Champaign County IL Archives Biographies.....Cunningham, Judge J O 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Celia Snyder cgsnyder@uiuc.edu September 1999

Biography of Judge J O CUNNINGHAM, Champaign County, Illinois

From:  "History of Champaign County, Illinois with Illustrations," 1878

JUDGE J. O. CUNNINGHAM

Was born in Lancaster, Erie county, New York, December 12th, 1830, and is
the eldest child of Hiram N. and Eunice (BROWN) CUNNINGHAM. Mrs. Cunningham
was a member of the Brown family of Vermont. Her grandfather erected and
carried on the first carding and fulling mill in the then Colony of
Vermont, prior to the revolutionary war.

Hiram was descended from the Cunningham family, of Connecticut, who settled
there in the latter half of the seventeenth century. His ancestors bore a
patriotic part in the struggle for American liberty. As a family, they have
distinguished themselves for their integrity and purity of character, as
well as for their intellectual and moral culture. Hiram Cunningham, when a
lad, removed, with his parents, in 1810, to what was known as the "Holland
Purchase," Erie county, New York. Here his days were spent on a farm, until
he attained his majority, when he removed to Huron county, O., and engaged
in farming. He continued to reside in that county until his death, which
occurred in 1866.

J. O. CUNNINGHAM, when a boy, had such opportunities for acquiring an
education as the district schools of the neighborhood afforded. When about
the age of nineteen, he became a student of the Baldwin Institute, at
Berea, Ohio, and subsequently matriculated at Oberlin College. During a
portion of the collegiate years he taught school, and in the fall of 1852
removed to Vermilion county, Indiana, and taught a school at Eugene. There
he began the study of law.

He became a resident of Urbana, Illinois, June 18th, 1853, and soon after
purchased the Urbana Union, it being the first and only paper published in
Champaign county at that time.

In 1859, he graduated at the Union Law College at Cleveland, Ohio, and on
the first of day of May the same year he became a partner of Judge Sim in
the practice of his profession. That partnership lasted five years.

In 1861, Mr. Cunningham was elected county judge, the duties of which
office he discharged with ability for one term of four years.

In 1867, he was appointed, by Governor Oglesby, a member of the Board of
Trustees of the Illinois Industrial University, and served very efficiently
until 1873. After his judicial term expired, he resumed more fully the
practice of his profession.

In 1869, he became a partner with W. B. Webber, Esq., in the practice of
the law, which partnership continued until 1876.

In politics, the Judge was formerly a member of the Republican party. In
1874, he became a Greenbacker, and is now identified with the National
party.

He was married October 13th, 1853, to Miss Mary McCONOUGHEY, daughter of
Colonel Porter D. McCONOUGHEY, of Bainbridge, Granger county, Ohio. They
are both members of the M. E. Church.


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