A history of northeast Missouri, Vol. 2 pt 2, Part 60

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

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1885. He had been a man of prominence and position in Callaway county, having served as sheriff and district judge and was further hon- ored by his election to the legislature of the state. His wife, Laura Hart, who was born in October, 1817, in Albemarle county, Virginia, migrated to Callaway county, Missouri, in company with her parents in about 1825, and with them settled on the farm now owned and occupied by Jilson Harrison, near Auxvasse creek.

Mrs. Berry was born on February, 25, 1874, and began her schooling in Callaway county, but at the age of nine the removal of the family to the place where her later years were passed, caused the scene of her edu- cational experience to be changed. From the age of nine her home was located about six miles distant from the home of him who later became her husband. Mr. and Mrs. Berry are the parents of four children, namely : Martha Elizabeth, born April 4, 1901; Gaither Henry, born July 1, 1905; Walter and Wallace (twins), born December 30, 1909.

Politically Mr. Berry is a Democrat and has always been regarded as a public spirited and worthy citizen who has never withheld his in- fluence and efforts for the betterment of his community. He has taken an active part in various business enterprises of the town, and has been a director of the Bank of Rush Hill since it was organized.

HARRY CAPPELLE SCHEETZ. The Scheetz family, which is one of Ger- man ancestry, had its first American representative of whom there is au- thentic record in the person of George Scheetz, who was born near Wil- mington, Delaware, in 1782. His father, presumably, was the first of the name to settle upon American shores, but of him and his life and works no records are available. Thus the family record which it is deemed most appropriate to incorporate in brief in the sketch of Harry Cappelle Scheetz, begins with the name of his grandfather. This family, be it said, has long been prominently identified with the fortunes and growth of the Episcopal church in America, and each succeeding genera- tion has supplied valuable timber to the ranks of her clergy. The grand- father, it is true, was a convert to the faith, having been trained for the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal church, but later casting his lot with the old established Church of England, in its American form, the Episcopal church. His service was none the less sincere, and his works were of a high order, and of inestimable value to the church body. Other professions and trades have claimed members from each generation, and all of the name have performed worthy works in the fields of activity to which they gave themselves.

Long established in Maryland, it was in 1840 that Rev. Frederick B. Scheetz, the father of the subject, settled in Missouri and Harry Cappelle Scheetz was born near Hannibal, in Ralls county, on the 6th day of Feb- ruary, 1841.

Reverting to the ancestry of the subject, it is of record that George Scheetz, the grandfather of Harry C. Scheetz, was born near Wilming- ton, Delaware, in 1782, the son of German parents who had all their lives devoted their energies to the farming industry in that state. George Scheetz was educated for the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal church and engaged in that work as a young man. It was while preaching in Maryland that he became acquainted with the woman who became his wife. She was Marie May Cappelle, the daughter of Dr. Joseph Cappelle, a surgeon with the French troops of General Lafayette during the War of the Revolution. Dr. Cappelle was a noted member of the Masonic fraternity in his day and he came from France during the War of the Revolution in the army of the great French patriot, Lafayette. When the war was well over he moved his family from France to the colonies,

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or the United States of America, as they were then known, and his daughter, Marie May Cappelle, was born on the Potomac river, in Mary- land, in 1786. She was twenty-two years old when she married Rev. George Scheetz in 1808. It so happened that the family of Dr. Cappelle were devout members of the Episcopal church, and it was through his association and marriage with a daughter of the family that Rev. George Scheetz was impelled to renounce his fealty to the church in which he was reared and unite with the church of his wife. Some time after that event he moved to Philadelphia and there became rector of St. Mark's Episcopal church, continuing in that connection from 1815 to 1850-a continuous service in one parish of thirty-five years. During this period three daughters and one son were born to them. The eldest daughter, Mary Anna, was born in Philadelphia in 1809, and in 1830 married Charles Swift of Easton, Pennsylvania; their son, Frederick B., was born in 1816; another daughter was born in 1819, and the youngest daughter, Caroline, was born in 1824. The second daughter married Dr. F. J. Mendenhall in 1847, and settled in Wilmington, Delaware; Caroline married Dr. George C. Jones of Philadelphia, in 1848. In 1840 Frederick B. Scheetz and Mrs. Charles Swift, his eldest sister, moved from their Philadelphia home and came to Missouri, locating near Han- nibal, in Ralls county. This migration immediately followed the mar- riage of Frederick B. to Miss Henrietta F. Cruger, a young English girl, whom he had met in New York City. She was a music teacher and a

young woman of beautiful character and fine attainments. They ar-

rived in Hannibal, Missouri, on April 20, 1840, and in the vicinity of that now thriving city, the young couple built their little log cabin home, a twenty foot square building constructed of the rough logs with clap- board roof and a three foot square window in either side of the cabin.

