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OHIO GENEALOGY EXPRESS
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Welcome to
Greene County, Ohio
History & Genealogy |
BIOGRAPHIES
Source:
History of Greene County, Ohio,
its people, industries & institutions
by Hon. M. A. Broadstone, Editor in Chief -
Vol. I. & II.
Publ. B. F. Bowen & Company, Inc.,
Indianapolis, Ind.
1918
George J. Graham |
PROF. GEORGE J.
GRAHAM. There are few men
in Ohio who have held a longer connection with the schools
of this state than has Prof. George J. Graham, who
for more than twenty-five and one-half years was principal
of the Xenia high school and later superintendent of the
Xenia city schools, a position he occupied for more than
four and one-half years, or until his resignation to accept
his present position as a traveling salesman for the
George Dodds & Sons Granite Company. For seven
years prior to his entrance upon the duties of principal of
the high school at Zenia Professor Graham had
occupied the dual position of superintendent of schools and
principal of the high school at Waynesville, in the
neighboring county of Warren, and prior to that period of
service had been for years engaged as a teacher at other
points, so that when he resigned his position as
superintendent of schools at Xenia in the summer of 1916 he
had rendered a service of thirty years in behalf of the
Xenia schools and had been actively and continuously engaged
in school work for fifty years, a period of service equalled
by few, if any, of the educators in the state of Ohio.
Professor Graham successfully passed the examination
for license to teach school when he was sixteen years of
age, began teaching when he was nineteen and in 1886
received a life license as a high-school teacher. He
is a member of the Ohio State Teachers Association, the
Western Ohio Superintendents Round Table, the Central Ohio
Teachers Association, the Miami Valley Schoolmasters Club
and of the department of superintendents of the National
Educational Association, and there are few educators in the
state who have a wider acquaintance than he.
George J. Graham is a native son of Ohio and has
resided in this state all his life save for a few years
during the days of his young manhood when he was engaged in
teaching in Illinois. He was born on a farm in the
vicinity of Plymouth (now known as Bartlett), in Washington
county, Nov. 7, 1847, son of Wilson and Sarah (Dickson)
Graham, natives of Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania,
who were married in that county and in 1846 came over into
Ohio and settled on a farm in the Plymouth (now Bartlett)
neighborhood in Washington county, where they spent the
remainder of their lives. Professor Graham's
grandparents on both sides lived and died in Westmoreland
county, Pennsylvania, save grandmother Graham, who
late in life made her home with her son Wilson and
there spent her last days. Wilson Graham and
his wife were members of the Methodist Episcopal church and
their children were reared in that faith. There were
five of these children, of whom the Professor was the third
in order of birth, the others being Thomas, who died
at the age of thirteen years; Dickson, a farmer, of
Washington county, who died in 1914; Martha Ann, who
married George Goddard and who, as well as her
husband, is now deceased, and Margaret who married
William Goddard, a brother of George, and is
living at Belpre, in Washington county, this state.
Reared on the home farm, George J. Graham
received his early schooling in the neighborhood district
school and supplemented the same by attendance at Bartlett
Academy. When sixteen years of age he received a
certificate to teach school at Marietta, Ohio, but did not
begin teaching util he was nineteen, his first examination
for license having been merely a tentative step taken to
test his scholarship. For two terms Professor
Graham taught in his home district and then he went to
Sangamon county, Illinois, where he engaged in teaching for
four years in the fall and winters, spending the summers on
the farm in Ohio, at the end of which time, on account of
his father's failing health, he returned home and for two
winters again had charge of the home school, and then for
three years taught at Plymouth. In 1877 Professor
Graham married and later took a course in the National
Normal University at Lebanon, this state, and was graduated
from that institution in 1879. Upon thus qualifying
for high-school work the Professor was employed as principal
of the high school and as superintendent of schools in the
village of Waynesville, in Warren county, and he held that
dual position for seven years, or until 1886 when he was
engaged as principal of the Xenia high school and moved to
that city, where he ever since has resided. For
twenty-five and one-half years Professor Graham
continued to serve as principal of the high school at Xenia
and he then was promoted to the position of superintendent
of the city schools, a position he occupied for four years
and six months, or until in August, 1916, when he resigned
to accept the position he is now filling as a salesman for
the George Dodds & Sons Granite Company at Xenia.
Professor Graham is a member of the Xenia Business
Men's Association.
On Dec. 26, 1877, Prof. J. Graham was united in
marriage to Elizabeth Hosom, who also was born in
Washington county, this state, daughter of Benjamin A.
and Mary Ann (Becket) Hosom, the latter of whom was born
in that same county and the former, in Morgan county, this
state, and to this union three children have been born,
namely: Fern, wife of L. K. Sone, who is
engaged in the real-estate business in New York City;
Mabel, wife of Silas O. Hale, former county clerk
and present deputy auditor of Greene county, and George
I. Graham, proprietor of the Aldine Publishing House at
Xenia. Professor and Mrs. Graham reside at 131
West Church street. They are members of the First
Methodist Episcopal church and the Professor is a member of
the board of stewards of the same. He also is a member
of the local lodge of the Free and Accepted Masons.
Source: History of Greene County, Ohio, Vol. II - publ. by
B. F. Bowen & Company, Inc., Indianapolis, Ind.,
1918 - Page 164 |
NOTES:
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