Grundy County IL Archives Biographies.....Wheeler, George E ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/il/ilfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Deb Haines ddhaines@gmail.com March 25, 2006, 12:57 pm Author: Bio/Gen Record LaSalle/Grundy 1900 George E. Wheeler George E. Wheeler, of Mazon, Illinois, is one of the prominent and influential citizens of Grundy county, where he is also one of the most substantial and prosperous farmers. The Wheeler family, of which he is a representative, comes of the Old Puritan New England stock. The remote founders of the family in America came from England in the days of Puritan emigration from that country. The following account of the genealogy of the family is taken from a memorandum left by the late Henry H. Wheeler, father of George E. Wheeler. Thomas Wheeler, the great-great-grandfather of the immediate subject of this sketch, was the first of the name of whom we have any record. He died while returning from the French and Indian war at Fite Miller tavern, near Pine Plains, Columbia county, New York, September 1, 1757. He is believed to have had a brother Solomon and they are thought to have lived at Woodbury, Connecticut, until 1749. Seth Wheeler, a son of Thomas and great-grandfather of George E. Wheeler, was born February 22, 1749, and was a captain in the patriot service in the Revolutionary war. He married Mary Treadwell, born November 23, 1751, and they had children as follows: Thomas, born September 3, 1776; Mary, born September 25, 1778, who married S. Truesdale; Thomas, born January 31. 1781; Sarah, born June 10, 1783, who married John Truesdale; Lucy, born February 13, 1786, who married John Gilbert; Stephen, born June 6, 1789, died May 9, 1861, aged seventy-one years, eleven months and three days; Solomon, born July 25, 1793, died May 7, 1852. Myron Wheeler, a son of Seth, Jr., married Catherine Roe and was killed in the battle of Buena Vista in the Mexican war. Stephen, a son of Seth Wheeler, born Jun 6, 1789, was married March 30, 1818, to Maria Powers, born October 20, 1795, and their children were as follows: Henry Harrison, born January 28, 1820; Mary, born March 8, 1822; Frederick Powers, born June 4, 1824; Richard Nelson, born February 21, 1826; John, born March 25, 1828; Frances, born April 10, 1830, who died February 18, 1832; Caroline F., born February 1, 1832, and died January 28, 1889; Sarah J., born September 28, 1834, who died March 14, 1835; Franklin, born February 20, 1836, who died November 24, 1863; Sarah J., born July 16, 1840; Helen D. (twin of Sarah J.) who married Edward C. Moody, November 26, 1862, and died June 24, 1879. Stephen died May 9, 1861, Maria, his wife, January 4, 1875. Henry Harrison Wheeler (a son of Stephen and Maria (Powers) Wheeler and Amanda R. Simmons were married October 16, 1849; Richard N. Wheeler and Lucy J. Wilson were married March 30, 1851; Sarah J. Wheeler and George W. Mersereau were married November 10, 1861. Maria Powers, who married Stephen Wheeler, was the daughter of Frederick Powers, who was born March 31, 1765, and died December 21, 1831. He married Ruth Pennoyer, who was born February 25, 1767, and died July 16, 1853. The children of Frederick and Ruth (Pennoyer) Powers were as follows: Lucy, born October 4, 1779, who died October 2, 1803; David, born May 30, 1791, who died August 24, 1849; Talbot, born August 28, 1793, who died November 28, 1874; Maria, born October 20, 1795, who died June 4, 1875; Julia A., born May 18, 1797, who died June 6, 1875; George, born December 27, 1798, who died September 21, 1803; Caroline F., born March 3, 1801, who died November 9, 1888; Lydia, born September 16, 1802, who died June 19, 1883; William, born August 27, 1804, who died September 30, 1085; Frances W., born December 22, 1806; Charlotte J., born December 22, 1810. Stephen Wheeler, grandfather of George E. Wheeler, became a farmer, but in early life was a carpenter. He owned a farm of two hundred acres in Broome county, New York, where he died. Henry H. Wheeler, a son of Stephen and Maria (Powers) Wheeler, was born in Dutchess county, New York, January 28, 1820. He received a good education for the time, primarily in the common schools, and finishing his studies at a seminary located on his father's farm in which his father was a stockholder. Mr. Wheeler was throughout his life a wide reader of good books and kept well up with the times. He married, in Broome county, New York, October 16, 1849, Amanda