USA > Indiana > Vigo County > Terre Haute > Greater Terre Haute and Vigo County : closing the first century's history of city and county, showing the growth of their people, industries and wealth > Part 42
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 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48
845
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
He married Miss Lunetta Catt, a native of Greenfield, Indiana, and a daughter of Milton and Lina Catt.
FERDINAND ARTHUR MOSHER, a well known citizen of Terre Haute and senior member of the grain commission house of F. A. Mosher & Company, is a native of the Empire state, descended on both sides from old substantial New York families. His paternal ancestors were Quakers, who came from Rhode Island at an early day, and located successively in Dutchess, Jefferson (LeRaysville) and Oneida counties. Mr. Mosher's parents, Ennis and Catherine (Barbour) Mosher, were natives of New York state, the father being for many years a merchant at LeRaysville. Jefferson county. Thence he removed to Whitesboro, Oneida county, and there continued in business for a short time, returning to LeRays- ville, where he passed away.
It was at Whitesboro. Oneida county, New York, that the subject of this sketch was born. He was reared in LeRaysville, receiving his education in its common, and at a normal school, and his first business training in his father's country store at that place. This, at the time, was the family residence, the home having been transferred from Whites- boro, where it had been established for only a short time. In December, 1882, as a young man, Mr. Mosher removed from LeRaysville to Terre Haute, there joining his cousin, F. F. Keith, and establishing himself as an active factor in the grain commission business. A few years later Mr. Keith retired from the house and went to California, Mr. Mosher suc- ceeding to the large business and conducting it alone until January 1, 1907. when D. P. Lynch was admitted as a partner in the formation of the present firm of F. A. Mosher & Company. Mr. Mosher is a member of the Chicago Board of Trade and of the Terre Haute Commercial and the Country clubs, and is also identified with the Masonic and Elks fraternities, being an active, strong and honorable citizen.
JAMES K. P. STEPHENS was born in Clay county, Indiana, near Bowling Green, May 8, 1845, a son of James and Wealthy (Beaman) Stephens, farming people. James Stephens was born in 1794 in Mont- gomery county, North Carolina, and died in 1849, and his wife, who was born in the same county in 1810, died in 1888. James Stephens was a son of James Stephens, Sr., who came to this country during the period of the Revolutionary war, and was a soldier under Lafayette. After the close of the conflict he settled in Fayetteville, North Carolina, and spent the remainder of his life there, conducting a general mercantile storc.
James Stephens, Jr., lived at home until the War of 1812, and then as a boy of eighteen years enlisted with Elijah Haltom's company,
846
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
Colonel Bendumas' regiment, and served as a private until the close of the war. He was never wounded during the entire struggle, and after its close walked from Cincinnati, Ohio, via Fayetteville and Indianap- olis, to Fort Harrison, following the Indian trail. After a sojourn there of three weeks he returned to Cincinnati, and in 1825 came back to In- diana by way of Cumberland Gap, Tennessee, and located in Clay county, near Bowling Green, which continued as his home during the remainder of his life. For his services as a soldier in the War of 1812 he had received a grant of one hundred and sixty acres, and he thereafter con- tinued as a grain and stock farmer, owning at the time of his death over six hundred acres, and was one of the wealthiest farmers in the county. Politically he was a Democrat. Of the eight children born to Mr. and Mrs. Stephens only three are now living. The eldest, Elijah, resides on the old home farm in Clay county, where he was born and reared. He was born in 1828. He married Rebecca Orman. Nancy, the second of the living children, was born in 1840 and resides in Los Angeles, Cali- fornia, the wife of George W. Ellis, a real estate dealer and hotel pro- prietor.
James K. P. Stephens, the third and youngest of the living children, remained at home until he, too, left for the seat of war, joining, in 1862, Company M, Sixth Indiana Cavalry, Colonel Topping's regiment, later under the command of Colonel Biddle, for services in the Civil war. He served as a private until October 15, 1865, when he was seriously wounded by being run over. During his military career he served in the battles of Richmond, Kentucky, and Knoxville, Tennessee, in the campaigns of eastern Tennessee, Atlanta and from Chattanooga to Atlanta. He then returned with General Thomas to Franklin and Nashville, and after the war had ended he came back to Bowling Green, Indiana. He received his honorable discharge October 15, 1865, at Indianapolis. Shortly aft- erward he was married, and in 1867 he bought the farm where he now lives, near Lewis, Indiana, owning seventy acres and carrying on general grain and stock farming, but he is now retired from active pursuits.
