USA > Pennsylvania > Crawford County > Our country and its people. A historical and memorial record of Crawford County, Pennsylvania. > Part 79
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partnership with E. L. Mitchell and in 1872 they removed to Olathe, Kansas, constructed a track and commenced training on a large scale. In 1877 Mr. Marvin went to California and soon afterward became superintendent of the celebrated Palo Alto farm at Menlo Park, California, owned by Senator Leland Stanford.
After leaving California Mr. Marvin came to Pennsylvania, having charge of the racing stock of the Prospect Hill stock farm at Franklin, owned by Miller & Sibley, and established huis residence at Meadville in 1892. His home on Chestnut street is one of the handsomest in the city. Colonel H. S. Russell, a prominent horseman, wrote of Mr. Marvin: "If the trotting inter- ests of the country had been piloted by such men as he there would have been more honest owners in the field to-day, and the better part of our citizens would be ready to encourage, rather than suspect, the motives which prompt capital to invest in a pastime which unfortunately has been shamefully abused." Mr. Marvin is the author of a book, "Training the Trotting Horse," which became a standard text-book among horsemen. Mr. Marvin is a modest man, and it was only after repeated urging from his friends of the trotting horse that he consented to place in readable form the result of his life-long study and observation. He is recognized as the greatest of horse trainers and has been referred to as "the genius of his profession."
In the year following to that which we have referred Mr. Marvin com- menced one of the most remarkable records known in the whole history of the track. The following "world's records" up to that time were won: A yearling, Bell Bird, made a record of 2:261; Arion, when two years old, went in 2:102: Sunol, when three years, got a record of 2:101; Sunol, when four years, received the same figures, 2:103 : Palo Alto on age went in 2:083 ; Extasy produced, in 1898, a record of 2:103. These were all at that time "world's records," which must be regarded as remarkable for one man to make. Mr. Marvin has held the "world's records" thirty-six times. Mr. Doble, the next in such records, has held them eleven times.
There is no doubt that Mr. Marvin has a knowledge of the horse un- equaled. He has that equable temper of mind that keeps him from rashness. He loves his great racers and teaches them as though they were human. As a consequence he gets everything from his horses which they are capable of doing. He is undoubtedly the ablest in his profession of this generation.
Mr. Marvin was married at Kansas City December 5, 1873, to Miss Fanny Martin of Osawatomie, Kansas. Mr. and Mrs. Marvin are the par- ents of three children : Howard, Jessie, and Charles, Jr.
Jacob Schwarts, proprietor of the Central Avenue Hotel, Titusville, was born in Germany in 1846, a son of Adam and Catharine ( Hessler ) Schwartz, who first located in Buffalo after coming to this country, The former died
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in Titusville, December, 1897, at the age of seventy-seven years. Mr. Schwartz located in Titusville in 1867 and was employed in a brewery until 1887, when he purchased the Central Avenue Hotel, which he still con- tinues to conduct.
Mr. Schwartz is the oldest of a family of five children, three of whom are living, as follows: Jacob; Charles, of Warren, Pennsylvania; and Fritz, in New York. He was first married in 1874 to Anna Linter, who died in 1892. Their children are John, Lottie, Ella, Aleen, and George. His second marriage was in 1895, when he wedded Bertha Wege of Pleasantville, and they have two children,-Harold and Edward.
Mr. Schwartz is a member of the K. of P. and D. O. H.
George Lovell Cary, president of the Unitarian Theological School at Meadville, was born in Medway, Massachusetts, on May 10, 1830. He re- ceived a common and high school education in Medway, and fitted for college at the Williston Seminary, East Hampton, Massachusetts, and the Leicester Academy at Leicester, that state. In 1848 he entered Harvard University, where he was graduated in 1852.
In order to secure a needed respite from study he engaged thereafter in manufacturing and mercantile pursuits until 1856, during a part of which year he resided in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In the autumn of this year he was appointed acting professor of Greek in Antioch College. Upon the reorgani- zation of the faculty, in 1857, he was appointed professor of Greek and Latin. He held this position until 1862, when he received an appointment to the chair of New Testament literature in the Meadville Theological School, with which institution he has ever since been connected. Upon the death of Dr. Livermore, in 1890, he was made president of the Theological School, which position he still holds. He is the author of "An Introduction to the Greek of the New Testament," published in 1879, and also of a work on "The Synoptic Gospels," soon to be published.
