Blackford County Biography Ref. Page

JOSEPH Q. HANNAH. Since he was a boy of six years, Joseph Q. Hannah has had his home in Grant county. He remembers the county when not a single line of railroad traversed it, and practically all the facilities of modern life—the railroads, improved highways, telephones, interurban transportation, rural mail delivery—have come as events of his own lifetime. Mr. Hannah has a fine farm in section twenty-eight in Green township, has prospered in a material way, has reared a household of children, and has his record clean in all the varied relationships of the world.

Joseph Q. Hannah was born in Rush county, Indiana, a locality from which so many present residents of Grant county came, on April 15, 1850, a son of David and Elizabeth Carter Hannah. His father was a native of Kentucky, and Grandfather Joseph Hannah was born in Ireland, came to the United States, locating in Kentucky, where he was a farmer, and where he spent the balance of his life. He dropped dead while hoeing corn at the extreme old age of ninety-five years. Elizabeth Carter, the mother, was born in Kentucky, a daughter of Arthur Carter, of that state. David Hannah and wife grew up in Kentucky, were married there, moved to Rush county, which was their home for about ten years, and in 1856 moved to Grant county, locating in Green township. David Hannah continued here as a prosperous farmer, until his death. There were six children of David Hannah and wife living in 1913, namely: Arthur, William, James, J. Q., Frank, and Isaiah. Two of these live in Howard county.

On the home farm Joseph Q. Hannah grew up, attending the district schools as opportunity was presented, and when ready to take up the responsibilities of life for himself, he established a home by his marriage to Iva A. Toole. They became the parents of two children: Myrtle, wife of Warren Bear, and they had two children, Estel and Locia A., but the latter is dead; and one that died in infancy. Mr. Hannah's first wife died in 1876. In August, 1878, Mr. Hannah married for his second wife, Ida Langston, who was born in Rush county, Indiana, February 22, 1860, and moved with her parents to Grant county, where she lived until her marriage. She is the daughter of Edgar and Deborah Langston. Mr. and Mrs. Hannah have six children living in 1913, namely: Bertha M. is the wife of Michael Gavin, and they have two children, Ernest and Harriett; Clarence E., born August 6, 1881, is a graduate of the common schools, was a student in the Marion Normal College, and for some years a teacher, and now lives at home; Halsie Olive, born October 2, 1883, is the wife of Roy Toole, and has one child, Pauline; Herman A., born July 20, 1887, graduated from the common schools, studied in the Marion Normal College, and lives at home; Ada G., was born November 27, 1889, passed through the common school and the high school, also took studies in the Marion Normal school and is now the wife of Joseph Read; Hazel F. was born November 1, 1892, and is a graduate of the common schools. Mr. Hannah is a Democrat in politics and has taken much interest in local affairs. He is the owner of one hundred and sixty acres of land in Green township.

"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

FRANKLIN RYBOLT. In every community there are a few public spirited men, who, regardless of the fact that they usually can least afford the time, spend much time and energy and money in promoting and engineering any project for the public good. Such a man is Franklin Rybolt, of Sims township, Grant county, Indiana. One of the most successful farmers in the county, and with various business interests in addition, he finds time to aid in any movement which has as its end the improvement of civic or social conditions in the county. Broad minded and clear visioned, Mr. Rybolt would be a valuable citizen for any community and the universal esteem in which he is held in Grant county proves that the people realize his worth.

