He was born in Shelby County, May 11, 1883, son of Thompson and Britta (Wheeler) Arnold. His father, one of Shelby County's well-to-do farmers, was born in Kentucky and came to Indiana just before the Civil war. He served several years in the Union army.
Clarence Arnold was one of six children. He attended school in his native county, and after graduating from the township high school entered upon his work as a teacher and was one of the capable school men of the county for a number of years. He was then elected township assessor, and for eight years had charge of the assessment rolls in his home township. His thorough acquaintance with the system of assessments and his popularity over the county brought him election to the office of county assessor in 1926, and he was reelected in 1930 for another term.
Mr. Arnold married Miss Jessie Smitha, who is deceased. He is affiliated with the Knights of Pythias and Loyal Order of Moose, and during the World war helped put over Shelby County's drives for the sale of Liberty Bonds and raising of funds for the Red Cross and other patriotic purposes.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
ARTHUR A. ALEXANDER, president of the Citizens National Bank of Franklin, has been an active figure in the business life of that community since early manhood. The Alexanders have lived in Johnson County for a century, and they have supported many religious and civic undertakings, particularly Franklin College.
Mr. Alexander was born at Franklin, July 1, 1870, son of Robert A. Alexander and grandson of George Alexander. George Alexander came from Eastern Tennessee to Johnson County, Indiana, in 1830 and spent his active life as a farmer. Robert A. Alexander was born in Franklin Township, was a merchant at Franklin, and for many years was a trustee of Franklin College. He married Serepta Riley, who was born in Perry County, Indiana. The Rileys came to Indiana in territorial times. Closely related to their family were the Shumakers.
Arthur A. Alexander was one of two children. He attended the grammar and high schools of Franklin and in 1890 took his Bachelor of Science degree at Franklin College. His first business was organizing the Franklin Canning Company, with which he was identified until 1897. For several years he was interested in lumber mills in Kentucky, and on returning to Franklin, in 1903, was elected vice president of the Citizens National Bank, and since 1910 has been president of that institution. He is also president and a director of the Franklin Building & Loan Association. Mr. Alexander since 1914 has been a member of the board of trustees of Franklin College. He lives on the same lot on which he was born and in a period of ninety-seven years the votes of himself, his father and grandfather have been regularly recorded in every successive election in Franklin Township.
Mr. Alexander married Miss Rose Tyner, of Franklin. He is a member of the Indiana State and American Bankers Associations and for several years' was president and a director of the Rotary Club. He is affiliated with Franklin Lodge of Masons and the Phi Delta Theta fraternity. He was chairman of the second and third Liberty Loan drives during the war and was interested in all the patriotic activities of that time. Mr. Alexander was for five years a member of the Franklin School Board and served on the park board seven years.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
LLOYD A. POTTENGER. A great many Indiana people are familiar with the products if not with the plant and grounds of the Pottenger Nursery, located on Route 52, seven miles northwest of the Circle at Indianapolis. Mr. Pottenger is an experienced nurseryman, and has built up an extensive business supplying all kinds of flowering and ornamental plants. His specialty is the growing of peonies, the main plant of which is located on ten acres of ground. In 1930 he purchased the Lowry Nursery, adjoining his place, consisting of fifty acres, all in general line in growing nursery stock.
Mr. Pottenger was born in Kankakee, Illinois, April 23, 1887, and represents an old family of Northern Indiana. His great-grandfather Pottenger came to Indiana from Southern Ohio and was a pioneer minister. Mr. Pottenger's paternal grandparents were Wilson and Mary (Armstrong) Pottenger. Wilson Pottenger was born near Hamilton, Ohio, was brought to Indiana when a boy and as a young man studied medicine and practiced that profession with success and honor. During the Civil war he became a first assistant surgeon in the Seventy-third Indiana Infantry, and was in all the fighting of his regiment up to the siege of Atlanta, and later was at the battle of Nashville.
The father of Lloyd A. Pottenger was William T. Pottenger, who was born at LaPorte, Indiana. Early in the Civil war he and a boy chum went to Indianapolis for the purpose of enlisting. His companion failed to pass the tests, and this put a damper on the desires of William T. Pottenger to go to the front. On account of his age and because his father was in the service, Gov. Oliver P. Morton paid his expenses back to his home town at LaPorte. Later he carried out his purpose of becoming a soldier, being fourteen years old when he enlisted, and served as a private in the Army of the Cumberland until the end of the war and was with Sherman in his march to the sea. After the war he followed farming. He and his wife are buried in Crown Hill Cemetery at Kankakee, Illinois. William T. Pottenger married Zipporah Herrick. They had a family of seven children: Belle, wife of John Walliscraft, of Chicago, Illinois; James, who married Grace Newton; Nellie, wife of Charles Woodruff; William A., who married Martha Livingston; Avery, who married Bertha Lyon; Lloyd A.; and Laura, who married Ed Shogren.
