USA > Ohio > Wayne County > History of Wayne County, Ohio, Volume I > Part 93
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Mr. Ewing was married in 1889 to Minnie E. Long, a lady of educa- tion and culture, the daughter of Mrs. Adam B. Long, of Loudonville, Ohio."
Mr. Ewing is a member of the United Presbyterian church, of which he is a liberal supporter and interested worker, having held many of the hon- orary offices in the same, and he is at this writing superintendent of the Sun- day school, in which he is doing a very commendable work. He belongs to the United Commercial Travelers, Wooster Council No. 196, and at present is senior counselor. He has the interests of Wayne county at heart, being public-spirited, always ready to assist in the furtherance of any cause for the general good, and personally he is a man of unswerving integrity, kindness, charitable, genteel and trustworthy, according to those who know him best, and he has hosts of friends wherever he is known.
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WAYNE COUNTY, OHIO.
WILLIAM M. MELLINGER.
In examining the life record of William M. Mellinger, one of the pro- gressive and well-known citizens of Plain township, Wayne county, we find that he is the possessor of those elements which always make for success. Earnest labor, unabating perseverance, good management and a laudable am- bition-these are the elements that have brought him a comfortable compe- tency and the good will of his fellow men. His career has ever been such as to warrant the trust and confidence of the business world, for he has ever transacted all business on the strictest principles of honor and integrity. His devotion to the public good is unquestioned and arises from a sincere interest in his fellow men.
William M. Mellinger was born September 7, 1843, on the old home farm in Plain township. A history of his parents and the other members of the family will be found complete on another page of this work, entitled, "A Brief History of the Mellinger Family," consequently only those items bearing directly on the subject of this review himself will be brought out here.
Mr. Mellinger began working on the old home farm when he reached proper age, attending the district schools during the winter months in Plain township. He later attended the Fredericksburg Academy under V. C. Smith, obtaining a very good education. He first turned his attention to teaching, alternating the same with sawmilling for a period of seventeen years. and for seven years additional continued teaching, winning a wide reputa- tion throughout this locality as an educator second to none in Wayne county, his services having been in great demand; however, only ten years of that time were spent in Wayne county, three years having been devoted to this work in Lake county and twelve years in Preble county, winning, in each of the latter, a reputation for thoroughness and ability in his work as he had done in Wayne county. After he abandoned sawmilling he took up farming in Summit county ; but in 1897 he returned to Wayne county and he and his sister bought two hundred and twenty-four acres of the fine farm his grand- father had taken up from the government. It is located in Plain township. the original farm consisting of five hundred and eighty-four acres, and Mr. Mellinger has since devoted his attention to general farming with his usual success. Politically he is a Democrat and while living in Preble county he held the office of justice of the peace, also held the same office in Wayne county, in all twenty-one years, giving entire satisfaction in the same. The early members of the Mellinger family belonged to the Mennonite church, but William M. belongs to the Reformed church.
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WAYNE COUNTY, OHIO.
FRANKLIN HOLMES.
The history of the loyal sons and representative citizens of Wayne county iwould not be complete should the name that heads this review be omitted. When the fierce fire of rebellion was raging throughout the Southland, threatening to destroy the Union, he responded with patriotic fervor to the call for volunteers, and in some of the bloodiest battles for which that great war was noted proved his loyalty to the government he loved so well. Dur- ing a useful life in the locality where he lives he has labored diligently to promote the interests of the people; at the same time he has lived up to a standard of citizenship that has brought to him the friendship and regard of all who know him.
Franklin Holmes is a native of Wayne county, Ohio, having first seen the light of day near Pleasant Home on the 4th of February, 1844. He is descended from German ancestry and his paternal grandparents, Daniel and Charlotte Holmes, were natives of Pennsylvania and came to Wayne county, Ohio, in 1812. Here they took up one hundred acres of land and the father devoted his active years to that vocation. They are both now deceased. The subject's maternal grandparents, David and Eve Weaver, were also natives of the Keystone state, who came here in 1812 and took up one hundred and sixty acres of government land, on which they spent their re- maining days. Children of these grandparents, Jacob Holmes and Chris- tena Weaver, married and settled near Pleasant Home, where the father suc- cessfully prosecuted agriculture, having owned one hundred and twenty-two acres of land at the time of his death. He was a quiet and unassuming man, inclined to be retiring in disposition, but was possessed of sterling qualities of character which gained for him the sincere respect of the entire com- munity. They were members of the German Reformed church, to which they were generous contributors. They were the parents of eight children, seven of whom are now living. Jacob Holmes was born April 2, 1814, and died August 16, 1901. His wife, who was born in 1829, died March 27, 1891.
