USA > Indiana > Blackford County > Biographical memoirs of Blackford County, Ind. : to which is appended a comprehensive compendium of national biography embellished with portraits of many well known residents of Blackford County, Indiana > Part 69
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James H., already living here, and while on a visit to him her determination to remove here was made. It was like beginning life over again. With nothing in her posses- sion, she and her two boys had to make a living for themselves. Sherman secured work carrying water for the section hands on the railway, and not having a pair of shoes he went to John L. Weaver, of Dun- kirk, who sold him a pair of shoes on credit, which he paid for at the end of the season's work. From the time he was ten years old he worked on the farm, and as soon as he and his brother, David, were old enough they bought thirty acres of land two and a half miles south of Trenton, and here they from this time on made their home. About two years later the mother died, but she lived alone long enough to see her sons in a home of their own. After death David remained five years with Sherman, and since leaving Sherman has worked in a glass factory at Marion.
From the age of ten Sherman was the main support of the family. He worked the farm in summer time and attended school in winter up to the time he was fourteen, when he attended three months of the year, which was about all the education he re- ceived, except such as he acquired by pri- vate study and by coming in contact with the world. After purchasing the thirty acres of land, as above recorded, he and his brother cleared it of its timber as rapidly as they could, and by the time of their mother's death they had gotten it in shape so that all could be comfortable and happy and after her death Sherman purchased the heirs' in- terest in her half. Later they bought more land, Sherman buying the eighty he now lives on April 6, 1886. All but ten acres of this eighty was covered with timber, and
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there was no house upon it. He therefore erected a small upright house, into which he moved with his wife, whom he had mar- ried December 17, 1885. She was formerly Miss Emma Florence Anderson, a daugh- ter of Dr. James Anderson, the oldest physi- cian in the vicinity, he having practiced at Dunkirk thirty-five years and having begun as a pioneer. Dr. Anderson died at Dun- kirk December 25, 1894, at the age of sev- enty-two. Miss Anderson was born at Dunkirk, was educated there and taught school there for some years.
When our subject and his brother began on the land they last purchased, one hun- dred and twenty acres, they were about twenty-three hundred dollars in debt, but having good teams and outfits generally, they worked together five years, putting about one hundred acres under cultivation. While most of the valuable timber had been cut off before their purchase, yet there was considerable good elm still standing and they cut it into wood, hauled it to Mill Grove, there trading it for tile, which they laid be- fore the land was plowed. There were on the land many ponds, which, by the process of underdraining, were drained of their water and converted into dry and excellent farming land, in fact the best on the farm. An excellent outlet for their drains was effected by a company ditch which they them- selves made. Before they dissolved part- nership they were purchasing more land, and Sherman kept on buying, until now he owns three hundred and twenty acres, of which two hundred acres are in the home farm and two other tracts are near enough to be operated therefrom. He has inclosed about three hundred of his three hundred and twenty acres, and has it all tiled and in an excellent state of cultivation. Regularly
Mr. Ford grows about one hundred acres of corn and fifty acres of oats, and devotes the remainder of his farm to meadow and pasture. He keeps from twenty to fifty cattle and one hundred hogs, feeding them the corn he grows, instead of selling it off the farm in its raw state. He also keeps about one hundred head of sheep and as many horses as his farm needs.
The house in which he lives he erected in 1895 and it is a very neat and comfortable structure. Up to that time he had lived in the old two-room house. He also has erect- ed a large and convenient barn, and shows in every way that he believes in progressive agriculture. Politically Mr. Ford is inde- pendent in politics, especially in local and state affairs; but in national matters he is generally in harmony with the Democratic party. Mrs. Ford is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church. Mr. and Mrs. Ford have two children, Ruby Pearl and Lela Crystal, both bright young girls at home.
LOUIS GANNOM.
Louis Gannom (deceased), formerly one of the prominent citizens of Blackford coun- ty, was born in Montreal, Canada, Septem- ber 17, 1853, and dicd April 20, 1900. His parents, Leon and Celine Gannom, were both natives of France, but were married in Can- ada. Having the misfortune to lose his mother when he was four years old, he was reared by strangers on a farm, remaining with the same family until he attained his majority, when he removed to Indiana, be- cause his brother, Napoleon, had already settled in this state. Arriving here in 1879, he for a short time worked on a farm, and
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then in the same year purchased seventy acres of land, the present homestead, going in debt for the land. Upon this farm a small amount of clearing had been done and a log house had been erected, which log cabin re- mained the home of his family for eight years.
