A twentieth century history of Marshall County, Indiana, Volume II, Part 36

Author: McDonald, Daniel, 1833-1916
Publication date: 1908
Publisher: Chicago : Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 388


USA > Indiana > Marshall County > A twentieth century history of Marshall County, Indiana, Volume II > Part 36


Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).


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


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HISTORY OF MARSHALL COUNTY.


father's death he moved to Morrow county, Ohio, and in 1863 he came with his oldest brother, Isaac, to Panama, Marshall county, Indiana, and engaged in the milling business. At one time he was the proprietor of three saw mills, and he continued in that business with his brother until 1879, when the latter sold his interest to Dwight L. Dickinson, who re- mained in partnership with Mr. Lee, of this review, until 1892. During a few years thereafter Mr. Lee lived retired, and again entering business activities he was identified for four years with the carriage business in Bourbon. He subsequently turned his attention to the sale of agricultural implements in partnership with John Plant, and this line of trade has ever since claimed his time and attention.


In 1855 Mr. Lee was united in marriage to Ruth Platt, whose death occurred in 1893, and in the following year he married Alice Beatty. To the first union were born two daughters, Viola, now Mrs. Listenfelt, and Rosamond, Mrs. Fouts. Mr. Lee is a Democrat in his political affilia- tions, and fraternally is a member of the Masonic order, joining the Blue Lodge in Bourbon in 1869, and he is a member of the Chapter and Commandery in Plymouth and the Consistory in Ft. Wayne. Marshall county numbers Thomas B. Lee among her earliest and most honored pioneers. He established his home within her borders in a very early day, when the county was but thinly settled, and in those early days the residents of Panama secured their supplies from Bourbon, six miles dis- tant, ox teams being used for the purpose, and it often took the greater part of two days to make the return trip. Mr. Lee is thus familiar with the early days of Marshall county, and he has inscribed his name on the pages of its business history.


BRODIE W. PARKS, M. D. From the formative period in the history of northern Indiana the Parks family have been prominently associated with its business, professional and political life. James Parks, the grand- father of Brodie, is recorded as the first white settler in Bourbon town- ship, whence he came from Bourbon county, Kentucky, and in memory of his old home county there he bestowed the name of Bourbon upon his township and town here. Prior to his removal from Kentucky, a son, Dr. John F. Parks, was born in Bourbon county, and he married Malinda Hall, they becoming the parents of Brodie W. Parks November 27, 1851, in Bourbon, Indiana.


Brodie W. Parks, physician and banker, received his literary training in the Bourbon public schools and the University of Michigan, and his medical training in Rush Medical College of Chicago, wherein he gradu- ated in 1876. He thereafter practiced medicine and sold drugs and hardware, and finally, in 1907, with others he organized the Bourbon Banking Company, a state bank, and was elected the president of the institution. Mr. Parks was born and has always lived in or near Bour- bon, has risen step by step to a place of influence and honor among public- spirited and high-minded men, and as a professional and business man fills an important position in the business life of the city and community. He is independent in politics, and although a member of no particular religious denomination he favors the Christian church and is a believer in the Bible and its teachings.


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He married, December 25, 1876, in Marshall county, Mary Alice, the daughter of David L. Gibson, and their children are: Lizzie G., Nellie M., Mary E., John J., Howard D. and Carlanthia A., all of whom have attained to mature years with the exception of the youngest, who is but thirteen. During his life Mr. Parks has spent considerable time in travel, spending two years on the Pacific coast when young, and with the exception of that of South Dakota he has at different times visited every western state of the Union.


LUTHER JOHNSON, M. D. Throughout the entire period of his pro- fessional career Dr. Luther Johnson has been numbered among the medical practitioners of Bourbon, coming to this city in the year following his attendance at Rush Medical College, in June, 1867, and his long identification with this place and his prominence here entitles him to more than a passing notice in a work of this character, devoted as it is to the portrayal of the lives of the representative men of Marshall county. He was born in Findlay, Ohio, April 24, 1836, a son of Miller and Hanna (Caton) Johnson, natives respectively of West Virginia and Ohio. During his early manhood the father became a resident of Ohio, locating near Columbus, where he followed agricultural pursuits for a time. Re- moving in 1853 to Marshall county, he established his home on a farm in Walnut township, near Bethel, where he followed the tilling of the soil during the remainder of his active and useful life, dying at the age of seventy-eight years in 1884. His wife survived him until 1889, dying also at the age of seventy-eight years. Mr. Johnson was of the Quaker faith and was of English descent.


