Commemorative biographical record of the counties of Sandusky and Ottawa, Ohio, containing biographical sketches of prominent and representative citizens, Part 67

Author: J.H. Beers & Co
Publication date: 1896
Publisher: Chicago, J.H. Beers & co.
Number of Pages: 1040

USA > Ohio > Sandusky County > Commemorative biographical record of the counties of Sandusky and Ottawa, Ohio, containing biographical sketches of prominent and representative citizens > Part 67
USA > Ohio > Ottawa County > Commemorative biographical record of the counties of Sandusky and Ottawa, Ohio, containing biographical sketches of prominent and representative citizens > Part 67

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).

Dr. Yates was united in marriage, at Clymer, Chautauqua Co., N. Y., June 8, 1847, with Miss Mary L. Williams, a daughter of Alva and Silva Williams, and to their union came four children, viz. : Florence, born October 6, 1848, at Wattsburg, Erie Co., Penn., died at Benton, Ohio, June 1, 1850; Everett E., born at Benton, October 23, 1850, died at Toledo, Ohio, February 19, 1875; Auzurella J., born at Green Spring, Ohio, May 28, 1857, wife of Guy P. Rafferty; Edward Van Ness, born at Green Spring, June 21, 1859, residing in Sandusky, Ohio. Mrs. Yates passed away at Green Spring, November 24, 1882. Dr. Yates is a member of George Field Post, No. 168, G. A. R., at Oak Harbor, is affili- ated with the Masonic Fraternity, and was a member of Monticello Lodge, at Clyde, Ohio, but is not now connected with any lodge. In recognition of his valuable services rendered, his name has been inscribed on the monument erected at Cleveland to the heroes of the war.

W ILLIAM G. WINSTONE is a practical and prominent farmer and fruit grower of Portage township, Ottawa county, liv- ing on the lake shore road. A native of England, he was born in Warwickshire, May 12, 1811, and is a son of William and Fannie Winstone, who were natives of the same country. In their family

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were fourteen children, our subject being the only one to come to this country. He received no school privileges, for at the early age of seven years he began to earn his own living; but he was endowed by nature with a bright mind, and, culti- vating powers of observation and reten- tive memory, he has learned in the school of experience lessons which have made him a well-informed man. Through much of his life he has followed bridge and railroad building.

The year 1850 witnessed his emigra- tion to America, and he soon located in Cleveland, Ohio, whence in December, of the same year, he came to Portage township, where he has since resided, while to-day he ranks among the oldest and most respected citizens of Ottawa county. He has been twice married, his first union being with Mary Kelig and the wedding celebrated at Stratford-on-Avon in 1843. They became the . parents of three children, of whom two survive, namely: Stephen, a resident of Lorain, Ohio; and Lucy Ruth, wife of John French, who is living in McMinnville, Tenn. The mother of these was called from earth in 1859, and in 1861 Mr. Winstone was united in marriage with Mrs. Fannie Russell, widow of Reuben Russell. Again Mr. Winstone was de- prived by death of his wife, this lady dying May 12, 1886. By her first hus- band she had four children, of whom George, a resident of Toledo, Ohio, is the only survivor; the others were Mrs. Jane McAlby and James, who died January 3, 1876, leaving a widow and six children, two of whom-Clara and Bert-reside with Mr. Winstone; some years later their mother became the wife of Anthony Lafer, and now resides in Sandusky City. Her other children were George, of San- dusky county, Ohio; Alice, wife of Ora Golden, a resident of Martin's Point, Eric Co., Ohio; Fannie, wife of Phineas Dun- ham, of Sandusky City; and Nellie, wife of Theodore Schrader, of Vickery, Ohio.

