USA > Ohio > Genealogical and family history of eastern Ohio > Part 11
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In this last list of children we find the name of John M. Osborne, who was born on September 26, 1832, on his father's farm, which he now pos- sesses. He was reared and educated there and early became a lover of agricultural pursuits. He has a splendid farm of one hundred and eighty- five acres, which is richly underlaid with a stratum of soft coal, and he has enjoyed a very profitable income from his efforts. He has recently erected one of the most commodious and imposing dwellings in the township and in many other ways has shown that the hand of prosperity has been upon him. He has been a member of the school board for twenty years and is now the district clerk, and he also holds the office of trustee of his township. When his term expires he will have been trustee for twelve years.
In 1856 Mr. Osborne was married to Miss Mary A. Kyle, a native of Youngstown township, this county, and a sister of Joshua and William Kyle. Their son William is now a business man of Youngstown. This biography would not be complete without mention of one of Mr. Osborne's most inter- esting characteristics. He is an inveterate Nimrod, and not only delights in the hunt of small game, but has more than once engaged in the exciting chase, and his skill is shown in the many antlers which adorn his home. During the game season he usually visits northern Michigan, paying a license fee of twenty-five dollars. He is a dead shot, and this combined with his staying powers and his eagerness when on the chase, has given him an en- viable reputation as a sportsman.
WILLIAM H. SPENCE.
A leading citizen of Lisbon, Ohio, who has been a practicing attorney here since 1894, and has taken a deep interest in the city's growth and devel- opment, is William H. Spence, who has been a member of the Ohio bar since 1884. The birth of Mr. Spence was in Lisbon, Ohio, and he is a son of John and Lauretta (Wiles) Spence, the latter of whom is a daughter of George A. Wiles, of Baltimore, Maryland. The Spence family is of Irish descent and was founded in America by William H. Spence and three broth- ers who had preceded him to America and settled at Nashville, Tennessee.
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The former, the grandfather of our subject, came from Ireland and located first in Madison township and later removed to Elk Run township, Columbiana county, Ohio, where he became a prominent citizen. John Spence, the son of the latter, was born in Columbiana county, where for many years his ability as an engineer and surveyor was recognized. His death took place in 1897, when he had reached his seventy-sixth year. The members of his family who are located in Columbiana county are the following: William H., of this sketch; J. F., an engineer and surveyor of Lisbon; D. C., a farmer near Lisbon ; Ella B., and Mary E.
William H. Spence was educated liberally, passing through Mount Union College, the Cincinnati Law School, and was a graduate of Ann Arbor, Michigan, in 1884. His first location for practice was at Wooster, Ohio, where he remained for four years, in 1888 moving to East Liverpool, and in 1894 removing to Lisbon, where he has been fully occupied ever since with a general practice. Mr. Spence has been an active member of the Democratic party and his efficiency as a worker has been recognized by his appointment as a delegate to county, state and national conventions. He belongs to the or- der of Odd Fellows. In 1892 Mr. Spence was united in marriage with Miss Maggie E. Coburn. Both Mr. and Mrs. Spence enjoy a wide acquaintance in Lisbon and take a prominent part in the social life of the city.
DELLA MARY WALKER, M. D.
In this age of advanced thought in the line of the recognition of superior ability in the feminine world, it has become no unusual thing to meet with cultured women occupying responsible positions in the profession. It is the privilege of the authors of this volume to present for the delectation of their readers a few brief points in the career of one of the most successful practi- tioners of medicine in northeastern Ohio, the lady whose name heads this paragraph.
