USA > Indiana > Memorial and genealogical record of Representative Citizens of Indiana > Part 46
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were, in 1832, united in marriage, and here resided until their removal to Howard county in September of 1852. This county had been acquired by recent treaty from the Miami Indians and was known as the "Indian Reserve," and was, at that time, a dense and, but for the occasional small "clearing," unbroken for- est of giant oak, walnut, poplar, chin, beech and sugar trees-now of inestimable value-then but dreaded umborers of the soil against which this sturdy pioneer, with his family, ranging from infancy to young manhood, with axe and saw and fire, waged battle royal in his struggle for subsistence. Shadowed by the foliage, the partially cleared and undrained fields yielded meager and uncertain return, and, but for the abundance of wild game, hunger, more to be dreaded than its prototype, the gaunt timber wolf, whose howlings made night hideous, had kennelled by the fireside. Improved highways there were none, and little need of them, for there were no products of the farm for the market. "Blazed" trails, avoiding the ponds and sloughs, connected the cabin homes and directed the way to the remote school house and postoffice. The subject's father built the first school house at Sycamore, in this county, in 1852, and his oldest brother, Charles L. Somers, taught the first school at that place. The equipments were rude and the methods primitive. Spelling, reading, writing and arithmetic comprised the course; later, geography and gram- mar were added. That it might not interfere with labor, in which every member of the household participated, the forty to sixty- day school term was invariably taught in the mid-winter. The political demagogue had not yet capitalized the ills of infancy for adornment of campaign oratory. Such were the environments and opportunities of Mr. Somers from his ninth to eighteenth year. Within them he grew to robust manhood, became a profi- cient speller and reader, a skilled axman and an expert rifle shot. Meanwhile comfort, if not luxury, had come to the home fireside; township libraries had been established and his boyhood dreams became realized. Books, Books, Books! Abbott's Histories, Plutarch's Lives, Farr's Ancient History, Davidson's Connexion of Sacred and Profane History and other valuable books became his constant companions-but not for long. The ill-nourished and slow-forming ideals, so long delayed, were but taking definite form under these new inspirations, when the storm of civil war broke upon the land and idols were shattered. The Somers family
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was patriotie, and the five sons entered the Union army. Orlando A. enlisted and was mustered into the service of the United States as a private in Company D, Thirty-ninth Regiment Indiana Vol- unteers, for a period of three years or during the war, on the 29th day of August, 1861, and served the full period of his enlistment. This regiment entered Kentucky in September, 1861, and was, with others, organized into the Army of the Cumberland by Con- eral Anderson, of Fort Sumter fame, remaining in that army under his successors, Sherman, Buell, Rosecrans and Thomas, until the fall of Atlanta, and thence, under Kilpatrick, with Sher- man to the sea and in his campaigns through the Carolinas, and was a portion of Sherman's escort when he received the surren- der of General Johnson at Durham Station, North Carolina. This regiment served as infantry in the great campaigns and battles of Shiloh, Perryville and Stone's River, after which it was mounted and served as mounted infantry in the campaigns of Tullahoma and Chickamauga, with their minor engagements, and in the great battle of Chickamauga, after which it was transposed to cavalry and designated the Eighth Indiana Cavalry and served as such until its muster out at Lexington, North Carolina, July 20, 1865. It is famed for having fought the first engagement of the Army of the Cumberland at Upton Station, Kentucky, Oeto- ber 12, 1861, and the last at Morrisville, North Carolina, April 13, 1865; also for having suffered the heaviest losses of any regiment on that most sanguinary day, December 31, 1862, at Stone's River, and in the fiercely fought battle of Averasborough, North Caro- lina, March 16, 1865. Because of its services and losses, it stands high upon the roll of the famous three hundred fighting regiments made immortal in history. It was in such a regiment the young man Somers marched and fought, and whose conduct, character and courage, whether in camp, on the march, or in battle, was without reproach, as many of his comrades yet living bear willing testimony.