Lloyd A. Pottenger was educated in schools near the City of Kankakee, Illinois, completing his school work in 1907. For a time he was physical director at Pontiac, Illinois. Following that he was athletic director of Eureka College at Eureka, Illinois, taking his college work at the same time, and also took work in physical training with Y. M. C. A. College at Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. He then went to Spring Hill College at Mobile, Alabama, where he was physical director. During summer vacations he sold books and for a time acted as sales manager for a Chicago house, with territory in two states, Wisconsin and Northern Illinois.
Mr. Pottenger left this work to engage in business for himself as a nurseryman, purchasing the Kankakee Nursery, which he operated, until coming to Indianapolis in 1922. He still owns the land on which the Kankakee Nursery is situated and is president of its operating company. Mr. Pottenger is a Republican, member of the Masonic Lodge and Methodist Episcopal Church.
He married, April 4, 1914, Miss Lola Graves, daughter of Elizur and Arvilla (Slauson) Graves, of Madison, Wisconsin. Her father was in the grain and live stock business. Mrs. Pottenger graduated from the University of Wisconsin in 1910. They have six children: Lester, Lawrence, Richard, Doris, Miriam and Lloyd, Jr.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
HON. LOUIS E. WEBB, mayor of the City of Shelbyville, is a member of a family that has been in this section of Indiana for a century or more. Mr. Webb learned the printing trade when a youth and is head of the successful printing business which has been carried on for many years at Shelbyville under the firm name of L. E. Webb - Printer.
He was born at Brownsville, Union County, Indiana, November 11, 1866. His grandfather was Forrest Webb, a Virginian, who was the founder of the family in Indiana. Robert L. Webb, father of Mayor Webb, was born in Fayette County, Indiana, and married Caroline Mason, of the same county. He had a variety of business interests, being a farmer and stock dealer, and conducted a livery stable and hotel in Shelbyville.
Louis E. Webb, one of five children, attended school at Milton and completed his education at Shelbyville, to which place his father moved in 1881. Mr. Webb at the age of seventeen began learning the trade of printer and has followed that business now for over forty years. He has operated a business at Shelbyville since 1906 as the L. E. Webb - Printer, located at 15 West Jackson Street, has all the equipment and the skilled assistance for prompt service in both quality and quantity printing.
Mr. Webb was city clerk of Shelbyville from 1909 to 1914. In November, 1929, he was elected to the office of mayor and began his term of four years in January, 1930. Mr. Webb is a member of the International Typographical Union, is a Presbyterian and a Republican. He was honored with the office of president of the Rotary Club in 1929. Mr; Webb married Elizabeth E. Flaitz, of Shelbyville. Their only child, Richard, is deceased.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
J. CLIFFORD NOBLITT. Of the members of the younger business generation of Bartholomew County who are contributing to the manufacturing prestige of their respective communities, one who has made rapid strides toward position and recognition is J. Clifford Noblitt, plant manager of the Noblitt-Sparks Industries, Inc., of Columbus. Mr. Noblitt, who has been identified with manufacturing all his life, has been connected with his present concern since 1921, and since March, 1925, has been a resident of Columbus, where he has built up a reputation as a business man and is the center of a circle of sincere friends.
J. Clifford Noblitt was born on a farm in Bartholomew County, Indiana, May 23, 1898, and is a son of John W. and Hanna (Barkes) Noblitt. His father, who was a native of Indiana and a member of an old pioneer family of this state, was for many years engaged in agricultural operations in Bartholomew County and became a well-known and substantial citizen. He married Hanna Barkes, of Brown County, Indiana, and to this union there have been born seven children: Lodema, the wife of W. B. Thomas; Laura, who married Oscar Thompson; Myrtle; who married William Winchester; Quintin G., president of the Noblitt-Sparks Industries, .Inc.,who married Grace Taylor and has two children, and who, with F. H. Sparks, founded the present company in 1918; Charles C., who married Anna Clark; Loren S., manager of the Columbus Creamery; who married Minnie Walls and has three children; and J. Clifford, of this review.
