USA > Ohio > Lorain County > A Standard History of Lorain County, Ohio: An Authentic Narrative of the. > Part 18
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and turned the management of the home office over to his son. Mr. Durand is now one of the leading representatives of the general insurance and real estate field in Lorain County, and his business connections also extend to Cuyahoga County.
In 1889 he married Lillian B. Burgess, of Norwalk, Ohio. They have two children : William Breckenridge, who is attending high school; and Corinne, in the Conservatory of Music at Oberlin College. The family are members of the First Congregational Church. Mr. Durand is a past chancellor of the Knights of Pythias and has filled the various chairs in the lodge of Masons. In politics he is a republican. For sixteen years he filled the office of township clerk at Oberlin, and was chief of the local fire department for eight years.
CHARLES E. WILSON. From a successful career as a farmer in Avon Township, Charles E. Wilson graduated into a position of business and public leadership at Elyria. Mr. Wilson is one of the honored veterans of the Civil war, has spent most of his life in Lorain County, has served with credit in public office, and among other important relations which he sustains toward business is chairman of the board of directors of the Lorain County Savings & Trust Company, one of the largest and solidest banking institutions of Northern Ohio.
Charles E. Wilson was born in Avon Township, Lorain County, Ohio, August 26, 1840, a son of William and Elvira (Clisbee) Wilson. The father was born in Northamptonshire, England, in 1812, and came to the United States at the age of eighteen with his father, William. William, Sr., was twice married, and his first wife died in England and his second in Avon Township. After living in Cleveland, Ohio, for a few years William Wilson, Jr., was married in that city to Miss Elvira Clisbee, and in 1839 they removed to Avon Township, Lorain County, settling on a tract of land which at that time was covered by woods. He died there January 19, 1860, at the age of forty-seven years two months and nine days. In politics he was a democrat, and a member of the Baptist Church. His wife, who was of New England stock, lived to be eighty-five years of age and passed away at Tabor, Iowa, May 25, 1904. In 1867, after the marriage of her son Charles, she and three of her children went to Cassopolis, Michigan, lived in that state about three years, and then went West to Tabor, Iowa, where she spent the rest of her years. Mrs. Wilson in Iowa took a very prominent part in church work, was a devoted Baptist, and was especially known for her kindness and helpfulness in times of sickness and need. She was laid to rest at Tabor. In the family were six children, three boys and three girls, of which two sons and one daughter are still living: Charles E., who is the oldest of the family; Nancy, wife of N. S. Phelps, living on a farm near Glenwood, Iowa; Louis E., of Tarkio, Atchison County, Missouri; Anna, wife of J. S. Graves of Tabor, Iowa, died there leaving one son, Thaddeus L., who after the death of his mother was brought to Lorain County by his uncle, Charles E. Wilson, was reared and graduated from the Elyria schools and is now married and lives in Portland, Oregon; Willis S., who died at the age of twenty-three in Tabor, Iowa, where he is buried; and Alice, who died and was buried at Tabor, Iowa. All these children were born in Avon Township, Lorain County.
Charles E. Wilson had the stimulating environment of the partly de- veloped farm during his early youth, and when the occasion and oppor- tunity were given attended the common schools of Avon Township. He afterwards had one term of instruction in Oberlin College. He had just reached manhood when the war broke out, but did not enlist until 1864, when he left the heavy responsibilities of the home and enlisted
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in Company H of the First Ohio Heavy Artillery, which was in service chiefly in Eastern Tennessee. He remained with the army until after the close of the war, and was discharged at Nashville, Tennessee, in June, 1865. After the surrender of Lee he returned home, and in the fall of the same year drove a team to Iowa, and spent one year on a farm in that state. Returning to Lorain County, he was married, and located on the old homestead, which for several years he rented, and later bought. Mr. Wilson was an active and progressive farmer in Avon Township until 1886, and now for almost thirty years has been a resi- dent of the City of Elyria. In public affairs he has always been an influ- ential factor, and his chief service was as county commissioner, a posi- tion he held for six years and ten months, two terms of three years each, after which he served an appointive term of ten months.