After his discharge from military service, Mr. Somers re- turned to his home near Greentown, in the eastern part of How- ard county, with health so shattered at that time as to disable him from manual labor. He again entered the common school with the intention of qualifying himself as a teacher in the publie schools. After attending two terms, during the winter of 1864 and the fall of 1865, he was granted a license to teach and taught
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several terms of school, meeting with good success as a pedagogue. In the fall of 1870 Mr. Somers removed to Kokomo and entered Howard College, where he was a student one term. Ile was then for three years engaged as a teacher in the public schools of Kokomo, but was compelled to quit the school room on account of ill health. In 1874 he was chosen superintendent of the schools of Howard county and he rendered faithful and efficient service in the cause of education. At the end of his term he went on the road as a commercial traveler. At the end of a year's travel, with improved health, he entered the hardware and implement busi- ness as a salesman and was later deputy sheriff of Howard county for two years. During the administration of President Hayes he was appointed postmaster at Kokomo, the appointment, which bore the date of January 30, 1879, coming to him entirely un- sought. In the discharge of his official duties as postmaster he exhibited the same high qualities as elsewhere and so satisfactory were his services that he was retained in the office during the ad- ministrations of Presidents Garfield and Arthur and a portion of Cleveland's, retiring from office on November 2, 1885, a period of almost seven years. Upon retiring from the office of post- master, Mr. Somers devoted his attention to the improving and cultivation of a fine farm lying northeast of Kokomo and which he made one of the best improved farms in Howard county. In the carly nineties, he served a term as a member of the county com- missioners-board and court. He has been successful in all his business affairs and is now comfortably situated, being numbered among the leading men of his city. Though in his seventieth year, he is well preserved and takes a keen interest in all public events, keeping in close touch with the current happenings of the day.
Mr. Somers is a wide reader and close student, and in his spacious home, at No. 909 East Jefferson street, he has a large and carefully selected library of choice books, in whose company he takes the greatest delight. His present location, where he has lived for forty years, is an ideal home, the house being comfort- able and pervaded by a spirit of old-time hospitality, while the grounds surrounding the home are embellished with cannon and other war reminders.
Politically, Mr. Somers has been a Republican since the birth of that party, and has been active in political affairs, hav- ing served as a member and chairman of the Republican county
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central committee. During Governor Mount's administration, 1898, Mr. Somers was elected to the General Assembly, represent- ing Howard, Miami, Grant, Huntington and Wabash counties, and here, as in all other spheres of labor to which he has been called, he acquitted himself with honor and to the credit of his constituency. He served on several important committees and took a leading part in securing the passage of medel legislation. In 1900 he was supervisor of the twelfth decennial census for the eleventh congressional district, composed of Cass, Grant, How- ard, Huntington, Miami and Wabash counties, and the duties were so performed as to evoke the compliments of the director of census.
The subject has taken a deep interest and an active part in farmers' institute work, and as a representative of Purdne Uni- versity has covered the greater part of the state in the interest of this work, giving much attention to the construction and main- tenance of good roads. As a delegate from the state of Indiana, he has attended national and international good roads conferences and has taken an intelligent part in the discussions in these con- ventions. He has shown a marked spirit of enterprise in sup- porting every movement that has for its object the advancement of the best interests of the community in any way.
Fraternally, Mr. Somers has devoted much of his time to the Grand Army of the Republic and other organizations of veteran soldiers, and he has been signally honored by some of these socie- ties. In 1909-10 he was elected department commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, and he accepted this splendid honor with a due sense of its high obligation and filled the office with great distinction, conferring additional luster on his name and reflecting credit upon those who selected him for this high position. To him belongs the unique distinction of being the only private soldier in either of the four great veteran organizations- the Army of the Cumberland, Army of the Tennessee, Army of the Potomac and Army of the Ohio-to be elected to office in the organizations. He also bears the distinction of being the only private soldier who has ever been chosen to deliver the annual oration before either of these societies. He was further selected to deliver a second oration at Chattanooga in 1912, but, because of other engagements, he was forced to decline the honor. He is now engaged in writing the history of his regiment, in which he
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takes a great pride and which is largely a labor of love. He de- livered the annual oration before the Society of the Army of the Cumberland at their thirty-second annual reunion held at In- dianapolis on September 20-21, 1904, the address being published in the report of the society's proceedings for that year.
