In the books' own words, not ours, with obvious scanning errors fixed. The later printing (1911) is folded below the first. Families often supplied these stories to the publisher, so check key dates.
From History of Monroe and Shelby Counties -1884 (FACSIMILE) (1884), General history of Shelby County, Missouri (1911)
PHILIP DIMMITT, M. D. (Of Cooper & Dimmitt, Bankers, Shelbyville).
Dr. Dimmitt, who was for a number of years the leading physician of Shelby county, doing a large and lucrative practice for many years before he retired, and who has long been prominently identified with agricultural affairs of the county, is a native of the Blue Grass State, and was born in Washington county, December 11, 1824. His father, Judge Walter B. Dimmitt, was one of the pioneer settlers of Marion county, Mo. He came to that county in about 1829, before the Government surveys had been made, and pre-empted a large body of land. He became a leading farmer of the county. He was judge of oe ee Nr ae ee
SR Oe Nh a ee a ee A ee the county court and otherwise quite prominent in the affairs of the county. He died in 1849 in the fiftieth year of hisage. He had been reared in Harrodsburg, Ky., and besides receiving a good practical education, had a number of years’ experience as assistant in the county clerk’s office. Arterwards he acted as sheriff of his native county, Washington, of which Springfield is the county seat. The Dimmitts came to this country from England, but they were originally from France. The family first settled in Maryland and then came to Kentucky. Judge Dimmitt was married in Kentucky in 1824 to Miss Louisa Houghes, a young lady of Irish descent, though her family had been settled in Kentucky for several generations. She survived the death of ber husband until about 1872. There are four of their family of children living: Philip (the Doctor), John J., a wealthy citizen of Georgetown, Texas, William S., of Clarence, and Mary H., now the widow of George B. Moore, residing on the old homestead. Dr. Dimmitt was educated at Marion College, and at the age of 21 began the study of medicine under Dr. J. H. Kibby of Palmyra. Subsequently he took a course at the Missouri Medical College, two terms, where he graduated in 1849. He also took a supplemental course in the St. Louis Medical College, and graduated there in 1852, after having practiced in the interims between his terms at college for about two years. He then resumed the practice at Monticello, in Lewis county, where he had commenced practicing in 1849, and continued there until 1856, when he located at Boonville, in Cooper county. He practiced at Boonville for four years and then removed to Shelby county, locating on a farm about four miles north-east of Shelbyville, where he continued the practice for 14 years. Having a number of slaves whom he wished to have employed and not desiring to sell them or hire them out, he for that reason located on a farm. He followed farming and stock-raising, in connection with his practice, quite extensively, and was very successful in these lines also. He raised and sold large numbers of cattle. He still has two large farms, one of 800 acres and the other of 600 acres, devoted to grain growing and stock-raising, he superintending the former and his son, Prince, the latter. Dr. Dimmitt soon took a leading position in the practice of medicine in this county, and, until he voluntarily retired from the active work of the profession, stood at the head of the physicians of the county. It had been his purpose to retire from the practice as soon as he was 50 years of age. Indeed, that was a pledge made to his wife, and this he faithfully kept, promptly retiring from the practice in 1874. On the 31st of January, 1850, Dr. Dimmitt was married to Mrs. C. F. Henderson, who had been left a widow by the death of her first husband, Adderson J. Henderson, whilst she was yet hardly more than a young girl. She was but 22 years of age when she became the wife of Dr. Dimmitt. They have been blessed with six children: Walter A., Frank, Prince, Marvin, Pope and Lee. In 1874 Dr. Dimmitt organized the Shelby County Savings Bank, of which he became cashier. Several years after this was converted into the banking house of Cooper & Dimmitt, which it has since continued.
The business and standing of this bank have been fully spoken of in.a sketch of Mr. Cooper, so that it would be only repeating to add anything in regard to it here. Dr. Dimmitt is one of the leading and public-spirited citizens of Shelby county, and is universally respected and esteemed. Mrs. Dimmitt is a member of the M. E. Church South.;
(Merchant, Shelbyville).
