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BIOGRAPHIES
Source:
A Standard History of
THE HANGING ROCK IRON REGION OF
OHIO
An Authentic Narrative of the Past, with the Extended
Survey of the Industrial and Commercial Development
Vol. II
ILLUSTRATED
Publishers - The Lewis Publishing Company
1916
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FREDERICK G. LEETE.
The active career of Frederick G. Leete as a civil and
mining engineer and business man in Lawrence County began more
than thirty yeas ago, and in that time he has won a high
position in his profession, being the author of numerous
newspaper, pamphlet and magazine articles on the Geological
Structure and Resources of Southern Ohio. He is one of the
most useful and influential citizens of Ironton.
For many years Mr. Leete has given special
attention to the practicabilties of the running waters of the
state and his broad observations and information along that line
eventuated in a conspicuous service to the state during the last
constitutional convention of Ohio, in which he served as
delegate from Lawrence County. Mr. Leete has made a
thorough study of the general problem of conservation and
development of water power in Ohio, and went into the convention
as one of the acknowledged leaders of the conservation forces.
He succeeded in having written in the organic law of the state a
clause giving the Legislature power to pass laws providing "for
the conservation of the natural resources of the Sate, including
streams, lakes, submerged and swamp lands, and the development
and regulation of water power and the formation of drainage and
conservation districts." Already at the time of the
convention Mr. Leete has developed a broad and systematic
plan by which the various streams of Ohio, capable of developing
water power, might serve as the basis for unit districts which
should be organized under the auspices of the state and by
resources properly developed under state supervision. By
the organization of such conservation districts and the
scientific utilization of their resources, Mr. Leete
has long been convinced that adequate power might be developed
to supply not only the ordinary needs of manufacturing and
municipal lighting, but the electric current should be
introduced into every farm home and every village of the state.
Mr. Leete has been a working member of the Ohio
Valley Improvement Association since its inception, and through
that and other organizations has used his professional influence
and his pen to call attention to the undeveloped resources of
Lawrence County.
Frederick Guilford Leete was born at Ironton,
July 14, 1860, and represents not only a prominent early family
of Southern Ohio but one of distinction in the early annals of
New England. His father, Ralph Leete, was a
prominent attorney in Ironton, and was born in Pennsylvania.
The mother was Harriet E. Hand, a native of England.
The Leete family originated in England and an
adequate sketch of the lineage can be found in "Evans Pioneer
Record of Southern Ohio." As early as 1209 the Leetes
were found in Cambridgeshire. Frederick G. Leete is
in the ninth generation from Sir John Leete of Dodington,
who was a justice of the court of common pleas. His son,
William Leete, born in 1612 in England, located at New
Haven, Connecticut, July 10, 1689. He held numerous
offices in that colony, was deputy governor of New Haven from
1658 to 1664 and from 1669 to 1676 was deputy governor of
Connecticut after New Haven and Connecticut had been united.
From 1676 until his death in 1683 he was governor of
Connecticut. This colonial official was noted for his
integrity and wisdom, was the first Puritan in his family, and
some of his best qualities have been transmitted to his
descendant in Southern Ohio. A son of this first American
ancestor was Andrew Leete, also colonial governor of
Connecticut, beginning in 1667 and continuing until his death in
1702. He is given credit for secreting the charter of the
colony when it was sought to be destroyed, and also prevented
the arrest of the regicides Goffe and Whalley, who
were fugitives in the colony.
Fredeinck Leete was graduated from the fronton
High School in 1878, and from 1879 to 1884 taught the grammar
department at Waverly. In the meantime he had taken up the
study of civil engineering, and from 1884 to 1886 studied law
with his father at Ironton but was never admitted to the bar.
His occupation as a land surveyor began in 1884, and for the
past thirty years that department of his profession has received
a large amount of attention. Politically Mr. Leete
is ranked as a democrat, but practically is independent in
politics, and has manifested a strong advocacy of the temperance
cause. He is not a member of any church.
Mr. Leete married Jennie McNichols Holland
of Ironton. Her father, Patrick McNichols,
was a former contractor and business man of that city. In
the judgment of his fellow citizens Mr. Leete has
long held a position among the leaders in his home county.
He has a cool, calm judgment of men, affairs and institutions,
and in many ways has maintained the high ideals set before him
by his illustrious ancestors. He stands for right and
justice whenever and wherever duty calls, and to a degree beyond
most men has realized his highest ambition to be a useful and
honorable citizen.
Source: A Standard History of The Hanging
Rock Iron Region of Ohio, Vol. II - Illustrated - Published by
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1916 - Page 878 |
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SMITH S. LITTLEJOHN.
The subjective qualities that beget popular confidence and
respect are not lacking in the character of the present
treasurer of Lawrence County, and the mere fact that he has been
called to the important fiscal office of which he is the valued
incumbent shows significantly the estimate placed upon him in
the county of which he is a representative citizen and in which
he stands exponent of most loyal and liberal citizenship.