Orlando A. Somers has been twice married and has reared two families, of which he is justifiably proud. In 1866 he was married to Mahala Ellen Morris, daughter of William Burton and Mahala (Waters) Morris, who bore him five sons, Charles V., the youngest, dying in infancy, and Caius Eldon, Edward Olin, Lytton Lee and Percy Morris, who are living. Mrs. Somers died on February 28, 1886, and on March 24, 1887, he married Emma Heaton, daughter of John Osborne Heaton and Louisa Heaton, of Kokomo, to which union were born two daughters, Jean and Gail, both of whom are at home with their parents.
As a private citizen, teacher, business man, soldier, student, lecturer, home-lover-in every relation of life, Orlando Allen Somers has been true to his highest ideals and in no situation has he fallen short of the full measure of a man. He has always been found on the right side of all questions affecting the public wel- fare and his life has been a credit to the county honored by his citizenship.
SAMUEL MARION RIED, M. D.
That "man lives not to himself alone" is an assertion that is amely verified in all the affairs of life, but its pertinence is most patent in those instances where men have so employed their inherent talents, so improved their opportunities and so mar- shalled their forces as to gain prestige which finds its sphere of influence ever widening in beneficence and human helpfulness. Greater than in almost any other vocation is the responsibility that rests upon the physician, since in his hands repose at times the very issues of life and death. To those who attain determinate success must there be not only given teelmical ability, but also a broad human sympathy which shall pass from mere sentiment to be an actuating motive for helpfulness. The late Dr. Samuel Marion Ried, of Muncie, dignified and honored the medical pro- fession by his able and self-abnegating services, attaining notable distinction and unqualified success. His long and useful life as one of the world's workers was one of devotion, almost consecra- tion, to the noble profession of which he was so worthy a repre- sentative and well does he merit a place of honor in every history touching upon the lives and deeds of those who have given the best of their powers and talents for the aiding and betterment of their kind. He was in the most significant sense humanity's friend, and to all familiar with his life there must come a feeling of reverence in contemplating his services and their beneficial re- sults.
Samuel M. Ried was born in Shelby county, Ohio, August 27, 1843, and he was the son of William R. and Susan (Young) Ried, natives of Virginia and Montgomery county, Ohio, respect- ively. They were the parents of five children, all now deceased, the subject of this review having been the last survivor. The death of Mrs. Susan Ried occurred on March 30, 1863, and the following year William R. Ried was united in marriage with Jean Henry, who lived to an advanced age on the old home farm in Ohio. The death of William R. Ried occurred February 10, 1893.
Samuel M. Ried grew to manhood in his native county, as- sisting his father with the general work about the place when he
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became of proper age. Ilis carly educational training was ob- tained in the public schools. Later he attended the Wesleyan University, at Delaware, Ohio, which institution he left before completing the preseribed course, for the purpose of joining the army, but before he could get to the front and aid the government in its struggle to preserve the Union, fate interposed and he was strieken with typhoid fever, from which he recovered slowly. He mas ihus incapacitated for mary service, a fact which he great- ly deplored. He again turned his attention to his books and dur- ing the next six years engaged in teaching school, giving a large measure of success, his services being in great demand, earning the reputation of a capable and painstaking instructor. He finally tired of the school room, having for some time entertained a lau- dable ambition to enter the medical profession, and accordingly he entered the office of Dr. William R. Venard, of Plattsville, Ohio, and his progress in the study of medicine was rapid. In order to further equip himself he entered the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Keokuk, Iowa, where he completed the full course in a most creditable manner, graduating with the class of 1878, and soon afterwards resumed the practice of his profession which he had first begun in 1866 in Warren county, Indiana. He re- mained in Warren county for a period of twenty-three years, during which time his name became a household word through- out that section of the state, his success being ever on the in- crease, until he took front rank with the ablest of the medical fraternity. Seeking a wider field for the exercise of his talents, he located in Muncie in 1889, his fame as a general practitioner having preceded him here, and he soon ranked second to none in the profession in this city, his patients coming from all over Delaware county and even from adjoining counties, especially when delicate and important surgical work had to be done, for in this line he had few peers.
