USA > Illinois > A history of southern Illinois; a narrative account of its historical progress, its people, and its principal interests > Part 72
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Vol. 3-31
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In 1908 Dr. Reinhardt was united in marriage with Miss Gertrude Gaffner, the estimable daughter of Dr. Gaffner, a well-known physician and surgeon of Clinton county, who practices in Trenton, and two ehil- dren have been born to this union, Charles and Ralph.
MARCUS N. MCCARTNEY. Vast as is the field of educational uplift and achievement, its discussion as pertains to Southern Illinois rarely fails to call to mind among the well-informed the name of McCartney. For years it has been a synonym for earnest effort and noteworthy achievement in this greatest of American institutions. For not alone has one individual achieved distinction in this respect, but son has followed father in perpetuating the distinctive honor that attaches to the name.
Marcus N. McCartney, who is superintendent of the city schools of Metropolis, comes from one of the illustrious families of Massae county, his distinguished father being one of the pioneer settlers of Southern Illinois. Born in Metropolis, December 2, 1863, Professor McCartney is a son of the late Captain John F. McCartney, who won prominence as an early educator, as a lawyer, in business, in politics and by the sterling worth of his individuality.
Captain McCartney was of sturdy Scoteh descent, born in Scotland in 1834. He died in Hot Springs, Arkansas, on November 12. 1908. He was brought to America in 1836, and grew to manhood in the Western Reserve of Ohio. Graduating from the Kingsville Academy where he was offered the chair of mathematies, and later he was also tendered the chair of mathematics in Vermilion College, Ohio.
The newer country called to him in 1856, shortly after attaining his majority, he and a schoolmate named Morford fared forth to seek their fortunes. They descended the river to Caledonia, a community in Pu- laski county, Illinois, where they were forced to stop and replenish their finances, as Mr. McCartney had but thirty-two cents remaining when they reached that point. They went to work in a sawmill, but the resi- dents soon discerned that they were men of refinement and education, and a man named Bell induced them to become permanent residents of the locality, secure license and take up teaching. They did so and Mr. McCartney for two years taught the Grand Chain school, the place at that time being known as "The Nation," from the presence and influence of the Indians about there.
After he had been settled for several months in the school work at Grand Chain Mr. MeCartney returned to Ohio, completed his college course, and then returned to his new home, married and resumed his school work. He went to Metropolis in 1860, his friend Morford having preceded him and taken a school, being its first principal. The school was in a two-story house occupying the corner of the lot upon which the Central School now stands.
Mr. MeCartney had been occupying his spare time in the study of law under the direction of Judge II. M. Smith, of Caledonia, then the county seat of Pulaski county, and had been admitted to the bar and engaged in praetiee for several months when JJudge Green, of Metropolis, induced him to locate there and take charge of the schools, which he did, as the successor of his friend Morford. During the second session the war spirit became so intense that it was useless to continue the school. It was accordingly dismissed and Captain MeCartney raised a company early in 1862 for service in the Union army. As recruiting officer he raised Company D of the Fifty-sixth Regiment, Illinois Volunteers, and was commissioned its captain.
The regiment saw service with both Grant and Sherman. First at- tached to Grant's forces, it took part in the capture of Fts. Henry and
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Donelson, was in the siege and capture of Vicksburg, and then marched aeross and united with the troops operating against the Confederates in Tennessee. They formed a part of General Sherman's army for the Atlanta campaign, where a battle was fought every day during the one hundred days that were required to reach and take Atlanta. Captain McCartney continued with the victorious army on its famous march to the sea, and then when by the countermarch through the Carolinas the Southern forces were cut in twain. At Goldsboro, North Carolina, the victors received the surrender of General Johnston's army and continued to Washington, where they participated in the Grand Review at the close of the war.
