USA > Indiana > Newton County > A standard history of Jasper and Newton counties, Indiana : an authentic narrative of the past, with an extended survey of modern developments in the progress of town and country, Volume II > Part 17
USA > Indiana > Jasper County > A standard history of Jasper and Newton counties, Indiana : an authentic narrative of the past, with an extended survey of modern developments in the progress of town and country, Volume II > Part 17
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42
EMIL BESSER, M. D. In the medical profession the achieving of success worthy of the name can come only to the man who has not only prepared himself most fully in a technical way but who
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also turns his attention to this exacting and responsible vocation with a high sense of personal stewardship, with an earnest desire to be of service to his fellow men and with an animating sympathy that transcends mere emotion to become a positive force of help- fulness. Doctor Besser has won such success and in the course of his long and effective service as a physician and surgeon he has held closely to the highest ethics of his profession and been appre- ciative of its most noble and worthy traditions, the while he has spared neither time nor effort in keeping himself at all times abreast of the advances made in medical and surgical science. He is en- gaged in the general practice of his profession at Remington, Jas- per County, and is looked upon as guide, counselor and friend in many representative family homes within his sphere of zealous and self-abnegating labor. Thus there is all of consistency in designat- ing him as one of the leading members of his profession in this sec- tion of the Hoosier State, where he is held in unqualified popular confidence and esteem and where the unswerving loyalty of his friends is on a parity with that which he himself accords. The doc- tor is a liberal and public-spirited citizen and his success in temporal affairs has been such that he has been able to wield much influence in business connections aside from the work of his profession, the while he has shown loyal interest in all things touching the com- munal welfare. .
Doctor Besser claims the Hawkeye State as the place of his nativity and is a scion of one of its sterling pioneer families. He was born at Harper, Keokuk County, Iowa, on the 11th of April, 1869, and is the only son and eldest child in a family of four chil- dren; the second in order of birth was Matilda, who is the wife of Harry D. Funk, a prosperous manufacturer at Chicago Heights, a virtual suburb of the great western metropolis, the City of Chicago; Henrietta is the wife of Joseph Clarahan, a successful agriculturist of Keokuk County, Iowa, where they maintain their home in the Village of Harper; and May remains at the parental home, in the same village. Doctor Besser is a son of John P. and Emelia ( Krach) Besser, the former of whom was born in Parel, Prussia, and the latter in the Province of Mecklenburg of the great German Empire. John P. Besser was a child at the time of his parents' immigration to America, and the family home was established in Iowa in the early pioneer period of the history of that commonwealth. There he received good educational advantages, for Iowa has from an early day to the present maintained specially high status in the domain of education, and he has long held prestige as one of the able and in- fluential exponents of agricultural industry in the state to whose material and civic development and progress he has contributed his quota. He is now the owner of a fine landed estate of 320 acres and is one of the substantial and highly honored citizens of Keokuk County. He is a stalwart and effective advocate of the principles of the democratic party and has been influential in public affairs
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of a local order, as indicated by the fact that he formerly licld the office of sheriff of Keokuk County, an incumbency which he re- tained eight years. Ile is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity and both he and his wife hold membership in the Lutheran Church, Mrs. Besser having been an infant at the time of her parents' immi- gration from Germany to the United States.
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Like many another who has achieved precedence in the medical profession, Doctor Besser found his childhood and youth com- passed by the benignant influences of the farm, and he early began to accord effective assistance in the work and management of the old homestead place, the while he fully availed himself of the ad- vantages afforded in the local schools. His ambition first led him to prepare for the veterinary profession, and in 1887 he was grad- uated in the Iowa State Veterinary College, with the degree of Doctor of Veterinary Surgery. For eight years thereafter he was engaged in active and successful practice as a skilled veterinarian, with residence and professional headquarters in his native Town of Harper. In the meanwhile the doctor had manifested his versatility of talent by identifying himself successfully with business enter- prise, as he was for three years actively identified with the cloth- ing business at Ilarper, and after his retirement from this line of mercantile enterprise he was for two years engaged in the dry-goods business in the same village. The very nature of the scientific and practical work which fell to his portion as a representative of the veterinary profession had a tendency to quicken his appreciation of the greater opportunities offered in the more exacting and re- sponsible profession of medicine and surgery, and he finally deter- mined to prepare himself for the higher profession in which he has since attained to marked success and prestige. In 1896 he en- tered the medical department of the University of Iowa, at Iowa City, where he continued his studies two years. He was then matriculated in the Chicago Medical College, in which representa- tive institution of the western metropolis he was graduated as a member of the class of 1899 and with the well earned degree of Doctor of Medicine. At this juncture it may consistently be noted that each successive year the doctor avails himself of effective post- graduate study and work in Chicago, with a view to keeping himself in close touch with the advances made in his profession, besides which he has recourse to the best standard and periodical litera- ture of his profession, with a private technical library that is espe- cially select and comprehensive.
