LICKING COUNTY OHIO - BIO: GRAHAM, John S. (published 1925)
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HISTORY OF OHIO by Charles Galbreath
The American Historical Society, Inc. 1925 - Volume 5, page 410

        JOHN S. GRAHAM has been a figure in Licking County, in the
Granville community, for many years, grew up there, had been a farmer and
stockman, banker, member of the Legislature and is the present mayor of
Granville. He was born in Center County, Pennsylvania, January 16, 1864,
son of John S. and Hannah (Hayes) Graham, both natives of Center County,
Pennsylvania, January 16, 1864, son of John S. and Hannah (Hayes) Graham
both natives of Center County, Pennsylvania, while the grandparents Graham
came from Scotland. The parents of Hannah Hayes were born in Pennsylvania.
John S. Graham, of Granville, was a baby when his parents came to Ohio and
settled on a farm in Licking County. He attended public schools there, and
as a young man engaged in farming and stock raising, and still has large
interests in those lands. From the farm his activity extended to commercial
affairs in town, and in 1903 he was one of the founders of the Granville
Bank, becoming one of its first directors and for the past twelve years has
been its president. Mr. Graham is now serving his second term as mayor of
Granville. For about a year he has given considerable time to his duties as
manager of the Granville Co-operative Company, doing a general warehouse
business, buying and selling farm supplies and builders supplies.
        Mr. Graham was elected and represented Licking County in the
Eighty-first and Eighy-third General Assemblies of Ohio. He was a member of
the Board of Education of McKane Township ten years, was for six years one
of the county commissioners, and during the World war, having a son at the
front, he was spurred to unremitting efforts in behalf of the success of
all patriotic causes and campaigns, being a member of the Licking County
War Work Committee. He is a member of Grange, is a republican, is president
of the Board of Trustees of the Methodist Church, and was elected a
delegate to the World's Conference of Methodists. Mr. Graham has also some
financial interests in oil and gas wells.
        He married at Springfield, Ohio, October 4, 1888, Miss Minnie K.
Deardorff, daughter of General John and Elizabeth (Pettigrew) Deardorff, of
Springfield. Her father was a solider of distinction in the Union Army
during the Civil War. Mrs. Graham is a member of the Daughters of Veterans,
has been very active in literary and musical clubs and church affairs at
Granville, and is president of the Home Missionary Society of the Methodist
Church.
        Mr. and Mrs. Graham have two sons, Paul B. and Hayes D. Graham. The
son Paul was educated in Denison University and in Ohio Wesleyan
University, and is now established in a successful contracting business at
Grand Rapids, Michigan. He married Myrtle Lovell, of Newark, Ohio. Hayes D.
Graham attended Denison University and Ohio Wesleyan University, and
married Oleta Spellman, member of one of the early and prominent families
of Licking County. Hayes D. Graham is now engaged in farming on a place
adjoining Granville.
        Hayes D. Graham in May, 1917, enlisted for service in the World
war, being trained at Camp Perry, then at Mineola and went to France in
October, 1917, with a regiment of infantry commanded by Colonel Hough in
the Forty-second or Rainbow Division. In the spring of 1918 he was
commissioned a second lieutenant, was put with the Twenty-ninth Division,
and while on the field of battle was made first lieutenant. He served as
liaison officer of his regiment, and was on active duty in several sectors,
being once slightly gassed. In the great battle of the Argonne he was on
duty thirty-five days without once taking off his clothes, and in the last
fight of that engagement he was with an outfit of 228 men who went into
action and only sixty-eight of whom came out alive. He is an active member
of the American Legion.

History of Ohio - Volume 2 page 45
Constitutional Convention of 1850-1851
Selection and Character of Delegates

The following paragraph mentions John Graham.

        Writers have bestowed high praise on the body of men chosen to
frame our second constitution. perhaps at this late day it would be vain
and unpatriotic to question this judgment, and something on the character
and personality of the delegates of all our conventions is reserved for
future presentation. It is safe to say, however, that the electors of the
different districts did not, without exception, send to this convention
their men best equipped for framing the constitution. In the county of
Franklin, including then as it does at present, the capital city of the
state, Samuel Medary, the chief advocate of the convention, a man of
experience in public affairs, and especially well informed on all questions
likely to arise before that body, was defeated by his whig opponent, John
Graham, a local surveyor and former sheriff, who evidently knew little
about the constitution and was not stimulated to interest in it by contact
with his fellow delegates. He never addressed the convention on any
subject. As we learn from the ample "Debates and Proceedings," he seems to
have risen to his feet before that body but four times; once to send to the
clerk's desk a proposition from a Columbus citizen to rent a hall to the
convention, once to offer a petition signed by a few women of Franklin
county, opposing the legalization of the liquor traffic, and twice to offer
resolutions evidently prepared by others. His opinions on questions up for
consideration are found only in the aye and nay votes recorded in the
proceedings. Medary, outside of the convention, had more to do than Graham
in the convention in shaping the constitution Hon. Henry Stanberry, of
Columbus, who represented a district made up of Delaware County and a
portion of Franklin, however, gave the capital city fitting eminence in the
convention.


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