USA > Ohio > History of the Western Reserve, Vol. II > Part 27
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WILL CHRISTY .- It is no inconspicuous position which the city of Akron occupies as an industrial and commercial center. Among the business men of prominence and large capacity in Akron to-day is found as an able representative of the younger generation the subject of this sketch, who is a native son of this city and who has found definite satisfac- tion in contributing to its upbuilding as a man- ufacturing and commercial center from whose large and important concerns products go forth to all parts of the civilized world. A dis- tinctive captain of industry, Mr. Christy is well entitled to representation in this publication. He is president of the Central Savings and Trust Company, of which he was one of the promoters and founders and is identified with other of the most important industrial and public-utility corporations of his native city.
Will Christy was born in the city of Akron,
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on the 7th of December, 1859, and is a son of James and Jennette (Warner) Christy, the former of whom was born in Summit county, Ohio, and the latter in Medina county, Ohio. The father was a man of marked business acumen and was long numbered among the honored and influential citizens of Akron. In the public schools of Akron Will Christy re- ceived his early educational discipline, and in early manhood he became associated with his father in the tanning and leather business, with which he continued to be identified for a period of about twelve years. In 1888 his progressive spirit led him to concern himself actively with the promotion and construction of electric rail- way systems, and it was through his well directed efforts that was effected the organiza- tion of the Cleveland Construction Company, now one of the largest corporations of its kind in the Union and one that has built many thou- sand miles of urban and interurban electric railways in the United States and the different provinces of the Dominion of Canada. With this company he is still identified, and his capacity for affairs of wide scope seems unlim- ited, when is taken into consideration the fact that his energies and administrative talents have been called into requisition in connection with many of the most important concerns in Akron and elsewhere. In addition to holding the presidency of the Central Savings and Trust Company, one of the large and solid financial institutions of the Western Reserve, he is at the present time vice-president of the Northern Ohio Traction and Light Company, vice-president of The Firestone Tire and Rub- ber Company, president of the People's Tele- phone Company, of Akron, and president of the Hamilton Building Company, besides which he is a stockholder in many other corporations in this section of the state.
The Central Savings and Trust Company, to which Mr. Christy gives a direct personal supervision in his executive capacity, was or- ganized in 1897 by him and Joseph R. Nutt, the former of whom became president and the latter secretary. The enterprise was based upon a capital of one hundred thousand dol- lars, and in 1904 the business was incorporated under its present title, with the capital stock at the original figure and with a surplus fund of one hundred and forty thousand dollars. Upon the incorporation of the company Mr. Christy was continued in the office of president, of which he has since remained incumbent, and the other executive officers are as here noted :
M. Otis Hower and Harry H. Gibbs, vice- presidents; Joseph S. Benson, secretary ; Edwin R. Held, treasurer ; and George H. Dunn, assistant treasurer. In both its banking and fiduciary departments the company con- trols a large and representative business and the institution takes high rank among those of similar functions in the state of Ohio.
In politics Mr. Christy is aligned as a stanch supporter of the cause of the Republican party, but he is essentially a business man and has had no wish to enter the domain of practical politics. He is affiliated with various fraternal organizations and with a number of social orders, among the more notable of which may be mentioned the Portage Country Club, and the Union, Euclid and Country clubs, of Cleve- land. Though the exactions of his manifold business interests are great Mr. Christy has not withheld himself from ably fulfilling his portion of work as a progressive and public- spirited citizen, and every movement which has as its object the futherance of the best interests of his native city is certain to receive his earnest and loyal support and co-operation. The amenities of social life also have a due appeal to him and he and his wife are promi- nent in connection with the leading social activities of Akron.
On the 22nd of October, 1890, was solemn- ized the marriage of Mr. Christy to Miss Rose Day, who was born and reared in Akron and who is a daughter of Elias S. Day, vice-presi- dent of the City National Bank and one of the honored and influential citizens of Akron.
HENRY HOOPER, of Willoughby township, was born in Holsworthy, Devonshire, England. July 4, 1827, and is a son of William and Elizabeth (Hunkin) Hooper; the father died during his son's childhood, and the mother in Cleveland, in 1876, at the age of seventy-four years. His sister Mary, now dead, was the wife of George Sleemin, of Willoughby. When Henry Hooper was seven years old he began working out for his board and clothes, and when he reached the age of fifteen he began learning the trade of millwright. While learn- ing this trade he spent five years, receiving only his board and lodging, and no clothes, and for the five years paid fifty dollars in money for learning the trade. At the end of his apprenticeship, he started to work, spending two more years in England, and in 1851, sail- ing from Plymouth, he spent four weeks and two days on the ocean and landed at Quebec.