Frederick B. Scheetz received an exceptionally good education and was graduated from Bristol College in 1838. In 1839 he was assistant engineer in charge of the construction work on the New York Central Railroad in New York state, and it was while in the discharge of his duties in that capacity that he made the acquaintance of the woman who became his wife, and the mother of the subject. As mentioned above, their migration to Missouri followed their marriage, and in the log cabin home which they built near Hannibal, their first child, Harry Cappelle Scheetz, was born on February 6, 1841. In 1843 they sold their homestead, having arrived at the conclusion that neither one knew enough about farming as a practical business to insure their success, and they accordingly moved to Palmyra, where they taught one of the first schools ever conducted in the place. They continued in that work for some years, then determined to give the farming business another trial. They bought a place of one hundred and sixty acres in the year 1846, the same being located between Hannibal and Palmyra, near the Bates school house. In 1848 Mr. Scheetz was elected to the office of county surveyor for Marion county, Missouri, and two years later, in 1850, was appointed locating engineer for the Hannibal & St. Joseph Railroad. He completed the work of that road in 1855 and then resigned from his connection with the company. In the meantime, in 1852, he had sold his farm of one hundred and sixty acres, buying in its stead twelve hundred acres of unimproved land in the northwestern part of Marion county. In 1857 Mr. Scheetz was ordained a deacon in the Episcopal church, and with the help of his neighbors he built a small frame church on the corner of his large farm, the church being located about a mile distant from his residence. In those early days practically every farmer owned slaves, and Frederick B. Scheetz himself held two, but the greater part of the work of the farm was performed by hired labor from the two

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colored families who had cabins upon his farm. Between the years of 1856 and 1866 Deacon Scheetz conducted his farm and preached in the little church he had erected on his property, dividing his time between the two vocations. Not only did he preach to his own little congregation, but he gave his services of that nature to every town and village within a radius of thirty miles. It would be difficult indeed to form any adequate estimate of the value of the services of the pioneer preacher and farmer in his twofold vocation during the years of his ministry. It was about 1858 that his father, Rev. George Scheetz, moved from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Palmyra, in company with his two daughters, Mrs. Men- denhall and Mrs. Jones, and their husbands. Both these families were well to do and independent of worldly considerations, and they were free to devote themselves almost exclusively to the upbuilding of the church in Palmyra and vicinity, and this they did. Each family bought property in Palmyra and settled down to the work they found, but the outbreak of the war in 1861 shattered their plans, and the next few years found their work at a standstill in that vicinity. In 1866 the aged father and his daughters with their families moved to Monroe City, Missouri, located on the Hannibal & St. Joseph, and there built a new stone church. In that year the father died, his faithful wife, Marie May (Cappelle) Scheetz having passed on in Palmyra, some time previous at the age of seventy-two years. Upon the death of the aged clergyman, Deacon Frederick B. Scheetz, his son, was advanced to the ministry in charge of the new church, and he held that ministry until the year 1880, when he was elected to the pastorate of Grace church at Kirkwood, Missouri, where he continued until his death in 1904, at the age of eighty-seven, secure in the love and esteem of all who knew him and after a life full of good works and honorable service in the cause of his church. His wife had preceded him in 1902 when she was eighty-one years of age. Thus passed the parents of the subject, himself then well advanced in the span of life.

