USA > Pennsylvania > Northampton County > History of Northampton County [Pennsylvania] and the grand valley of the Lehigh, Volume II > Part 19
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John M. Diefenderfer was born at the homestead near Fullerton, White- hall township, Lehigh county, Pennsylvania, December 29, 1855. He attended the district school until twelve years of age, then became a pupil in the preparatory school for Mühlenberg College at Allentown. After completing his studies at Mühlenberg, he began teaching, and in August, 1888, came to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and for three years was principal of the Neisser School. The next four years he was principal of the Penn School, then was transferred to the Jefferson School, as principal, he having held that position for the past twenty-four years, 1895-1919. Mr. Diefenderfer is also secretary and treasurer of the Krause Hardware Company, an office to which he was elected upon the incorporation of the company in 1909. All through his career as thus briefly outlined there has been a parallel current of usefulness never conflicting, but rather benefiting and aiding Mr. Diefenderfer in his pedagogical work. When a boy he developed a passion for music which the years but intensified. While at Mühlenberg he took a course in music under Professor Ettinger, of Allentown, and a similar course under Professor Her- man of the same city. He was also a musical student in New York City under Dr. Mason. He became a thoroughly skilled and trained performer on the pipe organ; his first position as organist and choirmaster was in the Salem Reformed Church, on Chew street, Allentown, Pennsylvania, Dr. A. J. G. Dubbs, pastor, and in 1880 became organist and choir leader of the Reformed Church at Schoenersville and Rittersville churches, where he was also teaching school. In Bethlehem he has been most active in musical circles. For eight years ( 1888-96) he was organist of Christ Reformed Church, his next position being with the Wesley Methodist Episcopal Church. There he was responsible for the entire scheme of the new pipe organ installed in the church at Centre and Wall streets. The action of the organ is tubular pneumatic throughout and was built from specification drawn by Mr. Diefenderfer, who also supervised its construction and installation. The organ was dedicated Jannary II, 1906, a chorus of fifty voices rendering the sacred cantata "Ruth," by Dudley Buck, as part of the dedicatory programme, Mr. Diefenderfer presiding at the organ. In addition to his work as an organist, he was for a long time
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leader of the famous Brotherhood Glee Club of Christ Reformed Church, an organization which sang at many festive occasions in the city and surrounding country and was very popular. He formerly and for many years gave private instructions on violin, organ and piano, but several years ago retired as a teacher. He is an active member of the Reformed church, is a Democrat in politics and a member of the college fraternity, Phi Gamma Delta. He is an ardent disciple of Isaac Walton, his special pleasure being bass fishing, his record being an admirable one. He also enjoys a day's outing with rifle or shotgun, his aim being quick and true.
John M. Diefenderfer married, at Bath, March 21, 1878, Melissa R. New- hart, daughter of Abraham and Mary (Schall) Newhart, of Allentown, Penn- sylvania, her father an accountant with C. A. Dorney & Company, furniture dealers, until his death, September 5, 1894. He married Mary Schall, born March 24, 1839, at Moorstown, Pennsylvania, who is living. Mrs. Diefen- derfer has been a member of the Reformed church from childhood, and has been a teacher in the Sunday school for thirty-five years, and for about twenty years has taught an adult Bible class in Christ Reformed Sunday School. She is also an active member of the Missionary Society of Christ Reformed Church. Mr. and Mrs. Diefenderfer are the parents of four chil- dren : I. Adelaide Jane, married Alonzo WV. Clemens, draughtsman with the Bethlehem Steel Company. 2. Alfred J., owner of the Commercial Body & Truck Company, 1872 Broadway, New York City ; president and secretary of the Hayes-Diefenderfer Company ; he married Rosalind R. Richmond, of New York; he is a Mason and also a member of the Kappa Sigma fraternity. 3. John H., formerly instructor in mathematics at Culver Military Academy (Indiana), trained in the Officers' Training Camp at Camp Taylor, Louisville, Kentucky, was commissioned a lieutenant in the Artillery Division, later serving with the Sixty-Sixth Field Artillery, Camp Kearney, California, and is now studying law at the University of Pennsylvania ; he is also a Mason and belongs to Kappa Sigma fraternity. 4. Robert Newhart, born July 9, 1895 ; a graduate of the Bethlehem High School in 1912; was in the employ of the American Coke Company, No. 2 Rector street, New York City, as expert engineer in design, erection and operation of by-product coke ovens and by-product recovery apparatus and appliance, being engaged at Jolict, Illinois, preparatory to departing for British Columbia, where he was to be engaged in the capacity of a supervising engineer in the erection of a two and a half million dollar by-product coke plant. He had made remarkable progress in his profession and had been given responsibilities rarely entrusted to other than men much his senior. His death occurred October 4, 1918, during the influenza epidemic. He was a member of Kappa Sigma fraternity. These three sons are all graduates of the Bethlehem High School and Lehigh University. Mrs. Clemens, the only daughter, is a graduate of Bethlehem High School, Moravian Seminary and Kutztown State Normal.
