His grandfather was Enos Futrell, who probably was a native of England, and early in life settled in North Carolina, where he lived until death, both he and his wife having attained good old age. Of their children Michael Futrell, who was born in North Carolina about 1805, grew up there and in the course of time centered his affection upon a girl whose home was in the same vicinity. Subsequently her family moved north to Ohio, and that caused Michael Futrell to leave his native state, and follow her to the new country. On horseback he accomplished the entire journey over the mountains and across the valleys to Clinton county, Ohio, where he established a farm and was soon afterwards united in marriage with Miss Mary Rix, the North Carolina girl who was responsible for this change of residence. They lived in Clinton county until three of their children were born, and then about 1840 broke up their Ohio home and moved to Grant county, Indiana. They located near Lugar Creek, on a farm which had some improvements, and there Michael continued his labors for a number of years. Later he sold his first place and bought eighty acres in Mill township near the county poor farm. That was the home on which both he and his wife spent their last years, and at his death in 1883 he was past seventy-one years of age, while his wife attained to the venerable age of ninety-one, and kept her faculties until the last. Both were members of the New Light Christian Church, and in politics he was a Democrat.

Jordan Futrell, who was the second among the children of his parents, and who has one brother and two sisters still living, was born in Clinton county, Ohio, November 15, 1835. He was a very small child when he came to Grant county, and his earliest recollections were centered about the old home on Lugar Creek, and all his education was supplied by the district schools of that locality. He reached his majority after the family had moved to Mill township, and after several years of work and experiments in different directions he bought forty acres in Monroe township. Industry and good judgment as a farmer, enabled him to gradually increase his holdings, until he had eighty acres, and though not one of the largest, this, under his direction became as fine a farm in the volume and quality of its products as any that can be found in the township. Among the improvements he built two excellent barns and a fine country house. Mr. Futrell's active career as a farmer continued until 1902, in which year he moved to Upland, and four years later sold his farm and gave over the cares of an active life. He owns an excellent piece of property on Irwin Street, where he has his home.

In Mill township in 1858, Mr. Futrell married Miss Rebecca Ballinger. She was born near Marion in 1834, and grew to womanhood in Grant county. The Ballinger and the Futrell farms lay side by side in Mill township, and this was the case of two young people growing up and knowing each other from childhood, and later uniting the destinies of their individual lives in married union. Mrs. Futrell was a daughter of John and Betsey (Burson) Ballinger, who were early settlers of Grant county, but later in life went out to Fremont county, Iowa where they died. The Ballingers were members of the Friends Church. Mr. and Mrs. Futrell have the following children: Mary E., wife of John Doller, a farmer in Monroe township, and has two children, Laura and Ruth; Nancy E. is the wife of Jasper Hobson, a farmer, and they have two daughters, Ethel and Zelda, also one son, Everd; she first married Thomas Shannon who died, leaving a daughter, Rebecca, who is now living with her grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Futrell; Emma died after her marriage to William Bird, and left three sons, James C. and Jordan L., twins, and Ralph. Mr. and Mrs. Futrell have four great-grandchildren living.

"BLACKFORD AND GRANT COUNTIES INDIANA, A CHRONICLE OF THEIR PEOPLE PAST AND PRESENT WITH FAMILY LINEAGE AND PERSONAL MEMOIRS"; Complied Under the Editorial Supervision of BENJAMIN G. SHINN; vol. II ; THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY; CHICAGO AND NEW YORK; 1914
Submitted by:Peggy Karol and Karen Overholt

Will C. Jay of Gas City is a well known representative of this branch of the Jay family, there being many distinctive Jay family relationships in the county, but the Samuel Jay descent antedates all of them. While David Jay, who is mentioned in the Mill Township and the Friends' Church chapters, was the first of his immediate family to locate at Jonesboro, and while he came direct from Miami county, Ohio, his father, Samuel Jay, who left the Carolinas in the exodus of Quakers to the Northwest Territory early in the nineteenth century, was then a member of his household and he lies buried at Back Creek — a genuine Deep River Quaker buried a "stranger in a strange land," and all for conscience' sake. He was opposed to human slavery. His grave is among those marked with quarry stones at the instigation of Northern Quarterly Meeting of Friends, already mentioned in the chapter on County Cemeteries.