In the public schools of Marshall county Dr. Luther Johnson received his literary training, and on leaving the school room as a student he returned as a teacher, following the profession for a number of years. In 1861 he offered his services to his country's cause as a soldier in Company D, Ninth Indiana Infantry, but on account of a wound which he received at the battle of Shiloh he was discharged on a surgeon's certificate for disability in June, 1862. Returning to his home, Dr. Johnson became actively interested in the political affairs of the com- munity, and made the race for the office of sheriff, but was unsuccessful at the polls. It was then that he determined upon the practice of medi- cine as his life occupation, and for four years he was a student of medi- cine, returning in 1866 from Rush Medical College. As before stated, he came to Bourbon in June of the following year, and his name has since been a household word in the homes of this community, and his long professional career has been attended with marked success. For forty years he has been a member of the Masonic order, affiliating with Bour- bon Lodge No. 227, in which he has held all of the offices several times, and he is also a member of the Knights of Pythias, the Independent Order of Red Men and the Miles H. Tibbetts G. A. R. Post No. 260, at Plymouth.


Dr. Johnson married, in 1867, Rhoda A. Borton, a daughter of Samuel Borton, of Stark county, Ohio. Their three children are Charley M., Arthur L. and Willa W.


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HISTORY OF MARSHALL COUNTY.


F. E. RADCLIFFE, M. D. Occupying a high place in the medical fraternity of Marshall county, Dr. F. E. Radcliffe has been successfully engaged in practice in Bourbon since 1893. His birth occurred in Whit- ley county, Indiana, July 8, 1872, his parents being E. M. and Mary (Norris) Radcliffe, natives respectively of southwestern Ohio and In- diana. In the early '50s the father came to Indiana and located at Pierceton, where he has ever since maintained his residence and is promi- nently identified with its business interests. He is a Republican politically, and is a member of the Baptist church.


After completing his literary education in the schools of Kosciusko county, F. E. Radcliffe began the study of medicine in the Purdue Med- ical School, then the medical department of Butler University, in which he graduated in 1898. He then entered the ranks of the medical prac- titioners at Burket, being at that time twenty-one years of age and the youngest physician in the state. After a residence there of five years he came to Bourbon, where he has been in continuous practice since 1893. He has gone steadily forward in the profession, studying, working and striving to keep abreast of modern thought and the discoveries in med- ical science, and he caters to a general practice.


Dr. Radcliffe married, in 1899, Miss Lela, a daughter of George Knox, one of the prominent early residents of Kosciusko county, In- diana, and a veteran of the Civil war. The doctor is a member of the State and American Medical Associations, and has fraternal relations with the Masonic Lodge No. 229, of Bourbon. His father is a Knights Templar Mason, and all of the doctor's male relatives are members of that helpful and beneficent order.


A. C. MATCHETTE, M. D. Many years of self-denying labor in the service of suffering humanity is the summing-up of the life of A. C. Matchette, one of the most honored citizens and venerable physicians of Bourbon. He is a representative of an old Virginia family of French extraction, and in the Old Dominion state his parents, William J. and Eliza (Wasson) Matchette, had their nativity. The father came to In- diana in the early year of 1829 and established his home in Wayne county, where he was a leading member of the medical profession for several years, and previous to his removal he had practiced medicine in his native state of Virginia. In 1842 he removed from Wayne county to Goshen, where he had large real estate interests, and he remained in that city until his life's labors were ended in death, in 1861, aged sixty-six years. He was a leading Abolitionist in the early days, in fact the honor of being its first advocate in Indiana belongs to him. He was also very enthusiastic in the cause of temperance, and was honored and revered wherever known. His wife died during the infancy of their son A. C.