WILLIAM JOHN HELLER, son of James W. Heller (1842-1888), was born at Bath, Northampton county, Pennsylvania, and educated in the public schools there. When sixteen years of age he came to Bethlehem. After working in a store for about a year he entered the employ of the Lehigh Valley National Bank, where he remained for upwards of eighteen years.
When Mr. Schwab acquired the Bethlehem Steel Company in 1904, Mr. Heller became convinced that there were possibilities in Bethlehem real estate. That his judgment was sound has since been proved. H. A. Foering, who was at the time headmaster of the Bethlehem Preparatory School, was similarly convinced. They became associated as partners. While Mr. Heller was still in the employ of the bank, the firm acquired real estate and began erecting houses, Mr. Heller planning and managing the business, first after banking hours, subsequently giving his entire time to the business.
William Staler.
THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR. LENOX AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS R
L
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The firm has to its credit the erection of hundreds of houses, and the development of many acres of land into improved and valuable building tracts. Mr. Heller would never countenance the methods of the average real estate speculator. The improvements on the tracts in which he was interested were always kept in advance of the sales.
As is shown by the county records, Mr. Heller personally has bought and sold real estate more extensively perhaps than any other man in either Lehigh or Northampton county. The titles to several thousands of acres of land, representing more than a million dollars, together with many dwellings and building lots, were acquired and sold by him, this being aside from the transactions of his firm, which have been as extensive as those of any firin in the Lehigh Valley.
He has always interested himself in municipal and civic affairs, and has been aggressively in favor of all questions pertaining to the advancement and betterment of Bethlehem. In politics he has always been a Republican. In 1907 he was elected a member of the old Borough Council from the then First Ward. He served as councilman continuously thereafter until the consolidation of Bethlehem and South Bethlehem, which went into effect in 1918. Mr. Heller gave active support to the movement for the consolida- tion of the boroughs of Bethlehem and South Bethlehem into a city of the third class. Later, as chairman of the annexation committee of the Chamber of Commerce, he had charge of the movement for the annexation of the Edgeboro, North Bethlehem. Hanover township and Lower Saucon township districts to the city, which was successfully concluded. He took an active part in the several drives for war relief, and is vice-president of the Bethlehem War Chest Association. On September 26, 1918, he was appointed, by J. H. Cummings, chairman of the War Resources Committee, a member of the committee representing Sub-Region No. 3, Region No. 4. Bethlehem, Penn- sylvania, comprising the counties of Northampton, Carbon and Lehigh.
Mr. Heller was instrumental in the building of the Minsi Trail Bridge. and is now a director of the Bridge Company, being also its secretary. He is a director of the Lehigh Valley National Bank, the Bethlehem Securities Company and the Bethlehem Chamber of Commerce; president of the Mel- rose Land Company and of the Bethlehem Cemetery. He is a member of the Bethlehem Club, of which he is at this time a director, also a member of the Rotary Club. He has long been interested in local history and genealogy, and is a member of the Sons of the American Revolution, the Northampton County Historical Society, and the Moravian Historical Society.
Mr. Heller's ancestors have always lived in that section of the State now included in Northampton county, although at the time the original Hellers settled here it was still a portion of Bucks county. The county records show that his early Heller ancestors in America were very exten- sive land owners. This trait of his ancestors is perhaps reflected in Mr. Heller's choice of real estate as a business.
(GENEALOGY)
Christopher Heller (1688-1778), aged 50, the progenitor of this family in America. and his son Simon, aged 17, landed in Philadelphia from Rotterdam on September 5. 1738, as is shown on the Colonial records. The law required only the registration of all male immigrants above sixteen years of age, which undoubtedly accounts for the fact that there is no record of any other members of Christopher's family at the port of entry. The early records of the Lower Saucon Church show that Christopher had six sons: John Dietrich, Simon, Michael, Daniel, Ludwig and Christopher, Jr. Just why the name of John Dietrich, the eldest son, is not with those of his father and brother on the records at the port of entry is not known. He may have arrived at a subsequent date.
