USA > Missouri > A history of northeast Missouri, Vol. 2 pt 2 > Part 26
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tional advantages, attending the public schools of his native vicinity, the University of Missouri, Harvard University and Cambridge (Eng- land) University. He chose teaching as a profession, and for two years taught public schools in the county of his birth, then being appointed to the principalship of the Olean public schools, a capacity in which he acted one year. He then spent a year as principal of the Plattsburg (Mo.) high school, and subsequently became teacher of mathematics in the Richmond, Missouri, high school, where he remained one year, and after spending the years 1891 and 1892 as tutor in mathematics in the Univer- sity of Missouri, became assistant professor of mathematics in the same institution in 1893, a chair which he occupied until 1903. In that year he became professor of mechanics in engineering in the University of Missouri, which he has continued to retain to the present time. Since 1904 he has also been a tutor to the university, i. e., a confidential advisor of students.
On September 20, 1892, Professor Defoe was united in marriage with Miss Cora Alice Eitzen, of Washington, Missouri, an honor graduate of the University of Missouri.
Professor Defoe is a member of the American Mathematical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the London Mathematical Society, the Royal Society of Arts (London), the Amer- ican Economic Association, the American Academy of Political and So- cial Science, the Association for the Advancement of Engineering Edu- cation and the American Geographic Society. He was elected a member of the city council of Columbia in 1908, and re-elected in 1910 and again in 1912, and during this time has served on the committees on streets, water and lights, finance and others.
FRANCIS WATTS PATTON. The subject of this sketch was born at the village of Paynesville, in Pike county, Missouri, on April 21, 1842. He is the son of Thomas D. and Julia A. Patton, his father coming from Bourbon county, Kentucky, in 1824, and his mother, Julia Watts, in 1816. Mr. Patton is one of thirteen children born to his parents, only four of whom are now living. He attended the common schools of the country where most of the children of the pioneers received the meager education afforded by the limited facilities of that early period. Mr. Patton re- mained on the farm until January, 1859, when he entered the store of Joseph Meloan as a clerk, where he remained until the spring of 1863, when he began business for himself and after a year he associated his brother, J. H. Patton, with himself and the store partnership continued until the spring of 1876, when they closed out the business and F. W. Patton moved onto a farm purchased in 1875, which he left in 1879 to return to merchandising in the same town, changing his business from dry goods to groceries and hardware, which business he conducted until 1906, when he turned the store over to his son, William, and moved to Clarksville, of which place he is still a citizen.
Mr. Patton was married December 24, 1867, to Miss Bettie Forgey and to this union seven children were born. The dates of births and deaths follow: Lucy Watts, born September 8, 1870, died April 14, 1879; William Forgey, born January 16, 1873; Henley Kissinger, born March 14, 1875, died October 13, 1895; Nancy Emma, born March 16, 1878; Howard Watts, born December 16, 1880, died November 24, 1898; Guy Glover, born January 14, 1885; J. H. Jr., born January 24, 1888.
Mr. Patton is an extensive farmer, owning, in connection with his brother, J. H. Patton, some 2,500 acres of valuable land in the south- east portion of Pike county, besides having other land which he owns individually. All his farming is done on the tenant system, one of which
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tenants has been with the owners for over thirty years. Mr. Patton is a progressive citizen, solicitous for the betterment of all the educa- tional, material and religious interest of his community and always ready to lend a helping hand to every worthy cause. For fifty years he has been a consistent member of the Christian church, always seeking to promote harmony and fraternity and solicitous for the advancement of the Master's cause. For forty-five years, and until he left Paynes- ville, he was clerk of the church of which he was a member and he even now continues his relationship with that body, while he has been unani- mously elected treasurer of the church at Clarksville. For the past twenty-five years Mr. Patton has been treasurer of the Christian Cor- poration. He has been a Mason since 1865. He was raised to the sublime degree of Master Mason by Prairieville Lodge No. 137 in 1865 and formed the Paynesville lodge, of which he was a charter member, in 1877, with which lodge he is still associated. He was secretary of Paynesville lodge for thirty years and six months. Mr. Patton never held a political office but acted as a justice of the peace of Calumet township for four years and has served consecutively as notary public for forty years, which position he still holds.
