Mr. Thallemer was born at Mishawaka, November 25, 1884, son of Aloysius and Elizabeth (Leyes) Thallemer. His father was a native of Baden, Germany, and was fifteen years of age when he came to America and located at Mishawaka. He became an expert painter, and in after years carried on a successful contracting business as a painter and decorator. He died in 1905. His wife, who was born in Brooklyn, New York, passed away in 1926. There were three sons: Herman of South Bend; Joseph M., and William, of Mishawaka.
Joseph M. Thallemer was educated in the Saint Joseph's parochial schools in Mishawaka and has had an active experience in the undertaking business for a quarter of a century. He graduated from the Askins Embalming and Training School of Indianapolis. Mr. Thallemer conducted undertaking parlors at Mishawaka from 1909 to 1919. He then sold out his business and during the next seven years traveled an extensive territory in Michigan and Indiana, representing an undertaking supply manufacturing company. In 1926 he left the road and resumed his business at Mishawaka, establishing the Thallemer Funeral Home, a mortuary on which he has spared no expense, pains or detail to make a perfect medium of service.
Mr. Thallemer married, January 26, 1915, Miss Mabel C. Titus. She was born in Kosciusko County, Indiana, daughter of the late Cornelius Titus. Her mother, Mrs. Mary Titus, lives in Mishawaka. Mr. Thallemer is a member of the Knights of Columbus, the Fellowship Club and Saint Joseph's Catholic Church.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
EARL CALVIN HOLLIS is a World war veteran and in business circles of South Bend is the senior partner of Hollis & Haverstock, undertakers and funeral directors, located at 2528 Mishawaka Avenue.
Mr. Hollis was born near English in Crawford County, Indiana, April 6, 1895. His parents, Calvin and Maude (Williams) Hollis, were also born in Crawford County, where their respective parents were early settlers. Earl C. Hollis attended the grade and high schools of his native county and was a young man of twenty-two when America entered the World war. He enlisted, was assigned duty in the Medical Corps, and was with the Forty-second or famous Rainbow Division. While overseas he participated in the activities of this division at Chateau Thierry, St. Mihiel and the Meuse Argonne, and the day before the armistice, on November 10,1918, he was gassed while in the Argonne.
After returning home, Mr. Hollis turned his earnest attention to the profession of embalmer and undertaker. In the spring of 1921 he was graduated from the Chicago College of Embalming and during the remainder of that year remained in Chicago employed by an undertaking firm. He was then located at Benton Harbor, Michigan, for a time, and from 1922 to 1924 was associated with Mr. A. M. Russell in an undertaking establishment at South Bend. In 1924 he and Mr. Osborne Haverstock established the business of Hollis & Haverstock. They own the fine funeral home on Mishawaka Avenue, located in the attractive River Park section of South Bend.
Mr. Hollis has shown the qualities of a public spirited citizen since coming to South Bend and is president of the River Park Civic Club and a member of the River Park Business Men's Association. He has affiliations with his war comrades in the American Legion, belongs to the Masonic fraternity and Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the United Brethren Church. His favorite pastime is the game of golf. Mr. Hollis married Miss Eva Mae Underwood. She was born at Madison, Jefferson County, Indiana, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Calvin Underwood. They have one child, Betty Dolores, born at South Bend, February 24, 1924.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
NICHOLAS KRULL, who was born in Hanover, Germany, February 4,1876, came to Indiana from Chicago and has for a number of years been one of the substantial business men and citizens of Kentland, Newton County.
Mr. Krull's parents, Nicholas and Tekla (Miners) Krull, spent all their lives in Germany. His father was not only a farmer but also a dealer in farm machinery and implements. The family comprised seven children: Rudolph, who still lives in Germany; Hammond V., who came to America and completed his studies for the Catholic priesthood and is now a priest at Ottawa, Ohio; Henry, in Germany; Francis, also a Catholic priest, located at Stephens, Ohio; William, in Germany; Gesenia, deceased; and Nicholas.
Nicholas Krull acquired the education of the common schools in Germany and was a boy of fifteen when, in 1891, he came to America. For three years he lived at Dayton, Ohio, where he served his apprenticeship as a baker. Then, following a year of work at his trade in Chicago he came to Rensselaer, Jasper County, Indiana, and in 1903 moved to Kentland, where he worked at his trade and engaged in business for himself, conducting a bakery and café. He has been in business there for over a quarter of a century, and his patronage is a tribute to the quality of business service he has rendered, and also to his personal traits of genial character. Mr. Krull is a Republican, a member of the Catholic Church and is affiliated with the Knights of Columbus and Modern Woodsman of America.
