History of Idaho, the gem of the mountains, Volume III, Part 23

Author: Hawley, James Henry, 1847-1929, ed
Publication date: 1920
Publisher: Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company
Number of Pages: 926


USA > Idaho > History of Idaho, the gem of the mountains, Volume III > Part 23


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The family circle was broken by the hand of death when on the 7th of August, 1918, Mr. Foote was stricken with paralysis, passing away the following day. Up to that time he had been about and attending to his business as usual. His remains were interred in the cemetery at Middleton, the funeral service being conducted by Dr. J. W. Boone on the lawn where he had been accustomed to sit in his leisure moments- a place that he loved well.


Mr. Foote was a man of remarkable self-control, was widely known for his kind- ness to others and it was proverbial that no one ever appealed to him for aid in vain. He assisted many boys in gaining a start in life and was ever ready to encourage them and point out to them paths which would lead them forward. He was a man of irre- proachable integrity, whose word was as good as any bond and who enjoyed the unbounded faith of his fellowmen. He always respected the rights of others and at the same time demanded from others the same consideration of his own rights. The worth of his life work was widely acknowledged and the many sterling traits of his character won for him the warmest regard of all who knew him. His best traits of character, however, were reserved for his own fireside and in his home he was an ideal husband and father.


It was Mr. Foote who gave the ground for a church organization and Mrs. Foote who organized the Sunday school out of which developed the Baptist church of Middle- ton. At the time of Mrs. Foote's arrival here there were no Sunday school services at Middleton and the services in Caldwell were held but twice a month. She soon set to work to change this condition. Caldwell had been founded but two years before her arrival in Idaho and she felt that moral influences should be a potent force in the de- velopment of this new district. Her labors have been untiring. She has served as organist of the Baptist church at Middleton and her younger daughter is now filling that position, while her younger son is superintendent of the Baptist Sunday school. Mrs. Foote helped to found the Carnegie library in Caldwell and her portrait is among


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those of its promoters which hang upon the library wall. She was also the organizer of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union at Middleton and was awarded a Ilfe membership by the local union. She has always been most ardent and zealous in her work for the church and in support of all those agencies which make for the uplift of the individual and the betterment of the community at large.


JOHN McMILLAN.


John McMillan, of Boise, well known as a representative of farming and sheep raising interests in Idaho, came to the state in 1886 and throughout the intervening period, covering a third of a century, has been connected with the sheep industry. He has likewise extended his efforts into other fields of business and since 1900 has been the president of the Idanha Hotel Company. A native of Scotland, his birth .occurred on the old homestead in Kirkcudbrightshire on the 12th / of May, 1857, his parents being Anthony and Agnes (McFadzen) McMillan, who were also born in the land of hills and heather but who in 1886 joined their son John in Idaho and remained residents of this state until called to their final rest. The father died in 1906, at the advanced age of eighty-nine years, and the mother's death occurred in 1908, when she was seventy-seven years of age. They were life- long members of the Presbyterian church.


John McMillan, who was one of a large family, was reared upon the old home- stead in Scotland and pursued his education in the public schools and in Douglass Academy, after which he assisted in the further development and improvement of the home farm until 1882, when at the age of twenty-five years he crossed the Atlantic to New York. For three months thereafter he was employed on railroad construction in Pennsylvania and subsequently spent four months in a stove fac- tory in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Attracted by the opportunities of the west, how- ever, he made his way to Laramie, Wyoming, late in 1882 and there engaged in herding sheep until 1884, when he was made foreman of a sheep ranch and so continued until 1886. He then began raising sheep at Mayfield, Idaho, where he resided from 1886 until 1889, and afterward operated independently in sheep rais- ing at Mayfield from 1889 until 1894. In the latter year he removed to Boise and was actively interested in the sheep industry at this point until 1917. His interests continually developed in extent and importance and he became known as one of the prominent representatives of sheep raising in the state. Extending his activity into other business fields, he became instrumental in building the Idanha Hotel and since 1900 has been the president of the Idanha Hotel Company, which erected one of the finest hostelries of this section of the country. He has long been recognized as a man of sound business judgment and keen discernment and his energy has brought him to a place in the foremost rank among the successful business men of Boise.