Simmons, who was born October 6, 1822, in Dutchess county, New York, a daughter of William and Clarissa (Roe) Simmons. William Simmons was born August 7, 1785, in Dutchess county, New York. He was the son of Nicholas Simmons, of sturdy Holland-Dutch stock, and the grandson of Peter Simmons, who came from Holland in the eighteenth century and settled in the northern part of Dutchess county, or possibly in the adjoining county of Columbia, New York. Nicholas Simmons married Katrina Snyder, also of Holland-Dutch stock and born on the farm adjoining his father's. They had ten children - four boys and six girls - named Katrina, William, Henry, Anna, John, Charity, Hannah, Betsy, Polly and Anthony. Nicholas Simmons lived to be nearly eighty years old and died in Broome county, New York. In politics he was a Democrat. William Simmons, the father of Mrs. Henry H. Wheeler, was a soldier in the United States Army in the war of 1812 and came near death from yellow fever while in the service. He was a prosperous farmer, entirely a self-made man of upright character and a remarkable physical constitution. He was twice married, the first time to Clarissa Roe, in 1813, in the town of North East, Dutchess county, New York, where she was born March 7, 1794, a daughter of Silas and Mercy (Harvey) Roe. They settled on the Roe farm in Dutchess county, and lived there about ten years, and there she died September 13, 1827. For his second wife he married Wealthy Roe, her cousin, who bore him two daughters: Clarissa, December 8, 1832; and Laura, December 31, 1833. By his first wife (Clarissa Roe) there were born five children. The eldest of these, Harvey R., born September 28, 1814, married Almira Marsh, who died January 2, 1889. They had two children who lived: Eugene W., born in 1840; and Rollin, born in 1846. Edward, the second son of William and Clarissa (Roe) Simmons, was born April 14, 1816, and was twice married, first to Harriet Winchell. His second wife was Sarah (Mead) Trowbridge. There were two children by the first marriage: Alfred, who lived to be twenty-two years of age; and James, who died when two years old. Of Edward Simmons more than a passing notice should be given. He lives at Millerton, Dutchess county, New York, near where he was born, and is one of the oldest lawyers in that part of the state, having reached the venerable age of eighty-three years. He is distinguished for his prominence at the bar, his educational work and for long activity in public affairs. In the winter of 1832-3, he began teaching school in Lime Rock, Connecticut, and from that time until 1848 he followed that occupation with marked success. In 1838-9 he taught a school of high grade at Greene, Chenango county, New York, and from there went to Great Barrington, Massachusetts, teaching Latin and Greek and the higher English branches. In 1843 he returned to Millerton and with Alexander Winchell, afterward prominent as a geologist and long a conspicuous member of the faculty of the University of Michigan, opened a private school. Mr. Simmons built the store in Millerton now occupied by James Finch, and engaged in a general merchandise business there, which he conducted twenty- five years and then transferred to Mr. Finch, who had been his clerk for fifteen years. In 1867 Mr. Simmons was admitted to the bar. He has been a successful lawyer and is a member of the New York State Bar Association and still gives some attention to legal matters. He was the financial secretary of the New York state constitutional convention in 1867, of which William A. Wheeler was the president and Samuel J. Tilden, Horace Greeley and other well known men of the time were members. He filled the office of supervisor for five terms, and was the chairman of the board for one term, and he was a member of the committee which appeared before the state board of assessors and secured a reduction in the assessment of Dutchess county, which in three years saved the tax-payers two hundred thousand dollars. He is an advocate of good schools and favors every local improvement. Politically he was a free-soil Democrat in early years, but voted for Fremont in 1856, and since that time has been a Republican. He has been a member of the Baptist church for sixty- four years, and is a member of the Masonic fraternity. (The above sketch of Edward W. Simmons was taken from a Dutchess county (New York) newspaper.) Julia A., a daughter of William and Clarissa (Roe) Simmons, was born February 5, 