He married, November 17, 1897, Miss Mary Josephine Ramp, daughter of Charles and Louise (Sommers) Ramp. To their marriage were born five children, two of whom are deceased. The son Nicholas P. graduated from Purdue University in 1923, is a district engineer with the Bell Telephone Company, at Elgin, Illinois, and married Dorothy Jackson. The son John attended Notre Dame University, and the daughter, Louise, was a student at Purdue University.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
ERLE LEROY HARDY, the meteorologist in charge of the United States Weather Bureau at Fort Wayne, has been reporting for the weather bureau for a number of years. He grew up in the Southwest, in New Mexico, and his first weather bureau service was rendered at Santa Fe. Mr. Hardy is a World war veteran.
He was born at Yankton, Yankton County, South Dakota, August 31, 1894, son of Glenn L. and Rhoda (Wright) Hardy. His father was born in Nebraska and his mother in England and is now deceased. Glenn L. Hardy is a retired railway engineer, living at Baxter Springs, Kansas.
Erle L. Hardy was the oldest of four children, one of whom is now deceased. He was a child when his parents moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he graduated from high school, and soon after leaving school he took up work in the Santa Fe office of the United States Weather Bureau. Later he attended the New Mexico Agricultural College. During the World war period, 1917-19 he answered the call to the colors and was overseas with the Twenty-ninth Engineers of the Second Division, engaged in special signal work. He received his honorable discharge April 4, 1919, and then resumed his connection with the weather bureau station at Santa Fe.
In 1923 he was transferred to the United States experimental station at Wagon Wheel Gap, Colorado, and had charge of the station from June, 1923, to October, 1926. During 1926 he was assigned special duty in making frost and weather observations all along the Pacific Coast and since May, 1927, has been in charge of the Fort Wayne station of the weather bureau.
Mr. Hardy in Fort Wayne, as elsewhere, has shown an attitude toward active participation in local community affairs. He is a member of the Chamber of Commerce and is in charge of its better garden division. He belongs to the American Legion.
Mr. Hardy married, February 4, 1917, Miss Maud L. Doughitt, who was born at Santa Fe, New Mexico, daughter of Mr. R. L. Doughitt. Her mother is deceased. Three children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Hardy, Lloyd Arnold, Julia, who died at the age of two months, and Erleyne Elvera.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
ORRIN M. CONLEY. During the long years that have marked the judicial history of Elkhart County its bar has been maintained at high standard, especially in Elkhart, the vital and attractive city that is its metropolis. Among those who at the present time are well upholding the prestige of the legal profession in the county is Orrin M. Conley, who is one of the veteran and honored members of the bar of the City of Elkhart and who has here been established in the practice of his profession more than forty years and whose business associate is his son Arthur H., the firm of Conley & Conley having its offices at 205 Haynes Building, and its business being of important and representative order, as its senior member has long held precedence as one of the able and influential members of the local bar. In 1930 he was elected judge of the Superior Court for Elkhart County and took office January1, 1931.
Greater interest attaches to the career of Orrin M. Conley by reason of his being a native of Elkhart County and a representative of one of the sterling pioneer families of this section of the state. He was born at Jamestown, this county, July 5, 1860, and is a son of George W. and Sarah A. (Towsley) Conley, both of whom were born and reared in Summit County, Ohio, where their marriage was solemnized at Akron, the birthplace of the bride. In 1856 George W. Conley established the family home at Jamestown, Elkhart County, Indiana, and in 1868 he thence removed to a farm in that immediate vicinity. There he remained, a substantial farmer and an. honored and influential citizen, until his death, at the age of seventy-six years, he having passed away March 25, 1908, and his widow having died in 1918, at the venerable age of eighty-three years. Of the nine children the subject of this review was the fourth in order of birth, and of the number four others likewise are living.