Mr. Littlejohn is a scion of a family whose name
has been closely and worthily linked with the history of Ohio
during virtually an entire century, and his ancestral record in
the Buckeye State is one of which he may well be proud, even as
may he also of the more remote genealogical history in both the
agnatic and maternal lines.
Mr. Littlejohn was born at Jackson, the judicial
center of Jackson County, Ohio, and the date of his nativity was
June 18, 1858. He is a son of James and Cynthia (Smith)
Littlejohn, the former of whom was born in Scioto County,
Ohio, in the year 1820, and the latter of whom was born in
Greenup County, Kentucky, in 1824. The Littlejohn
family was founded in Ohio within a short time after the
admission of the State to the Union, and its representatives in
the various generations have proved sterling citizens of
industrious habits and definite loyalty to all that makes for
civic and material development and progress. James
Littlejohn devoted the major part of his active career to
agricultural pursuits and was a man who ever commanded
inviolable place in popular confidence and esteem. He was
originally a whig and later a republican in politics and he was
sixty-five years of age at the time of his death, in 1885.
His widow attained to the venerable age of eighty-seven years
and was summoned to the life eternal in 1911, her memory being
revered by all who came within the compass of her gentle
influence. They became the parents of ten children, two of
whom died in infancy. Those who attained to years of
maturity are here designated by name and in order of nativity:
William H., Alice, James I., Louis C, Smith S., Margaret E.,
Mary, and Marion E.
Smith S. Littlejohn was reared to adult age in
Scioto County and there was afforded the advantages of the
public schools of Wheelersburg, after which he attended the
National Normal University, at Lebanon, this State, until he had
attained to the age of twenty years. Through this
effective discipline he admirably fortified himself for the
pedagogic profession, and for seven years he was numbered among
the representative teachers in the schools of Scioto County.
After his retirement from this line of professional endeavor he
rented a farm in the same county, and for two years he devoted
his attention to agricultural pursuits. He then, in 1879,
removed to Lawrence County, where he located in the little
village of Steece, in Elizabeth Township, and assumed the
position of manager of the general store of the firm of E. B.
Willard & Company, with which firm he continued for fifteen
years and one month - a period within which he gained wide
acquaintanceship through the county and made for himself a host
of loyal friends. In 1901 he removed to Ironton, the
county seat, where he remained one year, and for the ensuing
nine years he had charge of the Hanging Rock Furnace property,
with residence and headquarters at Pine Grove. He was thus
prominently concerned with the great iron industry of this
section of the State and at the expiration of the period noted
he was transferred to the charge of the firm's general store at
Hanging Rock, where he remained thus engaged for three years.
Thereafter he was assistant secretary of the Union Furnace
Company until 1913, when he was elected county treasurer, the
duties of which position he has since discharged with
characteristic zeal and ability and to the distinct benefit of
the county and its people. He is a man of fine
administrative ability and marked capacity for detail, so that
the business of the treasurer's office is found at all times in
the best of order, the while he is punctilious in doing all in
his power to subserve the financial prosperity of the county
through the effective management of its fiscal affairs.
While a resident of Scioto County Mr. Littlejohn served
six years as justice of the peace, and incidentally he gained
comprehensive and accurate knowledge of the principles of law.
He has proved worthy of the implicit trust reposed in him by
others and has had much to do with the management of estates and
properties of important order.
Source: A Standard History of The Hanging
Rock Iron Region of Ohio, Vol. II - Illustrated - Published by
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1916 - Page 704 |
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JOHN H. LUCAS.
A native son of Ironton, Lawrence County, and a representative
of one of the sterling pioneer families of this now thriving
industrial city, Mr. Lucas is the sole owner of
the large and representative retail drug business conducted
under the title of the Lucas Drug Company, with a large
and admirably equipped establishment. Mr. Lucas
became virtually dependent upon his own resources when he was a
mere boy and through his ability and well-ordered efforts he has
achieved distinctive success and gained secure vantage ground as
of the representative business men and influential citizens of
his native city and county, where his friends are in number as
his acquaintances. He is one of the most progressive and
liberal of the admirable coterie of men who have been potent in
furthering and maintaining the civic and material prosperity of
Ironton. The significant colloquial term "Booster"
applies to him most effectively in all that touches the
interests of his native city, to which his loyalty is unwavering
and marked by deep appreciation.
John H. Lucas was born at Ironton on the 25th of
October, 1858, and is the youngest in a family of five children,
the others being: William, Clara, Ludwig and Carrie.