Mr. Wilson has long been active in financial affairs at Elyria, and was formerly a stockholder in the Elyria Savings Deposit Company. With the organization of the Lorain County Banking Company, he sold his stock in the former institution and became one of the original stockholders of the new company, and on the 15th of November, 1915, the bank was reorganized as the Lorain County Savings & Trust Com- pany and its capital stock increased. He has been one of the directors for a number of years, and is now chairman of the board. The Lorain County Savings & Trust Company has capital stock of $150,000, and surplus and undivided profits of nearly $115,000. The total resources according to a statement made in the spring of 1915 aggregated over $2,000,000. Probably the item in this statement which most accurately indicates the high standing of the bank in Northern Ohio is that show- ing the deposits, which at the time aggregated over $2,000,000. The executive officers of the banking company are : Arthur B. Taylor, presi- dent ; Richard D. Perry, vice president; Louis B. Fauver, second vice president ; Alvin J. Plocher, secretary; Herbert A. Daniels, treasurer; Aloysius M. Thome, assistant treasurer. The board of directors com- prise a number of the best known business men and citizens of Lorain County.
In addition to his responsibilities as chairman of the board of di- rectors of the Lorain County Savings & Trust Company Mr. Wilson is a stockholder in various enterprises in Elyria and elsewhere, including the Cleveland, Columbus and Southwestern Electric Railway. He is president of the Masonic Temple Building Company of Elyria. He is a member of Richard Allen Post, G. A. R., of Elyria; of King Solomon Lodge No. 56, Free and Accepted Masons; and of the Elyria Chamber of Commerce. While not a member of any church, he is a regular attendant and supporter of the Methodist Episcopal Society of Elyria, where his wife has an active membership. Among other public services he has been a member of the Elyria city council, and in politics is a republican on national issues.
In Avon Township, on April 16, 1867, Mr. Wilson married Miss Elzina Lucas. She became his wife when he was still struggling to get a start as a young farmer, and they have traveled life's highway to- gether, sharing and dividing each other's joys and sorrows for nearly half a century. To their marriage were born two daughters. Mrs. Alice E. Edwards, the only one now living, resides at the Wilson home in Elyria, and her daughter, Miss Alice W. Edwards, after graduating from the Elyria High School in the class of 1914 entered the Ohio Wes- leyan University at Delaware. The other daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Wilson was named Grace, and died at the age of sixteen years. The daughter, Mrs. Edwards, and her daughter, are members of the Con- gregational Church at Elyria.
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ALBERT Z. TILLOTSON. While most lawyers of Lorain County have their homes in Elyria, one of the able representatives of the profession is Albert Z. Tillotson, of Oberlin. Mr. Tillotson has a very large private practice, and his position is such that it is evident he made no mistake when he returned from his career as a school man, which he had fol- lowed for a number of years, to the law.
Born at Brunswick, Medina County, Ohio, August 2, 1867, he is a son of Zadock and Emily M. (Metcalf) Tillotson. Both parents were natives of Ohio, his father born in Brunswick in 1835 and his mother in Liver- pool in 1843. They were married in Liverpool, Ohio, in 1860 and the father died after a long career as a farmer in May, 1913, at the home of his only son and child, Albert Z., in Oberlin. The mother died in 1898. The latter was a member of the Baptist Church while the father was a Methodist, was a republican in politics and was affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
Albert Z. Tillotson finished his education in the Oberlin Business College, and had also attended a select school at Brunswick. His work as a teacher was continued through sixteen terms, and in the meantime he had taken up the study of law under his uncle, C. A. Metcalf, and after his admission to the bar practiced with his uncle at Oberlin and Elyria for five years. Since then he has been alone in practice and has handled cases before all the courts of the state and the Federal district.
In politics he is a republican and an active party man in his section of Lorain County. He has served as justice of the peace, and was elected police judge of Oberlin, being one of the youngest men honored with that office. He has also been a candidate for nomination as probate judge.
In 1888 Mr. Tillotson married Emily C. Felakins. She was born in Sullivan, Ashland County, Ohio, daughter of George Felakins, a farmer and early settler there. Mr. and Mrs. Tillotson have a fine family of eight children : Roy E., who is now a senior in Oberlin Col- lege ; Jessie, a teacher in the public schools; Mary E .. a teacher at Pen- field; Frances E., who is employed in Cleveland, Ohio; Ruth Marie, Esther M .. Ruby Lou and Rose Elaine, all at home.