Harry Cappelle Scheetz attended the public schools but two terms, between the years of eight and ten, at the time when the family lived in the vicinity of the Bates school. His next schooling was in St. Paul's College at Palmyra, in 1855 and 1856, and thereafter he was in the hands of private instructors, one of them Professor Shaw of the Uni- versity of Massachusetts. In 1864 Mr. H. C. Scheetz married Fannie M. Green of Monroe City, and soon thereafter built him a home upon the farm of his father, or to state the matter more accurately, upon a farm of one hundred and sixty acres which his father presented him with upon his marriage. This place was located four miles west of Monroe City, and was an unimproved place. It may be said, however, that between that time and the year 1888, Mr. Scheetz was able to make a fine and productive farm out of the place. He increased his holdings in the meantime to two hundred and forty acres, built a fine stone house, capacious barns, windmill, etc., and the place was well stocked with fine animals of all kinds usually found on a well conducted farm. During these years a quartette of children were born to these parents-two sons and two daughters, and these have been educated in approved manner and are now filling useful places in the world.

Concerning these young people, more detailed mention is here made, to make a complete record of the family down to date. The eldest, a girl, was born in 1865, and is now Mrs. Mary S. Proctor of Chicago; the eldest son, Frank B. Scheetz, was born in 1868, and is a civil engineer by profession. He was with the Missouri Pacific Railroad in charge of their bridge department for eighteen years, and is at this writing (1912) with the Kansas City Bridge Company in Kansas City, Missouri. The

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second son, H. V. Scheetz, born in 1873, was for five years in the shops of the Hannibal & St. Joseph road in Hannibal, later was fireman five years, then locomotive engineer, and is now a conductor on the Northern Pacific Railroad at North Yakima, Washington. In January, 1913, he married Miss Corrine of that town.

Harry Cappelle Scheetz has been a lifelong Democrat. He has given a deal of public service in his time in one capacity and another as well as having given to his section of Marion county one of the most produc- tive farms. In 1866 he was appointed deputy county surveyor under County Surveyor Lockling, and later served in the same capacity eight years under Major Dean. Then he was appointed by the governor of the state in 1886 as county surveyor to fill out the unexpired term of Major Dean. He was next elected to two successive terms of four years each in the same office, his service continuing until 1897, and his work in the interests of the county proving him a capable and practical engineer, and being of a nature calculated to result in the best of conditions for the benefit of the county. For twenty years Mr. Scheetz was a notary public. In 1903 he continued his engineering work in the interests of the county upon his election to the post of engineer in charge of the laying out and constructing of what is known as the South River Levee District, between Hannibal and Quincy, along the right bank of the Mississippi river. The work was finished in 1906, but Mr. Scheetz is yet engineer in charge of the levee. He has been city engineer of Palmyra for the past twelve years and has assisted at intervals in some railroad surveying of an important nature.

In the year 1900 Mr. Scheetz prepared and published the "Twentieth Century Atlas Map of Marion County, " a work of the greatest value and one that has met with the approval of all who have occasion to require such a handbook.

The fraternal affiliations of Mr. Scheetz have been principally with the Ancient Order of United Workmen, of which he has been a member for the past twenty years. Like all his family, Mr. Scheetz is a member of the Episcopal church. He was baptized in this church of his people in Hannibal, Missouri, in 1845, Bishop Kemper, that fine old gentleman, long since gone to his reward, officiating at the ceremony, and he was confirmed in the church of his father, St. Jude's, on the home farm, in 1857, with Bishop Hawks in charge of the ceremonials. He was also a member of the new St. Jude's church at Monroe City until 1886, and since that time has been a member in good standing of the St. Paul's church in Palmyra. He is a member of the Sons of the American Revolution by right of his colonial ancestry, a distinction which but a limited num- ber of native born Americans may claim. At the present time Mr. Scheetz is at work on a preliminary survey in the locating of an electric railway in the county. Mrs. Scheetz died in 1889, her death occurring very suddenly at Palmyra. She was the daughter of Ellis C. and Mary Green, and was born in the state of New York in 1844. She came to Missouri with her parents in 1856, when they located on a farm near where Monroe City is now located. Mr. and Mrs. Scheetz were united in marriage by the grandfather of the subject, Rev. George Scheetz, the marriage occurring in 1864, when the old gentleman was eighty years of age. For some years, as has already been stated, the young couple lived on their farm, moving to Palmyra in 1888, and in the following year the wife and mother was called home. She died very suddenly and is interred in the family plot in Monroe City, where many mem- bers of the family have been laid when their earthly careers have closed. Mrs. Scheetz was a woman of the most extraordinary qualities, sharing in all the Christian virtues and enjoying the esteem and regard of all Vol. III-26

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who came within the circle of her gentle influenee. She was a devoted wife and mother, and her loss is yet mourned by those whom she left behind her.

