My Genealogy Hound

JAMES STEELE, farmer; P. O. Arcanum, Ohio. To the subject of this sketch we are pleased to accord a place in the front rank of the early pioneers of Darke Co.; he was born in Maryland in 1802; in 1812, he removed with his mother to Butler Co., Ohio, and labored faithfully for the maintenance of his widowed mother and the support of the family; his father died when he was only 8 years old, and the responsibility of providing for the family rested exclusively on our subject; young as he was, he fully understood the situation, and labored faithfully for the support and comfort of the family till he attained his 21st year, at which time he learned the blacksmith’s trade, which, combined with farming, made life very successful; in 1868, on account of failing health and rapid advancemen of old age, he abandoned the anvil and forge, and his attentions have been exclusively directed to the farm; Mr. Steele has lived on the farm he purchased at Government price, for forty-five years; he has lived to see the monarchs of the forest laid low by the onward march of civilization, the wilderness robbed of its verdure, the desolate and pestilential swamps deprived of their poisons and converted into productive fields; truly, the change has been great—a howling wilderness has been conquered and subjected to the use of a great industrial people within half a century; and still the resources of Darke Co. are not more than half developed. He united in marriage with Jemima Johns, March 6, 1825; twelve children have been given to this union, of whom ten are living, viz., Elizabeth and Hannah (twins), Urial, Stephen, Thomas, Martha, Asher, Ellen, Eliza and Mary (twins), William and Catherine having died in infancy. Mr. and Mrs. Steele have lived to see their children all married and comfortably situated in life; they have, taken great pains in educating them, five of whom are successful educators.