USA > Michigan > Oakland County > History of Oakland County Michigan a narrative account of its historic progress, its people, its principal interests Volume II > Part 47
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 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56
In politics Mr. Benjamin is a Republican. For seven years he was township supervisor and was assessor of his school district for about thirty years. He has served his township on the board in various capacities and is always on the qui vive to do all in his power to advance the best interests of the community in which he resides. Fraternally he Vol. II-22
832
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows; in which or- ganization he has passed all the official chairs. He retains a deep and abiding interest in his old comrades in arms and signifies the same by membership in Dick Richardson Post, No. 147, Grand Army of the Re- public, at Pontiac. He is likewise a member of the National Association of Civil War Musicians, and is secretary and treasurer of the Michigan division of that organization. He is also a member of the executive board of the National Association of Civil War Musicians. He and his wife are devout members of the Methodist Episcopal church at Royal Oak and he has been treasurer of the Oakland County Sunday School Asso- ciation for many years. For a number of years he was superintendent of the Royal Oak Sunday-school and he is recording steward of the official board of the church.
Mr. Benjamin has been twice married, his first union having been to Martha Ann Campbell. They were married at Royal Oak in 1868. The one child born to them died at the age of ten months. Mrs. Benjamin died in 1872. On the 30th of November, 1876, Mr. Benjamin was united in marriage to Miss Ella S. Parker, a daughter of Asher B. and Harriet N. (Castle) Parker, the former of whom was born in Oneida county, New York, and the latter in Monroe county, New York. Harriet Castle was a daughter of Heman and Nancy (Wilmarth) Castle, both of whom were natives of Vermont. The Parker family came to Michigan in 1835, and Mrs. Benjamin was born in Royal Oak, Oakland county, this state, in 1851.
S. WILSON HARGER. That the large percentage of foreign born pop- ulation, most of them from the southern countries of Europe, in our cities need not be so alarming to the student of social conditions is evidenced by the sturdy stock of the large body of our American farmers. Prac- tically all of them with a long American lineage, and behind that de- scended from ancestors with the hardy blood of the north in their veins, they stand ready to offset the taint that is insinuating itself into the American stock through the slums of the city. S. Wilson Harger, of section 29, West Bloomfield township, Oakland county, Michigan, is one of these farmers from whom eventually the whole nation will seek to recoup its energies. Many generations ago his ancestors had the blood of the nobility of Norway in their veins, but, troubled by political dis- sensions, emigrated to Scotland, where they and their descendants stayed long enough to get a noticeable amount of Scotch blood. Just before the Revolutionary war two brothers of the Harger family came to the United States, and it is from them that Wilson Harger descended. These two brothers early proved their love for their new country by fighting for it in the War of the Revolution.
Douglas Harger, the father of Wilson Harger, was born in Genesee county, New York, the son of Seeley Harger, a native of Somerset county, New York. He came to Michigan first when he was about four years old, but returned and married there, his first wife, who accom- panied him to Michigan, and who died soon afterward in Genesee county, near St. John's, Michigan, leaving him a widower with two children. After her death he went back to New York and was married again, this time to Eunice Wilson, the daughter of Stephen and Ellen Seeley Wilson, who came as pioneers into Michigan from New York in the early days. Her father was a native of Long Island. In 1858 Mr.
833
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
and Mrs. Harger came to Michigan, where he lived until his death, in May, 1908, and where his widow still lives. They were the parents of six children, of which only two survive, Mark E. and Wilson.
S. Wilson Harger lived with his father until he was twenty-seven years old, when his marriage to Laura Todd, daughter of George W. and Lydia (Dummock ) Todd, of West Bloomfield township, took place. The wedding date was December 5, 1899. They have had one child, Douglas Harger, named for his grandfather, who was born in May, 1907. Mrs. Harger is a graduate of Pontiac high school and taught school for three years before her marriage. Mr. Harger is a Democat in politics. He owns one hunded and twenty acres of land in section 29, West Bloomfield township. They are both members of the Presbyterian church at Pontiac.