Franklin Rybolt was born in Green township, Grant county, Indiana, on the 8th of November, 1854. His father was Jarret Rybolt and his mother was Rachel (Foster) Rybolt. Both of his parents were born in Brown county, Ohio, where they were reared and where they later married. It was in 1851 that Jarret Rybolt and his young wife started out for the newer lands to the west. They had very few personal possessions and still less ready money but they were animated with courage and filled with high hopes. They brought all their household goods across the country in a one horse wagon and fifty dollars was the sum they owned in cash. With this money Mr. Rybolt entered forty acres of land a half mile south of Point Isabel in Green township. He cleared a spot large enough to build a cabin upon and when this was done set about the difficult task of clearing the rest of the land by his unaided efforts. Indomitable will it took and many months of hard work but the task was accomplished. He prospered as a farmer and at the time of his death was the owner of four hundred acres all of which he had gained by his own efforts. He was a prominent and influential man in the community, taking an active part in the life of the district. He was a member of the Methodist Episcopal church and was class leader in the church of that denomination in Point Isabel for many years. He always gave liberally to the support of the church and many times aided a struggling congregation to build a church by liberal gifts. He was a member of the Republican party in his political views. Seven children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Rybolt, four of whom are living today, namely: Franklin; Mary A., who is the wife of G. W. Kilgore; William H. who is a farmer in Green township, and Emma, who married William H. Miller and resides in Fairmount, Indiana.

Passing through the years of childhood and boyhood on his father's farm, young Franklin lived the life of a normal country boy, but he was always eager for an education, and began to attend the common schools as soon as he was old enough. After completing the course of study they had to offer, he was still unsatisfied, but since he could no longer be a student, he did the next best thing and became a teacher, for nothing fixes knowledge as does the imparting of it to others. He began to teach at the age of seventeen and for ten years he was a teacher in the common schools of this county. During this period he also farmed and part of the money which he earned in the two occupations went into a further education, for he attended the Holebrook School at Lebanon, Ohio, for a time. During these ten years he farmed in summer and taught school in the winter, and until 1888 he lived on a farm in Green township.

In 1888 Mr. Rybolt was elected recorder of Grant county, Indiana, running on the Republican ticket. This is strong evidence of the high regard in which he was held by his fellow citizens and he was to realize this even more later in his career. He served as recorder for four years, from August 4, 1889, to August 4, 1893. Previous to this, at the age of twenty-two, he was elected assessor of Green township on the Republican ticket, being the first Republican assessor the township had ever had, and at the time of his election the Democratic party was conceded a majority of fifty. In 1880 Mr. Rybolt took the census in Green township and in 1910 he took the census for the northern half of Sims township. After his term as recorder was finished Mr. Rybolt located on his present farm, which is situated on section 25, one mile south and one mile and three-quarters east of Swayzee. Part of the one hundred and sixty acres of which he is the owner is located in section 36 and part in section 25. The farm itself is known as the Orchard Grove Farm, and he owns one hundred and sixty acres of land all told. He is a general farmer and stock raiser. Mr. Rybolt is a stock holder in the Sweetser Bank and is also a large stock holder in the Sweetser Telephone Company, having been president of the latter corporation for four years.

In politics Mr. Rybolt is a member of the Republican party and has been a valuable man to his party in many ways other than as an office holder. He and his family are members of the Methodist Protestant church and he is a member of the official board.

In October, 1874, Mr. Rybolt was married to Miss Mary J. De Vore, who is a native of Henry county, Indiana, a daughter of Elbridge and Deborah (Lenington) De Vore. She was reared and educated in Green township, Grant county. Of the children born to Mr. and Mrs. Rybolt, six are living, as follows: Minnie L., the wife of Homer Trueblood, of Whittier, California; Rachel B., who married John B. Shaw, and has three children: Roscoe, Catharine and Franklin; William E., who married Otha Sharp and has two sons, Kenneth and Gerald; Christian, who married Goldie Burner, and has one child, Alene; Luella, who is the wife of Roger Lake, and has one child, Mary Ellen; and Oral, who married Uda Bragg.

LEVI E. HUMMELL, of Sims township, Grant county, Indiana, is one of the most respected and well liked men in the county. Quiet and absorbed in the work of his farm, he yet has many friends, who have been attracted to him by his strong character, and the honesty and uprightness of his nature. Mr. Hummell has been a hard worker all of his life and his success is no more than he deserves. He is now the owner of one of the best farms in Sims township, and has his land in a fine state of cultivation.

