USA > Ohio > Crawford County > A centennial biographical history of Crawford County, Ohio > Part 24
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institution is largely due to his efforts, which have resulted in making this one of the leading financial concerns in this portion of the county.
On the 2d of October, 1889, occurred the marriage of Mr. Sheetz and Miss Theresa W. Michaelis, a native of Bucyrus and a daughter of the Rev. August Michaelis, a minister of the Lutheran church. Her father was born in Prussia and came to America about 1840, when a young man. Unto our subject and his wife have been born two sons,-John A. and Walter F. Mr. Sheetz votes with the Democracy and is a recognized leader in its ranks. He has served for six or seven years as a member of the school board and for six or eight years has been treasurer of the board. His religious belief con- nects him with the Lutheran church, and for three years he was a member of the church council, while for a similar period he served as deacon and was secretary of the building committee when the present substantial and com- modious house of worship was erected. Mr. Sheetz is a man of distinctive ability, and his character is one which is above a shadow of reproach. He has been faithful in the offices to which he has been called, loyal to the duties of public and private life and is widely known and respected by all who have been at all familiar with his honorable and useful career.
CHARLES J. SCROGGS.
Charles Jacob Scroggs, the senior member of the law firm of Scroggs & Monnett, is the only child of the late Hon. Jacob Scroggs, attorney at law, and his wife, Julia A. Walwork. The Scroggs family in America was founded by three brothers, Alexander, Allan and John, who came from Edin- burg to Cumberland county, Pennsylvania, about 1740, and who, according to family tradition, were either nephews or grandnephews of Chief Justice Scroggs of the King's Bench under Charles II. Allan Scroggs died in Cumberland county in 1776, leaving a numerous family, of whom the second son. John, made his way to Baltimore, where, in 1786, he was married to Frances Hook. Their third son, also named John, was born in Baltimore June 9. 1794. and continued to live there until IS19, taking part in the war of 1812 and being present at the bombardment of Fort McHenry and at North Point. He then removed to Cumberland county, Pennsylvania, and one year later to Columbiana county, Ohio, where in 1821 he was married to Miss Ann Shawke, daughter of Jacob and Dorothea ( Kester) Shawke. Her father was born in Lebanon county, Pennsylvania, November 15. 1759, and was of Bavarian ancestry. being able to trace his family back to the
Jacob Garages-
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fourteenth century. He was a soldier of the Revolution, serving during portions of seven years in a number of Pennsylvania companies, and dying at Lisbon, Ohio, in 1832.
Johin Scroggs was a hatter by trade and followed this business at Lisbon and Canton, Ohio, and afterward at Bucyrus, moving to this place in 1839 and settling on the site of the present residence of the subject of this sketch, his house at that time being the last one but one on Walnut street and the last one on Rensselaer street. Here he resided until his death, in 1861, having lived, not an eventful life, but one which won for him the highest respect of all who knew him. After his death his widow made her home with her only living daughter, Mrs. W. T. Giles, until her death in 1882, at the ripe age of eighty-six years. Both Mr. and Mrs. Scroggs were life- long and faithful members of the Methodist Episcopal church, and the pres- ent beautiful edifice in Bucyrus contains memorial windows in their honor.
They were the parents of seven children: Joseph R., who died in Free- port, Illinois, unmarried, in 1867, a newspaper man by profession, and a prominent Mason and Odd Fellow; William M., for two terms county auditor, married Miss Margaret Byron in 1849, and died at Bucyrus in 1874, leaving surviving him his widow and two children, all since deceased ; Jacob: Mary, wife of W. T. Giles, one of the veteran newspaper men of the west, who died at Freeport, Illinois, in 1898, his wife having passed to the spirit world in 1889, leaving two children,-W. S., a railway mail clerk, and Mira L., a teacher in the Chicago schools; Mira, wife of C. W. Butter- field, died at Bucyrus, Ohio, in 1859: Amanda, who died young ; and Jolin B., a prominent lawyer of Kansas City, Kansas, where he died in 1899, leaving surviving him a widow and three step-children.