Doctor Ried possessed a pleasing personality, a genial man- ner and an obliging disposition which, coupled with his ability as a physician and surgeon, soon won the confidence and good will of the people and the highest respect of his professional brethren. He was an active and influential member of the Dela- ware County Medical Society and the State Medical Society. Fra- ternally, he held membership with the Masons, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Improved Order of Red Men, also
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the Knights of Pythias. Ife was active in these lodges and passed through all the chairs in the same. He was an active and in- fluential member of the High Street Methodist Episcopal church, of which his family are members. For some time he was super- intendent of the Sunday school at Independence. Politically, he was a Republican.
The Doctor was very successful in a material way and he was a stockholder in the Muncie Mutual Home Savings Company, also a director in the same. Ile accumulated a splendid and care- fully selected library in his pleasant and attractive home at No. 222 North Monroe street, Muncie, where the many friends of the family have long been wont to gather, finding here a genuine hos- pitality.
The domestic life of Doctor Ried began in 1866, when he was united in marriage with Maria Jane Johnson, daughter of Joseph and Hannah (Doran) Johnson, an excellent old family of Shelby county, Ohio, where the birth of Joseph Johnson occurred. He married Hannah Doran, who was born in Butler county, Ohio, the eldest of a family of ten children. She lived in Shelby county, Ohio, until about twenty years old, when she was married and moved to Independence and lived there about twenty-one years, then moved to Muncie. She received a good education in the schools of Shelby county. Her father devoted his life to agricul- tural pursuits. Her mother, a woman of gracions personality, makes her home with her daughter on the old farm near Sidney, Ohio, and is now eighty-six years old.
Three children were born to Dr. Samuel M. Ried and wife, namely: Francis A., who died on May 28, 1876, aged six years; William J., whose death occurred on April 8, 1877, aged six years, and Lee B. Ried, who lives with his mother at their home on Monroe street; he was born on February 4, 1877.
The death of Doctor Ried occurred on November 7, 1910, after a busy, useful and successful life, of which his descendants and friends may well be proud. He had done much for the up- building of the youth of Muncie, many a young person having been encouraged and helped on his way to success and a higher life by this noble-hearted physician.
It is deemed entirely appropriate here to reprint the funeral sermon delivered by Dr. Clark Crawford upon the burial of his
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friend, the immediate subject of this memoir, from the text, "Thy will be done," Matthew xxvi:12:
"The man of faith lives with more satisfaction to himself and with larger blessings to his race than does the man of doubt. For example, think of Christ and Pilate, MeKinley and Ingersoll. When I say 'a man of faith,' I do not refer to the man whose brain contains a mere muddle of beliefs, who has preindices and superstitions instead of convictions. I refer to him who is sure that there is an eternal right and an eternal wrong; that the right is worthy of his supreme and constant devotion, and that the wrong, if embraced and followed, will bring him to physical and spiritual bankruptcy at last.
"We do not need a long, involved creed, but we do need a few certainties. If we believe that the universe is ruled by love as well as power; that the outcome of goodness is happiness and the result of sin in misery; if we see a God in the events of life and feel that we can communicate with that God by prayer; if we are sure that God has so revealed himself in his eternal Son that we can in some measure understand him and come into fellowship with him; if we have faith in another life where the freed soul will have larger opportunities than its surroundings here have permitted; if we possess and exemplify the spirit of brotherly love and helpfulness incarnated in Jesus, we need have no fears as to our fate either here or hereafter.
"Man's creed is apt to be long and prolix, but God's is very short. Short as it is, however, we have no time to lose if we shape our character, our conduct, our dispositions in accord with its requirements. The life of every human being has its solemn, pathetie side. We have all learned that by experience. We need the sympathy and the help of God if we are to be sustained and do good work. There are times when we are appalled by the sit- uation in which we find ourselves. No light anywhere, but dark- ness everywhere. A score of friends may stand by us and give us what consolation can be put into words, but they cannot help us as we must be helped if we are to overcome in the trial. Human friendship is precious, but much more than human friendship is needed. Love mingles its sighs and tears with yours, but there is still an empty place in your heart which neither friendship nor love can fill. Have we not all had that experience ? Have we not found upon our heart a heaviness which no arm could lighten, a
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dread which no words could dissipate, a dreariness which no love could brighten with hope?
