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Below is a family biography included in Portrait and Biographical Record of Berrien and Cass Counties, Michigan published by Biographical Publishing Company in 1893.  These biographies are valuable for genealogy research in discovering missing ancestors or filling in the details of a family tree. Family biographies often include far more information than can be found in a census record or obituary.  Details will vary with each biography but will often include the date and place of birth, parent names including mothers' maiden name, name of wife including maiden name, her parents' names, name of children (including spouses if married), former places of residence, occupation details, military service, church and social organization affiliations, and more.  There are often ancestry details included that cannot be found in any other type of genealogical record.

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ISAAC MOSER. Mr. Moser, one of the very wealthy men of Mason Township, and for many years a large money-loaner, was born at Richfield, Pa., February 24. 1837. His parents, Charles and Elizabeth (Fall) Moser, were natives respectively of Frauenburg, France, and Pennsylvania. The father was a descendant of one of the old Jewish families and came to America when he was about eighteen years of age. He had two brothers, one of whom, Nathan, became a wealthy man, went to California and there died. The other brother was a man of culture and learning, and was a prominent Jewish Rabbi. One of his sisters married a Mr. Heyman and the other sister married a man by the name of Levi. The far-famed cornet player, Levi, is her son.

Upon reaching the American coast the father of our subject had but eighteen cents in money, but, like most of his race when first reaching this country, he became a peddler. He soon had a store of his own, and later he traded in live stock, thus making a fortune. In 1855 he came to Michigan, locating at Mt. Clemens, and was one of the proprietors of a mineral well in that place when it first started, and at the time of his death was one of the stockholders and Directors in the Mt. Clemens Savings Bank. Shortly after coming to this country he married the widow Middelsworth, her maiden name having been Fall. Her first husband’s father was one of the most prominent men of his day in the State of Pennsylvania, serving twenty-one years in the State Legislature, and one term in Congress. She became the mother of one child by her first marriage, and this child was named after his father, John Middelsworth. Mrs. Moser is now living at Mt. Clemens.

He of whom we write was second in order of birth of eight children, four sons and four daughters, and his educational advantages were not of the best, for he began assisting his father in the store when twelve years of age. He also worked on the farm his father owned, and when but eighteen years of age he began working at the butcher business at Mt. Clemens, whither he had moved with his father in 1855. Later he became the proprietor of a general store in that place.

For some time during the late Civil War he was in the employ of the Government in the railroad department, and was located at Bridgeport, Ala., and Deckard, Tenn. At the former place he met with an accident. A fire broke out in the depot while he was sleeping in it, and in assisting to get out blankets and other Government supplies he slipped and sprained his ankle. He has never fully recovered from this. Soon after he came to Cass County, Mich., and bought a piece of land in Mason Township. Six months later he sold this at a profit of $2,500, and bought the place where he now lives, and which adjoins the first tract he bought.

In 1869 Mr. Moser was married to Miss Susan Conley, the eldest daughter of William Conley, of Mason Township, and a native of the Buckeye State. She went with her father to Indiana when quite young, and finally to Cass County, Mich., where they settled in Mason Township. Here Mr. Moser became acquainted with her. Five sons were born to this marriage: Theodore, Charles A., Clarence, Leland and Willard. After his marriage Mr. Moser located on his present farm and became an extensive fruit-grower. As Michigan has for a number of years enjoyed a wide-spread reputation for being one of the most prolific fruit-growing States in the central cluster, Mr. Moser has taken advantage of this fact to inaugurate an industry that has been a great success. He is an expert in the business and has made considerable money at it. Of late years he has done but little work aside from looking after his various interests, for he is counted one of the largest money-loaners in his section.

Mr. Moser has always been a Democrat in politics and has held many of the local offices in his township. For twenty years he was School Treasurer, also Justice of the Peace, and at the present time is one of the Board of Review of the township. He was made a Mason at Mt. Clemens, and has been a life-long temperance worker. He never drank a drop of liquor in his life, never uses tea or coffee, and dislikes tobacco in any form. In fact, he is temperate in all things.

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This family biography is one of numerous biographies included in the Portrait and Biographical Record of Berrien and Cass Counties, Michigan published in 1893. 

View additional Cass County, Michigan family biographies here: Cass County, Michigan Biographies

View a map of 1911 Cass County, Michigan here: Cass County Michigan Map

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