 1852, and Ma died at Ironton, Ohio, September r, 1863. She was the granddaughter of Thomas Kelvey, who was born October i, 1763, married (July 18, 1785) Ann Seeker, said to be a niece of Thomas Seeker, Archbishop of Canterbury, and came to America about 1801. Thomas Kelvey was of Scottish origin, the name being originally McKelvey. Thomas Kelvey was a man of education and means. Coming down the Ohio, he stopped awhile with Blennerhasset, then proceeded to Maysville. Afterwards he moved to Highland County, Ohio, then to West Union, Adams County, where his wife died (March 7, 1831,) and was buried, and finally to Burlington, where he died (April 18, 1838,) at the home of his son, John. He was a watch and clock maker. Mr. John Means, of Ashland, Kentucky, has one of Thomas Kelvey 's clocks. Some interesting heirlooms are in existence. Among others a miniature painted of him, probably in !:« ranee, when a young man, in the costume of that day, with powdered hair, lace, ruffles, etc. Also a parchment certificate of his membership in a French Lodge of Masons, "La Lodge de L Epperance," issued May 2, 1791. In this certificate he is described as being twenty-seven years of age and a native of Canterbury, Kent County, England. Thomas Kelvey had four children. John Seeker, born January 21, 1796: Johanna, born November 22, 1798; Thomas, born August i, 1801, and Henry, born October 3, 1805. Johanna Kelvey married John Sparks, December 21. 1820, and died September 15, 1823, at West Union. Thomas Kelvey died June 11, 1831, unmarried, and was buried at Burlington. Henry Kelvey was married, and died May 8, 1834, leaving a son, who is still residing at Granville, Ohio. John Seeker Kelvey married Kerenhappuch Hussey, in Highland County, September 7, 1825, came to West Union, where he lived for several years and where his daughter Sarah was bom and then with many Adams County people, moved to Lawrence County. He was a man of superior attainments for those days, was for years the Recorder of the county and died at Burlington, July 2^, 1851. His wife, who was born July 28, 1809, survived him many years, finally passing away at Columbus, January' 2, 1896. She lies by his side in the Burlington graveyard. Grandmother Kelvey was in many ways a remarkable woman. She was married at sixteen, raised a large family, endured many trials, and died at eighty-six, with mental faculties unimpaired and with scarcely a gray hair in her head. She was a direct descendent of Christopher Hussey (1598-1685). one of the early settlers of New England, who with Tristram Coffin and Thomas Macey, were among the original owners of Nantucket Island. Kerrenhappuch was also a descendant of the Rev. Stephen Bachiler (1561-1600 Whittier's **The wreck of Rivemiouth" ) , who left England for Holland, and after a short residence there, came to America in the year 1632. He went first to Lynn, Massachusetts, where his daughter, Theodate, who married Christopher Hussey, preceded him. From Lynn, he went to Ipswich, thence to Newbury, where he lived until 1638, when he settled at Hampton, where he was installed first pastor of the Congregational Church there. For an interesting account of this Puritan divine, the reader is referred to the life of John G. Whittier, by Prichard. He mentions the "Bachiler eyes'' as being dark, deep-set and lustrous, with a tendency to repeat themselves from generation to generations. Daniel Webster and John G. Whittier, who were both descendants of Bachiler, had these eyes.

Biographical Sketches 861

The leading events in Solicitor General Richards' life may be thus summarized: Graduated at Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania, 1875: graduated at Harvard College, 1877; studied law ^nd admitted to the bar, October, 1879; Prosecuting Attorney of Lawrence County, 1880 to 1882; City Solicitor of Ironton, 1885 to iSSg: Master Commissioner in the Cincinnati and Easter Railway case, 1885; State Senator from the Eighth Ohio District (Lawrence, Gallia. Meigs and Vinton Counties) irom 189a to 1892; Attorney General of Ohio during McKinley's administration,. 1892 to 1896; member of the Commission to Codify the Insurance Laws of Ohio, 1895 to 1896; of the Second General Assembly of Ohio, 1896; Special Counsel of the State Board of Appraisers and Assessors of Ohio, 1896 to 1898: General Counsel of the State Board of Medical Registrations and Examination of Ohio, 1896 to 1898; Solicitor General of the United States from July i, 1897. to the present time. Mr. Richards was married June 12, 1890, to Anna Williard Steece, of Ironton, Ohio. Two children have blessed this union, John Kelvey, Jr.. bom at Ironton, April 20, 1891, and Anna Christine, born at Columbus, September 29, 1894.

