Early Grand Haven Area Residents

Click on the picture for a larger image.  Text courtesy of Wallace K. Ewing, PhD. from A Directory of People in Northwest Ottawa County, Copyright 1999 by the Tri-Cities Historical Museum.  All rights reserved.

Last names beginning A - H

Last names beginning I - S

Last names beginning T - Z

 

I - S

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Jones, Hamilton

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Robbins, Hunter Savidge

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Kendrick, Frederick

bulletRussett, Joe & May Sara
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Kiel, Albert

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Savidge, Hunter

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McNett, DeForest

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Savidge, Sarah Caroline Patten

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McNett, Eleanor Griffin

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Sheldon, Willard C. I

bulletMcNett, Dr. Jacob 
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Shupe, Charles R.

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Munroe, Dr. Stephen

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Slayton, Nathaniel Volney

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Parrisien, Jean Baptiste

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Smith, LeMoyne Seth

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Pennoyer, Henry I

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Smith, Lora A

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Pennoyer, Henry II

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Stuart, Robert

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Pennoyer, John

 

Hamilton Jones

Hamilton Jones, b.1807-d.1888  

Hamilton Jones, who lived from 1807 to 1888, built a steam mill at Grand Haven, featuring a large circular saw and siding mill. The mill was located on the Grand River, near the west end of Fulton Street. Hamilton was appointed to serve as Grand Haven’s third Postmaster, a position he held from September 12, 1866 to May 26, the next year. His wife, Jerusha Roberts, lived from 1814 to 1883. Both were buried at Lake Forest Cemetery. Their daughter Melissa married Benjamin Safford of Grand Haven.

Frederick Kendrick

Frederick Kendrick, b.1845-d.1918  

Born in England in 1845 [1848], Frederick Kendrick entered government service in 1873. He was in charge of the harbor tug Colonel Graham at Ludington and was instrumental in a dramatic rescue. “A [Congressional] gold medal was awarded to Captain Frederick Kendrick, master of the government harbor tug at Ludington, ML in recognition of an act of magnificent gallantry, resulting in the saving of forty-four persons from the large grain barge, J. H. Rutter, on the first of November 1878 .” He was later transferred to Grand Haven, where he was put in charge of government ships that wintered in Government Pond. He resided at 106 Franklin with his wife, Emma. Frederick died on September 1, 1918. [“Magnificent Gallantry of Local Sailor.”]

Albert Kiel

Lucy (Mrs. Albert) Kiel

Albert Kiel, b.1841-d.1930  

Born in The Netherlands November 8, 1841, Albert Kiel came to Grand Haven about 1861.  Within a short time he established a furniture and undertaking business that he conducted until his death in 1930. For many years he was one of the best known businessmen in the state. In 1872 he married Lucy De Keep [De Kiep], who was born in The Netherlands on August 16, 1848 and came to this area with Dr. Van Raalte’s colony at Holland. Lucy died April 26, 1908 at her home. Their children included Eleanor, who married Louis Bissonette of Durand, Michigan, and died in 1982; Sarah Henrietta, who at age 55 became I. Edgar Lee’s second wife and lived in Grand Haven; and Thomas, also of Grand Haven. Albert was a member of the City Council from 1895 to 1898. He was one of the earliest advocates of the city electric lighting plant, and it was largely through his efforts that the municipal power plant was established and kept in operation in Grand Haven. The Kiels resided at 315 Columbus Street. Albert died June 6, 1930 at his home and was buried at Lake Forest Cemetery with his wife. [Tribune obituaries, April 27, 1908 and June 7, 1930.]

