Lake County IN Archives Biographies.....Pierce, Floyd M. 1873 - 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com December 10, 2006, 1:16 pm

Author: T. H. Ball (1904)

FLOYD M. PIERCE.

    Floyd M. Pierce is the eldest child of Marion F. and Maggie (Randolph)
Pierce, whose biographies as prominent citizens of Lake county are given on
other pages of this history. The son has himself found a broad field of
usefulness in his native county, and Ross township has especial reason to be
proud and grateful for his sterling and public-spirited citizenship and his
loyalty to all that concerns the general welfare. Both now and in later years
his work for the educational interests of the township will be cherished and
held up as one of his most important achievements. As trustee of the township he
has given a far more than ordinary or perfunctory attention to the practical
matters of education, and every child of school age is receiving more or less
benefit from the enlarged educational opportunities which have been so largely
the result of his endeavor and ambition along these lines.

    This leading young business man and public official of Ross township was
born in the township and county of his present residence, on May 25, 1873. He
was educated in the public schools and the Northern Indiana Normal School at
Valparaiso, after which he taught school for two years, from which experience
his later work for the schools has received the greater stamp of practicality
and effective direction. He was also appointed to the office of postmaster of
Merrillville for a term of four years, and at the present time is successfully
engaged in the coal business at this town.

    Politically Mr. Pierce follows his father in adhering stanchly to Democratic
principles. He was elected to the office of trustee of Ross township in 1900,
and still holds that important office. During his term he has had the oversight
of the construction of three schoolhouses and has otherwise been a leader in
local affairs. He was directly concerned with the erection of the beautiful high
school building at Merrillville., which is an honor to the town, the township
and county, and shows how thoroughly this section of northwestern Indiana is
living up to the reputation for high educational ideals established for the
entire state of Indiana. The high school is seventy-four feet front and
thirty-six feet wide., has two stories and a seven-foot basement, is built of
stone and pressed brick, is heated by two furnaces, contains four large rooms,
and is finished throughout after the most modern style of school architecture
and educational equipments. The total cost of this permanent and model structure
was seven thousand dollars, and its durability and thoroughness of construction
are its chief points of economy, and it is altogether a credit to the taxpayers
of the community. The rooms are seated with desks of the most approved and
hygienic pattern, there are genuine slate blackboards, speaking tubes, and many
other points of equipment which would astonish the old-time educator of half a
century ago. In 1903 the Merrillville high school held an exhibition of the work
done by the pupils of the manual training department, and the products of their
youthful skill and handiwork were of such high grade that the photos of the
different articles have been sent to St. Louis and are now on exhibition there
at the World's Fair. Prior to the erection of the high school building the
school contained only eight grades, but since Mr. Pierce's administration the
full twelve grades have been instituted and now afford the children of Ross
township unequalled opportunities for public school education. Another act of
his administration has been the discontinuing of three small rural schools and
their consolidation with the central school, the pupils being transported at the
public expense to the school daily, and this has been done with decreased
expenditure for maintenance and with much increased efficiency in the character
of work accomplished.

    Mr. Pierce has fraternal affiliations with the Masonic lodge No. 551 and
with Hobart Tent No. 65 of the Knights of the Maccabees. He was married,
February 16, 1895, to Miss Lillie M. Niksch, and they have three children, Vida,
Myra and the baby. Vida is now in the second grade of her school work. Mrs.
Pierce was born January 25. 1876, and was reared in this county and educated in
the common schools. Her father passed away March 2, 1903, at the age of
seventy-seven, but her mother is still living at the age of seventy-two.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

ENCYCLOPEDIA
OF
Genealogy and Biography
OF
LAKE COUNTY, INDIANA,
WITH A COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY 
1834—1904

A Record of the Achievements of Its People in the Making of a Commonwealth and
the Founding of a Nation.

REV. T. H. BALL
OF CROWN POINT, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
ILLUSTRATED
CHICAGO   NEW YORK
THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
1904


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