Christopher settled in Lower Saucon township, which was then in Bucks county, at the foot of the south slope of the Lehigh Mountain, not far from the present village of Seidersville. The tract upon which he erected his commodious log house and large log barn and outbuildings was an original purchase of 176 acres under war-
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rant dated September 8, 1742. This plantation, as it was then called, was known as "Delay." The original log house is still standing. The large log barn was razed a few years ago. In its day it was a large and commodious habitation. Now it is but a mute, decrepit reminder of days fast being forgotten. Until a few years ago the house was in rather a good state of preservation. Now it is rapidly falling into decay and is entirely uninhabitable save, perchance, by an easy stretch of the visitor's imagination, by the spirits of its pioneer inhabitants of the early days-days of the invincible heart and steady nerve. Christopher lies buried in the ancient cemetery at the Lime Kiln Schoolhouse in Lower Saucon township.
Simon Heller (1721-1783), Christopher's second child and second son, on warrant dated October 3, 1746, took up a traet of land in Lower Saucon township, on which he built a saw mill, to which he later added a grist mill. Subsequently he added additional land, until his holdings amounted to 215 acres. A mill is still on the site of the original mill. After taking up his abode on Saucon creek he was instrumental in organizing the Lower Saucon Reformed congregation, which, prior to his time, held its services in private houses, principally in the house of George Hartzell. The congregation's burying ground was the cemetery at what is now known as the Lime Kiln Schoolhouse, immediately west of the furnace near Hellertown. Simon was one of the first trustees of the congregation, and purchased the book in which the first records of the congregation were kept, wherein he entered the names of his father and all of the sons, also all the baptismis in the Heller family prior to the year 1765. A number of Simon's brothers also settled in the immediate neighborhood, along the beautiful Saucon creek. This early Heller settlement has since developed into the present borough of Hellertown.
Simon, in 1764, disposed of his mill site and farm, and moved with his entire family to Plainfield township, then also in Bucks county, where he purchased a large tract of 600 acres lying along the King's Highway. Here, too, he was a prime mover in organizing a church-the Plainfield Reformed Church-as shown by the old church records. He also acted in varions interests of the government in border affairs. He was the principal man on the board of viewers to lay out the road through the Wind Gap and on to Wyoming. It was over this road that Sullivan passed with his army. It is known to this day as Sullivan's Trail.
Simon's wife, who was Louisa Dietz, of Milford township, died and was buried at Plainfield Church. Simon, in due time, married a second wife. Shortly afterward he transferred all of his property in Plainfield township to his eldest son, Jacob, and moved over the mountain into Hamilton township to a plantation of 500 acres which he had purchased some time previously. Here also he caused a church to be organ- ized-the Reformed Congregation of Hamilton Township. With his second wife he also had a number of children. The Blue Ridge divided the two branches of Simon's descendants. His children were: Saphronia, Elizabeth, Jacob, Abraham, Peter, Mar- garet, Sarah, Daniel, John, Anthony, Cathran, Maria, Anthony (2d), Daniel (2d), Simon, and Louisa. He died in 1783 and was buried by the side of his first wife in the cemetery adjoining the Plainfield church. Chiseled in stone over the grave of Simon is the following inscription:
Here rests in God, Johan Simon Heller, born June 18, 1721, in Germany, at Petershetm, in Palatinate, died May 20, 1783. In his marriage he begat 16 children. He itved to see sixteen grandchildren and fifty-four great-grandchildren, and reached the age of sixty-four years, less five weeks and two days. His selected funeral text was 4th chapter Romans, Ist verse. (Then follows a German rhyme taken from a German hymn book of that date and which, translated. means as follows:) The body in the earth shall rest until the final day. Grant to me a joyful resurrection and tatercession at the judgment.
Simon's interest in church affairs is indicative of his Christian character, and that this sturdy pioneer considered himself one of the forbears of a family in this country is shown by his attention to the church records, the inscription on his tomb- stone, and his selected funeral text. It is due to the records left by him that the family is able to have a complete genealogical record.
Jacob Ileller (1750-1822), Simon's third child and eldest son, to whom Simon had transferred all of his plantation on the south side of the Blue Mountains, consisting of 600 acres, conducted his affairs profitably. At the time of his death, according to his will recorded at Easton, his estate consisted of five contiguous tracts of land situated in Plainfield and Bushkill townships, containing all told 902 A. 73 P. strict measure. Jacob conducted the Post House along the King's Highway at a point near Wind Gap in the Blue Mountains (now the Woodley House, Wind Gap Borough). Sullivan, on his march to Wyoming, spent a night at this hostelry, while his army bivouacked along the llighway. Jacob was captain of a company of rangers along the frontier during the Revolution. He had eleven children: Susanna, George, Charles, Samuel, lohn, Jacob, William, Eliza, Rebecca, Catharine and Thomas. He is buried at Plainfield Church. He married Susanna (maiden name unknown), who was born in 1757 and died in 1797, and lies buried beside her husband.
