Thomas E. Beery

As printed in 1902

THOMAS EWING BEERY.

There could be no more comprehensive history written of a city, or even of a state and its people, than that which deals with the life-work of those who, by their own endeavor and indomitable energy, have placed themselves where they well deserve the title of "prominent and progressive." and in this sketch will be found the record of one who has outstripped the less active and less able trodders on the highway of life, one who has taught the golden lesson of a career unsurpassed by that of any other in northern Ohio.

The ancestors of Thomas E. Beery, of this sketch, were of German extraction, the paternal branch coming from Switzerland in the latter part of the sixteenth century and settling in Pennsylvania and Virginia. The stanch little republic whence they came was not. nor is it now, altogether German in its constituency, but the German element is largely predominant and constitutes, the ruling moral and political features which give the nation its chief characteristics. — industry, progressiveness and love of liberty.— and these commendable qualities are carried to every part of the world in which the Swiss have a foothold.

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In the war of 1812 Mr. Beerv was in the military service of his country, and was encamped at Fort Ball ( now Tiffin) and there impatiently listened to the guns of Major Crogan, who with his troops was defending P'ort Stevenson at Lower Sandusky, while Mr. Beery was idly whiting away the time and ardently longing to take part in the conflict.

Mr. Beery was a personal friend and sincere admirer of Ohio’s eminent statesman. Hon. Thomas Ewing, claiming that. Both as a statesman and a lawyer, that gentleman never had an equal, let alone a superior, and in his honor Mr. Beery named his son. the subject of this sketch. George Beery died on his beautiful farm, five miles east of Lancaster, Ohio, in 1856, sincerely mounted by a host of warm-hearted friends and to the incontrollable grief of his widow and his large family of surviving children.

Mrs. George Beery, the mother of the subject of this sketch, here the maiden name of Catherine Cradlebaugh. Her father was a native of Germany, was a Revolutionary soldier, and was also a German Reformed clergyman, for the ministry of which church he was educated in Germany. Mrs. Beery was born in Washington county. Penn., in 1789, came to Fairfield county, Ohio, in 1806, and died in 1870. She was a lady of great force of character and the mother of twelve children, of whom three survive and remember her with deep affection as a mother of the good old style.

Thomas E. Beery, the youngest child of this family of twelve, was born in Fairfield Ohio. July 6, 1835. and in youth enjoyed such advantages as the schools of a country < 1’ strict afforded, and these he attended in the winter, but assisted on the home farm during the spring, summer and fall. He afterward attended the high school at Lancaster, and the Otterbein University, and, being an apt student, progressed very rapidly.

In 1855, at the age of twenty years, Mr. Beerv entered into mercantile trade in partnership with his brother, Simon, at Bremen, Fairfield county, a town laid out and named by his father. In 1857 Mr. Beery came to Upper Sandusky, where he has since been engaged in various kinds of business and now stands in the foremost rank of the most successful business men of the city. His successes have been in such lines as dry goods, hardware, grain, wool, banking and manufacturing, in all of which he has decidedly made his mark.

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As printed in Biographical memoirs of Wyandot County, Ohio : to which is appended a comprehensive compendium of national biography ... embellished with portraits of many national characters and well known residents (1902). See the original pages. Wording is the original; obvious scanning errors have been corrected, and a few may remain.