Jacob Scroggs was born in Canton, Ohio, August II, 1827, and died at Bucyrus, Ohio, March 23, 1897. During his boyhood he acquired such education as the frontier schools could furnish, and also learned his father's trade, but that not proving congenial employment he taught school for five terms, worked on the local newspapers and in clerical positions in the court- house, clerked in Toledo for a year and traveled for one year for Winthrop. Smith & Company, the predecessors of the American Book Company. He then studied law, under the direction of Judge Hall and D. W. Swigart, was graduated at the Cincinnati Law School in 1854, and the following year opened an office in Bucyrus, where for forty years he occupied an honored position at the Crawford county bar. Never sanctioning the "sharp prac- tice" which too many consider a necessary concomitant of the practice of
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law, others had more success than he in making a jury believe "the worse were the better cause:" but in profound knowledge of the law, fine reasoning powers and in that integrity of character which enabled and compelled him on occasion to fearlessly tell a client he was in the wrong, he stood easily in the front rank. From the memorial to him adopted by the Ohio State Bar Association, we extract the following :
"Upon his fair fame the breath of suspicion never dared to rest. His word was a bond that was never forfeited and his rugged manhood com- manded confidence and won respect from all. With few early advantages, he made himself, by industry and energy, a peer of the ablest lawyers of the state, a man of liberal education, broad views and affluent circumstances. He was held in universal esteem by men of all parties throughout the city, the county and the state."
Always an active Republican and Crawford county being heavily Demo- cratic, circumstances prevented his ever holding important public office. He was mayor of Bucyrus for four years and for twelve years a member of the board of education, being for ten years the president of that body, and for nine years his name being upon both tickets. He was a presidential elector in 1864 and again in 1880, was the Republican candidate for circuit judge in 1884. and two years later was an unsuccessful candidate for the Repub- lican nomination for supreme judge.
He was married to Julia A. Walwork on September 22. 1859. She was born in Philadelphia August 4, 1833. and died at Bucyrus, Ohio, July 23. 1901. She was a daughter of Thomas Walwork, a native of England, and Mary Stephens, of Glens Falls, New York, her mother's family tracing back to the carly Puritan settlers. She commenced to teach school at the age of fourteen, her first experience being gained near Syracuse. New York, and had a life certificate empowering her to teach in any school in New York state. In 1855 she went to Georgia as a teacher, but her anti-slavery views led to her return north in 1857, she coming to Bucyrus to take charge of the high school, a position she filled with marked success and continued to hold until three years after her marriage. The rest of her life was devoted to her home, family and friends. For many years before her death she was an invalid and virtually confined to the limits of her own home, yet her per- sonality was such that so long as she lived she remained one of the most prominent factors in the intellectual and social life of the city.
They had but one child. Charles Jacob Scroggs, the subject of this sketch. He was born in Bucyrus, Ohio, July 14. 1863, was educated by his mother
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and in our public schools, at which he graduated in 1877, the youngest high- school graduate on record. He attended Ohio Wesleyan University at Dela- ware one year, and then took a four-years course at Michigan University, Ann Arbor, graduating at that institution in 1884 with the degree of A. M., being one of seven in a class of ninety to receive the master's degree instead of the customary A. B. Two years later he was graduated at the Cincinnati Law School with the degree of LL. B., and since then has been actively engaged in the practice of his profession at Bucyrus, being asso- ciated with his father until the latter's death, and since then with his present partner. He has inherited many of his father's characteristics, and as a safe, accurate advisor, particularly in matters of commercial and corpora- tion law, he is excelled by none in the county. He has also been actively identified with the business life of the community. He was one of the organ- izers of the Bucyrus Loan & Building Association, of which he has been attorney and director since its inception, and helped organize, and is one of the board of directors of, the Home Mutual Fire Association.
Outside of business he finds employment for his time in his books, secret orders and the game of whist. He has one of the finest private libraries in Bucyrus and has it thoroughly at his command, is a member of all of the local Masonic bodies and of Ohio Consistory, thirty-second degree, at Cin- cinnati: is a past chancellor. Demas Lodge, No. 108, K. of P., and under Grand Chancellor Young was his deputy for the sixteenth Pythian district, composed of Crawford, Seneca and Wyandot counties : was a charter mem- ber of Bucyrus Lodge, No. 156, B. P. O. E., and is a life member of the grand lodge of that order. He also takes an active interest in the Sons of the American Revolution, and has been one of the board of managers of its Ohio society and was a delegate to its last national congress. He is recognized as one of the leading whist-players of the state, and is a frequent contributor to the literature of the "silent game." He has never married.