On the 20th of November, 1895, in Boise, Mr. McMillan was married to Miss Clara Hubbell, a daughter of Norman S. Hubbell, of Pennsylvania, and they have one son, John, Jr., who was born March 28, 1897, and was graduated from the Boise high school with the class of 1915. Mrs. McMillan is a native of Union, Oregon, but was reared and educated in Boise.


Mr. McMillan has always turned to hunting and fishing for recreation. His fraternal relations are with the Benevolent Protective Order of Elks and of the Boise Commercial Club he is one of the directors. He has taken active part in pol- ities as a stalwart advocate of republican principles and has frequently been called to office. He served as a member of the house of representatives of Idaho in 1893-4 and in 1907 became representative of Ada county in the state senate for a two years' term. In 1908 he was made postmaster of Bolse and occupied the position for four years. While in the legislature and senate he gave most careful considera- tion to the vital questions which came up for settlement and his support of any measure was proof of his firm belief in its efficacy as a factor in good government or as a means of promoting the welfare of the state. In a review of his record it is easy to trace the steps of the orderly progression which has brought him from a most humble position as a laborer in connection with railway construction to a place among the most substantial and representative business men of his adopted state. This has resulted from no unusual opportunities or any speclal talents but


a


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has come as the result of close application, of unfaltering energy and a determined purpose that has enabled him to overthrow all the difficulties and obstacles in his path and push steadily forward toward the goal of prosperity.


JOSEPH L. SEWELL.


Joseph L. Sewell, a wholesale dealer in hides and tallow at Boise, comes to this state from Utah, his birth having occurred in Ogden on the 24th of Jan- uary, 1866. He is the eldest of seven children whose parents were Joseph B. and Melissa (Wilson) Sewell. The father, who was a commercial traveler dur- ing his active business life, was born in England and died in Oregon, November 26, 1891, at the age of forty-eight years. He had come to the United States when a youth of fourteen years in company with his parents, Joseph and Emily Sewell, who were early settlers of Utah. Joseph B. Sewell is still survived by his widow, who now lives at Grand Junction, Colorado, at the age of seventy-one years, making her home with a daughter. The five sons and two daughters of the family are all yet living, namely: Joseph L .; Esther, now the wife of Edward D. Stone; George E .; James E., living in Boise; Ernest B., of Salt Lake City; Frank, a resident of Richland, Oregon; and Grace, the wife of Frank Bork, of Richland, Oregon.


Joseph L. Sewell spent his youthful days in Utah and is indebted to the public school system for his educational opportunities. In 1891 he removed to La Grande, Oregon, where he spent six years in the employ of D. H. McDaneld & Company, a large Chicago concern dealing in hides, tallow, wool, pelts and furs. He acted as manager and buyer for the firm at La Grande and in 1897 he removed to Boise as representative of the same firm. He afterward purchased the Boise business from the Chicago concern and has since conducted it under his own name and on his own account. He has been in business for himself for more than twelve years and is today the pioneer in his line in the city and the only resident of Boise engaged in the business. He has built up a trade of substan- tial proportions and through well directed energy and perseverance has made his undertaking one of substantial profit.


Mr. Sewell was married in Ogden, Utah, February 2, 1890, to Miss Anna Lucy Aldous, who was born in Huntsville, Utah. They are parents of two sons: Joseph C., born December 31, 1891; and Harry A., December 9, 1894. Both were in the military service of the United States. The former is an expert in commer- cial art work, which he followed in Chicago for a few years prior to the war, there establishing a good business. The younger son was a student in the Northwestern University of Chicago before called to the colors.


Mr. Sewell belongs to the Boise Chamber of Commerce and is interested in every effort of that organization to develop the city, to promote its trade rela- tions and to secure the adoption of those standards which have their root in high civic ideals. He belongs to the Woodmen of the World and his political allegiance is given to the republican party where national questions and issues are involved, but at local elections he casts an independent ballot.