In his political views Mr. Winstone has been a faithful supporter of the Demo- cratic party, and in his religious principles he is an adherent of the Universalist Church. He is public spirited and enter- prising, and readily endorses any project calculated to stimulate the development and prosperity of the township and county. He is a kind-hearted man, ex- pressing his generous nature in kindliness to his friends and in substantial assistance to the needy. In all the relations of life he has been trustworthy, constant and honest, and his habits of industry and application have enabled him to secure a handsome and comfortable home in which to spend his declining years, while a com- petence surrounds him with the neces- saries and many of the luxuries of life. His home is ably presided over by his granddaughter, Clara Russell. Prompt and decisive in action, practical and steadfast in purpose, industrious and painstaking, he is a man of judgment and probity, held in the highest esteem by a large circle of friends and acquaintances.

D H. BITTINGER, proprietor of a steam sawmill and stave factory, at Woodville, Sandusky county, was born January 4, 1849, in Ashland county; Ohio, son of George and Mary (Kidwell) Bittinger.

George Bittinger was born February 10, 1808, in Franklin county, Penn., and came with his father, Daniel Bittinger, to Ashland county, where the family settled, the father following farming and weaving. Here both parents died, the mother at the age of eighty, the father at the age of sixty-six. Their children were: Susan, Catharine Polly, Betsey, Barbara, Sarah, Daniel and George. George Bittinger was reared in Franklin county, Penn., and remained at home up to the age of eighteen. He became a farmer, and sell- ing out his interests in Ashland county moved to Richland county, Ohio, where 1

D. H. Bittingen

ー

Jucob Burguer.

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he died in 1894. He was a Democrat politically, and he and his wife were members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. She is still living, at Mansfield, at the age of eighty-five. They had nine children: James, who lives in Richland county, Ohio; George, who lives in Huron county; Margaret, deceased wife of Sam- uel Steel, of Tiffin, Ohio; Ellen, now re- siding at Mansfield, Ohio, who married for her first husband E. C. Walker (who lived in Ottawa county), and for her second wedded Daniel Black; Hettie Ann, mar- ried to I. P. Walker, who lives at Mans- field; Mary Jane, who married George Steele, of Mansfield; Hattie Alice, de- ceased wife of I. P. Walker, who after- ward married her sister, Hettie Ann; D. H., our subject; and John L., of Bowling Green, Wood county. The mother's peo- ple were from Virginia, of English de- scent.

D. H. Bittinger was reared in Ashland county to the age of nine years, when he removed to Richland county, there work- ing on a farm and at the carpenter's and cooper's trades, having early manifested a peculiar aptitude for mechanical work. On January 7, 1869, he married Miss Sarah C. Low, who was born in Ashland county November 16, 1849, and they have six children living, viz .: Otis E. (at home), Ella Urettah, Mary Christina, George McClellan, Flora Bell and Daniel Cleveland. After working as a carpenter at Mansfield a few years Mr. Bittinger came, in 1872, to Sandusky county, and worked the first four years as journey- man. He then embarked in the cooper- ing business, which he has followed al- most exclusively for fifteen years, manu- facturing, from the rough logs, flour, lime and meat barrels, etc., which he sells to W. H. Bruns and H. Rancamp. He does cooper work, head sawing, making vats, and in fact all kinds of work in that line, employing from fifteen to twenty men. He is also carrying on an extensive and constantly increasing lumber business. 29

He is a Democrat, politically, and a member of the I. O. O. F. He was elected mayor of the village, but resigned on account of ill health.

Mrs. Bittinger is a daughter of Samuel and Christina (Deeter) Low, and was born in Ashland county, of which her maternal grandparents were pioneers; her paternal grandparents were pioneers of Richland county. Samuel Low died when his daughter Sarah (Mrs. Bittinger ) was a child; Mrs. Low is still living, in Ashland county, Ohio. They were the parents of two children-Sarah C. (Mrs. D. H. Bittinger) and Mary Elizabeth (wife of John Bittinger, of Wood county, who is a brother of our subject). Mr. and Mrs. D. H. Bittinger have a fine home in Woodville, in which community they are highly respected, and Mr. Bit- tinger is one of the influential men of the village in which he lives.