DeForest & Eleanor McNett

Eleanor Griffin McNett

Eleanor Griffin McNett 

De Forest McNett, b. 1826 - d. 1916 & Eleanor Griffin McNett 1850-1935  

Eleanor was born in Grand Haven in 1850, the daughter of Henry and Rachel Eastman Griffin. She lived in the family home at 301 Franklin Street, which was erected in 1844, and attended the first school in Grand Haven, when Mary A. White was the teacher. She graduated from Elmira College in New York and taught in Grand Rapids and Milwaukee schools and at a school for Native Americans in Arizona. Eleanor married De Forrest McNett in 1892. He was from Sodus Point, New York and the brother of Dr. Jacob McNett, one of the earliest physicians in Grand Haven. De Forrest, born in 1826, died in Grand Haven in 1916. His wife was known as a good speaker and some of her articles were published in magazines. She was a charter member of the Grand Haven Women’s Club. and became its President in 1915 and 1916.  Eleanor was the first Executive Secretary of the Ottawa County Chapter of the American Red Cross. She served in that capacity from 1917 to the mid­-1930s. Some of her scrapbooks were donated to the archives of the Tri-Cities Historical Museum. In her will, she donated her house at 315 Franklin Street and four adjoining lots to be used for a museum. The legacy room, as specified in the will, was to contain antiques and pictures from the Griffin Family. The building was occupied by the Girl Scouts in 1941 and named the Griiffin-McNett House. McNett died on December 3, 1935 and was buried at Lake Forest Cemetery with her husband.

Dr. J.B. McNett

Jacob McNett, b. 1826 - d. 1916

One of the earliest physicians in Grand Haven, Dr. McNett settled in here 1856, and was a surgeon in the Civil War.  

Dr. Stephen Munroe

Stephen Munroe [ Monroe ] II, b.1813-d.1890  

Stephen Munroe, who was born in Parma, Monroe County, New York on June 28, 1813, moved to Jackson, Michigan in 1834, went on to Albion in 1840, and then to Grand Haven in 1850. His parents were Stephen and Susan Hicks Munroe. Around 1843 Stephen started to study medicine, and within a few years he received a medical degree from Bellevue Hospital Medical School in New York City. In Grand Haven he maintained an office in Griffin’s Drug Store in Grand Haven [29 Washington]. He later purchased an adjacent house at 21 Washington as his residence and another building at 23 Washington for his office. Michigan Medical History relayed this: “Dr. Monroe was the pioneer in the practice of medicine in Ottawa County. He traveled up and down the lake shore on foot, on horseback, or in a canoe suffering hunger and fatigue in his long tedius trips. A shrewd energetic man, he has been successful, such as he will be.” Although a busy physician, Stephen also was an entrepreneur and built a sawmill in Mill Point [Spring Lake] at the foot of Jackson Street in 1867. It later was known as the Munroe, Boyce & Co. Mill. Between 1849 and 1855 he purchased nearly 200 acres of land in Spring Lake Township. In 1871 Stephen was named director of the First National Bank of Grand Haven.  

Although comparatively young, Stephen retired from the medical profession in 1857, when Jacob McNett came to take his place. Munroe wanted more time for his business enterprises, and also to spend more time with his wife, Orpha Cobb, who was an invalid. They were married in 1855. Ophra was from and cousin to the twins John and James Barnes. She lived from January2, 1828 to July 21, 1858. Around 1882 Stephen moved West and died in Southern California on December 28, 1890. Stephen L. Munroe was his nephew.

Jean Baptiste Parrisien

Jean Baptiste Parrisien [Parisien], b.1812-d.1912  

Jean Baptiste Parrisien, a Chippewa Indian and Voyageur, arrived in Grand Haven with Louis Campau and Richard Godfroy in 1835, and the next year he became the first mail carrier between Grand Rapids and Grand Haven. He walked the Indian trail that later became known as the Grandville Road along the south side of the Grand River, and carried the mail along that route on foot. He then entered the service of Nathan White carrying mail between the Grand Haven Company and their mills at Grandville. Before he could do this it was necessary to blaze new trails connecting with the old ones. Jean started at a little frame building that stood on the corner of Washington and Second Streets, then proceeded in a southeasterly direction to Rosy Mound, roughly following today’s Lakeshore Drive, thence southeasterly through the townships of Grand Haven, Robinson, Allendale, and Georgetown to Jenison. Some of these roads no longer exist.  

