In the books' own words, not ours, with obvious scanning errors fixed. The later printing (1909) is folded below the first. Families often supplied these stories to the publisher, so check key dates.
Born 1844
From History of the city of Dayton and Montgomery County, Ohio (1909), Centennial portrait and biographical record of the city of Dayton and of Montgomery County, Ohio, containing biographical sketches of prominent and representative citizens, together with the biographi (1897)
WILLIAM L. BATES, one of the well-known citizens of Dayton, Ohio, was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1844, and is a son of Richard and Nancy (Trotter) Bates. Richard Bates was a native of Lincolnshire, England. He was one of the old time merchants of Cincinnati, having been the proprietor of the first wholesale grocery house on Walnut street, in that city. His death occurred in Clifton, a suburb of Cincinnati, in 1855. Nancy Trotter was a native of Steubenville, Ohio. In 1858 she, with her family, removed to Dayton, her eldest daughter having previously married John H. Winters, the prominent citizen and banker of this city. Mrs. Bates’s death occurred in Dayton in 1870. She was a woman of unusual attainments, and charity and benevolence were among her strong characteristics. She was the founder of the first orphans’ asylum in Dayton, and she and Mrs. Parrott, mother of Col. E. A. Parrott, raised the money by subscription to purchase the land (the present site of the Deaconess hospital) upon which the orphans’ asylum was situated. The number of inmates became so large that Mrs. Bates was instrumental in having a bill passed by the Ohio legislature establishing a county orphan asylum, and the original asylum was removed to the West Side and made a county institution. The widows’ home was subsequently established upon the site of the orphans’ asylum, and of that institution Mrs. Bates became first president, and so continued until her death, being succeeded in the presidency by her daughter, Mrs. Winters. In 1868 the increasing number of inmates of the widows’ home necessitated the establishment of a new and more commodious home, and following its removal to another location the present Deaconess hospital was erected on the site of the first orphans’ asylum.
Three sons and two daughters were born to Richard Bates and wife, as follows: Richard Adolphus S., William L., Susan and Ella. The eldest daughter married John H. Winters, and the youngest married Charles T. Huffman. All of the children reside in Dayton except Adolphus, who is a resident of Saint Paul, Minn.
W. L. Bates was educated in the public schools of Cincinnati and Dayton. At the end of his third year in the high school, in 1 862, he entered the army. After the war he returned to Dayton and became interested in the grocery business, and has ever since been associated with that industry. He engaged in the brokerage business in 1877. Mr. Bates was made a master Mason in Mystic lodge, in 1871. He was made a Knight Templar of Reed commandery in 1874, and received the Scottishrite thirty-second degree in 1881. He served as commander of Reed commandery in 1885, and as captain-general of Reed commandery for eleven years. He was elected presiding officer of Dayton chapter of Rose Croix, Scottish rite, in 1891, and served as such until 1894. He was elected grand warden of the grand commandery of Ohio in 1893, and has been promoted each year since and is now grand junior warden. He is a member of Old Guard post, G. A. R. Mr. Bates was married in October, 1868, to Belle, daughter of the Hon. Warren P. Noble, of Tiffin, Ohio.
'Spy* ESSE BOOHER.— This venerable na- II tive-born citizen of Dayton first saw the J light in the embryo days of what is now a great center of trade and population. His father, Samuel Booher, settled in Dayton in 1806, was a wagonmaker by trade, and died in 1857 at the age of seventy-five. He married Miss Susan Lehman, who was the first person baptized into a church in this city, and was connected with the Christian church the remainder of her life. She became the mother of thirteen children and died at the age of eighty-four years. Of her large family four are still living. Gideon is a farmer in Kansas; Mrs. Catherine Ware, the widow of Thomas Ware, has her home in this city; Mrs. Susan Beachler has her residence in Salem, in this county; and the fourth is the subject of this biography. Jesse Booher’s birth occurred February 15, 1821, in a frame structure which stood on East Second street, next east of the present Windsor hotel, and which was later known as the Schieble house. Being only a quarter of a century behind the birth of the city, he has had the privilege of watching its growth from an insignificant village of less than a thousand people to its present proud place as the fifth city in the state of Ohio.