As an evidence of his business ability and the confidence the people have in his personal integrity it may not be amiss to state that during his active business career Mr. Patton has been chosen or appointed ex- ecutor or administrator of thirty-five or forty estates, many of them aggregating large values in real and personal property, all of which has been settled without trouble with the parties in interest and without disturbing the pleasant personal relations existing before. And it may be proper to add that he has now no less than seven estates in charge, two of which, combined, amount to more than one hundred thousand dollars.
The ancestor who founded the Patton family in the United States came hither from Ireland about the year 1768 and settled in Pennsyl- vania, from which point three of his posterity emigrated to Kentucky and another settled in Virginia. The Patton family has proved a pro- lific one and their name has become a household word in many states of the Union. The Pattons were Presbyterians until Thomas D., Frank W. Patton's father, united with the Christian church after his removal to Missouri, since which time his family has clung to the Christian church as their religious home. The Watts family, from which F. W. Patton's mother descended, like the Pattons, was a large one and played a conspicuous part in the early settlement of Missouri, while their re- moter descendants contributed to the early settlement of the far west in the days when only men of iron nerve and heroic courage ventured into those then distant regions.
Mr. Patton by blood and intermarriage of the families is closely re- lated to the McCunes, Starks, Biggs, and Hollidays, all coming down from pioneer immigrants and whose descendants are still among the best and most representative citizens of northeast Missouri. Though seventy-one years of age, F. W. Patton, the subject of this review, is still in good physical health and of unusual mental activity, attending to his large and varied interest and rendering much gratuitous and valuable business assistance to the great number of people who consult him upon all kinds of subjects and who feel that they are benefited by his judicious advice. Those who know Mr. Patton best will certainly wish for him continued good health and a peaceful and happy old age. Synopsis of the Families of the Father and Grandfather of F. W. Patton.
John Patton, born March 1, 1779, died September 26, 1816; first wife, Susana McCune, born 1774, died 1813; second wife Margaret Mc- Clintock, born 1782, died 1816; ten children by first wife, namely :
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Betsey Patton Wright, William Patton, Sarah Patton McClintock, Joseph Patton, John Patton, Thomas D. Patton, Susana Patton Patter- son, Alex L. Patton, Samuel Patton, Nancy Patton McRaney ; one child by last wife, Margaret Patton Van Deven.
Thomas D. Patton was born October 3, 1803, and died August 6, 1879. He married Julia A. Watts, who was born November 9, 1810, and died June 30, 1873. They had a family of thirteen children, only four of whom are now living: J. H. Patton and Joseph A. Patton of Paynesville: F. W. Patton of Clarksville, and Julia E. Meloan of Els- berry-John Patton died when two years old; Elizabeth Patton Meloan, Susan Patton Meloan, Mary A. Patton Thompson; Nancy Patton, died when twelve years old; Thomas W. Patton, Col. J. H. Patton; Sarah Patton Frazin, who married Dr. R. P. Hawkins after the death of her first husband; F. W. Patton, B. G. Patton, Joseph A. Patton, Julia E. Patton Meloan; Van Deren Patton, died when twenty-two years old.
MANOAH SUMMERS GOODMAN. The subject of this sketch was born in Pike county, Missouri, some seven miles southwest of Clarksville, the town in which he now resides, on the third day of September, 1837. He was reared on the farm under the old regime of domestic slavery and received his early education at the common schools of the district in which he lived; was then sent to St. Paul's College at Palmyra, Mis- souri, where he was fitted for the University of Virginia, of which he is a partial graduate, the death of his father having prevented his re- turn to this institution for the completion of the university course.