Isaac Hummell, the father of Levi E. Hummell, was born in Pennsylvania, and married Barbara Ann Bowers, who was a native of Ohio. To them Levi E. Hummell was born on the 8th of February, 1858, in Allen county, Ohio, near Delphos. Just six months later, on the 8th of August, 1858, Mrs. Hummell died, and for two years her little mother-less son was cared for by relatives. Then his father married again and he went to live with his father and step-mother. He attended the common schools in Allen county, Ohio, and later Van Wert county, Ohio, and then in 1867 he accompanied his father to Indiana. Here they located in Richland township, in Grant county, and the boy went to school in Richland and Sims townships until he was twenty years of age. He then attended the county normal school for a year and the end of the year found him ready to go to work. He began life on a farm, working by the day, month or year. His sole possession at this time was a horse and buggy. He continued in this way, gradually laying aside money with which he eventually purchased land. Shortly after his marriage in 1886 he bought eighteen acres of land but he was in debt for some of it. He now owns eighty-three acres of well improved and valuable land, and is a general farmer and stock raiser. His farm is located on section 26, in Sims township, a mile east and a quarter of a mile south of Swayzee.

Mr. Hummell and his family are members of the Primitive Baptist church and he is one of the deacons of the church. In politics he is a member of the Democratic party, and he has served as constable of the township. He is a stock holder in the Swayzee Co-operative Telephone Company and was one of the charter members of that concern.

Mr. Hummell was married on the 1st of December, 1886, to Miss Anna U. Pence, a daughter of Lewis C. Pence and Mary J. (Mauler) Pence. Mrs. Hummell was born and reared in Sims township, where she also attended school. Two children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Hummell. Basil W., who was born on the 20th of May, 1890, having been graduated from the Swayzee high school, had one term in the Marion Normal College and is now a teacher in the public schools. He married Miss Laura B. De Vore and lives on a farm in Washington township, but is still teaching. Dea May, who was born on February 7, 1895, is a graduate of the Swayzee high school and is living at home.

MAJOR JAMES W. SANDERSON, treasurer of the National Military Home in Marion, Indiana, is one of those men whom men admire and women trust. Frankness and honesty and an entire lack of affectation in this age of shams and pretentiousness have won for him a wide popularity. He not only has a splendid record as a soldier but an enviable one as a railroad man, having been for many years in the railroad business in the central part of the United States. In the position which he now occupies, one that requires both executive and financial ability, Major Sanderson has been entirely successful, and has carried out his trust in a way that has won him much admiration.

Major Sanderson was born on a farm in Lucas county, Ohio, on the 4th of June, 1844. He is a son of David and Eliza Ann (Wood) Sanderson, his father having been born near Salem, Massachusetts, and his mother being a native of Ohio. David Sanderson was a farmer and lived in Lucas county, Ohio, all his life. He and his wife were the parents of five boys, of whom three are now living. Of these, Myron P. is a farmer in Lucas county, Ohio, A. D. lives in Deerfield county, Michigan, and the Major.

Until he was eighteen years of age, Major Sanderson made his home on his father's farm and when he was not engaged in helping with the work of the farm he was attending the common schools of the community. After finishing the courses offered therein he was sent to Central Ohio Conference College, at Maumee City, Ohio, where he completed his education. After this he went into railroading, entering first the service of the Lake Shore road, which was at that time known as the Michigan Southern and Northern Indiana Railroad. He was later made general agent at White Pigeon, Michigan, and here he remained f or nineteen and a half years. It was in 1892 that he came to Marion and Grant county, Indiana, as chief clerk for the Clover Leaf Railroad Company. After five years in this position be entered the service of the Panhandle road, remaining with this corporation for four years. In all he completed over thirty years of service in various railroads, both in train service and in station work, and when he left the service railroading lost a valuable and experienced man.