AARON B. AVERY, M. D., was a descendant of Christopher Avery, the first of the name who immigrated to this country in 1630, and whose only son, Captain James, founded the well-known family of "Groton Averys." His great-grandfather, Nathan Avery, was a soldier in the Revolutionary war, and settled in 1817, at Palmyra, New York, from whence his son, Benjamin, migrated to Michigan with his family in 1838, locating in Dansville, Ingham county. Nathan Avery, Benjamin's oldest son, removed to the township of Lyndon, Washtenaw county, where he married, March 22, 1847, Matilda Rockwell, daughter of Eli and Charlotte (Ford) Rockwell, and resided here until his death, Sep- tember 9, 1889, and here his third child and oldest son, Aaron B. Avery, was born, August 26, 1853. His boyhood was spent on his father's farm, attending the district school until at the age of sixteen years he entered the State Normal School at Ypsilanti, remaining two years. In 1874 he attended the Chelsea high school, from which he was graduated in 1875. For five years he.was a successful teacher in the schools of Washtenaw and Livingston counties, following this occupation between intervals of attending school and attending lectures at the Homeopathic College of the University of Michigan, where, in 1878, he received his degree of M. D. Shortly afterward he entered the practice of his pro- fession in Farmington, Oakland county, where he soon became popular and was called upon to fill the position of health officer and superin- tendent of schools. On October 22, 1879, Dr. Avery married Miss Lil- lian Drake, daughter of Francis Marion and Sarah Elizabeth (Chad- wick) Drake, of Farmington . Two daughters, Blanche and Lucile, were born to Dr. and Mrs. Avery.
After nearly eight years of successful practice in Farmington and vicinity, Dr. Avery removed to Pontiac, where his reputation had pre- ceded him. Here he immediately entered upon an extensive practice and speedily took his place among the leading physicians. He was eleven years surgeon of the P. O. & N. Railroad and served for fourteen years as examiner on the United States pension board. He has also held the office of first vice-president of the State Homeopathic Medical College of this state, and chairman of the Bureau of Materia Medica. He was president of his graduating class at Ann Arbor and has been president of the Alumni Association, as well as of a number of business enter- prises with which he has been from time to time connected.
Dr. Avery stood high in the Masonic fraternity. He was raised in Farmington Lodge, No. 151, F. & A. M., in June, 1879, and was past-
834
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
master of the same. At Pontiac he identified himself with the frater- nity and had the honor of being past master of Pontiac Lodge, No. 21, F. & A. M .; past high priest of Oakland Chapter, No. 5, R. A. M., and past commander of Pontiac Commandery, No. 2, K. T. He was also a member of Moslem Temple, Detroit, Michigan. In politics he was a Republican.
Dr. Avery was a man of strong and decided character, to whom Nature had bestowed on mind and physique an unusual share of , lavish gifts. In the height of his usefulness and ripened experience, after giving thirty-three years of his life to the service of the sick and un- fortunate, he died after an illness of only a few hours, June 12, 191I.
JAMES WILSON ORR. Although born in one foreign land and for a short time a resident of another, the late James Wilson Orr, of Pontiac, lived about fifty-four of the seventy-two years of his life in the state of Michigan, and about twenty-seven of them in Pontiac, in which city he passed away on April 19, 1912. As a result of his long years of close proximity with the state he became thoroughly imbued with the spirit of Michigan and her people, and was in close touch and sympathy with all her aspirations and efforts toward the progress and further development of their great, enterprising and rapidly growing common- wealth.
Mr. Orr's life began in Scotland, on July 19, 1840, and he lived in his native land until he was seventeen years old. His parents, Robert and Mary (Montgomery) Orr, were also born in Scotland, and were reared and married there. In 1857 the father crossed the Atlantic to Canada and located in London, Middlesex county, province of On- tario. He had been a superintendent of railroad construction in his native land and he followed railroad work in Canada after his arrival in that country. In 1858 the mother followed him to their new home, bringing all the children with her except the eldest son, who remained in Scotland. There were eleven children in the family, seven of whom grew to maturity, and for years they all returned home to spend the Christmas holidays with their parents.
James W. Orr removed to Detroit when he was eighteen years old and found employment in the clerical department of the Detroit, Grand Haven & Milwaukee Railway, which is now a division of the Grand Trunk System. He remained in the service of that road for thirty-eight years, holding on through all the changes of connection and ownership that came to it, and was promoted from place to place on his merit with steady regularity. The only period during which he was not with the road in this extended service was the four years between September, 1861, and October 1, 1865, when he was in the Union army, fighting against the dismemberment of the land of his adoption.
