Macoupin County
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Biography - LESTER D. SMITH

Lester D. Smith, who is the owner of an ideal home at Shipman and is now living practically retired, having gained a competence, was born at Gray. Herkimer county, New York, October 19, 1854. He is a descendant of Irish and Scotch ancestry and is a son of Phineas H. and Mary (McCombs) Smith, the former of whom was born about 1831, in Herkimer county, and the latter in Oneida county, New York, in 1834. The great-grandfather of our subject, on the paternal side, came from Ireland to America in the eighteenth century and settled in Rhode Island. John Smith, the grandfather, was born in Rhode Island in 1801. After growing to maturity he moved to Herkimer county, New York, and was married to Mary Hemingway, a native of that county. He engaged in the lumber business at Gray but subsequently gave his attention to farming. In his old age, after the death of his wife, he came to Illinois, having been preceded to this state by his children, and died at Shipman about 1886.

The family of Mr. and Mrs. Smith consisted of ten children, six of whom grew to maturity: Phineas H., the father of our subject; Charles, of Iowa, now deceased; Orrin, who resides at Los Angeles, California; Matilda, who married Peter Valentine, of Iowa, and is also deceased; Laura, who became the wife of Wallace Bullock, of Gray, New York, and is now deceased; and Mary, the widow of Charles Bingham, of Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Phineas H. Smith possessed advantages of education in the public schools of New York state and grew to maturity under the paternal roof. In 1853 he married Mary McCombs, a descendant of a Scotch family that settled near Utica, New York, and for a number of years engaged in the manufacture of cheese at Dolgeville, Herkimer county. In 1855 he disposed of his factory and came to Illinois, locating on a farm in Shipman township, Macoupin county, which he cultivated to good advantage. Owing to the encroachment of age he retired at Shipman and died here about 1901. Five children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Smith, namely: Lester D., of this review; Hattie M., who married C. M. Stanley, of Cazenovia, New York, and is now deceased; Irving P., a resident of Shipman; Winifred, the wife of Herman Shultz, of Shipman, record of whom appears elsewhere in this work; and Mabel, who died at the age of twenty-three.

In the public schools of New York state Lester D. Smith secured his early education and later attended a business college at New Haven, Connecticut. At the age of twenty-one, like thousands of ambitious young men, he decided that the great west offered a field more inviting than the long-settled states of the east and he emigrated to Warren county, Missouri, where he found employment as manager of a creamery, a business which he had thoroughly learned under his father. In 1877 he came to Shipman and established a creamery in his own name. The business prospered and subsequently he opened a store in connection with his creamery. In 1891 he sold out and bought three hundred acres of land in Shipman and Hilyard townships, which he improved by the erection of buildings and the planting of shade trees and a fine orchard of ten acres. He became the owner of the first herd of pure blooded Holstein-Friesian cattle in this section but disposed of his cattle in 1896 and concentrated his attention upon stock-breeding, making a specialty of pure blooded Shropshire sheep, which he disposed of for breeding purposes. In 1909 he sold his farm and purchased seventy acres within the corporate limits of Shipman. He has greatly improved his place by erecting a modern residence of nine rooms, and other buildings, and has one of the most attractive homes in Macoupin county. Having attained a position of comparative financial independence, he now enjoys the comforts of many years of earnest and well directed application.

On December 20, 1877, Mr. Smith was married to Miss Inez Timmerman, a daughter of John and Mary (Lankton) Timmerman, and they are the parents of four children: Harry C., who married Eunice Hoff and resides at Los Angeles, California; Florence, of St. Louis, Missouri; Gilbert L., who died at the age of twenty-three; and Edna Agnes, at home. The Timmerman family is of German descent and the progenitors in this country settled in Mohawk Valley, New York, before the Revolutionary war. Several of the ancestors of Mrs. Smith served in the patriot army and she and her daughters are entitled to membership in the Daughters of the American Revolution. A younger brother of her grandmother served as mail carrier in the Revolutionary war. Her grandfather was Abraham Timmerman and he was the father of nine children, namely: Henry, now deceased, who made his home in Steuben county, New York; Solomon, also deceased, who resided in Herkimer county; Levi, of Steuben county; John, the father of Mrs. Smith; Marcus, now deceased, who made his home in Steuben county; David, who was a resident of Herkimer county, and is now deceased; Adeline, also deceased; Charlotte, who is the widow of Sandford Canute; and Elizabeth, who married William Morgan, of Herkimer county, and is now deceased. John Timmerman was reared on his father’s farm in Herkimer county and received his education in the public schools. He gave his attention to agriculture and stock-raising for many years and is now living retired at the age of eighty, at Little Falls, New York. In his family were four children: Inez, now Mrs. Lester D. Smith; and Margaret, Elizabeth and John, all of whom are deceased.

Lester D. Smith has for many years made a close study of Free Masonry and has taken the York and Scottish Rite degrees. He is a member of the chapter at Carlinville, the commandery at Alton, the S. R. Lodge of Perfection of East St. Louis, and the Oriental Consistory of Chicago. He also holds membership in the Methodist church of Shipman, in which he is serving as trustee and recording secretary. He is active in church work and in all movements which seek to promote brotherhood and a kindly feeling among men. In politics he adheres to the republican party. He has served as school trustee and was president of the village of Shipman in 1887. As a successful business man and an energetic and progressive citizen he ranks among the leaders in the county and he can claim an extensive circle of warm personal friends throughout a region where he has been favorably known for more than a third of a century.


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 386-388.


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