Genesee County MI Archives Biographies.....Stage, Milton B. 1824 - 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com January 24, 2008, 12:30 pm

Author: Chapman Bros. (1892)

MILTON B. STAGE. This intelligent and prominent gentleman, whose residence is at
Clio, Genesee County, is now the County Surveyor. He was born May 4, 1824, in
Stafford, Genesee County, N. Y., and his father, James Stage, was born August 3,
1791, in Sussex County, N. J. He was a farmer by occupation and owned a
beautiful estate of one hundred acres in Genesee County, N. Y., where his life
closed June 3, 1860. He served for two years in the War of 1812, entering the
army as a private and being promoted to a Lieutenancy. He took part in the
engagement of Ft. Erie and Lundy's Lane and when Gen. Scott was wounded he was
one of the twelve who helped to carry him off the field and take him to Batavia.
He was a large and powerful man, six feet in height and weighed two hundred and
ten pounds. He drew bounty land and a pension from the Government, on account of
disability incurred in the service. His political connection was with the
Democratic party.

  The mother of our subject was Mary, daughter of Joel Butler, a Revolutionary
patriot, who commanded a privateer during that war, which vessel was captured by
the British, and he and his crew were taken to England and suffered untold
agonies in prison. He was so disabled by the treatment he received that he lived
only a few years after his release. His daughter, Mrs. Stage, died December 10,
1856.

  In the days when Peter Stage, the grandfather of our subject, began pioneering
in Genesee County, N. Y., in 1800, he took up enough land to give each of his
children one hundred acres. Indians and wild beasts then abounded and the Indian
language was commonly spoken. The family had some narrow escapes from wolves and
bears, who were so bold as to steal hogs out of the pen near the house.

  Our subject is the eldest child in a family of three and spent his early days
upon his father's farm. He took a three years' course of study in the seminary
at Lima, N. Y., making a specialty of civil engineering and surveying, under
that eminent mathematician, George C. Whitlock. After graduating he was for two
years assistant engineer on what is now called the Pennsylvania Northern Central
Railroad. In this work he acquired a good reputation for skill and received
quite a recommendation from the chief engineer of the road.

  In 1854, when Milton Stage was thirty years old, he came to Michigan and
settled upon a tract of three hundred and twenty acres of land, which his father
located in 1836 and which the son had visited in 1842. This is now one of the
best farms in Vienna Township. The marriage of this young-man had taken place
October 30, 1845, his bride being Rosabelle Dorothy, daughter of John Cooper, an
English physician and surgeon. Mrs. Stage was born in Devonshire, England, and
came to the United States when she was twelve years old. Her first child died in
infancy unnamed. Mary E., who was born December 28, 1849, is now Mrs. Charles B.
Mann; Sarah L., born March 6,1852, has married William A. Humphrey; Rosabella
M., born July 6, 1857, is now Mrs. Lucius W. Stewart; Frank E., born March 12,
1859, died in his twentieth year; James, born January 15, 1867, died in early
childhood. The parents of this family are devoted members of the Congregational
Church at Clio.

  Our subject is a member of the Masonic fraternity and also of the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows and in political matters is a Democrat. Since 1861 he has
been County Surveyor several times and his repeated re-elections speak well for
his personal popularity in a strongly Republican county. He has collected a vast
amount of Indian relics and curios from all over the world, constituting a
museum of no small merit. He has done a vast amount of surveying in this section
of the State, having done considerable work for Beers & Co., when they made a
map of Genesee County in 1873, and also for the last county atlas that was
brought out in 1889, besides making surveys for Geil & Jones, who made a wall
map of Genesee County in 1859.


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

Portrait and Biographical Record of Genesee, Lapeer and Tuscola Counties,
Michigan, Containing Biographical Sketches of Prominent and Representative
Citizens, Together with Biographies of all the Governors of the State, and of
the Presidents of the United States

Chicago:
Chapman Bros.
1892

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