A history of northeast Missouri, Vol. 2 pt 2, Part 104

Author: Williams, Walter, 1864- , ed
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 912

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Francis Marion Grimes, Jr., was born on the old family homestead in Howard county, grew up a rugged country; lad and was taught those habits of industry and traits of self-reliance and honesty which have been the foundation of his subsequent success in life. After completing his education at Central College at Fayette he engaged in the poultry business, beginning in a small way and building up until his business has now reached those proportions where his sales average $100,000 annually. Pluck, not luck, business acumen and a determination undaunted by adverse circumstances have been the means by which he has achieved his gratifying attainment in business, and he well merits his standing as one of the foremost business men of. Northeastern Missouri. One of his interesting but trying experiences in this line was when on one occasion he drove 600 turkeys twenty miles along the public highway to his place of business in Fayette. There his building is 24x118 feet, and his prin-

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Mr. R. Die Cinny

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cipal shipping points are Chicago, New York and Boston. He is a pleas- ant man to meet and is popular with all who know him.

In 1897 he was joined in marriage to Miss Beulah McCaushel, a daughter of J. B. McCaushel, of Fayette, Missouri. Mr. and Mrs. Grimes have two children, viz. : Elva, now ten years of age, and Virginia Lee, an infant. Mr. Grimes in a fraternal way is a Free and Accepted Mason.

WILLIAM H. DULANY. Very few men living can look back on a life so knit with the actual growth and development of Missouri as William H. Dulany, who first saw the light in the wilderness of northwestern or Missouri territory, in the earliest quarter of the nineteenth century. In the year 1816 his father, Joseph S. Dulany, had come to this country, locating in that part of it which is known as Howard county, and going into Fort Cooper for the winter. He was one of the noted Indian fight- ers of the period, whose activity in many Indian skirmishes in the Big Neck and Black Hawk wars was rewarded in later years by a grant from congress of 160 acres of land to be levied from any part of the govern- ment property in Missouri.

In the spring of 1817 Joseph S. Dulany and others settled their families in cabins near the fort, and in one of these William Dulany was born on the ninth day of January, 1818. He remembers that remote childhood as a time of mingled privation and luxury. The facts that few of these settlers had possessions other than their primitive homes and that no shops were nearer than St. Charles or St. Louis, two hun- dred miles away, made it necessary that all their wearing apparel be of the crudest home-made variety. From each family's little cotton and flax patch material was obtained, which by means of the processes of breaking, carding, spinning and weaving, was converted into fabrics for roughly fashioned clothing. Outer garments of buckskin, dressed in the Indian fashion ; hats of coon or otter skin, dressed with the hair on; footwear of the Indian moccasin variety or of leather made of cowhides tanned by being placed in a trough and covered with tan bark and water-these articles comprised the clothing with which William Dulany was familiar as a boy. The bread with which the family was provided was made from corn meal which was prepared by crushing the grain with a pestle in a wooden mortar or by grating it on an improvised grater. But provisions were fairly luxurious in variety of game, fruit, nuts and honey, which Mr. Dulany remembers as of almost inexhaustible plenty.

School privileges were meager but were appreciated to their fullest value. No public schools existed, but neighborhood schools were organ- ized by subscription among the families who were ambitious and enter- prising. These would have a cabin erected near a spring and would employ a teacher at a salary of from eight to twelve dollars per month and with his board and lodging furnished weekly in alternation by the patrons of the school. William Dulany remembers with real affection the primers and readers of those days of his early intellectual develop- ment. Not only were the primitive goose-quill pens in use, but the only ink procurable was that which the teacher and pupils made by boiling down maple bark until it was black. The first and only school of which William Dulany was a pupil was taught by John Treadwell Cleveland, then a young man; he was the oldest brother of Grover Cleveland's father, and was one of those who had taken Horace Greeley's advice to "go west," where he had organized some of the earliest rural schools of Missouri.

