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Below is a family biography included in Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Independence County, Arkansas published by Goodspeed Publishing Company in 1889.  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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F. B. Meriwether is a native-born resident of the county, his birth occurring in 1861, and he received his early scholastic training in the common and graded schools of his native county. From his earliest youth he clerked in his father’s store, and, after attaining a suitable age, became a partner with his father in a store in Batesville, and was married, in 1880, to Miss Queen Berry, whose birth occurred in Mitchell, Tenn., in 1862. To them have been born two children, but only one is living, Nettie. The wife died on the 3d of September, 1887. After his father’s death, Mr. Meriwether engaged in business with G. W. Browning, and came to Sulphur Rock, where he was engaged in merchandising until 1886, and has since been in the lumber business. He is quite well fixed financially, and the father, at the time of his death, owned nearly 2,000 acres, his estate being one of the largest and richest in the county. F. B. Meriwether is one of the leading young business men in Independence County, and, as a young man, is very popular with his associates. Unlike most persons to whom a competence is left, he has not foolishly squandered it, but has continued to add to it, and is now ranked among the wealthy residents of the county. His parents, W. D. and Eleanor Meriwether, were Kentuckians, the former being a native of Shelby County, where he was born September 5, 1822. He was taken by his parents to Mississippi, thence to Independence County, Ark., where both his father and mother died. At the time of his marriage, he had very little property with which to commence life, but he opened a country store on his forty-acre farm, and at the breaking out of the war, owned an extensive tract of land, a lucrative mercantile business, and thirty-five negroes. He was a very heavy loser during the war, and during this period the most of his time was spent in St. Louis and Little Rock. After the war he again opened business on his farm, and did exceptionally well until 1871, when he and family moved to Sulphur Rock, and for the next eight years were engaged in business at this point. From that time until 1883, when the father died, they were occupied in merchandising at Batesville. He was one of the shrewdest and most successful merchants of the State, and was justly called the “Cotton King of Northeast Arkansas.” In his family were twelve children: Mary, who died when six years of age; Julia, the wife of G. Brown; Buck, George, Martha, Johanna, wife of Dr. J. W. Hodges; William, Frank B. (our subject), Clinton, David, who died at the age of three years; Eliza, who died at the age of three and one-half years, and Thomas, who died when an infant. The maternal grandfather died at the age of one hundred and three years.

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This family biography is one of 158 biographies included in Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Independence County, Arkansas published in 1889.  View the complete description here: Independence County, Arkansas History, Genealogy, and Maps

View additional Independence County, Arkansas family biographies here: Independence County, Arkansas Biographies

View a map of 1889 Independence County, Arkansas here: Independence County, Arkansas Map

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