Orrin M. Conley found the greater part of his boyhood and early youth compassed by the influence and activities of the home farm, and the neighborhood district school afforded him his preliminary education. He profited fully by the advantages of the public schools, and at the age of seventeen years he became a teacher in one of the rural schools of his native township. He continued as one of the successful teachers in the schools of Elkhart County eight years, and in the meanwhile he attended Northern Indiana Normal College, the institution that later became the present Valparaiso University. In 1884 he became a student in the law department of that institution, .and in that and the following year he continued his law studies under the effective preceptorship of Capt. O. T. Chamberlain, who was then one of the representative members of the Elkhart bar. Mr. Conley was admitted to the Indiana bar in 1886, and during the long intervening years he has made the City of Elkhart the central stage of his loyal, earnest and successful activities as an attorney and counselor at law. His character and achievement mark him as one of the leading lawyers of his native county, where remain few others who have here been engaged in practice during even an approximately equal period of consecutive years. He has appeared in connection with much important litigation in the various courts of this part of Indiana and has ever stood exponent of the best type of professional ethics. From 1886 until 1893 he was junior member of the law firm of Hubble & Conley, and in the latter year he became senior principal in the law firm of Conley, Frank & Conley, which continued until 1913, the year that marked the inception of the present representative firm of Conley & Conley.
Mr. Conley has never deviated from the line of basic allegiance to the Democratic party, he served as city attorney of Elkhart during the period of 1922-26, and in the spring of 1930 he was made Democratic candidate for the office of judge of the Elkhart County Superior Court and, as before stated, was elected.
Mr. Conley has ever taken deep interest in all things touching the welfare of his native county and state and has been greatly influential in civic and political affairs in his home city. He is the owner of a fine farm of 200 acres in Cass County, Michigan, which lies adjacent to Elkhart County, Indiana, and there he has a private lake that offers excellent fishing facilities, besides constituting an attractive site for the summer home of the family. Mr. Conley enjoys hunting and fishing, but he has been devoted to the work of his profession and has had time for few definite vacations during the long years of his active law practice.
In the World war period Mr. Conley was a zealous worker in the local drives in support of Government war agencies and each of his three sons was in active military service in that climacteric period, one son having died in the service, as will be noted in a later paragraph.
In the year 1887 Mr. Conley was united in marriage to Miss Cora Estella Griffin, who was born at Adrian, Michigan, but reared at Elkhart, Indiana, she being a daughter of James M. Griffin, who was a gallant soldier of the Union in the Civil war and who received in this connection a medal of honor, he having long been in railway service thereafter and having met his death in a railroad wreck that occurred August 13, 1896. Mr. Conley was a grandson of Capt. William Conley, who held the office of captain of a company that took active part in the War of 1812. Mrs. Cora Estella Griffin, who is divorced from her husband, resides in Chicago. She was graduated in St. Mary's College at South Bend, Indiana, is a talented musician, and was formerly a successful and popular teacher of music. Of the children of this union the eldest is Harold Griffin Conley, who was born October 12, 1889, who was graduated in the University of Chicago and who is now a college professor, he having served in the United States Army in the World war period. James Raymond, the second son, was born August 20, 1891, and in his World war service he was stationed at Camp Taylor, Kentucky, when he succumbed to an attack of the prevailing influenza, his death having there occurred October 6, 1918. He was graduated in the law department of the University of Michigan and was junior member of the law firm of Conley & Conley, of Elkhart, when he entered World war service. He was the only lawyer from Elkhart County to die in World war service. He is survived by his widow and their one daughter, Ellen R., who was born August 6, 1918, two months prior to his death. Arthur H., youngest of the three sons, was born April 28, 1896, and he attended the University of New Mexico and the law department of historic Harvard University. After receiving honorable discharge service from his as a sailor in the World war period he succeeded his brother, James R., deceased, as the junior member of the father's law firm, and as a member of the law firm of Conley & Conley he is well upholding the honors of the family name, besides which he is serving as judge of the Municipal Court of Elkhart at the time of this writing, in 1930.
The second marriage of Orrin M. Conley was solemnized April 12, 1915, when Miss Bessie Pearl Willard became his wife. Mrs. Conley was born at Battle Creek, Michigan and was reared in Los Angeles, California. No children have been born of this union.
Mr. Conley is affiliated with the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and the Knights of Pythias, and the Congregational Church. Mr. Conley has marked literary talent and numerous fine poetical contributions have come from his pen.
Click here for photo.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
EMMETT VICTOR HARRIS. A member bar of the Fort Wayne since 1891, Emmett V. Harris, of the firm of Harris & Harris, has gained through individual effort and native talent an enviable position among the lawyers of the state. During his long and active career he has been identified with much important litigation that has come before the courts, and likewise has been an active leader of the Republican party, at one time having been its candidate for attorney-general of the state.