A. C. Matchette was born in Wayne county, Indiana, August 24, 1837, but received his literary educational training in the public schools of Goshen. Inheriting a love for the medical profession from his father, he became a student in the Northwestern University, from which he received his diploma in 1862, and during the three following years he practiced his chosen profession in Chicago. In the meantime he had enlisted for service in the Civil war, entering the Twenty-ninth Indiana


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Infantry, and his military service, which covered a period of three years, was wholly connected with the medical department, and a part of his army career was also with the navy. He took part in several memorable engagements, including Arkansas Post and many others in eastern and western Tennessee, and he also participated in the siege of Corinth. At the close of his military career in 1865 Dr. Matchette came to Bourbon to join his brother, W. C. Matchette, who had been a medical practi- tioner here for some time, and thus the doctor is numbered among the city's pioneer physicians. The county at that time was an almost un- broken wilderness, with no roads or drainage, and the early settlers were often obliged to make their journeys on foot, it requiring from two to five days to cover fifteen miles. On account of the lack of drainage there was much malaria here, and the doctor has often been called upon to prescribe to from seventy-five to one hundred and twenty patients in one day. One can hardly realize what it meant to be a pioneer physician, riding here and there, far and near, in all kinds of weather over the little pathways that served the pioneers as highways, courageously bear- ing cheer and comfort to the distant patient. In those early days the county was richly wooded, and walnut trees which would now sell for a thousand dollars were cut down and burned in order to clear the land. The site of Dr. Matchette's drug store, now in the business center of Bourbon, was at the time of his arrival here a pond, and from the door of the log cabin drug store which stood upon its edge he has often shot ducks. Bourbon was quite a lumber center in those days, and many saw mills were located within its borders and in the surrounding country.


In 1866 Dr. Matchette was united in marriage to Marie Louise Curran, a daughter of Rev. Dr. Curran, a Presbyterian divine of Hunt- ington, Indiana. Their only son, Richard, is now the manager of his father's drug business. Dr. Matchette also had one brother and six sisters, but only one of the number, Benjamania, is now living, she being the widow of the late Dr. France, an old and prominent medical prac- titioner of Bourbon. The doctor is independent in his political affilia- tions, although in the early days he was a firm Abolitionist and cast his first vote for Lincoln. He has never cared for the honors of public office, and at one time was nominated on the Greenback ticket for congress, but declined to accept the honor. He is a member of the Masonic order, the Red Men and the Knights of Pythias, and to him belongs the dis- tinction of being a charter member of Masonic Lodge No. 227, of Bour- bon. The doctor has been very successful in the line of his profession, and especially so in the treatment of the liquor and drug habit, in which he has attained national fame owing to a formula which he invented and which has been adopted by several successful institutions, they dis- carding their own methods and adopting his. The record of a noble life is a man's best monument, and no words of eulogy can add luster to the name of Dr. A. C. Matchette.


S. E. HARRIS. Among those whose business activity has contributed to the welfare and prosperity of the city of Bourbon is S. E. Harris, who for many years has been a prominent figure in journalistic circles. As the editor of the Bourbon News he is well known to the general public


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HISTORY OF MARSHALL COUNTY.


of this section of Indiana. Throughout nearly his entire business career he has been connected with journalistic work, entering the field in 1880, in Ellettsville, when he established the Ellettsville News and continued. as its editor for four years. During the following four years he was the editor and proprietor of the Orleans Examiner in Orange county, Indiana, and, returning thence to Ellettsville, he was engaged in news- paper work in that city for two years. During several years thereafter he was a resident of Bloomington, this state, and in 1896 he came to Bourbon and purchased the Bourbon News, having ever since continued the publication of that sheet with the exception of one year. At that time he sold the paper, but was induced by the general public at the close of one year to resume its editorship. During his connection with this journal he has increased its subscription list from four hundred to over two thousand. His power as an editor is widely acknowledged among contemporaneous journalists.


Mr. Harris is a native son of Indiana, born in Monroe county on the 23d of September, 1850. His father, James Harris, was a well known physician there for many years, but was born in Kentucky. Dur- ing his boyhood days he came with his parents to Monroe county, and for fifty years he followed the practice of medicine there, becoming one of its most prominent citizens and leading physicians. His death occurred in 1902, when he had reached the eighty-fourth milestone on the journey of life. His wife, Sarah A. Fletcher, was a native of Pennsylvania, and died in 1901. They gave to their son, S. E. Harris, a common school education, and after its completion he engaged in the drug business with his father, who conducted a drug store in connection with his medical practice. The son later turned his attention to agricultural pursuits, and in 1880, as before stated, entered the journalistic field.