F. J. GRABER.


F. J. Graber has become the owner of a farm of eighty-seven acres four miles southwest of Wilder, on which he is producing excellent crops and engag- ing in the manufacture of syrup. His activities have been wisely directed and he is meeting with a substantial measure of success as the years go by, dating his residence in Idaho from 1906. He had previously lived in Minnesota and Iowa but is a native of Switzerland, his birth having occurred in the Land of the Alps on the 3d of January, 1860. His parents were Jacob and Barbara Graber, who came to the United States when their son, F. J., was but eight years of age, establishing their home in Burlington, Iowa, where they still reside, both being now past the age of eighty years.


F. J. Graber remained in Iowa for a decade and then removed to Blue


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Earth county, Minnesota, where he followed farming for eighteen years. Attracted by the opportunities of the growing northwest, he came to Idaho in 1906 and settled on his present place of eighty-seven acres four miles southwest of Wilder. This he homesteaded, for it was at that time a tract of wild and unbroken land, the only crop produced being the native sagebrush. He and his sons cleared the place and have brought it to a high state of cultivation, the fields now being devoted to the raising of alfalfa, clover and wheat. All of the land is under cultivation save a small strip. In addition to the production of crops Mr. Graber is engaged in the manufacture of syrup from sorghum, a work which he under- took five years ago. He has built a fine little plant for the manufacture of this product and everything about the plant is thoroughly complete and modern. His business has greatly stimulated the growth of sorghum in the district and in 1918 Mr. Graber made three thousand gallons, having a market in Boise for all that he can produce. The syrup is put up under the name of F. J. Graber & Sons.


In 1884 Mr. Graber was united in marriage to Miss Nancy Elizabeth Bow- man. a native of Iowa. They have become the parents of seven children who are yet living, while two have passed away. Those living are: Golda May, the wite of George E. Hudson. of Wilder, and the mother of five children; Edgar H., twenty-nine years of age, associated in business with his father: Edna Sarah, a twin of Edgar and the wife of Ray Winter, by whom she has two children; Glenwood F. twenty-seven years of age, who has recently returned from New York, where he was with the Eighth Division of the Twelfth Infantry Supply Company when the armistice was signed; Elsie Belle, the wife of Charles Schultz and the mother of one child; Harold H., who is fifteen years of age and is attending school; and Wayne L., aged twelve, also in school. Mr. and Mrs. Graber certainly have a fine and happy family and the young men are splendid types of physical manhood.


Mr. Graber has ever been recognized as a man of diligence and determina- tion and through the utilization of these qualities he has worked his way steadily upward since he started out in the business world on his own account. After farming in lowa and Minnesota for a number of years he came to the northwest to utilize the opportunities of this rapidly developing section of the country and is now one of the substantial farmers and manufacturers of the Fargo district of Canyon county.


MRS. HARRIET H. ANDREWARTHA.


Mrs. Harriet H. Andrewartha occupies an attractive old home at No. 1111 Grove street, in Boise, which she has occupied for the past third of a century. She is num- bered among the pioneer women of the state, having come to Idaho territory in young womanhood as a school teacher from the state of Georgia in 1874. Her maiden name was Harriet H. Dunagan and she was born in White county, Georgia, July 31, 1849. She is a daughter of Frederick Dunagan, a musician of ability, who also taught music and who became a prospector and miner, going to California as a gold seeker in the early '50s. Later he came to Idaho, living in oid Alturas county for many years. He afterward removed to Baker, where he passed away in 1907. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Louisa A. Kerbow, passed away in Boise about twenty years ago.


Their daughter Harriet was reared upon a plantation in White county, Georgia, to the age of sixteen years, when she became the wife of Benjamin West, of a fine old Georgia family. One child was born of that marriage, William Lee West, whose birth occurred before his mother was seventeen years of age. The marriage of Benjamin West and Harriet Dunagan proved an unhappy one, the young husband turning out to be altogether unworthy, and a legal separation followed. The son is now a resident of Idaho, making his home in Boise county.


Mrs. Andrewartha was not quite twenty years of age when she came to the territory of Idaho in 1874 to teach school, bringing with her her young son. She taught school for several years In old Alturas county, now Eimore county, and for a considerable pericd resided on a ranch at what is known as Mayfield before becoming a resident of Boise. In 1881 she was married to the Rev. John Andrewartha in old Alturas county. He was a Methodist minister and a man of splendid qualities and high standing. In


MRS. HARRIET H. ANDREWARTHA


DR. BERTHA IRENE ANDREWARTHA


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1885 a daughter was born to them while they were still residing on Mrs. Andrewar- tha's ranch at Mayfield, which she had homesteaded and which comprised one hundred and sixty acres of land. Their daughter there born was named Bertha Irene and grew to young womanhood, becoming a skilled physician. She was graduated from the Willamette College of Oregon but became a victim of tuberculosis and passed away when but twenty-four years of age.


