BIOGRAPHIES
COMMEMORATIVE
BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD
OF THE COUNTIES OF
HURON AND LORAIN, OHIO
CONTAINING
Biographical Sketches of Prominent and Representative Citizens
and of Many of the Early Settled Families
ILLUSTRATED
CHICAGO
J. H. BEERS & CO.
1894
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LANG FAMILY - See
J. H. LANG
Source: Commemorative Biographical
Record of the counties of Huron and Lorain, Ohio -
Illustrated_ Publ. Chicago: J. H. Beers & Co. - 1894
- Page 631 |
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J. H. LANG.
The LANG FAMILY, of which this
gentleman is a worthy representative, and which was
at one time quite numerous in Huntington, Lorain
county, can trace their genealogy back to Plymouth
Rock.
The earliest known member of the family was one
Robert Lang, a seafaring man who came from
Scotland as early as 1630. He built a house at
Portsmouth, N. H., some time between 1635 and 1650,
which is still standing in a very good condition.
It was built of New Hampshire Pasture Oak. The
walls are bricked up between the studs with brick
brought from England, and the nails were hand made.
This house was occupied by English soldiers during
the King Philip war; was also occupied
by Governor Wentworth, and sheltered
General Washington when he visited New
England. This is one of the oldest houses in
the New England States, and relics of it are now in
the possession of some of the younger members of
this old family. The following line brings
this
family down to the present numerous generation:
First from Robert was John, then a second
John, who was a Revolutionary soldier.
Then Bickford, and a second Bickford,
who was a captain of militia in the war of 1812.
He was born in Rye, N. H, married Abigail Locke,
and settled in Epsom, N. H., where he reared a
numerous family. His eldest son William
was the first to leave the parent nest, and go to
what was then the “Far West.” His brother
Reuel soon followed, and both settled in
Huntington, Lorain county, about the year 1821,
being among the first settlers of that township.
David, another son of Bickford,
followed about 1835, and the father came in 1833,
all of them settling in Huntington. Another
son, John, settled in Ashland, Ohio, where he
was for a number of years a prosperous merchant and
business man, and where he died in 1847.
Benjamin, another son, graduated at Kenyon
College, Gambier, Ohio, and was for some time a
professor of that college; he died in Kansas in
1835. David spent the most of his life,
after coming to Ohio, in Huntington, a prosperous
farmer, and died at the home of his son John
in Rochester in 1884. Josiah Crosby,
the youngest son of this family, enlisted in the war
of the Rebellion, but was taken sick and died before
he had seen any active service, his death occurring
in 1861. Of the two boys who first came to
Ohio, Reuel was a cabinet maker, and worked
at the trade of carpenter and joiner for many years;
and many of the first frame structures of Lorain
county show his handiwork. He was for many
years a local preacher among the Methodists. The
last years of his life he spent in Wellington,
surrounded by many of his children, where he
peacefully passed away in March, 1891, in the
eighty-ninth year of his age. William,
the eldest son, is still living with his son John
in Wasioja, Minn., in his ninety-sixth year.
Bickford, Jr., was the only one of this
numerous family who did not “go west.” He
remained in his native State, and is still living at
Franklin, N. H. There were four girls in this
family: Maria, who married Dr. Babb,
and died at Manchester, N. IT.; Lorenda,
married to Kimball Prescott, and died at
Marinette, Wis.; Sarah, who married
Morrill Chesley, and still lives in New
Hampshire, and Abigail, who married Milton
Barker, and died at Oberlin, Ohio.
Beyond this brief review, this history will have
only to do with the later generation, and with those
who have been more intimately connected with the
history of Lorain county.
Of the descendants of this family, only the children of
Reuel settled in this county. Josiah
Bickford, the eldest, married Lorena
Chapman, and for a number of years lived in
Huntington, where he followed the trade of
carpenter; for more than twenty years he was engaged
in the tin, stove and hardware trade in Wellington.
He served a term as mayor of that village, and by
his enterprise and counsel added much to its
prosperity; for the last few years his home has been
in Cleveland; he had four children - three sons and
one daughter, viz.: Watson W. and Charles,
both in business in Cleveland; Eva A., now
the wife of George M. Cadwell, a business man
in Cleveland; the first-born son was killed when a
child by the kick of a horse. The next son is
Jesse H., the subject proper of this sketch,
of whom further mention will presently be made.
Cyrus Welcome, the third son, lived at
home in Huntington till the age of twenty, when he
visited his relatives in New Hampshire, where he
died in his twentieth year. Louisa
Maria, the eldest daughter, married Peter S.
