Joseph B. Blatterman, Maysville, KY., then Caddo Parish, Louisiana

Submitted by Mike Miller
Date: 1999-2000






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Joseph B. Blatterman, a resident of Shreveport since 1908, has had a 

successful and extended experience in business covering a large portion 

of the south.  Mr. Blatterman and Mrs. Blatterman have both been 

prominent in Shreveport civic and social life.  Both represent old and 

distinguished families in American affairs.



Mr. Blatterman is a grandsons of George Blatterman or Blaetterman, who 

was the first professor engaged for the University of Virginia.  His 

name figures frequently in the correspondence of Thomas Jefferson, who 

concerned himself with every detail in the beginning of that university.  

Many of the first teachers were imported from abroad, and in one letter, 

written in 1821, Jefferson referred to a professor of modern languages 

who would be readily acceptable, "Mr. George Blaetterman, 33 Castle 

Street, Holborn, a German who was acquainted with our countrymen, 

Ticknor and Preston, and highly recommended by them," in 1824 this London 

professor was engaged in and is described as "in the prime of life," 

has a wife and two small children, and they appear amiable and domestic; 

he speaks English well, though not without a foreign accent; but we are 

obliged to encounter every way, as there are no profound English professors 

of the modern language."  Thus George Blaetterman became the first professor 

to arrive at the university, in December, 1824, and continued in the chair 

of modern languages until 1840, when he was retired.  He was a regular 

contributor to magazines of that period, and was an amateur farmer.



The father of Joseph B. Blatterman was George W. Blatterman, who was born 

in 1820, in England, and was a student in the University of Virginia in 

1836-38, and subsequently became a teacher at Maysville, Kentucky.  George 

W. Blatterman married Eleanor Collins, a native of Kentucky, and of 

distinguished Virginia ancestry, a relative of the Monroe, Grayson, Orr, 

Peers and Collins families.  Through his mother Joseph B. Blatterman is 

of Revolutionary ancestry, and for many years he has been a member of the 

Louisiana Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution.  His great-

grandfather Collins was in the Revolutionary war from Virginia and his 

maternal grandmother's father, Maj. Valentine Peers, was an officer of 

the line in the Continental Army.  Mr. Blatterman's maternal ancestors 

have lived in Virginia since 1646.



Joseph B. Blatterman was born at Maysville, Kentucky, in 1862.  He grew 

up and acquired his early education there, and at the age of eighteen went 

West.  For six years he had the experience and training of a cowboy.  

Since then he has made a successful record as a salesman and business man.  

For seven years he was traveling representative for the Murphy Varnish 

Company, and for fourteen years was division manager at Atlanta for the 

Proctor Gamble Soap Company.  On coming to Shreveport in 1908 Mr. Blatterman 

became sales agent in charge of the sales. distribution and service of 

the National Cash Register Company of Dayton, Ohio, handling the products 

of the Dayton company.  His territory is North Louisiana and East Texas.



Mr. Blatterman married Miss Anne Haldeman Escott, daughter of James V. 

Escott, of Louisville, and a prominent member of the Daughters of the 

American Revolution and a niece of the distinguished Kentuckian.  Walter 

N. Haldeman, who for many years was publisher of the Louisville Courier 

Journal.  The Haldeman family lived for a number of years at Maysville, 

Kentucky.  Mrs. Blatterman's principal activities outside of her home and 

family have been in connection with the Old Folks Home at Shreveport.  

She has been its president for several years, and her personal interest 

has in many ways been responsible for the routine administration and also 

the sound spirit of service that characterize that institution.  Mr. and 

Mrs. Blatterman have two children:  Baron E. and  Eleanor.



A History of Louisiana, (vol. 2), p. 133, by Henry E. Chambers.  

Published by The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, 1925.