J. Clifford Noblitt was reared on his father's farm and during the winter terms attended the country schools, following which he attended the Columbus schools, also the Zarephath Academy, of Bound Brook, New Jersey. When he first severed home ties and entered upon his independent career it was as an employe of the General Motors and the J. E. Farber Manufacturing Company of Flint, Michigan. In 1921 he went to Indianapolis and joined the Noblitt-Sparks Industries, Inc., with which he has since been identified. He first was employed as a receiving clerk and engaged in short buying for the company and was gradually advanced through merit, industry and fidelity until March, 1925, when the Indianapolis plant was moved to Columbus. He was then made plant manager. This concern employs about 800 people in a modern establishment that covers about seven acres of ground on East Seventeenth Street. This is equipped with the most up-to-date machinery known to the business and the main products of the factory are automobile heaters, jacks and various other parts and appurtenances for the automobile industry, with a wide territory and a large force of salesmen. Mr. Noblitt has come to be known as one of the best informed men in his line, and has a wide acquaintance in the trade. He is a well-educated man who enjoys the perusal of good literature and also finds pleasure in all manly sports and pastimes. He is public-spirited, and as a member of the Chamber of Commerce and the Kiwanis Club takes an active part in all movements for civic betterment and progress.
Mr. Noblitt married Miss Mary M. Forester, and they are the parents of one child: Curtis C. The pleasant family home is located at 1920 Washington Street. In the time honored Masonic fraternity Mr. Noblitt has received the thirty-second degree of the Scottish Rite, is also a Knight Templar, and is a member of the B. P. O. Elks . He and his family are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
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INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
FRED W. KENNEDY is a Shelbyville man whose early experience was in his father's flour mill. The mill handled a great deal of grain and young Kennedy had a good deal to do with the shipment of grain in carload lots. A box car was in any case a leaky container, and Mr. Kennedy, like other grain men, was not only impressed by the need of some improvement that would prevent leakage and other losses, but seriously worked the problem over in his mind with a view to a practical solution.
The solution as he worked it out has been the basis of a big Shelbyville industry, of which he is the president today, known as the Kennedy Car Liner & Bag Company, Incorporated.
Mr. Kennedy was born at Shelbyville, September 5, 1870. His father, George W. Kennedy, was a farmer, lumberman and flour miller. Fred Kennedy after completing the work of the grade and high schools at Shelbyville and getting a business college course, went to work in his father's mill and was its manager until 1916. In his search for materials and schemes to line the interior of box cars to prevent grain leakage he turned from lumber material to paper products and eventually improvised a system of car lining that has become practically standard and has enormously reduced the losses due to grain leakage while in transit. To manufacture his car lining materials Mr. Kennedy in 1908 started a small factory on Broadway, a building with 3000 square feet of floor space and employing twelve people. Since the manufacture of car liners for grain cars was a seasonal business, in order to keep his factory going throughout the year he developed other lines of paper containers, and the company now manufactures a wide and diversified list of bags and containers for shipping purposes. They began making shipping bags for automobiles and automobile bodies in 1910, and in 1912, having secured ground on East Washington Street the company put up the first unit of the present plant. In May, 1912, the Fred W. Kennedy Company was changed to the new corporation known as the Kennedy Car Liner & Bag Company, with Mr. Fred W. Kennedy president, Burton F. Swan, vice president and treasurer, and P. G. Hunker, secretary. In recent years the company has added new lines to satisfy an increasing commercial demand for containers of boxboard or paper material. Today the company has a plant of 250,000 square feet of floor space, employs 400 people and ships forty carloads of its product every month. This material goes to all the states of the United States and a great deal of foreign export.
Mr. Kennedy is a member of the National and State Manufacturers Association, is a Rotarian, a Royal Arch, Council degree and Knight Templar Mason, also a Scottish Rite Mason and member of Murat Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Indianapolis. He is a member of the Knights of Pythias and Independent Order of Odd Fellows and has served in the City Council of Shelbyville. During the war his factory was indirectly engaged in operation for Government uses. During that time he did work on committees in the sale if Liberty Bonds, in filling the County War Chest and in behalf of the Red Cross.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
JOHN E. CHAMBERS. American industry is undoubtedly progressive, but in its progress it always has to overcome that inertia which clogs every human undertaking. Manufacturers as well as the general public are too well satisfied with conditions as they are. They have constantly to be goaded by inquiring and inventive minds of men not satisfied with the policy of let-well-enough-alone, and after a new process has been demonstrated as more efficient, then the task remains for the public to be educated to the dollars and cents saving or profit to be obtained by the use of the new process.