When he dotted his shoulderstraps for the habiliments of the private citizen Captain McCartney decided to resume his law work. He took up the practice of this profession at his old home in Southern Illinois and speedily won a place of prominence. Soon he was elected state's attorney of the southern eirenit, and for many years was looked upon as a leader in Republican politics. The breadth of his capacity and his extensive enterprises aside from his law practice would have taxed the energies of most men, but Captain MeCartney is remembered as having made his mark in a number of varied lines. His business acumen, as evidenced by his investments, showed that he could have been a leader in any line. He bought heavily of eity property, and improved it with some of the best business houses of the city. Among these instances are the State Hotel block, the Herald building, the National State Bank build- ing and the Opera House building, in which is located the library, and which property he left by testament to the Christian church, that they might use it as the nucleus for the erection of a permanent home.
Captain MeCartney was a firm believer in ground as an investment, and his operations were not confined to eity property. Farming land was equally attractive to him. He believed that all wealth originated from the soil, and that it was the firmest foundation of a fortune as well as the most constant and assured contributor to man's efforts. This be- lief he showed by acquiring a large amount of land in Massac county. Flis country home was known as one of the beautiful and perfeetly ap- pointed residences of the region. It was located on a tract of several hundred aeres, and was built to his idea, possessed of all the necessaries and conveniences to make the estate ideal for the last years of a strenuous life. Here his widow and daughter, Miss Hope MeCartney. reside at the present time. The Captain was as thoroughly interested in the welfare of the dweller in the country as he was in the prosperity of the city man, and his contributions for the improvement of the publie highways were frequent and generous.
The field of journalism attraeted him, and soon after leaving the army and returning to Metropolis he founded the Promulgator, a Repub- liean weekly which was eventually absorbed by the Journal-Republican. Some years later the Captain's political sentiment changed, he revised his views and founded The Metropolis Times, through the columns of which he strongly advocated the principles of prohibition. So inter- ested did he become in the question that he was urged with unanimity to take the nomination of the Prohibition party for Congress, and polled the largest vote accorded to any Prohibition candidate before or since that time.
It was natural that one with such extensive property interests should be a close observer and active participant in financial matters. Captain MeCartney was one of the prime movers in the organization of the First National Bank of Metropolis, and became its president. Later he as- sisted in directing the organization of the National State Bank, and
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was its president when he died. IIe was an organizer and became a director of the National Bank of Golconda, and was at the time of his death the president of the National Bank of Brookport. These were not honorary capacities hy any means, but the Captain gave to the direc- tion of the affairs of these flourishing institutions the benefit of his skilled mind and vast experience. His knowledge of all kinds of in- vestments was unequaled, and he knew the rating of those with whom he had business dealings far more intimately than any information that could be furnished by the cold figures of a financial agency.
His splendid mind and tireless energy sought varied avenues of em- ployment. He became a state director for the Farmers' Institute, rep- resenting his district as such at the time of his death. He spent years in lecturing on agricultural subjects and visited European countries for the purpose of acquiring at first hand knowledge that would be useful to his farmer-friends in his commonwealth of the New World. In the pre- liminaries which resulted later in the locating of the C., B. & Q. Railway bridge and ineline at Metropolis, he was one of the first consulted and it was through his grasp of the possibilities and presentment of the situ- ation very largely that the negotiations with the company were success- fully terminated. He was president of the Metropolis Commercial Club when he passed away, and the widespread enterprises with which he had been associated mourned the loss of a real chief and paid proper tribute to his memory when he was laid away. He was an active man in the Christian church and kept its material welfare constantly before him. When General Logan and other national leaders organized the Grand Army of the Republic, Captain McCartney, himself the veteran of more than a hundred engagements, applauded the idea and gave it his earnest co-operation. He was identified with the Masonic and Odd Fel- lows fraternities in an active way until increasing business cares cur- tailed these social connections to some extent.
While located at Caledonia Captain McCartney married Elizabeth McKee, a sister of Judge Hugh McKee and of F. M. McKee, two men of prominence in Pulaski county. She died in Grand Chain during the latter part of the war, while he was away in the army, and is buried in the little cemetery at that place. There were two children by this mar- riage. A daughter, Lizzie, married Frank Stroud, and is a resident of Seattle, Washington. Marcus N. MeCartney is the other child. Captain McCartney's second wife, who survives him and resides at the old home place in Metropolis, is a native of Hanover, Germany, her maiden name being Minnie Luekens. Her family has one of the best known relation- ships of Massac county, her father, William Luekens, did not migrate from his native land, hut his family came to the United States when Mrs. MeCartney was a young girl. The children of this union are: Grace, wife of F. A. Trousdale, one of the prominent citizens of Me- tropolis, and who was formerly a member of the Illinois General Assem- bly ; Mrs. Anna Slimpert, of Metropolis; Mrs. Hattie Fouts, of Seattle, Washington; Carrie, wife of John Weaver, an educator of Metropolis ; Mrs. Kate Holifield, cashier of the National Bank, of Brockport, Illinois; Thomas Franklin, cashier of the National State Bank of Metropolis and an ex-superintendent of the city sehools; and Miss Hope McCartney, who is assistant cashier of the same bank.