Dr. Walker is a native of the classic little village of Poland, Mahoning county, a community which has been made more or less prominent of late years by the connection of the late lamented President Mckinley with its educational life. Miss Walker is the daughter of Isaac and R. Edna (Stu- art) Walker, her father having been a prominent farmer near that village, where he was born in the year 1819. He was the son of Josiah Walker, who was one of the pioneer settlers of the Western Reserve from the Keystone state. He emigrated from Westmoreland county about 1800, and entered land from the government which has since remained in possession of the Walker family. Josiah Walker married a Miss Polk, who was a first
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cousin of President James Polk. On the maternal side of the family Dr. Walker's grandfather was Robert Stuart. Her grandmother's name was Rebecca McClelland. Grandfather Stuart is remembered to have served gal- lantly in the war of 1812 as a private soldier. The ancestry on both sides of the family were people of great longevity, there very seldom being a case of death in the family under eighty years, and some of them living to nearly the century mark. Mr. Isaac Walker, the father of our honored subject, was a prominent and worthy figure in the public life of the local community in which he lived. The family have always taken a very great interest in the Presbyterian faith, and did much in the early day to establish and encourage it in the Poland community.
Dr. Walker herself is an only child. She was given a thorough educa- tion in the district schools of Poland and at the Union Seminary in that village, an institution which has educated a large number of the prominent residents of northeastern Ohio. This was supplemented by a thorough course at Wooster University, where she took the degree of A. B. in 1889. Deciding upon medicine as a field to which she would devote her life, she became a matriculate of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, and after a thorough course at that institution received its diploma. She im- mediately located in Salem, in 1896, since which time she has been engaged in the active practice of her profession. During that time Dr. Walker has built up a fine general practice, and is looked upon as an authority in mat- ters concerning medical jurisprudence. She takes a lively interest in the social life of the community, and can always be depended upon to give her support to any literary or religious scheme looking to the betterment of the young people of Salem. She has a host of friends who have nothing but good wishes for her future.
HENRY KOHLER.
This gentleman is one of the enterprising farmers of Canfield town- ship, Mahoning county, who are responsible in large measure for the sub- stantial progress and development of this section of Ohio, for it is the tiller of the soil who is at the base of the pyramid of civilization and upholds all the rest of the structure. He cultivates one hundred and eighty-three acres there, and while a man of few words and of quiet disposition, is practical and thorough in all that he undertakes. He is the son of Daniel and Eliza- beth (Huffman) Kohler, the former born in Washington county, Maryland, in 1798, and the latter somewhat later, in Pennsylvania. Daniel was a sol- dier in the war of 1812 notwithstanding his youth, and after the war moved
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to Ohio and located in Beaver township, Mahoning county. He was the owner of four hundred and twenty-six acres, three hundred of which lay in Pennsylvania, and was a prosperous farmer. He was a member of the Luth- eran church, and lived to the age of eighty-six years, while his wife died in her fifty-ninth year. Their family consisted of ten children, nine of whom grew to maturity and four are living at the present time.
Henry Kohler was born in Beaver township, Mahoning county. June 12, 1830, and was educated there. But as he was the eldest son, his literary training was rather limited, and he began farming for himself at an early date. He purchased his first farm in 1869, which consisted of only twenty-five acres, but he resided on that and made a living up to 1881, when he bought his present place. This is one of the best in the township and has been very productive under the management of its owner.
In 1867 Mr. Kohler was married to Miss Hannah Boyer, who was born in Beaver township in 1841 and comes of a family of old settlers in this county. Six children were born of this union, and five are living: Dan- iel; Jonas, who married Miss Amelia Huren; Henry B .; Lucinda and Allen. Mr. and Mrs. Kohler are members of the Reformed church, and he is a Democrat in politics.
WILLIAM F. MAAG.
The history of a city would be poorly written which contained no men- tion of its newspapers, the mention of them necessarily involving some notice of their editors and proprietors. It is a truism that a town may be judged by its press, and the degree of growth or enterprise may be ascertained by consulting the status of the printing plants.
Among the smaller cities of Ohio, none of its size has a more vigorous or enterprising journal than the Vindicator, published in Youngstown, which, like all other places, has had its feeble and failing papers, but in this case, as in other cases, we are to judge only by the best, which emerge in the newspaper as in the natural world by the operation of the inexorable law of the "survival of the fittest." It may be confidently asserted that in Youngs- town the Vindicator is "the fittest," as it certainly survived all periods of depression and the times of trial that beset most commercial enterprises, and continued at all times to advance. To tell something about the man who is largely responsible for the rise and success of the Vindicator, and who at present is the business manager and treasurer and principal owner of the Vindicator Printing Company's extensive plant, is the object of this brief biography.