A good many years ago John E. Chambers was interested in the manufacture of incubators. He was also attracted to that simple device, originated by Edward Atkinson more than forty years ago, long known as the "fireless cooker." In both the incubator and the fireless cooker the essential feature is insulation which retains heat as the indispensable element in hatching eggs and in cooking food. America has been a country so abundantly supplied with natural resources that it has gone on generation after generation cheerfully wasting each as well as other natural resources, but for the past thirty years conservation has been an idea growing yearly more potent and thousands of engineers in hundreds of laboratories have been steadily working over means of more economical utilization of heat and getting more energy in proportion to the consumption of fuel. The old types of heating apparatus and cook stoves were chiefly heat wasters, accomplishing their essential purpose at an extravagant cost of fuel.
Mr. Chambers limited his studies and experiments to one special field, the gas range. He applied the fireless cooker idea not only to the oven but to the concentration and prolonged use of the heat generated on the top of the range. His ovens he insulated on all six sides with thicknesses of mineral wool, so that when heat is introduced into the oven it stays there until its job is done. He invented the "thermodome," which in simple terms is an insulated cover that comes down over utensils on top of the stove and after the contents are once started cooking they continue to cook under the protection of the thermodome for a long time, just as cooking was carried on in the old-fashioned fireless cooker.
Out of this, told here very briefly but really constituting a long series of experiments and a big task of business building, has come the Chambers Manufacturing Company of Shelbyville, of which Mr. Chambers is the president. The business was started in 1912, as the Chambers Manufacturing Company, Inc., with John E. Chambers, president, Albert de Prez, vice president; Dr. Samuel Kennedy, secretary, E. A. Chambers, treasurer. The company is now one of the ten largest exclusive gas range manufacturing plants in the United States. The complete product is manufactured in the Shelbyville plant. The insulating material is an Indiana product, shipped in car lots. The plant comprises sheet metal fabricating departments, machine shops, porcelain plant, electro plate department, japaning department and assembling and shipping department. The industry covers nine and one-half acres of ground, has 250 people employed and the ranges are shipped and sold allover the United States and are exported to nineteen foreign countries. There are eighteen district managers over the United States, and two big retail stores are operated, one at Indianapolis and the other at Baltimore. The company is a local Shelbyville corporation, controlled by the business and professional men of that city, who were for the most part the original incorporators.
The Chambers gas ranges were awarded the grand prize at the International Exposition at Paris in 1928. The efficiency of the range has been demonstrated under the severest tests and has been endorsed by many great institutions, including hospitals, hotels, apartment houses as well as countless numbers of private homes. Under the exact and certified measurements of disinterested laboratories and institutes the Chambers ranges have demonstrated completely a fuel saving over ordinary ranges of approximately one-half and at the same time, by the conservation of prolonged application of heat, have produced more wholesome food, with less loss and waste. The basic idea in the original Chambers ranges was a heat conservation on the principle of the fireless cooker, and a later improvement was the "autostat" control, which not only controls the temperature but shuts the gas off completely at exactly the right time to take advantage of the range's insulation.
The founder and originator of this industry, Mr. John E. Chambers, is a native of Iowa. He finished his education in Dennison University in Ohio. For four years he was connected with an industry for the manufacture of optical goods. He has been a resident of Shelbyville since 1904, and later founded his present business. Mr. I. W. Scott, who joined the company in 1916, has advanced through various positions of responsibility to that of treasurer and general manager.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
WILLIAM F. VOGEL, superintendent of schools at Shelbyville, has given most of his active career to educational work in Indiana. He came to Shelbyville after several years with the Indiana State Department of Education, where he served as director of teacher training.
He was born in Vanderburg County, Indiana, September 21, 1884. His great-grandfather came from Bavaria, Germany, and was the founder of the family in Vanderburg County. His grandfather, William Vogel, was a farmer and blacksmith, and during the Civil war was a member of the Indiana Home Guard. The father of William F. Vogel is Charles W. Vogel, who was born in Vanderburg County and is a well-to-do and substantial farmer of Warrick County and was at one time township trustee of Boone Township. He married Margaret Bower, and they reared a family of five children.
