USA > Pennsylvania > Delaware County > Biographical and historical cyclopedia of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, comprising a historical sketch of the county > Part 61
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This imperfect sketch of the career of John C. Rhodes demonstrates that he is the posses- sor of excellent business tact and talents, and of that rarer virtue of steady persistency, which knowing how to adapt means to ends, tenaci- ously works on and patiently awaits the re- sult which is sure to come in the fulness of time. Beginning at the bottom of the ladder, he has steadily pushed his way into promin- ence and success, and is still extending his business enterprises and widening the sphere of his commercial operations. He is a mem- ber of the Episcopal church, and is also con- nected with Benevolent Lodge, No. 140, In- dependent Order of Odd Fellows. and the Junior Order of American Mechanics.
J ONATHAN LARKIN FORWOOD,
M. D., one of the most active, useful, and influential public men of Chester city, and a leading and remarkably successful physician
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BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
and sugeon of Pennsylvania, is one who has risen to position and honor by ability, industry, and the force of an unconquerable will. He is a son of Robert and Rachel ( Larkin) For- wood, and was born at West Chester, Chester county, Pennsylvania, October 17, 1834. Rob- ert Forwood was a native of Delaware, where his family settled nearly two centuries ago, coming from an English home of respectability and affluence. In Delaware the Forwoods nat- urally succeeded to a position in society as high as the one they had left in England, and became prominent in the section where they resided. From the Delaware Forwoods the Pennsyl- vania, Virginia, and Alabama families of the name are descended. Robert Forwood left the paternal roof to do for himself at an early age, and after residing for a time at West Chester, Chester county, came to Lower Chi- chester township, where he died. He married Rachel Larkin, a daughter of William and Sarah Larkin. The Larkin family, of which Mrs. Forwood was a member, traces its new- world ancestry back to John Larkin, who set- tled in Cecil county, Maryland, in 1682, prior to the coming of Penn in the Welcome, and from whom all the Larkin families of Delaware county are descended. John Larkin was a man of means and prominence in his county, as he owned there a large and valuable tract of land, and was active in local affairs.
Jonathan L. Forwood was not surrounded in boyhood with any unusual advantages to secure an education, but was so situated as not to be able to fully enjoy the limited school privileges of his day. Three winter terms of three months each was the extent of his school- ing when he had reached his fifteenth birth- day, but undaunted by an inauspicious begin- ning toward acquiring knowledge, he applied himself diligently to self study. Working in the daytime, he could only devote night hours to the prosecution of his studies, but such was the success of his efforts that at eighteen years of age he passed a creditable examination as a teacher. He then taught at
Eagleville, Montgomery county, this State, and saved a part of his monthly salary of twen- ty-five dollars to pay on his tuition and expenses at Freeland college, where he remained two years, and made his scant means carry him through by teaching a class in geometry. Leaving college he resumed teaching to secure means to acquire a profession. When his school was ended he was presented with a handsome silver cup, appropriately inscribed, in testimony of his efficient services as a teacher, and then by advice of Dr. Charles T. Morton, selected the study of medicine. In the autumn of 1855 he entered the university of Pennsylvania, from which he was graduated with high honors in the class of 1857. Im- mediately after graduation Dr. Forwood came to Chester as a suitable field for the practice of his chosen profession. Here he soon es- tablished a remunerative practice that has grown with each succeeding year until it now extends beyond the limits of the city. Dr. Forwood made a specialty of surgery, when he first came to Chester, and being very suc- cessful, his operations in surgery have covered almost all important cases since then. From 1864 to 1868 he had charge of the Municipal hospital of Philadelphia, then temporarily located at the Lazeretto, where, after the battle of Gettysburg, he performed several splendid operations on Confederate soldiers sent there. He has performed amputation at the shoulder joint, and has successfully operated in very difficult surgical cases that are seldom at- tempted except in medical colleges by surgeons of National reputation. While never neglect- ing the many and varied duties of his large practice, Dr. Forwood has found time to be- come active in the civil and political affairs of his city and county. In 1867 he established the Delaware County Democrat, making it a paying enterprise in the face of great opposi- tion, and in the same year was elected a mem- ber of council. He served four terms of three years each as mayor of the city, was the democratic candidate in his district for Con-
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OF DELAWARE COUNTY.
gress in 1874, and served as a delegate to the National Democratic conventions of 1880 and 1884. Differing radically from the Democratic party on its measures and legislation after 1884, he withdrew from its ranks in 1888 and became affiliated with the Republican party in its later legislation on National affairs. Since 1888 he has been actively identified with the Republican party, and is one of the most influ- ential men in its ranks in Chester city and in the county. As a political speaker Dr. For- wood is in great demand, and as a political manager few men excel him. He is also in- terested in the material development of his city, serving now as president of the board of trade.