George Heller (1783-1864), Jacob's second child and eldest son, lived in Plainfield township, in or near Belfast. George is the first of this line of whom there is a likeness known to be in existence. A daguerreotype portrait of him is in the posses-
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sion of William John Heller, as is also his family Bible-a large English Bible, in which the Apochrypha is included, published in 1825 at Philadelphia by H. C. Carey and I. Lea, publishers, in which were faithfully kept comprehensive genealogical records. The first records were entered by George, later by others, finally by his son Samuel. The entries made by George state that he is a son of Jacob and his wife Susanna. It also gives his marriage record and the records of his children's births, marriages, etc. His records are all fully substantiated by the church records of Plainfield township church, as shown by the published translation by Rev. Henry Martyn Kieffer, D.D., pastor of the church, 1902. On May 4, 1806, George married Susanna Appel (1785-1833), widow of Philip Appel, daughter of David Beidelman. George had eight children: Mary Magdalena, Hannah, Susanna, George, Samuel, Eliza Ann. Thomas Edward and Jacob Daniel. He is buried in Dryland Cemetery at Hecktown.
Samuel Heller (1815-1895), the fifth child and second son of George, on June 2, 1838, married Margaret Gold (1818-1903). He resided for a time in Plainfield town- ship. He followed farming for a period near Hecktown, and later moved to Bath. Samuel had eight children: Valentine, James Washington, Owen, Lewis, Susanna, Maria, Oliver Theodore, Matilda Ellen and Lovin Albert. He and his wife Margaret are both buried at Hecktown.
James W. Heller (1842-1888), second child and second son of Samuel, was born in Plainfield township. When a boy he clerked in a general store. When seventeen years of age he enlisted in Company D, 129th Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers. Shortly after being mustered out of the service he married Anna M. Heckman (1847- 1912), daughter of John and Louisa Kemmerer Heckman, of Nazareth. Prior to his marriage he had entered into the general merchandising business for himself at Bath, where his was the principal business establishment. He was also interested, in partnership with several others, in several slate quarries in the Chapman slate region. James W. had four children: Charles Grant, William John, Anna Louisa and Elizabeth Margaret. James W. and his wife Anna M. are buried in Greenmound Cemetery at Bath.
FRANK REEDER, JR., third of his name to practice law in Easton, son of General Frank Reeder and grandson of Governor Andrew Horatio Reeder, he comes from a race of lawyers, and is bred to the law. His grand- father's fame as a lawyer was nation-wide, and his father possessed that rare quality known as a judicial mind. As secretary of the Commonwealth and in other phases of his public career, General Frank Reeder filed opinions on many questions, a number of which were reported. He was a great lawyer, and would have made a great judge had he not declined a position on the Superior Court bench. In politics he was a leader, and his extensive travels in Europe and America added to his intimate acquaintance among prominent men, and his fondness for good literature gave an additional culture to a man of education and natural refinement. The earliest known ancestor of this branch of the Reeder family was John Reeder, who came from England prior to 1656 and settled at Newtown, Long Island, his name being found among the residents of the town in that year. His son, John (2) Reeder, came to Ewing, New Jersey, near Trenton, in the early part of the eighteenth century, and married Hannah Burroughs, daughter of Isaac. They were the parents of a son, Isaac Reeder, whose name is signed to an agreement August 26, 1703. Isaac Reeder purchased a farm from Zebulon Heston, upon which he lived, and which long continued in the family. Isaac Reeder married (second) Joanna Hunt, and among their children was a son, John (3) Reeder, who married Hannah Mershon. John (3) and Hannah Recder were the parents of : Absalom Reeder, who married October 16, 1788, Christina Smith, of Easton, Pennsylvania. There Absalom Reeder lived all his after life and is buried in the First Presbyterian graveyard, having been laid there after his removal from Easton cemetery. He was the father of Governor Andrew H. Reeder.