Mr. Booher is a man of clear mind and observing eye, and there is no one better informed upon Dayton affairs. He enjoys the distinction of being the oldest living male born within the boundaries of the city. It is currently believed and reported by the younger residents of the city, those who get their information from tradition, that the old Newcom tavern was the first house erected upon the present site of Dayton. This, Mr. Booher says; is not true. He states from positive knowledge that the first house erected here was brought on a raft by a Marylander named Watson, and was located on the east part of the ground now occupied by the Steele high school.
Mr. Booher has been a carpenter and master mechanic all his days, occupying the same shop on Booher alley for half a century. I' or the centennial celebration of April, 1896, he constructed, out of timber taken from the huge logs of the Newcom tavern, a miniature cabin which remains an heirloom in the hands of John Cotterill, the owner of the old tavern at the time of its removal to Van Cleve park.
Mr. Booher, when a mere boy, had the opportunity of seeing a steamboat, then a new invention, and an object of curious interest to a person of his inventive genius. He was given a lithograph of the boat; and from this, after a year's toil, he succeeded in producing a model. This he named Lucretia, No. 2, the original having been Lucretia, No, 1. This model frequently changed hands, and is now preserved in the Dayton Library & Museum building in Cooper park.
The Booher family was a sturdy one, injured to toil, and generally of long life. The maternal grandmother of Jesse Booher attained the remarkable age of 100 years, lacking only two weeks. Our subject is a man of fine physique, though not above the medium height. He is the embodiment of bodily health and endurance. Though past seventy-five years of age, he still takes delight in skating, in which art he has been the envy of the boys of three generations.
During the dark days of the Rebellion, he was among the first to enter the three months’ service. He enlisted under the president’s first call for volunteers in company A, Eleventh Ohio volunteer infantry, serving four and a half months. He offered himself for enrollment in the three years’ service, but was rejected on account of a crippled hand. Mr. Booher was married in this city, April 26, 1841, to Miss Cynthia Ann Reynolds, a native of Philadelphia, born in 1822. To this union there have come seven children, four of whom are still living, viz: Lucretia Creamer, the wife of a conductor in Indiana; Belle, now Mrs. Gager of New York city; Emma Rule, living in Portland, Ore., and William Orvis, who is connected with a circus. Mrs. Booher, who is still living, is in feeble health, largely as the result of a fall.
Mr. Booher is a member of Old Guard post, G. A. R. Politically he is a republican, served for twenty-eight years as city dealer of weights and measures, and has held other official positions.
In 1852 he made the journey to California via Cape Horn. On the way out he visited the cities of Rio de Janeiro and Valparaiso. He returned to Dayton in 1854, and engaged in pine coopering, which he followed very extensively for several years, employing as many as forty men at times; but he could not make head against labor-saving machinery, and after a time retired from the business. He prepared a model for a steam fire engine as early as 1849, thus being among the first to discover a practical way of fighting fire. This model was destroyed in a fire in Cincinnati, and the idea was never patented by him.
As printed in Centennial portrait and biographical record of the city of Dayton and of Montgomery County, Ohio, containing biographical sketches of prominent and representative citizens, together with the biographi (1897). See the original pages. Wording is the original; obvious scanning errors have been corrected, and a few may remain.
WILLIAM LIGGETT BATES.