Wright, lived a short time in Huntington, a
number of years in Oberlin, moved to Vermontville,
Mich., where he accumulated some property, and about
ten years ago returned to Wellington, where lie
still resides. Mr. Wright was
famed as being one of the most ingenious mechanics
in the country, He enlisted in the army and served
with honor, and is now retired in broken health, on
a small pension. They had three children, two
of whom died in infancy, and the third, Grace,
is now the wife of Utley Wedge, and resides
in Cleveland. Esther Abigail, the next
daughter, married Charles W. Horr, a
prosperous business man of Wellington; they had a
family of four boys, the eldest of which is a lawyer
in Cleveland, and the rest still live in Wellington.
Charles, the fourth son, died at Huntington
in the twentieth year of his age. Olive
Amy, the youngest daughter, after graduating
from Oberlin College, married Dr. Meriden B.
Lukens, who practiced medicine for many years in
Illinois, Wisconsin, and Cleveland. Ohio, and
finally drifted to Dalton, Ga., where they now
reside. George Locke, the next
son in line, grew to sixteen years of age in
Huntington; then went to Wisconsin and took a
position in the store of his brother Jesse,
and when the war broke out he enlisted in Company G,
Twelfth Wisconsin Volunteers, in which he served
gallantly and faithfully; was severely wounded at
the siege of Atlanta, Ga., a minie ball being
permanently left in his right lung; after he
returned from the war he studied telegraphy, and has
been engaged in that occupation ever since; he is
now engaged in important work of this kind in the
East, with a residence in Boston; he married
Lizzie Viles, at Oberlin, and they have one
daughter, now married and residing in Washington, D.
C. Merrill Warner, the youngest of this
family, also grew to manhood in Huntington, married
and settled in Wellington, where he now resides, an
honored citizen. He has been many years a
member of the village council, and has had much to
do with the affairs of that village; he has one son.
Burton Lang, who is married and
lives in Cleveland. Five generations of
Langs have lived and flourished in Lorain county
- Watson, the son of Josiah, having
two children, and Burton, the son of
Merrill, having one. Bickford, of
the first generation, died in Huntington at the age
of about ninety years, and Reuel, of the next
in line, died in Wellington as before stated.
Of David’s family, Albert, the eldest,
died in Huntington; John, the second son,
lives in Rochester; Lydia Ann, the
oldest daughter, is now the wife of Horatio
Horton, and lives in Huntington; Henry,
a younger son, entered the army, and was killed in
action. The names mentioned above comprise all
or nearly all of this numerous family who have been
identified with Lorain county. While this
family has not produced any great men, there never
has been any stain on its moral character, none of
them ever having been in either Congress or
Penitentiary.
Jesse Hart Lang, whose name opens this sketch,
was born in Huntington township, Lorain Co., Ohio,
Dec. 21, 1827, a son of Reuel and Amy (Hart) Lang,
natives respectively of New Hampshire and Vermont.
He was named after his maternal grandfather.
Mr. Lang grew to manhood in his native
town, attended school in Oberlin a number of years,
and engaged in teaching and study from 1844 to 1848.
On January 1, of the latter year, he married Miss
Mary E. Fitch, of Sheffield township, Lorain
county, a daughter of Samuel B. and Dolly (Smith)
Fitch, natives of Massachusetts and early
settlers of Sheffield township, Lorain county.
The first two years of our subject’s married life
were spent on a farm in Huntington township, after
which he removed to Olmsted Falls, Cuyahoga Co.,
Ohio, where he was engaged in managing a woolen
factory for five years. In 1856, with his
young wife and one daughter, he went to Grand
Rapids, Wis., where he was in the employ of the
Government, and at the same time studied law.
While there he was a candidate for the Legislature,
but was defeated, the District being largely
Democratic. For ten years he was there engaged
in the businesses of land surveyor, lawyer and
merchant. Returning to Oberlin in 1870, he has
here since resided, engaged in the profession of
attorney and general business agency. He is a
Republican, and cast his first vote for the
Free-soil party. Socially he is a F. & A. M.,
and he and his wife are members of the
Congregational Church. They had six children,
all of whom died young, the youngest, Carrie,
at the age of thirteen years. Mr.
Lang published a work entitled ‘‘Childrens’
Pictorial Bible,” containing twenty thousand
illustrations (seven hundred of them being
electro-plates) and a topical analysis. He
spent twenty, years on the work.
