USA > Michigan > Monroe County > History of Monroe County, Michigan : a narrative account of its historical progress, its people, and its principal interests Volume II > Part 7
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Mr. and Mrs. Chapman have had five children, namely: Cornelia C., wife of Dr. Barnaby; D. L., who lives on the old homestead originally
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settled by his grandfather; Almond B., who resides on the farm which his father cultivated for thirty years; Mabel M., wife of Dr. Cooper, of Carleton, Michigan; and Hazel, wife of H. A. Wagar, cashier of the Rockwood State Bank. The sons are both farmers in Monroe county, where they own land and raise stock, and both are married.
Mr. Chapman has formerly been a stanch supporter of Republican principles and candidates, but now is a member of the Progressive party and its candidate for Judge of Probate court, but outside of acting as delegate to numerous conventions, he has not taken other than a good citizen's interest in matters of a public nature. Fraternally, he is con- nected with the I. O. O. F. He and his wife are members of the Meth- odist Episcopal church, which they support liberally, and both are well known in Rockwood's church and social circles.
CHARLES ALVERSON BERRY. The beautiful and commendable custom of giving choice farm names to identify them and distinguish them from others obtains to a considerable extent in Monroe county, and the names seem to be chosen with good taste and judgment. One of the best and most fitly named is Locust Grove Farm in section fourteen, Ash town- ship, owned and cultivated by Charles A. Berry, as it was by his father before him. For its richness of soil, intelligent and progressive culti- vation and the character and value of its improvements it is worthy of special notice, as is its proprietor for the enterprise and vigor with which he manages all the operations connected with it, and his general excellence as a man and citizen.
This farm has been in the Berry family for many years. Its present owner was but three years old when his residence on it began, and he has never since lived anywhere else. His life began at Belleville, Wayne county, Michigan, on October 14, 1869, and he is a son of J. W. and Jane (Tyler) Berry, natives of this state also. The father was born in Detroit in 1836, seventy-six years ago, a son of Louis Berry, who came from Germany and located in Detroit in early days. J. W. Berry and his wife were among the early settlers and pioneers of the township in which their son, Charles A., the youngest and only of their children, now lives, and in which his mother died in 1895 at the age of sixty-two years.
Charles A. Berry grew to manhood on the farm he now occupies and was educated in the country school in the neighborhood and the harsher but more thorough school of experience. He assisted his father on the farm from his boyhood, and gave special attention to the care of horses from the time when he was fifteen years old, acquiring in this service a considerable fund of accurate and practical knowledge of horses, how to care for them properly and treat their ailments intelligently. This knowledge he has subsequently enlarged by systematic reading, study and observation, until he has become thoroughly grounded in the theory and practice of veterinary surgery, and is regarded as an authority on all subjects connected with it. His services are in great demand as a veterinary surgeon, and are always cheerfully and judiciously given, and with good results.
Mr. Berry has prepared himself for this kind of professional work in the improvement and equipment of his farm, too, having ample and well Vol. II-4
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provided stables for horses and cattle, his own and those of his patrons, and all the appliances for his work in this line his experience has shown him the need of. His farm is also improved with a modern dwelling house of nine rooms, all well furnished, large hay and grain sheds, a general dairy house 18 by 22 feet in size, a good fuel house and other structures serviceable in use and convenient in location and construction.
One of the special attractions and ornaments of his farm is a beautiful and thrifty grove of locust trees from which the place derives its name. This, with the ample and well constructed buildings, the conveniently sized and well tilled fields, the good fences and other evidence of thrift and prosperity, add vastly to the value of the farm and make it one of the most pleasing and desirable country homes in the county.
In his farming operations Mr. Berry is very enterprising, progressive and successful. In his work as a veterinary surgeon he is also very successful and enjoys a high and widespread reputation. And in his devotion to the welfare of his township and county and their residents, and the general interests of his locality in the way of further develop- ment and improvement he is thoroughly wide awake, alert and energetic. He is also warmly interested in the fraternal life of the community as a member of the Order of Odd Fellows and its useful adjunct, the Order of the Daughters of Rebekah, to which his wife also belongs. These manifestations of his worth and usefulness have won for him the high regard of all classes of the people, and his jovial and generous disposi- tion have given him wide and enduring popularity in all parts of this county and those which border on it.