President Cary was married March 12, 1854, to Mary Isabella Harding of Springfield, Massachusetts.
John Joyce Carter, the son of John and Cecelia (Joyce) Carter, was born in the city of Westport, Ireland, June 16, 1842. The paternal great- grandfather, the grandfather, the father and the subject of this sketch-four generations-were each named John Carter. The Carters, on the one side, and the Joyces, on the other, were both ancient Irish families, and in the union the blood of Clan Carty and that of the Joyces of Connamara mingle and pass through the veins of John J. Carter of to-day. The lineage on both sides was of grand old Irish stock.
The father of the subject of this sketch was a merchant in the city of
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Westport during many years of its prosperity, when the merchantmen from many lands visited and frequented the western shores of Ireland, and Clewbay in particular, to exchange their wares for the woolens, linens and laces of Irish handicraft; and from the trade in these exchanges he secured what in those days was a good competence for himself and family, so that he was accounted a wealthy man.
But when fortune was smiling upon him, in the happiest days of his life, death took from him his beloved wife, leaving to liis care two children,-a daughter approaching womanhood, and the infant, John J., then eighteen monthis old, the sad misfortune to be followed about a year and a half later by a bereavement, like a tragedy, of the surviving parent. To John J. Carter memory does not recall even the face of his father. The yearning all his life to remember the slightest trace of a mother's loving embrace, or a father's blessing, has passed unsatisfied! He has grown from childhood to youth, to middle life and to the beginning of declining years; he has slept on the tented field, made long and weary marches, bivouacked many nights under the open sky and charged upon the cannon's mouth ; he has returned in triumpli, loaded with honors, after years of military service under his country's flag; he has toiled early and late in amassing a fortune, and his efforts in acquiring wealth have been crowned with success; the little boy tripping his way alone in a areless world, buffeting many obstacles, has grown to strong manhood and become a power in society; but the longing of his heart to awaken recollec- tion of his mother's face and gentle voice, though unavailing, has never ceased.
After his mother's death a grand-aunt, with excellent management, took charge of his father's household and with fidelity cared for the children. In the mighty struggle for Catholic emancipation, led by Daniel O'Connell, his father was one of the strongest supporters of that patriot; but in the midst of the rejoicing over O'Connell's final victory his father met with an accident which proved fatal. After his death the little boy John and his sister were removed to the home of their maternal grandfather, where they remained until the sister's marriage, in the winter of 1845. The father left a compe- tence for his children. The marriage contract provided for an early depart- ure of the young couple to America. The sister undertook the care of her little brother, as the three-herself, husband, and young John J .- started for the United States. They landed in New York in the early spring of 1846, then went to Troy Center, New York, where they lived for some time, and in that city was the dawn of Mr. Carter's recollections. The next home was in Buffalo, that state, some time in 1848. From Buffalo they moved to Cleveland, Ohio, and from that city to Portageville, Wyoming county, New York, arriving there in the summer of 1850. Soon afterward the sister's husband died, a sad loss to the two remaining ones.
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Soon after her husband's death the sister placed her young brother under the charge of Rev. John Sheridan of Portageville, who took upon himself the responsibility of his education. Concerning this honie Mr. Carter has many pleasing recollections. Here his mind began to expand and life opened to him amid agreeable associations. The relations lasted only one year, when the lad was placed under the care of a younger man, Rev. Dollan. Mr. Carter thinks the change was not fortunate, however good the intention which prompted it. Some of the experiences, however, under Rev. Dollan are pleas- ant to remember. He was put into school at Buffalo, where he had good instruction. He was thoroughly drilled in the Latin language, and he still retains the benefit of that training. After returning from Buffalo he soon left the charge of Mr. Dollan and started out to make his way alone, without any definite plans as to his future course.
But a good Providence continued to guide him. He found a home with worthy and kind-hearted people at Caseville, Allegany county, New York, where he spent some of the happiest years of his life, going to school winters and performing such work as his young hands permitted.
In the summer of 1854 Cyrus Rose of Livingston county, New York, became interested in young Carter and made him a member of his family, treating him with marked kindness. In the winter of 1854 Carter entered the Nunda Literary Institute, one of the old academies of the state of New York. In 1855 he entered upon a full classical course of study. He acknowl- edges his indebtedness to A. Judson Barrett, principal of the academy, but later a distinguished clergyman at Rochester, New York. He was there four years, and shortly before the completion of his course the buildings of the institute burned. Afterward Asher E. Evans, A. M., continued the school at Holm's Hill, where Carter continued his studies in Greek, Latin and math- ematics for more than a year. To Mr. Evans, also, as a thorough and faithful instructor, Mr. Carter acknowledges his obligation.