According to Esther Dean Nyland, Jean was born on December 22, 1812 in Wisconsin near Lake Superior. His father was of French heritage and his mother was a Chippewa [Ojibway]. Jean had four brothers and two sisters. He was brought up on an Indian reservation in northern Wisconsin until he was six or eight, when he moved with his mother to Sault Ste. Marie. When he was 16 they moved to Mackinac Island, where he again he lived among the Indians and eventually married there. He died September 9, 1912 at his home in Grand Haven. A daughter, Josephine, was born in Hart on January 8, 1872, and married Charles Rumsey. Josephine died about 1938. As recently as 1999 a descendant of Jean’s lived in Arizona. By then the spelling of the family name had changed to Perysian.

Henry Pennoyer I

Henry Pennoyer I [Penoyer], b.1809-d.1886

Born in Norwalk, Fairfield County, Connecticut on February 8, 1809, Henry moved with his parents, John and Sally Pennoyer, to Cayuga County, New York when he was ten. John who was born about 1783, in 1837 settled in Cook County, near Chicago, with two of his sons, Stephen, who was born about 1812, and James, born about 1819. A daughter Susan also settled there with the family. In 1834 Henry and his wife, Harriet, went to Chicago, where they remained for two years before settling in the Muskegon area. In Muskegon Henry and his brother Augustus built a sawmill in 1836. Henry later moved to Grand Haven, where in 1843 he became Proprietor of the first Ottawa House Hotel on the northeast corner of Water Street [Harbor Drive] and Washington Streets [1 Washington] in Grand Haven. The hotel, which burned down on November 13, 1860 , also functioned as a stop for the Grand Rapids stagecoach.

In 1838 Henry was named to a commission charged with building a state road along the south side of the Muskegon River, and in the same year he was elected Ottawa County’s first Sheriff. In 1850 he was Commissioner of the Grand Haven and Black River Plank Road Company, and in 1851 he was part of a commission charged with laying out a plank road between Grand Haven and Holland. Also that year, Henry began to manage Clark Albee’s Washington House [approximately 24 Washington], a position he gave up on July 12, 1856. In 1853 he replaced Thomas Ferry as Deputy Collector of Customs for Grand Haven. He was Treasurer for Grand Haven before it became a city. He served in the State House in 1849 and ten years later in the State Senate. In the early I 850s Henry was editor of the Grand River Times, and in 1856 he helped found and became a charter member of the Ottawa County Agricultural Society. In 1857 he was President of the Grand Haven Lyceum, which presented public discussions of the time’s important topics. Because of his size 14 shoes, the Indians and voyageurs nicknamed him “Big Foot.”

Henry’s first marriage was to Harriet Kells of Mentz, New York. After two years in Chicago, the couple moved to the Muskegon area in 1836. Harriet and Henry had four children: John, born in Muskegon on September 20, 1839; Sarah M., born in Muskegon on April 29, 1841; Mary Arms, born in Grand Haven on September 23, 1847, and Clara, born in Grand Haven on April 8, 1852 . Harriet died on May 4, 1852, and the next year, on April 14, Henry married Aletta “Lettie” Teeple, who was born on November 20, 1829 in Plymouth, Michigan. Her parents were Peter and Sarah Losey Teeple, who had moved to Cascade Township in Kent County in late 1836. Lettie moved to Grand Haven in 1849 to be with her sister, Jane, and Jane’s husband, Thomas Merrill. Jane, born on January 30, 1826, was about three years older than Lettie. The Merrills were married in 1846, and later moved to Ferrysburg. Lettie tended to Henry’s children after Harriet’s death and also worked for him at the Washington House. Lettie and Henry had five children: Lettie May, born October 25, 1856; Henry 11, born January 24, 1860; Susan Amanda, who was born on August 18, 1861and died in March, 1863; Perry, born on January 15, 1864; and Frederick Anson, born on February 8, 1866. Also a member of the household was Lettie’s girl, Sarah Jane, from her short-lived marriage to William Rellingston. Lettie and William were married in Grand Haven on Christmas Day, 1849, and by July 12 the next year he was gone forever. Lettie later filed for divorce. In August, 1858 the Pennoyer family moved from Grand Haven to Crockery Township, where Henry tried his hand at farming. He bought 600 acres in Sections 13 and 24. Henry died on April 25, 1886 and was buried at Lake Forest Cemetery. Lettie left Michigan for Oregon a few years after his death and died in Seattle, Washington in 1911. Pennoyer Street in Grand Haven was named after Henry. [“Between Hope and Fear:  the Life of Lettie Teeple,” Part I, Michigan History, Fall 1974, and Part Il, Michigan History, Winter 1974.]