W. C. Jay is a son of Elisha Benson and Ann (Scott) Jay, and the death of his father, April 7, 1904, was the final chapter in the family history of David and Sarah (Jones) Jay who came in 1835 in a wagon train from Miami county, Ohio, settling on a farm west of Jonesboro, living there one year before the town came into existence. This Jay farm is now owned by Fred Schrader. Some of the children were born in Ohio and some in Indiana. They were: Job, Verlinda, who married D. M. V. Whitson; Lydia; Elisha, who married Ann Scott; Samuel; Thomas; William, who married Martha Ellen Howell; Susannah, who married Hezekiah Miller; and the first born, who died in infancy. All who married left posterity, and there are a number of Jays in the fourth generation of the family. Thomas and Samuel Jay later joined their brother and father at Jonesboro, and through Samuel, Sr., David and Elisha, Will C. Jay is in the fourth generation of Jays in Grant county. Through Mrs. Verlinda Jay Whitson, Charles J. Whitson and Verlinda Belle Johnston, there have been five children born in the sixth generation—a record not attained by all pioneer families, although the name Jay disappeared in the third generation of that branch of the family.

Samuel Jay, the original Carolina emigrant, did not sustain active business relations with the community in Grant county, but his sons had much to do with the development and early history of Jonesboro. Thomas Jay was among the emigrants from Jonesboro to Kokomo, when the first railway enterprise failed in Grant county. He had conducted a general store and operated a pork-packing plant there, and went to Kokomo to secure shipping facilities. He impressed himself on the Howard county metropolis, and his children are still Kokomo residents. Samuel Jay, who reared a family in Jonesboro, was for many years associated in the Jay & Bell Dry Goods store, an establishment rivaling Marion stores at the time Jonesboro was bidding for the Grant county court house to be located there. David Jay, grandfather of Will C. Jay, was always an agriculturist, and a man of strong convictions. "You could not influence old David Jay against what he thought was right," and he was an active Abolitionist during underground railway vicissitudes in Grant county. Old Slave Mammy Wallace always told of the protection given her when she was a refugee by David Jay, Jonathan Hockett, and Nathan Coggeshall, a group of Abolitionists west of Jonesboro. While she never reached the "cold and dreary land" of Canada, the old woman always had kindly recollections of David Jay. He allied himself with Antislavery Friends and helped to establish Deer Creek Antislavery Meeting. When he died at sixty-four he had read the Bible through once for each year on his balance sheet of time. He enjoyed a lasting friendship with Meshingomesia and whenever the Miami chieftain was hunting along the upper course of the Mississinewa, he always stopped and cooked a meal at the Jay farmstead near Jonesboro, and all the Indians accompanying him always slept under shelter — hospitality similar to that received from Samuel McClure in Marion.

In war times David Jay sold his farm at Jonesboro and bought the William Howell farm (the old Billy Howell place) when the Howell family emigrated to Iowa, and it was one of the best developed farms with the first two-story log house ever built in Liberty township on Deer Creek. This farm in Liberty has not changed ownership often, its succession of owners being Howell, Jay, Whitson, Sutton, Stiers, from the government title secured by William Howell. With his family David Jay had much to do with the organization of the Bethel church in 1864 (see sketch of Willis Cammack) and at the time of his death he was the recognized head of the meeting. He was the typical Quaker, and there was no sham in his nature. It was in 1847 that David Jay's cousin, Denny Jay, located north of Jonesboro—the Jesse Jay homestead at present — and since their wives were sisters (Sallie and Polly [Jones] Jay), the Jay-Jones family which meets in annual reunion is the descendant relationship. The name Jay and the word Quaker were synonyms — interchangeable terms—in the early history of Grant county, but subsequent amalgamation has done much to change many family histories in this respect.

Besides Will C. Jay, the other children of Elisha B. and Ann (Scott) Jay were as follows: Miss S. Alice Jay; Edgar B. and Charles A. Jay; Thomas F. Jay, who died after reaching manhood and is survived by a daughter, Miss Belle Jay; and James M., who died in infancy.