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While on board ship he had studied an emi- grant guide, and decided that Cleveland would be a good place to locate, so he proceeded to tnat city, on his arrival finding no one he had ever seen or heard of. However, he had good courage, and decided to remain in the country at least one year, having but one or two dollars left. His first work was at Mayfield, in a wagon shop ; his work was mainly on wagons, although he set water wheels in several coun- ties in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Then in com- pany with Mr. Pennhall and Mr. Orwell, Mr. Hooper had a carriage shop in Cleveland, which they operated until 1861, and then his health failed so that he left this and went on a farm in Kirtland.
In 1854 Mr. Hooper sent for his mother and sister, and as a result of his success in this country, nineteen others came at the same time. He has been on the farm since 1861, with the exception of five years he spent in Cleveland as superintendent of a cooper shop. He lives at present in Willoughby Village, although he still owns the farm, in Kirtland, consisting of one hundred and ninety acres. He was always very successful in the conduct of his affairs, and has always been very industrious and am- bitious. In leaving his native land to come to America, he made a resolve to refrain from drink and bad company, and he attributes his great success to his ability and strength to live up to his good resolutions. He also had great respect and affection for his mother, who was a woman of very high character, and as long as she lived he led a single life. Mr. Hooper married, in 1883, Elizabeth Stevens, who was born in England, and came to America in 1870. They have no children.
MIRS. ROLDON O. HINSDALE .- Both by blood and marriage Mrs. Roldon O. Hinsdale, of Wadsworth, Medina county, is identified with carly and substantial pioneers of New Eng- land and the Western Reserve. She was born at Solon. Cuyahoga county, Ohio, on the 5th of November. 1844, daughter of Leander and Susan (Willey) Chamberlain. Her father was a farmer of English ancestry and her mother was of old-world Welsh forefathers, who set- tled in Vermont. Henry Chamberlain, the emigrant who established the family in Amer- ica, was born about 1596, and in 1638, with a colony of 133 persons under the leadership of Rev. Robert Peck, emigrated from the county Norfolk on the ship "Diligent," John Martin. master. The ship sailed from Ipswich and
arrived in Boston harbor on the 10th of Au- gust, . 1638. It is stated by Daniel Cushing, town clerk of Hingham, Massachusetts, from 1669 to 1700, and himself a passenger on the "Diligent," that Henry Chamberlain brought with him his mother, wife and two children; but from other records it appears that there were three, and probably four children in the emigrating family, viz .: Susan, Henry, Will- iam and John. The mother mentioned was probably the widow of Christian Chamberlain, who died in Hingham, April 19, 1659, aged eighty-one years. The line of descent from Henry Chamberlain, first of Hingham and later of Hull. Massachusetts ( where he died in 1674), is through William Chamberlain, of Hull; Joseph Chamberlain, of Hull and Had- ley, Massachusetts, and Colchester. Connecti- cut ; William Chamberlain, also of the latter place : Peleg Chamberlain. Sr., of Colchester and Kent, Connecticut ; Peleg Chamberlain. Jr., of Kent and New Milford, that state ; and Leander Chamberlain, the father, of Addison county. Vermont, and Solon, Ohio.
Leander Chamberlain was born in the county named, April 16, 1804. and was a son of Le- ander Chamberlain and his wife (nee Mercy Berry). Until he was seventeen years of age, he remained with his parents in his native town of Ferrisburg, but their death led him to leave the home locality and locate in the vicin- ity of Groton, New York. He remained there for a year, then returned to Ferrisburg and spent a year, and afterward engaged in farm- ing in Franklin county, New York. Mr. Chamberlain was married, December 12, 1827, to Miss Susan Willey, daughter of Ansel Wil- ley, and after living in Constable, that county, for two years, moved to the neighboring town of Malone. It was not until several children had been born to them that they joined a party of neighbors and friends, left their New York home and accomplished the weary overland journey of twenty-four days which brought them to the fertile lands of the Western Re- serve. They finally ( 1840) settled at Solon, Cuyahoga county, and commenced the opera- tion of the model dairy farm which was the family homestead for fifty years. There the younger children of the household were born. until five sons and three daughters gathered around the open hearth. Three of the boys afterward served in the Union armies.