"Is there nowhere any comfort, any consolation, any useen influence to steal into the spirit with transfiguring power? The agnostie shakes his head in an emergency like that and does not speak, for he has nothing to say. He can utter things which may add to your despair but he has no thought that will afford you resignation and comfort.
"Your father, your husband, your brother has fallen asleep and when you call him he does not answer. The eyes will never open again, the lips are like lips of marble. There is a dread stillness in the house, broken only by the beating of your own heart and your unrepressed moans. Is that the end? Has Ithe story been told? Is the volume of his affection closed and clasped with an iron clasp? Have you said farewell forever and has the dear one taken a sudden departure into the realm of nothingness? If that were so what would life be worth? What is the use of loving if the most sacred ties are snapped when death taps at the door? He would be better off who never loved at all, for he would suffer less. Such a doctrine of life would make it true that the least love we bestow on any one the larger are our chances of hap- piness. That would lead to the inhuman conclusion: Let us care for our selves only and be utterly unearing as to the welfare of others. Such is the crushing result of unbelief as to the destiny of a life of goodness and duty, love and purity. In our grief the man of doubt may be at our side. He may be a tender-hearted man, willing to do what he can to assuage our grief; but what can he honestly say to cheer and solace us? Has he any balm for our wounds, any message for our distress? He has not, and there- fore were better absent than present. But Christ comes, or some- one who bears His message, and tells us of the house not made with hands, of the grave as the gate through which we enter heaven, of a time of meeting beyond the time of parting, of that blessed Father who does what is best even when he causes the tears to flow, only asking us to wait patiently in faith that some day we will see that IIe was right. What a change comes over our souls then. God's magic has put a smile under our tears, a hope under our despair. In restful faith we can then say, 'Thy will be done.' Standing at the grave of the loved one, we can lift
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our eyes to the blue sky and ery, 'For a time, good-bye; we shall meet again yonder.'
"To the loved ones who survive Doctor Ried, I would say: To you may there come the solace which God alone can give. You look on the face of father and husband today for the last time on earth, but you do not see him there. Ile has gone. Ilis body is but the empty casket whener the soul bes departed. Let it be your trust that one more voiee has been added to the chorus of praise, that one more soul has been freed from the trammels of time. You have one fewer to love on earth; one more to love in heaven. So says the religion of Jesus. It is cheerful, hopeful, joyful. May it be yours until death shall be no more and you, with the dear ones gone, shall be with God on the other side."
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JAMES MILTON LABOYTEAUX.
It is a pleasure to investigate the career of a successful self- made man. Peculiar houve auchses e chas individual who, ise- ginning the great struggle of life alone and unaided, gradually overcomes unfavorable environment, removes one by one the obstacles from the pathway of success and by the master strokes of his own force and vitality succeeds in forging his way to the front and winning for himself a position of esteem and influence among his fellow men. Such is the record, briefly stated, of the late James Milton Laboyteaux, for several decades one of the most substantial and representative citizens of Delaware county, Indiana, to a brief synopsis of whose life and character the read- er's attention is herewith directed in this memoir. His protraet- ed residence in this section of the state made his name widely and familiarly known. Ilis life and the history of this locality for a period of nearly a half century was pretty much one and the same thing. He lived to see and take a prominent part in the later-day growth of the community. He was one of its wisest counselors and hardest workers. He was a progressive man in the broadest sense of the term; realizing the wants of the people, he tried to supply the demands of the vicinity honored by his citizenship generously and unspairingly. His was a long life of honor and trust and no higher eulogy can be passed upon him than to state the simple truth that his name was never coupled with anything disreputable and that there never was the shadow of a stain upon his reputation for integrity and unwavering honesty. Mr. Laboyteaux was a consistent man in all he ever undertook, and his career in all the relations of life was utterly without pre- tense. He was held in the highest esteem by all who knew him, and the city of Muncie and county of Delaware could boast of no better man or more enterprising citizen.
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