Mr. Harris was born in Seneca County, Ohio, May 8, 1860, and is a son of William L. and Amanda (Beigh) Harris. His paternal grandfather was Robert Harris, who was born in Ulster County, New York, a son James Harris, and a grandson of James Harris the elder, who was born in England and came to America at an early date, settling in New York State, where he spent the rest of his life in agricultural pursuits in Ulster County, and died on his farm in Plattekill Township, where burial was made. Robert Harris, the grandfather of Emmett V. Harris, was born in 1789, and was reared and educated in Ulster County, where he carried on farming in Plattekill Township until 1832, when he moved to Seneca County, Ohio. Later he went to Oklahoma, during the early exploitation of that territory, but eventually returned to Ohio, where he rounded out his life as a farmer and was buried in Seneca County, near the old homestead. Robert Harris married Miss Catherine Wygant, a granddaughter of W. L. Scott, who came from Scotland at an early day and settled in Ulster County, New York, where he followed the tilling of the soil during the remainder of his life.
William L. Harris, the father of Emmett V. Harris, was born in Ulster County, New York, November 19, 1827, and as a youth accompanied his parents to Ohio, where he met and married Amanda Beigh, who was born in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, in 1829. They became the parents of eight children, of whom four died in infancy. Two sons, now deceased, grew to manhood, and Emmett V. Harris and a sister, Mrs. Lillie B. Walker, of Portland, are the only children now living. During his early career William L. Harris adopted the educator's profession, which he followed for a period of seventeen years, but later turned his attention to farming and the manufacture of oil barrel staves, being thus engaged at the time of his death in Seneca County, Ohio, in 1902. Mrs. Harris, who died in 1881, was a consistent member of the United Brethren Church.
Emmett V. Harris was educated in the public schools of Seneca County, Ohio, and before he reached the age of twenty-one years was a teacher in the country schools and later in the village of Castalia, Erie County, Ohio. Thus it was that he earned his tuition fees for a course at the Ohio Northern University, at Ada, Ohio, from which he was duly graduated in 1887, with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. In that same year he removed to Morgan County, Indiana, where he was superintendent of the public schools for three years, in the meanwhile applying himself industriously to the study of law. In 1890 he was admitted to the Indiana bar, and immediately opened an office at Fort Wayne, where he has since built up and developed a large and .lucrative practice, including among his clients some the most important interests and individuals of the city and elsewhere. Mr. Harris was appointed by Judge Albert B. Andersen as referee in bankruptcy and has been the recipient of numerous other honors. A leading member of the Republican party, he served as chairman of the Republican county central committee and the Republican city committee, and during this time Fort Wayne and Allen County went Republican for the first time in the history of the state. In 1916 Mr. Harris was one of the candidates of his party for the office of attorney-general of Indiana, and was defeated in the nominating convention by only six votes. The family is affiliated with the Methodist Episcopal Church. Mr. Harris is a member of the Allen County Bar Association, and practices in the State and Federal Courts. H e has been successful in his profession and in the gaining and holding of friendships, and has the full confidence of the general public.
In August, 1887, Mr. Harris was united in marriage with Miss Laura B. Chalfant, who was born in Perry County, Ohio, a daughter of Samuel and Mary Chalfant, and to this union there have been born the following children: William L.; Zama V.; Howard E.; Edith C., who died in 1897; Stephen D.; Robert B.; Wendell O.; and Emmett V., Jr., who died in 1917.
Wendell O. Harris, son of Emmett V. Harris, and junior member of the firm of Harris & Harris, after his graduation from the high school at Fort Wayne took a special course in selected studies at the University of Michigan, at Ann Arbor, and in the law department of that institution, since which time he has been associated with his father in the general practice of law in their offices in the Tri-State Building. He is accounted one of the rising young lawyers of the city, and already has displayed talents that should carry him jar in his chosen profession.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
DR. JAMES ALEXANDER GORDON. One of Indiana's beauty spots is Winona Lake, with its wooded park, its lagoon and island shores and its beautiful lake. It is known for its Chautauqua, schools and various conventions and conferences, drawing speakers and visitors from all parts of the world. In the heart of the village, set on a hill, is the Winona Church, which is in a sense a monument to the first pastor installed, Rev. James Alexander Gordon, D. D., who was pastor from the year of its organization as a Presbyterian Church in 1913 until his resignation in the summer of 1929.