But the scholarly delights of the young Dulany were cut short when he was only nine years of age. The gradual settling of added pioneers

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in the Howard county region made it advisable that this family remove to a newer section in which the plenitude of game was not yet in any degree diminished. Here the country was too sparsely settled for school privileges. A year and a half later the mother of the family died and some time afterward a step-mother with four children of her own came into the family, with the not uncommon result that jealousy and unjust suspicion poisoned the boy's mind against her. Angrily resenting what he chose to imagine mistreatment of his own sisters, the fourteen-year- old boy left his home, saying that he would never return. Although he soon regretted his rebellious self-exile, he was too proud to turn back. Of his later perfect understanding with his father's wife, her expres- sions of pardon and real affection for him and his efforts to compensate her for that childish unfairness, he has often spoken with an emotion that demonstrates what a really warm heart he had. His mature view of the case was that his impressionable mind had been unjustly biased by the interference of relatives of his deceased mother.

At the time, however, his anger was succeeded only by chagrin and by a determination to persist in his decision to remain away from home. After walking more than fifteen miles, he approached a settlers' cabin and indicated that he wished to be hired. This man and his wife, Mr. and Mrs. W. P. Stephenson, although they knew the boy was a runaway, received him kindly. He has never forgotten the lunch that refreshed him after his long walk, nor the good offices of Mrs. Stephenson in her later care for his clothing. He was put to driving oxen in hauling logs on a "lizard," which was followed by other tasks necessary in opening up the farm. When Christmas time came the youth was highly gratified to know that his services had been valued at "two bits" per day, for the only money he had ever before possessed was one picayune-61/4 cents, which he had earned by an entire day's work at cutting cockle- burs. During the three following years he continued with the same employer at one hundred dollars a year. At the end of that time he entered a quarter section of government land, an occasion which caused him much embarrassment because he did not feel competent for the form of properly writing his name.

Then ensued, in connection with William Dulany's farm labors, a period of night study. From Old Franklin, twenty-five miles away, his employer brought him a pencil and memorandum book, with copies of Pike's small arithmetic and Walker's little dictionary. Each evening he toiled over his copies, his multiplication tables and the lists of words in his memorandum book, which he carefully compiled from all new ones he heard, with the definitions copied from his dictionary. His vocabu- lary grew rather rapidly now, for he frequently assisted new settlers in building their cabins. He kept his ears open and made good use of his books by the light of hickory bark carefully gathered for the purpose.

At the end of the three-years' period he had saved $204.00 from his one hundred per year, an example in frugality and economy which many modern youths might wisely imitate. After a fourth year with Mr. Stephenson, William Dulany felt that having grown to manhood's physique and strength, he should increase his earnings. At $10 per month, with board provided, he worked for ten months for one A. W. Reid, in building a water mill on the Elk fork of Salt river. As a result of being much in the water while building a mill dam. he was taken ill of ague, or chills and fever. The entire winter of illness, with the ex- pense of his board and doctor's bills and the "Sappington's pills" pro- vided, greatly diminished his stock of earnings. A year of farm work at $10.00 per month was succeeded by a contract in rail splitting at three bits a hundred. He then did similar work and also that of making clap-

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boards and building cabins for other immigrants. The cabin building was done at a price of $25 for a complete cabin, with all the usual ap- purtenances of fireplace, chimney and latch-string door, and with a floor smooth enough for dancing.

Mr. Dulany's next change of vocation was one connected with a prominent Missouri industry. Since the early discovery of Captain Swinney of Virginia that Missouri soil was well adapted to the raising of tobacco, the seed he had imported had been extensively used by farmers from whom he bought the product for use in his own factory, erected for the purpose. The tobacco-raising industry had become almost a mania within a comparatively short time and many tobacco factories were erected. In one of these, operated by a Virginian named John B. Carrol, located at Glasgow, Missouri, Dulany accepted a position at $150.00 a year and board. He continued this work, to pecuniary advan- tage, for three years, during the latter part of which time he was sent out to conduct some of the buying among the farmers-a line of the business in which there was naturally much competition. The next step for this ambitious young man was the renting of a large barn and the install- ment of a tobacco press for a modest factory of his own. He had soon increased the number of presses to four, which was the limit of capacity of that building. As his rental was but $25 and he paid only one dollar weekly for living expenses, his profits grew rapidly. He removed to Paris, Missouri, where he rented a livery barn and converted it into an eight-press factory. His next step was the building of a large factory in Paris, in which he manufactured both chewing tobacco and leaf to- bacco, exporting much of the latter to Ireland, Antwerp, Bremen and Liverpool. The shipping of the product was done by Major J. W. Booth, who was the superintendent of the Missouri tobacco warehouse, a state institution, which was located on Sixth and Washington streets in St. Louis. Mr. Dulany continued in the tobacco business with success until the close of the Civil war, with the exception of two years spent in Cali- fornia mines in the period of the "gold rush." His marriage had oc- curred two years previously and his deep appreciation of what he con- sidered his high duty to an inestimably noble woman had roused his financial ambition. Renting out his factory, he went westward and spent two years on the Middle fork of the American river. His constant work was rewarded by an amount of gold which he counted a fair success, for its net amount was $11,800.