While attending school in the winter of 1859-60, the congressman of the district gave out notice that a vacancy in the district existed at West Point, and that he would name as cadet the young man who should stand highest in a competitive examination for the place. Young Carter entered the competition, and easily won the highest marking ; but he did not get the ap- pointment. A long delay followed in naming the cadet, and when the ap- pointment was finally made, it was suggested. if agreeable. Annapolis might be had: but, as favoritism had deprived him of what he had fairly won, he dismissed the subject.
Young Carter then fitted himself for college. He walked all the way to Rochester from Nunda, was examined and admitted to the freshman class of Rochester University : but he found that he had barely enough money to pay his tuition one year in the university, and so he concluded it would be better
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to return home and earn more money before beginning the university course. Accordingly he walked back to Nunda, so as to save every cent, and found on his return $45 in his pocket. He kept on studying, working and saving. teaching school in the winter following, and in the spring his stock of money had risen to $200. Intending to enter the sophomore class at Rochester in the next September, he continued to stay at the academy, when the attack on Sumter fired his young heart and the name of John J. Carter was the first in Nunda and in the rest of Livingston county to be placed on the enlistment roll of volunteers for the service of supporting the government in upholding its authority throughout the Union. The date of his enlistment was April 12, 1861, while he was eighteen years of age. This is important, as well as true, history. When he came out of the service he was only a little over twenty- three years of age, but he had served throughout the war. He was mustered out August 2. 1865, when not a hostile gun was left aiming at the national government, and months after Lee's surrender at Appomattox. His record from first to last was an unbroken line of bravery. The limits of this sketch do not permit a recital of the many fields of battle on which he risked his life. He entered the service as a private at the age of eighteen, and he came out over four years and three months later with a lieutenant-colonel's commission.
Immediately after the war Mr. Carter located in Titusville, engaging in mercantile business. (His oil history appears elsewhere on these pages.) He has had several years' experience as a railroad president and manager.
He is a Fellow of the Geographical Society of the United States; a companion of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States; a member of the Grand Army of the Republic, and a member of the Medal of Honor Association of the United States. He is president of the board of school controllers of the city of Titusville.
In July, 1866, he was married to Miss Emma, daughter of F. H. and Sarah Gibbs, of Nunda, New York. Four children live to bless the union : Charles Gibbs, Luke B., Emma and Alice Carter. Charles is a successful lawyer, practicing in the city of Pittsburg ; Luke is a student in Yale College, and Emma and Alice are in the preparatory school of Wellesley College, in Massachusetts.
The life of Colonel Carter has been full of usefulness. He is still in his prime. He is one of the ten subscribers who gave each $10,000 to the Industrial Fund, is a large stockholder of the Titusville Iron Company and one of its directors and managers ; and he is also a director of the Titusville Commercial Bank.
T. D. Kepler, proprietor of the Kepler Hotel at Meadville, was born in Woodcock township, this county, December 10, 1865. He is a son of Samuel W. and Martha C. (Strouss) Kepler. The former was a prominent hotel
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proprietor, and died March 15, 1891, at the age of seventy years. Samuel WV. Kepler was a son of Jacob and Margaret A. ( Peiffer) Kepler. The for- mer was a native of Maryland, and located in Le Bœuf township, Erie county, Pennsylvania, in 1798: the latter is a native of Pennsylvania. Jacob began his business career in 1817, in Woodcock, this county, conducting a hotel there for twenty-one years, at the same time keeping the postoffice. He reared a family of thirteen children. In 1843 he abandoned the hotel business and removed to a farm in Hayfield township, this county, where he remained for some twenty-six years, and then came to Venango and opened a tavern. Much of his time was occupied in the manufacture of domestic wines. He served through the war of 1812. He died in 1877, in his eighty-fourth year. Samuel Kepler was twice married, the first time to Christine Sherred. Their issue was five children: Pharus D .. Peter S., E. Cassius, Frank P. and Thomas. The second marriage was to Martha C., daughter of Major Reu- ben Strouss, of Saegerstown, this county. She still survives, and resides with her son, T. D., subject of this sketch. To this union were born ten children, five of whom are living-Edgar, Tracy (subject), Anna, Mattie and Fred- erick.