THE YOUNGSTOWN ARC GRAVING ER
THE. VINDICATOR
THE RUNDSCHAU
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WILLIAM F. MAAG.
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William F. Maag is a native of the country where the epoch-making art of printing was invented. It was in accordance with the "eternal fitness of things" that he should have devoted himself to this "art preservative of all art" and achieved success as one of its most ardent devotees. He was born in Ebingen, Germany, in 1850, and was apprenticed to a printer at an early age; and long before he was grown to maturity had learned the practical details of the business.
With this equipment,-and it constituted nearly all his resourses,-he turned his face westward and in 1867 crossed over to the shores of America. He followed the tide of emigration then setting in strongly toward Milwaukee, worked a year there as a printer and later was engaged three years at his trade in Watertown, Wisconsin. His next move was to Fort Wayne, Ind- iana, where he was engaged "at the case" until 1875, when he made his final change, locating in the thriving city of Youngstown. Here he found his opportunity and improved it by purchase of the Rundschau, a German weekly paper which he has since owned and conducted with ability and success, it being the only German paper in that section. In 1887 Mr. Maag bought the Youngstown Vindicator, at that time a weekly, and two years later he, the late John M. Webb and others formed a partnership known as the Vindicator Printing Company. Mr. Maag was made manager and treasurer, and since then has been untiring in his devotion. The best evidence of the manner in which he has discharged his responsibility, and also of the prosperity that has marked the progress of the venture, is afforded by the fact that shortly after the company was organized a daily edition of the Vindicator was issued; the weekly was continued in much improved form and numerous additions made to the present plant. In June, 1896, a Sunday edition of the daily was added, and the appearance in January, 1902, of a semi-weekly afforded addi- tional evidence that the Vindicator office and its owners were sharing in the general prosperity that had visited the country. Among other additions are a fully equipped engraving department and one of the largest job printing offices in the state.
But his managerial and organizing achievements are not the only claims of Mr. Maag as a man of affairs and aptitude for public business. These qualities, and others of more personal nature, so commended him to his fellow citizens that they elected him a representative from Mahoning county in the state legislature, he a Democrat and the county strongly Republican. In Columbus he proved a hard-working and attentive member, looked closely after the interests of his constituents, and established a clean and notable record fully in keeping with his character.
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In 1872, as a result of an acquaintance while resident at Watertown, Mr. Maag was married to Miss Elizabeth Ducasse, of that city. Their house- hold has been brightened by the birth of four interesting children. Alma M., William F., Jr., Ida I. and Arthur D. Mr. Maag's fondness for fra- ternities and other social fellowship is manifested by his membership in a number of the more prominent orders. He is especially enthusiastic in Masonry, having reached the thirty-second degree in that ancient order, is a member of St. John's Commandery No. 20, K. T., and also holds mem- bership in the Elks and the Improved Order Knights of Pythias. He is also a trustee of the Youngstown Glenwood Children's Home. Mr. Maags' Ger- man geniality has commended him as generally in social circles as have his ability and energy in the world of business, philanthropy and politics.
GEORGE N. BOUGHTON.
The Canfield Manufacturing and Novelty Company of Canfield, Ohio, is one of the concerns upon which the material success of that town depends, furnishing, as it does, employment to a number of hands and increasing the commercial activity of the place. The firm was organized in 1882 by Mr. Boughton, and in 1891 it became a stock company, and at present the em- ployes number about thirty. The plant is conveniently situated on the Erie Railroad, covering about an acre in extent, and the products find their way to nearly all the states, but especially to Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania and New York. The life and soul of the concern centers in its superintendent and manager, George N. Boughton, to whom its success can in large measure be attributed. He is so closely connected with historical families of this section of Ohio that a brief sketch of his antecedents and his own career would be interesting.