OVID BELL, owner and editor of the Fulton Gazette, one of Missouri's most influential county newspapers, is one of the distinguished journalists of the state. Clear and forceful in editorial expression, comprehensive in its treatment of the news, with high ideals of business and professional ethics rigidly adhered to, the Gazette holds high rank. It is its editor in print. Mr. Bell is a native Missourian. He was born on a Callaway county farm southeast of Fulton on June 10, 1875, the oldest child of John P. and Emma Keen (Gilbert) Bell, both. Virginians. When Mr. Bell's father was elected county collector in 1884 the family made Fulton their home. Retiring from the collector's office in 1887, the senior Mr. Bell bought the Fulton Telegraph and in the office of this newspaper, at the age of twelve years, the son began his newspaper career. In public sehools at intervals, in Westminster College a year, at other times in or near the newspaper office, Mr. Bell's education for public service as an editor of a country journal continued.

In March, 1897, Mr. Bell became the private secretary of Richard Parks Bland, the noted advocate of the free coinage of silver, who was then the representative in congress from the eighth district of Missouri, obtaining the position through the influence of his father, one of Mr. Bland's closest friends. Mr. Bell went to Washington when President MeKinley called the extra session of congress which enacted the Dingley tariff law, and continued in his position with Mr. Bland until the death of that gentleman in June, 1899. The following winter he returned to Washington and worked in the bureau of a Philadelphia newspaper, giving up his work finally because of the effects of the Washington climate on his health, and abandoning the keenest desire of his early life; that is, to become Washington correspondent for a metropolitan newspaper.

Returning to Fulton during the winter of 1900, Mr. Bell, in March, 1901, became editor and owner of the Gazette. When the paper eame into his possession its subscribers numbered less than five hundred and its plant was worn out. Though without financial resources at the be- ginning Mr. Bell has built up the business and plant to their present large proportions and also has erected a large brick building for the ex- elusive use of his business. The Gazette building and plant are con- sidered models, while the newspaper itself is often referred to as "the ideal country weekly." His work on the Gazette has brought him wide recognition among newspaper men, and at the present time he is presi- dent of the Missouri Press Association, one of the largest and most im- portant state press associations in the country.

Mr. Bell was actively identified with the movement that resulted in the election of Joseph W. Folk to the office of governor of the state of Missouri in 1904, and at the request of Mr. Folk, sought a place on the Democratic state committee that year. After his election as a member of the committee he was chosen its secretary and two years later declined re-election. Six years before his election as secretary of the committee he was stenographer to one of his predecessors in the office.

Mr. Bell was married on September 4, 1912, to Miss Maud Hall, of Roeheport, Boone county, a daughter of James C. Hall, cashier of the People's Bank of that city, and formerly for many years assessor of Boone county. Mrs. Bell is a member of an old and prominent family of central Missouri, and is a gracious and talented lady. She was edu- cated at Christian and Stephens colleges, Columbia, and also studied piano musie one year in Leipsic, Germany.

QuisBull

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Mr. Bell is a deacon of the Fulton Presbyterian church and is ac- tively identified with other branches of the work of the church. He is president of the Westminster College Alumni Association and a past master of Fulton Lodge No. 48, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.

He is recognized as a leader in state and national press associations, not merely because of his thorough-going newspaper ability, but because of the dignity, enthusiasm and strength with which he upholds the best traditions of the profession in which he has so conspicuous and so deserved a success. .

JOHN TREADWAY is a son of parents who were pioneers in the state of Missouri, and he was born within a quarter of a mile of his present residence, on July 27, 1836. His birthplace was the "Dickey" Carr farm, upon which his father, Washington Treadway, settled upon his advent into Missouri, in October, 1835. The Treadway family formed a part of the caravan which included the McDannolds, natives of the same Kentucky town as were the Treadways, and the ox teams and old prairie schooner conveyed the household, white and black, to the Paynes- ville community, where the future life of the family was to be centered.