Mareus N. McCartney, the senior son, was educated in the publie schools of his home eity and later in the old Metropolis Seminary, from which he graduated. While completing his education he took up teach- ing in the country schools, and attended the Normal School at Normal, Illinois, and the Holbrook Normal University at Lebanon, Ohio, where he received the degree of B. S. in 1885. Six years later the University
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conferred upon him the degree of A. B. He has been carrying on the work for his Master's degree in Columbia University while doing the work incumbent upon him as superintendent of schools.
The history of Professor McCartney's progress in his chosen vocation is one of steady advancement. In the beginning he taught two years in the district schools of Massac county. His first dircetive capacity was as principal of the schools at Grand Chain, where his father had first taught, years before. Then he was superintendent for six years at Mound City, and successively superintendent at Vienna, Illinois, for ten years, aeting superintendent at Carmi, Illinois, for part of a session, city superintendent of schools for Bloomfield, Missouri, for four years, and then city superintendent for two years in Metropolis, where, like in Grand Chain, he followed in the footsteps of his honored father, just fifty years intervening between their work in that capacity in Metropolis.
The measure of years, however, does not express the fullness of Pro- fessor MeCartney's work in so telling a fashion as the eonercte expres- sions of accomplishment. He instituted the high-school in Mound City and graded the schools there. He performed a similar service for Vienna, creating the high school course; reconstructed the high school at Bloom- field, Missouri, and put both Vienna and Bloomfield sehools on the ae- credited lists of their State Universities. In Metropolis he raised the credits of the high school from fifteen to seventeen, and saw it attain to the high water mark of an enrollment of twelve hundred, a teaching force of twenty-four and the aceumulation of sixty thousand dollars worth of school property. For twenty-two years Professor McCartney has been engaged in county institute work through Missouri and Illinois. He was president of the Southern Illinois Teachers' Association in 1892 at East St. Louis, and is finaneial sceretary of the Association at the present time. In addition he holds membership in the Illinois State Association, and has served most acceptably on the High School Course of Study Committee of the state organization. He is a member of the National Educational Association and attends its annual sessions. In company with his family he has traveled extensively through the United States, north, cast. south and west, and keeps in close touch with all the approved movements that aid in the edneation of the young. IIc is a close observer, a deep student, and a logical thinker. Ready of speech he makes a forceful, interesting talk, brimful of ideas and valuable theories.
Professor McCartney was married to Miss Ida Huckelberry at Mound City, Illinois, on Angust 29, 1895. His wife graduated from Holbrook Normal University with the degree of B. S. in 1891, and follows teaching, being one of the representative educators and woman's elnh devotees of Southern Illinois. She was born in Metropolis, a daughter of David B. and Mary Herrington Huekelberry. Her father was a soldier in the Carmichael Cavalry from Illinois during the Civil war, dying soon after the close of hostilities from the effects of the ardnous campaign. His widow married Captain Romeo F'riganza, well known as superintendent of the navy yard at Mound City during the Civil war. Professor and Mrs. McCartney have had three children in their family, Mary Neele. who died in infancy, Mareic May and Alice Elizabeth. In his religious sentiments Professor McCartney is a member of the Christian denomi- nation. Socially he fraternizes with the Masonie order, having member- ship in the Blue Lodge and Chapter. His publie and private life, his personality and his attainments have stamped him as a man among men, a shining monument of latter day nobility.