Said General W. E. Doster, who, in his address presenting a portrait of Governor Andrew HI. Reeder to the County of Northampton, September 23, 1901, and which now hangs on the walls of the court-house at Easton :
As a boy, and as far back as I remember anything, I heard the name of Andrew Reeder mentioned as a staunch Democrat, and leader of that party in the "Tenth Legion,"
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read of his speeches on behalf of Polk, when running for the Presidency against Clay, for Cass when running against Taylor, and for Pieree when running against Seott, in the campaigns of 1844, 1848, and 1852-of his supporting David J. Porter, Shunk and Bigler, when they ran for the Governorship of the State-of his political bouts with James M. Porter, once Secretary of War. I also knew and read much of the part he took in the famous Miller will case-of his defence in the celebrated conspiracy trial, which divided all Easton into hostile camps-his connection with the opening of the Delaware to steam navigation-his efforts on behalf of the opening of the Lehigh Valley and what is now the North Penn. Railroad, and later his opposition to the removal of the old Court House into what he was pleased to call "the first corn-field on the Bethlehem road."
I first saw and heard Mr. Reeder while he was making a speech at Bethlehem in 1852, advocating the claims of Franklin Pierce, in the course of which he unmercifully ridiculed the Whig party, to which my family belonged. I smarted under his lash, but could not help admiring the way he cracked it and laid it on, and his wonderful power as a speaker. I made his personal acquaintance first in 1855, while he was acting as my father's general counsel, and frequently afterwards, when he represented my father's executors. His office was on the first floor of a building standing on the southeast corner of the Square, next to the county offices, and opposite the front door of the Court House. The front office was occupied by his long and slender young partner, Green (destined to become Chief Justice), the inner room by himself. The Governor was muscular, rather portly, and stood six feet in height, although his commanding air gave the impression of being taller. His shoulders were square and broad, his carriage erect and proud, with a look of determination but kindness in his face.
While he was uniformly respectful to judges, he knew very well how to sustain the dignity of a member of the bar, and it was out of the power of any judge, however arbi- trary, to overawe him, or cause him to flinch one inch from the position that he believed to be right. In his addresses to the jury he was clear and logical, rather than persuasive or passionate. Although he was a great master of the power of ridicule, exact expres- sion and vehement delivery, his sentences were devoid of the literary graces which adorned the orations of Rufus Choate, or the opinions of Gibson, and were rather moulded in the ponderous manner of Daniel Webster or William M. Meredith. In repartee or power of apt classic quotation, he was no match for Brown, nor, in adroitness and humor, for Porter, but when it came to sledgehammer blows of the argument, delivered with giant force, he was irresistible, and, as a rule, carried off the verdict. In brief, from my knowl- edge of what his professional income was, and how he stood as an advocate in Eastern Pennsylvania, from 1855 to 1864, I believe I can confidently say, without drawing invidious distinctions, that his professional income was larger, and his fame as a lawyer more extended, than that of any member of our har of his time, and it was a bar famous for able men. In private life he seemed to aim at the same excellence that he did in his professional career. His financial credit was always of the best. He was a director of the old Easton Bank, and made only safe investments. He kept an exact account of his expenses, written in a beautiful hand, and paid everybody as he went. On the other hand, he was extremely generous to his friends, and after the dinner hour it was seldom that someone did not come in and ask for assistance in pecuniary way, and get it.
Andrew Horatio Reeder, son of Absalom and Christina (Smith) Reeder, was born in Easton, July 12, 1807, and died there July 5, 1864. He graduated from Lawrenceville (New Jersey) High School, and prepared for the practice of law under the preceptorship of Peter Ihrie, one of Easton's leading law- yers. Andrew H. Reeder was admitted to the bar in 1828, and began practice in Easton, giving strict attention to the law from that date until 1854. He rose to high position as a lawyer, and was a familiar figure in all State and Federal Courts of his district, and of frequent appearance in other County Courts. Had his fame rested alone upon his reputation as a learned and able lawyer, it would have been secure. But an incident in his life brought him his greatest fame and prominence, and it is as governor of the territory of Kansas, appointed in 1854, that he is known best. Franklin Pierce was then President of the United States; Jefferson Davis, Secretary of War; Stephen A. Douglas, a United States Senator; and Asa Baker of Pennsyl- vania, a member of Congress. The Kansas-Nebraska Act, which practically repealed the Missouri Compromise, had been passed, an act which as a Democrat, Mr. Reeder approved. There then began that bitter struggle between those who wanted to make Kansas "free soil" and those who wanted it "slave territory," and into this turmoil Andrew H. Reeder was plunged, without any solicitation on his part, by his appointment as Governor of Kansas, then a territory. He stood between the two factions representing
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