"Jack" Richards is an ardent Republican and has taken an active part in politics since leaving college. He has been a member of Ward, City. District and State Committees engaged in the active organization and conduct of campaigns. He has been a delegate to City, County, District, State and National Conventions. He has spoken for the Republican party on the stump throughout Ohio and in other States. On becoming State Senator, he made a study of taxation in Ohio with special reference to constitutional limitations. The accepted opinion was then that, under the Constitution of Ohio, as it stood, nothing but property could be taxed for general revenue. Accordingly when several unsuccessful attempts, at great expense, had been made to amend the Constitution and enlarge the taxing power, he took the position that no amendment was required, that rights, privileges, franchises and occupations could be taxed under the Constitution as it stood. These views have since been embodied in our tax laws, which have added largely to the revenues of the State and have been sustained by the highest courts. Among these are the laws levying taxes upon foreign corporations, upon telegraph, telephone and express companies, upon railroad, street railway, electric light, gas, water, pipe line and similar corporations, upon sleeping car companies, upon freight line and equipment companies, in fact practically upon all corporations, foreign and domestic, of a quasi public nature, en- . joying peculiar franchises. In addition to drafting and sustaining these laws, Mr. Richards drafted the present election law of Ohio, a modification of the Australian ballot system and sustained it in the court. He drew the present law relating to the practice of medicine in Ohio, and as the counsel of the State ^ledical Board maintained its validity in the courts. He sustained the constitutionality of the Compulsory Education law of Ohio in the Supreme Court, and subsequently redrafted the law, putting it in its present form. As Solicitor General, he is the representative of the Government before the Supreme Court of the United States and has argued the more important cases which have been submitted to that court during the present administration. In doing this, he has had to meet the leaders of the bar from everv section of the countrv, but has been no less fortunate in the results than he was as Attorney General of Ohio. Notable among the cases now are the Joint Traffic Association case (171 U. S., 505) argued for the railroad by Mr. Carter, the leader of the New York bar, Mr. Phelps, Ex-Minister to England, and Ex- Senator Edmunds, of Vermont; the case of Nichol v. Anns (173 U. S., 509), involving the validity of the Federal Tax on sales at exchange and board of trade in which Ex-Secretary Carlisle and Mr. Robbins, of Chicago, presented the opposition to the law and the Addyston pipe case in December, 1899, in which the Sherman anti-trust law was first applied to an industrial combination.

the subject of this sketch, was bom near Lexington, Ky., on the twentyseventh day of September, 1832. His father, Joseph Russell Shaw, was a native of Berks County, Pennsylvania, and his mother, Rachel Corns, was a native of Pike County, Ohio. They were married in Pike County, June 20, 1830.

His boyhood and youth, to manhood, were spent mainly on a farm in Adams County, and his advantages for an education were limited to the opportunities offered in those days by the Public schools.

By special diligence and good use of the time usually allowed the farmer's boy for attending school, he prepared himself to teach in the Public schools. He received his first certificate from J. M. Wells (after ward a prominent attorney of West Union), and taught his first school in what was known as Gilbert's District, in the northwestern part of the county in the Winter of 1852 and 1853. He followed the occupation of a teacher of Public schools and in attending school until 1861. At the breaking out of the Civil War, he was a member of the junior class of Antioch College, then under the presidency of Horace Mann. He left his studies in the early Spring of 1862 and raised a company in Greene County, Ohio. The company was assigned to the iioth O. V. I., and he was chosen the First Lieutenant of it. On August 7, 1862, he was detailed as Aide-de-camp on eGn. Elliot's Staff, Third Division, Third Armv Corps, on November 14, 1863 ; he was promoted Captain of Company E, December 9, 1864. On April 2, 1865, he was brevetted Major for gallant and meritoriou»conduct on the field. This was Gen. J. Warren Kdfer's regiment, and it was in no less than twenty-four battles and engagements, beginning with Union Mills, June 13, 1863, and ending with Appomattox, April 9, 1865. He was discharged June 26, 1865, and returned to Yellow Springs, Ohio, and received his college degree of A. B. From this time until April, 1876, he was engaged in Public school work as a teacher or superintendent till April. 1876, when he was appointed Superintendent of the Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors* Orphans' Home, at Xenia, Ohio. He remained in this position for two years, until the Summer of 1884, when he was displaced by a change of the State administration. In the Spring of 1885, he was employed by the Commissioners of Adams County to superintend the finishing and opening of the Children's Home, which he did to their entire satisfaction. He is now and has been for some time past the lessee and manager of the Cherry Hotel at Washington C. H., one of the most popular hotels in the State. In all matters for tlje public good, he is one of the foremost of his city, and is most highly esteemed as a successful business man and an enterprising and public spirited citizen. His political views from boyhood were always very positive and unswerving. His father belonged to the anti-slavery wing of the Whig party. This fact, supplemented by personal observation of the evil effect of slavery on the social conditions of both races, the injustice to the colored man and injury to the material prosperity of the South, confirmed him in his opposition to the institution. At the disruption of the Whig party, he allied himself with the RepubUcan party and has always strenuously advocated its principles. He never sought nor held a political office.

