USA > Michigan > St Joseph County > History of St. Joseph county, Michigan, with illustrations descriptive of its scenery, palatial residences, public buildings, fine blocks, and important manufactories > Part 39
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At the age of twenty-three he became acquainted with and married Miss Julia V. R. Woodworth, of Centreville. They were married July 25, 1847, and soon after established themselves on a new farm, three miles north of Centreville, where they have since resided, engaged in the quiet occupation of farming and rearing their family, which consists of four children,-two sons and two daughters. The two daughters are married, and one of them has lost her husband, and is left a young widow with a young child. She is at this time living at home with her parents.
Mr. Langley has a fine farm of two hundred and sixteen acres, situated on the south bank of the St. Joseph river, well adapted to the production of the various kinds of grain for which this region is so justly celebrated. In religious sentiment he is liberal in his views, without any decided preference of denominational fellowship.
In politics he is more pronounced, cherishing very decided Democratic views. A kind husband and father, generous and honorable in his dealings, he commands universal respect and esteem from his neighbors and acquaint-
ances, and love and devotion from his friends and relatives. He has, in the pages of this work, bequeathed to his friends and the citizens of St. Joseph county a fine view of the homestead, with portraits of himself and his esti- mable wife, which will remain as a monument to the memory of that truest and noblest type of manhood, an American gentleman.
OLIVER W. WILCOX,
whose portrait and that of his excellent wife, with a fine view of his farm residence, may be found elsewhere in the pages of this work, was born in the town of Westerly, Rhode Island, in 1803, on the old Wilcox farm, he being one of the fifth generation of that family since its first settlement on this side of the Atlantic.
He was the son of Oliver, who was the son of Isaiah, a Baptist minister, who was the son of Stephen, who was the son of Edward Wilcox, who emi- grated from England and settled in Rhode Island at an early period in the history of the English colonies.
Oliver W. is the eldest son in a family of twelve children, and received but limited advantages from the common-schools of that day, remaining with and assisting his father on the farm until he attained his majority ; he then left home and commenced work for himself. He was engaged in ship- building about ten years at New Bedford and other places.
He then came west to Rochester, New York, where he remained six months, and then went to Michigan in quest of a farm. He selected and made a purchase of one hundred and ten acres in the present town of Nottawa, St. Joseph county, and the same fall built the house in which he now resides. He then returned to Massachusetts in quest of a wife to preside in it.
On his return, he, with his usual business promptness, made an offer of matrimonial partnership to Miss Harriet Vincent, which was as promptly accepted; and in February following he returned, bringing his wife to their new home in the wilds of Michigan, since which time Mr. Wilcox has been engaged in the quiet occupation of farming, never mixing in the strifes and turmoils of political or public life.
In the year 1842 he met with a great loss in the death of his beloved wife, which' left him alone with his three little ones, one son and two daugh- ters. The two daughters are living, both married. The son died in the Union army, at Chattanooga. After four years of dreary mourning, Mr. Wilcox decided to fill the vacancy in his heart and home by taking another com- panion, which he did by marrying Miss Lucy A. Kent, of Kalamazoo, a na- tive of Rutland, Vermont. The fruits of this union are three sons and two daughters ; one son and one daughter are married,-the other three children are living at home with the old gentlemen. A member of the Baptist church for the last forty-seven years; a consistent Christian; temperate in all things, and a Republican in politics. He is to-day, at the age of seventy- three years, a hale and hearty old gentleman, universally respected by his acquaintances, and loved by his friends.
THOMAS W. LANGLEY.
Foremost among the enterprising pioneers of St. Joseph county, Thomas W. Langley, the first actual settler on the site of the present village of Centreville, stood pre-eminent. Energetic and untiring, he achieved fully as much, if not more, with the means at his disposal, than any other man in the early days of the settlement of the county. Buying the bare site of the county seat, he pushed to completion in the incredible space of three months, a frame court-house, twenty-four by thirty, the largest log-house in the county, for hotel purposes, a blacksmith-shop, store-building, flouring and saw-mill, and had a post-office, a school, and religious services in regular and successful operation. He was constantly doing something to aid in the prosperity of the village and enhance the value of the property therein. He brought in the first stock of goods sold in the village, and engaged, at various times, in mercantile, manufacturing and agricultural pursuits, and, as occasion required, kept the hotel of the village. He was the first post- master of the village, and held the position from 1833 to 1840.