Dr. Forwood is a member of the Pennsyl- vania State and Chester County Medical soci- eties, and also of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. Highly successful in his political career, yet his profession is the field of his ambitious desires, and his triumphs in surgery afford him the greatest pleasure.
E DWARD H. JOHNSTON, president of the Johnston Car-Coupling Company, manager of the Johnston Railroad Frog & Switch Company, and prominently identified with several other leading industries in eastern Pennsylvania, is another notable example of what talent and tenacity of purpose will do toward lifting their possessor from obscurity to fame and fortune. He is the son of an English gentleman farmer, and was born in Cheshire, England, April 14, 1832. In that country he grew to manhood, receiving a superior education in the private schools of his native land, and afterward served an ap- prenticeship with his cousin, Joseph Whit- worth, the famous edge tool maker, of Man- chester. At an early age Mr. Johnston had manifested great mechanical ingenuity, and beginning at the bottom of the edge tool business he thoroughly mastered it in every detail, until he was able to produce in the fin-
ished state any of the finest tools then made in England. At the age of twenty-four, in 1856, he came to America and located in New York city, where he was foreman of the Atlan- tic Dock works for a time. He then went south to Atlanta, Georgia, and for several years held the position of foreman in a large machine shop in that city. Returning to New York city, he had charge of the Globe Iron works until 1866, when he removed to Phila- delphia, Pennsylvania, and assumed the man- agement of the Walton Railroad Switch works in that city. He held the position of general manager in these works for a period of twenty years, but resigned in 1885 to organize the Johnston Railroad Frog & Switch Company, of Chester, Delaware county. This corpora- tion began business with a paid up capital stock of fifty thousand dollars, and met with such nnexampled success that its stock was twice doubled in less than six years. It is almost entirely devoted to the manufacture of railroad frogs, switches, and other devices in- vented and patented by Mr. Johnston, and the demand for its productions is constantly in- creasing as the utility and superiority of these inventions become known. In this enterprise alone, and in the course of a few years, Mr. Johnston has scored a success ample enough to crown a long business career and fully sat- isfy the ambition of a lifetime. But this is only one of his many successful undertakings. He is the inventor of Johnston's car coupler, which was officially adopted by the Philadel- phia & Reading railroad system as their stand- ard coupler in 1891, and in 1892 the Johnston Car-Coupling Company was organized in Phil- adelphia, with Mr. Johnston as president. This company has a capital stock of one mil- lion dollars, and is devoting its energies to the general introduction of the Johnston coupler on the railroads of the United States and Can- ada. Mr. Johnston is also president of the Willimer Automatic Signal Company, of Phil- adelphia, whose works are at Pottstown, in Montgomery county, and he holds the same
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BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
office in the Pennsylvania Wood Preserving Company, whose capital stock is five hundred thousand dollars, and whose works it is con- fidently expected will be located at Chester, this county. He is also a large stockholder and director in the Eureka Cast Steel Com- pany, of Chester, in which he has been finan- cially interested for more than ten years. No one knows how many patents he has taken out on his various inventions, but the number is very large.
In 1857 Mr. Johnston married Mary Wales, a daughter of Robert Wales. To Mr. and Mrs. Johnston was born a family of six chil- dren, one son and five daughters : Jennie, Susan, Amelia, Elizabeth, Emma and Charles E. H. The family resides in Philadelphia, though Mr. Johnston comes to Chester every day on business. He is a member of the Pro- testant Episcopal church of West Philadel- phia, and takes an active interest in every- thing connected with his church. For many years he has been connected with the Masonic fraternity, having served as master of his lodge while in New York city. He is now a member of Excelsior Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons, of Philadelphia; Union Chapter Royal Arch Masons, of New York ; and Philadelphia Commandery, Knights Tem- plar, of Philadelphia. He is also connected with the Knights of Birmingham in the latter city. While in New York Mr. Johnston was selected as one of the trustees of Havana col- lege, but resigned that position on coming to Philadelphia. As a talented inventor he has few peers, and his long business career is unique, in the fact that every one of the en- terprises with which he has been connected, from first to last, have been sealed with the seal of abundant financial success.
