There are few men in Macoupin county who are better informed from
personal experience as to pioneer life in this section of the state than
George A. Brown, who was born at Brighton October 18, 1839, and has made
his home in this city during the greater part of his life. As a young
man he witnessed many stirring scenes in various parts of the
Mississippi valley and also on the great plains and in the early mining
camps of the Rocky Mountains, and his reminiscences are more interesting
than any tale of fiction.
He is a son of Michael and Sarah E.
(Peter) Brown and under the parental roof he grew to manhood, his early
education being secured in the public schools of his native town. At the
age of eighteen he began to work at the carpenter’s trade but his plans
were interfered with by the gold excitement which followed the discovery
of the yellow metal in Cherry Creek, near the base of the Rocky
Mountains, where Denver is now located. Early in 1861 he started with
William Loveland and drove an ox team across the plains to Golden,
Colorado, where Mr. Loveland engaged in the mercantile business. The
young man, however, went into the diggings of Clear Creek and Gilpin
counties and spent eight months in an eager search for gold in Eureka
Gulch, the Twelve-Mile Diggings and Pine Gulch, devoting the remainder
of the year to prospecting. He also spent eight months in the general
store of Mr. Loveland at Golden.
In January, 1863, Mr. Brown
returned east, traveling as far as Poughkeepsie, New York, where he
attended the Eastman Business College. Having completed a course at that
noted institution he came back home and enlisted for the one hundred day
service in Company E, One Hundred and Thirty-third Illinois Volunteers,
under Captain Dugan. He was stationed with his company at Rock Island,
Illinois, and assigned to guard Confederate prisoners. After receiving
his discharge he went to Alton, Illinois, and secured employment as
clerk in the store of Hathaway & Wade, with whom he continued for a
year. He then engaged as clerk in a clothing store for six or eight
months and spent the following summer at his trade as a carpenter in
southeastern Missouri. He next associated with his brother, James
McKendrie Brown, in cultivating a farm of one hundred and sixty acres in
McLean county, Illinois, which was owned by their parents, and in
February, 1869, returned to Macoupin county and for one year cultivated
a portion of the home farm. He then entered the grain business at
Brighton, in which he was engaged for many years with marked success,
and sold out to his son Russell in 1910. He was one of the organizers of
the First National Bank of Brighton and was honored by being elected
vice president, a position he has filled to the entire satisfaction of
officers, directors and depositors of this growing institution.
In 1869 Mr. Brown was married to Miss Mary Lapsley, who was born in
Ohio, of Irish descent, and died in 1886. They were the parents of three
children, two of whom survive: Russell S., who is engaged in the grain
business at Brighton; and Mary E., the wife of John F. Garber, teacher
of botany and physiology in the Yateman high school at St. Louis,
Missouri. On the 26th of October, 1892, Mr. Brown was again married, his
second union being with Miss Martha R. Fry, a native of Brighton and a
daughter of James and Mary E. Fry, who were pioneer settlers of that
place.
The name of Mr. Brown is not upon the register of any
religious denomination but his wife is an earnest member of the
Presbyterian church. Politically he adheres to the republican party
whose candidates and principles he has supported for many years. He
served as a member of the board of supervisors five years and also as
school trustee. For more than four decades he was actively connected
with the mercantile interests of Brighton and as a financier ranks among
the far-seeing men in this part of the state, his opinion often being
sought by persons desiring to make safe and profitable investments. As a
result of his good business judgment he occupies a place of large
responsibility and is justly held in high esteem.
Extracted 15 Nov 2018 by Norma Hass from History of Macoupin County, Illinois: Biographical and Pictorial, by Charles A. Walker, published in 1911, Volume 2, pages 347-348.
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