Mr. Dimmitt, a large and influential dealer in general merchandise, has been in the business for about 11 years, and has as fine a trade as any man in the county. He was first in partnership with Mr. Dussair, but is now alone. He carries a $10,000 stock, his annual sales amounting to about $20,000. He also has a branch stock at Shelbina, in charge of Pope Dimmitt, his brother. This was started with a $2,000 stock in 1883. Mr. Dimmitt is a member of the firm of Dimmitt & Cooper, dealers in buggies, carriages, etc. They do an extensive business, buying by the car-load from Cincinnati and St. Louis. Mr. Dimmitt was born in Lewis county, Mo., at Monticello, November 22, 1850.. He was the eldest of six sous, was educated at the public and high schools at Shelbyville, and at 17 began teaching school, farming in his leisure moments, continuing until he went into business. Mr. D.now lives on a farm of 500 acres, beautifully situated one and a half miles south of Shelbyville. He is paying much attention to the breeding of short-horn cattle, having for sale a herd of 21 breeders, the head of the herd being the celebrated bull, Marquis of Airdrie. He has also Poland-China and Jersey red hogs, and the imported Norman horse, Moridovi, valued at $2,000.00. Mr. Dimmitt owns a large store which he erected in addition to the three adjoining buildings in 1876. Mr. D. was married June 4, 1872, to Miss Lizzie Vaughn, daughter of Wilson Vaughn, and has four sons: Philip, aged 10 years; Walter, aged seven years; Roy, aged five years; and Joseph Bowles, aged two years. Mr. Dimmitt is not a member of any society, norhas he as yet connected himself with any church.
PRINCE DIMMITT (Farmer and Stock-raiser, Post-office, Shelbyville).
Mr. Dimmitt is a son of Dr. Philip Dimmitt, of the banking firm of ‘Cooper & Dimmitt, at Shelbyville, and was born while his parents were residents of Boonville, in Cooper county, his natal day being the 30th of July, 1860. The same year of his birth his parents removed to Shelby county and located on a farm in this county. He was therefore reared in Shelby county. His education in the higher branches was acquitted in the High School of Shelbyville. Having a natural inclination for farm life, he those the pursuits of agriculture, farming ind handling stock, as the field of his activity, and since reaching his majority he has been engaged in farming and raising and dealing in stock in this county. Mr. Dimmitt, besides attending to the ordinary
- duties of his farm, handles about 140 head of cattle annually, and some mules in addition. A good judge of stock and full of energy and enterprise, he is rapidly coming to the front as a prominent stock man of the county, and has already achieved substantial success in this line of business. On the 17th of March, 1881, Mr. Dimmitt was married to Miss Cora E. Schofield, a d: daughter of Ellis Schofield, Esq., late of Palmyra, but now deceased. “Mr. and Mrs. D. have two children, Nora Lee and Edith Belle. A sketch of his father’s family has been given in the biography of Dr. Dimmitt, which appears elsewhere in this work.
HENRY B. DINES (Editor and Proprietor of the Shelby County Herald, Shelbyville).
Mr. Dines, of the Herald, one of the leading newspapers of the county in circulation and influence, as well as in business prosperity: and success, is justly entitled to no inconsiderable measure of credit for the enviable position his paper occupies among the better class of country journals in North-east Missouri. The paper was originally established by Willard & Childs in 1871, and had a precarious existence for several years, but was finally placed on a paying business basis. Up to 1876 it was Republican in politics, but after Hayes’ election Mr. W. L. Willard, the editor, espoused the cause of the National Greenback party and succeeded in attracting a large following in this county. In 1881, Mr. Willard having become the proprietor of the office, Mr. Dines bought him out and has since been editor and sole proprietor. All who know anything of the newspapers of the county, and, indeed, of the country papers of this section of the State, will readily admit that the Herald is one of the best in the list both in a business point of view and in ability, editorially. Mr. Dines has continued the Greenback policy of the paper, and the cause it represents has suffered nothing, so far as the Herald is concerned, from any fault of his. Conducted with ability and superior business management before he took charge of it, the same characteristics have distinguished its career not less since that time. In a word it is a paper, in every essential feature, in which he and his party, as well as the community at large, may justly feel no ordinary degree of pride. Mr. Dines himself, is well known to the people of the county as one of its representative and worthy citizens. He has been a resident of the county almost continuously from boyhood, and during all this time his life has been one of active and useful industry, and without a reproach. Mr. Dines is a native Missourian, born in Knox county, September 24,1844. His parents were John W. and Nancy (Murphy) Dines, worthy and respected residents of Shelby county. The Dines family is an old Maryland family, and is of English descent. Mr. Dines’ mother was of Irish parentage. His parents were married in Clar ‘ke county, Mo., in 1843, and afterwards resided for some years ‘in Knox county. In 1845, however, they located in Clarke county, where they made their home until 1857, when they came to