Mr. Langley was born in Murray street, New York, in the year 1801. His father, William Langley, was a native of England; he was a mason by trade, and assisted in the building of the Drury Lane theatre, in London, the old Bowery and the old City Bank in New York, and the first capitol buildings at Albany.
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HISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
The mother of Mr. Langley, the subject of this sketch, Susan Elliott, was a native of Ireland, and came with her parents therefrom to Philadelphia when she was ten years of age.
Mr. William Langley, the father, also landed first at Philadelphia, where it is supposed he was married to Miss Elliott. During the building of the old capitol buildings at Albany, in 1812, Mr. Langley left his wife and children at old Fort Stanwix for safety, during the war then being waged between the mother country and the United States.
Three children were the fruits of this marriage, viz .:
SARAH, born in New York city, and who afterwards married W. G. Hirst, who emigrated from Wakefield, England, and was a manufacturer of woolen goods ; he owned and operated a factory known as the Branchtown mills, near Germantown, Pennsylvania.
THOMAS W., the subject of our sketch ; and
SUSAN, born in New York also, and who married Lawrence Butler, a sea- captain. with whom and a son, she was lost at sea about the year 1831, leaving two daughters surviving her.
At the age of fourteen years Thomas W. Langley was apprenticed to the trade of a woolen manufacturer, with his brother-in-law, Hirst, and at seven- teen years was promoted to the position of foreman of the mills, with fifty operatives under his charge. At twenty-one years of age he was admitted into the business as a partner with Mr. Hirst.
About the year 1822 Mr. Langley rented the Black Rock mills near Germantown, and operated them in connection with the Branchtown mills, conducting also, at the same time, two dry-goods stores in Philadelphia, on Market and Second streets, in company with his mother, Mrs. Susan Langley.
In 1825 he purchased a farm and mill in Treydiffen township, Chester county, Pa., twenty-one miles from Philadelphia, and changed the mill into a woolen factory, which he conducted under the name of the "Clintonville factory :" he also operated a store, limestone quarries and kilns, and con- tinued his connection with Hirst in the Branchtown mills. having over one hundred operatives on his pay-rolls. He sold his Chester county property in 1831, and removed again to Branchtown mills. In May, 1832, he suf- fered from a severe attack of fever, and, upon the peremptory advice of Doctors Physic and B. Franklin Bache, of Philadelphia, traveled over the Alleghenies in a carriage, accompanied by his son, William B., then a boy of nine years, to regain, if possible, his usual robust health. He trav- eled as far as Rochester, New York, where he stopped with his cousin, Judge E. Smith Lee, his health being much improved.
Receiving letters from home informing him of the mills' suspension by reason of the cholera then raging, he took a packet on the Erie canal for Buffalo, where he met an old friend, who commanded one of the three steamers then afloat on Lake Erie, who persuaded the invalid to try the virtue of the lake breezes, at least as far as Ashtabula, but landed him in Detroit, where, meeting with old friends,-Colonel Macks, Desnoyers and others,-was persuaded to stay over one trip and look at the country. He bought a section of land where the site of Flint, in Genesee county, is situ- ated, and, hearing Thomas Sheldon, the receiver of the land-office at White Pigeon, discourse in glowing terms of the St. Joseph country, Mr. Langley, on receipt of further news from home, concluded to take a look at the beau- tiful prairies and oak-openings of St. Joseph; and so, buying an Indian pony, saddle and outfit, the whole costing fifty dollars, he went, in company with Sheldon, General Brown, Colonel Anderson, and other officers who were going to the Black Hawk war, to White Pigeon, where he arrived in
June, and proceeded to explore the county and buy the site of the county seat, as fully detailed in the Centreville history, as is also his settlement and operations thereon, and his emigration with his family from Philadelphia thereto. On his return to the latter place, his friends said he had left the city a sick man, and had returned a crazy one, so enthusiastic was he in his praises and description of his new purchase in St. Joseph county.
On the 22d of March, 1822, Mr. Langley was married to Margaret Stig- man, the ceremony being performed by Rev. Dr. Broadhead, in Philadel- phia. She was a native of Maryland, and her parents dying when she was at a tender age, she became a member of the family of her uncle, Thomas Badaraque, a Frenchman, engaged in the East India trade with one Lewis Clapier, in Philadelphia, and by her said uncle was nurtured in affluence, with everything at her command, and illy fitted to fill the position she sub- sequently so worthily and uncomplainingly occupied, amid the privations of border life.
The children which were the fruits of this union were:
WILLIAM BADARAQUE LANGLEY, born in Germantown, June 9, 1823; now a farmer in Nottawa.