On March 18, 1891, when he was twenty-two years old, Mr. Berry was joined in wedlock with Miss Jennie E. Erving, a young lady of broad intelligence, good family and high ideals of life. She was born and reared in Wayne county, this state, and is a daughter of the late Henry Erving, of that county. Her father was a gallant soldier in the Union army during the Civil war, and a valued citizen of his county at all times. His death was widely lamented, and the example of elevated manhood and useful citizenship he gave the people around him has been and still is a stimulus for good in the community of his residence while he lived.
Mr. and Mrs. Berry have three children, their daughter, Ora Lau- retta, their son, Benjamin Alverson and their other daughter, Bessie Olivia, all of whom are still under the shelter of the parental rooftree, and potential factors in the attractiveness of the family circle and the popularity of the home as a resort for the numerous friends of all who live in it.
Mr. Berry traces his lineage to the German, since his grandfather's name was Louis Beahr, who came from Germany. The grandfather was a soldier under command of General Custer at the battle of the Little Big Horn, and the name of "Beahr" was changed to the English name of "Berry" by the grandfather, Louis Beahr.
EDWARD M. WHIPPLE. Orphaned at the age of five years by the death of his father in the battle of the Wilderness in the Civil war, and forced by the circumstances of the family to begin the struggle for ad-
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vancement among men on his own account at an early age; dependent always wholly on his own exertions and resources for his progress up the rugged road to independence in a worldly way and a good position in the regard of his fellow men; confronted by obstacles and reverses many times in his course, yet winning his way steadily through every difficulty until he reached his present condition of substantial pros- perity and comfort and public esteem, Edward Whipple, one of the leading farmers and citizens of Ash township, is well entitled to the gen- eral approval his course has won for him and all the prosperity he enjoys, for he has earned it all by genuine merit.
He is a native of this township and his successes have all been won here. They are therefore all the more gratifying to the people around him, for they indicate the character of the sturdy citizenship of the township and typify the best elements of its sterling manhood. Mr. Whipple's life began on his father's farm in this township on June 28, 1859, and he is a son of Irvin Rufus and Sarah (Rubert) Whipple, na- tives of the state of New York. The father was reared on a farm in his native state, and was educated and married in that state, but soon after his marriage moved to Michigan and located in Monroe county, Ash township.
He was ardently attached to the Union, and not long after the begin- ning of the Civil war enlisted in its defence in the twenty-fourth Michi- gan Volunteer Infantry. His regiment was soon at the front and in the midst of hostilities, and with it he took part in several of the historic battles of our great sectional strife, finally laying his life on the altar of his country in patriotic sacrifice to its needs. He was wounded so seriously at the battle of the Wilderness in May, 1864, that one of his legs had to be amputated in the hospital on the field, and he died from the loss of blood in a hemorrhage which followed the amputation.
The survivors of his household at the time consisted of his widow and their five children. Frank died at the age of fifty and Emory at that of fifteen years. The two living besides Edward are his brothers Andrew and Rufus. Andrew is a resident of Ash township, Monroe county, as Edward is, and Rufus has his home at Flatrock in Wayne county. The mother died when she was past eighty-three years old. After the death of her husband her life was full of trial and hardship for a number of years, but she met the requirements of her lot with a serene and lofty spirit, performed its duties with fidelity, endured its privations with fortitude, and gave her family a noble example of elevated and most worthy American womanhood while rearing it in the practice of the vir- tues that characterized her and formed the daily habits of her life.