J ACOB BURGNER. The ancestor from whom sprang the Burgner families in America, with which our subject is connected, was a native of Switzerland, who lived near one of its beautiful lakes, in view of the snow- capped mountains, breathed the pure air of liberty, and in early manhood sought his fortunes in the New World.

In the year 1742 three brothers- David, Christopher and Peter Burgner- carpenters by trade, emigrated from the vicinity of Berne, Switzerland, and after a long sea voyage on the brigantine "Mary," from Rotterdam, landed in Philadelphia, and settled in Lancaster county, Penn. Peter, the youngest, and the ancestor above referred to, was then about twenty-three years old. They each brought from the Fatherland a large Ger- man Bible, printed at Frankfort-on-the- Main, 1574, in which they kept brief family records. Peter's Bible has de- scended by inheritance to the subject of this sketch, and is still, 1895, in a good

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state of preservation. It may be seen in a glass case in Birchard Library, Fre- mont, Ohio. About the year 1759 Peter Burgner married Salome Burkhardt, and established a permanent home in Lan- caster county. Their children were David, Elizabeth, Mary and Jacob. For many years he lived in a log house, the roof of which was thatched with straw. His oc- cupation was that of building houses and bank barns after Swiss models.

Jacob Burgner, grandfather of our subject, was born in 1769, and first learned the trade of carpenter. About the year 1800 he married Mary Conrad, and they lived in Cocalico township, Lan- caster Co., Penn., where he learned the trade of blacksmith, and procured his sup- plies of iron from Valley Forge. In the spring of 1806 he moved to Franklin county, Penn., where he kept a black- smith shop on the public road, near what is now the Richmond Furnace railroad station. In 1812 he removed to Stark county, Ohio, west of Massillon, and a year later settled in Franklin township, now a part of Summit county, on a tract of 320 acres of government land, where he followed blacksmithing and farming the rest of his life. His death occurred January 7, 1844, when he was seventy- five years of age; his wife died in 1843, aged sixty-four. Their children were Salome, Peter, John, Jacob, David, Sam- nel, George, Elizabeth, Anna, Daniel and Mary, all of whom but two became heads of families, and all are now (1895) dead except Daniel, who is a farmer, near Falls City, Nebraska.

Peter Burgner, father of our subject, was born in Lancaster county, Penn., in 1803, came with his father's family to Ohio in 1812, and grew to manhood in the vicinity of Clinton, Summit county, following farming, and working several years in the construction of the Ohio and Eric canal. In 1830 he married Miss Catharine Hollinger, daughter of Jacob Hollinger, and for a short time operated

a sawmill near Clinton. In 1831 he moved to the "Oak Openings," in Thompson township, Seneca county, Ohio, and set- tled upon a farm of 160 acres, four miles southwest of Bellevue. Here he cleared away the forest and raised heavy crops of grain and grass. He had been accustom- ed to plow among stumps with ox-teams and cut grain with a hand sickle, but was among the first to use improved methods and implements. In 1844 his wife and in- fant son died, leaving him with a family of six children: Jacob (our subject), David, Samuel H., Joseph H., Mary and Elizabeth, of whom only the eldest son and the two daughters are now living. Three years later he married Miss Sarah Schoch, with whom he lived seven years; there were no children by this union. In August, 1854, the second son and second wife died of cholera. In April, 1862, he married Miss Sarah Decker, sold his farm and bought another adjoining hers and her mother's, about one mile south of his old home. Here the three lived together about thirteen years. His wife died in January, 1875, and he soon after sold his farm and went to live in the family of his daughter Mary, wife of Henry Biechler, at York Center, Sandusky county. He died January 16, 1878, at the age of seventy-five. He had been a member of the Christian Church at York Center about forty years. His third son, Dr. Samuel H. Burgner, of Bellevue, Ohio, was a graduate of Jefferson Medical Col- lege, Philadelphia, Penn. ; he died in 1866, leaving a daughter, Orielle E., an orphan, who was reared in the family of her uncle, Jacob Burgner; she attended the Fremont High School, graduated from Oberlin College in 1883, taught school two years in Chicago, Ill., and a year and a half in the Oberlin public schools. She mar- ried in 1888 Mr. S. M. McKee, of Grand Rapids, Mich., and now lives on a large farm near Portland, Mich. Mr. Burg- ner's fourth son, Joseph, who was a teacher, died unmarried at the Burgner

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homestead in 1862. The youngest daugh- ter, Elizabeth, wife of Joseph Maurer, a farmer, lives near Monticello, White Co., Indiana.