JOSEPH LAFAYETTE LANGLEY, born in Philadelphia, September 28, 1854, the same day the great and good Lafayette was received with hearty welcome to that city; now a wholesale tea-merchant in New York.
DEWITT CLINTON LANGLEY, born in Treydiffen township, Chester county, Pa., July 28, 1826 ; now a real-estate broker in New York city.
THOMAS CHESTER LANGLEY, born in Treydiffen township, September 23, 1828 ; now a merchant in Constantine, St. Joseph county.
WASHINGTON ELLIOTT LANGLEY, born in Treydiffen township, February 21, 1830.
SUSAN B. LANGLEY, born at Branchtown Mills, April 28, 1832; now Mrs. J. Austin Sperry, of Little Silver, N. J.
LAWRENCE BUTLER LANGLEY, born in Centreville, St. Joseph county, Michigan, April 19, 1835; now engaged in stock-raising at Rio Frio, Uvalde county, Texas ; and
HENRY STIGMAN LANGLEY, born in Centreville, September 6, 1837, and died September 21 following.
Joseph L. married Antoinette Hale, in Detroit, in 1851, and Thomas C. married Susanna J. Proudfit, of Constantine, November 24, 1852.
Mrs. Langley died August 21, 1850, after a short illness, aged a little more than forty-six years.
In 1851 or 1852 Mr. Langley closed out his interests in St. Joseph county, and returned to Philadelphia, where he formed a mercantile agency, travel- ing through the South for several of the jobbing-houses of that city ; he was thus engaged at the time of his decease, at Paducah, Ky., January 9, 1855.
Mr. Langley " possessed a noble and generous nature, a mild and amia- ble disposition, and a kind, benevolent heart, and, as a consequence, enjoyed the confidence of many devoted and affectionate friends." About a month before his death (November 9, 1854), he was married to Mrs. C. R. Moore, of Philadelphia, and started immediately to the West in her company. Upon landing at Paducah he was injured by a fall, which he survived but thirteen days, and was cared for most kindly, and buried by the Masonic fraternity, of which he was a member. In politics he was a Democrat.
RESIDENCE OF GEO . . I. CROSSETTE CONSTANTINE, ST JOSEPH Co., MICH.
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RESIDENCE OF JACOB S. GENTZLER, Two MILES NORTH OF WHITE PIGEON & TWO MILES SOUTH-EAST OF CONSTANTINE, CONSTANTINE TP., S" JOE CO, MICH.
113
HISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
CONSTANTINE.
The settlement of the territory included in the present limits of the town- ship of Constantine, began in the year 1829,-William Meek, of Wayne county, Ohio, being the advance-guard of the host to follow. He came in the winter of 1828-9,-possibly in the summer of 1828,-and made his selection of a location at the intersection of the Fawn and St. Joseph rivers, where the present village of Constantine is situated; but his family did not come until the spring of 1829, when he built a cabin for them, (the first in the settlement,) then went to Monroe and bought his land. In the following winter he began the erection of a saw-mill,-from which time onward, until long after the plat of the village was laid out, the settle- ment was known as "Meek's Mill."
The second family to come into the settlement was Jacob Bonebright's, which settled on the farm at present owned and occupied by A. Hagenbuch on section twenty-six. Mr. Bonebright, from Pennsylvania, originally came and located in May, 1829, and built the second house in the settlement. Nathan Syas and family came in the same spring or summer after Mr. Bonebright. He located a farm which covered the site of the present dwell- ing of Hon. H. H. Riley.
C. B. Fitch, afterwards judge of the county-court, came in from Ohio in 1830 and located on the prairie, and built the first frame house outside of the village, but in 1831 sold the same to John G. and William Cathcart, who, with their families, came in the fall of 1831.
William Hamilton, from Ohio, came to the prairie in 1827 to look at the country, but returned to Ohio, and again came in 1830, and returned with- out purchasing. In 1827 he went to Beardsley's prairie, in Cass county, and worked through harvest. In 1832 Mr. Hamilton came with his family of four sons, a married daughter and her husband, Alfred Poe, and their child, and settled in the openings on what is now known as Broad street, on the farm now owned by Adam Gentzler. Heman Harwood came in 1832 to Broad street, and located a portion of the farm now owned by the Gib- sons. Mr. Hamilton built two log-houses in the summer and fall of 1832. John Garrison came in 1833 to Broad street.
Mr. Bonebright, who came to look for a location in 1828, stopped with Klinger on the shores of Klinger lake, making his location the following year, as before stated. He sold his first location in 1836-7, and removed to the one now occupied by his widow and son Henry, where they have lived over forty years.
