BIOGRAPHY: Solomon WAGNER, Cambria County, PA 

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From Wiley, Samuel T., ed. Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Cambria 
County, Pennsylvania. Philadelphia: Union Publishing Co., 1896, p. 103-4
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Solomon WAGNER

SOLOMON WAGNER, farmer, lumber manufacturer, coal merchant and general dealer of 
Glen Glade, who, with no capital except the willingness and ability to toil, has 
won recognition as a thrifty and reliable business man of Cambria county, is a 
son of George and Mrs. Mary Smith (ne้ Cane) Wagner, and was born at Glen Glade, 
in Jackson township, Cambria county, Pennsylvania, June 11, 1849.
     Mr. Wagner is descended from a sturdy and highly reputable German ancestry, 
and his immigrant ancestors first settled in what was known locally as Black Log 
Valley, in Huntingdon county, this State. They settled there some time 
subsequent to the Revolution, and were tillers of the soil, assisting in opening 
up that valley and claiming it to civilization.
     Henry and Daniel Wagner, two brothers, with their families, left that 
valley in about 1830, to settle in Jackson township, which has since been the 
home of their posterity. Henry Wagner, who was the grandfather of our subject, 
was a shoemaker by trade, and, after locating in Jackson township, pursued that 
trade in conjunction with farming. He was an honest, hard-working man, and 
acquired an ample fortune for his day. He was a member of the German Baptist 
church, and was a regular attendant of church and Sabbath school.
     His marital union with Elizabeth Roush resulted in an issue of nine 
children: Jacob, Samuel, George, Martin, Mrs. Elizabeth Rollins, Mrs. Catherine 
Pergrim, Mrs. Mary Brown, Hannah and Mrs. Sarah Rager.
     George Wagner's father was born upon the old homestead, and died in his 
native township December 14, 1857, aged forty years, having passed his entire 
life near the scenes of his birth. He was engaged in laboring upon a farm all 
his life, and was a member of the German Baptist church. He married Mrs. Mary 
Smith, ne้ Cane, a daughter of William Cane, of Baltimore, Maryland, who became 
the mother of eleven sons and one daughter: Jacob, died young; Andrew was a 
soldier of the late war, enlisted in 1862, in company "D," One Hundred and 
Fifteenth regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer infantry; was wounded at the battle 
of Gettysburg, July 2, 1863, from the effects of which he died on the 14th of 
the same month in the hospital at Baltimore; John and George were twins; the 
former is night watchman, in the employ of the Pennsylvania railroad company, at 
Altoona, Pennsylvania, and the latter was a farmer, late, of Jackson township; 
Hannah married Joel Simmons, a farmer of Jackson township.
     Solomon Wagner started in life as a day laborer, but, by his own efforts, 
untiring industry and honorable business methods, has acquired a fair amount of 
this world's goods, and to-day finds him in a position of comparative ease and 
affluence.  In 1877 he engaged in the blacksmith business at Fairview, but one 
year later he abandoned that business to engage in the pursuits of husbandry, 
and owns a farm of one hundred and twenty-one acres, adjoining Glen Glade.  In 
1886 he engaged in manufacturing lumber, and now owns a saw and planing mill, 
the annual product of which amounts to about $3,000.  Aside from his farming, 
lumbering and milling interests, he owns a valuable tract of coal land, situated 
near Glen Glade, and containing one hundred and seventy-seven acres.  He mines 
and ships each year about one hundred car loads of this coal to Ebensburg, 
whilst about twenty thousand bushels per annum are consumed by the local trade.  
D. W. Dunwiddie, of Philipsburg, Centre county, Pennsylvania, has leased a part 
of the coal land, and is now putting in a siding which connects with the 
Pennsylvania railroad, and the ensuing year will see the output of his mine 
greatly increased.  Mr. Wagner also owns another tract of land of fifty-six 
acres in Jackson township, and six houses in Glen Glade.
     He is a republican, and has served as a member of the school board.
     On February 19, 1871, Mr. Wagner and Miss Rachel Shuman were joined in 
wedlock, and they are the happy parents of six children:  Caroline, the wife of 
Herman Krouse, of Glen Glade; Mary C., the wife of William Krouse, also of Glen 
Glade; Hannah, the consort of John Wilkinson, of Jackson township; Harriet, 
William E. and Daniel W., are at home.