USA > Indiana > Henry County > Hazzard's history of Henry county, Indiana, 1822-1906, Volume II > Part 80
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Isaac Parker was twice elected to the General Assembly and served in the ses- sions of 1841-2 and 1845-6, with honor to himself and profit to his constituents. In the latter term which was strongly democratic, he managed to so win favor among his dem- ocratic colleagues, who were divided among themselves between two democratic candi- dates, as to secure the election of his personal friend, Jehu T. Elliott, as prosecuting attorney for the circuit of which Henry County was then a part-that officer being chosen by the General Assembly under the old constitution. Politically speaking, that election as prosecutor was the beginning of the career which carried Judge Elliott through several promotions, to the Supreme bench of the State, where he won such well merited distinction and honor.
It was a great sorrow to Mr. Parker that his wife, whose industry and devotion were far beyond her strength, was for years an invalid and that, of a large family of children, only his two sons, Benjamin S., the eldest, and Edwin E., who was born in 1840, lived to be grown. Perhaps the greatest of these severe afflictions occurred in 1858, when Martha and Charles Rollin, aged respectively ten and seven years, fell vic- tims to diphtheria and Edwin E. was paralyzed and made an invalid and sufferer by it for all his after life. Bright, gifted and beautiful were the two children that died. They were the joy and hope of their parents and neither ever recovered from the grief caused by their loss.
Mary Parker, the wife and mother, died in the Spring of 1861, at the age of forty nine years. Edwin E., so far recovered that he taught school in 1861 and volunteered in the 69th Indiana Infantry, in 1862; he saw some service with the regiment and was brought home, as all supposed, to die, but slowly gained strength until he was able to enter a law office at New Castle to study that profession. After raising a cavalry com- pany in conjunction with Volney Hobson, he again sought admission to the service out was refused on account of his physical condition. He was married about that time to Caroline Hubbard, a daughter of Butler Hubbard, who was then County Recorder. They were the parents of four children; one son, now a resident of Richmond, Indiana; a son, who died in childhood; and two daughters, who live with their mother in Fort Wayne, Indiana. After a varied career in Indiana, Ohio and the West, as a teacher, lawyer, reporter, editor and lecturer, Edwin E. Parker died in 1903, and sleeps in the beautiful Linden Wood Cemetery, at Fort Wayne, Indiana. He left a number of poems, essays, and other prose writings that his friends hope to issue in book form at some appropriate time.
It was in the hope of renewing his father's hold upon life that Benjamin S. Parker gave up, for the time being only, as he supposed, his cherished dream of a life divided between agricultural and scholarly pursuits, and engaged in business with his father at Lewisville, where Isaac Parker died in 1866, at the age of sixty years. He and his cherished wife and all of their deceased children, except Edwin E., lie buried in the quiet country graveyard at Richsquare, near their old, and except for the invading sorrow of death, happy home.
Isaac Parker was in youth a man of fine appearance; his hair, eyebrows and beard were very black; his face rosy and his eyes clear and piercing. He was five feet
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and ten inches in height; his shoulders were broad and his head finely proportioned. He was a good public speaker and had wonderful ways of making and retaining friends, due to his sincerity of character and his obliging disposition. So ready to help others was he that much of his time was taken up hy men who wanted aid with their accounts, or in the settlement of estates, always without pay and, possibly, in some cases without thanks. He never had a plow, a horse nor a utensil of any kind that was too good to lend to his neighbors. His home was always open in hospitality such as his means af- forded. He belonged essentially to the old, ideal lite taught by the sages, prophets and poets of the past, and yet he had his strong ambitions and was somewhat quick of temper in his earlier manhood, and intolerant of meanness and littleness always. Later in life his nature hecame refined into a silken smoothness which only some untoward offense could rouse into fiery action.
One of the tenderest and most sympathetic of men, anything like brutality and cruelty toward the weak, called forth his severest condemnation. It was characteristic of his tenderness of heart that once, when one of his children died and there was only a farm wagon in which to convey it to the graveyard, he took his seat upon the floor of the wagon, and folding the little coffin in his arms carried it thus to the place of burial and then handed it over to the friends who were to hide it away in the ground.