William F. Vogel grew up in Warrick County, attended rural schools and the Boonville High School. His first teaching work was done when he was nineteen years of age. He taught in Boone Township of Warrick County, in the Boonville grade schools, and then became principal of the Poseyville High School. During these years he was utilizing his vacation periods by carrying advanced studies in Indiana University and spent two full years there, 1907-08 and 1911-12. His A. B. degree came from Indiana University in 1912. Subsequent to that he continued his graduate studies and in 1917 Columbia University awarded him the Master of Arts degree. After leaving Poseyville High School Mr. Vogel was principal of the North Vernon High School one year, and in the fall of 1913 became superintendent of city schools there. For the school year 1917-18 he returned to his home town as superintendent of schools at Boonville. For several summer sessions he was one of the instructors in Evansville College. Mr. Vogel in 1924 was appointed by State Superintendent B. J. Burris as director of the teachers training division of the Indiana State Department of Education at Indianapolis, and he remained there until January, 1927. It was a work that brought him in contact with educators allover the state and did much to increase his standing and reputation among Indiana school men. Since January, 1927, he has had charge of the administration of the public school system of Shelbyville.
Mr. Vogel is a member of the Indiana State Teachers Association, is on the executive committee of the Indiana School Men's Club, a member of the Southern Indiana Superintendents Club and the Indiana Superintendents Research Club. He is a Phi Delta Kappa, the national educational fraternity, a Rotarian and a Mason. During the World war he was living in Jennings County and took an active part in promoting the success of the various Government campaigns for the sale of bonds, war stamps, and was one of the speakers in the Red Cross campaign. In August, 1929, Mr. Vogel married Miss Mabel C. Stanley, of Indianapolis, Indiana, his present wife. His first wife was Blanche Huffman, who died, leaving two children, Margaret Ann and William Robert, both of whom are attending school at Shelbyville.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
JOHN B. THOMPSON, chief of police of Shelbyville, is one of the most capable police officers in Southern Indiana. He has had many years of experience in police administration, and took up that work after he had been in business for himself for several years at Shelbyville.
Mr. Thompson was born in Shelby County, March 8, 1877. The Thompson family were settlers in Virginia in the early Colonial period, and he had ancestors in the Revolutionary war. His grandfather, Charles Thompson, ,was a native of Virginia and came to Indiana as early as 1817, his parents and other members of the family settling at Richland in Rush County.
Chief Thompson's father was John G. Thompson, who was also born in Shelby County. He was a citizen well known in public affairs, a very substantial farmer and stock raiser, and for twelve years served as a justice of the peace of Noble Township, and was also justice of the peace of Addison Township. He married Frances Jackson, of Shelby County, and of their family of eight children John B. was the fifth in order of birth.
Mr. John B. Thompson attended the common schools of Shelby County. When fifteen years of age he left the routine of the school room to go to work and earn his own living. For three years he was employed in a wood bending factory, had three years of experience in the dairy business, after which he was employed in a furniture factory. Mr. Thompson was engaged in various retail interests until 1918.
His entire time and attention have been given to the duties of the police department since 1918, when he was made assistant chief- of-police, and since 1922 has had the responsibilities of chief of the department. He is a member of the Indiana Chief-of-Police Association and the International Association for Criminal Identification. Mr. Thompson during the World war took an active part in promoting the work of the Government at Shelbyville, having charge of the registration board at the City Hall. He is a Democrat in politics and is a member of the B. P. O. Elks and Improved Order of Red Men.
Mr. Thompson married Miss Florence Kendall in November, 1897, and is the father of five children: Foy K., who is a World war veteran, having been in France with the Motor Transport Corps; Miss Lela; Major Bruce; Maurice; and Marguerite, wife of Gilbert Leonard.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
HON. JAMES A. EMMERT was elected judge of the Sixteenth Judicial Circuit of Indiana at the age of thirty-three. It was an unusual honor for a man of his years, but one fitly bestowed upon a record as a very thorough and painstaking lawyer, and the confidence of the people has been fully justified in the ad- ministration he had given of the difficult duties of this office.
Judge Emmert was born at Laurel in Franklin County, Indiana, September 26, 1895. The Emmert family came from Germany and settled at Wilmington, Delaware, about 1845, and in 1848 moved to Indiana, settling in Dearborn County. Judge Emmert's grand- parents were Jacob and Catherine Emmert. His father, Clinton B. Emmert, was born in Dearborn County, is a flour miller by occupation and is now located at Clarksburg, Indiana. He married Alice Patterson, and their only child is Judge Emmert.