On February 24, 1880, lie was married to Martha R. France, a daughter of Daniel and Margaret Ann (Vincent) France, of Delaware county, Indiana, in which county, near Albany, she was born, educated and reared. Her father having died when she was three years old, her mother married Francis Marion Shrack, of Dunkirk, and is now his wife. Mr. Gannom gave his en- tire time and attention to the clearing and improvement of his farm, and was enabled to pay for it easier than would otherwise have been the case, because of his wife's bringing with her at the time of their mar- riage five hundred dollars, which she in- vested in the land. Placing nearly all of his farm in cultivation, he improved its condi- tion very materially by a complete system of underdraining, tile being used in this work. The house standing on it he erected and had the farm entirely paid for before his death. In addition to doing all this he pur- chased two other tracts of land, each con- taining forty acres, one in Blackford county and the other in Delaware county. One of these latter tracts he also cleared and tilea, so that it is evident he was one of the most industrious men of the community, perform- ing an immense amount of work. While these three farms are all in the gas belt, yet no well has as yet been sunk on them.
Mr. Gannom for about one year before his death had been in poor health, occasioned in part by his too industrious habits. Re- ligiously he belonged to the Catholic church,
retaining his membership in the Dunkirk church until his death. Politically he was a Democrat, but never took an active part in the party counsels. He and his wife were the parents of the following children : Mary M. and Sarah Celeste, twins, the former the wife of Jesse Evelsizor, of Jackson town- ship, and the latter the wife of Albert Brown, of the same township; Lorena Ethel, wife of Frederick Nichols, of Dunkirk; Tinus Rosalie, wife of Albert Smoot, of Dela- ware county; Ica Oscar, Walter C., Mar- garet Ann, Bessie Belle, Louis Edward and Joseph Raymond, the last six all living at home with their mother, who is highly re- spected by the entire community in which she lives.
JOHN S. SELLERS, M. D.
Prominent among the active practition- ers of the healing art in this section of the state is John S. Sellers, of Montpelier, who is associated with Dr. Charles B. Mulvey in a wide and successful practice. The family of Dr. Sellers is one that is related in various lines to many of the American representa- tive families, among others being that of ex- Governor Oliver P. Morton. His parents were Isaac and Emma (Troxell) Sellers, who were among the pioneers of Madison county, Indiana, where the Doctor was born on the 18th of November, 1845. His pater- nal ancestors were of Scotch-Irish stock, who settled in Pennsylvania, later removing to Kentucky, where Isaac was born in 1812. His wife, Emma, was the daughter of George and Elizabeth (Biggs) Troxell, by whom he had eleven children, of whom the Doctor is the sole survivor. The others were Sel- ma, who married Griffith Hinchman; Gran- ville, Monterville; Adelaide, who became
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John S Sellers
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Mrs. Calvin Cassell; Isaac T. Atty, de- ceased; James, Cassius M., Mary, Ira and Wallace. The mother of this family was born in Maryland of German parentage, her ancestors having coming from the father- land in an early day. She was reared in the family of ex-Governor Burbank and was married at Centerville, Wayne county.