In Bowling Green, Indiana, May 17, 1866, Mr. Stevens married Margaret Craft, who was born on the 30th of August, 1846, the daugh- ter of Peter Craft. They have seven children living and four deceased, namely: Betty, born September 16, 1867, the wife of David Swalley, a farmer of Anderson, Indiana; Thaddeus A., born January 20, 1872, conducts the home farm; Pat, born April 4, 1873, married Drusilla Barnes and resides in Pierson township; Maude, born April 29. 1875, the wife of Emery Brash, of Coalmont, Indiana ; May, born August 16, 1876, the wife of Charles Richey, of North Dakota; Sherman, born March 29, 1882, married Ethel Clark and resides in Terre Haute, and
847
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
Ethel, born August 21, 1884, is at home. Mr. Stephens votes with the Republican party and both he and his wife are members of the Methodist church. Mr. Stephens is a member of General Cruft Post, No. 284, Grand Army of the Republic, of which he is now the adjutant, and for ten years was its commander. He is the recipient of a pension of seven- teen dollars a month. Stephens cemetery is located on his land and contains a soldiers' monument seventeen feet high and two twenty-four pound cannon and twenty sixty-four pounds shells. This is the only soldiers' monument in the county, and was erected by the post here.
General Cruft Post, No. 284, Grand Army of the Republic, was mustered in January 25, 1884, at Lewis, Vigo county, by Captain Todd, of Jasonville, Indiana, with thirty-one charter members. The officers elected were: Commander, James K. P. Stephens; senior vice com- mander, Gilbert Liston ; junior vice commander, G. A. Sanders ; adjutant, I. O. Beckwith; quartermaster, R. H. Cochran; chaplain, Samuel Woods; surgeon, C. C. Givins; officer of day, O. T. Stark; outside guard, M. S. Boston; sergeant-major, W. T. Payne; quartermaster ser- geant, Munson Gosnel.
This post meets on the Saturday after full moon, at 2 p. m., each month. General Cruft Post, No. 284, Department of Indiana, Grand Army of the Republic, has prospered from its organization and has buried more than one hundred old soldiers. They have also procured from the government over one hundred headstones or markers to mark the old soldiers' graves. In 1903 General Cruft Post appointed a com- mittee of comrades to go to Bedford, Indiana, and buy a suitable monu- ment to be made of Bedford stone. This committee was composed of J. K. P. Stephens, R. H. Cochran, Gilbert Liston and C. C. Givins. They went to Bedford, Indiana, October 1, 1903, and hired J. W. Hues, of Bedford, to cut and make a soldiers' monument from Bedford stone to cost $1,500 and to be erected in the Stephens cemetery at Lewis. The monument stands seventeen feet high and the west side represents the Grand Army of the Republic, the south side represents the cavalry, the east side represents the navy, the north side the artillery, and the top represents the infantry. There is a circle around this monument and all old soldiers are buried around this circle. The old soldiers have several other fine private family monuments in this cemetery.
This post has also procured from the government, by the aid of Senator Albert J. Beveridge and Congressman E. S. Holliday two twenty- four pound steel cannons that weigh one thousand eight hundred pounds each. There are also, on substantial stone breastworks, twenty sixty-four pound bomb shells. These are all placed in the Stephens cemetery op- posite the Southern Indiana Railroad depot at Lewis, Vigo county. Indiana.
8.48
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
BURTON CASSADAY .- During a number of years Burton Cassaday was numbered among the educators of Vigo county, and when he left the school room, where for fourteen years he had taught and labored, to enter a business life, he was serving as the principal of the West Terre Haute schools. In 1894 he purchased the drug store in this city which he has since conducted, carrying a complete line of drugs and sundries, and he is a registered pharmacist. Mr. Cassaday also owns a large busi- ness block here, is the secretary of the West Terre Haute Savings, Loan and Building Association and the secretary of the West Terre Haute Improvement Company. These have proved a boon and the real success of West Terre Haute. the combined efforts of the two organizations having been the means largely of bringing it to its present high state of development. He is a large property owner in both Terre Haute and West Terre Haute. Mr. Cassaday is also president of the Indiana In- dustrial Life Insurance Company, which bids fair to make a revolution of the insurance world.