Charles Johnston, father of the suject of the foregoing sketch, was a native of Cheshire, England, where he died at the early age of forty-seven. His wife was Elizabeth Roycraft, who was born in Southshire, England, in 1806. She came to the United States with her son in
1856, and resided in Philadelphia until her death, in 1882, when in the seventy-sixth year of her age. She was a member of the Epis- copal church in that city, and her life exem- plified all the virtues and graces of true Chris- tian womanhood.
A LBERT CHARLES KIEFER, who,
since 1886, has been largely engaged in the bottling of beer, ale, and porter at 220 Edgmont avenue, in the city of Chester, is a son of Martin and Mary (Ott) Kiefer, and was born September 12, 1858, at the northeast corner of Eighth and Thompson streets, Philadelphia. The Kiefers are of German de- scent, and the family was planted in America by the paternal grandfather of the subject of this sketch, who, soon after his arrival in this country, settled in Delaware county, Pennsyl- vania, where he spent the remainder of his life, dying at No. 20 Market street, in the city of Chester. He was a Jacksonian democrat in politics, and was twice married. By his first wife he had eleven children: Caroline Ullmbrock, Gertrude Haas, Emma C., Clyde, Ida Mock, and Martin were among the num- ber. Martin Kiefer ( father) was born in Wur- temberg, Germany, August 13, 1821, and was a man of fine business ability. In early man- hood he learned the carpenter trade in Phila- delphia, and soon afterward engaged in con- tracting and building in that city, which busi- ness he continued to follow during all his ac- tive life, and in which he became very success- ful. Politically he was an ardent democrat, and in religion a member of St. Peter's Cath- olic church. He married Mary Ott, who was a daughter of Morris Ott, who came from Baden Baden, Germany, to Philadelphia, where he died. To Martin and Mary Kiefer was born a family of seven sons and five daughters : William H., Mary Antonetta, Al- bert M., deceased ; Lewis, Albert C., whose name heads this sketch ; Caroline M. Zippz, Emma Kreanun, Gertrude M., now a teacher
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OF DELAWARE COUNTY.
in the public schools of this county; Ida, Miriam, John Edward, and one deceased in infancy.
Albert C. Kiefer grew to manhood in his native city of Philadelphia, and was educated in the parochial schools connected with St. Peter's Catholic church. After leaving school he became a clerk in a grocery store in Phila- delphia, and later engaged in various other pursuits in that city, learning the stone cut- ter's trade among other things, at which he worked only a short time. In 1886 he began the bottling business at Chester, and has ever since continued that enterprise with increased success. His establishment is located at No. 220 Edgmont avenue, where he is engaged ex- tensively in the bottling of beer, ale, and por- ter. Two teams are required to supply his customers, and his trade extends throughout the city of Chester, and includes large ship- ments to nearly every town or village in Dela- ware county.
On May 28, 1883, Mr. Kiefer was united in marriage to Mary Lawler, a daughter of Philip Lawler, of the city of Philadelphia. Their union has been blessed by the birth of two children, both sons : Morris A. and Louis P., both living at home with their parents in their handsome residence in the city of Chester.
Politically Mr. Kiefer is strictly independent, voting for the men or measures that in his opinion are best calculated to advance the public welfare, without regard to party con- siderations. He is energetic and enterprising in the management of his business, and has met with the most gratifying success financially.
H. H. SAWYER, general manager in the Manufacturing Company, the well known makers of electric light fixtures and machinery, of Philadelphia, who resides at Ridley Park, this county, and is a member of the borough council here, is the only son of Jacob W. and Emma ( Dunham) Sawyer, and a native of Camden, New Jersey, where he
was born December 13, 1862. His paternal grandfather was descended from old New England stock, and at an early age adopted a seafaring life. He married and lived in Massachusetts, and had two children. Jacob W. Sawyer ( father) was reared in his native State, where he obtained a good practical education, and later learned the business of stationer, book-binder and manufacturer of blank books. He resided at Dover, and later in Boston, in both of which cities he pursued his occupation successfully. His death oc- curred June 17, 1879, when in the fifty-second year of his age. Politically he was a repub- lican. He was connected with the Odd Fel- lows for many years and was twice married. His first wife was a Miss Offerman, by whom he had five children, and after her death he married Emma Dunham, to whom was born one son, the subject of this sketch.