The theological and religious views were Unitarian, and formed along the line of the teachings of Theodore Parker, Edward Everett Hale, Horace Mann, Thomas Hill, and others of like views.

On the twelth day of August, 1852, he was married to Rachel Jane Gutridge, daughter of James Gutridge, a citizen of Concord Township, Highland County, Ohio.

The Hon. John Little, of Greene County, says of him: "There is no better citizen than Major W. L. Shaw. He served his country faithfully and well in the Civil War. As a business man, he ranks among the first."

Gen. J. Warren Keifer, with whom he served, says of him: "He was devoted to his duties as Adjutant General and Inspector General while serving on my staff in the Civil War. He was efficient, intelligent and tireless. There was no better officer of his rank in the Volunteer Army."

was born Februar}' 22, 1822, in Richmond, Virginia. His parents were from near Belfast, in Ireland, and were Presbyterians. They had located in Richmond, Va., but a short time prior to the birth of their son, James. In 1827, they removed to Cincinnati, and in 1828, to a farm near Fayetteville. Brown County, Ohio.

James Sloane was raised a typical farmer's son. He worked hard all Summer and attended District school in Winter. At seventeen, he received a severe injury, caused by a log rolling on his side and fracturing his ribs, from which he never fully recovered. In 1839 and 1840, he taught school in Brown and Clinton Counties. In 1840, he began the study of law with Judge Barclay Harlan, in Wilmington, Ohio, and graduated from the Cincinnati Law School in 1844. In 1845, he located in Hillsboro and began practice. In 1845, he was married to Miss Kate White, of Ross County, who bore him two sons, one of whom is Ulric Sloane, the eloquent advocate, now a resident of the city of Columbus, but well known to all the people of Adams County. In 1856, James Sloane was elected a Common Pleas Judge in the Fifth Judicial District on the Democratic ticket, but resigned after one year's service. He felt that he was made for the bar and not for the bench, and whik his fellow members of the bar were of the opinion that he made an excellent Judge, he felt that the bar suited him better. He practiced law in Highland, Ross, Fayette, Brown, Clinton and Adams Counties. When the war broke out he organized Company K, 12th O. V. L, three months service.

and went out as its Captain. He was wounded April 20, 1861, and mustered out July 6, 1861, to accept appointment as Captain in Company K, I2th O. V. L, three years* service. He was severely wounded in the West Virgina campaign, at Scary Creek, July 17, 1861. His health broke down and he resigned November 25, 1861. He soon learned, after going into the army, that the injury received at the age of seventeen prevented him from performing the duty of a soldier and hence his enforced retirement. He practiced law in Hitlsboro until 1868, when he opened an office in Cincinnati, where he remained until 1871, when he returned to Hillsboro. He died September 17, 1873, of congestion of the brain. He possessed high degree of natural talent. His mind was always clear and he possessed great analytic power. He was capable of great and continued mental effort and seemed to take pleasure in it.

He had a remarkable memory and a fertile imagination. In his temperament he was warm and impetuous. He was an eloquent and powerful advocate. His success was brillant, but with it all, he was a misanthrope and given to fits of melancholy. He could be a delightfid companion if he chose, but did not often so choose. His last days were clouded by his fits of melancholy and he stood aloof from most of his friends. He is remembered by the bar in the counties before mentioned as a lawyer of wonderful power and application.

Emmons Buchanan Stivers, a son of Lilley Stivers and his wife, Barbara Reynolds, was born in Fincastle, Brown County, Ohio, May 6, 1857. When in his fourth year his parents removed to a farm near Ash Ridge, Jackson Township, Brown County, where he was reared and where he received the rudiments of an English -education in the District schools. In 1876, he began teaching school as a profession and followed it with remarkable success for fifteen years, having in the mean time taken a course in the Normal University, Lebanon, Ohio, then under the control of President Alfred Holbrook.

In 1882-3, he had charge of the academy at North Liberty, Adams County, and in the Autumn of the latter year was elected Superintendent of Schools at West Union, receiving the highest salary ever paid in that position. On December 2y, 1883, he was married to Miss Ida Mc- Cormick, a daughter of William McCormick, near Tranquility, Adams County. While a resident of West Union, Mr. Stivers edited and published The Index, afterwards merged into The Democratic Index, a newspaper of wide circulation. He also, in 1885, published his "Outlines of United States History," and a hand-book for teachers, titled "Recreations in School Studies," which has reached its tenth edition.

