The Hancock-Henderson Quill, Inc.
Years ago when Margie Barber and I were discussing early history of this township, she gave me this history of the area commemoration of the town of Media s 125th birthday, these articles written by Faree Mathers are being shared.--Virginia Ross
Part V
About the same time the Gibson family immigrated to America, the Mathers family came. Samuel Mathers of Ireland ran away from home in his youth and took a ship for America. The ship having gone down in a storm off the coast of the New Land, he was carried ashore by a sailor and afterward went to Quebec. Here he married Jane Grier. Then they came to Pennsylvania and resided there for a few years. Later he moved with his family to Henderson County. Their oldest son Joseph was ranked as one of the influential men of Walnut Grove Township. Their other sons were Robert, James, Samuel and George, all of whom were pioneer settlers of this county.
Samuel Mathers son Samuel, my grandfather with a friend made his way to California during the Gold Rush. He returned later to Illinois with a few gold nuggets. He married Samuel C. Gibson s oldest daughter Catherine Ann in September 1863. They settled on a farm in Walnut Grove Township near the Gibson and Pogue homes which is known as the Mathers farm. Six children were born to the couple: Earnest Stoutesman, Samuel Grier, Joseph Jay, David Gibson, John Rankin and Myrtle Hope. Stoutesman or Stute as his friends called him, Grier, and Joseph were farmers. David and John learned telegraphy and were employed by the Atchinson, Topeka, Santa Fe and the Union Pacific Railroads. Myrtle lived with her grandparents (Samuel C. Gibson) after her mother s death. She taught school in Media and Biggsville.
Ernest Soutesman Mathers, My father, known as E.S. Mathers, was born 1867 and lived on the Mathers farm until his death in 1945. He married Roxey Jane Huss in October 1887. They had four children: Nellie, Faree, Eurie and Raymon. Nellie married Clyde Stanbary, a carpenter. Faree, unmarried, was a school teacher, having taught school for 43 ½ years in Henderson and Warren Counties. Eurie taught school seven years and then married Frank Harold Graham of Sugar Tree Grove north of Monmouth. He was a railroad postal clerk and a carpenter. He served in the Navy in World War I and II. They had two daughters, Dorothy Jane and Marjory Hope. Raymon married Vera Philhower of Raritan and they had a daughter Zoe and a foster son Donald who is a mortician. Raymon was a farmer and a machinist.
Grier Mathers married Anna Pogue and their children were Merle and Russell. Joseph Mathers married Florence Bacon; they had one daughter, Gladys Fern. David Mathers married Orpha Clover of Lomax; they had two daughters, Madonna and Maxine. John Mathers married Phoebe Gearheart of Raritan and their children were Elizabeth, Lloyd, Mildred and Johanna.