On the 14th of February, 1899, shortly after his graduation in the medical college, Doctor Besser made his appearance in Rem- ington, Indiana, a total stranger and with his available capitalistic resources represented in the sum of about $25. With characteristic zeal and self-reliance he initiated the practice of his profession, and his ability and sterling character soon enabled him to develop. a substantial practice, so that his novitiate was of brief duration. He
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has developed a very extensive general practice and his unqualified siteeess offers the best voucher for his ability, close application and personal popularity. The prestige that is his is indicated by the fact that his practice is not confined to Jasper County but extends also into Benton, White and Newton counties. His medical library comprises more than 200 volumes, and his office equipment inchides the best of modern laboratory facilities, including the X-ray machine. He is an influential and valued member of the Jasper and Newton County Medical Society, of which he has served as president, and also maintains active affiliation with the Indiana State Medical Society and the American Medical Association.
The business acumen of Doctor Besser has not been denied fruit- ful exemplification during the period of his residence in Jasper County, and he has entered most fully into the varied phases of com- munity life, with an influence that has been in all respects benignant. He has made judicious investment in farm land in Jasper County and also in the State of South Dakota, and the aggregate area of his landed estate at the present time is 1,074 acres, besides which he is the owner of valuable realty in his home village of Remington and at Rensselaer, the county seat. He is a stockholder in the State Bank of Remington and owns one-half of the stock of the Remington Telephone Company, of which he is president. This company has a list of 525 subseribers and gives to them the best of modern telephone service. In this field of enterprise the doctor has extended his activities still further, for he is the owner of the Rey- nolds Telephone Company, of Reynolds, White County, which effectively gives service to 200 subscribers.
As a citizen Doctor Besser is most liberal and progressive and though he has had no desire for public office he is found aligned as a staunch supporter of the cause of the republican party. He is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, in which last mentioned organization he is affiliated with the lodge in the City of Lafayette.
BARNETT IIAWKINS. Among the early families that settled in Newton County, Indiana, that are still well and worthily repre- sented here, were those bearing the distinctive English names of Hawkins and Jones. The former, for generations, had lived in New York, and the latter in Ohio. Both came to Indiana as home- seekers, industrious, upright, Christian people, and were, with others, founders and promoters of those eivilizing agencies that are yet reminders of the older generation, churches, schools and tem- perance. The late Barnett Hawkins for many years was a man of high standing at Kentland, where his death occurred July 9, 1903.
Barnett Hawkins was born at Poughkeepsie, New York, Decem- ber 9, 1834. ITis parents were Edgar and Lydia (Ward) Hawkins, the latter belonging to an old Quaker family that still, in many sec-
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tions, maintains the simplicity of the old faith. Of the six children born to this marriage, which took place in New York, two survive, George and Frank Hawkins. When the family began migrating, it settled first at Michigan City, Indiana. From there removal was made to Laporte, and in 1850 Edgar Hawkins settled on farm land near Brook. He acquired three separate tracts of eighty acres each, a part of which was government land. He owned also a mill at Brook, and his death was caused through an accident happen- ing in this mill. For a number of years he served in the office of justice of the peace. Both he and wife were active members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, she uniting with the same at the time of her marriage.