Jacob Burgner, teacher and steno- grapher, Fremont, Ohio, was born in Thompson township, Seneca Co., Ohio, November 5, 1833. He grew up to hard work on his father's farm and attended the pioneer district schools. At the age of seventeen he began to teach country schools in the winter seasons in his own township. Between the years 1852 and 1859 he attended several teachers' insti- tutes, four terms of school at the Seneca County Academy, under Prof. Aaron Schuyler, the mathematician, and four years at Otterbein University, Wester- ville, Ohio, from which latter institution he graduated with the title of B. S., in June, 1859. He paid nearly all his ex- penses while at school by his own earn- ings. On September 8, 1859, he was married, near Flat Rock, Ohio, to Miss Rebecca M. Miller, daughter of Isaac Miller, then living at Tuscola, Mich. During the following school year he taught the East Grammar School at Fre- mont, Ohio, and the next year taught the Maumee Grammar School under J. W. Hiett, superintendent. Returning to Fremont he taught the Fremont High School one year under Rev. E. Bushnell (now of Adelbert College), superinten- dent, and he next served as superintend- ent of the Port Clinton and Green Spring Union schools.

In the fall of 1862 Mr. Burgner bought a farm of fifty acres three miles southeast of Fremont, where for health and profit he followed farming in the summer, teaching country school in the winter seasons for twenty years. In the spring of 1864 he enlisted in Company H, One Hundred and Sixty-ninth Regiment O. V. I., and served about four months as a soldier, at Fort Ethan Allen, Va. He was afterward elected justice of the peace of Ballville township, which office he held

six years. Having learned phonography, in 1853, at Seneca County Academy, and kept in practice, he now found it conven- ient to furnish verbatim reports of public assemblies for the county papers, and of legal testimony for the court and bar of Sandusky county, during the intervals that could be spared from farm work. A mere enumeration of his voluminous work in this line during the last forty years would be tedious. In the spring of 1885 he reported the proceedings of the Gen- eral Conference of the United Brethren Church, at Fostoria, Ohio, when that Church was rent in twain on the question of granting Church membership to per- sons who belonged to secret societies. He had been a member of that Church for thirty-six years, and was a decided " liberal."

In the fall of 1885 Mr. Burgner's family, at the urgent solicitation of his niece, Orielle, removed to Oberlin, Ohio, for educational purposes, leaving him alone on the farm. After finishing up his farm work, a few months later, he sold his live stock and farm produce, rented his farm to a neighbor and joined his family at Oberlin. Here, in ill health and under many perplexing difficulties, he spent four busy years in writing the His- tory and Genealogy of the Burgner Family in America, a book of 200 pages, containing 1,500 personal names, and illustrated with portraits and family trees. The work was copyrighted and published in 1890, and found a ready sale among relatives. Not finding enough to do in the line of shorthand and typewriting to occupy all his time in Oberlin, Mr. Burg- ner changed his place of business back to Fremont, Ohio, his family remaining in Oberlin. During the past year he has assisted in preparing sketches for this volume. Mr. Burgner is a charter mem- ber of Manville Moore Post, G. A. R., secretary of the One Hundred and Sixty- ninth O. V. I. Regimental Association, stenographer and assistant secretary of

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the Sandusky County Pioneer and His- torical Society, and a teacher of short- hand and typewriting in Odd Fellows' Block. Front street, Fremont. He and family are members of the Second Con- gregational Church, Oberlin. In politics he has always been a Republican.