His close friend and neighbor, Judge Joseph Farley-who was a man of note and for some years an associate judge of the circuit court-and he were once rival candidates for the General Assembly, Farley on the Democratic and Parker on the Whig ticket. They canvassed the county together on horseback, met and conversed with the people in behalf of their respective parties. If anything occurred to keep either of them at home for a day, the other refrained from continuing the canvass until his friendly rival could again participate in it. If any other canvass for office in this county was ever made upon such terms, no record has heen kept of it.
Isaac Parker was of such peculiar nature and genius that he could not possibly conform to all the peculiarities of the Quaker sect, then considered essentials by most of their organizations in the new settlements. He loved art, romance, poetry. song and music, as the body of the Society in the West has come to do now to a lesser degree, and yet he was in deep sympathy with the cardinal doctrines of the Society and was hy no means a "Hickory Quaker" in the sense of being careless of spiritual things, but was really one of the most reverential and earnest thinkers upon subjects connected with the destiny of the human soul. Indeed his sensitive mind was always alert upon such themes; so much so that insincerity and sham disgusted and grieved him. His neighbors, most of them, respected his attitude upon sacred things and accepted it as one of his peculiarities, little dreaming how soon it was to cease being peculiar even among the Quakers.
In his devotion to books and the larger life of the intellect and the imagination. he found those who best understood him among the lawyers, editors and other profes- sional men of his time and in their company took such delight and imparted so much pleasure in return that it hecame a common saying among his friends that Parker never left town for the lonely ride to his home through the woods until after sunset.
Looking back upon his life and influence, it seems that he might well have heen termed a "backwoods genius." He cannot be compared with other leading men of the local world in which he moved, because he was unique. His genius was radiant, attrac- tive and contagious in its influence with men and women of larger thought. while to the many,-those of whom it may be said as Wordsworth said of one of his characters, Peter Bell, that
"A daisy on the river's rim, A yellow daisy was to him And nothing more."
-he was but a common man, yet for his kindness of disposition, gentleness of demeanor and sincere interest in the welfare of all about him, he was ever the good friend to whom they might appeal in either joy or sorrow with a certainty of receiving a sympa- thetic hearing and wise counsel, if he could give no more.
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He was the friend of many of the leading men of the State and enjoyed their friendship in return. Had the conditions of his life permitted his genius to become creative instead of spontaneous and, therefore, ephemeral, he might have won an endur- ing reputation as one of the pioneers in the literature of the new land. It is often said that such men "live before their time" and waste their lives upon the raw, uncul- tured wilds of pioneer communities; but the better thought is that, unconsciously to themselves and to the world in which they move, they sow the seeds of future grace and beauty and are really among the most effective moulders of public opinion.
During the Civil War, the services of Isaac Parker were much in request by the friends of sick or wounded soldiers to whom, his long acquaintance and friendship with Governor Morton and many of the generals, colonels and men in military authority, enabled him to be of much assistance at a time when the conditions of the service rendered such attentions to individual cases of great value; but he made no charges beyond his expenses. Even deserters came to him and through his good offices were received back into the service with no greater penalty than that they were required to serve out the full time for which they had enlisted.
The war was over and the struggle over reconstruction was upon the country when his health, which had been precarious from and after his wife's decease, grew worse and he died as already stated on October 27, 1866. His funeral was probably the largest that had, up to that time, ever been given to a private citizen in the southeastern part of the county, and so he passed away, as "one in whom the elements were so mixed and mingled that all the world might say, here was a man."
BENJAMIN STRATTAN PARKER.
Editor. Author and Citizen.
Benjamin Strattan Parker, eldest son of Isaac and Mary (Strattan) Parker, was born in "A Cabin in the The Clearing," as related in the biography of his father, on February 10, 1833. He was married on January 21, 1869, to Hulda Wickersham, daughter of Jethro and Mary Wickersham, of Henry County, Indiana. They have lived happily together up to the present time and are the parents of three children. Florence Parker, the eldest, is the well known and popular primary teacher in the New Castle public schools, where she has rendered twelve years of most valuable and effective service. Allegra, the second daughter, is now Mrs. Samuel J. Bufkin, of New Castle, Indiana. She is a woman of many attainments and has been a favorite in club circles; she writes naturally and well and is much interested in birds and bird lore. She is the mother of two bright and promising children, a little girl of three years and an infant boy. The third child and only son, Jethro W. Parker, is also married and at present lives in Rushville, Indiana. He is an active business man, his specialty being the clothing trade, of which he has much knowledge and in which he is considered efficient.