In September, 1861, he enlisted in Company D, Thirty-sixth Illinois Veteran Volunteer Infantry, in which he served until the war closed, taking part in numerous battles and all the wearisome marches to which his regiment was subjected. He received an honorable discharge from the army on October 1, 1865, and immediately returned to the home of his parents, where he passed a month or more in rest and recuperation. He then came back to Detroit and resumed his connection with the rail- road service.
During the last ten years of this he was stationed at Grand Haven,
835
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
where he was general agent for the railroad company and the steamship lines connected with it in the business. In 1875 he was located in Pon- tiac as the agent of the company, and for several years served it in that capacity in this city. He was also one of its traveling auditors on three different occasions. In October, 1896, he retired from active work and took up his residence again in Pontiac, where he owns a very comfortable home at 94 Judson street, as well as several other pieces of valuable real estate.
In early life Mr. Orr was married to Miss E. Isabella Spence, a native of Scotland, and five children were born to this union. William and James are deceased, as is also an infant, while the living are Mary Isabella, the wife of William F. Harteck, of Grand Haven, Michigan, and James( also a resident of that city. On August 4, 1890, Mr. Orr was married to Miss Eleanor Jane Christian, a daughter of Thomas and Esther (Looney) Christian, natives of the Isle of Man. The father was a shoemaker and came to Albany, New York, from his native land in 1836, when a boy of eighteen years, and there he remained and mar- ried. In 1852 he brought his family to the west and located in Pontiac, where the father was the first man to produce hand sewed shoes. He and his wife passed the remainder of their days in Pontiac, where he died on December 5, 1898, and she on April 23, 1902. When they lo- cated at Pontiac there were not more than a few scattered residences on the present site of the city, and the community was entirely rural and primitive, but of a fine spirit of ambition and enterprise, which has made it what it is today. Mrs. Orr was born in Albany, New York, on March 29, 1846, and she still makes her home in this city, where she was reared and educated. She is a member of the First Methodist Episcopal church, of which her husband was also a member during his life time.
Mr. Orr was a faithful Democrat, and was always a zealous worker in the interests of the party. He served his city as alderman from the first ward, and in many ways showed his deep, abiding and serviceable interest in the welfare of his community. No public interest or enter- prise for the betterment of the communal welfare of the city ever lacked his ardent and intelligent support, nor ever languished for lack of the aid his energy and influence might give it. While he looked carefully to his own interests with the passing years, he was always on the alert to the wants of the city and county, and did what he could in the fur- therance of their best development. He was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic, but maintained no fraternal relations of other variety.
JOHN W. PATTERSON. Because the Patterson Manufacturing Com- pany is such a prominent feature of Holly life and because it is through Mr. Patterson's management that it has reached its greatest success his connection with it is perhaps the most interesting feature of this sketch. The enterprise was originally of a municipal nature. With the proceeds from the sale of Holly Park and four acres of adjacent land the build- ings of the present plant were erected and fitted out for use. The main building of concrete contains 33,000 square feet of floor space, with 10,000 square feet more supplemented in the power house shed and other accessory parts of the plant.
In spite of its auspicious beginning, the Holly Wagon Company did not prosper. Finding the competition of larger wagon companies too
.836
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
strong to cope with, and facing continuous losses, the leaders of the enterprise decided to close out in 1904. At its forced sale the plant was bought by John W. Patterson, the subject of this sketch. His early life, his business career and his development of the resources of the afore- mentioned wagon company will be traced in detail.
Mr. Patterson's parents, Thomas and Jane (Oswald) Patterson, were both born in Belfast, Ireland. In about the year 1852 they im- migrated, coming to Oakland county to settle on a new farm on which Thomas Patterson cut the first tree. On this farm in 1859 John W. Patterson was born and on this and the other land which his father cleared and developed he grew to the years of manhood. His parents lived until 1907 and 1911, respectively, each dying at the ripe age of eighty-three. Their family consisted of two daughters and one son be- sides John Patterson of Holly.
