USA > Indiana > Elkhart County > A standard history of Elkhart County, Indiana : an authentic narrative of the past, with particular attention to the modern era in the commercial, industrial, educational, civic and social development, Volume II > Part 57
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The following year, 1866, he came to Chicago and was engaged in a brokerage office there until June, 1869. Appointment as first assistant to C. H. Kirkendall, in the internal revenue service, caused him to take up his residence at Natchez, Mississippi, where he
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remained until May, 1873, and while there assisted in producing the first republican newspaper in Mississippi named The New South. He was also one of the few passengers taken aboard the famous steamboat Robert E. Lee when she defeated the steamboat Natchez in the celebrated race from New Orleans to St. Louis, leaving the first named city on the evening of July 1, 1870. The late Philo Morehous, the prominent Elkhart capitalist and former director of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railway, whose career is sketched on other pages, secured Mr. Davis' appointment as clerk in the local office of that road in Chicago in 1873, and he was subsequently promoted to revising clerk in the freight department. In 1874 he was induced by Mr. W. W. Cole of circus renown to take charge of the ticket office of the Adelphi Theater. It was the first classy vaudeville theater known in Chicago and Mr. Cole was its financial sponsor and owner. It was rebuilt on the ruins of the old postoffice and occupied the present site of the First National Bank. He remained there until Mr. Cole sold the theater early in 1876 and then took the original Georgia Minstrels to Cali- fornia for Col. Jack Haverly, and remained there until Christ- mas, when he returned to Chicago and became assistant general passenger agent for the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railway. In 1878. the Union & Central Pacific Railways and the Pacific Mail Steamship Company effected an agreement with the Rock Island, the Northwestern, the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern and New York Central lines to provide a through route transportation sched- ule around practically half the globe. As the representative of this transportation syndicate Mr. Davis went to Australia and New Zealand to give publicity to the American route from those countries to Europe. In all his varied career Mr. Davis finds more interest in this experience than in any other.
Mr. Davis was then Assistant General Passenger Agent for the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railway in Chicago until the Vanderbilts bought the Michigan Central and changes in officials were made which did not suit him so he again returned to the theatrical business as manager for the various Haverly enterprises. Among the most notable of these were Her Majesty's Grand Opera Company which was brought to America by Col. J. H. Mapleson. Mr. Davis conducted the tours of this company two seasons. He also conducted the only tours of America made by the famous actor, Lester Wallack. It was on one of these tours that he learned of the formation of the Chicago Church Choir Pinafore Company, which he induced Mr. Haverly to finance and book all about the country. His judgment was correct as no company ever achieved greater musical success. Then he met Jessie Bartlett who was the "Butter- cup" of the company. In 1887 he leased the Haymarket Theater in
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Chicago, which he sold afterward to Kohl & Castle of vaudeville fame, and from 1890 to 1900 leased and managed the Columbia Theater. In the Columbia deal the firm of Hayman & Davis was originated, which in 1900 after the burning of the Columbia built and owned the present Illinois Theater. Mr. Davis was also one of the owners and builders of the ill-fated Iroquois Theater, and was one of its managers at the time it was burned. He was indicted and prosecuted as one of the parties responsible for that disaster, and it required a tedious and long drawn out litigation, which kept him before the public eye for several years, before he was finally excul- pated from the charges of criminal negligence in connection with that calamity. To a large extent the case against him was the result of a vindictive plot on the part of a political and newspaper clique in Chicago to ruin him financially, and it took him four years to gain the vindication which he deserved. In 1914 Mr. Davis retired from the theatrical business, and while he spends much time in Chicago and has an office there, his real home and the center of his most delightful activities are on the Willowdale Farm near Crown Point.
Mr. Davis is a member of the George H. Thomas Post, G. A. R., and of the Union League, Chicago Athletic, Fellowship, The Green Room, The Strollers, Farragut Navy Veterans and South Shore Country Clubs, and the Indiana Society of Chicago.
March 31, 1880, he married Miss Jessie Bartlett. Jessie Bartlett Davis, who died May 14, 1905. was well known to a whole generation of theater goers as both a grand and light opera singer. Her debut in grand opera was with the Mapleson Company in the role of Siebel in Faust, and to the Margherita of Mme. Adelina Patti. Her greatest success in English opera was with the well known "Bos- tonians." She was principal contralto of this company for more than ten years. Her singing of the popular song "Oh ! Promise Me," in the opera Robin Hood, gave her a vogue never equalled by any American singer. She was born in Morris, Illinois. Of the two children of their union, William H. died in infancy, while William James II is now inventor and manufacturer of the Davis System of Electric Flood Lights and by his marriage to Florence Turtle has three children: William James III, Jessie Bartlett, and Florence. On June 12, 1907, Mr. Davis married his present wife, Mary Ellen O'Hagan.