The Boughton ancestors came to America in 1635 and settled in Connecticut; this section of Ohio, under the name of Western Reserve, was at one time owned by that state, and the first one of this family to migrate to Ohio was Eli T. Boughton, who made his arrival in 1808. He was a tailor by trade, and when he came he had, besides his sartorial outfit, fifty cents in money. By the following year he was permanently settled, had built a home and embarked extensively in the mercantile business, and he finally be- came a large landowner and speculated in real estate. His home was especial- ly noted for cordiality and open-hearted hospitality, and the itinerant preach- ers of the day were in particular favor at his hearthstone, he himself being a member of the Congregational church. He was twice married, and by his first wife, Julia Mygatt, he had three children, and by Mrs. Jerusha
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Church had four. Two daughters of this last union married prominent Ohio men; Charlotte married General R. P. Buckland, a distinguished leader of the Union forces in the Civil war, and Julia became the wife of E. J. Estep, an able attorney of Cleveland.
One other member of this family deserves particular notice in the person of Charles E. Boughton, who was born in Canfield in 1819 and died there on December 18, 1902. During this long lifetime he devoted himself to agricultural pursuits, owning a fine one hundred acre farm, and although his career was devoid of any stirring events as the world would view them, he stood high in the estimation of his fellow citizens and faithfully performed the part allotted to him of the world's work. He was a deacon in the Con- gregational church, served as a bank director for a number of years, and was an active anti-slavery man and always an upholder of Republican prin- ciples. In 1843 he was united in marriage to Miss Sylvia Smith Tanner, with whom he spent a happy wedded life of sixty years; the Tanners were also from Connecticut and located in Canfield in 1800, being almost the very first to settle there. Horace, who was born to this union on February 22, 1844, offered his services in the Civil war and was killed in the battle of Perryville, Kentucky, October 8, 1862, and his remains were the first to be brought to Canfield from the front.
This brings us to George N. Boughton, the second and only surviving son of the last named parents, who was born in Canfield, June 30, 1848. and was reared and educated in his native town. At a very early age he began working in his father's store and there became acquainted with busi- ness principles. His father was at that time in partnership with Dr. Jackson Truesdale. In 1872 he went to Cleveland and was employed by the Backus Oil Company, but ten years later returned to his native township and organ- ized his present enterprise.
Reference has been made above to the Tanner family, to which Mr. Bough- ton's mother belonged, and a more detailed account of them would add to the completeness of this biography. It is said that two brothers by the name of Tanner emigrated from Wales to Rhode Island about 1640, and about a quarter of a century later settlers of that name began to ramify in the direc- tion of Connecticut and New York. About 1729 or 1730 there was born in Rhode Island Thomas Tanner, who became the ancestor of the branch of the family with which we are at present concerned, and in 1740 he moved to Cromwell, Connecticut. His family consisted of William, Mehitabel and Hannah. William became the father of Tryal, who held the rank of captain in the Revolution and did valiant service for the freedom of his country.
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Tryal was very prominent and after the war came to Ohio, where he was sheriff of Trumbull county and very popular with his fellow citizens. He had eight children by his wife Hulda Jackson, and at his death, which oc- curred November 22, 1833, his estate was large enough to bequeath to each heir one hundred acres. One of these heirs was Edmund P., who was born in Cromwell, Connecticut, in 1815, and was an anti-slavery advocate, and his house was often used as a station on the underground railroad. He and his wife were both members of the Congregational church, in which he was deacon, and he was in accord with all the advance movements of the day ; he was a practical farmer and owned three hundred acres of land. His wife was Fanny Chapman, and by her he had eight children, seven of whom grew to maturity. His death occurred October 24, 1872. One member of his family was Mrs. Sylvia (Tanner) Boughton, who was born on July 31, 1822, and died April 8, 1903.