The subject of this account earned his first bread of independence at work on neighboring farms. He continued in this vocation until twenty- two years of age. Thereafter he held positions in hardware stores, pres- ently opening such a store in conjunction with C. W. Britton. He also handled grain in elevators for three years, eventually becoming a sales- man of agricultural implements. In this work he gained much of the valuable knowledge which has contributed so largely to his present suc- cess. For seven years he was associated in this work with the D. S. Morgan Company of Brockport, New York, and with Donaldson Broth- ers, of Mt. Clemens, for ten years. During this time his canvassing field covered chiefly the state of Michigan.
It was natural that Mr. Patterson should be one of the original stock- holders of the Holly Wagon Company ; their investment was $55,000, the town donating $5,000. He did not share the general belief in the futility of the enterprise, and when the company was dissolved he bought it, later taking in the Brown Brothers, of Grand Rapids. In 1904 the works thus became the Patterson & Brown Brothers Manufacturing Company.
This firm brought to the business such practical knowledge of busi- ness as well as of the needs in this particular line that its scope of man- ufacture was broadened and its annual output of farm wagons, bobsleds, cultivators, land rollers, combination stock racks, boats and garden wheel- barrows, altogether reached a figure of $65,000. The amount of its payroll rose to $15,000, and it pays the same amount locally for material. In 1909 Mr. Patterson bought the Brown interests and at present nearly all the stock is held by himself and his family. In spite of the fact that many prophesied failure for him, he has adapted his judgment to the needs of this important class of utilities and by applying the thorough knowledge his former experience had given him he has made his pro- ducts standard specialties for general use. The result has been that the demand for his supplies has exceeded the capacity of the plant to manufacture, that his profitable trade has constantly grown and that the value of the Patterson Manufacturing Company has been steadily in- creasing. It is counted one of the most successful of Oakland county's business enterprises.
Among Mr. Patterson's other business connections is that of the Furniture Company of Lansing, which owes its financial existence to him and which has capital of $60,000. He has been vice-president of the Holly Citizens' Savings Bank since its organization. Although his
837
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
experience has led him to manufacturing rather than landed interests, his farm of one hundred and nineteen acres near Holly, receives his careful attention.
Mrs. Patterson was Miss Sarah Seelig, the daughter of Daniel Seelig, of the vicinity of Holly. She became the wife of John Patterson in 1888. Their only child, Willah E., was educated at St. Mary's academy at Monroe until her failing health led her solicitious parents to send her to California in the hope of renewing her strength. But the land of sunshine and roses failed to restore her ebbing vitality; among its soft airs and surrounded by such comforts as tenderness can give, she ceased to breathe on January 6, 1909, at the age of twenty-one.
John Patterson is a supporter of the Presbyterian church of Holly and is broadly interested in religious and philanthropic benevolences. He is a Democrat in politics, as was his father, though not one of the public-voiced or office-seeking type. His most efficient service to the community has been in successfully developing the manufactory which is one of the features that have "put Holly on the map" conspicuously and permanently.
LUCIUS L. FRANK. Mr. and Mrs. Lucius L. Frank, of Rochester, may well claim to be among the "first families," not only by their birth and breeding, but literally speaking as well, for their ancestry traces back to the Mayflower so far as their national residence is concerned, and it has been nearly one hundred years since the family of each side of the house came to Michigan. The former and present generations proved their valor on the field of battle and the family name is an hon- ored and honorable one.
John and Arabella (Chipman) Frank, the parents of Lucius L. Frank, were from New England, the father, born January 18, 1799, a native of Vermont, the mother a New Yorker. He came to Michigan in 1823, locating in section 26, of Avon township, Oakland county. Mr. Frank purchased ninety-seven acres of land from the government and cleared and broke the ground, for all was covered with timber. He followed farming successfully. His wife came to this county with her parents in 1817. She died in 1846, but Mr. Frank survived until December 30. 1887. Their descendants were eleven in number, all but two being now deceased. They were: Alta C., widow of Loran C. Burch, of Pontiac : Mary Ann, John, Cyrus. Edwin R., Nancy A., Edwin R., Cyrus, Ara- bella, O., deceased ; Lucius L., of Rochester : and Amelia, deceased. On March 1, 1849, John Frank married Adeline Kettell, who died Septem- ber 22, 1886.
Lucius L. was born in Avon township on March 9. 1843. He re- mained on the home farm until nineteen years old, when he felt the inspiration that the Civil war sent through the country, and enlisted. He joined Company B of the Twenty-Second Michigan Volunteer In- fantry on August 1I, 1862, and served thirty-five months. He was mus- tered out at Nashville, Tennessee, June 26, 1865, and received his hon- orable discharge at Detroit, July 11, 1865.
