My Genealogy Hound

JOHN M. HOFFA. Through Clark County and far beyond its limits the New Carlisle Sun and the Buckeye Farmer are well known, being found in many households and their columns being perused by thousands of readers. It affords pleasure to the biographical writer to incorporate in this volume a sketch of the genial editor and publisher of these sheets, who demonstrates the fact that editors, like poets, are born, not made. The qualities which make a successful journalist are inbred and no amount of study can supply the lack of a keenness of observation, acute perception of the tastes of the public, and accurate judgement on matters treated in various departments of a newspaper. Beginning his editorial career with neither money nor experience, Mr. Hoffa has made it a success; in fact every dollar which he has and that which he is, are the results of his own natural abilities and the use he has made of his talents, and his life should encourage other poor boys in a manful determination to be “somebody.”

Myerstown, Lebanon County, Pa., is the birthplace of him of whom we write and his natal day was December 9, 1854. His father, Levi Hoffa, a native of the same county, died at the early age of twenty-nine years, when his son John was but two years old. He was a tailor and carried on business in Myerstown for a number of years. He was a member of the Lutheran Church and a son of Phillip and Elizabeth (Belcher) Hoffa who also lived and died in Lebanon County. The mother of our subject bore the maiden name of Susan Meily. She also is a native of Lebanon County, Pa. She is still surviving being now about fifty-nine years of age. She is the mother of three children — Mary A., John M. and William G. The first is the wife of George Umberger, a tailor at Bismark, and the youngest son is a dealer in barber’s supply at Harrisburg, Pa.

The early life of the subject of this sketch was spent in his native place and his education obtained in the Palatinate College at that place. Early in life he began clerking and later was engaged in business for himself a short time. The field of journalism attracted him and he abandoned his former occupation to start the Londonderry Weekly Gazette, at Palmyra, a sheet which he conducted a year. He then sold out, and removing to Larue, Ohio, bought the Larue News, running it two years before selling. His next enterprise was to buy the New Carlisle Sun in 1883, which sheet he has since owned, managed and edited. In 1887 he started the Buckeye Farmer, which now has a circulation of over five thousand copies.

The success which Mr. Hoffa has met with in his journalistic work has been merited by his close application to the details of his business and his earnest efforts to make of his publications newsy and popular journals. The columns are filled with interesting and instructive matter, adapted to the family circle, as well as to the man who desires to progress in the world and looks to the newspaper for information that will aid him in this effort. In the editorial department one finds pungent criticisms, suggestions and applications, and encouraging comment on all worthy enterprises.

On the 17th of July, 1875, Mr. Hoffa led to the hymeneal altar Miss Ida J. Zimmerman, of Palmyra, Pa., a young lady whose bright mind, cultured manner and fine character had won his esteem, as they have the respect of many friends. She was born in Palmyra and is the daughter of Abraham and Maria (Henry) Zimmerman, natives of the same place. Her happy union with our subject has been blessed by the birth of four interesting children — Mary J., Meily V., Harry L., and Abram Z.

Mr. Hoffa is quite interested in the social orders, and has taken all the degrees of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Patriotic Order of Sons of America, and ten degrees in Masonry. He is a member in good standing of the Lutheran Church.