H. H. Sawyer was reared in his native city, and educated in the public schools of New Jersey, being graduated from the grammar school of Camden, that State. After leaving school he learned the plumbing and gas fitting business in Philadelphia, and later engaged in the manufacture of gas fixtures in that city, where he remained until he came to Ridley Park, this county. From the manufacture of gas fixtures he drifted into the electric light fixture business in connection with the Man- ufacturing Company of Ffteenth and Chestnut streets, Philadelphia, which now makes a spe- cialty of electric light fixtures and machinery. Since 1886, Mr. Sawyer has been the general manager of the business of this firm, and by his superior ability and enterprise has built up their trade into extensive proportions and extended it into all parts of the country. In addition to this business he is also interested in various other enterprises in the city of Philadelphia and elsewhere, and has met with marked success in all his undertakings, being now regarded as among the clearest headed and most reliable business men in this part of the Keystone State.
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BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
On October 28, 1886, Mr. Sawyer was mar- ried to Miss Lippincott, of Riverston, New Jersey. To Mr. and Mrs. Sawyer have been born three children, one son and two daugh- ters : Helen, Elwood L., and Emma.
In his political affiliations H. H. Sawyer has always been a republican and protection- ist. He has taken an active part in local af- fairs for a number of years, and has done much for the success of his party and the principles and policy it represents. Mr. Sawyer was elected to a seat in the borough council of Ridley Park, which he still occupies, and is regarded as among the ablest local leaders of his party, and the most successful business man in his section.
F ERRIS ABNER MITCHELL, junior
member of the lumber, coal, feed and general supply firm of J. E. Mitchell & Bro- ther, of Glen Olden, this county, is the fourth son of Abner and Jane ( Thompson) Mitchell, and was born March 24, 1869, at Hockessing, Delaware. The Mitchells are of Irish extrac- tion, but have long been residents of America, being one of the old Quaker families of Penn- sylvania. Joseph Mitchell, paternal grand- father of the subject of this sketch, was a na- tive of Bucks county, this State, where lie passed his early life engaged in agricultural pursuits, afterward removing to Delaware. He was a member of the Society of Friends, and an old line whig in politics, becoming a republican upon the organization of that party, and his death occurred in 1876, at the ad- vanced age of ninety-three years. He reared a family of seven children : Lydia Gawth- rop, Hannah Wilson, Joseph, John, William, Thomas ( who served as a soldier in the late civil war), and Abner. Abner Mitchell (father) was born at Hockessing, Delaware, and was educated at the Friends' Westtown boarding school, from which he was graduated at the age of eighteen. He then engaged in farm- ing, upon the land which he still owns, and
has followed agricultural pursuits all his life. He now owns two fine farms, aggregating two hundred and fifty acres of excellent land, situ- ated near Hockessing, Delaware. Politically he is a republican, and in religion a strict member of the Hicksite branch of the Society of Friends. He married Jane Thompson, and to them was born a family consisting of five sons and three daughters: Charles T., deceased ; D. Thompson, J. Edward, now in the lumber, coal and feed business at Glen Olden, in partnership with the subject of this sketch ; Ferris A., Lucian H., and Hannah F. The parents still reside on the old homestead at Hockessing, Delaware.
Ferris Abner Mitchell was educated prin- cipally in the Marion academy at Kennett Square, Chester county, this State, and after- ward took a course of training in the Wil- mington, Delaware, Commercial college, from which institution he was graduated in the class of 1890. Soon after graduation he entered the employ of L. N. Wood & Brother at Fair- view, this county, and remained with them for a period of three years. In February, 1893, he came to Glen Olden and entered into partnership with his brother, J. Ed. Mitchell, who had established the lumber, coal and feed business at the latter place some time pre- vious, F. A. Mitchell succeeding a Mr. Hall, of the firm of Mitchell & Hall. The new firm at once threw great energy into their opera- tions and enlarged the scope of their business, until in addition to lumber, coal and feed they now handle lime, sand, drain pipe, hardware, paints, glass, doors, sashes, shutters, blinds, brackets, mantels, mouldings, frames, newels, balusters, cement, hair, plaster, pumps, oils, varnishes, brushes, screens, and indeed all kinds of builders' supplies. J. E. Mitchell, the senior member of this firm, was married to Carrie L. Lindersmith, and has one child, a son named Abner. Ferris A. Mitchell is unmarried. In politics and religion he ad- heres to the traditions of his family, and is a stanch republican and a member of the Hicks-
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OF DELAWARE COUNTY.
ite division of the Society of Friends. The firm of J. E. Mitchell & Brother is already widely known in this section, and their trade covers a broad area of territory and is import- ant and lucrative.