On August 31, 1889, W. C. Jay married Miss Cora Hill, daughter of Nathan and Emaline Hill. Their children are: Fred W., William A., Otis H., and Richard H.; James, the second in order of birth, died at the age of six years; and Mary died in a beautiful young womanhood.

Will C. Jay was a school teacher from 1884 to 1892, and after having a family about him went to the Eastman National Business College at Poughkeepsie, New York, where he learned bookkeeping and completed the study of stenography, having taken some work in short hand while a student in the Valparaiso Normal School. Mr. Jay acquired a full knowledge of shorthand at an opportune time. The development of the Gas City Land Company in 1892 afforded him a position which he retained as long as the company was in existence, and he still transacts business for members of the company since the dissolution of partnership. The Gas City Land Company maintained an office in Gas City from 1892 until the Century year, and four years later the company dissolved and the separate shareholders in realty have since employed him to look after their individual interests. Nearly all the stockholders in the Gas City Land Company were Panhandle Railway officials, and they thought they saw a great future for the town, but the story is all told in the failure of natural gas. Yet the work of the Land Company will always be apparent.

Mr. Jay acquired a thorough knowledge of business methods and real estate transactions while representing the Land Company, and since then real estate and insurance have been second nature to him. From 1905 to 1909 Mr. Jay served as trustee of Mill township, and he has served the town as a member of the school board and as city treasurer, being always active in community affairs.

Singularly enough, when Mr. Jay's son Fred was ready for business training, after graduating from the Gas City high school, he was sent to Poughkeepsie. The son was a student sixteen years after his father was there, and a most striking coincidence was that while students there, father and son each won a dictionary as a premium in a spelling contest. The father received an International and the son a Standard Dictionary in the same kind of contests, written spelling. When the son graduated from business college he had one and one-half years' employment at New Castle, Pennsylvania, and then went to Gary, where he is an accountant in the office of the American Sheet Steel and Tin Plate Works, beginning with the opening of the industry and remaining continuously.

Charles A. Jay, a brother of Will C. Jay, also acquired a knowledge of shorthand, and had employment with the American Window Glass Factory in Gas City, going with the company when its business was removed to Arnold, Pennsylvania, where he is now cashier and general superintendent of the factory. He married Miss Blanche Thomas and three little girls have been born to them: Anna, Florence and Edith.

While Miss Alice Jay has been principal of the ward school in Gas City many years, she was for five years a resident teacher at White's Institute when it was a government school for Indians, and she made frequent trips to the different Indian reservations in the west in the interests of the institution. When Thomas F. Jay died, it was his request that his sister Alice educate his daughter, and for two years Miss Belle Jay has taught in the Converse public schools. Edgar B. Jay always lived at the family homestead until the death of the mother on June 18, 1913, the property having been acquired by Will C. Jay, and his mother having remained its mistress as long as she lived.

"BLACKFORD AND GRANT COUNTIES INDIANA, A CHRONICLE OF THEIR PEOPLE PAST AND PRESENT WITH FAMILY LINEAGE AND PERSONAL MEMOIRS"; Complied Under the Editorial Supervision of BENJAMIN G. SHINN; vol. II ; THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY; CHICAGO AND NEW YORK; 1914
Submitted by:Peggy Karol and Karen Overholt

William Gunder was born in 1797, in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, and about the year 1820 moved to Darke county, Ohio, as one of the first settlers of Fort Jefferson. There he resided until 1855, in which year he removed to Montgomery county and there became a major in the Dragoons, the old militia, and one of the foremost men of his community. He died in 1863, while his wife, who was born in 1800, in Preble county, Ohio, passed away in 1849, in Darke county. They were the parents of ten children, of whom four are now living: Daniel, who resides at Marion; Mrs. Sarah Shepherd, an eighty-four year old resident of this city; Mrs. Caroline Shepherd, living in Covington, Ohio; and George W.