Early in the Civil war the cancelling of insurance policies made im- minent difficulties which required all of Mr. Dulany's determination and the assistance of his friend, Major Booth, to avert. The result was highly desirable to the tobacco manufacturer, who then hastened to Paris and with his assistants worked night and day to get his tobacco out before the insurance expired. They succeeded, with excellent returns, although impeded because of the presence of either federal or rebel troops during a greater part of the time. He then determined to escape both the pos- sible difficulties of void insurance and the annoyance of guerillas by changing the location of his tobacco business. Together with his brother, D. M. Dulany, and later with also J. H. McVeigh, he established a fac- tory in Quincy, Illinois, to which place other tobacco factories were removed from Missouri until Quincy became a manufacturing town to a notable degree. The Dulany factory continued until the close of the war. The taxing of all manufactured tobacco at forty cents a pound and the trickery of certain government inspectors in conjunction with unscrupulous dealers presently led Mr. Dulany and his partners leave the business. In the spring of 1866 they sold to a manufacturer who had for some time wished to buy the business. The career of Mr. Du-

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lany as a tobacco manufacturer presents interesting figures. He began with the $450.00 earned by his labor as a rail-splitter and builder, and closed at a profit of more than $80,000 and at a time when his fac- tory was doing above $350,000 worth of business.

In 1867 William H. Dulany took up his residence on a farm which he and his brother had purchased, near Huntsville, Missouri. There he began the business of cattle raising, stocking the land with about two hundred cattle. In the meantime his brother, D. M. Dulany, had become interested in white pine lumber from the mill of Ole Natwigg, of Wausau, Wisconsin. Agreeing to take the entire "cut" of the latter's mill, D. M. Dulany and Mr. McVeigh went into the wholesale lumber business in Hannibal, Missouri, William H. Dulany also joining the firm, in which all were equal partners. Mr. Dulany disposed of his cattle and farm and removed to Hannibal, as his brother and Mr. Mcveigh had done. As there was a great demand for wholesale lumber in the newly made state of Kansas and Nebraska, the first location of the Dulany and Mc- Veigh lumber business soon proved to be too small. They then purchased eight or nine acres on Collier street, which in time had to be increased to forty-three acres, besides additional leased ground which was used for piling lumber. Beginning by purchasing from the Natwigg mill, this lumber company presently was buying largely from many of the mills of the north. Of one of these, that of Ingram and Kennedy, at Eau Claire, Wisconsin, they bought the latter partner's share and with the already existing business for its nucleus, they organized in 1881 the Em- pire Lumber Company of Eau Claire, where Mr. Dulany's son, D. M. Dulany, was thereafter stationed as bookkeeper for the firm. That com- pany continued until a few years ago, when the timber of the locality was no longer adequate for its needs. In 1882 the Dulany brothers, with other partners, organized the Hannibal Saw Mill Company of $150,000 capital stock, which they soon doubled. This lumber plant they closed ont in 1901, because of lack of timber. In the meantime, in the year 1884, Mr. Dulany, with his son, G. W. Dulany, and Mr. McVeigh, had joined with R. J. Hurley in organizing the R. J. Hurley Lumber Company of Kansas City, Missouri. Mr. Dulany was made president of this company, which is still in business. Its paid-up capital stock is now $250,000. Mr. Dulany also has stock in the following companies : Standard Lumber Company, Dubuque, Iowa; Rice Lumber Company, Rice Lake, Wisconsin; Chippewa Lumber and Boom Company, Chip- pewa Falls, Wisconsin; Gem City Saw Mill Company, Quincy, Illinois ; Empire Lumber Company, Winona, Minnesota ;; Weyerhauser Timber Company, Tacoma, Washington; Long Leaf Lumber Company, Fisher, Louisiana; Louisiana Central Lumber Company, Clarks, Louisiana ; Western Elevator Company, Winona, Minnesota ; Eclipse Lumber Com- pany, Clinton, Iowa; Grandin Coast Lumber Company; Gulf Lumber Company ; Magnolia Pine & Cypress Company ; Hannibal National Bank ; Duffy-Trowbridge Stove Foundry Company.

