My Genealogy Hound

JOSEPH ABEL, glass-manufacturer, Pittsburgh, was born in Geisa, Saxe-Weimar, Germany, Jan. 9, 1831, and is a son of Ignatius and Josepha (Fleck) Abel. His education was completed at the College of Fulda, where he attended from 1844 to 1849. During the latter year he came to Pittsburgh, where he found employment in the drugstore of L. Wilcox, Jr. In 1854 Mr. Abel became the owner of the business. This he sold four years later, and established the drug business still carried on at the corner of Grant street and Fifth avenue, which he kept till 1880. He was one of the founders of the glass house of Knox, Kim & Co., in 1867, and ten years later took an active part in its management. In 1880 the firm became Abel, Kim & Co., with Mr. Abel as manager, and since 1884 has been Abel, Smith & Co. Mr. Abel was one of the incorporators of the Germania Savings Bank, of which he is vice-president, and of the Allemania Insurance company, of which he is president. He was one of the organizers of the German and Third National Banks, and was many years president of the German Library association. He was also one of the organizers of the College of Pharmacy.

In religious opinions Mr. Abel is liberal and tolerant. He espoused the cause of Gen. Fremont in his presidential campaign, and has ever been an earnest republican. During the war of the rebellion Mr. Abel was active in inducing Gen. Schimmelpfennig, a competent German military officer, to espouse the Union cause, and in interesting other influential German citizens. He aided in raising the 74th P. V., and in every way manifested allegiance to the country of his adoption. In 1870 Mr. Abel married Louisa, daughter of Frederic and Caroline Marchand, of Huguenot extraction. Mrs. Abel was born at Frankfort, Germany, and educated at Dieppe, France. She is the mother of two children: Hilda, aged seventeen, and William Fleming, aged sixteen. Mr. Abel’s grandfather, Philip, operated a flour, oil and saw-mill, to which his son, Ignatius, succeeded; and John Adam, father of Josepha Fleck, kept a hotel at Geisa.