The daughter Maria obtained her early edu- cation in the schools of Solon, later attending the Eclectic Institute of Hiram, Portage
R. Officedale
Mrs. R. C. Hinsdale
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county. For about six years before her mar- riage she taught at Solon and Newburg, the latter being now incorporated into the city of Cleveland. On June 15, 1869, she became the wife of Roldon O. Hinsdale, since which she has resided in the vicinity of Wadsworth. Her husband was a widower, with one child (George) by his first marriage, who is now a machinist of Salem, Ohio, and himself the father of Pauline. Mrs. Maria Hinsdale be- came the mother of three daughters. Louise is now Mrs. Arthur G. Abbott, who resides on the old homestead in Wadsworth township, and is the mother of two daughters, Mary Louise and Mildred Abbott. Maude, the sec- ond daughter born to Mr. and Mrs. Roldon O. Hinsdale, married George M. Elson, of Cleveland, Ohio, to whom she has borne James Hinsdale and Miriam Elson. Grace Hilda Hinsdale, the youngest daughter, was born December 27, 1880, graduated from the Wads- worth High School in 1898, and after a sup- plementary course of two years in the Cleve- land Central High School, taught three years in the Wadsworth township schools and five years in those of the village. This talented and beloved young teacher, a leader in the intellectual, moral and religious life of the com- munity, died suddenly of hemorrhage of the brain at the home of her sister in Cleveland. Her remains were brought to the old Hins- dale home northwest of Wadsworth and in- terred at Woodlawn cemetery, on the 14th of June, 1909. The death was so unexpected that none of the Wadsworth relatives were able to reach the bedside while life remained. To the loving mother, it was especially a deep grief and a profound shock. Mrs. Hinsdale, who has thus given to the world three noble women, is still active in the affairs of the com- munity with which the family life has been so prominently connected for many years. She is closely identified with the advancement of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union at Wadsworth, and is a member of the Wads- worth Cemetery Association and the Subordi- nate Ohio Grange, also a valued member of the First Church of Christ, Wadsworth. The home farm, under the skillful management of her son-in-law, Arthur G. Abbott, is still the model place founded by the labors of her la- mented husband and herself.
Roldon O. Hinsdale, whose death occurred August 25, 1906, at his homestead adjoining the paternal farm upon which he was born and where his parents spent most of the years
of their long married life, had been success- ful, both from the standpoint of pushing him- self substantially forward and of having con- tinuously contributed to the advancement of the community of which he was a native and always a faithful and a favorite son. He was born at Wadsworth, on the old Hinsdale home- stead, on the 27th of March, 1840, and it was here that his father, Albert Hinsdale, and his mother (nee Clarinda E. Eyles), spent forty- four years of their simple, useful and honor- able lives, first hewing a home from the forests of the Reserve and then applying themselves, with loving patience to the founding of a moral and harmonious household. A woman of untiring industry and of great nervous vi- tality, she was subject to various ailments, such as neuralgia and sciatic rheumatism, which, with consequent sleeplessness, continually sapped her natural strength. As her good hus- band pathetically observed, "she died from sheer exhaustion, April 28, 1880." He did not long survive her, dying August 14, 1882. They had become the parents of five children : Ellen Asenath, born in Norton, Ohio, October 2, 1834, a beautiful girl, who died of consump- tion December 1, 1847 ; Burke Aaron, who was born in Wadsworth, March 31, 1837; Roldon O., of this sketch, who was also born in that village, March 27, 1840; Louisa, a native of Wadsworth, born April 23, 1844, who is still fondly remembered by the earlier settlers of the place as an active, amiable, artistic and re- ligious child, a successful and popular teacher and a noble woman, whose death was a shock to the home, especially as she died at the com- paratively early age of thirty-three years, Sep- tember 8, 1876; and Wilbert B. Hinsdale, who was born in Wadsworth, May 25, 1851.
