USA > Illinois > DeKalb County > Past and present of DeKalb County, Illinois, Volume II > Part 4
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clearness of mental perception, a stability of pur- pose and an indefatigable energy, and these in- herent and intrinsic qualities are wholly incom- patible with failure. He stands today strong in his honor and his good name, in his business and social positions, his life record awakening the admiration of his associates in business and the respect of all who know aught of his career.
GEORGE STEWART MURPHY, M. D.
Dr. George Stewart Murphy, who is conducting a private hospital in Waterman for the exclusive treatment of surgical cases, was born in Chicago, November 28. 1868. His father, John A. Murphy, was a native of Canada and was of Scotch-Irish descent. He came to the United States in 1864, locating in Chicago, where he engaged in business as a contractor. meeting with excellent success, for he possessed considerable ability. He is now living at Vinton, Iowa. at the age of seventy years. hav- ing removed to that state in 1904. He is still in active business and his entire life has been char- acterized by unfaltering enterprise and diligence. He married Catherine L. Wright, who was born
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in Canada and is now fifty-eight years of age. She is of Scotch descent and is a member of the Presbyterian church. In the family were three children, George. Maude L., and Henry. the last named being interested in mines in Butte, Mon- tana.
Dr. Murphy of this review was a student in the public schools of Chicago and afterward entered Cornell College. lle read medicine with Dr. T. B. Lacey, of Council Bluffs. and entered the medical department of Creighton University at Omaha. Nebraska, in 1893, there pursuing a three years course, after which he was graduated in the class of 1896. He was externe in St. Bernard's and the W. C. A. hospitals of Council Bluffs during his student days and thus added broad practical training to his theoretical knowledge.
When his college course was completed Dr. Murphy located for practice at Macedonia. lowa. where he remained for two years and then settled at Burr Oak, Kansas, where he also spent two years. In 1900 he established an office in Chicago. where he continued for two years, also acting as assistant to Dr. O. Beverly Campbell, abdominal surgeon at the post-graduate hospital. and as as- sistant to other physicians in the same hospital. In August, 1902, he came to Waterman. where he has built up a very successful practice both in medicine and surgery. He left the city on account of his wife's health. but has not found the change unprofitable. for a liberal patronage is accorded him here. In 1904 he established a private hos- pital, which has more than met his anticipations. It has had many patrons from the beginning and in it he treats surgical cases exclusively. The hospital is well equipped for this work, having all the necessary instruments and appliances, and Dr. Murphy's broad experience and skill well qualify him for this department of practice. He has membership relations with the County and State Medical Societies and also with the American Medical Association.
On the 28th of January, 1897, Dr. Murphy wedded Grace Egiria Bartlett, who was born in Chillicothe, Ohio. June 20. 18:6. They now have two children, J. Bartlett and Mary Louise. Dr. Murphy is an Episcopalian in religions faith. while his wife is connected with the Presbyterian church. In politics he is independent, voting for men and measures rather than party. He has no aspiration
for office. preferring to give his undivided time and attention to his professional duties, which he discharges with a marked sense of conscientious obligation.
JOHN MAC QUEEN.
John MacQueen is one of the well known and prominent business men of DeKalb county, carry- ing on a very large stock feeding and shipping business at Kirkland. He was born in Scotland. September 2, 186%. His father, James MacQueen. also born and reared in Scotland, was there mar- ried to Miss Isabella Drummond, a Scotch lady. The father was manager of a large stock business in his native country for a number of years, and ere the emigration of the parents to the new world three of their children were horn. James Mac- Queen crossed the Atlantic to the United States and joined his son in DeKalb county in 1898. He now resides upon a farm near Kirkland and is classed with the enterprising agriculturists of the community. His daughter, Mrs. John Edwards. is a resident of Wales. England, while one son. Colin MacQueen. is with a live-stock commission merchant of Chicago.