Caleb Arnold and family moved into Constantine in 1833,-having pre- viously (1832) bought a location in Fabius,-and located on the opposite side of the river from the then settlement. Deacon William Churchill had settled on the edge of the prairie in 1831. Mr. Arnold's family consisted of his son, William F., now of Three Rivers; Daniel, now of Constantine ; Dr. O. F., of Three Rivers, and Lyman, who is now dead, and a daughter, Mrs. Tracy. William F. Arnold located on Broad street in 1836, and remained some years, removing to Lockport in 1854. Aaron Hagenbuch came into the township in 1837, and Norman Harvey in 1833, both of whom were of the leading citizens of the township.
Joshua Gale settled on the prairie in 1830, and afterwards sold his claim to William Welbourne, an Englishman, in 1835. It is said Gale moved his barn once, or was about to move it, when Mr. Welbourne bought him out, to get rid of the manure that had accumulated about his yards, but Mr. Welbourne moved the latter instead.
Alfred L. Driggs came to Constantine in 1831 and bought land on Broad street, but went to Branch county and built a saw-mill, where he remained until 1836, when he returned to Constantine and went to clearing-up and cultivating his land. He was supervisor of the township for eleven years, and representative from the county to the legislature in 1846. John Harri- son was a leading citizen, too, of the township, holding the position of super- visor, continuously for ten years, from 1857 to 1866 inclusive. Hiram Linds- ley is an old and well-known resident of the township, having held the position of county clerk for ten years. Deacon William George and family, of whom A. B. George, one of Constantine's foremost men of to-day, was a member, came into the settlement in 1834.
TOPOGRAPHY.
The surface of the township is, generally speaking, a level, though some- what broken as it approaches the St. Joseph, which passes through the
township. Its area includes within its limits twenty-two thousand seven hundred and fifteen acres of land-surface, sixteen hundred acres of the same being a portion of White Pigeon prairie. The balance of the area was originally covered with burr-oak and white-oak openings, some of it very heavy, and other portions light and scattering. The river-bottoms are heavily-timbered (or were so originally) with various kinds of wood common to the country. There are about four hundred and sixty acres of water- surface, the drainage of the township being as follows: The St Joseph river enters the township on the north line of the northeast quarter of the northeast quarter of section one, and runs southerly through sections one, twelve and thirteen, and southwestwardly through sections twenty, twenty-three, twenty- seven and thirty, making its final exit (after two attempts) on the southeast quarter of section thirty-one. Mill creek rises in two forks,-one on the northeast quarter of section three, the other in the northeast half of section six, and, uniting on the southwest quarter of section seven, runs nearly south to the St. Joseph, which it enters just south of the south line of the south- west quarter of section thirty-two. Fawn river or Crooked creek enters the township near the southeast corner of section twenty-four, and passes through the corporate limits of the village of Constantine to the east bank of the St. Joseph, which it enters through the elaborate works of the Hydraulic Company. Black run is a little creek, which rises on section sixteen, runs mostly due south, and enters the St. Joseph on the southeast quarter of sec- tion thirty-two.
The soil is the same fertile, sandy loam of the openings that characterizes the other portions of the county, and the prairie soil is similar in constituent elements to that of Nottawa prairie, the whole township being a highly- productive one in the cereals, corn, and agricultural products. The bowlder- drift passed by this township generally, except in the western portion, along the Cass county line, where a heavy deposit of stone is found, which has supplied the needs of the township up to the present time, and will continue to do so for some time to come.