Mr. Lucas is a son of John H. and Luvina (Schachleiter)
Lucas, the former of whom was born at Waldheim, in the
Kingdom of Saxony, Germany, in 1836, and the latter of whom was
born near the city of Berlin, Germany, in 1838. John H. Lucas
came to America when a youth and in 1852 he established himself
as a pioneer of Ironton, where he engaged in the work of his
trade, that of baker, incidentally erecting the first bakery in
the city. He died in 1861, when but twenty-five years of
age, and his widow survived him by more than two score years,
she having been summoned to the life eternal in 1909.
The public schools of Ironton afforded to John H.
Lucas his early educational advantages, which were limited,
as he began to learn the lessons of practical industry when a
mere boy and thus depended upon self-application and experience
in later years to supplement and round out his education, this
training having made him a man of broad views and mature
judgment. At the age of twelve years Mr. Lucas
became errand boy for a local drug store, and that he availed
himself fully of the technical advantages afforded him in
connection with this line of enterprise is shown by the fact
that he studied and worked until he had qualified himself
thoroughly as a pharmacist. He became prescription clerk
and served in this capacity until 1880, when he went to
Proctorville, Lawrence County, in which village he established a
drug store and engaged in business on his own responsibility.
In 1889 he sold the stock and business and returned to Ironton,
where he became clerk in the drug store conducted by Drs.
Gray and Robinson. In 1893 he became associated with
his employers in founding the Lucas Drug Company, and in 1897 he
purchased the interests of his partners, since which time he has
continued the business in an individual way and under the
original title. His establishment is essentially
metropolitan in its equipment and facilities and in addition to
handling drugs, medicines, toilet articles, sundries, etc., he
has a well-stocked department devoted to paints, oils, window
glass, etc. The establishment has long controlled a
substantial and representative trade, based upon fair and
honorable dealings and effective service, the while the success
of the business has been heightened by the personal popularity
of the proprietor.
In addition to his drug business Mr. Lucas has
been concerned with the development and upbuilding of other
important enterprises in his native city and county. He is
vice-president of the Home Telephone Company and a director of
the Iron City Savings Bank, besides which he has made judicious
investments in local real estate and has aided in the physical
upbuilding as well as the social and material progress of
Ironton. His influence and co-operation have been given in
support of measures and enterprises tending to advance the best
interests of his home city, where he served for some time as
president of the Business Men's Association and where he is now
vice-president of the Ironton Chamber of Commerce. Mr.
Lucas is found arrayed as a loyal supporter of the cause of
the republican party, his allegiance to which he has found no
reason to sever in the face of modern disaffection in its ranks.
In the Masonic fraternity he has received the ultimate or
chivalric degrees, and is affiliated with the Ironton commandery
of Knights Templar, as well as the Ancient Arabic Order of the
Nobles of the Mystic Shrine and the local lodge of the
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
In 1884 Mr. Lucas wedded Miss Ola B. Carter,
who passed to eternal rest in 1887, and who is survived by one
son, Emerson, who resides in Washington, D. C, and holds
a responsible position with the Southern Railway Company; he
married Miss Margurta May Jury, of
Louisville, Kentucky. On the 27th of December, 1891, was
solemnized the marriage of Mr. Lucas to Miss Florence
T. Turby, daughter of William W. and Henrietta Turby,
of Ironton, and the five children of this union are: John H.,
Jr., William T., Gray, Richard and
Paul. John H. Lucas, Jr., is manager of
the business of the Texas Oil Company in the city of Birmingham,
Alabama; William T. is a student of electrical
engineering in the Western Reserve University, in the city of
Cleveland; and the other children remain at the parental home.
Source: A Standard History of The Hanging Rock
Iron Region of Ohio, Vol. II - Illustrated - Published by The
Lewis Publishing Company, 1916 - Page 786 |
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JOHN H. LYND.
As proprietor of the flourishing and incidentally important
enterprise conducted under the title of the Lynd Transfer
and Storage Company, with headquarters at 140 South Fourth
Street, the popular citizen whose name initiates this paragraph
is recognized as one of the progressive and representative
business men of the younger generation in his native City of
Ironton, Lawrence County. Here he was born on the 6th of
December, 1882, and he is a representative of a family whose
name has been long and prominently identified with the civic and
material affairs of the Hanging Rock Iron Region of Ohio.
Mr. Lynd is a son of Benjamin F. and Margaret
(Brewster) Lynd, the former of whom was born at Burlington,
Lawrence County, on the 7th of January, 1861, and the latter of
whom was born in the City of Louisville, Kentucky, in 1864, the
subject of this review being the eldest of three children and
the other being Carl and Herbert. The parents are
prominent and honored residents of Ironton, where the father was
engaged in the grocery business for thirty yeas and where he has
lived practically retired since 1913. John H. Lynd
attended the public schools of Ironton until he had attained to
the age of eighteen years, and thus his discipline included the
curriculum of the high school. After leaving school he was
clerk in the grocery establishment of his father until he gained
the dignity implied in arrival at his legal majority, when he
entered the employ of the Ironton Portland Cement Company, for
which he was mine superintendent for seven years.