Concerning his early theatrical activities in Chicago, a sketch which after quite thirty years can be read with renewed interest is found in the Andreas History of Chicago, published in 1886, and from which the following is quoted: "On returning to America in 1878 he was secured by John H. Haverly to manage the tour of Her Majesty's Opera, which he did two memorable seasons. The
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success that attended Mr. Davis during the first season of his man- aging carcer, won for him the highest reputation, which has been constantly augmented by later achievements of a high order. Since entering the field of amusements, Mr. Davis has confined his opera- tions to this city and the Northwest, and he is a thoroughly identified Chicagoan. The Grand Opera House of this city received its most marked impetus when Mr. Davis assumed the direction of its affairs, and he won for it the title of 'The Mascotte Theater,' the house having then won the good will of the public through the efforts of its efficient manager. Perhaps no theater in recent years ever received the cordial homage of the public as did Haverly's New Theater (now the Columbia) upon its opening nights. The immense crowds that surged through its doors upon the first nights were a grand testimonial of the public's friendship to the house, and served to inseparably link the names of Mr. Haverly, the proprietor, and 'Will' Davis, the manager, with the history of the playhouse, no matter how often its name changes. The success of Mr. Davis in the management of the theater is well known, and his reputation was won chiefly through his constant appreciation of what the public needed. None but companies of the highest character and finest talent were permitted to go on the stage, and it has ever been Mr. Davis' policy to cater to the tastes of the refined and fashionable theater goers. When the financial storni came upon Mr. Haverly, and all his enterprises went into other hands, Mr. Davis bravely stood by the side of the heroic and honorable manager, and aided him in re-establishing his present ventures. When Haverly's Home Minstrels were organized, Mr. Davis took their management, and has carried on his work with the result as in years prior, always presenting entertainments of a high order and winning the esteem and patronage of the people. He has a prestige in the city for a clever presentation of whatever performance he may manage, and has a large following, which accompanies him from one theater to another. Messrs. Haverly and Davis are 'Chicago men' in all that the phrase implies, and as such are held in the highest regard and esteem of the amusement-loving public. Hand in hand in their various enterprises, always sure of the patronage of thousands of staunch friends, their successes in the future may well be based on their splendid efforts in the past. Mr. Davis is one of the most popular managers of the West. He resides on the North Side, and Mrs. Jessie Bartlett-Davis, the famous operatic singer, is his wife."
MRS. E. M. BULLOCK, whose establishment as a florist has been well known in the City of Elkhart for twenty-seven years, has some interesting individual associations and family connections with this section of Northern Indiana and Southern Michigan.
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She was born in Cass County, Michigan, in 1858. Her father was Nicholas Weaver. He was born near Fonda, New York, October 13, 1828, a son of Mathias Weaver. Mathias Weaver, it is thought, was born in Holland and came to America with his parents, who located in New York State. While living in New York he followed farming, and moved west to Michigan and was one of the early settlers of Cass County. He secured a tract of land bordering Eagle Lake, where he cleared up a farm in the midst of the woods, and remained a resident of that locality until his death, at the age of seventy-four. Mathias Weaver married Catherine Chago, who was said to have been a lineal descendant from Anneke Jans, a prominent early pioneer of New York City. She died at the age of eighty-five. Her six children were John, Nicholas, Catherine, William, Mary and Levi.
Nicholas Weaver as the son of a pioneer in Cass County had many of the experiences common to such men, having attended school in a log cabin building and beginning young to assist on the farm. He afterwards learned the trade of carpenter, and expanded his individual accomplishment as a contractor and builder. A great many churches, schoolhouses, residences and other structures in Southern Michigan still stand as a monument to his work and supervision.
In 1871 Nicholas Weaver moved to Elkhart and thenceforward for a number of years was the leading contractor and builder. A large number of fine residences and business blocks were put up by him in this city and Goshen and the surrounding country, and some particular structures that deserve mention were the Clark Hos- pital, Miles Medical Company building, Strong home on Strong Avenue. His home was in Elkhart until his death in September, 1901.