On the 15th of March, 1901, he came to the National Military Home in the capacity of quartermaster and acting treasurer, and in 1906 he became treasurer of this great national institution. His military record begins in 1862 when he enlisted in the Eighty-fourth Ohio Regiment for the three months term of service. He served through this enlistment and then re-enlisted in the One Hundred and Thirtieth Regiment, and finally came into the command of a company in the One Hundred and Eighty-ninth Ohio, from which he was mustered out in September, 1865, having seen almost constant service since the beginning of his term of enlistment.

Major Sanderson was married on the 2nd of April, 1873, to Mary L. Sheldon, of Blissville, Michigan, a daughter of Judge Homer J. Sheldon, who was a delegate to the famous Michigan Constitutional Convention. They have one son, Zach C. Sanderson, who is a graduate of the University of Michigan, and has further added to his advantages by a trip abroad. He taught history in the Winona College, at Winona, Indiana, for one year and is now traveling for the Century Publishing Company. Major Sanderson has never cared to take an active part in politics for like all true soldiers he is a citizen of the United States and polities that disrupt the country and lead so often to genuine harm, seem of minor interest to him. He is, however, an advocate of the principles of the Republican party, and casts his ballot at election times.

ERNEST PENCE. It is when we meet such men as Ernest Pence of Grant county, Indiana, that we realize that in spite of the corruption in polities, the apparently hopeless tangle into which we American people have wound our lives, and the vice and crime everywhere apparent, there are men of the same mold as those forefathers of ours of the days of ‘76, and that in the young men of the country, men of education and high ideals, strong in morals and intellect, is the country's strength. Mr. Pence is one of the young, progressive farmers of Sims township in Grant county, and is well known as a successful man and one of whom greater success is to be expected in the future.

Ernest Pence was born on the 7th of August, 1876 in Sims township, Grant county, Indiana, on the old Pence homestead, the son of Lewis C. Pence and Christina (Gowin) Pence. He was the second child of his parents and he grew up on his father's farm, attending the public schools of the township in the winter and in the summer assisting his father on the farm. After he was graduated from the public schools he devoted all his time to the work of the farm and became a farmer of practical experience. He remained at home until he was twenty-five years of age, when he bought his present farm. Prior to that, for four years, he was a partner with his father on the old home place. He is now the owner of seventy-five acres of land, the farm being located on section 34, in Sims township, one mile south of Swayzee, on the Wabash Pike. He raises a good grade of Duroc hogs, and his principal crops are corn and clover. He rotates his crops in clover, corn and oats, and raises a fine quality of product. The land itself is worth $225 per acre, and Mr. Pence is continually adding improvements.

In addition to his farming interests he has other business interests. He is a stock-holder in the Swayzee Co-operative Telephone Company and is also a stock-holder in the Farmers' National Life Insurance Company. Much of his time is also employed in his duties as secretary of the Farmers' Institute of Grant county, for it is a flourishing institution.On the 21st of September, 1901, Mr. Pence was married to Miss Pearl Outland, of Howard county, Indiana. She was educated in the public schools of Howard county and is a graduate of the Sycamore high school. Mrs. Pence is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church at Sims. She and her husband have no children.

Mr. Pence is an active member of the Democratic party, but he has never cared to hold office. He is an honorary member of the Modern Woodmen of America, but he has little time for political or fraternal societies, his farm and business interests being so exacting.

OWEN C. KIMBROUGH. In a comfortable rural home in Liberty township resides one of the old soldiers of the Civil war, a veteran who brought to the business responsibilities of his career the same qualities of efficiency and fidelity which he displayed as a soldier of the Union during the days of the sixties. Mr. Kimbrough has been a resident of Grant county for more than forty years, was for a number of years connected with lumber milling at Fairmount, and is now engaged in the quiet duties of agriculture at his home place in Liberty township.