John MacQueen, the other member of the fam- ily. was reared to manhood in the land of hills and heather and acquired good common-school advantages there. He afterward served for five years with MeDonald & Frazer, the largest stock- commission firm in Scotland. and during that time he became thoroughly acquainted with the business in principle and detail. For two years he had charge of the firm's offices at Inverness. Scotland, and then, thinking to enjoy better busi- ness opportunities in the new world. he came to the United States in 1888, bringing with him a lot of Clydesdale horses and Shetland ponies which he sold in Chicago. Locating in Oregon. Wiscon- sin. he there imported and dealt in horses for two years. Subsequently he spent one year in Cali- fornia, where he was engaged in the sheep busi- ness. and in 1891 came to Illinois. settling first in Kane county, where he fed and dealt in sheep. establishing the first sheep feeding sheds and business in this part of Illinois. There he re- mained for five years and both exported and im-
JOHN MAC QUEEN.
THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
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ported fat sheep and also dealt in horses. In 1896 he came to Kirkland, where he made a per- manent location. He purchased land, upon which he has sheds for the shelter of the sheep and also has large feeding capacity for thirty thousand sheep. He now feeds, handles and ships a million and a half head of sheep annually and is one of the most extensive dealers in Illinois. He has purchased land adjoining the town and owns six- teen hundred acres, which he uses for pasture and as meadow land. It is divided into several well- improved farms and the Kishwaukee river drains the land for a distance of two and a half miles and also affords an ample water supply for an extensive stock business. Mr. MacQueen is one of the most progressive and public-spirited citizens of the county and his extensive business interests have been an element in its general prosperity. At Kirkland he put in an electric light plant, which he owns and operates. It was established in 1897 .. is a well equipped plant and gives an all-night. service.
Mr. MacQueen was married in Kirkland, in July. 1898, to Miss Hortense Erickson, who was born in Rockford. Illinois, and is of Swedish and Norwegian parentage. She was reared and edu- cated in her native city. Mr. MacQueen has built a neat and attractive residence in Kirkland and is there most comfortably sitnated. While he and his wife have no children of their own, they have adopted a son. Wallace MacQueen. to whom they are much attached, rearing and educating him as their own child.
Politically Mr. MacQueen is a stanch and un- faltering republican. He has served for several terms on the town board of Kirkland and has been again re-elected. He served as central committee- man for his distriet for two terms and has twice been a delegate to the state conventions. He takes a most active interest in the success of his party and his opinions have carried weight in its local councils. Both he and his wife are members of the Kirkland Congregational church and he con- tributes liberally to its support. He gave to the church a large bell as a Christmas present on the 25th of December, 1906. He has taken an active and helpful part in all the enterprises that tend to upbuild and benefit the community and his labors have been effective and far-reaching. He is a
member of the Masonic fraternity. belonging to the lodge at Kirkland, to the chapter at Geneva, the commandery at Sycamore and the consistory at Freeport, Illinois, having thus attained the thirty- second degree of the Scottish rite. He is also connected with Medinah Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Chicago and he has served through all of the chairs in the blue lodge, being at present worshipful master.
In the transaction of his business interests Mr. MacQueen has crossed and recrossed the briny deep thirty-one times. He exported sheep and imported horses for many years. In the conduct of his busi- ness he employs a large number of men, having a pay-roll of over one thousand dollars per month. He commenced life for himself withont a dollar when but sixteen years of age and for the first year received the munificent sum of two dollars and a half per week and boarded himself! The second „year he received four dollars per week and the third year five dollars, and during the last two years of his service with the big commission house of Scotland he received seven dollars per week. However, he obtained a practical and thorough business training and today is known as one of the largest dealers in sheep of the Mississippi valley, his reputation extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific. He well merits the success which has come to him, as it has resulted entirely from his perseverance, unfaltering labor and unabating energy. Moreover, he has never selfishly hoarded his wealth, but has kept it in circulation and has responded generously and freely to calls made upon him for co-operation in movements which have been directly beneficial to the county.
JOHN W. HUBER.
John W. Huber, who owns and operates three hundred and forty acres of land in De Kalb county, was a son of Gottlieb and Elizabeth ( Hei- derscheid) Huber, who came from Germany to the United States in 1855. They located in Malta township, De Kalb county, where the father still lives but the mother passed away in 1898. He has been very successful since coming to this county and in his farming operations has made a place
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among the substantial residents of this part of the state.