Professor Goodman, as he is known all over Pike county, is the son of William A. Goodman, a native of Albemarle county, Virginia, and who was reared within two miles of Charlottesville, the town at which Mr. Jefferson established the University of Virginia, and of Malvina Dunreath Hamner, of Buckingham county, in the same state. William A. Goodman, who was born in April, 1813, in Pike county, Missouri, and died in August, 1858, was the son of Jeremiah Augustus Goodman, of Albemarle county, Virginia, and of Mary Clarkson, whose father's, Manoah Clarkson's, plantation adjoined that of Mr. Jefferson. Manoah S. Goodman's maternal grandmother was Charlotte Clarkson Hamner, sister of his grandmother on his father's side, his parents having been first cousins. Both of M. S. Goodman's grandfathers were farmers or planters and both were soldiers in the War of 1812. Manoah Clark- son, the father of both M. S. Goodman's grandmothers, was a wealthy resident of Albemarle county, Virginia, a neighbor of Mr. Jefferson and a soldier in the War of the American Revolution. He reared a large family and the Clarksons of the country in general are largely his remote descendants. Upon attaining his majority, in 1858, M. S. Goodman, who inherited a large number of servants, devoted himself to farming, until the disturbed condition of the country and the unre- liability of slave labor drove him from hand to head work, and with James Reid, afterwards a well known Baptist divine, he established a high school in Clarksville at an outlay of over $7,000, where young men were fitted for the best universities of the country, a few going to Yale, one or two to Harvard, and some to the University of Virginia, and subsequently Mr. Goodman fitted one lieutenant, now Lieut. Col. James H. Frier, of the Federal service, for West Point. For twenty years Professor Goodman worked in public or private schools, always as superintendent of the former and as owner and principal of the latter. In 1882 or 1883 he abandoned school work and entered the journalistic field, establishing the Pike County Democrat at Bowling Green in Pike county. Coteries of designing Democratic politicians had conspired all over the county to name all the candidates for office- distributing the places among themselves and resorting to any character
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of procedure to accomplish their purpose. This assumption of the rights and prerogatives of the people by those who would wreck the party for personal aggrandizement, Professor Goodman fiercely and ably opposed. The fight was perhaps the longest and bitterest ever made in any party in northeast Missouri, but the result justified the outlay of physical strength and mental endeavor, for the conspirators were finally driven from place and power and the people again came into their own. In 1887 he sold the Democrat and bought the Clarksville Sentinel, one of the oldest and best established papers in the county, which he conducted most successfully for ten years, when, his health breaking down, he sold the plant and after traveling south and west in search of health and spending much time in hospitals he gave up active mental work and devoted his attention exclusively to his farms and property interests in the little city of Clarksville. With a penchant for polities Mr. Good- man has made some history as a Democrat in local and state affairs, having been repeatedly selected to represent his party in county, dis- trict and state conventions and in 1892 he was chosen a delegate to the national convention at Chicago and assisted in nominating Grover Cleveland the third time for president of the United States. He was also selected by Hon. D. R. Francis, then governor of Missouri, as one of the state's delegates to the Deep Water Harbor convention held at Topeka, Kansas,-one of the first formal efforts ever put forth to improve the waterways of the country. Of a naturally vigorous mind, of scholarly attainments, thoroughly informed as to the social and moral status as well as perfectly familiar with the party record and public career of the men who have played their little parts upon the stage of political life in Missouri, and having the courage of his convictions, Mr. Goodman has always been in an attitude to exert a benign and healthful influence upon the public and political affairs of his own county as well as to be, in a more restricted sense, of some service in assisting in directing publie thought and party action in other and broader fields. A great admirer and warm personal friend of Hon. Champ Clark, whose wife was one of his early pupils, Professor Good- man probably did as much as any one person to bring to the attention of the people the merits and abilities of that aspiring statesman and no doubt his defeat for the last presidential nomination was the most pain- ful disappointment of his life. Notwithstanding he spent twenty years in the school room, thirteen years in the editor's chair and 'six or seven years on a farm, Professor Goodman found time to write the greater part of a thousand-page history of his county, published in 1883, in which is preserved the history of pioneers, the times and places of the early settlements, the official and political happenings, its early schools and religious organizations, its early agricultural condition, the Civil war in Missouri, the material progress made since 1865, with personal sketches of the most prominent citizens, including a goodly number of the women who bore with such fortitude the hardships and dangers incident to life on the frontier and in the midst of savage Indians and equally savage beasts. This history is regarded as the handbook of Pike countians and has for years been the tribunal to which all appeals of historical facts are taken. Now past seventy-five years of age and in rather feeble health, Professor Goodman has ceased any effort at systematic literary work, confining himself to biographies of some of the leading statesmen and jurists of northeast Missouri. to be preserved in the Carnegie library at Louisiana for the use of the future historian. and to an occasional sketch of the life and labor of some close and well beloved friend gone before.