The subject of this sketch secured his early education in the common schools of the home neighborhood and remained with his parents until the outbreak of the Civil war. He gave unmistakable evidence of his patriotism by enlisting, on August 15, 1862, in Company E, One Hundred and Twen- tieth Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry, and served faithfully with this com- mand until the close of the war. He took part in some of the most sangui- nary conflicts of that great struggle, including, among others, Chickasaw Bluff, Arkansas Post, Thompson Hill, Raymond, Jackson, Miss., twice, siege
Mr & Mrs Franklin Holmes
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of Vicksburg, Champion Hill, besides many minor engagements and skir- mishes. He saw much arduous duty and was sick four weeks at Young's Point, lying under an ordinary tent. At Snaggy Point Mr. Holmes, to- gether with about half the members of the regiment, was captured by the enemy and they spent thirteen months in the Confederate prison at Camp Ford, Texas.
At the close of hostilities, Mr. Holmes and his fellow-prisoners were re- leased and he at once returned home and took up again the vocation of farming, to which he had been reared. Buying a comfortable place at Pleas- ant Home, he has here made his home ever since. He has done a good deal of well drilling in this county, being considered an expert in this line, and he has also farmed much rented land. He is a wide-awake man of affairs and has been active in prosecuting his affairs.
In 1868 Mr. Holmes was married to Clara J. Harbaugh, the daughter of Daniel and Mary Harbaugh, early settlers in Wayne county. Her father . died in 1862. To Mr. and Mrs. Holmes have been born three children, namely : Nettie is the wife of J. E. Matthews, of Ashland: Jennie Goldie is the wife of Frank Clippinger, of Collingwood, Ohio; Clyde Monroe is a carpenter by trade and lives at Ashland.
In politics Mr. Holmes gives a warm support to the Democratic party, though he has never been an aspirant for office of any nature. His fra- ternal relations are with the Grand Army of the Republic, where he and his old comrades-in-arms review the days of the early sixties and rejoice to- gether in a reunited country. In religion Mr. and Mrs. Holmes are mem- bers of the Evangelical church, to which they give an earnest support. Mr. Holmes is a man of even temperament, calm and self-poised, of refined char- acter, and is an honored and interesting gentleman. He has earned for him- self an enviable reputation as a careful man of business, and in his dealings is known for his prompt and honorable methods, which have won for him the deserved and unbounded confidence of his fellow-men.
JOHN DAVID BERGER.
Of the sturdy German element that has done so much for the develop- ment of Wayne county from the earliest pioneer times to the present day. the name Berger is indissolubly associated, for the several members of this hardy and industrious family have shown that they are deserving to rank with
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the county's best citizens in all phases of life, business, political and social. One of the best-known representatives of the present generation is John Da- vid Berger, the popular proprietor of the West End Restaurant, Wooster. He was born at Mount Eaton, Paint township, Wayne county, Ohio, June 4, 1856, the son of Gottlieb and Louisa (Grosjean) Berger, a highly respected family and well known in Paint township. The father was a stone-mason and was considered an excellent mechanic and in many places in the county may be seen the monuments of his handicraft, for his services were in great demand for many years. Gottlieb Berger was one of Wayne county's patri- otic citizens who gave their services to the government during the troublous days of the sixties, enlisting in Company C, One Hundred and Seventh Regi- ment Ohio Volunteer Infantry, and right gallantly he participated in the trying campaigns and bloody engagements of the same. Owing to the fact that his war record formed one of the principal chapters in his life, the history of this regiment is herewith appended.
