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JOHN F. KETTER.
This publication exercises one of its important functions when it
enters specific record concerning those sterling and progressive
citizens who are representative figures in connection with the
various lines of industrial and commercial enterprise in the Hanging
Rock Iron Region, and such a one is Mr. Ketter who is
president and manager of the Ketter Buggy Company, which
marks one of the important and substantial business enterprises in
the city of Ironton.
Mr. Ketter was born at Jackson Furnace, Scioto
County, Ohio, on the 26th of April, 1849, a date that indicates that
his is the distinction of being a scion of a pioneer family of this
favored section of the Buckeye State. He is a son of Henry
E. and Mary (Marting) Ketter, both natives of the great Empire
of Germany, where the former was born in 1828, and the latter in
1824. Henry E. Ketter was reared and educated in his
native land where he learned the trades of brick and stone mason,
and he immigrated to America in 1854, when a young man of about
twenty-six years. He became actively identified with the iron
industry in the Hanging Rock Region of Ohio in the pioneer days,
assisted in the installing of many furnaces and was otherwise
prominent as a skilled workman at his trade and in other mechanical
lines. He continued to reside in Scioto County until his
death, in 1881, and survived by thirty years the wife of his youth,
she having passed away in 1851. Of their four children, the
eldest is William, who is a resident of Columbus, Ohio;
Mary is the wife of Frederick Graham, of Ironton; John
F. of this review, was the next in order of birth; and
Henry, who married Miss Maria Shumway, is employed as an
expert blacksmith in the plant of the Ironton Portland Cement
Company.
John F. Ketter attended the common schools of
Scioto County until he was sixteen years of age, adn he then entered
upon a virtual apprenticeship to learn the carriage and buggy
business, by entering the employ of Henry Lively, of South
Webster, Scioto County. The contract made between them
provided that the young employe should provie for his own clothing
and should receive for his services forty dollars and board for the
first year, fifty for the second, and sixty for the third. At
the expiration of his contract agreement Mr. Ketter went to
the city of Portsmouth, where he worked as a journeyman at the
carriage-maker's trade, until he had attained to his legal majority.
Upon reaching the dignified position thus granting him the right of
franchise he gave evidence of his independence, ambition and
self-reliance by initiating business on his own responsibility.
He established a modest shop and through the efficiency of his work
and the fairness of his methods his trade grew apace, with
incidental augmenting of his prosperity in financial lines.
The major part of his independent business career has had Ironton as
its stage, and there, in 1902, he expanded the scope and importance
of his business by organizing the Ketter Buggy Company, which
is incorporated with a capital stock of $25,000, and of which he has
been president and manager from its inception, his technical ability
and careful administrative policies having been the prime forces in
making the enterprise a substantial success. Dr. Clark
Lowry is vice-president of the company, and John W. Ketter,
son of the founder, in secretary and treasurer.
Mr. Ketter has shown himself most loyal and
public-spirited as a citizen and business man, is a stalwart
supporter of the cause of the republican party, served one term as a
member of the city council of Ironton, is a member of the Ironton
Chamber of Commerce, and both he and his wife are zealous members of
the First Methodist Episcopal Church in their home city. In
addition to other realty in Ironton, Mr. Ketter is the owner
of his fine residence property at 431 South Sixth Street.
On the 27th of February 1870, was solemnized the
marriage of Mr. Ketter to Miss Emma Frouein, daughter
of the late Frederick Frouein, a prosperous farmer of Scioto
County. Of the five children of this ideal union the eldest is
John W., who is secretary and treasurer of the Ketter
Buggy Company; Frederick M., who is superintendent in the
factory of the same company, married Flora Crum, and they
have one child; Henry, who is a carriage trimmer by trade and
vocation, and who now resides in the City of San Francisco,
California, married Miss Blanche Rowe; Miss Nora holds
the position of stenographer in the office of the Ketter
Buggy Company; and Minnie is a student in the Ironton public
schools.
Source: A Standard History of The Hanging Rock Iron Region of
Ohio, Vol. II - Illustrated - Published by The Lewis Publishing
Company, 1916 - Page 648 |
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