History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 166

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
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ABRAHAM OVERHOLT AND HENRY S. OVERHOLT.

The late Abraham Overholt, the immediate pro- genitor of the large family bearing his name in West- moreland County, and who made that name a house- hold word, not only in Western Pennsylvania but in al- most every region of the country, was descended from the immigrant Martin Overholt, who came to America from Germany some time early in the eighteenth century and settled in Bucks County, Pa., where he died in his thirty-seventh year, leaving a family of children, one of whom was Henry Overholt, who married a Miss Anna Beitler, by whom he had twelve children, all of whom were born in Bucks County, and who came with their parents from that county to Westmoreland County in the year 1800. At that time several of the children were married. Of the married the daughters bore the names of Loucks, Fretts, and Stauffer. The family, with its married accessions, " colonized" on a tract of land then wild, but since long known as the Overholt homestead, in West Overton. The next to the youngest of the family was Abraham Overholt, with whose name this sketch opens. He was at that time in his seven- teenth year, and had learned the domestic weaver's trade in Bucks County, and while his brothers cleared the land he wrought at the loom for the family and the wide-about neighborhood. Mr. Overholt prose- cuted his trade continuously till about 1810, when he and his younger brother, Christian, purchased a 'special interest in the homestead farm, and after a couple of years' co-partnership with his brother in farming he bought out the latter's interest (com- prising one hundred and fifty acres), at fifty dollars

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an acre, a price then regarded high. This purchase included a log distillery having the capacity of three or four bushels of grain per day only. At that time nearly every farm in the neighborhood possessed its private distillery. Mr. Overholt soon after the pur- chase built a stone distillery, which had a capacity of from forty to fifty bushels per day, but he had no mill, and got his grain chopped on Jacobs Creek, in what is now Scottdale, and at Bridgeport. The haul- ing of the "chop" from those places to the distillery was principally done by cattle, driven by Mr. Over- holt's younger sons, in whose minds dwell vivid memories of those slow and dreaded days, when the cattle were likely to "stall" at various points along the road. About 1884, Mr. Overholt built a brick flouring-mill, and thereafter did his own chopping for the distillery. This mill and the distillery above mentioned were kept running till 1859, when both were taken down, and on their site was erected a large structure, comprising mill and distillery, and in dimensions a hundred feet in length, sixty-three feet in width, and six stories in height. The capacity of the distillery is two hundred bushels a day, that of the mill fifty barrels of flour. A short time before the erection of the new building, Mr. Henry 8. Over- holt, the oldest child of Abraham Overholt, pur- chased a half-interest in his father's farm and flour- ing and distilling business, and with him conducted the same till Jan. 15, 1870, when Abraham Overholt died, and on the 18th of June in the same year, and after a short illness, Henry followed his father to the grave. During the period of his partnership with his father, in fact, for ten years before the partnership was entered into, Mr. Henry S. Overholt conducted the business of the mill and distillery, the elder Overholt generally supervising. It should be here noted that Abraham Overholt was the first discoverer of coal in this portion of Westmoreland County, and commenced to use it before others made use of it. Prior to its discovery coal was brought from the other sides of the mountains to the blacksmith-shops of the region, and which it was found stood over the finest strata of coal. Mr. Overholt used to exhibit his coal-mines in an early day as a curiosity to visit- ing strangers from the East.

publican party, when he naturally united with it, and took extreme interest in its welfare. He was a warm Lincoln man, and during the late war was deeply aroused over the affairs of the country. Be- ing then nearly eighty years of age, he nevertheless visited the seat of war twice, in his anxiety over the state of the country and to encourage soldiers in the field with whom he was personally acquainted.

Mr. Henry S. Overholt, who was born Aug. 10, 1810, and who was at the time of his death in his sixtieth year, possessed many of the characteristics of his father. He was considered one of the best busi- ness men in Western Pennsylvania. A marked pe- culiarity of this gentleman was his reticence as to his own affairs, and which he preserved in such manner that they who were curious and inquisitive, and deemed that they had some light at the beginning of impertinent investigations, were sure to find in the end that they then knew nothing. Socially he was not garrulous, and though quiet was very popular, and much beloved by all who knew him. His life was eminently moral from boyhood to the day of his death.