The first American Hinsdale of whom there is any definite information was Robert Hins- (lale, a freeman of Massachusetts; one of the founders of the church in Dedham and a mem- ber of the artillery company of the place in 1645. As early as 1672 he moved to Hadley and afterward became a resident of Deerfield. He was twice married, and met his death at Deerfield, with his sons Barnabas, John and Samuel, being massacred by the Indians at that place September 18, 1675. These male members of the family fell, while serving with Captain Lathrop at the Bloody Brook mas- sacre. The name appears to have been vari- ously spelled, but there is no doubt of the direct descent of the family in America from the Robert Hinsdale mentioned, who was the
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father of eight children. The special branch to which Roldon O. was attached sprung from Barnabas, the second child and eldest son, who was born November 13, 1639, lived at Hat- field, married Sarah Taylor White, October 15, 1666, and died at Deerfield, as above men- tioned, September 18, 1675. Barnabas, the eldest of his five children, was a native of Hat- field, born February 20, 1668, and in 1693 was admitted as an inhabitant of Hartford, Con- necticut, dying in that city January 25, 1725. By his marriage to Miss Martha Smith, of Hartford, he became the father of nine chil- dren. Jacob, the third child of Barnabas Hins- dale and his wife, was born July 14, 1698; married Hannah Seymour ; settled in Harwin- ton on lands inherited from his father ; was a captain in the French-Indian war, and was a man of public prominence, serving at one time as a member of the colonial legislature. Jacob, Jr., the first born of his nine children, married Mary Brace, of Harwinton, and about 1773 removed with his family to Canaan, where he died, the father of a large family. The second child and son, Elisha, who was born in Harwinton in 1761 and died in Nor- ton, June 22, 1827, was the grandfather of Roldon O. Captain Elisha Hinsdale was reared at Canaan, joining the continental army when sixteen years of age and serving three years in the field of conflict between New York and the Potomac. He was one of the heroes of Valley Forge, and was brought home quite broken in health. He was a natural mechanic; learned the jeweler's trade, and after the burn- ing of his shop at Canaan associated himself with his brother Abel in the axe and scythe business. They established a plant on the west- ern branch of the Naugatuck, a few miles above Cotton Hollow, and turned out the "Clover Leaf" axes, which became famous east and west. In 1816 the captain removed to Ohio, and, as stated, died at Norton, now in Summit county. It is said the parting, of the two brothers was on the top of the hill, on the Goshen road above the axe factory, the one to plunge into the wilds of the west and the other to remain under the old roof-tree. Cap- tain Elisha Hinsdale was a remarkable man and one of distinguished physique. He was six feet tall, weighed about two hundred pounds, and, although of fine development. had a skin as fair as a child's almost to the day of his death. He twice represented Tor- rington in the legislature; was a captain in Connecticut and served as a justice of the
peace in Ohio as long as his health would per- mit. Orderly, honest, sociable and liberal, he was a man who was universally respected as well as liked.
Albert Hinsdale was the seventh of Captain Hinsdale's eight children, and was born on the 18th of July, 1809, and as the family started from his native town of Torrington for "New Connecticut" on October 4, 1816, he was in his eighth year. His remembrance of the ox- team journey to the Western Reserve was therefore vivid. When the outfit was ferried over the North river at Albany the boy viewed with bulging eyes the departure of one of the first American steamers to ply on the Mudson between the state capital and New York City. The route was by way of Cayuga lake and Buffalo, that village having not then fully re- covered from the British raid. After having been eight weeks upon the road, the family arrived at Braceville, Trumbull county, on the 2d of December. There they met several Con- necticut friends and Albert was placed in a school taught by Joe D. Humphrey, from Goshen. In June, 1817, the family moved to the Norton farm, which had been purchased of Reuben Rockell, of Winchester, Connecti- cut, five acres of which had been cleared and planted to corn, potatoes and oats. A resi- dence had also been constructed, said to be the best in town, as the logs were butted off and were hewn on the inside. The family soon bought a good cow, the neighbors were kind and it was not long before a com- fortable pioneer household was in full swing. Albert was eighteen when his father died and within a few years the family was broken up. The little farm of sixty-seven acres was di- vided, the widow and Albert having twenty-six between them and living together. He himself married in January, 1834. his wife being Miss Clarinda E. Eyles, daughter of William and Polly Eyles, who came from Litchfield, Con- necticut, to the Western Reserve in 1814. She was born July 12, 1815, on her father's farm, which afterward became a part of the site of the city of Akron. The Eyles homestead was located on the hill west of the "Basin," above the old Summit House. When not quite five years of age she came to Wadsworth with the family, and on January 7, 1834, married Albert Hinsdale, to whom she bore five children, as has already been noted.