He is a representative of a family which has long been identified with the interests of Vigo county, for his father was a farmer in Sugar Creek township for many years and the name of John B. Cassaday is also in- scribed among its pioneer residents. He was successful in business and at his death owned an estate of about four hundred acres. He served as a soldier in the Black Hawk war, was a squire in his township and voted with the Democratic party. He was born in Kentucky, of Irish ancestry, and his wife, nee Rebecca Goodman, was of German descent. Thirteen children were born of their union, and ten of this large family are now living, all residents of Vigo county.
Burton Cassaday, the youngest of the thirteen children, spent the early years of his life on his father's farm, receiving his education in the district school near his home, and he left the school room as a pupil only to enter it immediately as an instructor, beginning his labors in Prairieton township. He. too, gives his political support to the Demo- cratic party, and his fraternal relations are with the Knights of Pythias, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Red Men, the Modern Woodmen of America and the Knights and Ladies of Security.
Mr. Cassaday married Margaret Jane Curry, who was born in Honey Creek township, March 3. 1862, a daughter of Oliver M. and Ella (Rynan) Curry. The mother died in 1905, but the father is still living. He was born and reared to mature years in Honey Creek township, and his life's span has covered over seventy years. His home is now with his daughter Margaret in West Terre Haute. One daughter has been born to Mr. and Mrs. Cassaday, Margaret Earl, born November 7, 1906.
849
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
JOHN K. WEEKS .- The name of Weeks has long been associated with the history of Vigo county, and especially of Linton township, and the representatives of the family have left their impress on its agricul- tural development. As early as 1838 William L. and Nancy (Kester) Weeks, the parents of Louis L., wended their way here from Kentucky and became identified with the farming interests of Linton township. William L. Weeks was born in Virginia, July 7, 1794, and his death occurred on his farm here, August 21, 1875, long surviving his wife, who died in October, 1845. She was born March 2, 1797, in Kentucky, and the former was of English and the latter of English and German descent. They were married on the IIth of January, 1820, and became the parents of nine children, five sons and four daughters, but only two, Louis L. and his sister, Susan McClain, a resident of Pimento, are living.
Louis L. Weeks, the first born of the eleven children, claims Spencer county, Kentucky, as the place of his nativity, born November 14, 1820, and he was therefore a lad of eighteen when the family home was es- tablished in Indiana. When he had attained the age of twenty-one he took charge of his father's farm. The first land which he ever owned was a little tract of forty acres entered from the government, the entry price being a dollar and a quarter an acre, while later he bought forty acres of canal land for between two and three dollars an acre, and from time to time he added to his farm until he owned about five hundred acres. But in the spring of 1900 he gave all his property to his heirs with the exception of a house and lot in Pimento, for previously, in the latter part of the nineties, he had retired from active work. Mr. Weeks is also numbered among the early educators of Linton township, where he taught two terms of subscription school in the early days. He is a member of the Baptist church, of which he served as a clerk at one time, and representing the Democratic party he served two terms as a county commissioner and one term as a township trustee.
On the 9th of April, 1845, Mr. Weeks married Sarah Ann Kelley, who was born August 25, 1825, a daughter of David and Ruth (Arm- strong) Kelley, natives of Kentucky, the former of Irish and the latter of Irish and German descent. They became early pioneers of Vigo county, and the father died in its township of Prairie Creek in October, 1859, and the mother on the 18th of March, 1847. Eleven children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Weeks: Nancy D., deceased ; John K., who mar- ried Sarah F. Kester and resides in Linton township; David, who mar- ried Martha Watson, by whom he has one son, Louis, and resides in Linton township; Chauncey, of Terre Haute, married Mary Hickman and has five children; Julia B., the wife of Alexander Beard, of Pier- son township; Louis H., of Linton township, married Mary E. Siner
54
.
850
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
and has two living children; Carrie and Ruth, deceased; Ida, at home; Daniel V., deceased, and Eura, also at home. Mrs. Weeks, the mother, , died on the 19th of January, 1895, leaving the husband, with whom she had traveled the journey of life for so many years, to continue alone until he, too, shall answer the call and join her in the home beyond.
John K. Weeks, a son of Louis L. and Sarah Ann (Kelley) Weeks, was born October 20, 1848, in Linton township, and here he has spent his entire life and been prominently identified with its farming interests. He grew to manhood's estate on his father's farm here, in the meantime attending the district school of the neighborhood, and when but seventeen he took charge of the homestead farm. When he was twenty-one he began operating it for himself, but after three years left the home farm and rented land for two years. He then purchased one hundred acres, the nucleus of his present homestead, to which he later added a tract of sixty acres, and on his farm of one hundred and sixty acres he is engaged in general farming and stock raising. He owns some very fine horses, and among the number is the well known "Jewel," a Red Wilkes sire, which has gained a high reputation in this community. Mr. Weeks gives his political allegiance to the Democratic party.