Benjamin S. Parker and his wife are living quietly at their modest, tree-sur- rounded home, in New Castle, where they take delight in meeting their friends. Mrs. Parker is a generous, kind hearted woman, popular with her friends and respected by the community. She has been somewhat active in religious and social life and in certain benevolent societies. She was the first president of the Henry County Federa- tion of Clubs and was one of the early members of the Woman's Club, but is at present taking a rest from club work, though still much interested therein, and especially in that of the Woman's Club.
Benjamin S. Parker, in addition to what is told of his life in the preceding sketch of his father, has been a teacher, a business man, an editor, a contributor to newspapers and magazines and by a sort of compulsion has practised law a little in years that are past; he has also written and edited and published books and has taken an interest in politics and held office. He taught at various points in Henry and Rush counties, prior to 1863, sold goods and dealt in grain at Lewisville, Indiana, for eleven years prior to 1874 and edited "The New Castle Mercury" from 1875 to 1882. He was the elector for the sixth Congressional district on the Garfield ticket in 1880 and cast the vote of
Benjamin & Parker
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the district for the second martyr-president in the State electoral college. He was ap- pointed United States consul at Sherbrook, Province of Quebec, Canada, by President Chester A. Arthur, in 1882, and filled the place efficiently until 1885. He was elected Clerk of the Henry Circuit Court in 1886, filling the place most satisfactorily for the full term of four years, from 1888 to 1892, although an invalid during much of his term. He was elected representative for Henry County in the General Assembly in 1900 and served with credit during the session of 1901. At an earlier period of his life he had served the town of Lewisville, seven years consecutively, as school trustee, during which time in conjunction with the late Dr. W. M. Bartlett, he was instrumental in building a new schoolhouse in 1866, which was the first schoolhouse in Franklin town- ship of more than one room and which started the remarkable educational advance in that town and its vicinity. He has heen an ardent, though never bitter supporter of the Republican party because of its adherence to those principles of freedom and equality in which he believes.
Benjamin S. Parker, in his early years, spoke, lectured or read papers very often before literary societies, teachers' associations, Sunday school gatherings, political meetings and other assemblies of the people. Always of slender build, it was not per- mitted him to enter the Union service as a soldier, but his services to the cause during the Civil War were so numerous and of so many kinds that he has often, since its close, been a welcome guest at soldiers' reunions, especially of the regiments that were made up in Henry, Rush and Wayne counties, and he was many years ago elected an honorary member of the regimental association of the famous 36th Indiana Regiment.
Like his father, he has always been a great lover of poetry, art and music, and has written extensively in verse, of which his published volumes have been "The Lesson and Other Poems," 1871; "The Cabin in the Clearing," 1887; "Hoosier Bards," etc., in 1891; "Rhymes of Our Neighborhood," in 1895. He also, in collaboration with E. B. Heiney, compiled and edited "The Poets and Poetry of Indiana," a most valuable addition to Indiana letters, in 1900. His poetry has been widely read and has received many words of approval and praise from critics, scholars and newspaper editors, east and west. But the greater volume of his writings has been in prose and unfortunately for his reputa- tion with the larger world, much of it devoted to local themes.
While his opportunities for gaining a school training were confined to the Rich- square school, which in early times was one of the best in its immediate section, the home life in his father's house was in matters of literary and general information a sort of continuous school and Mr. Parker was so imbued with the idea of a life largely devoted to scholarly pursuits, that it made a student of him and when at an early age he began teaching he did not permit himself to lose much time in idleness which might have been devoted to increasing his knowledge and capabilities; but circumstances, seemingly beyond his control, changed the current of his life and carried him into traffic, in which adverse conditions arose which subjected him to loss and burdened him with debt-a burden which he did not cast off, as he might have done, but for long years has striven with and paid off as best he could, greatly to the detriment of his hopes and aspirations in other directions, until the strain and worry have so broken his health that at times his friends have thought that the end of his career was near at hand; but now at three score years he is as active and alert as ever and still buoyant with hope and works with his hands, his head and his heart as earnestly as in the past.
