J. R. Gibbs, Winn Parish, Louisiana Contributed by Greggory E. Davies 120 Ted Price Lane Winnfield, LA 71483 ********************************************** Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ********************************************** TIPS FOR SEARCHING RECORDS ON THE INTERNET Netscape & Ms Explorer users: If searching for a particular surname, locality or date while going through the records in the archives or anywhere....try these few steps: 1. Go to the top of the report you are searching. 2. Click on EDIT at the top of your screen 3. Next click on FIND in the edit menu. 4. When the square pops up, enter what you are looking for in the FIND WHAT ___________blank. 5. Click on DIRECTION __DOWN. 6. And last click on FIND NEXT and continue to click on FIND NEXT until you reach the end of the report.This should highlight the item that you indicated in "find what" every place it appears in the report. You must continue to click on FIND NEXT till you reach the end of the report to see all of the locations of the item indicated. John R. Gibbs Is one of the proprietors of the Lands Lumber and Manufacturing Company. The family is English. His father is John R. Gibbs, was an English sailor for many years; seven years with the British Navy. He came to the United States early in 1874, and settled in Lincoln, Nebraska. He married Miss Annie Hanley in Liverpool, England in 1873. They had three children and later in life he handled building supplies. He died in Malvern, Ark., Feb., 1903. Mr. Gibbs himself was born in Lincoln, Neb., Oct. 3, 1874, where he grew up and where he was educated, graduating in the schools. Jan. 17, 1898 he married Miss Isabella Shea. They have two children, aged nine and seven, an elegant home in Winnfield, other property as well as a good business. The Lands Lumber and Manufacturing Company is one of the very useful institutions in this section. Mr. Gibbs came from Arkansas to Winn Parish three years ago, but has been active indeed since then. he says "our futures is brighter than we can anticipate," and that our schools and churches are to grow endlessly. "We are enjoying marvelous prosperity from our timber now. This will give way later," says Mr. Gibbs, "and good roads and agriculture development will ensue, and through them a civilization will develop that must outshine our present wildest visions." Mr. Gibbs is strictly a skilled workman and man of affairs. Motto: "Golden Rule." (The above article was copied from The Guardian newspaper, Vol. XXVII, No. 8-9, published September-October, 1907 at Winnfield, LA., and is on file at the Watson Memorial Library, Cammie Henry Archives, Northwestern State University, Natchitoches, LA., submitted by Greggory Ellis Davies, Winnfield, LA.) John Robert Gibbs John Robert Gibbs, the present (1924) mayor of the fine little city of Winnfield, judicial center for Winn Parish, has shown in his administration of the municipal government the same progressiveness and loyalty that have marked his course in business affairs. He is a representative of the Standard Oil Company in the distribution of its products, and has made his influence potent in both business and civic affairs in his home city and parish. Mr. Gibbs claims Lincoln, the fair capital city of Nebraska, as the place of his nativity, and his birth there occurred October 3, 1874. He is a son of John R., Sr., and Hanna Hermely Gibbs, who were born and reared in England, whose marriage was there solemnized and who thence came to the United States in the year 1873. John R. Gibbs established the family home in Lincoln, Nebraska, when that city was little more than a village, and there he built up a prosperous business as a house decorator, a vocation in which he was specially skilled. In this connection he there decorated a house for Hon. William Jennings Bryan, who was then an aspiring young lawyer. He also did decorating work in the old main building of the University of Nebraska. Six of his brothers likewise came to the United States, and here all gained substantial success. John R. Gibbs, Sr., espoused the cause of the republican party after he became a naturalized citizen of the United States, but he so admired the sterling characteristics of William Jennings Bryan that he voted for that great commoner when he became democratic candidate for president of the United States. From Nebraska Mr. Gibbs eventually removed to Malvern, Arkansas, where he purchased land and developed a fine fruit farm. There he passed the remainder of his life, and he was seventy-seven years of age at the time of his death, in 1903, his widow, now (1924) seventy-seven years of age, being a resident of Seattle, Washington. It is worthy of special note that Mrs. Gibbs was somewhat more than sixty years of age when she learned to swim, her initial experience having been in the waters of the Puget Sound and she having gained much adeptness. John R. Gibbs had served on a Confederate war vessel, the Alabama, under Admiral Semmes, in the Civil War, he having enlisted for such service at Liverpool, England, where this vessel was built. Thus he had visited the United States prior to the time when he came hither to establish a permanent home, as noted in a preceding paragraph. Mr. Gibbs had studied deeply the agnostic works of Paine and Ingersoll, but his faith in Christian doctrines finally prevailed, and he scrupulously required his children to attend Sunday School with regularity. He is survived by three sons, of whom John R., Jr., of this review, is the eldest; Charles W. is a successful electrical contractor in the City of Portland, Oregon; R. H. as a telegraph operator was in the United States Signal Service in the Phillipine Islands seventeen years. He has followed the photographing business, and as a baloonist he formerly gave exhibitions before the public, he being now a resident of Seattle, Washington. John R. Gibbs attended the public schools of Lincoln, Nebraska, and Malvern, Arkansas, and as a young man he became identified with public work as a millwright and machinist. he was bor two years foreman in a planing mill of the Malvern Lumber Company, passed the ensuing three years in similar service in the Lewis Werner saw mill at Sayre, Arkansas, and thereafter he was for two years master mechanic for a lumber company at Pike City, Arkansas. In 1904 Mr. Gibbs established a machine shop at Winnfield, Louisiana and after operating this eighteen months he was for four years associated with the Louisiana Saw Mill Company at Whitford. He next gave three years to the management of the Winnfield ice and electric plant, and since 1913 he has here been the representative of the Standard Oil Company. Mr. Gibbs organized the volunteer fire department of Winnfield, and has been continuously its chief, always ready for active and effective service. His popularity in his home city has been shown in this prolonged service as its mayor. He was thus the head of municipal government in 1916-1917, was again in service in 1922-1923, and by reelection in 1924 he is still the valued incumbent of this office. Mr. Gibbs and his family are zealous members of the Presbyterian Church at Winnfield, and he holds in the same the office of deacon. He is a past master of the local lodge of Free and Accepted Masons, a past high priest of the Chapter of Royal Arch Masons, and is now captain general of Winnfield Commandery of Knights Templars, and is affiliated also with Scottish Rite Bodies and the Mystic Shrine. He has membership also in the Woodmen of the World. In 1896, at Malvern, Arkansas, Mr. Gibbs wedded Miss Isabel Shea, who was born at Bowerston, Ohio, her father having been a native of Ireland and having eventually changed the spelling of his surname from O'Shea to Shea. Mr. and Mrs. Gibbs have two children, Nellie is the wife of J. A. Taylor, who is an ice-cream manufacturer at Homer, Louisiana, both he and his wife being graduates of the University of Louisiana. At the university Mr. Taylor became a member of the Students Army Training Corps at the time of the World War, and he was preparing to enter service at Camp Taylor, in the Officers Training Camp, when the war came to a close. Charles B. Gibbs was graduated from Louisiana State University in 1922, and is a sugar engineer. He is to assume active control of his father's business in Winnfield, and his father will have taken a place in the office of the fire marshall in New Orleans before this publication is issued from the press. Charles B. Gibbs married Mrs. Elizabeth Scott, of Rayville, Richland Parish. (The above was extracted from "A History of Louisiana" by Henry E. Chambers, 1925. Submitted by Greggory Ellis Davies, Winnfield, Winn Parish, La.)