Mr. Harris married, in 1870, Laura B. Munson, a daughter of Will- iam B. Munson, of Monroe county, Indiana, and they have four children : Gerard B., a graduated optician, and who is associated with his father in business; C. M., a practicing physician of Bourbon ; Edna M., now Mrs. Yenaway, of Casey, Illinois; and Eloise, at home. Mr. Harris is a member of the Methodist church. Bourbon numbers him among her most public-spirited citizens, and among the people with whom he is laboring he is popular and highly esteemed.


SINCLAIR PARKS. The late Sinclair Parks, who died February 5, 1892, after a brief illness, was the oldest son of the pioneer James O. Parks, whose family were the first settlers of Bourbon township and gave the township its name. The history of this pioneer family will be found on other pages of this work.


It was one of the prominent and very active citizens of Bourbon township whom death took away in the person of Sinclair Parks. Born here in Marshall county, November 9, 1837, a son of James O. and Susan (Dinwiddie) Parks, he passed from the schools of this county to Bryant's Commercial College in Indianapolis, and then studied law, grad- uating with his degree from the University of Michigan in 1865. He was a student at Ann Arbor during the progress of the war, and finally could endure no longer to remain engaged in the quiet vocations of peace, so


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he enlisted in 1864, in Company E, One Hundred and Thirty-eighth In- diana Infantry, as first sergeant. On being mustered out at the end of the war he returned to college and was at once graduated, having nearly completed his course before going off to the army. He began practicing in Plymouth and in Bourbon, at first with his father and brother, and on the retirement of his father he continued in partnership with the latter. He deserves a permanent place in the history of the bench and bar of Marshall county, for he was a well qualified lawyer, both in education and practice, and acquired a good clientele. He was long prominent in Republican politics in the county, having served as chairman of the county committee, but never sought office for himself. At his death he was owner of two farms in Bourbon township and one in Tippecanoe, the former being still in the possession of his widow.


Mr. Parks married, in October, 1865, Miss Ada M. Mowlan, daugh- ter of Charles and Charlotte (Rambo) Mowlan, the father a native of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and the mother of La Porte county, Indiana.


The Mowlan family belong among the older settlers of Marshall county, having located here in 1845. Mr. Mowlan is well remembered in Plymouth, having been a merchant here for years, and was also elder of the First Presbyterian church of this city. Of his seven children, two died in infancy, and all are now deceased except Alfred Mowlan and Mrs. Parks, who live together in Bourbon. Mrs. Parks was the mother of three children, but none of them are living. Claude Vernon lived to be eight years old, while Orrison Wilmot died when three monthis old, and Early died aged two years. Mrs. Parks is a member of the Presbyterian church, in which her late husband was an elder.


NOAH BERKEY. One of the prominent and honored early residents of Marshall county is Noah Berkey, who for many years has been ex- tensively engaged in the tilling of its soil. He was born twenty miles north of Toronto, Canada, January 26, 1837, a son of Isaac and Gertrude (Blough) Berkey, both of whom were born in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. After their marriage they went to Canada, where they farmed for ten years, and then returned to the states and took up their abode in Elkhart county, Indiana. This was in the year of 1840, and they entered land and became the owners of one hundred and ninety acres. On this estate they spent the remainder of their lives, the father dying in 1874, and the mother five years later, in 1879.


In the family of these honored Indiana pioneers were seven sons and four daughters, and as the family were in limited circumstances the children were obliged to begin the battle of life for themselves at an early age. The educational training of their son Noah was thus very meager in his early youth, and he worked on the farm until 1869. It was in that year that he came to Marshall county, and here he became identified with the saw-milling business in company with his brother James in Center township. This section of the state was at that time thickly covered with timber, and the saw mill was one of its most valu- able institutions, a boon to the early pioneers who had to clear their land and prepare their own building materials. Mr. Berkey continued in the business for three and a half years. He also purchased one hun-


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dred and fifty-five acres of land in section 14, which he cleared and im- proved and placed it under its present high state of cultivation. Here he has been engaged in general farming and stock-raising for many years, and for nine years he also represented his townsmen in the office of township assessor. He affiliates with the Democratic party.