1819, married Lewis W. Barnes and died in September, 1851, leaving a daughter, Eva Julia, born August 27, 1846. Amanda, another of their daughters, who married Henry H. Wheeler, will be noticed more at length further on. James Barlow Simmons, the fifth and last in the family, was born April 17, 1827, and married Mary Stephens, and they were the parents of Dr. Robert Stephens Simmons. William Simmons, the father of the above mentioned children, died in Dutchess county, New York, July 14, 1868. Silas Roe, the father of Clarissa (Roe) Simmons, was an Englishman and a man of means, who owned a farm at North East, Dutchess county, which contained three hundred acres valued at one hundred dollars an acre. He died on the place, at a venerable age. His children were Uzziel, Annie, Jeduthun, Laura, Julia, Caroline, Amos, Clarissa, Lyman, Harvey, Harmon, Julia, Alvah and Amanda. Mr. and Mrs. Henry H. Wheeler, parents of George E. Wheeler, moved to Illinois in May, 1850, not long after their marriage. They came to Chicago by way of the lakes, and thence penetrated the state as far as Morris. They settled on the farm where the immediate subject of the sketch now lives, then consisting of one hundred and sixty acres, on which had been built a double log house. A small crop had been put in. Mr. Wheeler paid five hundred dollars for the place and improved it and made it a good home farm. In political opinion he was a stanch Republican, and one of the original members of the party, having voted for John C. Fremont. As a citizen he was honored, respected, and influential in the township. A friend of good schools, he was for many years a member of the board of education; and he also held the office of assessor in his township. In early life he was inclined to military affairs and held the office of lieutenant in a militia company in New York. He was one of the respected pioneers of Grundy county because of his strong, fearless, outspoken character and his upright and straightforward treatment of every one. An old neighbor said of him: "He was always honest and fair. He was independent in thought and always frank in his expression of his views." Mr. and Mrs. Henry H. Wheeler were the proud parents of three children: George E., born February 20, 1851; Elmer E., born September 18, 1860, who died March 13, 1862; and Clara May, born January 20, 1863. Mr. Wheeler died January 27, 1897, at this residence in Morris, where he had lived since May, 1873. Mrs. Wheeler is yet living, a venerable lady of excellent memory and much beloved for her high character. Their daughter, Clara May, married Abraham J. Neff, January 21, 1891, and has two children: Mae A., born in 1891; Paul A., born in 1892; and Dorothy, born in 1899. George E. Wheeler is one of the oldest continuous residents of Grundy county. He was born on the Wheeler homestead in Mazon township, where he now lives, and was brought up to farming among the pioneers and can well remember many of them. His education was obtained in the common schools of the county. In the fall of 1869 he was given a certificate as a school-teacher, by the late Hiram C. Goold, then county superintendent of schools. He taught school four winters, working the remainder of the year on the farm. Having received his education and taught in the schools of his neighborhood he fully realizes the necessity of better schools, so that the youth who has to acquire an education in this manner may have every opportunity. He is in favor of paying liberal wages to teachers, -- enough to secure the highest ability, so that all the preparatory branches and even some of the higher courses might be taught in the home schools. He has been a school trustee for ten years. He married, October 11, 1871, in Good Farm township, Grundy county, Illinois, Mary J. Keepers, who was born March 16, 1854, in Guernsey county, Ohio, a daughter of Israel J. and Mary (Kimble) Keepers. Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler settled on the Wheeler homestead and by steady thrift and industry have prospered and now own a fine and fertile farm and most attractive homestead. Their home place consists of two hundred acres, and their other farm, in the same section, contains one hundred and twenty acres. Mr. Wheeler has served his fellow townsmen as supervisor well and faithfully. The following is an extract from the Morris Herald: "He (Mr. Wheeler) was fist elected in 1885, serving two terms. He was again elected in the spring of 1889, and he has served continuously, succeeding himself, since that time. He has been chairman of the board during five years of this long service. In politics he is always a Republican." When Mr. Wheeler first became a member of the board of supervisors, a levy of forty thousand dollars was required to pay running expenses and indebtedness. He has seen a business policy developed, and has helped develop it, until this has been materially reduced. At one time county officers were allowed to retain all the fees of their offices, and in one case this amounted to three thousand seven hundred and fifty dollars per annum. Mr. Wheeler was an advocate, and aided in the adoption, of such legislation by the board as to allow officers a reasonable salary for services, and providing for an accounting of fees earned to the county. He occupies an enviable place in the esteem of the people of Grundy county, owing to his services in securing favorable action toward the care of the poor of the county by one person. It was Mr. Wheeler who wrote and presented the resolution to the board, which was adopted, providing for the appointment of a county agent for the poor. He has long since been of the opinion, from his actual knowledge of the work, that better relief could be afforded in this matter, and more economically, under the supervision of one person, and the people at large better protected. There seems little question now of the wisdom of Mr. Wheeler's foresight. It has created a reform which has saved the people thousands of dollars a year, and yet has taken care of every needy case of want or suffering in the county, weeding out impostors and others who preferred to accept a public charity rather than work. In matters of reform Mr. Wheeler is sometimes termed radical, yet his years of experience have proven of great value to the people at large, and the measures he has advocated, as a rule, have resulted satisfactorily. Mr. Wheeler is the president of the Vienna Township Mutual Insurance Company, which is chartered to do business in the townships of Vienna, Highland, Norman, Good Farm, Mazon and Wauponsee. The company has over six hundred dollars in policies in force and he has been one of its nine directors of the company for many years. He also is an earnest advocate of good roads and believes in the policy of beginning at once to improve the roads and doing as much as is consistent with the means at hand and in a practical and economical manner. No man is more favorably regarded in Grundy county than George E. Wheeler, and he has fairly won the high esteem in which he is held by his honest efforts in behalf of the people. The children of George E. and Mary J. (Keepers) Wheeler are Effie Pearl, born March 11, 1877, and Vernon, born July 23, 1886. Mrs. Wheeler and her daughter are members of the Baptist church. Samuel Keepers, a great-grandfather of Mrs. George E. Wheeler, of the old colonial stock, was the owner of a good farm in Chester county, Pennsylvania, where he lived and died. He married Ann Hayes, of Pennsylvania, and had children as follows: John, Joseph H., Kate, Elizabeth and Jane. After his death his wife (Ann) married again and had one daughter, Ann. Joseph H. Keepers, a son of Samuel and grandfather of Mrs. George E. Wheeler, was born in Chester county, Pennsylvania. He married, in that county, Hannah P. Jordan and they moved to western Pennsylvania and settled in Beaver county. About 1830 they moved to Guernsey county, Ohio, with teams. There he was a pioneer and became a substantial farmer. A member of the Baptist church, he was a straightforward, honorable man of the highest Christian character. His children were Phoebe A., William, Sarah J., Israel J., Joseph, Mary E., Hannah M., Philena and Henrietta. Mrs. Joseph H. Keepers died April 28, 1873, aged sixty-eight, at the home of her daughter, Mrs. Hannah M. Warnock, in Iroquois county, Illinois. Mr. Keepers died in Guernsey county, Ohio, December 6, 1842, scarcely past middle age. Israel Jordan Keepers, the father of Mrs. Wheeler, went with his parents to Guernsey county, Ohio, in 1830, when he was about seven years old. There he received a good common-school education and married, in Jefferson township, August 22, 1850, Mary Kimble, a daughter of Adam and Ann Marie (Huffman) Kimble. Adam was the son of Nathan and Betsy (Davis) Kimble. Nathan Kimble was born in Germany. He came to America, settled in New Jersey and served his adopted country seven years and six months in the