N ATHAN JONES, proprietor of one of the largest grocery stores in the city of Chester, and one of her best known and most successful young business men, is the only son of Thomas B. and Hannah ( Baugh) Jones, and was born in the village of Chelsea, Dela- warecounty, Pennsylvania, May 16, 1862. The Jones family is of Welsh descent, and its foun- ders on this continent were among the early Quaker settlers of Pennsylvania. Samuel Jones, paternal grandfather of the subject of thissketch, was born in the city of Philadelphia, and resided there during most of his life. He was a practical builder and contractor for many years, carrying on an extensive business and employing from fifty to sixty skilled workmen. Politically he was a whig and republican, and in religion a strict member of the Society of Friends, in which faith he had been reared. He married and had a family of seven chil- dren : Kate, Rachel, Mary, Lewis, Samuel, Nathan and Thomas B. He died aged seventy- eight. Their youngest son. Thomas B. Jones (father), was born at the family mansion in Philadelphia in 1824, and was reared and edu- cated in that city. After attaining manhood he also engaged in contracting and building, which he conducted successfully in Philadel- phia for many years. In middle life he re- moved to Chelsea, Delaware county, where for eighteen years he was engaged in agricultural pursuits, and in 1880 disposed of his farm and came to the city of Chester. Here he once more took up the building and contracting business, and was thus engaged until his death, July 26, 1890, when in the sixty-sixth year of his age. He was a stanch republican from the first organization of that party in Penn- sylvania, and for many years took an active 27
part in local politics, serving as commissioner of Delaware county for six years, and occupy- ing a number of minor positions at different times. In religious faith he was a Quaker and a prominent member of the Society of Friends all his life. He was twice married, first to Mary E. Williams, by whom he had two chil- dren : Shelley T. and Emma, who became the wife of Thomas F. Clayton, a relative of Judge Clayton, of this county. Mrs. Mary E. Jones was a daughter of Lewis Williams, a mineralogist of note and a student and traveler, who visited Europe and spent con- siderable time in researches in various places of interest in England and on the continent. After his first wife's death Mr. Jones wedded Hannah Baugh, and by this nnion had a family of three children, one son and two daughters : Nathan, whose name heads this sketch ; Bes- sie, who married a Mr. Yarnall; and Sallie, who became the wife of Benjamin Riley, a partner in the hardware firm of Joseph M. Bottomly & Co., of the city of Chester.
Nathan Jones was reared in his native county and obtained a good practical education in the public schools of Chelsea and Chester. After leaving the school room he worked with his father for four years on the farm, and then en- tered the employ of S. J. Ledger, a prominent grocer of Philadelphia, where he remained for another four years. He then, in 1879, came to the city of Chester and accepted a position in the grocery store of William M. Ford, at the corner of Third and Concord streets, with whom he remained until 1883. In the latter year Mr. Jones embarked in the grocery busi- ness on his own account, at the corner of Second and Howell streets, Chester, and suc- cessfully conducted that enterprise for a period of two years. In the autumn of 1885 he sold out to J. J. Kurtz, and interested himself in the Chester branch clothing store of Brown- ing, King & Co., of Philadelphia, which was located on Third street, near Market. There he remained for three years, and in 1889 pur- chased the grocery business of C. F. Finegan,
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BIOGRAPHY AND HISTORY
at the corner of Second and Morris streets, this city, where he has ever since been en- gaged in dealing in groceries, grain, provis- ions, flour and feed. Giving the strictest at- tention to his business, and being endowed with great energy and fine executive ability, he has built up a trade which is considered the second largest in Chester, and occupies three floors of a building twenty-five by one hundred and thirty feet in dimensions. Mr. Jones also owns valuable real estate interests in this city, among which are two fine brick structures and one large frame residence. He is also a stockholder in the Consumer's Ice Company, of Chester, and interested in sev- eral minor enterprises.
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