Edward Whipple was reared on the old family homestead and edu- cated in the country school in the neighborhood. He began farming as soon as he left school, and followed this occupation for a number of years for the benefit of his mother on the home farm. He purchased and moved to the farm he now occupies in 1897. The improvements on it when he took possession of it were not of much value, and he has re- placed them with others much more modern, substantial and valuable. His dwelling house is an attractive structure of seven rooms, all well and comfortably furnished, and he has also put up large barns, granaries,
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sheds, and good fences, tiled and drained his land and put it all in first rate condition for bountiful productiveness. The farm contains sixty acres of as good land as can be found in the township, is well adapted to cereals and grass, and is in the center of a fine farming region. He is wise to the character of its soil and knows just how to handle it to secure the best returns for the labor and care bestowed upon it in its cultivation.
Mr. Whipple was married on December 29, 1897, to Miss Jessie Pierson, a young lady of good family, superior intelligence and high social culture. She was a teacher in the Flatrock High School for three years prior to her marriage and enjoyed great popularity as an in- structor. She was born, reared and educated in Wayne county, the daughter of Benjamin W. and Delia (Kittle) Pierson, New Yorkers by nativity, the father born in New York and the mother at Mount Morris, Livingston county, in that state. Mrs. Whipple's maternal grandfather was a soldier in the Revolutionary war, and her father served three years in the Twenty-fourth Michigan Volunteer Infantry in the Union army during the Civil war. He was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic and the Masonic order, and at his death at Flatrock, when he was forty-nine years old, left his widow and his two children, Jesse and Mrs. Mary Fisher, of Wayne county, to mourn their bereavement. The widow is still living and is now seventy-six years of age.
Mr. and Mrs. Whipple have two children, their sons Pierson E., who is now (1912) fourteen years old, and Benjamin F., who is ten. Maple Grove farm, their beautiful country residence, is one of the most attrac- tive in the township, and a favorite resort of the numerous admiring friends of the family. Mr. Whipple has been a member of the school board for ten years, and has shown his interest in the welfare of his town- ship in many other ways. He and his wife are among its most esteemed residents and richly deserve the high and universal regard in which they are held.
JAMES F. BARRY. Renowned in his young manhood as a mighty Nimrod, hunting with great success large and small game, buffalo, deer, wild turkeys, dueks and pigeons, and still retaining his cunning and skill in this line of sport; highly successful and prosperous as a farmer of enterprise and advanced ideas; with a clean and commendable record as a public official to his credit, and a leader in the public affairs of his township and county in politics and in connection with material ad- vancement and improvement, the interesting subject of this brief review is a strong factor in the citizenship of his locality and one of its most representative and useful men.
Mr. Barry resides on a farm of ninety acres in Ash township, Mon- roe county, which he owns and which he has made one of the best in this part of the county. Although not a native of Monroe county, he has lived in it for a continuous period of twenty-seven years, and is therefore in full sympathy with the aspirations and desires of its people and ardently devoted to its and their welfare in every way. This he has shown by his earnest, active and intelligent support of every worthy undertaking for the promotion of the general weal of this part of the state, and his serviceable devotion to each and all of its interests, and
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the people of the region esteem him in full accordance with the genuine merit he has displayed.
Mr. Barry's life began in Van Buren township, Wayne county, Mieli- igan, on April 14, 1848. His parents were James and Leah (Post) Barry, the former born near the city of Rochester, New York, and the latter a native of New Jersey and descended from an old family long established in that state. The father came to Wayne county, this state, at an early day in its settlement and located in the woods. There he carved out and improved a fine farm, on which he died in September, 1847, and the mother passed away in December, 1879, aged fifty-four years.
Their son, James F. Barry, was reared to habits of industry, hon- esty and frugality on the old family homestead, and educated in the public school in the neighborhood and by judicious study and reading at home. In the days of his youth and young manhood he won wide local renown as a hunter. Wild pigeons, ducks, turkeys and deer were abundant, and thousands of trophies of the chase fell before his unerring rifle. At the age of twenty-two he went to Sedgwick county, Kansas, near where the city of Wichita now stands, but at that time on the frontier, and took up a government claim of one hundred and sixty acres on which he lived about one year.