WALLACE L. MONNETT.
Wallace Lafayette Monnett, the junior member of the law firm of Scroggs & Monnett, was born at Bucyrus, Ohio, September 18, 1871. his parents being Abram Cahill and Jennie E. ( Walwork) Monnett. The ancestry of the Monnett family can be traced back to Abraham Monnett, who came to Ohio from Virginia in 1800, taking up his abode in Chillicothe.
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He had eight children,-Isaac, Thomas, Margaret, Jeremiah, John, William, Osborne and Elizabeth. Isaac married Elizabeth Pittinger, and in 1813 removed to Pickaway county, moving again in 1828 to Crawford county, where he entered fourteen hundred and forty acres of land south of Bucyrus and engaged in stock-raising on an extensive scale.
His son, William, was born in Ross county, Ohio, April 22, 1808. When about eighteen he taught school a few terms, and at twenty accom- panied his parents to Crawford county, where he became prominently identi- fied with stock-raising interests. About the time of his removal to this county he joined the Methodist church, and when thirty-two years of age received a license as a local preacher. The same day he was appointed col- onel of the First Regiment, Third Brigade, Eleventh Division. Ohio militia, and filled this position acceptably for seven years. In 1851 he moved to Bucyrus and opened a general store in partnership with Patterson Marshall, but in 1854 returned to stock-raising, purchasing four hundred acres of land near Bucyrus, part of which is now in the city limits, and eleven hun- dred acres of land in Cranberry township. This land he continued to occupy until his death, March 21. 1885. He was prominent in county affairs and in church work, and lent his influence to all measures calculated to prove of good along material, intellectual and moral lines. He was married, in Jan- uary II. 1831, to Miss Elizabeth Cahill, a sister of the late Hon. R. W. Cahill, of Vernon township, and a daughter of Abram and Nancy ( Wallace) Cahill. She was born in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, April 12, 1810, and died at Bucyrus, Ohio, May 3, 1891. Her father resided in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, and at one time was connected with the state militia. Colonel Monnett and wife were the parents of five chil- dren : Mary J., wife of Hon. S. R. Harris ; Rachel, wife of W. H. Kinnear, of Bucyrus township: Sarah L., wife of L. L. Walker, of Whetstone town- ship: Isaac W., formerly of Walla Walla, Washington; and Abram C. Of these, Mrs. Walker is the only one now living.
Abram Cahill Monnett, the father of the subject of this sketch, was born in Bucyrus township March 31, 1839, and died in Bucyrus April 17, 1879. He was educated in the county schools and at Ohio Wesleyan Uni- versity. Delaware, Ohio. From 1861 to 1864 he was a member of Com- pany E, Thirty-fourth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, of which he was orderly sergeant, and participated in all the engagements of the Army of Virginia. He was married, December 11. 1867, to Miss Jennie E. Wahvork, a daugh-
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ter of Thomas and Mary ( Stephens) Walwork, who was born at Saratoga, New York, June 6, 1840. She was educated in the Albany State Normal School of Albany, New York, at which she graduated in 1860, and the fol- lowing year became a teacher in the Bucyrus schools, a position she satis- factorily filled for five years. They were the parents of five children : Frank W., Wallace L., Elizabeth, Julia and Rachel. Frank W. was edu- cated in the Bucyrus schools and at the Cincinnati Law School, and was admitted to practice in 1893. He located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where he remained until the breaking out of the Spanish war, since which time he has been in the army, being now in charge of a company of native scouts in the Philippines. Elizabeth was educated at the New England Conservatory of Music and is the wife of Rev. James M. Cass, a Methodist minister now located at Jay. Essex county, New York. Julia and Rachel are graduates of the elocution department of the Cincinnati College of Music and reside in Bucyrus with their widowed mother. They are teachers of elocution, of ability, and have an enviable reputation as public readers, all occupation to which they give a large part of their time.