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JOHN FREDERICK REICHERT. Pulaski county is undeniably rich in her prosperous farmers. Her fertile lands have ever been an attraction to men of pluck and energy, and many a goodly fortune has been forth- coming from the soil in the form of golden grain and other kindred pro- duets of Southern Illinois. No man who has achieved success in an agricultural way in Pulaski county has done so at the cost of greater effort than John Frederick Reichert, nor has any one realized a more phenomenal degree of success in that work than has he. John Frederick Reichert represents the aeme of industrial effort; he has brought forth worthy accomplishments in the face of seemingly insurmountable ob- stacles, and is an example of thrift and prosperity which might well be studied and emulated. Aside from his extensive farming interests, he has found opportunity to reach out into other fields, and his attention has been turned to banking, mechandising and real estate. He is un- doubtedly one of the foremost men of his town and county, and as such is recognized by all.
Born near Freeburg, Illinois, June 16, 1853, Mr. Reichert is a son of Jacob Reichert and a brother of August Reichert. He had but slight acquaintance with the schoolroom as boy and youth, his education being chiefly of an industrial character as a helper on his father's farm. In the winters it was his wont to secure employment in the coal mines, which supplemented the family income from the farm, and he remained with the old folks until he was twenty-six years old. At 9 P. M. July 29, 1883, he entered Pulaski county as the fore-runner of German settlement in and about Grand Chain. He brought his personal property with him in a wagon, and with $350 loaned him by a friend, Joe Erlinger, he contracted for the purchase of a traet of one hundred acres of land. This primal purchase represents the center of energy about which all the activities of his now widespread domain revolves. Pulaski county, in the part he chose for his home, was in an unsettled condition, and from the first ill-health was the portion of the family. Unacelimated as they were, their bodily strength and vigor was sapped by the unhealthful conditions, and death came to the little home on several occasions. These and other troubles followed Mr. Reichert and for a time ruin stared him in the face. But with the restoration of health Fortune ceased to frown upon his labors, and soon the results of his unrelenting toil were everywhere apparent. A few short years found him firmly established and making rapid progress towards financial independence. He con- tinued to add to his holdings until he was the owner of more than eleven hundred acres of farm land, but he has sinee redneed his raneh proper to something like 570 aeres, and it is unnecessary to say that the reducing of this land to a producing condition has involved much labor of a most strenuous sort, the results of which fully justify the cost. In 1892 Mr. Reichert erected a handsome brick dwelling, which, with the other splen- did buildings he has built from time to time, add much to the appearance and value of his country home. At first grain and stoek raising oe- eupied his attention entirely, but for a number of years he has been a buyer and shipper of both produets. Mr. Reichert was the founder of one of the principal business concerns in Grand Chain, known as the Grand Chain Mereantile Company, and he is the owner of the fine modern building in which the company earries on its business. He is a director and one of the organizers of the First State Bank of Mound City, and is a dealer in real estate in and about Grand Chain. A Repub- lican in his political convictions, he is concerned in the welfare of the party, but is inaetive in a political way. He was nominated for the office of county commissioner against his protest in recent years and was elected, but he declined to qualify diselaiming any desire for public
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office of any kind and not having sufficient time for sueh office aside from his private interests. Mr. Reichert is a member of the B. P. O. E. Lodge No. 651, in Cairo, Illinois.
Mr. Reichert married in St. Clair county Louisa Erlinger, the daughter of German parents of Freeburg. She was born May 1, 1854, and died January 7, 1890. She is buried at her old home. Five children were born to them, all of whom were vet at a tender age when death robbed them of the care of a mother. Their father has proved himself a parent indeed in his care of his family. He has looked after their education, given them careful home training, taught them the value of industry and integrity for its own sake, and has seen the majority of them establish homes of their own and enter upon successful agricultural or commereial careers. Their names are as follows: Theodore, born November 28, 1880, is secretary and treasurer of the Grand Chain Mer- cantile Company, and is married to Tillie Beyke; Edmund August, born November 21, 1882, is a farmer; Albert C., born March 25, 1885, is a farmer; John Fritz Theodore, born Angust 29, 1887, is at home, not married ; and Andreas Frank, born November 17, 1889, died in infancy.