Judge Emmert attended schools in Indiana, graduating from the Clarksburg High School in 1913, completed his preparatory work in the Tennessee Military Institute in 1915, and then entered Northwestern University at Evanston, Illinois. He received his A. B. degree in 1920, and in 1923 was graduated from the Harvard Law School, with the LL. B. degree.
In the meantime he had been with the colors during the World war. He enlisted and in June, 1917, was assigned to the United States Base Hospital No. 12, and went overseas, his unit being attached to the British Expeditionary Forces. He was in service in France twenty-two months, receiving his honorable discharge in April, 1919.
Judge Emmert after graduating from law school at Harvard located at Shelbyville, in September, 1923. Official honors came to him very early, and in 1925 he was elected mayor of Shelbyville, holding that office three years. In 1928 he was elected judge of the Sixteenth Judicial Circuit. Judge Emmert is a Republican, a member of the Shelby County and Indiana State Bar Associations. He belongs to the American Legion, is a Royal Arch and Council degree Mason and a member of the Improved Order of Red Men. He married Miss Bernice L. Foster, of Knox County, Indiana, June 1, 1929.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
JOHN RABB EMISON is one of the younger members of the Indiana bar, and has done his professional work in Vincennes and Indianapolis.
v While at Vincennes he was associated in practice with his brother as a member of perhaps the oldest law firm in the state, a firm that has had a consecutive existence since 1819, for considerably more than a century.
Mr. Emison was born at Vincennes, December 28, 1897, son of James Wade and Sada Ross (Rabb) Emison. The Emison family was established in Indiana in 1802. Sada Ross Rabb was a daughter of John H. Rabb, a pioneer Indiana banker and founder of the First National Bank of Vincennes.
John Rabb Emison attended the grade and high schools of Vincennes and was graduated with the A. B. degree from DePauw University atGreencastle in 1919. In the meantime he had joined the colors during the World war and was second lieutenant of infantry. After leaving DePauw he entered Harvard Law School, where he received his LL. B. degree in 1922. Mr. Emison's father was a graduate of DePauw University in the class of 1882.
After qualifying for the bar Mr. Emison returned to Vincennes and joined the law firm of Emison & Hoover, which succeeded his father. Both his father and mother died in 1917. In 1923 Mr. Emison was appointed an assistant United States district attorney, and from 1925 to 1929 had the unusual honor of serving as judge of the Superior Court of Knox County. He has practiced at Indianapolis, associated with Pierre F. Goodrich, son of former Governor James P. Goodrich. The firm is Goodrich & Emison, with offices in the Continental Bank Building. Mr. Emison is a member of the Indianapolis and Indiana State Bar Associations, and the American Bar Association, and is a republican in politics. He is a member of the Columbia Club of Indianapolis, belongs to the Masonic fraternity, B. P. O. Elks and the Phi Kappa Psi. On May 15, 1929, he married Catharine Stanbro, of Kokomo, Indiana. They reside at 201 West Forty-ninth Street, Indianapolis, and are the parents of a son, James Wade Emison, born September 21, 1930.
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INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
CHARLES P. SINDLINGER. The name Sindlinger in Shelbyville has for over seventy years been associated with one line of business, the supply of fresh meat to the consuming public. Two generations of the family have contributed their energies and management to the business. They were pioneers in the matter of progressiveness, and progressiveness has been a factor in the business through all the years. The head of what has developed into an extensive packing plant as well as a retail and wholesale market is Mr. Charles P. Sindlinger, who grew up in the business founded by his father.
His father was Phillip F. Sindlinger, a native of Philadelphia. He went to Cincinnati in early life and in May, 1859, started his meat business at Shelbyville, Indiana. Phillip Sindlinger had gone through a thorough apprenticeship not only as a local butcher, but with some of the big packing plants in Cincinnati. In the evolution of the butcher and packing business the Sindlingers have gone through phases of experience that illustrate the pioneer stages of the industry. Phillip Sindlinger on coming to Shelbyville gave service to his local customers of fresh beef killed three times a week. He not only butchered the beef, but spent a good deal of time riding horseback over the country district to secure the animals, which he drove to his slaughter house. In this department of the business Charles P. Sindlinger as a boy received a full share of training. He became an expert cattle driver, learned to judge cattle, hogs, veal and sheep, and even as a boy he had earned the confidence of his father and was acting the part of buyer for the establishment, riding long distances over the country around Shelbyville. It was to him very interesting work, but it exposed him to all kinds of weather, since he had to ride out several days in the week regardless of roads or weather conditions.