Wallace Lafayette Monnett was born in Bucyrus September 18, 1871. After graduating in the Bucyrus schools and at Eastman Business College, of Poughkeepsie. New York, he studied law in the office of Scroggs & Scroggs and afterward at Cincinnati Law School, at which he graduated in 1896. Hon. Jacob Scroggs having meanwhile retired from practice, he returned to his old office and on April 1. 1897, was admitted to partner- ship, the firm since then having been Scroggs & Monnett. He is now serv- ing his second term as referee in bankruptcy, discharging his duties in a manner that has won him the commendation of the profession and the public, and has acquired a high reputation in his general practice. In politics he is an aggressive Republican, having been chairman of the county executive committee. He belongs to but one of the large secret orders, Demas Lodge, No. 108, K. of P., of which he is past chancellor and has been county deputy grand chancellor. April 6. 1897. he was married to Mary Zouck, a daugh- ter of Jacob and Martha ( Millinder) Zouck, of Baltimore, Maryland, where the family is widely known in official and social circles. Mrs. Monnett was born near Baltimore December 26, 1876, and was educated at Maryland Col- lege, formerly Lutherville Seminary, and at the Cincinnati College of Music, at which she graduated in 1896. They are the parents of two children,- Martha Elizabeth and Margaret Louise.
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WILLIAM S. TAYLOR.
William Stacy Taylor, a popular passenger conductor on the Big Four Railroad residing at Galion, Ohio, was born in Loudoun county, Virginia, on the Ioth of February, 1845, and is a representative of one of the early families of that state. His grandfather, Joseph Gore, was a native of the same county, as was Mahlon K. Taylor, the father of our subject, whose birth occurred about the year 1810. In 1830 the latter was married to Miss Amanda M. Gore and in the year 1849 removed to Logan county, Ohio, locating on a farm two miles northwest of Bellefontaine, where he continued to reside, engaging in the business of farming until his death, which occurred October 18, 1868. The children of this marriage were as follows: Sarah J., the widow of Henry Casebolt, of Bellefontaine: Ruth H., wife of John Grimes, a retired farmer of Bellefontaine; Thomas O., who for a number of years has been an employe of the Standard Oil Company, located at various points and is now a resident of Columbus, Ohio; Annabelle, wife of R. B. Keller, cashier of the People's National Bank, of Bellefontaine; Frank G., a resident of Sioux City, Iowa, and is now in the employ of the street railway company of that place : Alice, who is living in Springfield, Ohio: Elizabeth, who died at the old home farm near Bellefontaine, in 1864, when three years of age; and William S., whose name introduces this review.
William Stacy Taylor, whose name forms the caption of this sketch, was a little lad of three summers when the parents came with their family from Loudoun county, Virginia, to Ohio, locating in Logan county, near Belle- fontaine. There from early youth until manhood Mr. Taylor continued to reside on the farm contributing such labor and assistance as his age and strength would enable him to perform. On the 27th of October, 1868, at the age of nearly twenty-four years, he chose as a companion and helpmeet on life's journey Miss Rachel Melinda Clabaugh, a daughter of Nicholas Clabaugh, of Champaign county, Ohio, who died in 1851. This union was blessed with the following children: Cornelia Amanda, born October 4, 1869: Agnes Belle, born September 10, 1870: Grace Edna, born May 10, 1872, and died March 23, 1878; and Iva Adel, who was born November 19, 1873. The eldest daughter is the wife of Joseph Belser, of Bellefontaine, and Agnes Belle is the wife of William H. Heffner, of Galion, while Iva married the Rev. O. D. Baltzly, pastor of St. Luke's church of Mansfield, Ohio.
William S. Taylor is a veteran of the war of the Rebellion. He re- sponded to the call of his country, promptly enlisting in Company L. Second
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Ohio Heavy Artillery, with which he served throughout the war. His con- nection with the Big Four Railroad Company was begun in May, 1874, when he was made brakeman. He successively passed through different positions of importance and trust and was, in 1888, promoted to the position of pas- senger conductor, which he has held continuously through thirteen years. Judged by his advancement during the term of his connection with the Big Four Company, merit and efficiency seem not to have been lacking in the dis- charge of the duties assigned to him. At this writing he is still a passenger conductor on the Big Four road and resides in a handsome residence on North Columbus street in Galion. He owns this property, together with other realty in the city, and there he is living, surrounded by the comforts and pleasures of life amid an affectionate family of noble children and grand- children to whom he is fondly attached. He is happy in the evening of life knowing that he has provided well for his loved ones. In October, 1873, he took up his abode in Galion, where he has lived ever since. In religious faith the family are Lutherans and in the church for many years past Mr. Taylor has held various offices at different times, ever giving his aid to church work with a willingness and cheerfulness commensurate with his means, and he was respected and highily esteemed by all who knew him.