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Henry Pennoyer II, b.1860-d.1930  

Born in Crockery Township on January 24, 1860, Henry was the son of Henry and Harriet Kells Pennoyer. He inherited the family farm after his father’s death in 1886, but sold it to Joseph Gibbs five years later and headed west. He spent a few years in Washington State, then went on to Alaska and the Klondike, where he searched for gold. In 1899 he lost several of his toes to frostbite. Henry died about June 27, 1930 on board a ship bound from Fairbanks to Sitka, Alaska.

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John Pennoyer, b.1839-d.1893  

John, the son of Henry and Harriet Kells Pennoyer, was born in Muskegon on September 30, 1839. Like his father, and later his son, Edwin, John developed an interest in the hotel business and became proprietor of the Ferrysburg Hotel by 1864, after working briefly the previous year at the Rice House in Grand Haven. The Rice House was located on the northwest corner of Pine and Second Streets [Lot 7, Block II], near the train depot, and was owned by Thomas Merrill of Ferrysburg. John married Mariette Stone in August, 1863. She was born in Ohio on January 2, 1844 and died on February II, 1892. John died on October 19, 1893 and was buried at Lake Forest Cemetery with his wife. Edwin 0. Pennoyer was born in Michigan about 1870.

Hunter Robbins birthday, June 23, 1957

Kate (Mrs. Wm.) Hyland, Hunter Robbins, Mrs. Kenneth Welch, Bill, Mrs. Hunter Robbins, Dr. Wm. Hyland, Mrs. Nathaniel Robbins.  Welches & Hylands from Grand Rapids.

Hunter Savidge Robbins I, b.1892-d.1969

Born in Grand Haven on June 23, 1892 , Hunter was the son of Nathaniel and Esther Savidge Robbins V and a graduate of Grand Haven High School . He graduated in 1917 from the University of Michigan and served as 1st Lieutenant with the Signal Corps at Selfridge Field in Mt. Clemens, Michigan during WWI. He was married in 1919 in Las Vegas. He and his wife Margaret R. Fuller, had three Sons and a daughter: Hunter Savidge II, born on April 27, 1920; Dr. Jack Kinkelin of Pasadena, California, who was born May 28, 1921 and married Margaret Miller on November 11, 1944; William Savidge of Spring Lake, who was born October 19, 1923 and married Millie Randall on May 6, 1948; and Virginia Marie, who was born February 9, 1929, married Fred Boyd Hansen, whom she divorced in 1959, and then married Kenneth Robinson, also of Oakland, on April 2, 1960. In the winter the family lived in Pasadena, California and in the summer they resided at 221 North Cutler [400 West Liberty ] in a home built by Hunter’s parents and presented to him and his first wife as a wedding gift. Margaret was born about 1898 in Michigan. In 1947 Hunter married Clara Belle Sullivan. Hunter died in September, 1969.

Joe Russett & May Sara, daughter of Blue Eye

Joe Russett, b. circa 1852 - d. circa 1892         

Born on the flat river, Joe was the son of an Ottawa mother and French father.  Russett married May Sara, the daughter of Blue Eye.  Russett died at Rosbach's Hotel about 1892 (American House), probably around the age of 40.  Mrs. Russett died at Battle Point about five years before Joe.