In 1809, Abraham Overholt married Maria Stauffer, daughter of the Rev. John Stauffer and Elizabeth, his wife.

Feb. 10, 1846, Mr. Henry S. Overholt was united in marriage with Miss Abigail Carpenter, born" March 13, 1824, a daughter of Benjamin F. and Mary Sarver Carpenter, of Versailles township, Alle- gheny Co., Pa.

Mrs. Abigail Overholt survives her husband, and resides in the village of West Overton. She is the mother of seven children,-Sarah A. Overholt, inter- married with Aaron S. R. Overholt (not a blood re- lative of hers), Benjamin F., Maria Carpenter, Abi- gail C., Abraham C., Henry C., and Jennie C., the wife of Nathaniel Miles, a native of Pittsburgh.

The record of the children of Abraham Overholt will be found under the heading, "The Overholt Family," in another part of this volume.

JACOB S. OVERHOLT.

Mr. Abraham Overholt as a business man was dis- tinguished for the order with which he conducted all his affairs, for his firmness and decision, for prompt- ness, great energy, and punctuality. He was never known to disappoint a creditor seeking payment, was gentle to his employés, and straightforward in all his dealings. As a citizen he was what his character as a business man would indicate. He was public- spirited, and was one of the earliest and most earnest advocates of the present common-school system of the State. In politics he was ardent. During Jackson's latter term as President he was a "Jackson man," but opposed Van Buren, and became an old-line Whig, and continued such till the advent of the Re- | was comparatively small; but the close attention,

The late Jacob S. Overholt, of Emma Mines, East Huntingdon township, and who died April 20, 1859, was the second son and third child of Abraham Over- holt, and was born at West Overton, Oct. 18, 1814. He was reared upon the homestead farm, and was ed- ucated in the common schools, and while young, though somewhat employed upon the farm, was also engaged in his father's distillery, learning the busi- ness of distilling, in which the elder Overholt had peculiar skill, and in which Jacob soon became so proficient that he and his elder brother, Henry S., were practically intrusted by their father with the management of the business at an early age. At the time when Jacob entered the distillery the business

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prudence, and activity of the young Jacob, with his brother, pushed it forward with gradual and safe progress, so that at the time he arrived at thirty years of age the business of the distillery, with that of a flouring-mill, both in the same building, had reached large proportions. The brothers continued for sev- eral years to conduct a prosperous business at West Overton, and in 1855 Jacob amicably dissolved busi- neas with his brother and removed to Broad Ford, Fayette Co., where he took into partnership with him- self his cousin, Henry O. Overholt, and there estab- lished a saw-mill, mainly for supplying the firm with materials with which to build up a then prospective village and a distillery, which in time became the most famous of the Overholt distilleries. The old distillery has since been pulled down, a larger one having taken its place since the death of Mr. Overholt. Under the immediate oversight of Jacob Overholt, the locality of Broad Ford, containing three dwellings when he first went there, shortly grew into a busy village. Mr. Overholt paid strict personal attention to his large business until his last illness. He was a man of great energy and business activity and integrity, and in the expressive language of one who knew him well, "he was everybody's friend." He was noted for his charity, never allowing the needy to go unserved by his door.

Dec. 29, 1886, Mr. Overholt was united in marriage with Miss Mary Fox, daughter of Christian and Eliz- abeth Funk Fox, who resided near Stonerville, in East Huntingdon township. Mrs. Mary Fox Overholt was born Dec. 6, 1816, and resides on the farm pur- chased by her husband the year after their marriage, and then called Emma Mines, and on which spot were born most of her children, nine in number, all but one living, and whose names are Maria F., Elizabeth F. (deceased), Abraham F., Isaac F., Mary Ann, Fenton C., Christian F., Jacob Webster, and Emma F.

OLIVER BOVARD ROBERTSON.