About 1889 Mrs. Andrewartha sold her ranch to John McMillan, of Boise, and re- moved to the capital city, where she purchased a large block of real estate on Grove street, between Eleventh and Twelfth streets. This property she improved by erecting several houses thereon, including three large, comfortable homes and five cottages, all of which she rents to desirable tenants, thus enjoying a good income.


Rev. John Andrewartha died seven years ago and Mrs. Andrewartha has since re- mained a widow. She is a consistent member of the First Methodist Episcopal church of Boise and also belongs to the Order of the Eastern Star. She is a woman possessed of good business ability and of natural culture and refinement and is most widely and favorably received in the best social circles of the city. In fact her own home is the center of a cultured society and warm-hearted hospitality is always there found.


HON. A. E. CALLAWAY.


In many respects A. E. Callaway left the impress of his individuality and ability upon the history of Idaho. The later years of his life were spent in Caldwell and for a long period he was closely associated with the agricultural development of the Boise valley and at the same time was keenly alive to the interests and upbuild- ing of Canyon county and for a number of terms served as a member of the legisla- ture before Idaho was admitted into the Union. He was born in Missouri, March 5, 1823, and there acquired a common school education while spending his boyhood days in the home of his parents, James and Katherine (Markham) Callaway, who were natives of Virginia. They were married in that state and removed to Mis- souri at an early period in its development, taking up their abode in what is now known as Callaway county and which was named in their honor. They were among the people prominent in the early development of that state, sharing in the hard- ships and privations incident to frontier settlement. The father was there killed by a falling tree.


A. E. Callaway, reared in Missouri, was a young man of about twenty-five or twenty-six years at the time of the discovery of gold in California. Hoping to win fortune in the mines, he crossed the plains with an ox team in 1849 and he fol- lowed both farming and mining in the Yreka country, living much of the time in Siskiyou county until 1862, when he sold his property there and came to Idaho, attracted by the gold excitement in this state. He went first to Florence and thence came to the Boise basin, where he remained until 1870. In that year he removed to the Boise valley and settled on one hundred and sixty acres of land, a portion of which is now within the western limits of Caldwell. One hundred and thirty-five acres of this land is still in possession of his widow and returns to her a good rental. Mr. Callaway continued to cultivate his land up to the time of his death, which occurred on the 26th of July, 1901.


On the 16th of February, 1870, Mr. Callaway had wedded Miss Mary Jane Fulton, who was born in Ohio, although the marriage took place in Idaho. Her mother, Mrs. Ellen (Howard) Fulton, had died in Ohio and she afterward came with her father, Frank Fulton, by ox team across the plains in 1863. They first made their way to Oregon and afterward came to Idaho, where Mr. Fulton married again, his second wife bearing the maiden name of Belle Clemmons, whom he wedded in 1864, soon after her arrival here from the east. Mr. and Mrs. Callaway became the parents of six children. Abner Kenton, forty-eight years of age, mar- ried Adah Asbill, a native of Lake county, California, and they have three children: Inez Early, who is attending the University of Idaho at Moscow and is an exceed- ingly precocious student; Kathryne; and Stephen. Nellie is the wife of Charles Sinsel, of Boise, and the mother of one child, Frank, sixteen years of age. Kittie Lee is the wife of Edward Hedden, surveyor general of Idaho, and while they have no children of their own, they are rearing an adopted daughter, Gertrude. Frank Early, forty-three years of age, married Minnie Johnson, of Oregon, and they are


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living at Ely, Nevada, with their three children: Douglas, aged ten; Virginia Lee; and Dugan, aged five. Mr. and Mrs. Callaway also lost two children, Marianne Johnson and Effie Eulalia.