John W. Huber was born on the old family homestead in Malta township. December 2:, 1861. and at the usual age entered the public schools, where he acquired a fair English education. He remained on the farm with his father until twenty- four years of age. when he went to work on the Great Western Railroad. there remaining for three and a half years. He was next identified with the St. Charles Milk Condensing Company at St. Charles. Illinois, where he also spent three and a half years, and on the expiration of that period he invested the money which he had earned in land in De Kalb township, purchasing the farm upon which he now resides and which he has since owned and operated. It comprises three hundred and forty acres of very rich and pro luetive land and he raises the crops best adapted to soil and climate. annually gathering rich harvests. Every- thing about his place is kept in good condition and he is both practical and progressive in his methods.
In March, 1892. Mr. Huber was married to Miss Amy Searles, a daughter of Stephen and Elmira (Ropps) Searles. Her father is a contractor and builder of St. Charles, Illinois, and both he and his wife are living there. Mr. and Mrs. Iluber have four children: William. Etta. Joseph and Fred, three of whom are in school. The parents are well known in De Kalb township and enjoy the warm regard of many friends. Mr. Iluber has been an ardent republican for many years but has never aspired to political honors or office. His attention has been devoted to the farm and in the management and control of his property he has displayed good busines- ability. being justly ac- counted one of the leading agriculturists of his locality.
HON. MILES BEACH CASTLE.
An enumeration of those men of the present generation who have won honor and public recog- nition for themselves and at the same time have honored the state in which they belong would be incomplete were there failure to make prominent reference to the one whose name initiates this
sketch. He gained distinctive precedence as a lead- ing business man of marked ability and as a states- man. in which connection he bore himself with such signal dignity and honor as to gain him the respect of all. He was distinctively a man of affairs and wielded a wide influence. A strong mined individuality so entered into his make-up as to render him a natural leader of men and a director of opinion. and this was manifest in both his business and political life.
Mr. Castle was born August 11, 1826. and his life span covered the years up to the 10th of Aug- ust. 1900. He was a native of Albany. New York. and was a descendant in the third generation of Gideon Castle, who came from England about 1200. The family at one time owned ten thousand aeres of land in New York state, and one Gideon C'astle was noted during colonial times as a mem- ber of the staff of General Washington. filling the position of commissioner with the rank of captain when the commander-in-chief was in New York during the struggle for independence.
Elijah Castle inherited from his father a farm in Dutchess county, New York, which was valued at ten thousand dollars. This he later sold and entered business circles at Albany. New York. He married Deborah Beach. of Dutchess county. Their son. Miles Beach Castle, was reared upon a farm and pursued his education in the academy at Jonesville, New York, from which he was gradu- ated when about twenty years of age. He then accepted a clerkship in a dry-goods store at Glens Falls. New York. and subsequently became gen- eral manager of the store which he conducted with success until 1855. which year witnessed his re- moval westward to Chicago. In 1856 he came to Sandwich, Illinois, and opened a lumberyard. From that time forward he was closely associated with the business interests of the city. He also established the Sandwich Bank in 1856 and continued active in the management and control of both until his death. making them important commercial and financial enterprises of the city. In 1810 he founded the Kendall County Bank at Yorkville. and in 1818, associated with his son, J. B. Castle, he established the Sandwich Irgus, which is now conducted and owned by his son. He operated his banks with great success for forty-five years and became recognized as one of the foremost. enter-
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prising and reliable representatives of financial interests in this part of the state.