The Gordon family were Scotch-Irish and immigrated from Ireland about the middle of the eighteenth century, settling in the Cumberland Valley of Pennsylvania, near the Maryland state border, at Greencastle, Franklin County. Rev. J. Smith Gordon, who prepared for the ministry at Princeton College and Seminary, settled for life and a ministry of more than forty-six years at Fannettsburg, in the same county, where he died in April, 1904, at the age of seventy-four years. His first wife was a native of Fannettsburg, a daughter of James Montgomery, M. D., and Catherine Elliott, of the same strong and devout race as the Gordons. James Alexander Gordon was born at Fannettsburg, October 19, 1861. His mother died three years later, and his father married again, and two sons and two daughters remain, one son, C. M. Gordon, Ph. D., being professor of physics at Lafayette College, Pennsylvania, and the other, John K. Gordon, a leading physician of Chambersburg, Pennsylvania.
James Alexander Gordon attended the village school at Fannettsburg and then prepared for college under the instruction of his father at home. At the age of sixteen years he was admitted to the freshman class of Wooster College, Ohio, and graduated in 1882, with the highest honors of his class. Three years later he finished the theological class at Princeton Seminary, New Jersey, and was ordained, June 9, 1885, by Carlisle Presbytery, Pennsylvania, to the ministry. He chose to seek a field in the West and after several months in Minnesota and other localities, accepted a call to the Presbyterian Church of Decatur, Michigan, in January, 1886, and filled that charge until September, 1889. On September 1, 1887, Doctor Gordon married Miss Alice Clark Hill, daughter of Hon. and Mrs. E. P. Hill, prominent in the town and church. He resigned his work at Decatur in 1889, having received an appointment to a post- graduate fellowship at Harvard Divinity School for advanced study for the following year. His competitive thesis for this prize fellowship was entitled "The Incarnation as the Goal of Evolution," and thus early showed the bent of his mind and reading towards the harmonizing of the old truths of the Gospel with the new knowledge of modern research. After a year at Harvard, during which he spoke in many churches in the vicinity and with his wife visited the historic spots of New England, he returned to the Central West and accepted a call to the First Presbyterian Church of Van Wert, Ohio, and labored assiduously in this congenial field for twenty-two years, from November, 1890, until October, 1912. During this long pastorate the church was greatly prospered, doubling in membership, increasing in offerings and in material improvements, as well as growing in spiritual and moral power in the community.
In 1897 a foster child, Helen Emily Gordon, was taken into Doctor Gordon's home, and in 1909 she became the wife of Edgar T. Thompson, a druggist of Lima, Ohio, with three children now constituting their family. In 1902 Doctor Gordon received the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity from the College of Wooster. The next year he was given leave of absence for four months and a round- trip ticket from his congregation to visit Europe, Palestine and Egypt. Mrs. Gordon and Lee R. Bonnewitz, superintendent of the church school at Van Wert, and his wife, made up the party for this splendid tour. After their return Doctor Gordon gave a series of Sunday evening travel talks, which were published in a local paper and later were put in book form under the title A New Pilgrimage in the Old World. For many years Doctor Gordon was the stated clerk, or chief executive officer, of the Lima Presbytery, and on the Synod or State Board of Home Missions. After much the longest pastorate in the Van Wert Church he resigned, and left his charge upon the installation of a new pastor, in October, 1912. He and Mrs. Gordon spent the most of the following year in travel and visiting along the Pacific Coast, from San Diego, California, to Alaska. During the winter for several months he supplied Saint Paul's Church, just organized at Los Angeles, California.
On his return from the West Doctor Gordon accepted a call to the pastorate of the reorganized church at Winona Lake, where he had been a frequent summer visitor. The church was now admitted to the Presbytery of Fort Wayne, although made up of members from various evangelical denominations and has always been warmly fraternal and broadly sympathetic with all who love the Lord of whatever name. Here for nearly sixteen years he and Mrs. Gordon have labored, winter and summer, with one brief interval of two months in Florida in 1920. The Winona Church has grown and developed in many ways. In the beginning of their life here the home that they had purchased was burned to the ground, with a score of others at Winona, April 18, 1914. The next winter saw them installed in their new and pleasant home built upon the same beautiful terrace overlooking the park and lake. In spite of the big fire loss of the town, the uncertainty and the financial depression, and other misfortunes of Winona Assembly in those years of the World war, the church has kept on, increasing slowly in numbers, in benevolence and in community power. After the war the congregation began to move forward in the erection of a church building, having occupied the Westminster Chapel and other quarters until this time. A beautiful and commodious church was erected, the cornerstone being laid June 24, 1923, and the dedication August 3, 1924, although the regular occupation of the church did not begin until November, 1924. The new church is of buff brick with stone trim, and includes an educational wing, with excellent accommodations for departmental and class work, and social occasions. In 1921 the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church met at Winona Lake for the fourth time and Doctor Gordon was made chairman of the hospitality committee, in which capacity he welcomed and provided places of residence for some fifteen hundred delegates, officers, missionaries and visitors during the week’s sessions.