The Boughton and Tanner families have been so closely identified with, and such active supporters of the Congregational church at Canfield, and it has become so intimately connected with their history, that a brief men- tion of its history would be fitting as a closing remark to this article. It is claimed that this church is the third oldest in the state of Ohio. It was or- ganized on April 24, 1804, by Rev. Joseph Badger and Rev. Thomas Robins, missionaries from Connecticut. In 1820 an edifice was erected costing about two thousand and two hundred and fifty dollars. During the early history of the society the Presbyterians and Congregationalists combined their ef- forts, and the church grew and prospered and became an important factor in moulding the moral and religious life of the community. In 1835 the Presbyterians established a church of their own. The Congregational body has a marked history financially, never having a standing debt, which for a church nearly one hundred years old is remarkable. Though not strong at this time, its influence is well sustained and in the support of which none have been more conspicuous than the two families and their relatives which have been duly sketched.
JAMES D. GIBSON.
Among the many important industrial enterprises in the thriving city of Youngstown, Mahoning county, is that of the Ohio Stone & Paving Company, of which the subject of this review is general manager, and he is one of the representative business men of the city and as such merits con- sideration in the compilation of a work of this province; but there is an- other element which renders this representation all the more consistent, for
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he is a member of one of the pioneer families of the county, the name having been identified with the annals of this section of the state from the early years of the nineteenth century and having ever stood in exemplification of sterling integrity and marked usefulness in connection with practical affairs.
James D. Gibson was born near the city of Youngstown, on the 8th of February, 1845, and he was reared to maturity in Mahoning county, receiv- ing his early educational training in the public schools, which he continued to attend during the winter months until he had attained the age of about nineteen years, while during the summer seasons he assisted in the work of the homestead farm, which was located about one mile southeast of the city. To the defense of the Union at the time of the war of the rebellion Mahoning county contributed a due quota of her brave and loyal sons, and one of the gallant young men who showed his loyalty and patriotic ardor in this crucial epoch was Mr. Gibson, who in May, 1864, when nineteen years of age, enlisted as a private in Company B, One Hundred and Fifty-fifth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, with which he proceeded to take up active duty, but it was his misfortune to soon succumb to severe illness, which rendered it necessary to send him to the hospital at Camp Denison, Ohio, and there he remained until he received his honorable discharge on account of physical disability; for more than a year after his return to his home he was practically an invalid. The next year, having to a large degree recuperated his energies, he drove a herd of one thousand sheep through from Ohio to the state of Illinois, where he remained a year, after which he returned to his home and here devoted his attention to farming for the ensuing two years. At the expiration of this period he became the proprietor of a flouring mill in Trumbull county, suc- cessfully operating the same for five years and then disposing of the prop- erty and returning to Youngstown, where he engaged in the manufacturing of brick, building up an enterprise of wide scope and importance and continu- ing the same successfully for the long interval of fifteen years, within which time he became recognized as one of the progressive, energetic and capable business men of the locality. About this time Mr. Gibson became the pioneer in the introduction of cement paving in this section of Ohio, and when the Ohio Stone & Paving Company was organized in 1884, he was made the manager of the same, and has ever since been incumbent of this position. It is largely due to his discriminating, systematic and careful management that the business of the company has grown to be one of such marked scope and importance, its operations extending into the most diverse sections of Ohio and also into adjoining states, while the concern has built up the highest commercial reputation and has never violated the least item of its contracts,
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thus begetting public confidence and insuring the expansion of the business. In politics Mr. Gibson is an advocate of the principles and policies for which the Democratic party has stood sponsor, but he maintains an independent attitude and is not a strict partisan, particularly in local affairs, where no definite issue is involved. He is a member of the Westminster Presbyterian church, as is also his wife, and both take an active interest in its work.
On September 15, 1875, Mr. Gibson was united in marriage to Miss Frances C. Heasley, of Youngstown, and they became the parents of two children, Louis D. and Frances J., both of whom survive their mother, who was summoned into eternal rest in 1882. On the 26th of October, 1887, Mr. Gibson wedded Miss Maria L. Brown, of Youngstown, no children having been born of this union.
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