Mr. Charles P. Sindlinger was born at Cincinnati, August 26, 1863, and was nine months old when his mother moved with him to Shelbyville. He was educated in the schools of that town, and from the age of fourteen was regularly assisting his father in the shop. His subsequent education was acquired by attending night schools, and he early developed into an astute and successful business man, and about 1886 took active charge of the business. In those years practically all the work of preparing the meat was by hand. He recalls how he made sausage by cutting up the meat on a block. The Sindlingers introduced machinery and improved appliances as rapidly as they were developed, and for many years the Sindlinger plant has been a model of equipment, operated by electric power. In 1921 Mr. Sindlinger built a new cold storage plant, with a weekly capacity for handling 300 hogs and twenty cattle. His business now employs twenty persons. The Sindlingers as packers specialize in pork products, and the output of their plant is distributed and sold to about seventeen towns around Shelbyville. His plant has about 10,000 square feet of floor space, and in addition to the plant in town he has a large farm near town where hundreds of steer and hogs are fed, furnishing a steady supply for the packing plant.
Mr. Sindlinger has been a strenuous worker. He has enjoyed prosperity, and his prosperity has not been for himself nor his family alone, but has meant something of value to the entire community. In addition to his meat business he is vice president of the Homestead Building & Loan Association, is a director of the Farmers National Bank, is president of the Forest Hill Cemetery Association, and is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and B. P. O. Elks. As a young man he was quite active in politics. During the World war he was chairman and team captain in all the five war loan drives, was also a member of the Red Cross board. He is a member of the Indiana State Meat Dealers Association.
He married Miss Lillie Applas, of Ohio. To their marriage were born four children. Their son Fred was in training for service during the World war and was ready to go to France when he died. The three living children are: Harold, associated with his brother in business, representing the third generation of the family as meat dealers and packers at Shelbyville; Miss Doris, who is a graduate of St. Mary of the Woods at Terre Haute; and Charles, also in school.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
CHARLES M. EWING, owner of the Ewing Funeral Chapel at Shelbyville, entered the undertaking business in 1915, after a number of years spent in educational and insurance work. Mr. Ewing has given Shelby County an indispensable institution and his chapel, at 112 North Harrison Street, will bear favorable comparison with any funeral home in the state. He is a prominent member of the funeral directors profession, and is a thorough business man.
Mr. Ewing was born in Brandywine Township, Shelby County, Indiana, July 9, 1877. In the same. house was born his father, William A. Ewing. The Ewing family was established in Indiana by his grandfather, James A. Ewing, who came from Pennsylvania to Indiana about 1830 and took up a homestead of eighty acres and developed it into a good farm. William A. Ewing spent his life as a farmer. He married Eliza Watts, who was born in another locality of Brandywine Township, where her father, Morgan Watts, settled in the early days.
Charles M. Ewing has one brother, W. Frank, who lives at Beaver, Pennsylvania. Mr. Ewing attended schools in Shelby County, graduating from the high school at Fairland, and later attended the Marion Normal College. To the work of teacher he gave seven years of his early life, and many people in Shelby County still recall him in the capacity of a teacher. He next entered newspaper work, as manager of the Liberal Publishing Company at Shelbyville, where he spent three years. The next five years he was in the insurance field for the Prudential Insurance Company and in August, 1915, turned his talents and his energies to the undertaking business. In 1919 he graduated from the Eskins Embalming School. Mr. Ewing possesses ideal qualifications for his work. He is a man of kindly sympathies, a friend in need, generous and public spirited. In 1922 he was appointed by the governor of Indiana a member of the State Board of Embalmers and was reappointed in 1926, serving two years as president of the board and is now its secretary. In 1923 he was elected the third vice president of the National Embalmers Conference of America and in 1929 was elected second vice president. He was also appointed a member of the National Board of Education by the president of the National Funeral Association of America.
Mr. Ewing married Mabel Griffith, of Shelbyville, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James E. Griffith. Her father was a merchant and manufacturer, and the Griffiths have been in Shelby County since pioneer times. The two children of Mr. and Mrs. Ewing are Robert Donald, a student in Indiana University, and Richard Louis, attending high school.