For nearly all of his years at Winona Lake Doctor Gordon has been a member of the board of directors of the Winona Lake institutions, and now for ten years recording secretary of the board, member and secretary of the executive committee. He was also, for about ten years, chairman of the pension committee of the Fort Wayne Presbytery and for one year chairman of the Synod's pension committee. After nearly sixteen years as pastor of Winona he resigned in June, 1929, desiring to be relieved of pastoral cares. He and Mrs. Gordon continue to live at Winona Lake, and are interested in the local institutions at Winona and Warsaw. Doctor Gordon was a member of the Delta Tau Delta fraternity at the College of Wooster, and belongs to the Kiwanis Club, Warsaw Chamber of Commerce and other organizations. Besides his book of travels he has published sermons and given lectures on religious themes and on travels.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
ELSWORTH HARVEY, vice president of the Marion National Bank, has lived all his life in Grant County. His record has been an interesting and important relationship with the community, as a farm boy, school teacher, public official, business man and banker.
Mr. Harvey, who represents a pioneer family of the county, was born at Marion, November 22, 1863. His great-grandfather was Eli Harvey, who lived in North Carolina, was affiliated with the Quaker Church, and on leaving that state moved to Clinton County, Ohio. His son, William Harvey, who was born in 1791, moved to Morgan County, Indiana, and about 1852 settled on a farm in Grant County. He died near Fairmount in 1883. The father of Ellsworth Harvey was Sidney Harvey, was born February 20, 1841, and was about nine years of age when brought to Grant County. He spent a long and industrious life as a farmer and passed away August 19, 1919, being buried in the I. O. O. F. Cemetery at Marion.
Elworth Harvey grew up on a farm in Franklin Township, attended the local schools there, and he continued his education in the Mississinewa School attended Professor Tingley’s Summer Normal at Marion, and this gave him the training required for passing a successful examination for a teacher's certificate. At the age of nineteen he was given his first school, in Franklin Township, and during the next seven years he taught in a number of schools in Grant County. The earnings he made as a teacher he applied to his higher education. After teaching a term or two he enrolled as a student in the State Normal School at Terre Haute, remaining as long as his funds lasted, and then returned to his home county and resumed teaching in the township schools until he was equipped for another period of study. At the conclusion of his last term at Terre Haute he returned to taught one term in the Fairmount Academy.
Mr. Harvey on August 3, 1893, was appointed deputy county treasurer of Grant County, and this was the beginning of a long and active relationship with the courthouse at Marion. In 1900 he was elected by the Republican party to the office of Grant County treasurer, and served in that capacity until December 31, 1904. Mr. Harvey in September, 1905, became a teller in the Marion National Bank. He has given a quarter of a century to the service of that institution, one of the largest banks in Eastern Indiana. He has had a series of promotions, eventuating with his election to the office of vice president in charge of the trust department. For the past eight years he has also been president of the American Security Company of Marion, which started with a capitalization of $50,000 and now has $150,000 capital stock. Mr. Harvey is treasurer and director of the Grant Community Chest, and during the World war was chairman of the Grant County Council of Defense. For the past eight years he has been a member of the County Council and was formerly a member of the township advisory board of Center Township.
Mr. Harvey is president of the Grant County Historical Society, is a member of the Methodist Church, a Mason, a past trustee of the local lodge Knights of Pythias, belongs to the Modern Woodmen of America, the Tribe of Ben Hur, was formerly affiliated with the B. P. O. Elks, and is past director of the Marion Kiwanis Club.