Revolutionary war. He afterward located in Washington county, Pennsylvaniaa. From there he came to Guernsey county, Ohio, as a pioneer in 1810, and took up and improved government land. He died in 1824 and is buried in Jefferson township, Guernsey county. He was elected a justice of the peace in 1816 and was the first to hold that office in Guernsey county. In 1817 he was the chairman of the meeting to organize Jefferson township. Nathan Kimble's children were Adam, William, Washington, Robert, Jane and Mary. His first wife, Betsy, nee Davis, died in Guernsey county, Ohio, and he married Rebecca _______, and their children were Nathan George, Cyrus, Matilda, and Sarah A. Nathan Kimble's farm was known as Congress Field and was a fine property. In the early Indian troubles the family frequently took refuge in a rude blockhouse which stood close by their cabin. Mr. Kimble had a claim to land near Winchester, Ohio, by virtue of a soldier's warrant for his services in the Revolutionary war. Adam Kimble, Nathan Kimble's oldest child, was born in New Jersey, in 1794, and married Ann Marie Huffman, who was born October 15, 1800, and died in 1878. She was of sturdy Pennsylvania-Dutch stock, a daughter of John and Betsy (McClellan) Huffman, natives of that state. John Huffman was a pioneer in Guernsey county, Ohio, before 1800, from "The Glades" of Washington county, Pennsylvania. The Huffmans were originally from Germany. John Huffman cleared his forest farm and became a well-to-do and substantial farmer. He lived to be about seventy years old and died in Ohio, a member of the Presbyterian church. John and Elizabeth (McClellan) Huffman were the parents of children named George, Joseph, Abraham, Benjamin, John, Elizabeth and Mary. Adam Kimble was a soldier in the war of 1812. After his marriage to Ann Marie Huffman he settled in Jefferson township, Guernsey county, Ohio, and owned in time the fine property called Congress Field, besides much other land, and was considered well off. His children were Elizabeth, Rebecca, Delilah, Davis, Huffman, William, Jane, Mary, Sallie, Eliza, Nancy, George, Nathan and Robert. The latter died in infancy. All the others lived to grow up. Nancy died, aged twenty-two years. The others, eight of whom are living, all reared families. Adam Kimble died January 4, 1862, as the result of a fall the previous New Year's eve. His wife lived to be seventy-eight years old. They were members of the Baptist church. Israel J. Keepers settled in Guernsey county, Ohio, on the old Keepers home property, which consisted of two hundred and twenty-five acres of land and a sawmill, which he owned in partnership with his brother Joseph. In September, 1864, he enlisted in Company I, One Hundred and Seventy-sixth Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry, for three years or during the war, and was honorably discharged at the close of the struggle. His regiment was stationed at Nashville, Tennessee. He came to Grundy county, Illinois, and settled in Good Farm township in 1866, and bought one hundred and twenty-three acres of land. This farm was well improved and he lived on it until 1883. At that time he bought another farm in the same township but never occupied it as a residence. He retired in 1884 and for some years lived at Gardner, Illinois. He died at the home of his daughter, Mrs. Carried Taylor, at Mazon, Illinois, October 3, 1892, aged about sixty-three years. He was a member of the Baptist church, in which he was for many years an elder, and his official place in the church was filled by his son, William I. Politically he was a stanch Republican. A friend of education, he was long a school director, and he was a much trusted man of fine business capacity and was the administrator of several estates and executor of a number of wills. His children are William I., Mary J., Joseph H., Caroline, Hannah Myrtle and Olive W. Mrs. Keepers, his widow, who was born June 17, 1831, is a lady of intelligence and greatly beloved by all for her many good qualities of head and heart. It is said of her that "she is mother to all." This is true especially in times of sickness and trouble. Her home is now with her children. Additional Comments: Source: Biographical and Genealogical Record of La Salle and Grundy County, Illinois, Volume 11, Chicago, 1900, p416-424 File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/il/grundy/bios/wheeler15gbs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/ilfiles/ File size: 22.9 Kb