Mr. Robertson was born in South Huntingdon town- ship, Jan. 16, 1839. He was brought up on the farm and elsewhere until eighteen years of age, and in youth attended school in the "Old Gate School- House," but had no particular affection for his teachers, and was a truant boy who loved to roam the hills, generally alone, and does not regret that he was a romp and escaped often as he did from what was to him a prison-house, that old school-house. From seven years of age on he often accompanied his father when going about the country engaged in the stock business, and thus his school-days were interrupted, and he was unable to keep along steadily with his classes, and was consequently discouraged. To this. fact Mr. Robertson attributes in a measure his early desire for playing truant, which grew upon him, and he was only occasionally in the school-house up to eighteen years of age, when he " graduated" himself

under a chestnut-tree on Painter's Hill, and started off (running away) to see honors in a higher school, that of the business world. He first hired out to a farmer, his uncle, Andrew Robertson, then an old bachelor, and proceeded to do the first real work he had then ever done. He found the plow and the hoe and the cattle and team-horses more congenial to his tastes than the teachers and the "picture-books" (geographies, etc.), which they understood little and he less.

But his first bliss was short-lived. An old maid kept house for his uncle ; he "did not like her much," and one night when his uncle was off courting, and Oliver was away a little late, she locked him out. The night was too cold to allow him to sleep comfort- ably in the oat-straw in a barn, and so he danced most of the night to keep warm. He "graduated" from this school the next morning, leaving his uncle's house, and "took a contract" for rooting up bushes for Col. Painter, of Hempfield township. for ten dol- lars; but a day's work demonstrated to him that his education there would cost him at least a hundred dol- lars, and he "graduated" thence the next day; but finally his uncle sought him and apprised him that the old maid would stay with him only a month, after which time the uncle married, and O. B. went to live with him, and remained with him two years and four months, doing good service as a farmer. He then went to work hauling coal for Painter's salt-works for ten dollars a month and personal board and horse- feed. He then felt rich, "and was, too." Three months at this business made him rich enough, and he then went to learn barn-building of one Jacob Pore, of his township, and stayed with him a year at seven dollars a month, "board and horse fed," and then took Pore into partnership for a year, and next year went to contracting alone in house-building and hired Pore. Pore worked a month, and O. B. not being suited with him "turned him off," and Pore " went to farming and peeling willows." O. B. and he " are now and always have been the best of friends."

About this time the Rebellion had come along, and was proceeding pretty briskly, when O. B. enlisted in the State service for three months in a cavalry regi- ment, furnishing his own horse, whiskey, and chickens. He "graduated" at this business at the end of the term, bearing off honors as a soldier, and the affection of his comrades as a good fellow more given to fun than blood.

He returned to contracting in house-building for a year, and feeling that his country could not get along without his services in the field, exchanged the chisel and plane for a gun and bayonet, and started off with Company G, One Hundred and Third Regiment Penn- sylvania Volunteer Infantry, down into South Caro- lina, where he had plenty of fun and whiskey and no fighting, except for rations (the war closing up soon after he got into the field). Nearly all the regiment took sick of fever and ague in the South. Some died

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on the way home. O. B. was left in South Carolina in charge of the sick, and remained there with them a few days, and then brought them to Harrisburg; and soon after the regiment was mustered out, and O. B. " graduated" forever as a soldier. He returned to his native hills, and went to house-building again.

In 1866 he bought a farm and went to tilling it; found the farm lonesome, and in a month hired help, put them in charge of the farm, and went himself to contracting, "graduating" then from personal farm- ing. His farm ran on in charge of his men for four years, at the end of which he sold it, making " a good thing of it." Meanwhile he prosecuted house-build- ing, how successfully is nobody's business. After sell- ing his farm he rented another for two years, and put his family and stock on it, and continued building, too. At the end of the two years he sold his stock, but kept his family and two teams of horses and a spotted coach dog (" a good one, which he bought for ten cents when he was a puppy"), and moved into the ancient locality of Fountain Mills, then a deso- late place, containing a grist-mill and a couple of little houses, now the flourishing borough of Scott- dale. A rolling-mill and a blast-furnace were at that time in process of building within the limits of the present Scottdale, and tenant-house-builders were in requisition. O. B. contracted, and continued to contract till the spring of 1881, when he " gradu- ated" at contracting in house-building, saving to himself for his labor four good tenant-houses and his private residence, with sundry lots paid for to put more houses on, and a drug-store, a dry-goods store, and other unmentionable properties, to say nothing of the best team of bay draught-horses in town. In 1881, feeling inclined to take a rest, he went into the butchering business, thinking he could thereby easily be of great service to his fellow-citizens; but he finds it the hardest business he ever worked at, both for his back and his pantaloons, which are constantly torn in their legs, and he is "right in that business now," and does not know whether he will quit it or not before he gets all his money scattered out. When that times comes he proposes to quit and go to col- lecting.