Shelby county. Mr. Dines, the father, is still living, one of the old and highly respected citizens of the county. He was for many years a local preacher in the M. E. Church, and has always taken an earnest and active interest in church work and the cause of religion. Farming has been his regular occupation, and in this he has had good. success, having now, as old age begins to cast its shadows from the Eastern horizon of life, a comfortable competency for his remaining years. Henry Bascom Dines, the subject of this sketch, was the first in his parents’ family of 10 children, and, like the others of the family, his early youth was, spent on his father’s farm, assisting at such work as he could do and attending the neighborhood: schools. Later along he attended the Shelby High School, where he completed a curriculum of the higher branches. In 1862 he enlisted in Co. B, under Capt. L. F. Carothers, of May. Johunson’s battalion of the Second Enrolled Missouri Militia, and was in the service for about 12 months. After returning home from the army he engaged in teaching school until 1866, when he embarked in the retail dry goods business, which he followed for over 10 years.. In the year 1879 he was admitted to the Shelbyville bar as a lawyer, since which time he has been quite successful in that profession. He has been a member of the lodge of Odd Fellows at this place since 1871, and has represented the district in the Grand Lodge. On the 15th of June, 1867, he was married to Miss Mattie L. Duncan, a daughter of John S. and Matilda (Lyne) Duncan, of this city. Mrs. Dines’ father has been postmaster at this place for the last 18 years. Mr. and Mrs. D. have a family of six children, namely: Clara Etta, Nellie, John Benjamin, Flora May, Homer Duncan and Walter Willard. Mr. and Mrs. Dines are both members of the M. E. Church, and active workers in the church. Mr. Dines has been superintendent of the Berean M. E. Sunday-school for the last 13 years. He has also always taken a public spirited interest in the affairs of the community and county. Though having little or no taste for official life or political advancement, he has nevertheless been prevailed on from time to time to accept one or two local offices. He has served as justice of the peace for about eight years, and was the first Mayor of Shelbyville after the reorganization under the city of the fourthclass law. During the present year he was a delegate to the National Greenback Convention at Indianapolis which nominated Gov. B. F. Butler for the presidency, and he is now supporting the redoubtable Benjamin for the first office in the nation, both by his personal advocacy and influence, and through the columns of his paper. The Herald also supports the Prohibition cause, and is recognized as one of the able organs of the Greenback party and the cause of Prohibition in this section of the State.
As printed in History of Monroe and Shelby Counties-1884 (FACSIMILE) (1884). See the original pages. Wording is the original; obvious scanning errors have been corrected, and a few may remain.
PHILIP DIMMITT, M. D.
I The late Dr. Philip Demmitt, whose death on November 23, 1898, at the age of seventy-one years cast a shadow over all of Shelby and the adjoining counties of this state, was one of the leadingphysicians and surgeons in this portion of the country, and also one of the most extensive and progressive farmers Shelby county has ever known and one of its most prominent and influential citizens, giving close and intelligent attention to public affairs and rendering the general public excellent service in various ways besides the advantages they derived from his professional work and his farming operations.
Dr. Dimmitt was born in Washington county, Kentucky, on December 11, 1824, and was a son of Judge Walter B. and Louisa (Hughes) Dimmitt, also Kentuckians by birth, the father having been, like the son, a native of Washington county. He was, however, reared and educated at Harrodsburg, in the adjoining county of Mercer, and for a time was assistant county clerk of that county, ater he returned to Washington county and served as sheriff there. In 1829 he moved his family to what is now Marion county, Missouri, arriving in this state and that portion of it before the government surveys were made. He made a wise selection of his location and preempted a large body of land, "on which he carried on extensively as a planter and general farmer. He also rose to prominence and influence in local affairs, served as county judge for a number of years, and was everywhere regarded as one of the most public-spirited and representative citizens of the section of the state in which he lived. His death occurred in 1849, and that of his widow, whom he married in Kentucky, in 1872.