It was not alone in business circles, however, that made Miles B. Castle a prominent resident of De Kalb county. Ile also figured conspicuously in political circles and was known as one whose alle- giance was unswerving in support of the cause or movement which he believed to be right. He allied his interests with those of the republican party, becoming an earnest worker in its ranks, and in 1822 was elected upon that ticket to the office of state senator. In 1874 he was re-elected and served as a member of the upper house of the Illi- nois assembly for six years. He took an active and helpful part in much important constructive legis- lation and gave careful and earnest consideration to each question which came up for settlement. He was appointed chairman of the committee on pub- lic buildings and grounds and as representative at large of the executive mansion and the new capitol at Springfield. Among other bills which he intro- duced and succeeded in passing was the first bill for the protection of the fish interests in Illinois. Ile was a member of the republican state central committee, was for years chairman of the executive committee of the Illinois State Equal Suffrage Association and belonged to other organizations which have had direct and far-reaching influene in molding public thought and opinion. He was a member of the State Press Association and of the Press Club of Chicago, and he was the friend and associate of many of the eminent men of Illinois, who regarded him as a peer and honored him for the strength of his character, his mental poise and ability and his practical successes in securing the adoption of principles for which he stood. Frater- nally he was a Royal Arch Mason. He possessed, too, literary tastes which made him a wide reader, and at the laying of the corner stone of the new capitol in 1865 he delivered a poem which received favorable comment from the press.
On the 21st of January, 1857, Mr. Castle was united in marriage to Mrs. Freelove Kinney Hub- bard, at Sandwich, a daughter of Hon. Asa Kin- ney. ex-senator of California. She was born Feb- ruary 24, 1836, and is a descendant of the Grinnell family, representatives of knighthood in Eng- land. Her education was completed in Knox Col- lege, at Galesburg. Illinois, and by her marriage she became the mother of one son and two daugh-
ters: John B., born August 13, 1859: Louise R., January 21, 1861 ; and Grace F., July 22. 1868.
JOHN B. CASTLE.
John B. Castle, in whom is found a worthy suc- cessor of a noble sire, was born August 13. 1859. in Sandwich, where he has lived to become an in- fluencing factor in business life. At the age of fifteen he went to work in his father's lumberyard and when nineteen years of age, in connection with his father, established the Sandwich Argus, and became also a half-owner of the paper-mills at Yorkville, Illinois. He was connected with that industry from 1886 until 1891. when the mills were destroyed by fire. He had been general manager of the business, which had been con- ducted upon a paying basis until its destruction. He is now vice president of the Sandwich Bank, and a half owner of a Immber and coal business established by his father, which has been conducted under the firm style of Mosher & Castle, the senior partner being F. S. Mosher. His interests have thus been varied and important and have been an element in the commercial and industrial growth and prosperity of Sandwich and this section of the state. He was for some time in the United States sub-treasury at Chicago, and returning to Sand- wich entered the hardware business under the firm style of Castle & Latham, being thus engaged from 1892 until 1898, when he sold out.
In the meantime he took up the study of law and was admitted to the bar on the 13th of Janu- ary, 1892, after having graduated from the law department of Lake Forest University. In 1898 he entered upon the practice of law in connection with John W. Blee as a member of the firm of Blee & Castle but retired in 1902. In the same same year he was elected to the legislature and in 1904 was re-elected, serving as chairman of the judiciary committee in the last session. He is recognized as an able working member of the house, connected with important constructive legislation and giving unfaltering allegiance to the measures which he deems will prove of greatest benefit to his community and the commonwealth at large.
Mr. Castle was married, October 8, 1885, to Miss Mary Latham, a daughter of Joseph and Charlotte
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( Esterbrook ) Latham. The Lathams came to Illi- nois in 1838 and the Esterbrooks in 1835. Both families were connected with agricultural interests and the land which was entered by the Esterbrooks from the government and became the original homestead of the family. is still in possession of representatives of the name. Mrs. Castle was born April 16. 1860, and by her marriage has become the mother of two sons: Miles Bert. born October 12. 1895: and Latham, born February 27, 1900.
Mr. Castle is a trustee of the Congregational church and is a thirty-second-degree Mason. He belongs to the Aurora commandery at Aurora. and to the Medinah Temple of the Mystic Shrine in Chicago. He also holds membership relations with the Knights of Pythias. He is very fond of hunt- ing and has indulged his love of this sport in pur- suit of large and small game in all the game states. Ile has never rested upon the reputation of his father but has made for himself through his indi- vidual effort a prominent place in the business world, being recognized as an excellent manager and a man of keen discernment. while his re-elee- tion to the state legislature is proof of his political prominence and leadership but. moreover, the fa- vorable regard expressed concerning him by those who have known him from his boyhood to the present time is the best indieation of the character of the man.