On the 12th of October, 1871, he married Sarah F. Kester, who came with her parents, John P. and Sarah (Beechum) Kester, from her native county of Spencer, Kentucky, to Vigo county, Indiana, when but two years of age. She died in 1881, leaving one daughter, Katie Estelle, who became the wife of Lute Beechum and died in 1899. On the 22d of December, 1885. Mr. Weeks married Eunice Kester, an own cousin of his first wife. She was born in Spencer county, Kentucky, January 28, 1845, and came to Indiana after her marriage. She is a member of the Baptist church.
CHARLES YAW was born within a quarter of a mile of where he now lives, March 31, 1861, and Pierson township has ever since con- tinued as his home and the scene of his operations. He is a son of Law- rence and Emeline (Kester) Yaw. The father, who was born in Mus- kingum county, Ohio, came to Indiana in about 1845, making the journey on horseback and locating in Vigo county. Soon after his arrival here he began work as a farm hand and taught school during the winter months, while later he began carpentering and building. He bought his first property in 1849, a tract of one hundred and thirty acres, and later he became the owner of an estate of three hundred and twenty acres. His knowledge of carpentering enabled him to erect all of his own buildings, and he continued his building operations and general grain and stock farming throughout the remainder of his active busi-
851
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
ness career. From the Whig party he transferred his allegiance to the Democracy, but was stanchly opposed to slavery. He was a member of the Baptist church. The union of Mr. and Mrs. Yaw was blessed by the birth of ten children, namely: William, deceased; Hettie, who mar- ried Hardy McClanahan and resides in Sullivan county, Indiana ; John, of Pierson township, married Nancy B. Beard; Louisa B., wife of Earl Liston, of Linton township; Charles, the subject of this review; Jesse B., who married Martha Pierson, and their home is in Pierson town- ship; Joanna and Fred, both deceased; one who died in infancy, and Alice, wife of John Rudisell, also of Pierson township.
Charles Yaw remained on the old Yaw homestead here, assisting his father in the farm work during the summer months and attending school in the winters, until his marriage, and at that time his father gave him forty acres of land, and he continued to reside in one of his houses for six years. Then, in 1888, he moved to his present home farm, selling the forty acres which his father had given him and purchasing sixty acres here, his first home being a four-room dwelling. He has made all the improvements which the homestead now contains, including some of the finest buildings to be found in the township, and he is now the owner of one hundred and sixty-five acres of general grain and stock farm. Mr. Yaw is a stockholder in the Riley Oil Company, and is the president of the Pierson Township Fair Association, which was founded by his father twenty-five years ago, and every year since town- ship fairs have been held here. He has always been an advocate of road improvement, and was one of the promoters of the first gravel road in the township.
On the 26th of November, 1882, he married Cora B. Hippel, born December 30, 1865, to Isaac P. and Barbara Hippel, both of whom are now deceased. The two children of Mr. and Mrs. Yaw are John Howard and Frank Leslic. The elder, born July 21, 1884, resides in Pierson town- ship on his grandfather's old homestead. He married Mildred McClan- ahan and has one son, born March 13, 1908, Lowell Desmond Yaw. Frank Leslie, the younger, was born February 15, 1885, and is at home with his parents. Both pursued courses at Brown's Business College in Terre Haute. Mr. Yaw, Sr., votes with the Democratic party and both he and his wife are members of the Baptist church.
CHARLES D. PIERSON is one of the most prominent business men in his section of Vigo county, and also has the honor of being a member of one of the county's earliest and most prominent families. The Piersons were the first permanent settlers here, and his great-grandfather was a Baptist minister and built the first church in Pierson township. The
852
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
building was made of logs and it stood about three miles west of Black Hawk, where the present church is located.
Taylor Pierson, a son of this pioneer minister, was born in Pierson township, as was also his wife, Ruth, and he owned at one time between six and eight hundred acres of land. He was a merchant as well as farmer and had the distinction of being the first merchant in Lewis.