The children of Jacob and Rebecca M. Burgner were Mary Alice, who died in infancy; Sarah Katharine, now teaching her fifth year in the Oberlin public schools; Linnaeus Peter, student at the State University, Minneapolis, Minn .; and Louis Elvero, a student at Oberlin Col- lege.

I SAAC MILLER. In writing sketches of the pioneer farmers of the Black Swamp it has been the usual custom to select those who have made a financial success in life, and who have lived to reap the rewards of their toil in rich farms, fine residences and large bank accounts. Yet it is not always the bravest soldiers who survive a battle and return to tell of the victory won. In the battles of life many brave boys must fall through no fault of their own; so also it is a well-known fact that many honest, hard-working, persevering, intelligent pio- neers, after an heroic struggle against ad- verse circumstances, were obliged to give up their farms, abandon their plans for the acquisition of wealth, and in poverty and comparative obscurity seek the higher and nobler consolations of Christianity. As a man of noble character and kind disposition, one who was universally es- teemed, who bore the reverses of fortune with manly fortitude, and tried by pre- cept and example to make the world bet- ter for his having lived in it, we give place to the subject of this sketch.

Isaac Miller, farmer and carpenter, was born in Schuylkill county, Penn., April 16, 1806, son of Jacob and Mar- garet (Moser, Miller. His paternal grand-

father, John Miller, who was an English- man, married a Miss Bauman, and their children were Jacob, Christian, Henry, Mrs. J. Shafer and Mrs. Cramer. His maternal grandfather was Michael Moser, a Welshman, who married Miss Catha- rine Wiseman (born on the Atlantic Ocean), and their children were Michael, Isaac, George, Margaret, Daniel and Mrs. Hepner. The children of Jacob Miller, father of our subject, were Sam- uel, Michael, William, Isaac, Reuben, Jacob, Rebecca and Charles. Our sub- ject grew to manhood on a farm near Orwigsburg, Penn., where he obtained a very limited common-school education and learned the trade of a carpenter. On August 7, 1827, he married Miss Mary, daughter of Abraham and Mary (Faust) Seltzer, of the same neighborhood, and in the spring of 1828 removed to Dela- ware county, Ohio. Here two children were born to them, Abraham F. and Reuben A., the first of whom died in childhood. In the spring of 1830 they removed to Sandusky county, Ohio, and settled in the wilds of Jackson township, on Wolf creek, near the site of Bettsville. Here was born their eldest daughter, Re- becca M., now wife of Jacob Burgner. In 1832 the family removed to Scott township, and settled on an eighty-acre tract of land since owned by John Hum- mel. This was on the edge of what was then known as Mud Creek Prairie, near the present site of Millersville. Here they lived and toiled about ten years, trying to clear up a home, drain the prai- rie and carry on farming, laboring under very adverse circumstances. Bad roads, poor crops, sickness from fever and ague, and doctor's bills were constant draw- backs. Here the family was increased by the birth of Wesley J., Susannah, Amelia, Hannah and Sarah, of whom only the first and the last two named grew to ma- turity. Their log-cabin home was often visited by the pioneer preachers of the United Brethren, Methodist and Albright

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denominations, and was for some time used as a place of worship.