Owen C. Kimbrough was born in Clinton county, Ohio, October 3, 1845, a son of Eli and Margaret (Townsend) Kimbrough. Mr. Kimbrough's maternal great-grandfather, Mendenhall, was a soldier in Revolutionary war. The Kimbrough family have been prominent in this section of Indiana since 1867, in which year the parents moved to Liberty township, and in that vicinity spent the balance of their lives. There was a large family of children, eleven in number, and these have borne honorable parts not only in this part of Indiana, but in various localities and states. The names of the children and their locations are as follows: John T., of Mill township, Grant county; Owen C.; Mary, wife of Sam Stewart; Amos H., a resident of the state of Oregon; Zack T., and William B., both of Marion; Thomas J., of Kansas; Martha, wife of James Stewart of Fairmount; Sarah E., wife of Jasper Howell, of Wells county, Indiana; Allie A., unmarried; and Clark H., who lives in Oregon.

Owen C. Kimbrough spent his early years on a farm, attended district schools up to the time he was eighteen years of age, and in the meantime struggling between his duties at home and his desire to become a soldier of the Union. Finally he could resist the call of patriotism no longer, and enlisted in Company C of the One Hundred and Ninety-third Ohio Regiment. He served with the Army of the Potomac, during 1864-65, and was a soldier on the field until the war was over. Coming home with an honorable record as a soldier, he first located in Ohio, and later moved to Richmond, Indiana. He worked as a machinist in Richmond until 1880. In 1868 he was married at Richmond to Lydia King, daughter of Lorenzo D. and Elizabeth King, and lived there a few years, and in 1872 brought a sawmill outfit into Liberty township of Grant county, but remained in Richmond, and worked at his trade until 1880. Many of the older residents will remember the Kimbrough Mill at Fairmount, which was conducted as a local institution there until it was burned in 1888.

To the marriage of Mr. Kimbrough were born three children: Lillian, wife of John M. Wright of Jonesboro; Margaret J., wife of Charles Bergan, who lives near Fairmount; and Maude J., who is unmarried, is a graduate of the common schools, and a student in the business college of Marion.

Mr. Kimbrough has served as commander of the Grand Army Post No. 328. In politics he has been a Republican since casting his first vote soon after the war, and has always taken much interest in local politics. His farm, located at the village of Radley, Contains seventy acres, and under his management has been brought to a high state of improvement and furnishes a good home and a profitable living for himself and family.

LEWIS D. MORGAN. On section thirty-five of Sims township, two miles south of the town of Swayzee, and on the Wabash Pike, is situated the fine country home of Lewis D. Morgan, one of the most substantial and highly respected citizens of western Grant county. Mr. Morgan has lived in this county nearly all his life, and the family are well known for their industrious character, and honorable citizenship.

Lewis D. Morgan was born in Rush county, Indiana, August 25, 1855, a son of John T. and Catherine (Phillips) Morgan. The father was born in Ohio, came to Rush county, Indiana, and afterwards settled in Sims township of Grant county where he lived until his death. He took up land in its wild state where his son, Lewis D., now lives. He was married in Rush county, and he remained a farmer all his active career. There were 12 children in the family, of whom seven are now living, namely: Amanda, wife of Milton Woodbeck, of Andrews, Indiana; Josephine, wife of Jesse Modlin; Jane, wife of Frank Collins, of Green township; William H. and Lewis D., who are twin brothers; Mary, wife of Isaac Eaves, of Sims township; Nilie, wife of John Brown, of Huntington, Indiana; Electa, wife of J. E. Matchett; Jacob, of Swayzee.

Lewis D. Morgan was reared on the farm where he now lives and while growing up to manhood was a student in the district schools in his neighborhood. With a common school education he began his career as a farmer, and for more than thirty years has energetically plied that vocation. On December 7, 1883, he married Miss Caroline Matchett, who was born in Green township of Grant county in 1859. Her education was obtained in the common schools and she is a woman of many fine attributes of character. They have two living children. Ortha M., a graduate of the Swayzee high school and the State Normal School, has been a successful teacher and now lives at home. Clyde J., a farmer in Sims township married Cleta Lemons, and they have one child, Nadine Morgan. In politics Mr. Morgan is a Republican, but has never taken an active part in party affairs, although a good citizen who gives his support to any community enterprise.

Deb Murray