Able Pierson, a son of Taylor and Ruth Pierson, was also a native son of Pierson township, and he remained at home until his marriage, receiving in the meantime but limited educational advantages, but in spite of this he became well educated for his time. Throughout his busi- ness life he followed agricultural pursuits, and was one of the largest stock raisers in this section of the county. He was also one of the original promoters of the Pierson Township Fair Association, and the grounds were located on his farm, which contained, at his death, thirteen hun- dred acres. He was a Democrat, but never an office-seeker, and was a member of the Baptist church. Two of his brothers served in the army during the Civil war, Moses and Josiah, but the former was out only a short time when he was killed by a scout, and Josiah served about three years. Unto Able and Mary J. (Stout) Pierson were born fifteen chil- dren, of whom the ten now living are: Printhia, who married Thomas Dix, and their home is in Shelburn, Indiana; William, who married, first, Nerva Van Clave, deceased, and secondly, Ada Volkerst, and he is .on the parental homestead in Pierson township; Mary and Mat, twins, the former the wife of C. H. Bentley, of Prairieton township, Vigo county, and the latter the wife of J. B. Yaw, also on the old homestead ; Ruth, the wife of John Peters, of Howard county, Indiana; Charles D., who is mentioned later ; John, who married Iva Fredericks and lives in Terre Haute; Pearl, a missionary in Old Mexico, and he married there ; Maud, wife of Ithamer Thomas, of Sullivan, and Jesse, who married Virginia Walters and lives in Spokane, Washington.
Charles D. Pierson was born on the farm on which the Pierson fair grounds are now located, April 8, 1871, and after attending for a time the common schools near his home he became a student in the graded schools of Riley, from whence he entered the Isabell Business College and graduated with the class of 1893. Returning home he worked for four or five years and was then married and had charge of his father's farm for two years. From farming he drifted into the lumber business, forming, in 1901, a partnership with his brother John at Lewis, but in 1903 he purchased his brother's interest. In 1904 he and his brother sank the Pierson coal mine in Coalmont, the first large mine on this road, and they also opened a lumber yard there. In 1906 they sold the mine and invested in timber land in Louisiana, and at the present
853
GREATER TERRE HAUTE AND VIGO COUNTY.
time are starting a saw mill there. Mr. Pierson has a half interest in the C. D. Pierson Lumber Company, and is the president of the Fort Harrison Lumber Company, whose offices are at 1466 South Seventh street. Terre Haute. His politics are Democratic.
On the 12th of October, 1899, Mr. Pierson was married to Mattie Ladd, who was born February 22, 1873, a daughter of William and Nancy Ladd, the former now deceased, but the mother is living on the home place here.
STEPHEN BEAMAN STARK, postmaster at Pimento, Linton town- ship, is a pioneer of that section of Vigo county, and was virtually engaged in farming there until his appointment to his present position seven years ago. His most extended absence from the county for which he has such an enduring affection, covered the period of his honorable service in the ranks of the Union army during the Civil war. Born on a farm in Clay county, Indiana, on the 29th of March, 1848, he came to Pimento when only a few years of age, and there he has been edu- cated to a useful and patriotic citizenship. Mr. Stark's father was Daniel M. Stark, who was born in Ohio, September 25, 1809, and died in Pimento July 23, 1881. His mother was known before marriage as Patience Welch, was a native of Ohio, born in 1807, and died at the old Pimento homestead on the 20th of September, 1869. He is of a family of seven children, who, besides himself, were Emeline, William, Simeon (deceased), Rebecca, Stephen Beaman and Eunice.
Although but a mere youth, Postmaster Stark enlisted in the Civil war as a member of the Fifty-seventh Regiment, Indiana Volunteer In- fantry, and participated in the battles of Spring Hill, Franklin and Nash- ville. He returned to Pimento and the farm upon which he had been reared, and both in practice and the encouragement of modern methods and movements has been identified with the best progress of Vigo county in agriculture, civic development, and in social and religious life. On November 18, 1866, when in his nineteenth year, he married Miss Esther Ann Akers, a native of Vigo county, where she has passed her useful life. To their union have been born these five children: Leona, now forty-one years of age, and the wife of Jeptha Boyll, a citizen of Terre Haute; Erdine, aged thirty-seven, wife of David Boyll, a prosperous farmer of Linton township; Edgar A., who died in 1879, at the age of six years; Jessie B., who resides, at the age of thirty-one, at Pales- tine, Illinois, and Arthur V., a resident of Texas, who has reached the age of twenty-eight. Mr. Stark and his wife are members of the Mis- sionary Baptist church, and are among its most enthusiastic workers, as well as interested participants in the charitable movements of the en-
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.