Vermilion county Illinois,JOHN H. PARRISH ==================================================================== Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives Joy Fisher ==================================================================== p. 261-262 JOHN H. PARRISH has for twenty years or more been one of the leading men of Sidell Township. As a farmer he is skillful and successful, has a comfortable and beautiful home, and is genial and hospitable in his manner, gaining the good will of all with whom he comes in contact. He is considerable of a politician, and in 1879 was elected Highway Commissioner for a term of three years. He was re-elected in 1885, and served another term. Prior to his assuming the duties of this office the Commissioners had contracted for a large amount of road grading, and unwisely involved the township in debt to the amount of $4,000. By careful management on the part of Mr. Parrish this sum has been greatly reduced, so that the township finances are placed upon a sound basis. Our subject was born May 7, 1839, in Coshocton County, Ohio. There his early life was spent, and as his brother had left the parental roof when about sixteen years old, John naturally assumed the principal charge of the homestead. To this he brought a bride in 1864, being married that year to Miss Elizabeth Donnelly. This lady was a native of his own county—in fact they had grown up together from childhood. They resided in Ohio until after the birth of two children, coming to this county in 1868. In the meantime the brother, Joseph Parrish, had become owner of a large farm, a part of which our subject rented, and upon which he operated with success. He, however, with many others at the time suffered greatly from ague, a disease common among the early settlers, before the land had been sufficiently cultivated to do away with miasma. The first purchase of our subject in this county was eighty acres, the nucleus of his present homestead, and to which he added until he had 200 acres. He put up a fine dwelling in 1888, and has brought his land to a good state of cultivation. To him and his estimable wife there were born nine interesting children, the eldest of whom, a daughter, Giula, is the wife of Joseph Thompson, of Sidell Township; Melvin P. remains at the homestead; Charles died when eighteen months old: Horace C., Allie, Grace, and Harley are at home. Belle died at the age of eighteen months, and Grover C. died when an infant. Mr. Parrish votes with the Democracy, and is quite prominent in local politics, frequently serving as a delegate to the county conventions. He has also served on the Circuit, Petit, and Grand Juries, and has officiated as School Director for a period of fifteen years. James and Lania (Hardman) Parrish, the parents of our subject, were natives respectively of Belmont and Coschocton counties, Ohio. The Parrishes were originally from Pennsylvania, in which State the mother's family also flourished quite numerously at an early day. The parents were married in Kosciusko County, where the father successfully pursued his trade of carpenter and joiner, and lived to be seventy-two years old. The mother died when our subject was a lad of seven, leaving besides himself, an older brother, Joseph, and a sister younger, Hannah, now Mrs. W. B. Shane, who lives in Smithfield, Ohio.