My Genealogy Hound

OREN STODDARD. A prominent agriculturist of the town of Busti, who was born in the “Green Mountain State,” but who has been identified with Chautauqua county since his early manhood, is the gentleman whose name heads this sketch. He is a son of Alvin and Rena (Hall) Stoddard and was born at West Brattleboro, Windham county, Vermont, July 18th, 1818. The Stoddard family are of English descent, and our subject’s grandfather, Jacob Stoddard, achieved distinction by serving on General Washington’s body guard during the Revolutionary war. Until his enlistment he was a farmer in his native State and at the close of hostilities returned there and died in 1812; his wife drew a Revolutionary widow’s pension until her death. Alvin Stoddard was a native of the same State and by trade was a miller and mill-wright. When a young man he was employed as a school teacher, and, having acquired a superior education, was offered a professorship in Yale College, which he declined. He was a deacon in the Baptist church and died when fifty-eight years of age. He married Rena Hall, a native of Brattleboro, Vermont, of French extraction; she, too, was a member of the Baptist church and died on April 5, 1853, aged sixty-three years.

Oren Stoddard was reared near the scene of his birth and was educated in the common schools of his native State until nineteen years of age, when, failing health compelling him to leave the rigorous climate of Vermont, he came to Chautauqua county and remained three years, and although he returned home at the end of that time, the salubrity of the climate and the natural beauty of Chautauqua county caused him to come back almost immediately and he has resided here ever since. He learned the carpenter and joiner’s trade and followed it for some time in connection with his farming. In 1841 he moved upon the farm where he now lives and has resided there since without interruption — an unbroken period of fifty years.

In 1842 he married Catherine M. Smith, a daughter of William Smith of the town of Busti, this county, and they were blessed with a family of five children, two sons and three daughters: Rena is the wife of Charles H. Johnson, a prominent manufacturer of this town; Eugene died when eight years and nine months old; Ella married H. E. Davis and resides at Warren, Pa.; Cooley died aged twenty-two years and four months; and May Belle is unmarried and at home. Mr. Stoddard owns a fine farm of well-improved land, and his residence is a nice brick house.

The grape product requires a large number of baskets in which to market it; to supply this demand Mr. Stoddard is engaged in manufacturing grape baskets, a business which he has conducted in connection with his farming for the past twenty-five years. Politically he is a republican and has held the honorable position of president of the Chautauqua County Agricultural Society in the year 1882. He was his party’s candidate for the Assembly at one time, but was not elected. Mr. Stoddard has always taken an active part in politics and is recognized as a very influential man. He is an intelligent and educated gentleman, fond of company and an excellent entertainer.