In his anxiety to remove the stagnant water from the prairie, Mr. Miller allowed his zeal to get the better of his judgment. With commendable enterprise and public spirit he got the promises of his neighbors to aid him in the construction of a seven- mile ditch to drain Mud Creek prairie; but when the job was completed and the June freshets came it was found that their engineering was at fault and the ditch did not answer its purpose. The crops of corn were all drowned out as before, and some of the neighbors refused to pay their shares of the cost of the ditch. The debt now fell so heavily on Mr. Miller that he was obliged to lose his farm. In the spring of 1842 he bought eighty acres of partly-improved land in York town- ship of George Donaldson, for which he again went in debt. Here by dint of hard work he succeeded in clearing land and raising a crop of wheat the second year. The price of wheat was then 50 cents a bushel at Sandusky City, his best market; and so anxious was he to make a payment on his farm that in the fall of 1843 he hauled his wheat twenty miles to that market for that price; if he had waited till the following spring he could have had $1.50 per bushel. But other misfortunes were in store for him. In the log-cabin home on this farm was born his youngest daughter, Minerva, now wife of Mr. Henry Hitchcock, a farmer in Nebraska, and a few months later Mrs. Miller died-from illness contracted by watching at the bedside of the wife of a neighbor, A. Dixon-leaving him with five children. His eldest daughter then kept house for him. When Mrs. Dixon recovered she took Mr. Miller's youngest daughter to raise, as she had no children of her own. Failing to receive the finan- cial aid from a Pennsylvania friend which had been promised, and which was his due, Mr. Miller was again obliged to sell his home. He next bought a house and

lot at Flat Rock, Seneca county, where he tried to keep his children together and send them to school, while he worked at his trade as carpenter or shingle-maker. In 1850 his sons Reuben and Wesley en- gaged in the lumber business in Tuscola county, Mich. A year later Mr. Miller joined them, and for a number of years conducted a sawmill at the village of Tus- cola, to which his sons rafted the logs cut each winter in the pine forests above on the Cass river. He also kept a board- ing-house for the mill-hands, being as- sisted by his daughters. After a few years of flourishing business Mr. Miller's partner in the sawmill, who also kept a general supply store, failed, and Miller's property was taken by his partner's New York creditors. Such was the law. In 1852 Mr. Miller married Mrs. Hannah Griswold, of Tuscola, and soon after re- tired from the lumber industry to live on her farm near by. This was a welcome home for both their children (Mrs. Miller also having children by her former hus- band) for several years, a sort of lumber- men's headquarters. Mrs. Miller died in 1873. Mr. Miller remained to manage the farm about two years, then relin- quished his life lease and retired from business altogether. In 1876 he attended the Centennial Exposition at Philadel- phia, and spent several months visiting among friends in Pennsylvania. In 1877 he lived for a season at the home of his daughter, Mrs. J. Burgner, near Fremont, Ohio, and afterward lived in the family of Mr. John Rinebolt, in Jackson township. In the spring of 1882 he took up his per- manent residence at the home of his daughter Hannah, wife of Morgan Ster- ner, at Bristol, Ind., where he died Sep- tember 3, 1885, and was buried in the village cemetery.

Isaac Miller in early life became a member of the Lutheran Church; but on moving to the Black Swamp, west of Lower Sandusky, and coming under the influence of the pioneer traveling preach-

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ers, he united with the Evangelical Asso- ciation, and became one of its most zeal- ous and consistent members for many years. In 1850 he united with the M. E. Church at Flat Rock, Ohio, and adhered to that faith during the rest of his life. He was a great friend of children, and established a number of pioneer Sunday- schools in destitute neighborhoods. In politics he was first a Whig, then a Re- publican, and finally a Prohibitionist. His two sons were soldiers in the Civil war, serving in the Third Michigan Cav- alry. His eldest son, Reuben A., living in Wisconsin, has for many years been a professional pine-land hunter; his other son, Wesley, has valuable interests in some gold mines near Idaho Springs, Colo. His daughter Sarah, deceased, was the wife of Dr. Samuel H. Burgner, of Bellevue, Ohio. Though unfortunate in his financial ventures, as the world looks at it, Mr. Miller gave to his children a more precious legacy than wealth in the practical exemplification of an exalted Christian character.

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Commemorative biographical record of the counties of Sandusky and Ottawa, Ohio, containing biographical sketches of prominent and representative citizens, Part 67

Author: J.H. Beers & Co Publication date: 1896 Publisher: Chicago, J.H. Beers & co. Number of Pages: 1040

Author: J.H. Beers & Co
Publication date: 1896
Publisher: Chicago, J.H. Beers & co.
Number of Pages: 1040