Mr. Berkey married, in 1861, Eliza Anglemyers, who died in 1862, and in 1867 he married Elizabeth Whitehead. She died. on the 16th of November, 1885, leaving five children: Chauncey, an agriculturist of Bourbon township; William, who is with his father; Bessie, now Mrs. Hatfield ; and two deceased, a son aged twenty-one years, and a daughter aged nineteen. As a citizen Mr. Berkey is held in high esteem in his community, and Marshall county is proud to claim him among her hon- ored pioneers.


LUTHER BANKS, deceased, was born in Connorsville, Fayette county, Indiana, June 15, 1832, a son of Thomas and Jane ( Moffett) Banks, natives respectively of Kentucky and Tennessee and of English and Irish descent. During his young manhood Thomas Banks came to Indiana and located in Marion county, where he acquired possession of forty acres of land where Indianapolis now stands, receiving it in lieu of wages for a year's work. He sold that tract in 1836 and moved to Delaware county, where he resumed his agricultural labors on land he had there purchased, and also dealt quite largely in stock. In 1864 he came to Bourbon and purchased the Bates farm, continuing its cultivation and improvement until he put aside the active work of the farm and removed to the city. Both he and his wife spent the remainder of their lives there, both dying at the age of seventy-five years.


Luther Banks received his educational training in the schools of Delaware county and in the college at Newcastle, Henry county, and thus well equipped he entered the teacher's profession and taught for twelve years in Delaware county. It was in 1864 that he came to Marshall county, establishing his home one mile west of Bourbon, and in 1867 he purchased the farm of forty acres on which he ever afterward lived. When he obtained possession of this land it was in its virgin state and by his own efforts brought it to its present high state of development, and in addition he owned eighty acres west of the homestead, on which his son is residing. He made a specialty of the raising of Oxford Down sheep, in which he was very successful, and to him belonged the credit of having raised and shipped to market the first strawberries ever raised in this section. Marshall county was proud to claim Luther Banks among her honored pioneer residents and business men, and in addition to being one of her prominent agriculturists he also taught school for one year after coming here.


On the 18th of June, 1858, he was united in marriage to Miss Mary E. Sanders, of Delaware county, who died December 12, 1876, and on the IIth of July, 1878, he wedded Miss Maggie E. Senior. Their only son, Morris, now operates his father's farm in Bourbon township. Dur- ing the long period of over forty years Mr. Banks was a valued member of the Christian church, and during many years served as its elder. He died very suddenly, March 7. 1908. He was out to his barn looking after


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his stock, and was stricken in death from heart failure. His funeral sermon was preached by Rev. N. H. Sheppard, of South Bend, formerly of Plymouth, Indiana. He left a wife, one son, Morris; thirteen grand- children, one sister, Mrs. Jacob Sunderland, of Muncie, Indiana, and many friends who honored him for his integrity. He was an upright, honorable citizen, and all who knew him esteemed him for his many noble characteristics.


AARON ARMANTROUT. The name of Aaron Armantrout is closely associated with the early history of Marshall county, and he now sleeps beside the sturdy pioneers who helped to build an empire and whose memory will ever remain green among those who lived among them" and appreciated their efforts. He was born in Ohio on the 23d of January, 1835, a son of Valentine and Nancy ( Hoover ) Armantrout, and when a boy he moved with his family from Dayton to Peru, Indiana, where he attended school and later farmed. His father died during his youth, and on attaining to years of maturity he married, February 26, 1857, Lucinda Ptomey, and moved east of Peru to farm with his brother John. It was in 1864 that he came to Marshall county, purchasing. eighty acres of land one mile northeast of Bourbon, but after one year he sold that tract and in 1877 moved to the present homestead of one hundred and sixty acres, while later he became the owner of eighty acres three miles west. He made the most of the improvements on this valuable homestead, and he farmed there until his life's labors were ended in death, in 1893, September 5, having then reached the fifty- eighth milestone on life's journey. He was a member of the Methodist church.




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