Mr. Tillotson is a member of the Baptist Church, is a Mason, having served as senior deacon in his lodge, has passed all the chairs of local lodge of Royal Arcanum, and is also a member of the Knights of Pythias.
GEORGE L. WELLER. Lorain County has produced a few men whose work has been notable in the realm of invention, and one of these is George L. Weller, who for many years was superintendent of the Elyria waterworks, and is now engineer of the steam plant in the Great National Tube Company's works at Lorain. Mr. Weller has from an early age manifested great skill, both in handling and in perfecting mechanical apparatus and at different times has given to the industrial world a number of devices which have served to lighten and cheapen the labor and time involved in the older methods of performing a given piece of work.
Elyria has been the home of Mr. Weller practically all his life. He was born there March 24, 1864, a son of John and Mary (MeCollum). Weller. His father died in 1890 at the age of fifty-seven. The old Weller homestead is just north of the city. There George L. Weller grew to manhood, gained his early education in the public schools of Elyria. was also a student in Oberlin College for a time, and then attended that old and substantial institution for business training, the Eastman Business College at Poughkeepsie, New York. His father was a stone mason, and
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from him he learned the same profession and that furnished him his chief means of livelihood until 1890. In the meantime, in 1889, he was appointed superintendent of the Elyria waterworks, and held that office consecutively for more than twenty years, until 1912. During the recon- struction of the waterworks after municipal ownership had been decided upon and while the pumping station was being constructed on the shores of Lake Erie, he did much work of the nature of civil engineering, and after having seen the new plant installed and in successful operation he resigned in 1912, and then went with The National Tube Company at Lorain. There he has charge of everything in that big plant that runs by steam power. The steam boilers generate altogether about a quarter million horse-power, and Mr. Weller is the capable man who has the responsibility of keeping up to the highest point of efficiency all of this power making plant.
Out of the originating genius of his own mind and his long experience in handling machinery, Mr. Weller designed the filters and the filtering process now for a number of years used in the Elyria waterworks. The value of this invention can be best told in terms of cost. When he became superintendent the company paid about nine dollars per million gallons for the filtering of water, but his new process reduced that cost to 50 cents a million gallons. In 1912 Mr. Weller secured patents both in the United States and in Canada for what is known as the Weller Water Meter. Another of his inventions is a channeling machine, used in stone quarrying, and this machine was one of the principal products manufactured by the Weller Engineering Company for a number of years. He has also invented and patented a number of other implements and processes used in stone quarries.
He is one of the prominent members of the Lorain County Engineer- ing Club, whose membership includes electrical, mechanical and steam engineers residing in this county. He is affiliated with the Modern Woodmen of America and belongs to The Elyria Chamber of Commerce and in politics is a republican. Mr. Weller was married July 19, 1893, to Miss Ida Alma Black of Vermilion, Ohio, daughter of John and Mary Black. They are the parents of two children: Jay C., who graduated from the Elyria high school in the class of 1912, and is now a student in Oberlin College; and Vileda, who is a member of the graduating class of 1917 in the Elyria high school.
ALBERT V. HAGEMAN. A native son of Lorain, Albert V. Hageman has passed his entire career in this city, among whose business men by his learning, industry, ability and character he holds a high place, while he is no less valued in the community as a liberal-minded and enterprising citizen. During his business life here, Mr. Hageman's hands have taken hold of incipient enterprises and have guided them to success; he has been honored by his associates with election to positions of trust not because of his self-seeking or importunity, but because such positions seek one who has shown rare intelligence and fidelity in the management of his own affairs.