Washington Treadway, the father, was a son-in-law of Reuben Mc- Dannold, the head of that numerous family of pioneers which settled in and about Paynesville, and he himself found the country to his lik- ing. He was born September 15, 1803, in Kentucky, and belonged to the slave-labor class of citizens. Farming constituted his life-work. He was a member of a Baptist family, and although he himself lived outside the church, he strongly favored its work throughout his life. He was a sturdy partisan of Thomas H. Benton, prominent for many years in the Missouri Democracy, and a member of congress for a long period. The father of Washington Treadway, Dr. John Treadway, left Kentucky about the time his son departed for Missouri, but the father located in Bartholomew, Indiana, and there practiced his profession until his death in 1845, or thereabouts. Dr. Treadway was born in Virginia in 1781. His wife, Elizabeth Griffin, whom he married in 1851, was the daughter of a Revolutionary soldier. She died in Pike county and is buried in the old Reuben McDannold cemetery. Dr. Treadway was one of those kind hearted, sympathetic, southern gentlemen, whose life was given to the alleviation of distress, and he literally wore him- self out in ministering to the afflicted, "without money and without price," if the conditions made that call upon his sympathy.

Washington Treadway in 1835 married Sarah E. McDannold, a daughter of Reuben and Phoebe (Ellis) McDannold, and they became the parents of two children, John, of this review, and Phoebe. The daughter was born August 26, 1838, became the wife of William H. Henderson and died in Pike county on January 20, 1912. The father, Washington Treadway, died August 29, 1875, and his wife died on January 12, 1865.

The district school educated John Treadway in his early years, and his final educational training was secured under the tutelage of the noted teachers of his time, Marcellus Boren and E. N. Bonfils. When he entered upon life independent of his parents' care, he engaged at once in stock trading, in which business other representatives of his family have been more than ordinarily successful, and in which he enjoyed his full share of prosperity. The first few years of his married life Mr. Treadway passed on the old Reuben McDannold farm and in 1870 he came to the farm which has since been his home and the scene of his very substantial achievements.

On February 21, 1860, he married Eliza A. Coons, a daughter of

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Captain John and Elizabeth (Wells) Coons, who were Kentucky pio- neers to Pike county. The Coons children were John, who died in 1912, in Texas; Clifton and Franklin died in childhood; Mary J., the wife of R. L. Keithley ; Carrie L. married William Culbertson and passed her life in Ralls county ; Eliza A. was born on December 4, 1836. Mr. and Mrs. Treadway are the parents of four children: Dr. Ollie Treadway, a veterinary surgeon and farmer, born April 27, 1861, married Eugenia Smith, who died and left a daughter, Ada Smith Treadway; Sarah E., the second child of Mr. and Mrs. Treadway, died in infancy; Dr. William W., born in September, 1865, is practicing medicine, as well as conducting a farm in Pike county, and Major Wells, the fourth child, is a farmer of Virden, Illinois; he married Sarah Wycoff and has three children, Carrie E., John W., and Herbert.

Mr. and Mrs. Treadway have been members of the Baptist church since 1857 and lived lives of the highest integrity, winning and retain- ing the esteem and admiration of all who have known them in their home community.

JAMES A. McDANNOLD is a representative of that numerous pro- gressive and popular family of pioneers established in Northeast Mis- souri by three sons of Reuben McDannold, who was born in Virginia, February 14, 1768, and who was a young boy at the time of the Revo- lutionary war. His son, William, was one of the trio of brothers re- sponsible for a share of the honor of building up the "house of McDan- nold" in Missouri; he passed his life about Middletown and is believed to be interred in the cemetery there.

William McDannold was born September 23, 1793, and he died in 1840. His life was that of a frontier farmer for he literally hewed an estate for himself out of the wilderness. He married and had the fol- lowing children : William is a resident of California; Orlando was a resident of Lincoln county, Missouri, at the time of his death, and he is survived by five children; James A. was the father of the subject of this review, who was named after him; a daughter who married A. M. Crouch in Virginia and subsequently settled in Audrain county, Mis- souri, where she died; and Mrs. Atkinson, who passed her life in Vir- ginia.

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A history of northeast Missouri, Vol. 2 pt 2, Part 60

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