O. B. was one of the primeval fathers of the borough of Scottdale, helping to organize the same. He was street commissioner the first year, but the people complained of mud in wet weather and dust in dry, and at the end of the year he ceased to be a candidate for further honors in that line. He was for one term a member of the Common Council, but next year sought retirement, and found it in the will of the people. The next year he was not made a burgess, though his fellow-citizens "ran" him for the office which that character is supposed to "fill" in boroughs, some of them forgetting, however, to go to the polls and vote for him; they even voted for another, who bore the honors of the office, to the relief of the grateful O. B.

O. B. is in politics.a Democrat, and always has been, being the only one of his family of that faith. In religion he is a Presbyterian, and an elder of the church. In this matter he agrees with his family.

When the church was organized in Scottdale, in 1874, there were but fifteen organizing members, about evenly divided as to sex. He was at the time of the organization of the church elected elder, and held the office for three years, as well as that of trustee, secretary, and treasurer of the church, and was never charged with defalcation or other peculiar misde- meanors in his church life.

In 1863, just before going to the tented field, it occurred to O. B. that he better bring a five years' courtship to a close, and he married Miss Mary A. Mitchell, then a full orphan, a daughter of the late James and Margaret Martin Mitchell, of South Huntingdon township. She died in 1873, leaving three children, -Harry Ross, Nettie Bell, and Hazel James,-all now living, Nettie being the wife of Dr. B. R. Mitchell, whom she married at the age of fourteen. Harry is a graduate of the School of Pharmacy, at Pittsburgh, and is in the drug and med- icine business in Scottdale. Hazel is going to school, and though but twelve years old enjoys sharing with his retired father the burdens of cattle-driving for Pittsburgh, riding his Texan pony, which he would not part with for all Scottdale.

In 1876, Mr. Robertson married Miss Anna Linda Livingstone, of Allegheny County. By her he has had two children, one of whom, John, is living. O. B., who never allows anything to bother him, consid- ered himself always happy in matrimonial relations, and is apparently destined to enjoy a lengthened old age after he arrives at it.

We must not forget to note here for the integ- rity of history that Mr. O. B. Robertson is probably of Scotch, but perhaps of English, descent. His grandfather, who used to keep a hotel on his farm of about eight hundred acres in South Huntingdon township, and was familiarly known as "Old Johnny Robertson," came into Westmoreland County from east of the mountains, and, so far as known, brought no record of his ancestry with him, if he had any. He married a Miss Joanna Jack for his first wife, and by her had seven children. She dying he married a Miss Nichols. Losing the latter he married a third, a Miss Harriet Jewett, of Ohio. She is now living in Pittsburgh, and after the death of Mr. Robertson, which occurred about 1852, she married again. The children of Mr. John Robertson by his first wife were named .John (deceased), Andrew, Joseph, William, Thomas (deceased), Sarah (deceased), and Eleanor (deceased).

O. B. Robertson is the son of Joseph Robertson, who is the only one of the sons of John Robertson who has been the father of male children. His mother, who died about 1858, was a Miss Isabella Bovard before her marriage, a daughter of Oliver

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Bovard, of South Huntingdon township. Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Robertson were the parents of eight children who grew to manhood and womanhood, and six of whom are living,-Joanna J .; O. B .; John; Eleanor (deceased) ; Margaret (deceased) ; Thomas; Andrew, and Isabella.

DR. NICHOLAS L. K. KLINE.

Dr. Nicholas L. K. Kline, surgeon dentist of Scott- dale, is a son of the late John Kline, of Penn town- ship, and was born Nov. 1, 1836, and is of German descent. A record of his ancestry in this country for several generations may be found in the interesting biographical sketch of W. J. K. Kline, M.D., in the Greensburg chapter of biographies in this volume.