He went on a Buffalo hunt in 1872 and killed seven of the mighty roamers of the plains which were so numerous in the early days of our history that the sound of their hoofs on the ground when moving in droves was frequently like that of a continuous roll of thunder. After a residence of about thirteen months in Kansas he sold his land claim and went to the gulf region of Texas, where he worked for the American Bridge company eighteen months in different places in the state. He then returned to Wayne county, Michigan, located in his native town- ship of Van Buren and followed farming there until 1885, when he moved to this county and the township in which he now lives, and has lived ever since that year.
Soon after his arrival in this county he bought the farm which he now owns and cultivates, and which his skill and industry as a farmer have made one of the best in the township of its location. He has erected on it a commodious and attractive dwelling house of nine rooms, all of which he has furnished comfortably and tastefully, and large barns, sheds and other outbuildings. The farm is judiciously divided into fields with good fences put up by Mr. Barry, and he cultivates it with excel- lent judgment, wisely rotating his crops, and using all his intelligence as a farmer to secure the best possible returns for his labor. He has the whole farm well tilled and drained, leaving no waste land, and making every acre yield its full tribute to his persuasive and commanding hand as a husbandman.
In political relations Mr. Barry is a pronuonced and loyal member of the Democratic party and one of its wheel horses in Monroe county. He is always an active, energetic and effective worker for its success, and stands high in the regard of both its leaders and its rank and file as a wise counselor. He served as a justice of the peace three years and as township supervisor four, filling both offices ably and with great.
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acceptability. Fraternally he was connected with the Order of Odd Fellows and took great interest in the work of his Lodge in the fra- ternity.
In 1874, moved by the recollections of former triumphs with his gun, he spent some weeks hunting big game in Minnesota, and was suc- cessful in his trip. During the last ten years he has shot over one thousand ducks, and in the old days he brought down blue passenger pigeons, a species now extinct, in numbers of many thousands. Since 1874 his hunting has been only occasional, but he has found in every attempt at it that his skill remains with him, and his eye is as clear and his aim as true as ever.
Mr. Barry was married in Wayne county on July 10, 1881, to Miss Isabella Strong, a daughter of William and Alvira (Jackson) Strong. The father was a Union soldier in the Eighteenth Michigan Volunteer Infantry during the Civil war. Of the five children born in his house- hold, three daughters and one son are living. Mr. and Mrs. Barry have three children. Their son, Grove, is a soldier in the Marine service. Their daughter Leah Frances is the wife of William Gretzler, and they live in Berlin township, Monroe county. James H., the other son, who is now (1912) nineteen years old, resides with his parents on the family homestead. All the members of the family are highly esteemed, and all are worthy the regard the people have for them.
EZRA L. LOCKWOOD. Measured by its beneficence, its rectitude, its productiveness, its altruism and its material success, the life of the late Ezra L. Lockwood counted for much, and in this history of Monroe county, where he maintained his home for more than half a century and to the progress and prosperity of which he contributed in large and generous measure, it is most consonant that there be incorporated a review of his career and a tribute to his memory. Few citizens of Mon- roe county have done more to further its industrial and civic development than did this honored pioneer, and he had the ability and courage to take the initiative in enterprises that have proved of incalculable value to the county and its people. He gave to such work the best of an essentially strong, noble and loyal nature ; his life course was guided and governed by the highest principles of integrity and honor; and his resourcefulness and constructive ability, as combined with fine intellectual powers, made him well qualified for leadership in thought and action. Within the compass of a sketch of this order it is impossible to enter into manifold details concerning his many services in connection with the civic and industrial development of Monroe county, but even the brief data here given, can not fail to reveal in a measure the man and his achievement. Further interest attaches to his career by reason of the fact that he was in the most significant sense the artificer of his own fortunes and that he made of success not an accident but a logical result.
