Westmoreland County PA Archives Biographies.....Keeley, Henry July 14, 1818 

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Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 October 14, 2018, 10:23 pm

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HENRY KEELEY, ex-county commissioner and an intelligent, well-known and highly
respected citizen of Unity township, was born in Chester county, Pa., July 14,
1818, and is a son of Henry and Mary (Rooks) Keeley. The Keeleys are of Quaker
stock. Henry Keeley was a prosperous farmer and an ardent presbyterian. He died
in 1832, aged fifty-six years. He married Mary Rooks who was a native of Chester
county. She was an estimable woman and a member of the Presbyterian church. She
was born in 1783 and died near Wellington, Iroquois county, Illinois, in 1872,
when in the eighty-ninth year of her age.

    Henry Keeley was reared on a farm in Chester county and attended
subscription and select schools. Leaving school, he learned the trade of
machinist at Wilmington, Delaware. After serving his seven years apprenticeship,
he was variously engaged until 1850, when he went to Lasalle county, Illinois,
where he became superintendent of the construction force on the Illinois Central
railroad at that place. In a few months he was compelled to return home. He then
accepted a position with a corps of engineers that was in the employ of the
Pennsylvania railroad and was with them for eight years in Pennsylvania and one
year in Alabama. He was then transferred to the maintenance way force and
continued on it until 1873, when he was elected commissioner of Westmoreland
county. He served for five years and was reelected in 1880 by a large majority.
At the expiration of his second term as county commissioner he returned to his
present farm near Youngstown, where he has been engaged in farming and
stock-raising ever since.

    On October 12, 1848, he married Elizabeth Peck, daughter of Charles and
Elizabeth Peck, of Chester county. Mr. and Mrs. Keeley are the parents of six
children: Charles E., a freight conductor on the Pennsylvania railroad; Mary E.,
Louis and John H., who are in California where they own a large ranch and now
have out 3,000 acres in wheat; William W., an engineer on the Pennsylvania
railroad, and Matilda, wile of Ellsworth Hamilton, of Youngstown, this county.

    Henry Keeley always supported the principles of the Democratic party and is
the only democrat in Westmoreland county that was ever re-elected as county
commissioner. He has resided in Unity township since 1852. Of late years he has
been an extensive traveler. He has traveled in the Middle, South Atlantic, Gulf
and most of the Western States besides visiting California, New York and
Toronto, Canada. He is generous and charitable and knows nearly all of the
people in Westmoreland county.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from
Biographical and Historical Cyclopedia of Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania
Compiled and Published by John M. Gresham & Co.
Samuel T. Wiley, Chief Assistant
1890


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