Not only does Mr. Dulany's material prosperity reflect great credit upon his business ability, upon which lies no shadow of double-dealing, but his splendid health at the age of ninety-five gives evidence that he has lived a clean, sane and wholesome life. Dissipations have never held any temptations for him, and indeed the popular games which arouse so much enthusiasm among young men and many of their elders of the present day seem to him an unpardonable and foolish waste of time. His studies and the delights of home have ever been his wholesome recre- ations. At his present ripe age he goes daily to his business, for his eye is still clear and his hand steady. His greatest pride is his family, which often gathers about him, to the fourth generation.

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He was married in 1848 to Miss Susan I. Van Zandt, at Jackson- ville, Illinois. Mrs. Dulany died at Paris, Missouri, in January 4, 1861. To this union six children were born, four of whom are living, Mary T. Dulany, Hannibal, Missouri; D. M. Dulany, Eau Claire, Wisconsin; G. W. Dulany, Hannibal Missouri; S, Belle (Dulany) Duncan, St. Louis, Missouri. Mr. Dulany was married to Mrs. Talitha C. Bodine at Paris, Missouri, in 1862. She died April 11, 1906, at Hannibal, Missouri. He also has five grandchildren and three great grandchildren.

RICHARD GENTRY ESTILL. One of the fine country homes of Howard county which for years has given a distinctive character of prosperity and well ordered enterprise to the country life of this section of Missouri is the Glen Eden farm, the home of Richard Gentry Estill and family. During the past sixty years no name has been associated more closely with the agricultural and stock-raising activities of Howard county than that of Estill. The founder of the name in this county was Colonel James R. Estill, from the Kentucky family of that name, and from 1845 until his death he was notable as a stockman and public-spirited citizen of this county.

Richard Gentry Estill, who represents the younger generations of his family in this county, is a grandson of Colonel James R., and was born on the place that is still his home on January 7, 1885. His father was the late William R. Estill, whose death in 1896 removed one of the most capable and popular young business men and citizens from Howard county. He was thirty-five years old at the time of his death, and was born on the old Estill homestead. He was educated liberally in the college at Boonville and Pritchett's College in Glasgow. He married Nannie Elizabeth Gentry, who was born in Pettis county, Mis- souri, in 1860, and received her education in the Christian College at Columbia. She was a daughter of Richard and Jael W. (Hocker) Gentry, her father a native of Owen county, Kentucky. The four chil- dren of William R. Estill and wife were: Richard Gentry; Mary Vir- ginia; James Robert, of the Greenwood stock farm formerly owned by his father; and Nannie Hocker Estill. The daughters were both educated in Wellesley College in Massachusetts.

Richard Gentry Estill was reared in a home of comfort and culture, and was given the best of advantages. He attended school in St. Louis, the Blees Military Academy and the University of Missouri. At the age of twenty-four he married Mary. Henrietta King, who was reared at Alfred, Texas, and was educated in the Christian College at Colum- bia. She is a daughter of Richard and Pearl (Ashbrook) King and a granddaughter of Colonel Richard King, whose name carries with it association of baronial power and wealth in southern Texas. The King family under Colonel King dominated one of the greatest cattle ranches in the world along the Texas coast, and its possessions and influences are still extensive in Nueces and adjoining counties of Texas. Mr. and Mrs. Estill have one son, Richard Gentry Estill, born November 1, 1910. Mr. Estill is a Mason and he and his wife are members of the Episcopal church.

The Glen Eden farm contains five hundred and twenty acres, sit- uated near the village of Estill. The home is a comfortable and picturesque place, surrounded with maples, elms and walnut trees, and is one of the few country homes that combine the quiet atmosphere of old-time comfort and hospitality with the conveniences of a modern residence. Mr. Estill has had a profitable business in general stock farming, and worthily bears the responsibilities of a family name that has always stood for conspicuous business success and honorable citizen- ship in Howard county.