Mr. T. D. Kepler first began business by opening a hotel at Mckean Corners, Erie county ; after two years he removed to Venango, this county, where he kept hotel till 1860. The following five years he spent in Titusville, this county, in the same line of business, and then for three years engaged in farming in Woodcock township, this county. 1
In 1868, Mr. Kepler took charge of the Eagle Hotel, which he kept until 1872, then the Cullum House, which he kept for seven years, and in 1879 opened the Kepler House, from which the present hotel takes its name. The new Kepler Hotel was erected and opened by its present proprietor in 1894. Our subject was married December 24,. 1888, to Minnie G., daughter of Richard Truran, of Meadville. To this union has been born one child : Clar- ence R. Kepler.
Ephraim Oakes, Randolph township .- Ephraim Oakes' grandfather, John Oakes, came into the county in 1815, accompanied by John Byham. Returning to their home at Worcester, Massachusetts, they brought their families the next year, Mr. Oakes settling on the Oil Creek road in Randolph township. His children are Abigail, wife of John Byham, John, Jr., Joel, Avery, Levi and Luther. Jolin, Jr., married Myra Spring, and their chil- dren are: Jane, wife of Nelson Smith; Ephraim; Clarisa, wife of W. H. Braymer; John W .; Ellen, wife of Peter Bogardus; William; and Hannah, wife of Dana Smith. After the death of his wife Mr. Oakes married Mari- etta Daniels, their children being Ellison, Elitha, Perry and Mary, wife of Edward Hatch. Ephraim was born March 17, 1835, in Randolph township,
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has been married twice, his first wife being Amanda, daughter of Austin and Nancy Clark, and his second, Sarah, daughter of John and Mary Allen, of Wayne. There is but one surviving child, Ancie, a daughter by the second wife.
Mr. Oakes has a fine farm of sixty-five acres. John W., his brother, was a soldier in the Civil war.
George WV. Barr, M. D., the son of Charles W. and Almira ( Blindberry ) Barr, was born at Sherburne, New York, December 16, 1832. He was a grandson of Aaron, the son of Hugh Barr, of Boston. His mother, a native of Dutchess county, New York, and of Knickerbocker extraction. The med- ical history of Dr. Barr, embracing his services as military surgeon in the Civil war, is given elsewhere in this work. It is proper, however, to remark that Dr. Barr may be called the father of the Titusville board of health. As the medical director of the board, he has given years of close attention to its work. The importance of that institution can hardly be overrated. Its proper regulations, to insure useful results, require faithful execution. As a citizen Dr. Barr takes a lively interest in all matters affecting the good of the community. He has accomplished a great deal for the city library, and is president of the Library Association. He owns a good deal of property in the city, and is a large taxpayer. As a member of the medical profession he stands high in the state. He has had a large practice in Titusville for a generation.
He married, first, August 8, 1858, Miss Lavinia, oldest daughter of Colonel Ira Ayer, of Evans, New York, who died in 1868, leaving one daughter, born October 6, 1859. The second time, he married Mrs. Lovina Hanford Cooper, of Gowanda, New York, and they have one daughter, Eva, born January 31, 1877, in Titusville. Miss Iris Barr has taught several years in the city schools. She has been principal of one of the ward schools, and she is now one of the teachers in the Titusville high school.
Uri C. Welton was born in Burton, Geauga county, Ohio. His father died at the age of forty-nine years, leaving eight children, six sons and two daughters, Uri C. being the fifth, then seven years old. He worked on the farm in the summer and attended school in the winter. At the age of fifteen he attended school for three terms at Hiram, Ohio (now Hiram College), being a pupil of James A. Garfield, afterward president of the United States. After his third term of school, he hired out to work in a general store, for fifty dollars a year at Chardon, Ohio. The following year he returned to the farm and remained there until fall. During that season he was married to Miss Miranda E. Bestor, of Chardon, who is a descendant of the Carltons who came over in the Mayflower. In October he took a trip up the lakes,
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stopping at Port Huron. Michigan, and while there he purchased both a wholesale and retail store and the business of both, including the stock of both, at Fort Gratiot, one and one-half miles above Port Huron, at the mouth of St. Clair river. He was there three years, doing a large and prosperous business. But impaired health, following fever and ague, compelled him to leave that climate.