Barnett Hawkins had only those educational advantages that casual attendance in the old log schoolhouse near his father's farm could give, in his boyhood and early youth, but he made such good use of his opportunities that he was able to teach school and thereby provide means for attending college at Greencastle. Ile learned the carpenter trade and followed the same as a vocation during the greater part of his subsequent life. He became well known over the county, coming to Kentland in 1865. He was a hard working, industrious man and skilled in his trade. He was a conscientious citizen of Newton County but seldom was willing to accept public responsibilities, serving. however, several terins as county surveyor.
On April 25, 1857, Mr. Hawkins was mited in marriage with Miss Anna V. Jones, a daughter of Cornelia and Mathilda (Minchell) Jones. The parents of Mrs. Hawkins came to Indiana from Ohio in 1860 and settled near Brook where they remained during the rest of their lives. Of their cleven children seven are living. Mr. Jones was a farmer and stockraiser. In early life a whig, he later became a republican.
Six children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins : Florence N., born January 25, 1858, died October 29, 1860; Homer E., born Sep- tember 10, 1861 ; Frederick G., born January 10, 1866, died June 18, 1870; Arthur E., born September 13, 1868; Edgar C., born July 25, 1870; and Clyde B., born July 24, 1876. Mr. Hawkins lived to see , many changes in Newton County and his influence was ever bene- ficial.
ANDREW HALL. As a pioneer citizen of Newton County, the late Andrew Hall is deserving of special mention in this historical and biographical work, if for no other reason. He was born on a farm near Berlin, Ohio, on May 14, 1831, and was a son of Edward and Sarah (McClure) Hall, both coming from families of English ancestry. He was one of their eleven children, of whom three are yet living, and the parents spent their lives in the State of Ohio.
Andrew Hall began his independent career at the early age of sixteen years. Up to that time he had received such educational advantages as the very primitive schools of the day afforded, and
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when he launched out on his own responsibility he was not pre- pared for anything but manual labor. However, he secured work in a printing office and there learned the printer's trade, at which he worked for some years. In 1866 he came to Newton County and settled on a farm near Goodland, spending four years there in that work, when he was elected to the office of clerk of Newton County, as the candidate of the republican party. He served one full term in the office and a part of another, when he resigned from the office and engaged once more in farming. He prospered in his farming career, and the fine farin of 100 acres he came to possess is still in the family ownership.
On May 23, 1865, Mr. Hall married Miss Emily Allen, the daughter of Jeremiah and Sarah (Wilson) Allen, people of Penn- sylvania birth, who later settled in Ohio and there spent the remainder of their lives. Four children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Hall. Margaret, the first born, is still at home. Winogene is the wife of Dr. F. W. Heatlic. Charles H. is also living at home, and Raymond L. is in Chicago.
Mr. Ilall was a man of very quiet instincts. He loved his home and the home life, and found no pleasure in the good-fellowship arising from membership in fraternal and other societies, which is so important a feature in the life of the average man. Good citizen- ship was a religion to him, and few men have lived more creditably in their home communities than did he. His widow survives hin.
ยท JAMES W. DODSON. Sixty-five years ago saw the advent of the pioncer citizen, James W. Dodson, late of Kentland, into Newton County, Indiana. He was of Kentucky birth and parentage, the son of an old and honorable family in that state, and he was still a very young man when he left the Blue Grass region for Ohio and later penetrated the then wilderness of Central Illinois. From Bloomington, in 1850, he came to Kentland, and here he spent the remainder of his life. Prosperity followed him all his days, and much of credit is due to him for his share in the work of develop- ing Newton County. When he died he left some property, an honored name and a family that honors itself in the respect and homage it has paid to him.
James W. Dodson was born in Kentucky, August 31, 1808, and he died on May 19, 1863, in Kentland, then known as Kent Station, Newton County, Indiana. He was twice married. His first wife was Mary Ann Reynolds, born March 18. 1810, and she died April 22, 1839, leaving two children. Mary Ann, died April 11, 1839, and William R. died March 27, 1903. On February 16, 1841, Mr. Dodson married Rebecca Sailor, who was born September 30, 1822, and she died on December 19, 1909. Seven children were born of this second union. They are mentioned as follows: John S., born July 7, 1842, and died June 17, 1844; Jesse, born April 18, 1841, and died January 16, 1910; Mary Jane, born March 7, 1846, and
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DODSON FAMILY HOME From 1862 to 1886
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died June 14, 1899. She married John Strohm, who died on Octo- ber 17, 1872, and they had one son, Harry A. Strohm, now living in Evanston, Illinois. Ruth E. was the fourth child in this family of seven. She was born August 23, 1847, and died October 24th of that year. Lewis S., born March 30, 1849; Squire M., born July 26, 1851, died May 15, 1915; Jeremiah, the youngest, was born on June 5, 1854. Of the three last named, further mention will be made in later paragraphs.
When James W. Dodson left his native state, Kentucky, he came to Ohio, settling first in the vicinity of Degraf. In 1847 he came with his little family to Bloomington, Illinois, and remained there, variously occupied, until 1850, which year marked his arrival in Newton County. He secured a forty acre tract of land about five miles northwest of the present site of Kentland, and there he lived for some years. He was a man of great mechanical skill, and besides being a successful farmer, he was a capable shoemaker, in dull sea- sons plying his trade with needle and awl, and finding plenty of occupation for the long winter months when farming was at a standstill. He was also a manufacturer of fireworks and he is credited with having made the fireworks that were used at Bloom- ington during the long remembered Zachary Taylor presidential can- that display being the first of its kind to be seen in Bloom- ington. It was the custom in those days for the shoemaker to visit the homes where his services were required, and he spent many pleasant days as the guest of various families in the county while busily engaged in making shoes for both great and small. He was a man of many pleasing qualities, and it is said that he was so pleas- ant a companion that he was often called upon to make unnecessary pairs of shoes, so loth were his employers to see the end of his stay. A great lover of music, he was a very creditable flutist, and wher- ever he went he was pressed into service as an entertainer. He also was the possessor of a very pleasing voice, and it was no uncommon thing for him to sit up until the small hours of the morning, singing and playing with friends. Among the most cherished possessions of his sons is a singing book, published in 1813, and much used by their father during his lifetime.
Mr. Dodson is a pioneer in the truest sense of the word, and his life stood for a quality of citizenship that is the very foundation of civic uprightness and solidity. He was a whig in early life, later a republican, and while he never sought office or cared for public life, he was deeply interested in public affairs and lent his influence to every movement inaugurated for the advancement and betterment of his community. He was a lifelong member of the Baptist Church. He was only fifty-three years old when he died, and it is now more than fifty years since he passed on, but his influence still lives in Newton County.
Lewis Dodson, son of James and Rebecca (Sailor) Dodson, was born near Bloomington, Illinois, and he came to Newton County Vol. II-10
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as a small child with his parents. Here he and his brothers, Squire M. and Jeremiah V., grew to man's estate. They went to school in the old log cabin school houses of that period, and they experienced all the hardships and joys incident to pioneer life. For twenty- eight years they were associated in a business partnership in Kent- land, but retired in October, 1910, after a very successful career as hardware dealers. They have reflected the high standards that dominated the life of their father in all their enterprises, and have won high places in the esteem and regard of their associates and fellow citizens, Like their father, they have never been seekers for political honors, but have been leaders in the best public activities of their city.
PERRY M. D. WASHBURN. A publication of this order exercises its supreme and most consistent function when it enters memorial tribute to so sterling a pioneer and honored a citizen as the late Perry M. D. Washburn, who played a benignant part in the civic and industrial development and progress of Newton County and who passed virtually his entire life within the gracious borders of the fine old Hoosier State. He was numbered among the earliest settlers in the vicinity of Kentland, and his wife was one of definite consecration to worthy industry and noble aims and ideals. He was for many years numbered among the sturdy yeomen of this favored section of the state and he made his farm one of the model places of Benton County. Though an earnest and successful ex- ponent of the basic industry of agriculture, Mr. Washburn did not hedge his life about with mere personal advancement but was loyal and faithful in his civic attitude and wielded benignant influence in the community life. He attained to the venerable age of eighty- one years and was summoned to eternal rest on the 9th of May, 1911, secure in the high esteem of all who knew him.
A scion of one of the honored pioneer families of the Buckeye State, Mr. Washburn was born in Athens County, Ohio, on the 29th of October, 1830, one of the eight children born to Eleazer and Sophia (McAfee) Washburn. Eleazer Washburn was born in Massachusetts and was a representative of one of the fine old colo- nial families of New England. As a young man he made his way into Ontario, Canada, where his marriage was solemnized, and with his young wife he finally removed to Ohio, in which state he re- mained until 1834, when he removed with his family to Indiana and became a pioneer farmer near Noblesville, Hamilton County, where he continued to reside for many years, though the closing period of his life was passed in the State of Texas. He was a man of sterling character and both he and his wife were scions of staunch Scottish stock, exemplifying in their personalities the worthy attri- butes that have made the Scotch type significant in sturdy integrity and unfulness in all of the relations of life.
Perry M. D. Washburn was about four years old at the time
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mrs Mary & Washburn
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of the family removal from Ohio to Indiana, and he was reared to maturity on the pioneer farm in Hamilton County, where his early educational advantages were those afforded in the primitive log- cabin schoolhouse. His alert and vigorous mind caused him to profit fully from the instruction thus gained and also to widen his intel- lectual horizon in later years of active association with the practical duties and responsibilities of life. He continued to assist in the work and management of the home farm until he had attained to his legal majority, and he then entered the employ of A. D. Graf of Ohio who was at that time engaged in railroad construction work between Indianapolis and the Wabash River. Still later he was similarly associated with the firm of Boody, Ross & Company, of New York, the builders of the Wabash Valley Railroad.
In 1855 Mr. Washburn married, and in the following year he and his young wife settled in Marshall County, where he purchased land and engaged in farming. Four years later, in 1860, Mr. Washburn disposed of his farm of forty acres and purchased a farm in Pulaski County, on the Tippecanoe River and seven miles north of Winimac. In 1864 he removed with his family to Newton County and for about twelve years thereafter he had the management of a large stock farm owned by Alexander J. Kent, the honored pioneer who was the foun- der of the present thriving Town of Kentland. At the time of his removal to Newton County Mr. Washburn had met with adversity that left the family practically destitute, his farm crops for the year having been destroyed by a severe frost. During the ensuing winter he provided for his family by working as a section hand on the rail- road, and in the spring he assumed his place as a valued employe of Mr. Kent, as previously mentioned. After the lapse of twelve years he purchased a farm of 160 acres, in Richland Township, Benton County, but this property he sold three years later, only to expand his field of operations as an agriculturist and stock-grower, for, in 1880, he purchased 320 acres of land in the same township, two miles north of the Village of Earl Park. He made this one of the splen- did landed estates of this part of Indiana and on this fine homestead he continued to reside until his death. From an appreciate estimate that appeared in a Kentland paper at the time of the death of Mr. Washburn are taken, with minor changes, the following quotations, which are well worthy of preservation in this more enduring form : . "Mr. Washburn was one of the 'grand old men' of this commun- ity. His life, with the labors and successes achieved during its time, was a model that all men might do well to imitate. He was ever honest and honorable in all his dealings with his fellow men, and, though a shrewd business man, he would rather give than take any little difference that might occur in the completion of any trade tran- saction. He was a man of exemplary habits; was ever kind, chari- table and considerate and a solicitous and devoted husband and father. He was a progressive and successful farmer, and as a result of his labors in and accumulations from that vocation he left a goodly
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inheritance for each of his large family of worthy and deserving chil- dren. The funeral of this honored pioncer citizen was held from the family home, the services being conducted by Rev. J. L. Brady, of Rensselaer, who was assisted by Rev. J. Bennett, of Kentland, and Rev. McEwan, of Earl Park, the remains being laid to rest in Fair- lawn Cemetery. The funeral was one of the most largely attended of all that have been held in the community. Mr. Washburn was a great lover of his home and family. A citizen of irreproachable character, he was a valuable man in his community and his passing . was a genuine loss."
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