Dr. Kline was brought up on the homestead farm, and was educated in the common schools, and at the age of eighteen years made a trip at coal-boating from Pittsburgh to New Orleans, after which he en- tered Leechburg Academy, in Armstrong County, which institution he attended in summer sessions. In the winter he taught school in his native town- ship, commencing his career as a school-teacher in 1857. He followed school-teaching for four years. In 1861-62, Dr. Kline was occupied in the oil regions in Venango County, Pa., in company with his brother, now Dr. Kline, of Greensburg, operating in oil. Re- turning from the oil regions he went to the study of dentistry in the office of the late Dr. A. E. Fisher, of Greensburg, where he remained for about two years, and then located at Irwin Station for the practice of his profession. When the doctor settled at Irwin it contained only ten houses, but the enterprise of the doctor and others so improved it that in a few years it was incorporated as a borough, the doctor being one of the incorporators. In 1867 he, in company with his brother Amos, established there a drug-store, which, together with his dental business, he con- ducted for some years. Finally he sold his interest in the drug-store, and after remaining a year longer at Irwin moved to Scottdale, August, 1873, where he still resides, practicing dentistry, and enjoying a good practice. He is devoted to his profession, and con- scientious in his work as well as skillful. Those once employing him remain his friends, and re-employ him on occasion. As an evidence of his sedulous industry it may be mentioned that he has without assistance manufactured over three thousand sets of teeth aside from all his other professional work. When he set- tled at Scottdale that now flourishing borough was a new place, almost as fresh and youthful in appearance as a Western city on the prairie when just staked out and boasting only the cabins of the first wagon-load of "colonists." Scottdale at that time had but five dwelling-houses. The building of the rolling-mill had just commenced. Dr. Kline was one of the in- corporators of the borough, and soon after its incor- poration was elected the first justice of the peace of

the place. He served as such for five years and two months. He has always taken an interest in the im- provement of the borough, and has been one of the Council. Dr. Kline is a member and elder of the Reformed Church, and was one of the eleven found- ers of the church in Scottdale, and together with his wife, who for about seven years prior to the present has been the organist thereof, has taken an active in- terest in its growth and maintenance.

Jan. 17, 1865, Dr. Kline married Miss Elizabeth Boice, of Greensburg, whose maternal great-grand- father, Richard Hardin, was an Englishman by birth, but a soldier on the side of the colonies in the Revolutionary war. Her grandfather, also : Richard Hardin, was a soldier in the war of 1812. Mr. and Mrs. Boice were the parents of nine children. Mr. Boice died in 1843 at the age of thirty-six years. Some years after his death his widow married Mr. Joseph Walter, of Greensburg, who is now dead. Mrs. Walter is living in Greensburg, and is seventy years of age.

JOHN STERRETT, ESQ.

Mr. John Sterrett, a venerable bachelor, well-to-do farmer, and highly respected and intelligent citi- zen and native of East Huntingdon township, is of Scotch-Irish extraction. His grandfather Sterrett came to America from the north of Ireland, 1760, and settled on a farm about seven miles distant from the battle-field of Brandywine, in Chester County, Pa. Two of his oldest children, James and John, participated in that battle. In Chester County he reared to maturity a family of four sons and three daughters, and about 1786 he with his wife and chi !- dren started out for Kentucky to join Daniel Boone, but reaching the place now called Mount Pleasant, in Westmoreland County, on the day before Christ- mas, they found themselves snow-bound, the snow being three feet deep. Compelled to tarry till spring, they finally made permanent residence in Westmore- land County, settling on a tract of land of three hun- dred and fifty-five acres, with an allowance of six per cent. for roads, etc., thrown in, and which was bought of Isaac Meason. The present farm of John Sterrett belonged to this tract. Upon this land the boys put up (at a point only a few rods in front of where Mr. Sterrett's house now stands) a good log cabin, which the family occupied for some time. The third son in number was Moses, the father of our John Sterrett. He married Margaret Woodrow, daughter of John Woodrow, a farmer, and a de- scendant of Puritan stock. John and Margaret Sterrett had eight children,-Polly, who married John Smith, and moved to Mount Vernon, Ohio, where she died Jan. 9, 1879; James, deceased; John ; Elizabeth ; Moses, now residing in Springfield, Fay- ette Co., Pa .; William, who died young; Samuel, died aged about twenty-one; and Jesse, who died at

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History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 166

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor Publication date: Publisher: Number of Pages:

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages: