Jasper County Democrat, Volume 17, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 May 1914 — GENERAL AND STATE NEWS [ARTICLE]

GENERAL AND STATE NEWS

Telegraphic Reports From Many Parts ot the Country. SHORT BITS OF THE UNUSUAL Happenings in Distant and Nearby Cities and Towns.—Matters of Minor Mention Front Many Places. NEWTON COUNTY PION EEK DEAD The Venerable John Ade of Kentland Dies of Paralysis at Congressional Convention. John Ade, of Kentland, one of the pioneer citizens of Newton counts, and the father of George Ade, the noted author and playwright, died suddenly at 'Valparaiso Tuesday afternoon, while attending the republican convention. Mr. Ade was chairman of the resolutions committee, and participated in the work of that committee. When their report was called for he arose and requested that George P. Haywood, cf Lafayette, read the report, saving that his own vblce was not strong enough. Mr. Haywood was in the midst of the reading when Mr Ade was seen to be in physical distress. Delegates gathered around him, and confusion reigned in the hall until a tall rugged delegate named B. Swetz, from Lake county, lifted Mr. Ade in his arms and carried him to the entrance of the theater* where it was thought the fresh -air would revive him. The proceeding l ’ were resumed, and Will R. Wood was responding to his nomination in a brief speech when the announcement of Mr. Ade’s death was handed to Judge Crumpacker, the chairman. As Mr. Wood closed Chairman Crumpacker broke the sad news to the conven- > tion and at his suggestion the whole; audience rose and stood with bowed heads for about two minutes. Hip body was taken to the home! of Judge Crumpacker to remain over night awaiting the arrival of bis sons and its removal to Kentland. \.. He is survived by six- children, ; Will H., Joseph, George. Mrs. John G. Ddvis and Mrs. Warren McCray, of Kentland, ard Mrs. John W. Randall, of Washington, D. C., where he was to leave to pay a visit* Wednesday. The funeral was held at Kent-; land at 2 p. in., yesterday. Judge; Hanley, John O’Connor, Mose Leo-! pold and C. C. Warner were among those from Rensselaer attending the; funeral. The following obituary of Mr. ! Ade is taken from the Newton County Enterprise: John Ade was born at Lawes,! England, Sept. 18, 1 828, the son of; John and Esther Wood Ade. At the; age of twelve he came to America! with his parents. They boarded a! sailing vessel at London and follow-1 ed the Thames to Portsmouth. The] voyage lasted 45 days and it was; while in mid-ocean that, he became acquainted with American customs. I The American sailors celebrated the I Fourth of July with customary en-l thuslasm. The twelve year old boy! and his brothers joined in, and his 75 years residence in America since obliterated all the British pecularities from his makeup. The family landed in New York, and imediately started for what was then called the far west'—Cincinnati. They went by rail to Philadelphia, and then rode on a canal boat to the foot of the mountains. On this side of the mountains they took a train to Pittsburg and then rode by flat boat to Cincinnati. J’hey made t|ieir home at the lit-] tie town of Cheviot, then six miles from Cincinnati, but now a part of the city. At the age of nineteen Mr. i Aue decided to take a trip through the newly developing country to the .west, so he boarded an Ohio river j steamer and went down the Missis-; sippi, afterward working his way up so Galena, the metrdpolis of the Mississippi valley. He walked from Galena to Madison, Wis., and then started back to Ohio to resume learning his trade, that of a blacksmith. In 1849 he went down the Ohio! again and up the Mississippi and Illinois rivers to Ottawa. Canal boat- ; ing had not yet opened for the season and Mr. Ade walked to Chicago and spent the summer of 1849 there. At that time Chicago was a city with a population of about 22,000. It was while in Chicago in 1849 that Mr. Ade heard Stephen A. Douglas deliver two speeches at the old Market Hall on State street. In the fall of 1849 he crossed Lake Michigan by steamer Jo New Bus-

falo and took the Michigan Central road to Detroit, and then across Lake Erie by boat and back to Cincinnati by the Little Miami road. It was in Cheviot, Ohio, May 20, 1851, that John Ade and Adaline Bush were united in marriage by Thomas Wells, a justice of the peace. For two years Mr. Ade conducted a toll gate and engaged in. 'blacksmithing, and in 1853 Mr. and Mrs. Ade started for this part of the world. Ayers & Company, of Cincinnati, had opened retail stores in Jasper county, Ind., -fftT Iroquois county, 111., and they employed Mr. Ade to come out and take charge of their Morocco store. He and his wife went by boat to Madison and tnen came by rail almost to Lafayette, making the remainder of the trip to Iroquois (or Bunkum) by wagon. The road from Ijafayette to Chicago ran near where Sheldon now stands. The region around Kentland was regarded impassible. This magnificlent farming regiofi, with its beautiful homes, stately groves, and wealth of modern improvements, was then a succession of boggy swamps and sloughs, grown up with coarse grass and rushes. The houses were ten or fifteen miles apart and the only habitations and broken ground were at the edge of the timber.

Iroquois was then the trading point for a vast territory. It was one of the important points along the road from Lafayette to Chicago. The next stopping place to the north was "Buck Horn" tavern at Donovan, and the first to the south was the old Sumner place in Benton county. Mr. and Mrs. Ade spent six weeks in Iroquois before moving to their new home at Morocco. This brings the story of this eventful life up to the sixty-one years spent in this county. A detailed review of Mr. Ade’s life during those sixty-one years would be almost a complete history of Newton county. For two years after locating at Morocco he ran the general store and then opened a blacksmith shop, going back to the old trade he had learned in Ohio. tn 1860 Newton county was .partitioned off from Jasper county, and Mr. Ade had an important part in creating the new county and formm lating its first government. At that time there was no town of Kentland. The first train on the line from Logansport had come west between Christmas, 1859, and New Year, 1860. The company established a station at this point and Kentland was made the county seat. Mr. Ade was truly a pioneer of the town, ille came here as the first recorder of the county qhd built the second residence In the town. The house built by Mr. Ade is still standing on the south side of Court Park, the second from the east corner of the block. These were stirring days in the life of Mr. Ade. The great civil war clouds were blackening and soon broke in all their furror. Mr. Ade, while serving as recorder and later as auditor, made many trips to the front to seek out and bring home the sick, wounded" and dead soldiers who had enlisted from this) county. On one trip he went as far south as Vicksburg. In recognition of his work in behalf of the soldiers MT. Ade was elected an honorary member of the G, A. R. several years ago, and has always been regarded by tiie old soldiers as a veteran in heart if not in arms. After the war and following his retirement from public office Mr. Ade was engaged as book-keeper in the store of C. B.' Cones, and in 1873 entered the Cones bank as cashier. In 1875 Mr. Ade formed a partnership with Greenberry MieCray and E. Littell I rmston and purchased the Cones bank, operating under the firm name of Ade, McCray & Co. Mr. Ade served as cashier of this bank until 1908, when he retired from active business. During the years intervening between his retirement from business and his death he wrote a history of Newton county, covering the period from 1853 to 1911. He also was writing an autobiography | of his life, which work was not completed.