Hillsdale County MI Archives Photo Tombstone.....Keith, Ozen 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Julie Witkowski JfwSki@hotmail.com July 29, 2007, 2:49 pm

Cemetery:           Goodrich Cemetery (AKA: Keith Or Lane Cemetery)
Name:               Ozen Keith

Date Of Photograph: July 2007
Photo can be seen at:
http://www.usgwarchives.net/mi/hillsdale/photos/tombstones/goodrich/keith111038gph.jpg
Image file size: 227.3 Kb

Born: March 18, 1798
Died: Dec. 27, 1885
h/o Cecelia Stewart, s/o Luke & Martha (Littlefield) Keith, aged 87 years, 9 
months, 9 days

Row 10 (From West End)

Additional Comments:
[The following was taken from the Hillsdale Standard, Tuesday, January 12, 
1886, p. 8]

Another Pioneer Gone

Ozen Keith, one of the pioneers of Hillsdale County, died at his home in 
Pittsford, Dec. 27, 1885 of paralysis, aged 87 years. The deceased was born 
March 18, 1798 in Cummington, Hampshire County, Mass. and at the age of 13, 
his father moved with his family to Winfield, Herkimer County, New York. After 
three years on this place his father died, leaving Ozen the youngest of twelve 
children. Alone with his mother, at the age of sixteen he and his mother 
carried on the farm for two years. Then she sold the farm and securing a house 
for her self and son, he learned the carpenter and joiner trade, at which he 
worked several years, and Nov. 19, 1823, at the age of 25, he married Cecilia 
Stuart, a resident of the same place from her birth in 1805. Here they lived 
till in the spring of 1834 he sold this place and with Daniel Loomis started 
for Michigan to find a home. 

They came to the Bean Creek Valley and settled their farm in Pittsford, 
Hillsdale Co. on section 23, Mr. Keith taking the east half and Mr. Loomis 
taking the northwest quarter. Then they went to work and built Mr. Keith's log 
house in the woods. There was not a tree cut west of them or a house this side 
of Jonesville, and no house nor clearing where Hudson now stands. There were 
two families north of Hudson, Charles Ames and Hiram Kidder. After having 
built the house, they returned for their families, moving on in the fall. They 
arrived at Mr. Keith's house the 4th of October, he bringing his aged mother, 
84 years old along with him, his wife and four children, cutting a road 
through the woods from Hudson to his place. For several years there were no 
doors nor windows to the house and blankets were hung up to keep out wolves 
and other wild animals. Here he cleared land to secure a living for his 
family; had to go to Tecumseh about 30 miles, to mill with an ox team, through 
the woods. 

Mr. Keith then took up the south half of the section north of his for his 
brother and in the winter of 1835 and 1836 he cleared off one acre of the 
ground on his half section for a cemetery. The next summer his aged mother was 
taken sick and died at the age of 86, she being the first one laid away in 
this new ground. He then sold the remainder of the half section to George 
Goodrich and Austin Nye. Four more children were born, making eight in all of 
whom two died at the age of ten and twelve years, the rest are living in 
Hillsdale County, excepting two who have gone to California on account of ill 
health. The six are Jane Cole in California, William Keith in Jefferson; 
Martha Langley of Hillsdale; Homer Keith of California and Louisa and Matthew 
Keith, who have always lived with him on the place on which he settled fifty-
two years ago. He has helped many new settlers to select their land, and lived 
to see them pass away. He was always interested in the growth of the country 
around him and held different offices in town, being township treasurer and 
several terms highway commissioner and supervisor six years. He with a few 
others opened a road through the woods to Jonesville, taking provisions along 
with them and camping out, building fires to keep the wolves away.

File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/mi/hillsdale/photos/tombstones/goodrich/keith111038gph.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/mifiles/

File size: 4.3 Kb