THE FIRST FARMS
opened were those of Judge William Meek, in 1829, Jacob Bonebright and Nathan Syas the same year, and Joshua A. Gale on the prairie, in 1830. The first house was built by Judge Meek in 1829,-a log cabin on the south bank of the St. Joe. The following were among the entries of public lands in 1829, the first year any were made in the town- ship : On the 15th of June William Meek entered the southeast quarter of the northeast quarter and the southeast quarter of section twenty-three, the west half of the southwest quarter and the southeast quarter of the south- west quarter of section twenty-four, and the west half of the southwest quarter of section twenty-five. The same day John Coleman entered the west half of the southeast quarter of section thirty-four; H. L. and A. C. Stewart the east half of the southeast quarter of section thirty-one and the southwest quarter of section thirty-two, and Johnson Meek the east half of the southwest quarter of section twenty-five. On the 16th, William Meek entered the west half of the northwest quarter of section thirty-six, and on the 29th, Aaron Brooks, of Richland county, Ohio, entered the west half of the southwest quarter of section thirty. July 13, Jacob Bonebright entered the south fraction of the northwest fraction-quarter of section twenty-six. There were twenty-five other entries the same year. In 1874 there were one hundred and thirty-four farms in the township, averaging one hundred and forty-three acres each. There were sown in 1874 four thousand two hundred and forty-seven acres of wheat, and two thousand acres of corn planted. The crop of 1873 yielded forty thousand five hundred and fifty-three bushels of wheat from three thousand eight hundred and two acres sown ; forty-nine thousand one hundred and seventy-three bushels of corn from one thou- sand eight hundred and eighty acres; three thousand four hundred and seventy bushels of other grain, three thousand five hundred and seven bushels of potatoes, one thousand one hundred and twenty-four tons of hay, fifteen thousand two hundred and thirty-seven pounds of wool, ninety-three thousand three hundred and twenty-five pounds of pork, twenty-nine thou- sand and twenty pounds of butter, and two hundred and forty-one barrels of cider. One hundred and eighty-one acres in orchards produced ten thousand three hundred and forty-seven bushels of apples, valued at six thousand four
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HISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
hundred and fifteen dollars. There were owned in the township, in 1874, three hundred and seventy-five horses, fifteen mules, three hundred and seventy-two cows, two hundred and fifty-three head of other cattle, one thou- sand two hundred and eighty-eight hogs, two thousand five hundred and ninety-eight sheep against three thousand two hundred and seventeen of the latter in 1873.
The leading farmers are: Samuel Gibson, who owns four hundred and thirty-three acres on Broad street in a body, a view of whose elegant farm- house and buildings, and a bird's view of his well-tilled acres, is given on another page of our work. Mr. Gibson is justly credited by his towns-people as being the most successful farmer in the county. The farm, for the most part, is under cultivation, and lies on both sides of Broad street, and two hundred rods on the St. Joseph, about two and a half miles from Con- stantine. Also Jacob Gentzler, John Hamilton, O. C. M. Bates, the Tracy brothers. Adam Gentzler, and Aaron Hagenbuch,-the latter being one of the heaviest land owners in the county, having eight hundred acres under cultivation.
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The first frame and brick houses in the township were built in the village, and are especially named in the history thereof. The first fruit-trees planted were on the farm of Joshua Gale, in 1830. John G. Cathcart also set out an orchard in 1832, and Judge Meek, in 1829, planted apple-seeds and peach-pits.
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THE FIRST IMPROVED FARM MACHINERY
was introduced into the township as follows : Fanning-mills, 1831 ; cylinder- the her-, 1835; reapers, 1842-43, and separators, 1842,-the prairie farmers leading the way in each instance.
IMPROVED LIVE-STOCK
were introduced by Erastus Tracy, who dealt in short-horn stock, and raised the same for several years after 1850; but no one now makes a specialty of either fine-blooded cattle or sheep, cultivation of the soil engaging the atten- tion of the majority of the farmers of the township almost exclusively. Milo Powers brought in some cattle from Wadsworth's herds, New York.
THE FIRST WHITE CHILD
born in the township was Henry Bonebright, a son of Jacob Bonebright, who was born February 3, 1830, on the present farm of A. Hagenbuch, near Constantine village. Joseph C. Meek, son of Judge Meek, was born the following summer.
THE FIRST MARRIAGE
was that of Elliott Woods and Eliza Meek, who were married in 1830 or 1831. Thomas and Nancy Armstrong were married about the same time, and Hiram Kell and Malinda Syas soon after.
THE FIRST DEATH
that occurred in the township was that of a child in the village, in 1830. Mr. Sixbury's child, and a child of a Mr. Pendleton were buried during the year. Nathan Syas buried a daughter in the winter of 1830-31, and Mr. Bush buried a child soon after, near the mill-pond. The wife of Thomas Williams was the first adult who died. She was buried in
THE FIRST CEMETERY
laid off in the township, the site for which was given to the town by Judge Meek, in 1831, when the plat of the village was laid out. The present cem- etery was bought by the board of health of the township, in 1853, and con- ยท tains ten acres. It lies about a mile east of the village. Mr. Abner Thur- ber was the first person to be buried in it, but was first buried in the old cemetery, and removed subsequently to the new one. The most notable monument in the grounds is that of Governor Barry and his wife. It is a double-fluted column, joined at the top by drapery, and is very unique and beautifully wrought. The governor died January 14, 1870, and his wife in March, 1869.
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