The Dimmitt family was of French origin. Its progenitors in the United States came to this country at an early day and took up their residence in Marylaud. But the spirit of adventure and desire for better conditions in life and opportunity that brought them across the Atlantic led them to leave the older and more settled part of the country and seek a new home in Kentucky when that now great and progressive state was a part of our expansive frontier, and to brave the hazards and privations of pioneer life. The same spirit impelled the Doctor's parents to come to Missouri when it, too, was on the frontier, and repeat on its soil the performances and acliievemeuts of their forefathers on that of Kentucky.
Dr. Phili]) Dimmitt, who was one of the most successful and distinguished members of the family in the New World, began his scholastic training in the primitive comity schools of his boyhood and youth and completed it at Marion College. At the age of twenty-one he began the study of medicine under the direction of Dr. J. H. Kibby, of Palmyra, Missouri. After a sufficient preparatory course of reading he entered Missouri Medical College, and from that institution he was graduated in 1849. But he was not satisfied with his professional acquirements, even as a beginner, and after a practice covering a number of months he matriculated at the St. Louis Medical College, where he pursued a more extended course and from which he was graduated in 1852. During the next four years he practiced his profession at Monticello, in Lewis county. In 1856 he changed this to BoonvUle, Cooper county, where he remained four years.
But in the meantime he visited Shelby county in 1860 and bought a farm four miles northeast of Shelbyulle, which became his final home and from it as a center he conducted a very active and extensive practice for a period of fourteen years in addition to farming on a very extensive scale. At the time alluded to the Doctor owned a number of slaves, and as he would neither sell nor hire any of them to other persons, he was obliged to keep them employed himself and he added to his lauded estate until at one ])period he and his sons fanned over 1,400 acres of land, and he was one of the busiest, most extensive and most successful cattle feeders in Shelby county, and by his progressive methods one of the most valued contributers to raising the standard of live stock in this portion of the state.
Still, large and exacting as were his farming and stock operations, they did not curtail his professional activity. He was universally considered the leading physician of Shelby county while he remained in active practice, which he did until he reached the age of fifty years, retiring in 1874. In that year he founded the Shelby County Savings Bank and became its cashier. Some years later this institution was converted into the private banking house of Cooper & Dimmitt, and as such it continued in business and flourished many years. For data concerning this banking institution see sketch of J. T. Cooper on another page of this volume.
On January.31, 1850, Dr. Dinuuitt was united in marriage with Mrs. C. F. (Agee) Henderson, the widow of Addison J. Henderson, and at the time of her marriage to the Doctor only twenty-two years old. They became the parents of six children, all of whom are living: Walter A., a leading farmer of this county, a sketch of whom will be found in this work; Frank, who is president of the Old Bank of Shelbina, and whose life story is also recorded in this volmne; Marvin, a banker in Chirence, this county; Prince, the president of The Bank of Shelbyville, an account of whose useful life adds to the interest and value of this history; Pope, who is a i-resident of the city of St. Louis; and Lee, whose home is in Shelby county.
The mother of these children died on July 6, 1893, and the father, as has been stated, on November 23, 1898. He was united in a second marriage with Mrs.
Hattie Hillias, the ceremony being performed in 1897. She is still living. The Doctor's first wife was regarded as one of the most estimable ladies in the county. In fraternal life the Doctor was a Freemason and active in the order for a long time. Ilis religions affiliation was with the Methodist Episcopal ehnreh, South, and in its affairs he also took a zealous and serviceable part. In all the relations of life he was worthy and fully entitled to the high rank he held in the regard of the people as a man and citizen. In his profession he was highly cultivated and exhibited great practical skill. In business he was upright, conscientious and progressive, and in connection with public affairs and the general welfare of the people he was one of the most enterprising and far-seeing, as well as one of the most helpful and inspiring men in the community.
As printed in General history of Shelby County, Missouri (1911). See the original pages. Wording is the original; obvious scanning errors have been corrected, and a few may remain.
Their biographies name Philip Dimmitt: Walter A. Dimmitt (b. 1850) Marvin Dimmitt (b. 1863)
The printed record stops around 1884. We trace your line from there down to you, with every source cited.