Having undertaken the study of the law in the office of Hon F. D. Bayless, while residing in West Union, in the Autumn of 1887, Mr. Stivers removed to Cincinnati to complete his course, and in 1888 he was admitted to practice by the Supreme Court at Columbus, Ohio.

In 1890, his healtii failing, he removed to his farm near his boyhood home in Brown County, where he now resides, looldng after his farming interests, his publications, and his legal practice.

Hon. Emmons B. Stivers Biographical Sketches 866

In 1895, Mr. Stivers was elected by the Democratic party to represent Brown County in the Ohio Legislature, and he was re-elected to that position in 1897. In 1899, he was elected to the Ohio Senate from the 2d-4th District, composed of the counties of Brown, Clermont, Butler and Warren, which position he is now holding. From 1897 to 1899, he represented the Sixth Congressional District as a member of the Democratic State Central Committee. While a member of the Legislature, Mr. Stivers was placed on the most important committees such as the Judiciary, Railroads and Telegraphs, Insurance, Fees and Salaries, and Municipal Affairs.

He is a member of the Masonic fraternity and of the K. of P. His domestic relations are most happy, and he has four bright and interesting children. His son, Ulric Stivers, was a Page in the 73rd Session of the Ohio Senate, at the age of nine years, being the youngest lad ever chosen to that position. He was chosen by the unanimous vote of the Senate regardless of politics, after the customary minority party Page had been appointed by the President of the Senate.

Joseph Patterson Smith, son of John M. and Matilda A. (Patterson) Smith, was born in West Union, August 7, 1856, and received the principal part of his education in the Public schools of his native place. He had a retentive mind and was especially proficient in mathematics and history. From his father, he inherited a splendid memory and a love of statistics, and from his mother an energy and ambition that were characteristic of the man in later years. Like many of his companions, during the Summer months in his youth, he learned the only trade for which an opportunity was offered in West Union - that of a printer. At about the age of sixteen, he was employed for a few months in a nail mill at Bellaire, Ohio, but his constitution was too delicate for such an occupation, and it was abandoned. For a time, he attended the University at Greencastle, Ind., supporting himself by labor at the printing case during the evening hours. Subsequently he taught for a few terms in the District schools of Ohio and Illinois.

From early boyhood, beginning with the "Reconstruction Period," Mr. Smith evinced a strong love for politics, and was noted among his townsmen for his knowkdge and understanding of the questions at issue, and for his ardent Republicanism, long before he attained his majority. As an occasional local correspondent, he attracted the attention of the editor of the Cincinnati Commercial, and was employed by him as a "special" to travel over the State, in 1876, and write up the political outlook in each of the Congressional Districts. In this manner he became acquainted with the leading Ohio Republicans (of whom Major McKinley was one) and formed lasting friendships with many of those who afterwards became noted in history of the State and Nation. From that time, until the date of his death, Joseph P. Smith was a prominent factor in Ohio politics. Almost wholly through his own exertions, Mr. Smith was successful in becoming the Republican caucus nominee and was elected Journal Clerk of the vSenate in the Sixty-fifth General Assembly. He was also for a time a Clerk in the Roster Department of the State Adjutant General's Office.

At diflerent times during the years covering and immediately following these periods, he edited the Western Star at Lebanon, the Clermont Courier at Batavia, and the Nnv Era at West Union. In 1888, he became part owner and edit'>r of the Daily Citisen, of Urbana, which gained a reputation under hts management extending beyond the confines of the State. The Citizen was the first newspaper to advocate the selection of Wiliam McKinley as the Gubernatorial candidate of the Republican party, and his name was kept at the head of its editorial columns from the day following Major McKinley's defeat for Congress in the famous gerrymandered district, in 1890, until his triumphant election for Governor of Ohio, in 1891. A number of the campaign documents used by the Republican State Committee that year (as were a number in subsequent years and also in the National campaign of 1896) v/ere prepared by Joseph P. Smith. Throughout the period of his control of the Citizen its editorials were widely quoted.

In 1891, the late John A. Cockerill, then editor-in-chief of the New York World, tendered Mr. Smith a position on the editorial staff of that paper; but the flattering offer, while appreciated as a gracious compliment, was declined, as he did not want to leave the State. A tender of the editorship of the Toledo, Ohio, Daily Commercial was accepted in Dec, of that year. While serving on the latter paper (in 1892), Governor McKinley appointed him State Librarian. Many useful, rare and valuable works were added to the library during his incumbency of the office. Especially is this true as to works of reference. In May, 1896, he resigned the librarianship to take a confidential position with Major McKinley, remaining with him throughout the Presidential campaign and until after the latter's inaguration as President of the United States, March 4, 1897.