When young Sellers was not yet eight- een, on the 10th of October, 1863, he en- listed in Company B, One Hundred and Thirtieth Indiana Volunteers, at Anderson, and was assigned to the Second Brigade, First Division, Twenty-third Army Corps, at Nashville. The regiment made for itself a brilliant history, participating in the great struggles of the Atlanta campaign, and being then sent after Hood, to Nashville, where the part it played was highly com- mended. After the utter rout of this gal- lant rebel commander, and the disappear- ance and almost annihilation of his army, the One Hundred and Thirtieth was sent, via Washington and the ocean, to the coast of North Carolina, where it marched over- land to join Sherman, who was coming in from the south. The memorable battle of Kingston was fought while thus en route through the state, and in this action young Sellers was wounded in the scalp, and though disabled from actual duty, remained with the command, which soon after made a juncture with Sherman's army at Golds- boro. After the final surrender of John- ston this army made the ever memorable march through Virginia to Washington, where the greatest military parade this country ever saw was enacted in the grand review. The regiment was kept in the field doing guard duty largely till the following December, when it was formally discharged from the service on Christmas day. John 33
S. having decided upon the following of a profession, chose that of medicine, though his ambition to prepare himself was not granted him for some time thereafter. He attended the high school at Anderson, fit- ting himself to teach, which he did for a few terms, finally taking up the study of his chosen profession as a student in the office of the highly esteemed Dr. N. L. Wickersham at Anderson, with whom he continued at various times for about five years. The regular professional training was completed in the Indianapolis Medical College, from which institution he was graduated in the class of 1887. He had, however, entered upon the practice some years before at Sulphur Springs, Henry county, Indiana, where he had attained a high standing as a physician, even before he received his degree of Medical Doctor. For nearly twenty years he has been in con- stant and active practice at the thriving city of Montpelier, where no gentleman of the profession has acquired a more enviable reputation as a citizen, or as a practitioner of the noblest of all arts. He is looked upon by his brethren of the profession as one whose judgment is seldom at fault, being thus frequently found in consultation with them. By natural endowments and professional acquirements Dr. Sellers is ad- mirably adapted to the noble profession to which his life has been consecrated, and his success therein long since won for him a creditable standing among the leading phy- sicians of the community. His long years of experience have rendered him unusually skillful in the treatment of many obstinate diseases, and the genial manner with which he enters the sick room at once inspires the patient's confidence and makes him the ideal family physician.
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Dr. Sellers was married on his twenty- ninth birthday, to Emma J., daughter of Alexander and Lucretia (Weekley), of Vir- ginia. Five children have been born to them, as follows : Charles A., a medical student ; Addie, and three who died in child- hood. Fraternally the Doctor is, and has been for nearly thirty years, a member of the Masonic craft, having been raised to the sub- lime degree in Mt. Maria Lodge, at Ander- son, Indiana, in 1872.
Reared in the faith of the Methodist church, he has ever adhered to the princi- ples inculcated in youth, all through life en- deavoring to so live that the silent influence of a Christian character would leave a last- ing and beneficial effect upon all with whom he has had contact.
Politically his franchise and influence has ever been cast for the advancement of the Republican party, though, as in all the principles that dominate human existence, he has taken a broad ground, not feeling that any one party or one school embodies all that makes for human freedom and a higher civilization. Being thoroughly im- bued with the noble purposes that have dom- inated the great men who have sacrificed comfort, friends and even life itself in the cause of humanity, that they could contrib- ute some little to the advancement of the greatest of the sciences, his own best thought and effort has tended to a progress in the treatment of disease and the lengthening of human life. Ever indicating a keen inter- est in all that has had as its object the better- ment of the community, he is never slow to lend the encouragement that experience gives, to whatever makes for greater enlightenment or more advanced civiliza- tion.
WALTER M. McDIRMIT.
The gentleman for whom this article is prepared was born in Blackford county, In- diana, March 26, 1863, the son of Will- iam and Malinda (Wilson) McDirmit, both parents natives of the state of Ohio. After attending the public schools at intervals un- til his fourteenth year young McDirmit left home and began life for himself as clerk in the grocery house of S. R. Patterson, Hart- ford City, in which capacity he continued about four years, obtaining meanwhile a sound practical knowledge of business and business methods. Severing his connection with Mr. Patterson he next accepted employ- ment with a gardener near the city of Mun- cie, which work occupied his attention for two years, when he came to Montpelier and became salesman in the general store of J. T. Arnold & Company.
Mr. McDirmit remained with the above firm for a period of four years and when Mr. Arnold disposed of the business to D. A. Walmer he continued with the latter gen- tleman three years longer as manager of the shoe department. During the succeeding two years he was purchasing agent for T. C. Neal & Company's elevator at Montpelier, and at the expiration of that time resigned the position and engaged in the livery busi- ness, to which he devoted his time and atten- tion until 1894, when he disposed of his es- tablishment to A. H. Bonham & Company. Subsequently, 1899, he bought back the livery barn and continued to run the same until 1900, in August of which year he again sold out and retired from the business, turn- ing his attention to other vocations.