EBENEZER B. FINLEY.
Ohio has always been distinguished for the high rank of her bench and bar. Perhaps none of the newer states can justly boast of abler jurists or at- torneys. Many of them have been men of national fame, and among those whose lives have been passed on a quieter plane there is scarcely a town or city in the state that can boast of one or more lawyers capable of crossing swords in forensic combat with many of the distinguished legal lights of the United States. While the growth and development of the state in the last half century has been most marvelous, viewed from any standpoint, yet of no one class of her citizenship has she greater reason for just pride than her judges and attorneys. In Judge Finley we find united many of the rare qualities which go to make up the successful lawyer and jurist. He possesses perhaps few of those brilliant, dazzling meteoric qualities which have sometimes flashed along the legal horizon, riveting the gaze and blinding the vision for the moment, then disappearing, leaving little or no trace behind, but rather has those solid and more substantial qualities which shine with a constant luster, shedding light in the dark places with steadiness and continuity. Mr. Finley
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possesses oratorical ability of high order and has in a manner secured that rare ability of saying in a convincing way the right thing at the right time. This has won him fame not only as a lawyer but as a lecturer, for he is widely known throughout the country by reason of his prominence as a speaker on historical and literary topics.
A resident of Bucyrus, Mr. Finley has long been a recognized leader at the bar and in Democratic circles in Crawford county, and has won dis- tinction in the legislative halls of the nation. He was born in Orville, Wayne county, Ohio, July 31, 1833. and is still an active member of the legal profession. He was educated in the public schools, and, determining to make the practice of law his life work, after careful study and preparation was admitted to the bar in 1862. He then took up his abode in Bucyrus, where he has since made his home. He had scarcely entered upon his profes- sional career, however, before he offered his services to his country, assisted to raise a company as the Sixty-fourth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, and became first lientenant of Company K, of said regiment, with which he served until wounded in the service and was honorably discharged. After being mustered out of the service he resumed the private practice of law and rose to a position of eminence in the profession. Along with those qualities, indispensable to the lawyer-a keen, rapid, logical mind, plus the business sense, and a ready capacity for hard work-our subject brought to the starting point of his legal career gifts-eloquence of language and a strong personality. An excellent presence, an earnest. dignified manner, marked strength of character, a thor- ough grasp of the law and the ability accurately to apply its principles are factors in Mr. Finley's effectiveness as an advocate.
Mr. Finley is no less widely known in connection with political affairs. He has long been one of the foremost men of his party in Crawford county, and in 1876 was elected to the forty-fifth congress from the fourteenth district, consisting of the counties of Crawford, Wyandot, Richland, Ashland and Holmes. He served so acceptably that in 1878 he was re-elected to the forty- eighth congress from the eighth district, comprising Crawford. Hardin, Marion, Morrow, Seneca and Wyandot counties. He made an excellent record in the national congress and acquitted himself brilliantly in debate. To every question that came up for consideration he gave earnest thought and attention, laboring untiringly for the measures which he believed would prove of general good. In 18844 he was made adjutant general of Ohio by Governor George Hadley and brought militia to a high state of organization. In 1897 he was elected circuit judge of the third circuit and displayed great ability in
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his judicial capacity. In 1896 he was elected as one of the delegates at large from Ohio to the national Democratic convention at Chicago, and took a prominent part as a leader in the convention, as chairman of one of the im- portant committees. His mind is analytical, logical and inductive. With a thorough and comprehensive knowledge of the fundamental principles of law he combines a familiarity with statutory law and a sober, clear judgment, which makes him not only a formidable adversary in legal combat but has given him the distinction while on the bench of having few of his decisions re- vised or reversed.
He attended all of the Democratic national conventions from 1876 until 1896. He has long been prominent in the councils of his party in Ohio, and liis opinions carry weight with Democratic leaders. For some years he was on the platform as a lecturer on historical and literary topics and was very successful in that line. His study and reading have been broad and com- prehensive, and he is a man of scholarly attainments and strong mentality, qualities which render him an entertaining and convincing speaker, while his oratorical ability of high order was always sure to please.
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