USA > New York > Niagara County > Biographical and portrait cyclopedia of Niagara County, New York > Part 26
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71
wards went into the furniture business with George Cheshire, under the firm name of Robertson & Cheshire, and then into the produce and insurance business with George MeChestrey, under the firm name of Robert- son & McChestrey, all of which he followed in Middleport. In 1874 he started a humber yard in Middleport, in partnership with S. G. Rowley, under the firm name of Robertson & Rowley, which continued for five years, when he bought his partner's interest, and has since continued alone. He also has a steam planing-mill in connection with his lumber yard in Middleport, in which he employs from five to ten men the year round. He was formerly a republican, but now belongs to the Prohibition party, being a strong temperance man. He was constable. of Royalton at one time, and is a member of Cataract Lodge, No. 295, Free and Accepted Masons, of which lodge he was secretary for a good many years.
Mr. Robertson has done more than his share in building up the village, is the owner of quite a number of houses and lots, which he rents. In the year 1870 he enlarged and rebuilt the . district school building, which is now converted into a graded or union school. He also has had charge of and built a goodly number of the buildings throughout the village, and almost all the buildings on the cast side of the village, which may be called the Robertson addition.
On November 29, 1860, he married Helen M. Parker, of New York city. Their union has been blest with three children: Lizzie A., William H. (deceased ), and Nellie E. Mrs. Robertson is a highly educated lady, having taught school for a number of years in Niagara county and Canada. At an early age she became imbued with a desire for a
225
OF NIAGARA COUNTY.
medical education, and finally concluded to take a medical course of studies. She entered Hahnemann Medical college, of Chicago, in 1887, from which well-known institution she was graduated in 1889, and has since been engaged in the practice of medicine at Middleport with good success.
HI. A. Robertson is a self-made man, hav- ing commenced life without any capital, and has, by industry and perseverance, earned all he has, and is now in comfortable circum- stances, with a bright and promising future before hin.
F FREDERICK R. MONTGOMERY,
ex-postmaster and an old and promi- nent resident of Johnson's Creek, is a son of Robert and Matilda (Stranahan) Mont- gomery, and was born in Sangerfield, Oneida county, New York, on the 24th day of Feb- ruary, 1827. Elias Montgomery (grand- father), was a native of Oneida county, where he lived and died, and was an exten- sive farmer by occupation, and a hotel- keeper in Sangerfield, same county. He was interested in a stage line from Albany to Buffalo, and also owned a distillery. He was a prominent and influential man, and in politics a Jacksonian democrat. He mar- ried, and reared a family of seven children : Elias, Robert, Bradford, Richard, John, Sophia and Maria. He was a prominent member of the Masonic order. William Stranahan (maternal grandfather), was a native of Connecticut, and moved from there at an early day to Otsego county, town of Butternuts, where he died. He served in the war of 1812, and was afterwards colonel in the New York militia, being quite prom- inent as a military man. He was also a farmer, proprietor of a rope-walk in New
Berlin, and owned four hundred acres of land and ran an extensive dairy. He mar- ried a Miss Joslyn, who bore him seven children : William, Charles, John, Calinda, Matilda, Mianda, and Lucinda. Robert Montgomery (father), was born in Oneida county, this State, in the town of Sanger- field, and came to Oswego county about 1824. He moved to Iowa and remained there for some time, and then returned and lived with his son at Hartland until he died in 1875, at the advanced age of eighty-three years. He kept a hotel at Fulton, Oswego county. IIe was of an originative and in- ventive mind, having invented a mill for grinding bark, also a horse-power for a threshing machine. He was formerly a democrat, but latterly became a republican, and was prominent in Masonry. He mar- ried Matilda Stranahan, by whom he had a family of three children: Virginia Victo- ria, Frederick R., and Henry C.
Frederick R. Montgomery received his education in the common schools. He came from Otsego to Monroe county in 1834, where he remained until sixteen years of age, when he learned the trade of harness making. In 1847 he came to Johnson's Creek, where he has since resided, and in addition to working at his trade runs a small fruit farm of eighteen acres, which requires the most of his attention.
He married Hannah Abbott, of Monroe county, on July 19, 1849, and by this union had eight children: Agnes, Ruby, Alice, Day, Harriet, Florence, Burt A., and Wil- liam F. The first four died in infancy ; Harriet married Burt Balliett, a hatter of Chicago, and died in 1884; Florence mar- ried Dr. Henry Wilmot, of Middleport; Burt A. married Mattie Taylor, of John- son's Creek, and is now a resident of Ra-
15
226
BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
venna, Ohio, where he is engaged in a basket factory; and William F. is a fruit evaporator at Ravenna, Ohio.
In politics Mr. Montgomery is a stanch republican, and in 1861 was appointed post- master of Johnson's Creek, which position he held eighteen years, and he was also justice of the peace for twenty years. He was under-sheriff under Alfred Ransom, of this county, one term, and was assistant sergeant-at-arms of the New York State Assembly in 1863-64. He has been com- missioned a notary public, which office he is now holding. He has been a leading politician for a great many years, is a men- ber of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, a strong temperance man, and a member of the order of Good Templars. He is also a member of the Equitable Aid Union, of Johnson's Creek, in which he is president. Mr. Montgomery has filled all the offices that he has held with marked ability, has given universal satisfaction to the people of Hartland as postmaster and as justice of the peace, the best proof of which is his long continuance in each of said offices, and in every station which he has occupied in life he has commanded the respect and es- teem of his fellow citizens.
W ILLIAM D. HOYT, a leading mer- chant and a democrat of Middleport, is a son of Rev. John B. and Emeline C. (Fenn) Hoyt, and was born in the town of Coventry, Chenango county, New York, July 12, 1837. His paternal grandfather, Thaddeus Hoyt, was a native of Connecti- cut, and removed in 1800 to the town of Walton, Delaware county, this State, where he died in 1840. He was a whig in politics, a Congregationalist in religion, a shoemaker
and farmer by trade, and followed farming principally for a livelihood. He was an anti-renter in the anti-rent troubles which occurred in New York, as the result of the creation of several vast landed estates along the Hudson and Mohawk rivers by the early Dutch rulers of the New Netherlands. He married, and reared a family of four sons : Thaddeus, Amzi, Chauncey, and Rev. John B., the father of W. D. Hoyt. Rev. John B. Hoyt was born in New Canaan, Connecti- cut, and came to New York, where he was a resident of the town of Green, in Chen- ango county, and then of the town of Cov- entry, where he died July 4, 1862, aged sixty-nine years. He was graduated from Yale college in 1827, then entered the min- istry of the Congregational church, and served as pastor of the church of that de- nomination at Green and Coventry for forty years. He was a man of fine education, a whig in politics, and in 1827 married Eme- line C. Fenn, who died in 1843, and left seven children. She was a daughter of Rev. Stephen Fenn, a Presbyterian minister of Harpersford, New York, who was an old-line whig, and reared a family of six children, all of whom are dead. After Mrs. Hoyt's death, Mr. Hoyt, in 1845, married Eliza Phillips, by whom he had one child.
William D. Hoyt received an academic education, and entered upon a business life for himself in 1855, as a clerk in a general mercantile establishment, in which capacity he served until 1863, when he embarked in the general mercantile business at Middle- port. He now owns and conducts a large and heavily stocked clothing and gentle- men's furnishing goods and stationery es- tablishment, besides being interested in several other business enterprises. He has had charge of an insurance agency for some
227
OF NIAGARA COUNTY.
time, besides serving for several years as general ticket agent and one term of four years as postmaster. He is a member and junior deacon of Cataract Lodge, No. 295, Free and Accepted Masons, and has served as clerk, treasurer, and trustee of the village of Middleport.
In 1863 he married Louisa E. Fenn, who died in October, 1878, and left three chil- dren : Raymond, now deceased; Charles A., book-keeper for the firm of Gould, Lee & Luce, of Rochester, New York; and Irving H., a clerk for Eastman & Co., of the above named city. In 1881 he united in marriage with Mrs. Eliza I. Churchill Bowden, daugh- ter of the late Major Churchill. By his second marriage he has no children.
In politics Mr. Hoyt is an active democrat of the Jeffersonian school. He was ap- pointed by President Cleveland as post- master of Middleport, and attended the third and fourth class postmasters' conven- tion in Chicago and Washington, where he served as chairman of the New York dele- gation. He represented the town of Hart- land in several democratic county conven- tions, was a delegate to the democratic state convention of 1889, and is a persist- ent worker for the success of democratic principles.
JAY S. ROWE, one of the most active business men of Johnson's Creek, is a son of Gordon and Ann Maria (Spalding) Rowe, and was born in the town of Navarino, Onondaga county, New York, May 11, 1848. The Rowes are of German ancestry. His great-grandfather was Joseph Rowe, who married Lydia Palmer. His grandfather, James Rowe, was born October 2, 1774, and died June 7, 1873, in Onondaga county, this
State. He served in the war of 1812, and was a farmer by occupation. He married Sallie Tefft, by whom he had twelve children, all of whom he reared and gave a good education, and set them off in life as they became of age or married. Being a man of fine German constitution, he endured cheerfully all the hardships that fell to the lot of the old patriots of this country. He was a prominent member of the Baptist church, and served as a deacon, and lived to see his children and grandchildren grow up around him, and died at the ripe old age of ninety-nine. Gordon Rowe (father) was born in the town of Onondaga, September 20, 1822, where he resided until 1851, when he removed to Johnson's Creek, where he spent the remainder of his days, and died March 8, 1891. He was a farmer by occu- pation, and owned a farm of one hundred acres in Hartland town. He was a repub- lican, and quite active in politics. IIe served as justice of the peace of Hartland four terms, beginning in 1872. He also served four terms as justice of sessions of Niagara county. He was a man above the average in intelligence and general information, and became well versed in law by his long experience as a justice of the peace. He married Ann Maria Spalding, April 15, 1846, who died September 1, 1870, and their union was blest with two children : Jay S. and James H. The last named married Myra Dennie, and now resides at the old homestead in Hartland, and follows farming.
Jay S. Rowe acquired his education in the common schools, and began life as a farmer, and followed that business until 1876, when he entered the mercantile business at John- son's Creek, running a store of general merchandise, and by close attention to his business he has built up a large and profit-
228
BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
able trade -the largest of that kind in the town.
On March 15, 1871, he united in marriage with Alice Robson, a charming lady with numerous friends, whose society she always enjoys. Her father, Kendra Robson, was one of the founders of the only Quaker church in the town.
Like his father, Mr. Rowe ranks high in point of intelligence and social standing. He is a stanch republican, and a very impor- tant factor in his party in the politics of Niagara county. Being active and energetic in all he does, he wields a wide influence in the political field. He is a member of Lodge No. 218, Free and Accepted Masons, at Hartland, and aets as treasurer of the lodge. Hartland has no more prominent nor prom- ising business men than Jay S. Rowe.
S YLVESTER G. ROOT, a prominent farmer of Johnson's Creek, is a son of Jesse C. and Polly (Sylvester) Root, and was born in Alexander, Genesee county, New York, January 18, 1822. He belongs to one of the oldest and most distinguished families of the United States. His great- grandfather, Erastus Root, was a native of Whitestown, Massachusetts. He was a lawyer by profession, and an eminent attor- ney and statesman. He was a prominent democrat, and served in the legislature of Massachusetts several terms, and afterwards represented that State in the United States senate. William Root (grandfather), was also a native of Whitestown. He removed from there to Lewis county, and from thence to Genesee county, where he died at the age of one hundred years. . He was an extensive farmer by occupation, and when the Revo- lutionary war broke out he enlisted as a
private and served his country through the whole war. He was a Jeffersonian demo- crat and active in polities in his day. He married and had a family of six children, four sons and two daughters: Isa, Fanny, Lowrie K., William, Jr., Jesse C., and Elias. The latter served in the Patriot war and was driven out of Canada, losing two daughters and one son during that trouble. Jesse C. Root (father), was also born in Massachusetts, and first moved to Lewis county, then to Genesee, and finally to Ni- agara county in 1837, and settled in the town of Hartland on the farm on which his son, Sylvester G., now resides. IIe was a farmer, cattle-drover, and horse-dealer. He married Polly Sylvester, by whom he had eleven children, five sons and six daughters. In politics he was a Jacksonian democrat, and was elected by his party a justice of the peace of Alexander, Genesee county. He died in Hartland in 1839, aged forty-six years.
Sylvester G. Root received a good Eng- lish education in the common schools and then entered Middleport academy, from which he was graduated in 1842. He has always been a farmer, and now owns one of the best improved farms in Niagara county, consisting of one hundred and five acres, which he has improved himself, all of his improvements being modern and of a sub- stantial character.
On January 1, 1856, he married for his first wife Jerusha B. Merritt, by whom he had five children : Lycia May, wife of Ed- ward J. Taylor, a prominent lawyer of Lock- port; Clarence M., a graduate of Pennsyl- vania university, of Philadelphia, who has received the degree of D. D. S., and who married Jennie Gould, and now resides at Springfield, Ohio; George S., also a gradu-
229
OF NIAGARA COUNTY.
ate of Pennsylvania university, of Philadel- phia, and has received the degree of D. D. S., and is likewise a resident of Springfield, Ohio; Edith, who makes her home with her sister, Mrs. Taylor; and Anna, deceased. Ilis first wife died in 1868, and he then married Mrs. Sabra ( Hayward ) Farnham. Frank Farnham, son of wife by her former husband, is a graduate of Rush medical col- lege, of Chicago, and is now engaged in the active practice of medicine in Detroit, Michigan.
Sylvester G. Root was formerly a demo- crat, up to the organization of the Free- Soil party, when he became a republican. After adhering to that party through the. war and the final settlement of all the issues involved in the war, on the organiza- tion of the Greenback party he joined it, and is still a greenbacker. ITis only aim in politics is to promote the welfare of the country, and to discharge his duty as a good citizen honestly and conscientiously. He is highly respected by all his neighbors, and his standing as a man is first-class.
R OBERT DAVISON, of Middleport, New York, is a son of Robert and Elizabeth (Stone) Davison, and was born at Black Rock, Erie county, New York, two and one-half miles east of Buffalo, November 29, 1830. Robert Davison (father) was born in the northern part of Ireland, and emi- grated to America about 1820, settling in Erie county, Pennsylvania. He removed from there to Black Rock, Erie county, in 1828, from thence to Lockport in 1836, then to Hartland corners, from there to Johnson's Creek, and in 1845 came to Middleport. He was a blacksmith, and followed that business all his life. Blacksmithing then
was much more difficult than now, as all the articles used which are now made by machinery were then made by hand. He was an uncompromising democrat, and mar- ried Elizabeth Stone, of Scotch descent, by whom he had a family of six children, three sons and three daughters: Mary A. (de- ceased) ; John, who married Sarah A. Flan- ders, resides at Alden, at which place he and his son, Charles, are ticket agents for the New York, Lackawanna, and Great Western railroad; Robert (subject); Eliza J. (deceased) ; George, resides on a farm in Hartland, Niagara county ; and Laura M. (deceased).
Robert Davison received his education in the common schools, and came to Middle- port with his parents, where he has since resided. He is a farmer by occupation, but prior to the civil war he run canal boats on the canal, owning five. During the war he took his boats to New York city, and from there to Philadelphia, where, in 1862, he took a load of government grain from Phila- delphia to Alexandria, Virginia, and was employed in this line of work until the elose of the war. He went as far south as New Berne, North Carolina, and was near Dutch Gap during a skirmish, when a twelve pound cannon ball went through the deck of his boat, which he secured and still has in his possession as a relic of the war.
On July 16. 1863, Mr. Davison nnited in marriage with Martha Campbell, danghter of Perry and Julia Campbell, of Middleport, New York. Mrs. Davison is a member of the Universalist church, and an earnest worker for its welfare.
In political faith Mr. Davison is a stanch democrat. Ile served as collector of Royal- ton two years, and was excise commissioner for seven years, commencing in 1874, being
230
BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
one of the three members first elected, all of which offices he filled satisfactorily. He owns a farm, in the town of Hartland, of thirty-two acres, twenty of which are in apples. His fruit farm is fine land, and is a regular garden. He also owns the Opera House at Middleport, which is 50 x 90 feet and three stories high, and a fine residence, all of which are the accumulations of his own industry and economy. He has hon- estly and conscientiously discharged all the duties of life, and came to the assistance of his country with his humble crafts in the time of her greatest need, and rendered an important service with his little boats, and he is now enjoying the blessings of that great government in comfort and peace.
F FREDERICK SOMMER, the subject of this sketch, is a son of Andrew and Margaret (Schoepflin ) Sommer, and first saw the light at Baden, Germany, July 18, 1829. His parents were natives of Baden, but emigrated to this country in 1849, shortly after the revolution of 1848, and located in the town of Cheektowaga, Erie county, this State, where they continued to reside up to the time of their death. Andrew Sonnner (father) was a civil engineer, and followed that profession in Germany, where he also served for a time as burgomaster of a small village in Baden. He took an active part in the revolution of 1848 in the mother country. In the United States Mr. Sonner followed the vocation of a farmer with profit. In politics he was first a democrat but later became a stanch republican. He was a Protestant in religion, and a sturdy defender of the faith. His death occurred July 22, 1890, in the eighty-fourth year of his age. His wife and helpmate pre-
ceded him in 1876, at the age of sixty-eight years.
Frederick Sommer received a common school education in Germany, attended an academical school for four years, and later was a student in a boarding school in Switzerland for one year. He then attended the Polytechnical institute at Karlsruhe until 1848, when the revolution caused the suspension of the institute. He came to the United States with his parents in 1849, and worked with his father on the farm in Cheektowaga until 1854. In this year he branched out, and taking his father as a partner, entered into the grocery business at Buffalo. Some time afterward he pur- chased his father's interest and continued a successful business until 1861, when he enlisted in Co. A, 21st New York volun- teers, as a private. When President Lincoln issued his first call for minute men, Mr. Sommer was among the first to respond, his name being the ninetieth enrolled, and as not one of the eighty-nine went to the front, he is entitled to the honor of being the first enrolled in his company under the banner of freedom. Mr. Sommer served in this regiment until August 30, 1862, when, at the second battle of Bull Run, he was shot through the leg. For six days and nights he laid on the bloody field of carnage with his limb broken, without food and without drink, until a stray ambulance corps accidently discovered him and picked him up. On the day he was wounded at Bull Run he was awarded a commission as second lieutenant. He was so prostrated by his in- juries that he was sent home, and remained on the farm until 1864. In August of that year, however, he organized a company of national guards in the town of Cheekto- waga-Co. E, of the 98th regiment, State
231
OF NIAGARA COUNTY.
of New York. He was commissioned cap- tain of the company, and in the same month they were ordered to Elmira, this State, to guard rebel prisoners. They were mustered in for one hundred days, and after serving about four months at Elmira, were dis- charged; but before the company was re- lieved from service Mr. Sommer received the commission of lieutenant-colonel. He was discharged as a supernumerary lieuten- ant-colonel on the consolidation of his regi- ment with the 67th regiment. At the close of Inis military career our subject returned to his farmi, where he remained until 1869, when he removed to Tonawanda, which has since been his home. He was active in the grocery business in this place until 1874, since which time he has been a silent part- ner in the business with his son-in-law, M. H. Schroeder.
Of his political and financial career little need be said beyond the plain facts, which go to show the esteem and confidence in which he is held. For eleven years, up to 1885, he held the position of collector of customs at this place, but was set aside by the Cleveland administration. He is at present serving his second term as justice of the peace, and also served one term in this capacity while on his farm. He served for a number of years as a trustee of the village, and acted, with credit to himself, as mayor for two years. Ten years' service is the record he bears as a member of the Columbia Hook and Ladder company, of which he has been president for a number of years. For three years he has been the trusted president of the North Tonawanda Aid & Savings Association, and to his great interest in the welfare of the city is largely due its present prosperity. Mr. Sommer owns some valuable real estate in the city,
is a stockholder in the German-American bank, a share-holder in the Niagara Vinegar works at South Tonawanda, and a stock- holder in the Lockport and Buffalo railroad.
In addition to his public and business career, Mr. Sommer has a happy home record, with scarcely a cloud to mar its brightness. On October 15, 1857, he mar- ried Julia Carrell, of Cheektowaga, who died in 1859, leaving one child, a daughter, now Mrs. Julia Schroeder, of this place. Ten years later, in April, 1869, Mr. Sommer espoused Magdelina Hertel, of the town of Amherst, Erie county. To this union were born six children, four sons and two daugh- ters : Charles L., Catherine E., Alfred G., Clara M., Herman R., and Arthur G.
In closing, it is only necessary to say that Frederick Sommer is a gentleman, and a man who has the esteem and full confidence of his neighbors. He is a member of the A. O. U. W., and of Scott Post, No. 129, Grand Army of the Republic.
F1 RANCIS HOAG, one of the leading and influential citizens of Middleport, is a son of Isaac and Ann (Powell) Hoag, and was born in the town of Laurens, Otsego county, New York. August 27, 1809. His ancestors were of English extraction. Paul Hoag (grandfather) was born June 25, 1752. Hle was a native of Duchess county, this State, but removed to Otsego connty, where he died January 25, 1837. He was a farmer by occupation and lived on a farm all his life, where he reared a large family of twelve children. He be- longed to the Quaker church and reared his family in that faith, and continued a con- sistent member himself until his death. Isaac Hoag (father) was born in Duchess
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.