Capt. Gustave Bueckling's company of the One Hundred and Seventh Ohio Infantry was raised chiefly in Wooster, from the patriotic Germans of that city. Recruiting for it commenced the latter part of July, 1862, and the company was soon filled to its maximum. In August it was ordered to Cleve- land, where it was incorporated with the rest of the regiment whose fiel! officers were : Seraphim Meyer, colonel; Charles Mueller, lieutenant-colonel ; George Arnold, major. Soon after organization the regiment was ordered to join the Army of the Potomac. Its first important battle was Chancellors- ville, where, as a part of Gen. O. O. Howard's Eleventh Corps, it was terribly handled by Stonewall Jackson, this regiment losing two hundred and twenty men killed, wounded and captured in this battle. Its next general engage- ment was at Gettysburg, where the regiment was almost annihilated, losing over four hundred men in killed, wounded and prisoners, out of five hundred and fifty that entered the battle. August 1, 1863, this regiment sailed in transports to Folly Island, South Carolina, and performed picket duty there until January, 1864. From there the regiment was taken to Jacksonville, Florida, where it had several skirmishes with the Confederates. It returned to South Carolina on March 23, 1865, and met a detachment of the enemy, defeating him, capturing three pieces of artillery, six horses and fifteen pris- oners. The regiment did provost duty in Charleston, South Carolina, dur- ing the balance of the service until July 10, 1865, when it was mustered out and sent home to Cleveland, where it was discharged. The regiment was made up of Germans, and was considered a very fine one, its members dis- playing their earnest patriotism and heroic valor on many occasions.
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Gottlieb Berger died of typhoid fever at Brooks Station, Virginia, leav- ing a widow and four small children. The mother, a woman of strong mind and willing hands, reared her children in comfort and respectability, educat- ing them and starting them out on life's highway prepared for its various vicissitudes, and she is still living at Mount Eaton; however, the near rela- tives of the children assisted in their bringing up, John David, of this review, having lived with an aunt near Mt. Eaton until he was sixteen years of age, and in that district he attended the common schools. He then worked as a farm hand until he was twenty-two years of age. In March, 1878, he mar- ried Johanna L. Tracy, daughter of Jacob and Phoebe Tracy, a highly-re- spected family living near Apple Creek, and to this union one child was born, Mrs. Carrie Olive, who lives in Akron, Ohio.
Soon after his marriage, Mr. Berger built the Maysville Drain Tile Works at Maysville, this county, and for five years operated the same very successfully, then sold out to the Sauvine Brothers, who now manage it. Mr. Berger then traveled for the Underwood Whip Company for a period of five years, the factory being located in Wooster. He succeeded in building up an excellent patronage for this firm. Then for several years Mr. Berger en- gaged in the laundry business on East South street, his business increasing gradually ; but he desired to launch into the restaurant business and is now and for the past four years has been proprietor of a well-conducted, attractive and exceptionally well managed restaurant at No. 26 West Liberty street. enjoying a very substantial trade which is rapidly increasing, owing to his quick and courteous treatment of patrons, his desire to please and his con- scientious business methods, which have characterized his entire career. He serves meals, hot and cold lunches at all hours and handles fine cigars and tobaccos. This is a meeting place for farmers. He is politically a Democrat.
DAVID P. SHIE, M. D.
Starting in life under unfavorable environment and beset by many obsta- cles, Dr. David P. Shie is deserving of a great deal of credit for what he has accomplished in subsequent years, for he stands today in the front rank of one of the most exacting and trying professions and is comfortably established in Orrville and known throughout Wayne county as one of her leading citizens. He was born at Bedford, Coshocton county, Ohio, February 22, 1862, the son of Peter Shie, a native of Germany, who came to America when fourteen
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years of age, locating with his father in Ohio. He is still living on a farm at Monroeville, Allen county, Indiana, at the age of seventy-eight years. He owns one hundred acres of excellent land and is prosperous. He married Lucy Rowe, who was born near Farmerstown, Holmes county, Ohio, and she died when her son, David P., was seven years of age. She was the mother of four children, namely : J. W. is living at Piqua, this state; W. H. died in 1892 at Hastings, Michigan ; David P., of this review; Mary, wife of P. W. Riffle, a policeman of Canton, Ohio. Peter Shie married a second time, his last wife being Elizabeth Middough, of Farmerstown, Holmes county, and ten children were born to this union, nine of whom are living. Peter Shie, grandfather of the Doctor, was a farmer, as was also Grandfather Jacob Rowe, who lived in Holmes county.