In 1911 Mr. Lynd purchased the establishment and
business of the Wieteki Transfer Company and he has since
conducted a general transfer and storage business of most
successful order, effective service and his personal popularity
having contributed materially to the expansion and specially
substantial status of the enterprise, the incidental equipment
and stock of horses being conservatively valued at $9,000. Mr.
Lynd is the owner also of his pleasant home, besides other
residence property in his native city. He is affiliated
with the local lodges of the Knights of Pythias and the
Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, was for three years a
member of the commissary department of the Seventh Regiment of
the Ohio National Guard, and both he and his wife are
communicants of the Protestant Episcopal Church.
On the 16th of October, 1907, was solemnized the
marriage of Mr. Lynd to Miss Alice Richards,
daughter of William and Clara (Thompson)
Richards, of Ironton, her father having been for fifteen
years manager of one of the leading iron furnaces in Lawrence
County and otherwise prominently identified with the iron
industry in the Hanging Rock Region. Mr. and Mrs. Lynd
have two children - Eloise E. and Richard Franklin.
Source: A Standard History of The Hanging Rock
Iron Region of Ohio, Vol. II - Illustrated - Published by The
Lewis Publishing Company, 1916 - Page 684 |
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W. WILSON LYND, M. D.
One of the representative physicians and surgeons of the younger
generation in his native city and county, Doctor Lynd
is established in the successful general practice of his
profession at Ironton, the judicial center and metropolis of
Lawrence County, with
office and residence at 306 South Sixth Street. In the surgical
branch of his profession he has performed numerous minor
operations and assisted in delicate major operations, but he has
not found it expedient to specialize in any phase of practice,
as his services have been in requisition
along general lines and his success has been such as to indicate
popular appreciation of his ability and of his devotion to his
exacting and humane vocation.
Doctor Lynd was born at Ironton on the
25th of January, 1879, and is a son of William H. and Nalona
L. (Urick) Lynd, both representatives of honored pioneer
families of Lawrence County, where the father was born, at
Burlington, on the 3d of November, 1852, the mother having been
born at Ironton in 1854 and having here been called to the life
eternal when but thirty years of age, her death having occurred
in 1884. William H. Lynd later wedded Miss Flora
Cumpston and they have five children—Georgia, Benjamin,
Grace, Howard and Edith. Of the four children
of the first marriage one died in infancy and those surviving
are James C, Josephine, and Dr. W. Wilson Lynd, of
this review. William H. Lynd is a well known
citizen and business man of Ironton, where he is engaged in the
retail grocery business.
In the public schools of Ironton Doctor Lynd
continued his studies until his graduation in the high school,
in 1899, and in preparing himself for the work of his chosen
profession he was signally favored in having the advantages of
that excellent institution, Miami Medical College, in the City
of Cincinnati. He was there graduated as a member of the
class of 1903, with the degree of Doctor of Medicine, and he
soon afterward established himself in practice at Ironton, where
he continued his labors until a nervous breakdown rendered it
expedient for him to lessen his strenuous application and seek
more or less radical change, in 1908, he passed about six months
in the City of Hanford, California, and thereafter remained
about three months in New Mexico,
where he passed the required examination and qualified for
practice, though his brief sojourn in that section of the Union
did not permit him to engage in professional work save in an
incidental way. Upon his return to Lawrence County, Ohio,
the doctor engaged in practice at South Point, where he built up
a substantial business and remained three years. In April,
1912, he resumed practice in the City of Ironton, where he has
since continued his successful efforts and controls an excellent
practice of representative order. He keeps in close touch
with the advances made in medical and surgical science, by
availing himself of the best of its standard and periodical
literature and through his active affiliation with the Ohio
State Medical Society and the Lawrence County Medical Society.
While a resident of South Point he served as health officer of
the village.
In politics Dr. Lynd continues to pay
unfaltering loyalty to the republican party; both he and his
wife hold membership in Emanuel Methodist Episcopal Church; and
he is affiliated with the Knights of Pythias. the Knights of the
Golden Eagle, the Junior Order of United American Mechanics, and
the Daughters of America, besides which he is identified with
the Ironton Chamber of Commerce and is an earnest supporter of
its high civic and commercial ideals and policies.
On the 4th of June, 1802, Dr. Lynd wedded
Miss Clara Weist, daughter of Henry
Weist, a prominent contractor and builder in the City of
Cincinnati, and the two children of this union are Lester O.,
and W. Wilson, Jr.
Source: A Standard History of The Hanging Rock Iron Region of
Ohio, Vol. II - Illustrated - Published by The Lewis Publishing
Company, 1916 - Page 747 |
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