Mr. McDirmit became a charter member of Montpelier Lodge, No. 188, K. of P., in
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1888, and since that time he has filled all the offices within the power of the local organi- zation to bestow, besides taking a prominent part in the deliberations of the order and doing much to promote its welfare in this city. He was married, April 29, 1885, to Miss Clara Geary, daughter of J. V. and Elizabeth (Turner) Geary. to which union the following children have been born : Ralph, whose birth occurred in February, 1886; Cecil, born March, 1890; Vera, born in August, 1892; and Elizabeth, who first saw the light of day September 6, 1896.
Mr. McDirmit has been twice elected to the common council and while a member of that body labored earnestly in behalf of the city's welfare by introducing and securing the passage of a number of important or- dinances. He has done much in a quiet way for the public good and the people of Montpelier recognize in him one of their progressive and substantial fellow citizens. To say that he enjoys an unusual degree of popularity is making a mild statement, as he numbers his friends by the hundreds in both city and country. His social nature makes him a hale fellow well met, and those who have known him longest speak of him in terms of the greatest praise.
NATHAN FIDDLER, DECEASED.
Nathan Fiddler was born October 15. 1824, in Knox county, Ohio, and died at his home near Hartford City April 22, 1896. His parents were John and Sarah (Reed) Fiddler. The father was of Pennsylvania ancestry and died in his fifty-third year.
While Nathan was born and reared in Knox county, he was married in Richland
county, Ohio, to Mary A. Walsh, who was born in Guernsey county, Ohio, March 18, 1829. Her parents, Thomas and Elizabeth (Bolinger) Walsh, were born in Pennsyl- vania, and were married before coming to Ohio; he died in Illinois at the age of sev- enty, and she at fifty-three in Ohio.
After marriage to his young wife, who was but eighteen, Nathan worked at the carpenter trade for about seven years, and then came to Winchester, Randolph county. Indiana, where he continued at his trade until he bought a farm, settling finally on a one-hundred-and-twenty-acre farm, which remained their home till the spring of 1884, when they came to Blackford county, pur- chasing the present homestead one mile west of Hartford City. His farm, five miles west of Winchester, contained one hundred and twenty acres of wooded land, upon which he erected a log house and where they con- tinued to reside as long as they remained in that county. His farm in Blackford county also contained one hundred and twen- ty acres, and this he greatly improved and enhanced in value by remodeling the house, erecting much new fencing and laying hun- dreds of yards of tile drain, which reaches to all essential points of the farm. By care- ful attention to the details that solve the ques- tion of success or failure in farm operation, he built up the farm from a dilapidated and worn out condition to one of great pro- ductiveness, making it one of the most de- sirable estates in the county. It lies con- venient to the city, with its ample market, and being an excellent stock farm is unus- ually desirable from that standpoint. While Mr. Fiddler had been almost wholly denied- the advantages of school training in- his youth, his mind was of a keen, perceptive nature and naturally gifted with those qual-
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ities that need only education to shine out in resplendent colors and make for the posses- sor a name and position worthy of the best endowed. Failing health had extended its warning, but ambitious to the last he re- fused to convert his business interests into other hands, but gave it such personal at- tention as it demanded. However, he took suitable steps to arrange all his business af- fairs, making such disposition as his own mind dictated, she with whom his life's bat- tles were fought, who had shared his cares, troubles and successes, being by right his sole legatee. She continues to conduct the farm, depending, of course, largely upon tenants. The farm, lying in the gas and oil belt, has been partially developed, having one well in operation.
The Fiddler family consists of four chil- dren, of whom Sarah E., the only daughter, is the wife of Jacob Burnworth, merchant and postmaster at Mollie Station, Indiana; James N. owns part of the old Randolph county homestead; William died March 14, 1898, at the age of forty-two, leaving a widow and one son, Harry; George W., the youngest, is a timber dealer at Hartford City.
Mrs. Fiddler, who bears her seventy years with little signs of feeling their weight, takes a commendable pride in her thirteen grandchildren and twelve great- grandchildren. She became converted and joined the Methodists as a girl of fourteen. and is now a highly respected member of the church at Hartford City.