Having -old out his business. he came to the oil region, settling in Titus- ville, in June. 1865. where he has since continued to reside. During this ti ne he las served sever 1 years in the city council. He carried on the oil refining business at Bull Run from 1865 to 1869. when oil was handled in barrel -. He has since been engaged in producing oil, and has also an ex- tensive luml er business in other localities, besides owning a large farm. which He carries on. together with the brown stone business, having a valuable quarry of brown stone, of which he supplies the trade.
He has two sons. W. R. Wolton, aged thirty-one, and U. C. Welton. Jr., aged twenty-one. The two young men are prominent producers in the Indiana oil Geld. Mr. Welton has been in active business since he left school at the age of seventeen.
The family to which the subject of this sketch belongs, traces its ancestry to John Welton and his wife nee Mary Upson, who came from England about the year 1667 and settled at Waterbury. Connecticut. Following in descent there were John. Thomas and Reuben Welton. Johnson F. Welton in 1794 married, at Waterbury. Connecticut, Susan Bronson. Lewis, the son of Johnson F .. was the father of Uri C. Welton. the subject of this sketch. In 1824 Johnson F. Welton and his family moved from Waterbury, settling at Burton, Olio, and died in 1844. at the age of seventy, leaving a large estate to his wife and nine children. The names of the children were Fred- erick, Isaac, Lewis. Reuben, Sarah, Maria. Emeline, Marcia and Minarcia, the last two being twins. The wife and mother of these nine children died in 1870, at the rige of one hundred and two years and three months. Lewis Welton, one of the sons of Johnson F., married Polly M. Hickox, of Newburg, Ohio, daughter of Uri Hickox, who settled in Newburg in 1810, then a wil- derness, with plenty of Indians for daily callers. Lewis purchased a farm partly cleared. in the east part of Burton, and settled upon it, finishing the clearing up and reducing it to an arable condition.
Willis B. Benedict was born in the village of Enterprise, Southwest town- ship. Warren county, Pennsylvania, February 19. 1838. He belongs to an ancient English family. the first emigrant of which from England. Thomas Benedict. settled in Massachusetts Bay in 1838, afterward removing to Con- hecticut. He died at Norwalk in 1690, where many of his descendants now live. The great-grandfather of the subject of this sketch, Thomas Benedict,
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was an active soldier in the war of the Revolution, afterward receiving a pen- sion, as was also James Spencer, his maternal great-grandfather. The grand- father of Willis, J. Benedict, soon after his arrival in Warren county, formed a partnership with his brother-in-law, Selden Spencer, for the purpose of manufacturing lumber. They purchased large tracts of land covered with pine timber, built mills on Pine creek at and near Enterprise, and operated there several years. Selden Spencer Benedict, his son, married Mary H., daughter of Dr. John Heffron, of Erieville, Madison county, New York. Dr. Heffron was a graduate of Dartmouth College, and a surgeon in the war of 1812. The children of this union were Willis B., the oldest ; Eugenia, wife of W. J. Booth, now residents of Titusville ; Francis Wayland, who died Novem- ber 22, 1865, aged twenty-two years; M. Laverne, wife of the late Dr. John Chick, the widow now a resident of Titusville, besides a son, next after Way- lind, who died in infancy.
Willis B. attended the district schools at Enterprise, the Waterford Academy, Erie county, and Duff's Commercial College, at Pittsburg, Pennsyl- vania. He began early the production of oil, and he was badly burned in the explosion at Rouseville, which killed Henry R. Rouse, in April, 1861. He first opened oil production on Pine creek, east of East Titusville, and opened the Enterprise district in the summer of 1865, as elsewhere stated.
In 1862 he was elected treasurer of Warren county, and in 1880 was elected to the state legislature. In politics he is uniformly a Republican. Though practically belonging nearly all his life to Titusville, he continued, until a few years ago, to keep his home at Enterprise. He finally moved with his family to Titusville, where he has since resided, in an elegant home on East Main street. In 1896 he was elected mayor of Titusville, and he is still the incumbent of that office. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and he has long been a generous supporter of the church, both here and at Enterprise. His blood is warm, his charities have been constant all his life- time, and he shares in many public enterprises. In a word, Willis B. Bene- diet is a popular citizen. He is director of the Titusville Board of Trade.
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