Mr. Hageman was born at Lorain, October 12, 1871, and is a son of Conrad and Catherine (Claus) Hageman, natives of Germany, the father having come to this country in 1845 and settled in Ohio, where his subsequent career was passed in farming in the vicinity of Lorain. After attending the public schools of Lorain, Albert V. Hageman entered a commercial college at Oberlin, Ohio, where he completed a business course. His first position was that of bookkeeper for the Amherst Stone Quarries, where he remained three years, subsequently becoming clerk in the Lorain Savings and Banking Company, in October, 1894. In
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1901 he was made secretary and treasurer of this institution, positions which he held until it was sold to the Cleveland Trust Company, in 1905, when Mr. Hageman was made manager of the new ownership and held that position until October, 1907. In 1897 he had been elected treasurer and general manager of the Black River Phone Company, which under his direction has grown and developed rapidly and now has 3,600 sub- scribers. Various other positions have been and are held by Mr. Hage- man. He is president of the Amherst Home Telephone Company ; was one of the organizers of the Cleveland Life Insurance Company, of which he served as a director two years and then resigned; was formerly a member of the advisory board of the Cleveland Trust Company; was one of the purchasers of the Hoffman Heater Company when that com- pany had failed, and assisted in bringing it to success, when he sold out his interests, in 1911; is a director of the Citizens Home and Savings Association and a member of the finance committee of that enterprise, and was one of the organizers of the Wickens Company. He has shown his faith in the future of Lorain and its industries by investing his means in realty and other holdings, and for some years has been the medium through which some large and important real estate transactions have been carried through. As a city servant he has ever been ready to do his full share toward advancing the community's welfare, and in 1915 his abilities were recognized by his appointment to the position of trustee of the Lorain Sinking Fund. He belongs to the Cleveland Athletic Club and is also well and favorably known in fraternal circles, being a Knight Templar and Shriner in Masonry, and a member of the Knights of Pythias, the Knights of the Maccabees and the Improved Order of Red Men. With his wife, he belongs to the Episcopal Church of the Redeemer, at Lorain, in which he is serving as vestryman. Mrs. Hage- man was formerly Eleanor M. Cunningham, of Clyde, Ohio.
GEORGE P. WALTON. It is not every man who can leave, when called from earth prematurely, a successful and growing concern to his family. The Walton Ice Company at Elyria, regarded as one of the important institutions in the commercial district, is a monument to the energy and integrity of the late George P. Walton, and it is still carried on as a prosperous concern under the direct management of his family. While Mr. Walton deserves great credit for building up this flourishing enter- prise, he is remembered not only for what he did in a material way but also for the genial personality, the kindly nature, and the public-spirited citizenship which were dominant qualities in his character all his life.
There was one locality in the City of Elyria with which George P. Walton's career was identified more than any other. This was the place of his birth, and in a house which is now the family homestead and he himself assisted to construct, located on the same site, he passed away. The Walton home is at 671 East River Street. There George P. Walton was born October 31, 1859, and he died January 4, 1912, when a little past fifty-two years of age. His parents, John and Catherine (Garrety) Walton were early settlers of Elyria, having established their home there in 1844. They came to Lorain County from Vineland, New Jersey, but John Walton was born in Northamptonshire, England, and his wife in Dublin, Ireland. Mrs. Catherine Walton died in Elyria thirteen years after the birth of her son George. John Walton was a brick- maker, worked at that trade for a number of years, but late in life be- came paralyzed and was helpless for several years before his death, which occurred in April, 1897. In the family were three sons and two daugh- ters, all of them now deceased.
In the environment which he knew from early childhood until the
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close of his life, George P. Walton was reared, gained his education at Elyria, and when still a boy learned the butcher's trade from the late John Savage. He was employed in that line until 1893, and then took up the ice business. For a number of years he handled the natural product, and got his supply from Black River which in years gone by was the scene of ice cutting and gathering in all this section of Northern Ohio. He also operated a cider press at Coon's Mill, thus making his ice gath- ering operations and cider making furnish alternate employment for the different seasons of the year. In the spring of 1911, about a year before he died, Mr. Walton erected an artificial ice plant on Winckles Street, and had the plant in full running order before his death. The immediate cause of his death was an injury to the foot occasioned by the falling of an iron bar at the ice plant, from which injury blood poison developed, and after an illness of six weeks he passed away. Mr. Walton had a host of friends not only in Elyria but in all the surround- ing country, and enjoyed success because of the fact that he was master of his business. Personally he was extremely popular, and the estima- tion in which he was held was well stated in the words expressed at the time of his death that "he was a big hearted, jolly, good natured man that it was a pleasure to meet." While always busy and doing something that was worth while, he was devoted to his home and family, and outside of business hours could usually be found within the family circle.
As already stated, The Walton Ice Company is a family business, and the oldest child, Miss Florence M. Walton, has shown herself to be a splendid business woman and has assumed many of the responsibilities connected with the business since her father's death. Prior to that time she had kept the books of the company and thus acquired a con- siderable knowledge of its affairs. The artificial ice plant on Winckles Street has a daily capacity of fifteen tons of ice, and the ice is manu- factured from distilled water. There is also storage space for 1,500 tons, and in 1915 the company erected a cold storage plant which fur- nishes facilities for the storage of fruit, eggs and butter. The company operates a number of wagons for supplying the local and family trade and the business is making rapid progress each year.
Before his death George P. Walton was a member of the Catholic Mutual Benefit Association. His family are members of St. Mary's Catholic Church at Elyria. At St. Mary's Church on May 17, 1882, he and Miss Elizabeth C. Neipfoot were married. She was born on Sugar Ridge in Elyria Township, daughter of Henry and Elizabeth (Meyer) Neipfoot. Her mother was born in Germany, coming to this country with her parents when she was eleven years of age. The father was born in Saxony, Germany, came over when about twenty-six, was a cabinet maker for a number of years, but subsequently bought a farm on Sugar Ridge and looked after its operations the rest of his active life. The mother died on that farm December 10, 1894, and the father subsequently lived in the home of his daughter, Mrs. Walton, at Elyria, until his death, December 6, 1896, at the age of seventy-seven. Mrs. Walton was educated in St. Mary's Parochial School in Elyria.
Mrs. Walton's five children are Florence M., Roland H., Charles F., Karl P. and Elmer W. All were born in the comfortable brick house at 671 East River Street, in which their father died. George P. Walton and his father and another man burnt the brick for the construction of this old residence. The children all attended St. Mary's Parochial School until they were about twelve years of age, and later continued their edu- cation in the public schools. Elmer, the youngest, is a member of the class of 1916 in the Elyria High School and is a capable young student,
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showing a high average in all his classes. All the children have been brought up with more or less familiarity with their father's business, taking an active part in its affairs, and its success and continued pros- perity are largely due to the harmonious workings of the members of the Walton family. The son Roland H. is now the active manager of the company. He is affiliated with Elyria Lodge No. 465, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, Elyria Lodge No. 431 of the Fraternal Order of Eagles, Elyria Lodge No. 778 of the Loyal Order of Moose, the Knights of St. John and the Elyria Chamber of Commerce. The son Karl P. is also affiliated with the Elyria Lodge of Elks. The Walton Ice Company as a business institution has membership in the Elyria Automobile Club.
ANDREW W. DAVIDSON. In the rural districts the honors of politics are usually better bestowed on the basis of merit and qualifications than in the large city communities. At the present time the trustee of Cam- den Township is Andrew W. Davidson, who was first elected to that office in the fall of 1913 and was re-elected in 1915. Mr. Davidson has for years been recognized as one of the most substantial citizens in the Kipton community and is a man in whom his fellows place implicit con- fidence both for what he has done and for what he is.
He was born in Russia Township of Lorain County, September 28, 1869, a son of Andrew and Martha (Edgar) Davidson. His father is the venerable Andrew Davidson, and the name of Davidson has for more than half a century been linked with the sterling qualities of industry and integrity in Lorain County.
Andrew W. Davidson grew up on his father's farm in Camden Town- ship, acquired an education in the local schools, and started out when quite young to make his own way in the world. With the sturdy dis- cipline of the farm, he was able to fit in usefully in any employment to which he turned his hand. For seven and a half years he was in the butcher business at Kipton, and in 1902 bought a farm of eighty-eight acres, which has since been the principal object of his energy and am- bition. He subsequently added fifty acres to his first purchase, but having sold twenty-five acres his estate now consists of 113 acres. In many ways he has improved his land, and for a number of years has conducted a small dairy, shipping considerable milk to the city centers.
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