Returning to the old home he carried on farming for twenty-one years, until his father's death. At that time he was working two hun- dred and forty acres. He now owns one hundred and twenty-one and one-half acres. He married Adeline S. Kent on March 12, 1867. She was a daughter of Joseph and Mary Ann ( Kettell) Kent, who were from
838
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
Massachusetts, Mr. Kent being a tinner by trade. Of their eight children four are deceased. In the order of their birth the children were: Joseph, of Massachusetts ; Martha, Amos and James, deceased; William, of Kansas City, Missouri; Adeline, wife of Lucius L. Frank ; and Cathe- rine, deceased. Mr. Kent died in July, 1849, and his wife survived him for a third of a century, passing away on November 4, 1881. Mr. and Mrs. L. L. Frank were blessed with eight children, and are additionally fortunate in that death has only once invaded the family circle. The children in their order were: John R. and Lucius H., of the Upper Peninsula; Joseph K., of Macomb county ; a son who died in infancy ; William L., of Cass county ; Kate Belle, wife of Henry Holt, who is at home with her parents; Harry S., of California; and Loren B., who is at home. Mr. Frank is a Republican and has served as school director. He belongs to the Grand Army of the Republic and his religious tenets are those of the Universalist church.
Mrs. Frank's grandfather, whose name was James, married Sarah Greenleaf at Newburyport, Massachusetts. She died February 19, 1812, leaving two daughters, Adeline and Mary Ann. Her grandfather on the other side was Joseph Kent, whose wife was Hannah Trask. Mr. Kent was a soldier of the Revolutionary war, and he and his wife left six descendants: Mary, Martha, John, Abbie, Joseph and Henry.
The maternal grandfather of L. L. Frank was Dr. Cyrus Chipman, who came to Michigan in 1817 from New York state, settling in Avon township. Dr. Chipman and his wife were the parents of thirteen chil- dren. They trace their lineage back in unbroken succession to the May- flower. John Frank, the father of Lucius, of this review, held com- missions from Governor Mason, including lieutenant, captain, major and colonel. He also went by the title of Colonel Frank. He was a surveyor here in the early days.
DR. ROBERT CASSELS. Supplementing his general farming and dairy- ing business with a thorough knowledge of veterinary practice, Dr. Robert Cassels, whose place is on Rural Route One out of Rochester, has a distinct advantage over most others who follow dairying and stock raising. For ten years prior to embarking in the latter lines he practiced as a veterinarian, and his services were most highly esteemed by the many who knew of his skill in handling all kinds of cases affecting stock of the different grades. When he embarked in agriculture and stock raising on his own account he did not neglect to keep up with his pro- fession, but studies and practices at all times.
Dr. Cassels was born in Wingham, province of Ontario, Canada, on February 21, 1872, his parents being Mark and Mary (Allen) Cassels. The father came from Ireland, but the mother was a native of Canada. When Mark Cassels crossed the Atlantic in 1855 he located at Wingham and followed farming all of his life, accumulating one hundred acres of land by his industry. He passed away on January 2, 1888, and his wife followed him to the better land on January 10, 1902. While the sable angel called the parents to their reward, the shadow of similar sorrow has never assailed any of their descendants and their six children are all living. These are: Martha, the wife of James Golley, of Wingham, Ontario; George, of Fresno, California; William, of Flint, Michigan ; James, of the same place; Thomas, of Wingham, Ontario; and Robert, the subject of this sketch.
839
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
Following his early educational training, Robert Cassels attended the Ontario Veterinary College, graduating therefrom in 1893. He came at once to Rochester and practiced for ten years. He bought .ninety-seven acres in section 23 of Avon township, but sold it again and bought his present place of ninety-eight acres in section 22. The many splendid improvements which the place bears have nearly all been installed by Dr. Cassels. Among these might be mentioned a huge silo, with a capacity of eighty-five tons. He makes a specialty of dairying and has a fine herd of twenty Holstein milch cows, headed by a registered bull of pure pedigree. All of the animals are thoroughbreds. Dr. Cassels in addition to the dairying follows diversified farming.
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.