Alonzo Johnson

As printed in 1885

ALONZO JOHNSON, farmer and butcher, Kent, was born in Shalersville Township, this county, May 25, 1835, son of Ebenezer and Annis (Stoddard) Johnson, natives of Vermont and New Hampshire respectively, the latter born April 8, 1811. His paternal grandfather, Sylvester Johnson, was a farmer of Rutland, Vt., and his maternal grandfather, Stoddard, a native of New Hampshire, settled in Freedom Township in 1834, afterward removed to Iowa and died there. The parents of our subject settled in Stowe Tov/ship in 1834, and in 1835 located in Shalersville Township, this county, where they purchased an eighty-acre tract of heavily timbered land which they cleared and improved, and where they lived until the death of the father m 1850, in his forty-second year. They had seven children: Alonzo, Lucinda (deceased), Emeline (Mrs. Willard Seward), Sylvester, Leander, Silas (died in the army during the late war) and Eben. The mother next married Rufus Newton, of Franklin Township, this county, in 1857. He died in 1862 and she moved to Daviess County, Mo., in 1869, and subsequently married William Hughes, who died in 1879, and his widow returned to Ohio in 1880, and is now residing in Kent. Our subject was reared in Shalersville Township, this county, and was educated in the common schools. He resided in Shalersville Township until 1863, when he removed to Kent, Ohio, and embarked in the grocery business, in which he was engaged two years. He then built the hotel known as the " Collins House," which he conducted for three years, and during that time opened a meat market, which he carried on from 1866 to March 30, 1885, when he retired from that business. He is also engaged in farming, now owning three farms in Franklin Township, this county, in company with his two eldest sons, living on the farm formerly occupied by Warren Burt. Mr. Johnson was married in November, 1855, to Mary J., daughter of William and Lavina Cook, of Franklin Township, this county, by whom he had twelve children, nine now living: Willard, Perry, Emma (Mrs. Henry Barker), Albert, Ora, Nella, Clayton, Cora and Selah. Mr. Johnson is a representative citizen of the township. In politics he is a Democi'at.

As printed in History of Portage County, Ohio (1885). See the original pages. Wording is the original; obvious scanning errors have been corrected, and a few may remain.