Professor Goodman married Miss Mary S. McCune, on October 29.
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1861, who is still living. Their children are Charles McCune Goodman, of Clarksville; Annie Goodman Calvert, wife of Dr. A. P. Calvert, a dentist of St. Louis, and Miss Nellie Goodman, who resides with her parents. William P. McCune, the father of Mrs. Goodman, came with his father from Bourbon county, Kentucky, when a small boy in 1819. He came from Revolutionary stock, was successful in his undertakings, had the esteem of all who knew him and died in Clarksville, Missouri, when eighty-four years old.
JOHN EUTYCHUS WHITTLE. Occupying one of the finest country homes in Boone county, about four miles southeast of Columbia, Mr. John E. Whittle is a native son of this county and has been actively identified through his career with the business and farming interests of this vicinity.
Mr. Whittle is a son of the late Thomas Whittle, who more than half a century ago came to Columbia as a poor journeyman cobbler, rose rapidly in his trade, acquired large business interests, and for many years was one of the leading citizens of the county. He was born at Wolverhampton, Staffordshire, England, on April 24, 1824, one of the twelve children of George and Annie Whittle. He was the only one of his immediate family to cross the ocean to America. At the age of four- teen he was apprenticed to a shoemaker and served seven years for his board and clothes, after which he spent three years as a journeyman in his native country. In 1850 he came alone to the United States, crossing on the steamship Mayflower and landing in New York penni- less, having to pick mushrooms in order to get his first breakfast in America. He followed his trade in the cities of Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore and elsewhere, and then went south to Mobile, whence the fever drove him away, and after a brief period of work in Memphis he reached St. Louis some time in 1851. After nine months in St. Louis, he set out for New Franklin in Howard county, but falling in with a companion on the journey, on his advice altered his destination and thus located in Columbia. Here he was employed by a shoemaker for two weeks at a salary of six dollars a week. He was thoroughly skilled in his trade in all its branches, and soon got work as a cutter at six dollars a day. By 1853 he had succeeded so well that he bought out the estab- lishment and gradually extended the business until at times he em- ployed as many as sixteen men. He was popularly known among his fellow citizens as "Boot T. Whittlemaker" and as "Johnny Bull." He continued in active management of his Columbia shop until 1869. In 1866 he purchased a farm of one hundred and forty-five acres a mile and three quarters west of town (now owned and occupied by Mrs. E. A. Frazee), and moved his home to that place in 1868, combining his shoe business and farming for one year afterward. That farm was his home from 1869 until 1891, after which he moved to Columbia, where he made his home until his death. He also owned another farm on Cal- lahan creek, consisting of two hundred and forty acres. He carried on general farming, and was also interested in saddle horses, keeping a number on his place. In politics he was a Democrat, was a member of the Christian church, and for many years was actively affiliated with Free Masonry. The death of this worthy citizen and successful busi- ness man occurred at the home of his son in Columbia on the 16th of August, 1909.
Thomas Whittle married, in 1857, Miss Mary Frances Hulen, daugh- ter of John A. Hulen. She was born November 14, 1836, and died April 10, 1899. Their four children were Anna Laura, Frances Lenoir, John E. and Thomas W.
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John E. Whittle was born at the home of his parents in Columbia on the 7th of March, 1860. After taking three years' academic work in the University of Missouri, he engaged in farming both on his own ac- count and in connection with his father, after which he traveled in Texas for two years. Upon his return to Columbia, Missouri, he was for some time in the office of circuit clerk and recorder under J. W. Stone, and while there was married, December 22, 1886, to Miss Ida Conley. Mrs. Whittle was born on a farm five miles north of Columbia, September 2, 1867, and was a daughter of Thomas W. and Mary Jane (Weldon) Conley. The three children of Mr. and Mrs. Whittle are Francis War- ren, Juanita and Ruth.