He married September 6, 1899, Miss Susan Emma Higgs, of Richmond, Indiana. Her parents, Robert and Eliza Higgs, came from Ossett, Yorkshire, England, about 1855 and settled on a farm near Richmond, where both of them are buried. Mr. and Mrs. Harvey have two children. Their son, Robert Sidney, born at Marion November 7, 1903, graduated in June, 1928, with the degree Bachelor of Arts, from Wabash College at Crawfordsville, where he was a Sigma Chi. He made a brilliant record in his literary studies and is now state editor for the Indianapolis Star. The daughter, Mildred Elizabeth, born at Marion May 25, 1907, graduated from high school in 1924, and in June, 1928, took her A. B. degree at the Western College for Women at Oxford, Ohio. She is now engaged in social welfare work at Indianapolis, and her special hobby is music.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
FLOYD T. ROMBERGER, M. D., of Lafayette, had the background of a general practice in medicine and surgery for a number of years, but since locating at Lafayette his abilities have been concentrated on his special work as an anaesthetist. He is regarded as an authority not only in Indiana but over the country on the application, of anaesthesia to medical and surgical practice.
Doctor Romberger was born at Elizabethville, Pennsylvania, September 2, 1887, son of John A. and Emma R. (Troutman) Romberger. The Romberger family came from Wuerttemberg, Germany. They first settled in New York, in 1740, and about 1755 one branch of the family moved to Pennsylvania, where they have lived for nearly two centuries. The Rombergers were represented by soldiers in the Revolutionary war. Many of them in the different generations have been millers as well as in other lines of business. Doctor Romberger's father was an educator, president of a bank and a leader in civic and religious activities at Elizabethville, Pennsylvania.
Dr. Floyd T. Romberger grew up at Elizabethville, graduated from high school there in 1903, and in 1905 took his Bachelor of Science degree from Schuylkill College at Reading, Pennsylvania. The following four years were spent in the University of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia, where he was graduated M. D. in 1909. He returned to Elizabethville and was engaged in a general medical practice there and over the surrounding district for eight years.
Doctor Romberger in July, 1917, was commissioned a first lieutenant in the Army Medical Corps. After six weeks of examination duty at Scranton, Pennsylvania, he was sent to the Medical Officers Training School at Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia, and on August 26, 1917, to Camp Gordon, Georgia, where he assisted in the organization of the Eighty-second Division. In that division he was made regimental surgeon of the Three Hundred Seventh Engineers and in April, 1918, sailed for France as surgeon with the Five Hundred Fourteenth Engineers. He arrived at Bordeaux May 12, 1918, and was with his regiment in the advance sectors of the American Expeditionary Forces until December, 1918. From December to May, 1919, he was with his regiment at Camp Pontanazen, France, and, sailing from Brest, arrived in the United States June 6, 1919, and was honorably discharged at Camp Dix, New Jersey, June 12. While in France he was commissioned a captain of the Medical Corps, May 18, 1918.
After returning from overseas Doctor Romberger made no immediate effort toward resuming general practice and during the summer took special work in the New York Post Graduate Hospital. In October, 1919, he moved with his family to Lafayette and established his offices here, specializing in anaesthesia. Doctor Romberger is a member of the Tippecanoe County, Indiana, State and American Medical Associations and several times has been a delegate to the state organizations and was president of the county society in 1923. He is a member of the staff of Saint Elizabeth's and the Home Hospitals, is a director of the Tippecanoe Tuberculosis Association, a member of the American Association of Anaesthetists, the Mid-West Association of Anaesthetists and the National Anaesthesia Research Society. Doctor Romberger out of his extended experience in anaesthesia has prepared a number of papers and articles that. have been read before conventions and have been published in national medical journals. He has been a lecturer before hospitals and medical institutions.
Doctor Romberger has many interests outside of his profession, particularly in a social and fraternal way. In 1929 he was worshipful master of West Lafayette Lodge No. 724, A. F. and A. M., is a member of the Scottish Rite bodies and Zembo Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, is affiliated with Lafayette Lodge No. 143, B. P. O. Elks, is a Rotarian, a member of the West Lafayette County Club. He is a director of the Purdue Building & Loan Association, and was a member of the West Lafayette City Council in 1924 and acted as street commissioner. He has done work in behalf of the Boy Scouts organization, is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church and a Republican.
Doctor Romberger married Laura Alice Enders, of Elizabethville, Pennsylvania. She graduated from Purdue University in 1909.
Their two children are Floyd T., Jr., attending Purdue University, and Phoebe E., attending the University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