Doctor Shie lived on the home farm until 1873, assisting with the various duties on the same and attending the neighboring schools. When his father removed to Allen county, Indiana, young David P. remained on the parental farm until 1879. In that year he left Indiana and returned to Ohio. He received his education principally at Berlin, Holmes county ; he began teach- ing school in 1881 and continued teaching for nine years during the winter months. He made a success in this profession, but desiring to enter the medical profession, he studied medicine during the last three years he was teaching. In 1890 he entered Starling Medical College at Columbus, where he remained for one year, then finished his medical education in the Ken- tucky School of Medicine at Louisville, graduating from the same on June 22. 1892. In July of that year he located at Fredericksburg, Ohio, where he was successfully engaged in the practice for a period of nine years. On Jan- uary I, 1902, he moved to Orrville, Wayne county, and has been practicing here ever since, having built up a lucrative patronage with the town and surrounding country and often being called to remote parts of the county. As a general practitioner and diagnostic an he has no superiors in Wayne county and he is kept very busy attending to his numerous patients.
Doctor Shie was married on December 30, 1883, to Ella G. Kohr, daugh- ter of Michael T. Kohr, of Strasburg, Ohio, in which place Mrs. Shie was born. On November 6, 1884, their oldest child, William Ray, was born; he is now seal clerk of the Pennsylvania Company and has the esteem and con- fidence of the company ; Marvin DaCosta was born December 2, 1893, and is now in high school, graduating in 1911 ; a daughter, Ida Elizabeth, was born March 1, 1891, and died when eleven days old. Both the sons are living at home.
Doctor Shie belongs to the Wayne County, State and American Medical
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Associations. He has served on the local school board, and he has been a member of the Methodist church since he was nineteen years of age. His wife and sons are also members of this church. Fraternally the Doctor be- longs to the Masons, Knights Templar and the Knights of Pythias. He is a splendid type of the sturdy. self-reliant, progressive, self-made man, hav- ing made his own way in the world since he was seventeen years of age. He is not only up-to-date in the strictest sense of the term in his profession. but he is a well-read man on current topics and deeply interested in whatever tends to promote the general good, especially of Wayne county. He is known as a man of strict integrity and all gentlemanly qualities and is therefore held in high esteem by all who know him.
OLIVER GEORGE GRADY, M. D.
Notwithstanding the long strides that have been made in the practice of the healing art within the past half century. the discovery of medical properties in hundreds of vegetable and mineral substances that not many years ago were not included in materia medica as remedies or barely men- tioned in the pharmacopeia or laid dormant as far as the dispensary is con- cerned; notwithstanding the charlatancy practiced by adventurers in the legitimate practice of the art and the quacks that claimed particular and special gifts in the treatment of human ills: and notwithstanding the fact that legislatures have found it necessary to regulate the general practice by the expulsion of diplomaless pretenders and the registration of legitimate and truly scientific physicians, there are some of the latter who have risen to eminence within the field of their actual labors. and their examples are being emulated by younger men in the profession who are conscientious and who are wise enough to see that the greatest and best success must come to them by practicing their profession along legitimate lines. One of these is Dr. O. G. Grady, one of the youngest but most promising of Wayne county's physi- cians, whose office in Orrville is already a busy place, because he has, during his brief practice, proven to be not only well read, capable and thoroughly competent to carry on the work of a general practitioner, but also that he is a man of unswerving integrity and honor, therefore inspiring confidence in his patients, who are rapidly increasing.
Doctor Grady was born in Wheelersburg. Scioto county, Ohio, March 28, 1884. the son of William Henry and Mary Preston ( Burke ) Grady, the
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latter the daughter of O. H. P. Burke, of Burke's Point, Ohio, he being one of the pioneers and best known citizens of Scioto county. William Henry Grady was for a period of twenty-four years one of the best known school teachers of Scioto and Adams counties, beginning teaching when six- teen years of age; he was superintendent of the schools at Wheelersburg and West Union, in Adams county, and he taught penmanship in the Portsmouth school, was superintendent of the schools at Union Mills, near Portsmouth. He left the school room where he had been very successful to accept a posi- tion as bookkeeper for the Norfolk & Western Railroad Company at Colum- bus, Ohio, where he remained for one year, then returned to Wheelersburg where he taught for three years and then took a position as transfer agent of the Norfolk & Western Railroad Company at Columbus, remaining in that capacity until 1906 when he was appointed state examiner in the state bureau of inspection, which position he still very creditably holds.