Mr. Callaway lived through all of the Indian troubles and experienced all of the trials incident to those harassing times. On many occasions it was thought that their lives would not be spared, yet Mr. Callaway lived to witness much of the transformation and development of this section of the state and to bear an active part in the work of progress and improvement. He was a leader in his community and for seven terms he served as a member of the territorial legislature, thus doing much to shape the early policy of the commonwealth. He aided in laying a broad and safe foundation upon which to build its later progress and prosperity, his service ever being of a most valuable character.


F. H. HOSTETLER, D. V. S.


Dr. F. H. Hostetler, who has since 1905 engaged in the practice of veterinary surgery at Nampa, was born in Elkhart county, Indiana, March 22, 1874, and when ten years of age accompanied his parents on their removal to McPherson county, Kansas, where he acquired his education together with considerable experience at farming. When nineteen years of age he entered upon a six years' experience as a school teacher and then took up the study of veterinary surgery. In 1905 he came to Nampa, Idaho, and at once entered upon the practice of his profession, which has steadily increased until it today extends throughout the entire Boise valley, his work recommending him wherever and whenever he has had an opportunity to show results. He is a specialist in parturient paresis, or what is commonly known as milk fever in cows, which disease is fatal if not treated at once. Dr. Hostetler has saved over ninety-five per cent of cases of this kind under the treatment which he pursues. His operating tables, rooms and surgical instruments are the best that can be procured and he is in a position to take care of his patronage as well as it could be cared for in the larger cities.


Dr. Hostetler's interest in the science of veterinary surgery was awakened at a very early age, for his father, Abraham Hostetler, was a veterinarian of Indiana and Kansas, practicing successfully for thirty years. He passed away in the latter state in 1905 and is still survived by his widow, who yet makes her home in Kansas.


On the 7th of April, 1898, Dr. Hostetler was married in Missouri to Miss Dessie Yoder, a native of Michigan, and they have become parents of five children: Virtie D., who was graduated from the Nampa high school in 1918 and became a teacher; Leo F., who completed a high school course in 1919; Orval H., attending high school; and Anna Velma and Adelia Lillian, who are also in school.


Dr. Hostetler and his family not only occupy a pleasant home in Nampa but he also owns a good ranch near the city. He is a member of the city council and is regarded as one of the substantial residents of Nampa and a prominent repre- sentative of its professional interests.


BENJAMIN S. HOWE.


Benjamin S. Howe, secretary of the Boise Artesian Hot & Cold Water Company, was born in Newton, Massachusetts. October 21, 1841, and has therefore passed the seventy-eighth milestone on life's journey but bears his years lightly and would readily pass for a man of less than three score and ten. He has been a resident of Idaho for thirty-three years and has made his home in Boise for a quarter of a century, or since 1894, when he removed to this city from Silver City, Owyhee county, Idaho, where he had previously been engaged in mining for seven years. Throughout the period of his residence in Boise he has been the secretary of the Boise Artesian Hot & Cold Water Company and has thus figured prominently in connection with one of the Important business interests of the capital.


Mr. Howe is a son of Benjamin B. and Nancy Turner (Warren) Howe, the former a native of New Hampshire and the latter of Massachusetts. In the paternal


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and maternal lines he is descended from Revolutionary war ancestry and both the Howe and Warren families were established in New England at an early period in the colonization of the new world.


Benjamin S. Howe was reared in Roxbury, now a part of the city of Boston, and there pursued a public school education, after which he served an apprentice- ship to the trade of steam boiler maker but never followed that pursuit. Following the outbreak of the Civil war, he enlisted in 1861 as a private in Company A, Twenty-Second Massachusetts Regiment, with which he participated in a number of minor engagements, and was honorably discharged late in 1862 owing to ill health. He returned to his home in Massachusetts, where he continued until 1865, when he left that state and made a trip with a freight wagon train to New Mexico. Subsequently he made several other trips across the plains, covering the distance eighteen times in all, or for nine round trips. In 1866 he became a resident of Nehraska City, Nebraska, and was there making his home when that state was admitted to the Union. He was also a resident of Denver in 1876, when Colorado was admitted to the Union, and when Idaho became a member of the great sister- hood of states in 1890 he was a resident of Silver City, so that his experience is such as few men can boast of-identification with three different states at the time of their admission to the Union.




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