After his marriage Mr. Whittle spent three years in farming his grandfather's place near Hallsville and then for three years was pro- prietor of a general merchandise store at Hinton, followed by four years in the grocery and tobacco business at Columbia. In 1898 he bought his present homestead southeast of Columbia, and with two hundred and seventy acres has done a prosperous business in general farming. Under his management the farm has been improved until it is one of the most productive and valuable in this vicinity. He has completely rebuilt his residence so that it is as modern as any city home, and a comfortable and attractive place for himself and family. Mr. Whittle is one of the Democratic voters of Boone county. He and his family belong to the Christian church, and in Masonry he is affiliated with the lodge, chapter and commandery.
JORDAN COLLER. A brave defender of his flag, always ready for duty whenever his services have been needed in either war or peace, Jordan Coller, retired hardware merchant of Fayette, Missouri, has set an example of noble-minded living and true patriotism that the rising generation will do well to follow. Coming to Fayette in 1866, with a brilliant record as a soldier, during the more than forty-six years that he has been identified with the city's interests he has so conducted his activities as to make just as enviable a record as a citi- zen and business man, and as one who has been influential in develop- ing and fostering the community's best interest he deserves and receives the respect of his fellow-citizens. Mr. Coller was born at Reading, Berks county, Pennsylvania, August 19, 1841, a son of James Coller and grandson of Paul Coller, both natives of Germany. James Coller was a miller by trade, and in young manhood came to the United States and established himself in business at Reading, Pennsylvania, where he was married to Sarah Boady, a native of the Keystone State, of German parentage, by whom he had six children. He was a stalwart Republican in politics, and both he and his wife were Lutherans, in the faith of which church he died at the age of seventy-three years, and his wife when seventy-eight years of age.
Jordan Coller was reared to habits of thrift, industry and integrity, and attended the common schools of Reading until he was sixteen years of age. in the meantime assisting his father in the mill. At the age of sixteen he was apprenticed to the tinsmith trade for a period of five years, but six months after the outbreak of the Civil war he enlisted, at the call for 75,000 three-year men, in Company E, Forty-sixth Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, Col. Joseph Knight, and Capt. William Wise. The regiment went into camp at Camp Curtin, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and was then sent south, its first engage- ment being at Ball's Bluff, under General Banks, in the Shenandoah valley. Later, at Cedar Mountain, Mr. Coller was wounded and taken prisoner, and confined in the noted Libby prison, was subsequently
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sent to Belle Isle, and eventually, in October, 1862, was exchanged. At that time he was sent to Indianapolis, Indiana, and rejoined his regiment at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, from whence they went to War- rington. At the battle of Chancellorsville, this command served under General Hooker, and later, at the battle of Gettysburg, sustained part of the fire of the Confederates in General Pickett's famous charge, being connected with the Twelfth Corps. Returning to Virginia, the regi- ment became a part of the Eleventh and Twelfth Corps, making it the Twentieth Army Corps, at Manassas Junction, and later took part in the battles of Chattanooga, Resaca, Kenesaw Mountain and others. At Kenesaw Mountain, Mr. Coller was wounded in the left leg by a minie ball, and was taken to the field hospital, but later was sent to the Nashville hospital for a week, and then removed to the Cincinnati Marine hospital, where he was lying at the time of the expiration of service. He received his honorable discharge as corporal of his com- pany, and returned to his home with a record for gallantry and faithful service of which any man might well be proud.
In 1866 Mr. Coller left his Pennsylvania home and traveled to St. Louis, but remained in that city only a short time, the same year marking his advent in Fayette. Here he started to follow the trade of tinsmith, and as his business grew he gradually drifted into the hardware line, in which he continued for many years, developing an excellent business. He also was active in building up the city, erecting three fine two-story business buildings, and later building five dwelling houses on vacant lots near the square. He is now living retired from business activities, but still interests himself in any movements calcu- lated to be of benefit to his adopted city. Mr. Collar has one of the finest collection of guns, sabres and Civil war relies to be found in the state. One of the curios in this group of mementos of the great war between the states is a wooden canteen, given by a wounded confeder- ate, whom Mr. Coller had befriended.
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