Mr. Ewing was for three years, 1924-27, a member of the Shelbyville School Board. He belongs to the Kiwanis Club, for five years was treasurer of the Chautauqua Association, is treasurer of the Presbyterian Church, and is a past chancellor and now master of finance of the Shelbyville Lodge, Knights of Pythias, and also belongs to the Masonic fraternity and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. During the World war he aid a helpful work in promoting the success of the drives, including the sale of Liberty Bonds, and for five years was an active member of the local Red Cross.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
EDWARD J. SHOOK, manager of the Hoosier Dairy Products Company of Shelbyville, is one of the active young business men of Indiana. He has been in his present line of work since leaving high school.
Mr. Shook was born in Rush County, Indiana, January 24, 1903. Four generations of the family have lived in Indiana, beginning with his great-grandfather, Joseph Shook, who came from Pennsylvania to Rush County in 1840. He was in an Indiana regiment in the Union army during the Civil war. His son, R. M. Shook, was born in Rush County and spent his business career as a shoe merchant in Rushville. The father of Edward J. Shook is W. F. Shook, also a native of Rush County and well known in mercantile circles at Rushville. He married Minnie Jones, of Decatur County, Indiana, whose father, Isaac Jones, came from West Virginia and settled in Decatur County before the Civil war. W. F. Shook and wife have two children, Edward J. and Ruth, the latter of whom attended school at Manilla, in Rush County and is now in the Manilla High School.
Edward J. Shook finished his education in the Rush County High School. At the age of eighteen he began his business experience with the Wadley Company, and was with that concern for seven years before coming to the Hoosier Dairy Products Company at Rushville. In 1929 he came to Shelbyville as manager of the local plant of the Jessup & Antrim Velvet Ice Cream Company. Mr. Shook also owns a half interest in a confectionery business at Manilla, Indiana.
He married Miss Margaret Coers, of Rush County, and they have two children, Mary Margaret and Robert F. Mr. Shook is affiliated with the Modern Woodmen of America.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
ELMER BASSETT, member of a family that has been in Shelby County since the year 1820, was born and reared on a farm. After leaving home he contrived the opportunities and means to study law, and for nearly thirty years has been a prominent member of the Shelbyville bar.
Mr. Bassett is a great-grandson of the pioneer of the Bassett family in Shelby County. This pioneer was Nymphas Bassett, who was born in Vermont, March 7, 1785, and when twenty-four years of age married Thankful Ann Bruce. They lived in Ohio until 1820, when they came to Indiana and settled in Marion Township of Shelby County. Nymphas Bassett and wife had ten children, and they and their descendants have constituted what js known as Nymphas Bassett's family, which for years made a regular practice of holding reunions. Members of this family are now scattered well over the country from the Atlantic to the Pacific Coast.
The third child and son of Nymphas Bassett was Sylvester Bassett, who was born March 24, 1814, and died in 1902. He married, December 23; 1836, Susan Monroney, and of their nine children the second child and oldest son was James M. Bassett.
James M. Bassett was born in Shelby ,County, April 12, 1840, and was one of the well-to-do farmers and stock men of the county. He was township trustee of Marion Township. James M. Bassett married, October 1,1861, Clarinda Norville, to whom were born seven children: William N., George, Elmer, Curtis, Walter, Hayes and Clancy.
Elmer Bassett was born in Shelby County ,January 10, 1867, and attended the common schools of the county, afterwards completing a business course in the Central Indiana Normal College at Danville. For two years he was employed as a clerk in the Census Bureau at Washington and while there attended night classes of the National University. He was graduated from the law department in 1902 and in the same year was admitted to the Indiana state bar. For two and a half years the was associated with the Shelbyville law firm of Hord & Adams. He was elected prosecutor of the Sixteenth Judicial Circuit, comprising Rush and Shelby counties, and after two years of experience in this public office he engaged in private law practice and has been one of the very busiest successful attorneys of Shelbyville. In 1920 he was elected prosecutor of Shelby County for the Sixteenth Judicial Circuit and again served for two years.
Mr. Bassett married Miss Minnie E. Ford, of Shelby County. He is a member of the Shelby County Bar Association. He is affiliated with the Masonic fraternity, is a past grand chancellor of the Grand Domain of Indiana and a past supreme representative of the Knights of Pythias order; also a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Modern Woodmen of America, Independent Order of Red Men and the Fraternal Order of Eagles. Politically he is a Republican and has been chairman of the city committee, and is recognized as one of the influential members of his party in Shelby County. During the World war he acted as fuel administrator for the county and joined other patriotic-minded men in promoting the success of the various war drives. He was a four-minute speaker in the Liberty Bond campaigns. Mr. Bassett is a director of the Farmers National Bank of Shelbyville. He is a Methodist.
INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