The parents were both of strong and re- ligious characters and the father. especially, was a person of close observation, quaint ex-
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pression and more than ordinary originality. They were very earnest in their efforts to se- cure for their children a good education, and after giving them the advantages of the dis- trict schools placed them in the Eclectic In- stitute, now the Hiram College. They were thus well grounded in scholarship when they were called to the practical activities of life.
Roldon O. Hinsdale added to the best of the old traditions all the enterprise and breadth of the new, and was both a successful farmer on a large scale and an able public character. Being a teacher in his early manhood he held advanced educational views, and endeavored to carry them into practice both in the school room and in the official service of the town- ship. From 1894 to 1898 he occupied a broader field in the public eye, serving then as a member of the Ohio house of representa- tives. During that period he was not only an active member of the committee on food and dairy products but chairman of the committee on agriculture. In the latter position his ob- vious ability as a scientific agriculturist at- tracted such general attention that in 1903 he was appointed to the state board of agricul- ture. In that capacity he gave his special at- tention to the improvement of agricultural ma- chinery, for which he had a positive genius ; but whatever his service on the state board he refused to accept any position which would take him permanently from Wadsworth and Medina county. At home he was the central figure in the development of grange interests, rural free delivery, the telephone system and all other projects which promised to lighten, broaden and strengthen the toilsome lives of his fellow agriculturists. This phase of his career cannot be too highly commended. The deceased was a member of the Disciples' church, to which his parents attached them- selves early in its history, and fully sustained his profession of faith as a follower of Christ, his lowly but brave and spiritual model.
HARVEY SANFORD SPENCER. - Prominent among the daring, energetic and enterpris- ing young men who came to Ashtabula county ere the wild beasts had fled before the ad- vancing steps of civilization, and assisted in the development of this fertile agricultural region, was Harvey Sanford Spencer, a suc- cessful farmer, and a man of sterling worth and integrity. A son of Caleb Spencer, he was born, April 5, 1797, in Fishkill, Dutchess county, New York.
Caleb Spencer, the descendant of a New England family of importance, was born, in 1750, in Rhode Island, and served as a soldier in the Revolutionary war. About 1800 he removed with his family to Greene county, New York, going there from Dutchess county, and was there a resident until his death, De- cember 6, 1806. He married, in 1778, Jerusha Covell, a native of Chatham, Massachusetts. She survived him, and in 1809 came with five of her children to Ohio, settling near Jeffer- son, in the midst of a vast wilderness. She spent her last days at the home of a daughter in Ashtabula, dying August 14, 1836, aged seventy-six years. She was a woman of much ability and force of character, possessing keen wit, and was a most entertaining and interest- ing talker. To her and her husband ten chil- dren were born, namely: Robert C .; Dennis ; Barzilla Nicholson; Jerusha: Alden Gage ; Edward Pierce ; Phoebe ; Daniel Maybey ; Har- vey Sanford, the subject of this sketch; and Platt Rogers, distinguished as the founder of the Spencerian system of penmanship.
Coming as a boy with his widowed mother to Ohio, Harvey Sanford Spencer, still a young, unmarried man, was living in 1813 on South Ridge, Geneva. On that eventful day in September when Commodore Perry met and conquered the enemy, he and a com- panion, Horace Austin, were sowing wheat on an open field bordering on Lake Erie, where now are growing trees two feet in diameter. Although he did not witness the battle, he saw the clouds of smoke rolling skyward, and heard the noise of the guns, sounding like heavy peals of thunder in the distance. In 1826 Harvey S. Spencer located on the lake, four miles north of the present site of Geneva, and with an energetic spirit and a pioneer's axe, began the clearing and improving of a homestead. His first dwelling was a primi- tive log cabin, built of round logs, with neither floor nor door, a log being rolled up at the opening at night to keep out the wild beasts. Here he lived and labored until a few years before his death, when he moved. He married, in 1818, Louisa Snedicar, of Geneva. She proved a true companion and helpmeet, performing her full share of pio- neer labor, being especially accomplished in domestic arts. She died in the village of Geneva, August 9, 1867. Eight children were born to her and her husband, namely: Betsey Elizabeth, Edward Pierce, Arthur Warren,
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