CHARLES W. MARSH.
It is astonishing to think how greatly the world is indebted to De Kalb county for advancement that has been made in connection with the agri- cultural development of the country. From this distriet have issued some of the greatest inven- tions that the world has known-inventions whose value to the farmer is inestimable. in which con- nection the name of Charles W. Marsh has be- come a familiar one throughout the United States and Canada. He is a native of the Dominion. but spent much of his life in De Kalb county and his history constitutes no unimportant chapter in its annals. His birth occurred on a farm near Co- burg, Ontario, on the 22d of March, 1834. his parents being Samuel and Tamar Marsh. In the
paternal line he is descended from William Marsh, who. fleeing from Kent county, England, in 1650 when the tide of the great civil war in that country turned against King Charles I, became a resident of the new world. He was a royalist and in con- sequence was in danger of losing his life should he fall into the hands of the followers of Cromwell. Loeating in Connecticut, he became the founder of a family that has won prominence in New Eng- land and has sent its members into all parts of this country to take their place in various eallings of life and business. His youngest son removed to Vermont and from the branch of the family of which he was the progenitor Charles W. Marsh comes. The mother of our subjeet was connected with the Schermerhorn family of New York.
At an early age Charles W. Marsh began his education and when a youth of ten years was a student in St. Andrews school in Coburg. Two years later he entered Victoria College, where he remained for more than three years, when in 1849 he accompanied his parents on their removal to Illinois. Notwithstanding the fact that his life has been devoted largely to agricultural pursuits he has always been of a studious disposition and spends his leisure hours in familiarizing himself with subjects that add to his large fund of gen- eral information. While in college he was especial- ly fond of languages and mastered Latin and French. while in later years he has acquired a good knowledge of Spanish.
The Marsh family on removing to Illinois be- came residents of De Kalb county. There were the parents. two sons and a daughter, and the father and sons successfully operated the land which the father purchased, transforming it into a very rich and arable farm. The sons. too, early displayed superior mechanical ingenuity and were always improving the farm machinery they used. They soon began dealing in farm machinery; and in addition to managing the home place they oper- ated breaking teams and threshing machines and also bought and sold lands nnder the firm name of C. W. & W. W. Marsh. During the '50s reapers were generally introduced through northern Illi- nois. The Marsh brothers had been working with reapers for two or three seasons previous but did not purchase a machine until 1856. With all the reapers of that period, whether hand rake, self
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your body Cumarsh
RESIDENCE OF C. W. MARSH.
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PAST AND PRESENT OF DE KALB COUNTY.
rake or dropper, the grain was cut and delivered in gavels upon the ground, the machines saving labor only in cutting, as the gavels had to be taken from the stubble and bound as before. Con- tinually studying to improve machinery, during the harvesting season of 1857 C. W. & W. W. Marsh came to the conclusion that two binders standing upon a machine so constructed as to carry them and to cut and deliver the grain to them at the proper height in good shape could bind as much as four or five men on the ground walking from gavel to gavel, stooping to the stubble and gathering the grain therefrom to bind. The result of their studies was that before the next harvest they had planned and built with the aid of a country blacksmith the first harvester-a machine so constructed as to successfully and practically carry binders whether manual or automatic, with which they cut and bound their harvest of 1858. With this machine the grain was cut, elevated and then delivered down an incline to the arms of the manual binders, just as it is now cut, ele- vated and delivered down an incline to the arms of an automatic binder. The Marsh harvester, carrying its two binders, effected as great a saving of labor in binding as the reaper had in the labor of cutting. It did even more, for it furnished the foundation for the modern harvesting machine, as it was the first and only machine to which au- tomatie binders could be successfully attached ; but it was so entirely different from other grain cutting machinery of that period that its merits had to be demonstrated and established by general public use as a carrier of manual binders before the idea of making it a carrier of an automatic binder was evolved, and many years elapsed be- fore this was accomplished.
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