To Mr. and Mrs. William Henry Grady two children were born: Dr. O. G., of this review, and Newton Burke, who is at this writing a medical student in the Starling Ohio Medical College at Columbus.
Doctor Grady was reared on a farm. He walked one mile to attend the district schools for five years. When thirteen years old he moved to Colum- bus and attended the graded schools, with two years in the north high school, and he graduated from the Wheelersburg high school with the class of 1901, and during the summer of that year he attended the normal school at Lucas- ville, Ohio. From November 1, 1901, to February 1, 1902, he worked for a grocery company, then worked for the Smith Brothers Shoe Company until September 2Ist following, foreman of the finishing department, in Columbus, Ohio. He then began work for the Norfolk & Western Railroad Company, having been appointed general storekeeper and chief clerk to the general foreman of the Scioto Valley division, which position he filled with entire satisfaction until September 21, 1905, when he resigned, for the purpose of gratifying an ambition of long standing-to begin the study of medicine. He at once entered the Starling Medical College of Columbus, Ohio, where he studied until April 20, 1906. From that date until September 12th follow- ing he worked as a machinist's helper in the Norfolk & Western railroad shops for the purpose of paying his expenses through college. Then he re-entered the above mentioned institution where he studied until May I, 1907. From April, 1907, to October, 1908, he was a locomotive fireman on the Scioto Valley division of the Norfolk & Western Railroad Company. During the summer of 1907 the Starling Medical College and the Ohio
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Medical University combined, forming the Starling Ohio Medical College, from which Doctor Grady was graduated with a most excellent record on May 18, 1909, successfully passing the examination of the state board the following June. He at once opened an office at No. 310 East Rich street, Columbus, Ohio, and remained there until August 5th following, when he came to Orrville, Ohio, and opened an office where he expects to remain permanently, having now built up a very satisfactory patronage, his services already being in great demand throughout the eastern part of Wayne county.
Doctor Grady was married on June 11, 1906, to Jennie Mae Bowers, a cultured daughter of an excellent Columbus, Ohio, family and this union has resulted in the birth of one child, a son, bearing the name of James Henry, who was born on April 24, 1907.
The Doctor belongs to the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and Engineers, Lodge No. 545, also to a local medical frternity in Columbus- the Phi Sigma Psi-and to the national medical fraternity, the Alpha Kappa Kappa; he also belongs to the Wayne County Medical Association. He is medical examiner for the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and Engineers and the Order of Rail- way Conductors, also for the Mutual Life Insurance Company. He also be- longs to the Modern Woodmen of America and the Ohio State Medical Asso- ciation.
GEORGE A. MCILVAINE.
To a great extent the prosperity of the agricultural sections of our coun- try is due to the honest industry, the sturdy persistence, the unswerving per- severance and the wise economy which so prominently characterize the farm- ing element in the Buckeye state. Among this class may be mentioned the McIlvaine family, members of which have not only attained a well-merited material prosperity, but have established a reputation for honesty that any community might be proud of. The earliest representative of this family came to Wayne county, Ohio, in the pioneer days and ever since that time his descendants have been active in developing the agricultural interests of the county.
George A. McIlvaine was born on the old homestead at Jackson, Canaan township, Wayne county, in 1851, the son of George Mellvaine. The reader is referred to the sketch of D. W. Mellvaine, on another page of this work. for a full history of the ancestry of this family. Suffice it to say here that
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both the grandfather and father of the subject were men of sterling worth and succeeded in establishing good homes here.
George A. McIlvaine was reared on the old home farm in this county, assisting his father in completing the clearing of his place and developing the farm. The former was born in the second log house built by his grand- father. He was educated in the home schools of Canaan township, also at- tended the Canaan Academy, obtaining a good education. After leaving school he chose farming as a life work. and accordingly rented a farm which he worked until his father's death, when he built a house on a part of the home place and continued farming there on twenty-six acres, which he still owns and which he now devotes to truck and general farming, making a very comfortable living, finding a ready market for his products. He has a neat and cozy home and everything about his little place is kept in first- class condition.
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