William Liggett Bates, a merchandise broker of Dayton, the extent of whose commercial interests makes him worthy to be classed with the representative business men of this city, was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, July 27, 1844, and in the paternal line comes of English ancestry. His father, Richard Bates, was born in Lincolnshire, England, on the 2d of August, 1808, and arrived in America in early manhood, locating in Cincinnati, Ohio, where for many years he successfully conducted business interests as a wholesale grocer. On the 9th of February, 1835, in that city, he was united in marriage to Miss Nancy Trotter, who was born near Glencoe, Ohio, March 4, 1814. She became one of the most prominent women not only of Dayton and Montgomery county but also of the entire state. She was the first president of the Woman’s Christian Association of Dayton and was largely instrumental in raising the funds for the Orphan’s Home, originally located on the present site of the Miami Valley Hospital, remaining president of that institution up to the time of her death. It was also largely due to her efforts that the Widow’s Home was organized and she was also its president when called from this life. She devoted not only her time but also her means to charitable work. She was president of the Soldier’s Aid Society and during the Civil war many soldiers were indebted to her for clothing, food, fruits and delicacies. She passed away on the 22d of October, 1870, at the age of fifty-six years, loved and respected by all who knew her. The father of our subject died March 21, 1855. In the family were seven children, namely: John, who died at the age of five years; Susan L., the wife of John H. Winters of Dayton; Richard J., who died at the age of sixty-eight years; Adolphus S., a resident of White Salmon, Washington; William L., the subject of this sketch; Joseph S., who died at the age of five years; and Ella M., the widow of Charles T. Huffman of Dayton.
After spending the first fourteen years of his life in the city of his nativity, William L. Bates came to Dayton with his widowed mother and here continued his education until, during his third year in high school, he offered his services to the government in defense of the Union, enlisting on the 4th of May, 1864, at the age of eighteen years, as a private of Company A, One Hundred and Thirtyfirst Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He was then made corporal and with that rank served for one hundred days at Fort Federal Hill and vicinity. He had previously been with the Fiftieth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, the sutler of which was a relative of his, spending the winter of 1863-1864 with that regiment. He was mustered out at Camp Chase, Ohio, in September, 1864, and at once returned to Dayton. Of the eighty-seven men mustered into his company May 4, 1864, only thirty-two are known to be living and on the forty-fifth anniversary celebration held May 4, 1909, there were only twenty-three of these present.
After the war, in connection with his two brothers, Mr. Bates entered the retail grocery business in Dayton under the firm name of Bates Brothers, which relation was maintained for four years, when he joined his brother in law, Charles T. Huffman, in the grocery business in 1870. He was thus associated with the commercial interests of this city for four years and in 1874 withdrew and went upon the road for a New York grocery firm which he represented for several years. In November, 1877, he turned his attention to the merchandise brokerage business and has continued in that department of commercial activity to the present time. His long association therefore, covering thirty-two years, indicates something of the success which he has achieved. Thoroughly familiar with the trade and market conditions, he has handled important and profitable lines, his capable management and keen business discernment being a strong element in the considerable success which he has won.
On the 22d of October, 1868, Mr. Bates was married in Tiffin, Ohio, to Miss Belle Noble, a daughter of Hon. Warren P. Noble, a well known statesman of Ohio, who served for several terms in congress. Their only child, Laura M., died August 17, 1885, at the age of sixteen years.
Since age conferred upon him the right of franchise, Mr. Bates has been a stalwart republican, in sympathy with the policy of the party in controlling federal and international relations. In 1898 he was appointed a member of the board of city affairs of Dayton and rendered capable and businesslike service in that capacity for three years. He is well known in various fraternal relations, being a comrade of Old Guard Post, G. A. R., while in Masonry he has attained high rank. He was captain general of Reed Commandery No. 6, K. T., of Dayton for twelve years, is past grand commander of the Knights Templars of Ohio, has been presiding officer at various important Masonic meetings and has been honored with the thirty-third degree. He also belongs to Christ Episcopal church and the guiding principles of his life are those which work for reliability and progressiveness in material affairs, for loyalty and advancement in citizenship and for a recognition of the obligations of the individual to his fellowman.
As printed in History of the city of Dayton and Montgomery County, Ohio (1909). See the original pages. Wording is the original; obvious scanning errors have been corrected, and a few may remain.
Named in this biography: E. A. Parrott (b. 1830)
The printed record stops around 1909. We trace your line from there down to you, with every source cited.