Source: Commemorative
Biographical Record of the counties of Huron and
Lorain, Ohio - Illustrated_ Publ. Chicago: J. H.
Beers & Co. - 1894 - Page 631 |
| |
C. F. LEE, the
widely-known and popular photographer, of Elyria,
was born in the town of Vernon, Conn., Aug. 26,
1843, a son of George and Ida Harris (Skillman
Lee.
GEORGE LEE was also a native of Connecticut,
born in the town of Vernon, in 1806. He was
reared to the woolen manufacturing business, working
from his earliest boyhood in what is known as the
Frank Woolen Mills. His business ability
was marked by the fact that in subsequent years he
succeeded to the management of these mills, and
became the principal stockholder and proprietor of
same. In about the year 1853 a disastrous fire
destroyed the plant, and, financially, Mr. Lee
was almost ruined. Concluding, in the hope
of recuperating his fortunes, to come west, he set
out with sanguine expectations, first locating at
Utica, N. Y., where he was superintendent of the
Globe Woolen Mills for about two years. He
then made a trip still farther west, visiting
different points in Illinois and elsewhere, but not
finding satisfactory inducements to remain, returned
eastward to Ohio, and made a settlement in Norwalk,
remaining there until 1863. Removing in that
year to Cleveland, he there engaged in the oil
refining business, and Fortune once more smiled on
his enterprise and indefatigable industry. But
again he was doomed to become a victim of the
devouring element, the ravages of fire once more
confronting him on his onward march to wealth, his
oil mills being burned to the ground in 1870,
whereby all he had a second time acquired was almost
utterly destroyed. This second disaster was
sufficient to crush the ambition of most men, and
Mr. Lee, finding himself to far advanced in
years to commence life anew the third time, gathered
together what he cold from the ruins of his estate,
and retired to Berlin Heights, in Erie county, where
he passed the rest of his days in peaceful
retirement, dying in 1874 at the age of sixty-eight
years. Mr. Lee was a lifelong practical
Christian, and a deacon in the Congregational
Church. In his political sympathies he, in
earlier years, was an Old-line Henry Clay
Whig, and in later life affiliated with the
Republican party.
Ida H. Lee, the mother of our subject, was born
at Riverhead, Long Island, N. Y., in July, 1812; in
1830 was married to George Lee; on Sept. 7,
1893, died in Elyria, Ohio, at the residence of her
son, C. F. Lee, where for some years she had
made her home. She was a descendant of one
Fanning, a native of Ireland, who had settled in
Long Island in an early day. To George and
Ida H. (Skillman) Lee were born six children, of
whom the subject of this sketch is the sole
survivor.
C. F. Lee received his education chiefly at the
old seminary at Norwalk, Ohio. In 1864 he
joined the Federal army, enlisting in Company B, One
Hundred and Sixty-sixth Regiment, O. V. I., at
Norwalk, Ohio. This regiment belonged to what
was known as the "one hundred days service," and was
sent to the defense of Washington, D. C. At
the close of his term of enlistment Mr. Lee
returned home and took up his residence in
Cleveland, Ohio, where he learned the art of
Photography with J. F. Ryder, and was in his
employ most of the time until 1876. In that
year he established himself in his present business
in Elyria, where he has since successfully conducted
the leading photographic establishment of the city.
In 1868 Mr. Lee was married to Miss Ella
Louise Morehouse, and three children have been
born to them, viz. George E., Ida V.
and Nellie M. Politically, our subject
is a Republican; socially, he is past master of King
Solomon's Lodge, F. & A. M., Elyria, Ohio, and a
member of Marshall Chapter No. 47, R. A. M.
Source: Commemorative
Biographical Record of the counties of Huron and
Lorain, Ohio - Illustrated_ Publ. Chicago: J. H.
Beers & Co. - 1894 - Page 688 |
| |
GEORGE LEE - See C.
F. LEE Source: Commemorative
Biographical Record of the counties of Huron and
Lorain, Ohio - Illustrated_ Publ. Chicago: J. H.
Beers & Co. - 1894 - Page 688 |
John Lersch |
JOHN LERSCH
Source: Commemorative Biographical
Record of the counties of Huron and Lorain, Ohio -
Illustrated_ Publ. Chicago: J. H. Beers & Co. - 1894
- Page 740 |
M. H. Levagood |
MOSES HERNER LEVAGOOD
Source: Commemorative Biographical
Record of the counties of Huron and Lorain, Ohio -
Illustrated_ Publ. Chicago: J. H. Beers & Co. - 1894
- Page 708 |
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