A scion of the stanchest of England colonial stock, Ezra L. Lockwood was a representative of families that were founded in New England in the early colonial days, the original American progenitors in both the paternal and maternal lines having come from England and settled
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in Connecticut about the middle of the seventeenth century. Mr. Lockwood was born at Watertown, Litchfield county, Connecticut, on the 11th of May, 1830, and was a son of Jacob and Maria (Scovill) Lockwood, both of whom were likewise natives of that historical old commonwealth. The old Lockwood homestead in Watertown has never passed out of the possession of the family within the long period of fully two centuries and is now owned by one of the name. When the subject of this memoir was a mere boy, his parents removed to the state of Delaware, and there his mother died when he was but thirteen years of age, his father having survived her by many years, being a resident of Elgin, Illinois, at the time of his death. After the death of his mother, Mr. Lockwood returned to the old home in Watertown, Connecticut, where he lived for a time with kinsfolk, but he soon became virtually dependent upon his own resources. He started the battle of life when scarcely more than a lad and with but limited education. His alert mental powers, his physical vigor and his determined ambition proved effective in coping with conditions at that period of his life, even as in later years of large and definite achievement, and it may further be stated that through self-discipline and long and active association with men and affairs he acquired the equivalent of a liberal education.
After severing the ties that bound him to the ancestral home, Mr. Lockwood went to the city of Philadelphia, where he remained about three years and where he found employment at the baker's trade. Upon coming to the west he passed an interval in the state of Illinois, and in 1849 he established his home in Monroe county, Michigan. He was at the time a youth of about nineteen years and he secured employment in Dundee township. From that time until his death Monroe county was his home save for an interim of about two years-1853-5-passed in the state of Illinois. In 1855 he became associated with Morgan Parker in the purchase of the waterpower and saw mill and handle mill at Petersburg, and they continued to operate the mills until 1861, when the partner- ship was dissolved. That this venture had not proved an overweening success is evident when it is stated that after the business was closed up, Mr. Lockwood found his capitalistic resources again represented almost entirely in his personal energy, ambition and determined pur- pose. In 1861 he purchased eighty acres of land in section 27 Summer- field township, and his initial payment for the property was but forty dollars. He had assumed connubial responsibilities about two years previously, and no slight courage was that manifested by the young couple when they established their home in the midst of a virtual wilderness and where there was an emphatic negation of the environment implied in the phrase, "where every prospect pleases." Mr. Lockwood cleared with his own hands a little plot in which he erected his primitive dwelling, and in the midst of the untrammeled forest he and his young wife installed their Lares and Penates in this dwelling, after which he set to himself the herculean task of reclaiming his land to cultivation. Concerning this period in the career of Mr. Lockwood, the following statements have been written and are worthy of perpetuation: "At this time they had no neighbors within a radius of two miles. The land in the vicinity was a very strong soil but was so wet. and so far removed
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from a natural drainage outlet, that by many it was considered worth- less. The land was wild and undrained and was covered with water the greater part of each year. Mr. Lockwood went into the forest and swamp and forthwith devised a plan for draining, making roads and effecting the reclamation of thousands of acres of land now unexcelled in development and fertility. His first purchase of eighty acres proved the nucleus of the large landed estate which he eventually accumulated through his energy and well ordered endeavors, his holdings in 1875 having been somewhat more than three thousand acres. By hard work, indomitable courage and unfaltering determination, Ezra L. Lockwood was the prime force in effecting the reclamation of a vast tract of land, principally in Summerfield township. In the early days he met with strong opposition to his progressive movements and was for a long period virtually alone in the battle with natural obstacles to be overcome in making the wonderful transformation. To him more than to any other man in Summerfield township is this township, as well as a large part of the surrounding country, indebted for the comprehensive drainage system that had developed swamps into most beautiful and productive tracts. Only those who have witnessed the transformation can fully realize the great and beneficient work accomplished through the energy, ability and determination of this one man. In the face of strong and even bitter opposition he succeeded in having constructed, one after another, the great drains which were needed to put these lands into proper condition for effective cultivation, and one of these drains, which bears his name, traverses the county from its western border to an outlet in Lake Erie, the drain being at various points thirteen feet in depth and forty feet in width. At the time of his death Mr. Lock- wood retained a fine landed estate of nearly nine hundred acres, and upon his original little homestead he continued to reside until 1906, when he retired from active labors and removed to the attractive resi- dence which he had erected in the village of Petersburg, where his widow still maintains her home."
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