His affections have been and are centered largely in his native State and county. He was the second president of The Western Association of Writers, and is an honorary member of The Century Club, of Indianapolis, and the Indiana Audubon Society, and with Thomas B. Redding, Elwood Pleas and Martin L. Bundy, founded The Henry County Historical Society nineteen years ago. He was also the first person to introduce the annual decoration of the graves of the soldiers of the Union in Henry County. This was in 1867, several years before it was taken up by the Grand Army of the Re- public.
In religion and ethics Mr. Parker has long been impressed with the broader faith and hope, rather than with narrow creeds of any kind, and hence is well disposed towards any form of religious faith which may tend to make humanity better and nobler, the
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conditions of life more hopeful and the soul more in harmony with the evident purposes of its Author.
Among a great many tributes that have been paid to his character and qualities of mind hy his friendly contemporaries, the following from his friend of many years, James Whitcomb Riley, has been selected to fittingly close this sketch:
THE CLEARER HAIL.
To Benjamin S. Parker.
Thy rapt song makes of earth a realm of light, And shadowy, mystical as some dreamland Arched with unfathomed azure-vast and grand With splendor of the morn, or dazzling bright With Orient noon; or strewn with stars of night Thick as the daisies blown in grasses fann'd By odorous midsummer breezes and
Showered over by all bird songs exquisite.
This is thy voice's heatific art-
To make melodious all things helow, Calling through them, from far, diviner space, Thy clearer hail to us. The faltering heart Thou cheerest, and thy fellow mortal so Fares onward with uplifted face.
-Armazinda, page 50.
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF JOHN POWELL.
LEADING PIONEER, PUBLIC OFFICIAL AND WELL REMEMBERED CITIZEN.
The first interrogation one receives upon entering Boston is: "What do you know?" In New York it is: "What are you worth?" In Philadelphia: "Who are your rela- tions?" To answer the last question and show who were the ancestors and who the descendants of John Powell is the purpose of this sketch.
In the principality of Wales, near Brecon, Brecknockshire, Watkin Powell was born. He. had three sons- John, Thomas and Watkin, who in 1801 came to the United States of America and settled first at Utica, New York. From that point Watkin Powell went to Spring, Crawford County, Pennsylvania, where he settled and where his descendants are at the present day farmers and stockmen of national reputation. John Powell moved to Virginia and became the head of the southern branch of the Powell family. Thomas Powell, with his wife, Nancy, who was also a native of Wales, and their son, Thomas, who was born in Wales, moved to Port Carbon, Pennsylvania, and there was born to this couple July 22, 1806, a son, John Powell, who is the subject of this sketch.
In 1809 Thomas and Nancy Powell moved with their family to Butler County, Ohio, and settled on a farm near Cincinnati. While located there two more children were born to them, namely: William, born October 15, 1810, and Elizabeth, born July 5, 1814. The latter became the wife of James Wasson and died his widow in Crawfordsville, Indiana, January 17, 1905.
John Powell lived with his parents and worked on the farm until he was eighteen years of age, when he went to Connersville, Indiana, and there served as a tanner's apprentice under Abraham Conwell. When his apprenticeship ended he was master of the business in every detail. Mr. Conwell always bore in remembrance his young ap- prentice, and when in 1863 Martin L. Powell, son of John, was in Connersville on a visit to Mr: Conwell, the latter called out to some men of his acquaintance, saying: "Here is a boy I want to introduce you to. His father was with me for years and I knew him well. You might fill this room with uncounted money and he would not touch a dollar save his own. I never knew a more honest man."