Mrs. Bullock's mother was Emily E. Odell. She married Nicho- las Weaver in 1854. She was born at Cleveland, Ohio, September 6, 1834, and died at Mrs. Bullock's home June 5, 1916, where she had come to be taken care of during her last illness. The funeral was from the old home on Beardsley Avenue, June 8. Her father, Simeon Odell, was born in New York State, where he was reared and married, and finally moved out to Ohio and became one of the early settlers of Cleveland, where he bought a tract of land that is now included within the city limits. He farmed that property for a time, but in 1834, in the month of October, only a few weeks after his daughter Emily was born, he set out for a new home in Northern Indiana. He made part of the journey by lake boat, and the rest by wagon and team. Accom- panying him were his wife and six children. He passed through Elkhart County, which at that time was a wilderness of alternate forest and prairie and the great part of the land still under the
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control of the government. For some reason Simeon Odell was not satisfied with the country around Elkhart and he traveled ten miles north, crossing the Michigan line, and settled in what is now Cass County, in the then Territory of Michigan. He bought a tract of land in the locality now known as Kessington. While he was constructing a commodious hewed log house his family lived in a tent.
No family in Cass County has been better known since pioneer times than the Odells. Their old homestead was situated on the great highway, known as the Detroit and Chicago Road. The Odell mansion became a tavern and stage coach station. Mr. Odell subse- quently erected a building to be specially used as a hotel. The old Chicago Road was for many years the main artery of traffic between Detroit and that section of the country and the southern end of Lake Michigan. Daily the highway had its throngs of stage coaches, movers' wagons and a great variety of freighting vehicles. The Odell homestead was an oasis in the wilderness and furnished food and shelter to hundreds of travelers who went up and down that turnpike. Much of the meat consumed on the table was supplied by the wild deer and turkey that roamed at will through the woods. Indians were frequent callers at the home. The women of the household carded and spun the cloth which dressed the family, and there were no stoves, all the cooking being done by a fireplace or in two large brick ovens which stood in the dooryard. That was the home of Simeon Odell, the pioneer, until the last few years of his life, he moved to Illinois on a large farm near Walnut, Illinois, where he died at the age of seventy-three. There are numerous descendants of his name still living in that section of Michigan and Illinois.
Simeon Odell married for his first wife Elizabeth Platt, who was born in New Jersey, and who died at the age of fifty-six years. Her father removed from New Jersey to New York, thence to Ohio, and was an early settler in the vicinity of North Fairfield. Mrs. Simeon Odell reared nine children, named Mariette, Milan, Benjamin, Emily, Pauline, Aminta, Elizabeth, Lucy, and Winfield.
Mrs. Bullock was reared in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Nicholas Weaver in Cass County, received her education from the local schools, and at the age of fifteen began teaching. She taught and attended school alternately for three years, and in 1878 graduated from the Elkhart High School. In August, 1879, she married Edward M. Bullock, who was born in Coldwater, Michigan. To this marriage were born four children: Merrill, Pearle, Babe and Clarence. These four children were all taken ill with diphtheria in the fall of 1899, and all died inside of ten days, leaving the home empty. Afterward two sons, Marion and Otis, were born; Marion
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is now a draftsman for the Commonwealth Edison Company, Chi- cago, and Otis is a student at Cornell University.
ABRAIIAN E. WEAVER. As the supervising editor of the present History of Elkhart County, the publishers feel it their duty to present to the readers a brief sketch of the life of Mr. Weaver, who for so many years has been closely identified with the educa- tional welfare of the county.
He was born in Olive Township of Elkhart County April 1, 1862, and his parents Henry M. and Anna Weaver, who were of Pennsylvania German descent, came to Elkhart County about 1850, and settled when the country was still new although the pioneers had been at work on the prairies and in the woodlands for about twenty years.
Professor Weaver secured his early training in the rural schools near his father's farm, and he also share in the duties of the home place. In 1888 he graduated Bachelor of Science from what is now Valparaiso University, and he afterwards completed the classical course and received the degree A. B. at the Indiana State Univer- sity of Bloomington.
He has found in educational work the opportunities he desires for effective service in the world. He taught in rural schools until 1890, then for four years was principal of a ward school in Elkhart City, was principal of the Elkhart Normal School three years, and for two years taught in the Bristol schools, having charge of the schools the second year.
In June, 1907, he was called to his present office as county superintendent of schools for Elkhart County and has been con- tinuously in that position down to the present time. The nine years since he took charge of the office a great deal has been accomplished in the way of improvements and progress in local educational mat- ters, but for this the reader is referred to other pages of the publi- cation.
For the past four years Mr. Weaver has been head of the local Chautauqua, and is making that institution a medium for culture and enlightenment in the community. Mr. Weaver has been a life- long democrat, and has been affiliated with the Knights of Pythias Lodge at Goshen since 1907. In 1884 he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church, and has always been a faithful and consistent member. He is now teacher of the Men's Bible Class and has filled that post for the past four years.
On May 2, 1889, in Baugo Township of Elkhart County Mr. Weaver married Cora R. Moyer, daughter of Daniel A. and Louisa Navarre, who died in 1893.
a. E. Weaver.
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