GEORGE E. CARTER, president of the Randolph Milling Company, of Baldwin, Illinois, has been a resident of that vicinity since his boyhood, coming with his parents to Illinois from Sullivan county, New York, in 1864, when he was but six years of age. He lived on a farm until twenty- one years old, and since he entered the business world he has been con- neeted with the milling industry in one capacity or another, save for but one exception, and since the inception of the Randolph Milling Com- pany in 1904 he has been active as president of that concern winning to himself an enviable record in that section for progressiveness and general business ability.
Born at De Bruee, Sullivan county, New York, June 7. 1858. George E. Carter is the son of Thomas Carter, an Englishman, born in Lincoln- shire, England, and coming to the United States in the fifties after his marriage with Rebecca Dickinson. He spent practically ten years in and near De Bruee as a farmer, and in 1864 brought his little family to Illi- nois. Here, as in New York, he engaged quietly in agricultural pursuits, and spent his life in the vieinity of Baldwin, dying there in 1894. His widow still survives him. They were the parents of the following named sons and daughters: John, who died near Baldwin, leaving a family : Mary A., who is the wife of Adolphus Miles and resides at Rosmond, Illi- nois : Chris, who passed away at Russell, Kansas, also leaving a family ; George E., of Baldwin: Joseph, who is connected with the Randolph Milling Company in Baldwin; Hepsey, who married E. C. Douglass and lives in St. Louis, and Sarah F., who is now Mrs. W. R. Preston, of Bald- win, Illinois.
George E. Carter was educated in the public schools of Baldwin, and following his graduation therefrom he completed a course of study in the Southern Illinois Normal. He later was graduated from the Bryant & Stratton Commercial College in St. Louis, and began his business life as a clerk in the store of George Wehrheim with whom he was associated for seven years and during which time he acquired valuable business experience. Upon severing his connection with that line of business he became associated with a Mr. Campbell, and they subsequently formed a partnership in Baldwin to buy and ship grain, which business they eon- dueted for a period of seven years. Disposing of that business, Mr. Car- ter established a small elevator in Baldwin, and bought wheat for the Camp Spring Milling Company for a year and a half, and a similar period of time he spent in buying wheat for the Conrad Beeker Milling
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Company, of Red Bud. Mr. Carter and Mr. Becker both saw favorable possibilities in the consolidation of the mutual interests, and they conse- quently bought a small grist mill in Baldwin from Heim and Peters, and during the time that Mr. Becker was connected with the business the firm went by the name of Becker and Carter. In 1904 Mr. Becker retired, and the new proprietor continued the plant as the Randolph Milling Com- pany, of which George E. Carter is the president, E. Linder is vice president and Clyde A. Carter is secretary and treasurer.
The mill, as now operated, represents practically a new industry as compared with the original plant, so wide has been the scope of the con- stant improvements which have been effected. Its building has under- gone many important changes; its power has been modernized and mul- tiplied ; its general equipment has been added to, and many other im- portant changes inaugurated, until today the plant ranks among the most up-to-date and efficient mills in the country, with a capacity of two hundred barrels of flour daily. When Mr. Carter came into the concern the plant was little more than a custom mill. His progressive ideas were immediately made manifest in the business by the successive changes that were wrought, and by the many additions for the enlarge- ment and improvement of the mill equipment. Its final overhauling and revolutionizing took place when the Becker interest came into the hands of the present owners. The output of the mill is marketed in a few of the Sonthern states, Mississippi taking the bulk of it, while Tennessee and Alabama absorb a small portion of it. The plant furnishes a splen- did market for home grown wheat and is an important factor in making Baldwin a trading center for the country interests.
On August 23, 1883, Mr. Carter married Miss Belle Holden, daughter of James and Sarah (Johnson) Holden, settlers from New Jersey. Mr. Holden has been identified with saw mill interests the greater part of his life. They have four daughters and three sons, Mrs. Carter being their second daughter. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Carter are as fol- lows: Clyde, a partner with his father in the Randolph Milling Com- pany, born May 4, 1884. He is a graduate of Barnes Business College at St. Louis, and was married November 29, 1907, having two children, Melba and Arlin. Eula is the second child of George and Belle Carter, and their third and youngest child, Fleda, is deceased.
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