After attending the public schools of Darke and Montgomery counties, Ohio, George W. Gunder took a course in Lewis Academy, Lewisburg, Ohio, and when seventeen years of age began to teach school. He had been so engaged about four years when the Civil War broke out, and laying aside the cap and gown he took up the sword and enlisted in Company B, Seventy-first Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry, with which he saw three years service. He was soon promoted to first sergeant, and later to second lieutenant and then first lieutenant, and in the latter capacity commanded his company in several hard-fought engagements. The Seventy-first Ohio participated in a number of the most sanguinary battles of the great struggle, including Fort Henry, Fort Donelson and Shiloh, the campaign at Chattanooga, Atlanta, Nashville and Duck River. During many of these engagements, Colonel Gunder distinguished himself, and on receiving his honorable discharge, at the close of hostilities he had a record for bravery and faithfulness to duty that gained for him the admiration of his men and the respect of his superior officers.

On his return to the pursuits of peace, in 1866, Mr. Gunder embarked in the mercantile business at West Baltimore, Ohio, and continued there until May 1, 1868, when with his partner, Mr. Samuel Arnold, he came to Marion, Indiana, and here for twelve years continued the same business, ten years of this time having their establishment on the present site of Barney Prince's store. In 1880 the business was organized as Gunder, Arnold & Company, dealers in dry goods, etc., the enterprise having by this time assumed large proportions, and in 1890 the personnel of the firm was changed and the style became Gunder Brothers. This was conducted by Colonel Gunder and his brother until the Colonel's retirement in 1904, since which time he has lived a more or less retired life, devoting his time to looking after his extensive realty interests. He has been successful in a material way and has accumulated a large property, but while he has been a busy man, with large private enterprises, he has never neglected to assist in all movements for the welfare of his community, and his support and cooperation have done much to aid in the progress that has made Marion a center of commercial and industrial activity.

In 1885 Colonel Gunder organized Company D, of the Third Regiment, Indiana National Guards. He was Captain of Company D for three years and was made major of that regiment under Judge McBride, now of Indianapolis, who was its colonel. In that same year, Governor Hovey authorized the organization of the Fourth Regiment, Indiana National Guards, appointing Colonel Gunder for this service, and when it was fully recruited, in 1890, he became its colonel. He was acting in this capacity when war was declared between the United States and Spain, in 1898, and on May 12th the Fourth Indiana was mustered into service, although enrolled April 26, 1898. The regiment was mobilized at Chickamauga Park, and on July 25, 1898, was ordered to Newport News, to embark for Porto Rico. After inspection by the Secretary of War, the Fourth was one of the first to be selected to go to the front, and subsequently saw service in Cuba and Porto Rico, and on the former island relieved the Spanish garrison at Mantanzas. The regiment was out one year, and was mustered out of the service at Savannah, Georgia, April 25, 1899. Of its one thousand three hundred and sixty men who left for the front, one thousand three hundred and fifty returned, the smallest loss of any regiment in active service, which was a distinct and eloquent evidence of Colonel Gunder's military skill. Although a strict disciplinarian, he was ever just, and was a great favorite with his men, who knew that he would ask them to do nothing that he would not himself perform.

On May 9, 1861, Colonel Gunder was married to Miss Anna Snorf, who died April 17, 1896, without issue. His second marriage occurred May 26, 1897, when he was united with Nita Fisher, of Marion. Colonel Gunder has had no children of his own, but has reared two boys: Milton H. Snorf, whom he took when seven years of age, and was reared to manhood, becoming prominent in Wabash county business and political circles; and Vernon A. Cogwill, who was educated in Marion High school and West Point, graduating from the latter in 1890, since which time he has been in Alaska, the Philippines, and other United States possessions, and is now a major in the Twenty-fifth United States Infantry, located in the Hawaiian Islands.

Colonel Gunder is a valued member of the Grand Army of the Republic. He was made a Master Mason at Troy, Ohio, in November, 1861, and has continued to enjoy the privileges of membership in this order to the present time, being prelate of Marion Commandery No. 21, and a thirty-second degree member of the Indianapolis Consistory. Politically a Republican, he was chairman of the Republican County Central Committee in 1884, but of late years has only taken a good citizen's interest in public matters. He has been a life-long member of the Congregational temple of the Christian church, which he assisted in building.

