BIOS: The MEAGER Family, Salisbury, Somerset County, PA

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History of Bedford and Somerset Counties, Pennsylvania; Bedford County by E. 
Howard Blackburn; Somerset County by William H. Welfley; v.3, Pub. The Lewis 
Publishing Company, New York/Chicago 1906, ppg. 463/4

The MEAGER Family.

John Meager, a retired business man, and John Howard Meager, his son, both of 
Salisbury, are the descendants of English ancestors, the former being also of 
English birth and the founder of the family in this country, where it is already 
numerous and well known in Somerset county.
John Meager was born in 1842, in Cornwall, England, and in August, 1867, 
emigrated to the United States with his wife and his child, Josephine.  He 
settled in Bucks county, Pennsylvania, where he worked at iron-mining and rose 
to be mine foreman.  In December, 1869, he moved to Frostburg, Maryland, where 
he worked in the coal mines until 1877, when he went to Glade City, Somerset 
county, and there held the position of foreman of mines for the Baltimore & 
Cumberland Coal Company.  In 1879 he moved to Hyndman, Pennsylvania, where he 
was employed during the summer as superintendent by J. J. Hoblitzel & Company, 
building among other things, two large lime kilns.  In September of the same 
year he went to Elk Lick township and opened the Frog Hill mines for the 
Baltimore & Cumberland Coal Company.  In November of that year he moved his 
family from Hyndman to Salisbury, where he has since lived.  He remained in the 
service of the same company for twenty years, as long as they were in existence, 
or until 1881, when he went to Coal Run and opened the Chapman mines for the 
Grassey Run Coal Company.  In 1882 he returned to Salisbury and worked for J. J. 
Hoblitzel as superintendent of the Frog Hill mines until 1885.  During the 
summer of that year he secured a lease from the Keystone Coal Company and has 
since been operating his own mines, now called the Grassey Run mines.  He is a 
stockholder in the First Natinal Bank of Salisbury and is interested in coal 
land in West Virginia.  He is a Republican and a member of the Methodist 
Episcopal church of Salisbury, of which he was one of the organizers.  He is a 
local preacher of the church and for twenty years was superindendent of the 
Sunday School, and in all church affairs an earnest worker.  He is a Republican. 
Mr. Meager married, June 29, 1865, Charlotte Truscott, born January 25, 1846, in 
England, and they were the parents of the following children: Josephine, born 
December 2, 1866, died February 10, 1881; she was their only English-born child; 
Martha, born September 29, 1869, wife of William McMurdo; Lydia Diamond, born 
August 29, 1871, wife of H. C. Shaw; Bessie, born August 24, 1873, died 
September 1, 1873; John Howard, see forward; Lottie, born April 28, 1879, at 
home; William, born May 8, 1881, died August 20, 1881; Charles, born February 
12, 1884, died August 20, 1902; and William (2), born October 30, 1889, died 
January 1900. 
John Howard Meager, son of John and Charlotte (Truscott) Meager, was born May 
24, 1875, at Frostburg, Maryland and was a child when the family moved to 
Salisbury, where he obtained his education in the public schools.  At the age of 
eleven years he went to work in the mines a driver boy, and worked there for 
eleven years.  During four years he was trackman in the mines and since January 
20, 1903, has held the position of mine foreman.  He belongs to the Improved 
Order of Red Men of Salisbury, and is a Republican in politics.  He is a member 
of the Methodist Episcopal church of Salisbury, of which he is trustee and 
steward. 
Mr. Meager married, December 22, 1898, Dorothy A., daughter of P. M. Connor, of 
Salisbury, and they have two children: Hazel and Elizabeth.