John Powell moved from Connersville to New Castle in 1827, where he soon after- wards purchased the tanyard of Charles Mitchell and all of the three hundred and thirty feet of land fronting on the south side of Broad Street, east of Mill, or what is now known as Fifteenth Street, for four hundred dollars. The Charles Mitchell referred to was the father of Leander P. Mitchell, the present assistant comptroller of the United States Treasury, and biographical mention is made of him in connection with the sketch of another son, Samuel Alexander Mitchell, which is published elsewhere in this History. This was in reality the beginning of the business career of John Powell. From the time of this purchase until his death no man was more closely identified with the history of New Castle. He was a thorough business man, who seemed to have an intui- tive grasp of the principles of trade, and he was an indefatigable worker. He did not depend on the local supply of hides for use in his tannery, but patronized for fully thirty years the markets of Cincinnati, St. Louis and New Orleans.
Mr. Powell was not, however, a man with a single idea, but while steadily conduct- ing his tanning business, he was also looking ahead, and seeing a future full of promise he dealt extensively for the period in real estate. Some of the prices paid for land by him show the remarkable opportunities for money making in that line which existed at that early period. The southwest corner of Fifteenth and Broad streets, eighty-two and a half feet, cost him twenty-five dollars March 10, 1832. It was upon this lot that he built in 1838 the brick house which is still standing, good and solid, and which was at the time the finest in New Castle. It was in this house that his son, Martin L. Powell, and the children following him were born. This lot unimproved is worth to-day prob- ably twelve thousand dollars. On August 12, 1829, Mr. Powell bought the east half of the north side of Broad Street, between Fourteenth and Fifteenth streets, one hun- dred and sixty-five feet, for ten dollars; the northwest corner of Broad and Fourteenth
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streets, eighty-two and a half feet, for ten dollars, and the square of five acres, the northeast corner of which is the southwest corner of Seventeenth and Broad streets, for one hundred dollars. These properties are now worth a large fortune.
Mr. Powell was especially noted for his kindly and charitable disposition. He was a truly benevolent man, but never sought publicity or personal commendation for his many benefactions. He was not only charitable, but he also made it a point to assist in a business way many whom he saw in need of such assistance. He was a good judge of men and seemed to know well whom he could trust. Ezekiel T. Ice, of Mount Sum- mit, has the most pleasurable recollections of Mr. Powell's generosity. In 1852, when Ice was a young man, twenty-two years of age, he and the late Joseph Kinsey desired to build a steam saw mill at Mount Summit, for which thirty-five hundred dollars were needed. Ice had eighty acres of not very valuable land and Kinsey had five hundred dollars in cash. They applied to Mr. Powell for aid and he not only made the necessary loan, but agreed to furnish the machinery besides. After a year of almost superhuman toil they found that it would take five hundred dollars more to complete the work. Discouraged, Mr. Ice offered the property to Mr. Powell for the debt, but he instead ad- vanced the needed five hundred dollars and said: "You are young and energetic and can pay two hundred dollars a year and six per cent. interest." They paid the debt. This was during the hard times preceding the great financial panic of 1857 and there was due Mr. Powell from others obligations amounting to more than ten thousand dol- lars. He did not even take a mortgage from Ice and Kinsey, nor did he foreclose on others when by so doing he could have profited by many thousands of dollars.
When the New Castle and Dublin turnpike was projected and bids asked for the work, Mr. Powell advised the late Robert Cluggish, then a young man, almost fresh from Scotland, to put in a bid. Cluggish had no money, but finally made a successful bid and was furnished the money by Mr. Powell without security. In this as in the previous case, his confidence was not misplaced. He furnished money to Murphey, Goodwin and Company with which to buy hogs. He gave credit to Henry Shroyer, then a young man, in 1834, for all the leather needed by him in his business of saddle and harness making. He gave horses to three preachers unconditionally, but from Charles B. Davidson he took a note payable when he should cease preaching Methodism. This note became due and collectable when Davidson afterwards joined the Presbyterian church at Indianapolis, but was never paid. Old "Daddy" Westlake, of Dublin, Wayne County, being harrassed by officers for debt, Mr. Powell loaned him a horse over sixty years ago. It was never returned. Some persons were given the opportunity by Mr. Powell to work out eighty acres of land at the entry fee of one hundred dollars, and this land is now for the most part worth fifty dollars or more an acre. Others were helped by him to build homes. No one in trouble, financial or otherwise, ever applied to John Powell in vain, whether it was for money or for counsel and advice.
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