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C. B. SMITH. Hereford Park, near Fayette in Howard county, is the home of one of the finest herds of Hereford cattle in the United States. Its proprietor, C. B. Smith, has given many years of careful study and business management to this farm, and its product justfiies his high standing among American stock breeders.

Mr. Smith started this enterprise on his Howard county farm in 1884, beginning on a modest scale as to numbers but with only the highest class of cattle. The increase in each successive year has been carefully bred, and only the most perfect animals used for the further increase. From time to time he has obtained special bulls, and the general standard of the two hundred and fifty registered animals that now comprise his herd is higher than the best of those he owned twenty- five years ago. Among stockmen his cattle have a reputation through- out the United States and rank right along with the few other prize herds in this country. In October, 1912, Mr. Smith sold fifty head at fine prices to some of the best judges of this stock, these cattle going to various farms in Missouri, Dakotas, Kansas and Texas.

Mr. Smith was born at Athens, Georgia, on December 2, 1850. His father, Rev. Thompson L. Smith, an Episcopal clergyman, was a Vir- ginian, who died at Denver, Colorado, in 1909, aged eighty-one. He was one of the Virginians who gave service to the Confederacy during the war and was a chaplain under the noted Stonewall Jackson. The mother formerly was Emily Screven Bond, of Savannah, Georgia, and also died in Denver, Colorado, at the age of seventy-six.

C. B. Smith left Georgia at an early age for Virginia. There were six children in the family, and during their youth they suffered the privations which were general throughout the South during the war period. After the war he came to Missouri where he attended the State University and began his career with only his ability as capital. For some years he was in railroad services at Kansas City and St. Joseph and Chicago, and for five years was general manager of the Continental Fruit Express Company. It was, therefore, with a thorough business training that he turned his attention to stock farming, and no doubt this has been a large factor in his success. He owns and leases about eight hundred acres of land in his stock farm, and employs a number of men in the raising of the crops and the care of his stock. He gives his personal supervision to his cattle, and has been very careful of those little details which are so important in any enterprise of this kind.

In 1876 at Fayette. Missouri, Mr. Smith married Miss Carrie Walts, a daughter of Benjamin Walts, a former well known citizen of Howard county, whose sketch will be found on other pages of this work. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Smith are: Mrs. W. F. Ingpen of Canada ; Louise ; Mrs. R. W. Blacket, of West Cliff, Colorado; and Mrs. E. R. Heck, of New York City.

Mr. Smith is a past chancellor of the Knights of Pythias, with which fraternity he has been connected for many years. He is a steward and the treasurer of his local Methodist church. The Hereford Park home is situated half a mile back from the highway, with a fine grove of oak and walnut trees about the house. Squirrels run about without fear and the song birds have found here a refuge from their human enemies. Many of the none too common mocking birds make a home here, and their wonderful song is often heard throughout the hours of the night. In the picturesque landscape of the Missouri valley there are few more charming homesteads than that of Hereford Park.

DOKE GENTLE, M. D. A young physician who has firmly established himself in the good opinion of his community and demonstrated his

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usefulness to society, Dr. Doke Gentle has made his home and profes- sional location at New Franklin, in Howard county since 1909. He was born in Pike county, near Bowling Green, July 14, 1886, and represents one of the oldest and most substantial families of Northeastern Missouri.

The Gentle family moved to Northeast Missouri about 1828. The doctor's father, William H. Gentle, was born in Pike county and was a son of Jesse Gentle. The mother's maiden name was Greive, and her father, Anderson Greive, with his wife is now living in Louisiana, Missouri. The parents of the doctor now reside at New Franklin.

Doctor Gentle during his youth attended the local schools and had a collegiate education before he took up preparation for his profession. In 1908 he was graduated M. D. from the St. Louis Medical College, and the following year opened his office at New Franklin. He is a member of the Howard County and the Missouri Medical societies and of the American Medical Association. His fraternal associations are with the Masonic order and the Odd Fellows. He is an enthusiastic student and continues to keep apace of the advancement and new thought in his profession. On June 28, 1912, he was married to Miss Euda May Aspel- mier, one of the well known young women of Howard county and a daughter of Fred Aspelmier.

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A history of northeast Missouri, Vol. 2 pt 2, Part 104

Author: Williams, Walter, 1864- , ed Publication date: 1913 Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing company Number of Pages: 912

Author: Williams, Walter, 1864- , ed
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 912