"BLACKFORD AND GRANT COUNTIES INDIANA, A CHRONICLE OF THEIR PEOPLE PAST AND PRESENT WITH FAMILY LINEAGE AND PERSONAL MEMOIRS"; Complied Under the Editorial Supervision of BENJAMIN G. SHINN; vol. II ; THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY; CHICAGO AND NEW YORK; 1914
Submitted by:Peggy Karol and Karen Overholt

While Daniel Ferree was of French ancestry with military blood in his veins, and not much given to the quiet, sedate life of Friends, he married Lydia Elliott, who was among the blue blooded North Carolina Quaker families, and some of her relatives were slaveholders according to the custom of the community. However, there was a revolt among orthodox Quakers against the institution of slavery, and knowing they could not overthrow it they came into the Northwest territory to escape it. Daniel Ferree and his wife joined this exodus early in the nineteenth century, but he did not become a Friend until long after taking up his residence in Morgan county, Indiana. The Quakers had some restrictions that did not suit him—his life having been in decided contrast to their peace-loving attributes.

It is reasonably inferred that the wife ruled when the Ferree family left the country where slavery existed, but after they came to Morgan county and when the environment was so different from the Southland, her church became his church, and their children grew up Friends. Evan Harvey Ferree remembers hearing his father tell of some of the obstacles in the way of this grandfather with Huguenot blood in his veins in reconciling the Quaker attitude toward slavery and his own early training, but in time he amalgamated with the society about him. It is hard for a strong nature to completely revolutionize itself, but that is what occurred in the life of Daniel Ferree, founder of the well known Grant county branch of the Ferree family in America.

In Morgan county the Ferree family lived neighbors to William and Ruth (Hadley) Harvey, and when the Harveys came to Grant county, John Ferree, a son of Daniel and Lydia (Elliott) Ferree, who had previously married Rebekah Harvey, came with them. This was the only Ferree of his generation who ever lived in Grant county. Mrs. Ferree was a sister to well known Grant county citizens by the name of Harvey. Her brothers—David, Eli, Mahlon, Jonathan, Jehu, Sidney and Alvin—and her sisters, Sarah and Mary, all have posterity here, some of them otherwise commemorated in the Centennial history. The children of John and Rebekah (Harvey) Ferree are: Alvin, who married Mary A. Bell; Evan H., who married Flora A. Cammack; Lydia, the wife of M. A. Hiatt; Charles A., who married Emma Dora Bond; William E., who married Charlotte Annis; and John D., who married Ada M. Heaston.

The Ferree family homestead was in the Little Ridge community in Liberty, and there all the children grew up, the father and mother later retiring from the farm and living in Fairmount. They gave their children educational advantages, and some were students in Earlham College, in addition to common school training, and there were teachers, business and professional men among them. Evan H. Ferree was a teacher for fourteen years, having had experience both in country and town schools and in a political way he has been highly favored by the voters of Grant county. (See chapter on Civil Government.) He has served as postmaster at Marion, and is at present connected with the Marion Light and Heating Company.

Mr. Ferree on August 20, 1880, married Flora A. Carnmack, daughter of Willis and Sarah (Jay) Cammack. Their children are: Edna S., wife of Edward H. Harris, and Evan Mark Ferree. The two little granddaughters in the family are Virginia and Janet Harris. The Harrises live in Richmond, but each summer Mrs. Ferree and her children and grandchildren spend some time in the Ferree cottage at Winona Lake. Mr. Ferree has always been a useful man in the community, fulfilling an old saying in Quaker circles, "He is frequently used in the meeting." They adhere to the Friends' faith in which both husband and wife had their training in childhood. The religious influences of his youth were from the Little Ridge and her's from the Bethel Friends Church in Liberty, two Quaker communities about four miles apart in the country.

"BLACKFORD AND GRANT COUNTIES INDIANA, A CHRONICLE OF THEIR PEOPLE PAST AND PRESENT WITH FAMILY LINEAGE AND PERSONAL MEMOIRS"; Complied Under the Editorial Supervision of BENJAMIN G. SHINN; vol. II ; THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY; CHICAGO AND NEW YORK; 1914
Submitted by:Peggy Karol and Karen Overholt