Mr. Fiddler was an influential and es- teemed frater of the Masonic fraternity, under whose beautiful and impressive cere- monies he was laid to rest at low noon, a delegation of his home lodge accompanying the remains to Winchester, where they were
met by the entire lodge, in which many years before he had been a Mason. Thus by his old associates his body was escorted to Fountain Park cemetery, the dust being finally appropriately consigned to the dust from whence it came. A beautiful granite block family monument marks the spot where rests the clay of this genial gentle- man, loving husband and respected fraternal companion.
WILLIAM BALES.
One of the most successful farmers of Jackson township and one of the best known citizens of the county of Blackford is Will- iam Bales, who was born in Greene county, Ohio, August 9, 1842, and who is a son of Cyrus and Cynthia (Beal) Bales. Cyrus Bales was also a native of Greene county, Ohio, and was a son of Jacob and Dorothy (Hickman) Bales, both natives of Ohio and married in their native state. Jacob Bales was one of four brothers who settled to- gether and erected what may now be called old-fashioned brick houses and forming quite a settlement of members of the same family. There were also in the same neighborhood several families of the Beals, one member of one of these families, George, serving as a soldier in the war of 1812 in an Ohio regiment. He was the grandfather of Will- iam Bales, and the father of Cynthia Beals was one of the strong, ambitious men of the earlier day and owned a good farm in Greene county, Ohio. He died at the age of eighty years, which is indicative of the fact that his health and habits were unusu- ally sound and correct.
In 1857 Cyrus and Cynthia Bales, with their family of six children, removed to
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Delaware county, Indiana, settling two miles southwest of Dunkirk, where he reclaimed from the wilderness a farm of one hundred and sixty acres, upon which he lived until within a few years of his death, when he removed to Dunkirk, dying there at the age of seventy-seven, his wife also dy- ing there at the age of seventy. They were the parents of sixteen children, nine of whom reached maturity and six of whom werę living in the year 1900. These six were as follows: John Calvin, a retired farmer of Dunkirk; Louis C., living at Mun- cie; William, the only one living in Black- ford county ; Rachel E. (Mrs Andrew Bar- ley), Cynthia E. (Mrs. William Hartford) and Laura B. (Mrs. John B. Brammer).
The boyhood of William Bales was spent on the farm, upon which his services were especially valuable, as he was the only help his father had in clearing it and putting it in a good state of cultivation, most of the other children being girls. His father was one of the most successful hunters of the early day, killing many turkeys and other kinds of game. William found so much work to do on the farm that his education was almost entirely neglected, so far as at- tending the public schools was concerned, but receiving instruction by his mother's knee at the fireside he became able to read and write and was one of the best spellers in the neighborhood, an accomplishment much more appreciated then than now.
In those earlier days there was no lack of that variety often called spice of life. Cyrus Bales was an expert on the drum and his brother, James, was equally skillful in the playing of the fife, and as there were other musicians in the family and in the neighborhood there was among them a little martial band. Jesse Bales settled ncar his
brother Cyrus on Greene street, in Dela- ware county, this street extending two miles south of the county line and being named after Greene county, in Ohio, from which so many of the early settlers had come, many of them being related to each other. James Bales was one of the handiest men in the community and his sons were brought up to play the fife and drum, hence their services were in great demand at public meetings and at various places.
William Bales, who, as previously inti- mated, was for most of his youthful days the main support of the family, remained at home until he was twenty-four years of age. He was then married to Miss Jane E. Clugh, who was also from Ohio (Clinton county) and who came to Indiana when a girl of twelve years, her parents settling in the same neighborhood, but in Blackford county, upon a farm still occupied by her brother, Isaac. For seven years after his marriage William Bales and his wife lived with his father, and he then settled on his present farm, two miles northwest of Dun- kirk in Jackson township. This was in 1873 and at that time there was no house on his farm and no clearing made. The little log cabin he then erected remained the home of his family for several years, until he erected his present commodious home. Be- ing an industrious worker, he soon had a good start on his new farm, which con- tained eighty acres, for which he paid twelve hundred dollars, and in buying which he involved himself in debt to the amount of eight hundred dollars. But so remarkable was his success that in three years' time he paid off the entire amount. Before he plowed any of his land he laid timber ditches and hence had excellent crops from the very beginning. Taking time by the forelock, he
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