Hunter Savidge

Hunter Savidge, b.1828-d.1881  

Born in Columbia County, Pennsylvania, Hunter’s parents moved to Turbotville, Northumberland Count when he was about six years old. Born on April 6, 1828, Hunter was the fifth son of thirteen children of Benjamin and Esther Hunter Savidge. He moved to Rockford, Illinois where he was in the contracting and building business until 1856, when he came to Spring Lake to purchase lumber for his business. He liked the area and the next year returned as a manufacturer lumber in association with men by the name of Young and Montague, owners of the Hopkins Sawmill. After a period of business difficulty, in 1861 he became a partner with Dwight Cutler of Grand Haven and the firm of Cutler & Savidge Lumber Company began to thrive as one of the most extensive and best known lumber firms in the Midwest .  

In August, 1870, Hunter bought a controlling interest in the Haire & Tolford Sawmill. The officers were Hunter Savidge, President; Dwight Cutler, Treasurer; Hiram W. Pearson, Secretary; and John B. Hancock. They prospered from the beginning, and Savidge became owner of a large amount of valuable real estate. He was the sole proprietor of the famous hotel, the Spring Lake House, one of the most popular summer resorts in West Michigan. On January 1, 1874 he sold his interest to the others. In 1871, Savidge was named Director of the First National Bank of Grand Haven. Also that year he loaned Aloys Bilz $10,000 to help him restart his business after a devastating fire. In 1873 Hunter constructed the Odd Fellows Building at 136 Washington in Grand Haven. He was a long-time member of the organization. Hunter organized a fire department to protect his sawmill. He was elected Supervisor of Spring Lake in 1876; was President of Greenville Lumber Company; became President of Ottawa Booming Company; served twenty years on the Spring Lake School Board; and was a Democrat, but never ran for public office. He gave this advice to a man who found himself in a financial emergency:  Cut down your expenses and keep cool.”  

On February 12, 1857 Hunter married Sarah Caroline Patten of Grand Rapids, who was born in 1832. Their honeymoon trip included a stage coach trip along the south side of the Grand River from Grand Rapids to Grand Haven, where they arrived the evening of February 22, in time for a Washington’s Birthday Party at the Washington House. The next morning they took the ferry across the Grand River to Mill Point [Spring Lake] and on to their home. Of their six children, three survived to adulthood. One of them, Esther, married Nathaniel Robbins V. The other two were George and William. In an attempt to improve his failing health, Hunter took a trip to California. He returned to Spring Lake, where he died April 11, 1881 and was buried at Spring Lake Cemetery with other family members.

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Sarah Caroline Patten Savidge, b.1832-d.1921  

Born in West Winfield, New York on March 19, 1832 , Sarah Patten came over land by prairie schooner with her family in 1845 to the small frontier hamlet of Grand Rapids on the edge of Michigan’s great pine forest. She became a teacher in Grand Rapids Public Schools under the direction of Jeannette Hollister, who married William M. Ferry II. Sarah saw her first railroad train in Grand Haven after embarking on a trip down the Grand River on her way to Chicago. She met her husband, Hunter Savidge, in Rockford, Illinois and married him in Grand Rapids February 12, 1857. They settled in Grand Haven after a stagecoach trip down the old river road in the dead of winter, staying the night at the Washington House, an early Grand Haven inn. A party was in progress for George Washington’s Birthday. In spite of their fatigue, they joined the festivities and began some of their lifelong friendships.  

After living in a modest home in Spring Lake Village for ten or twelve years, the Savidges built a large, two-story frame home near the lake [303 North Park Street]. Sarah lived alone in that home until her death on September 17, 1921. She was buried at Spring Lake Cemetery. She was an active member of the Spring Lake Presbyterian Church, a charter member of the Grand Haven Women’s Club, and various other organizations.

Top row left to right:

Dwight C. Sheldon b. 1873
Willard Sheldon II b. 1865
Mrs. Willard Sheldon II

Bottom row left to right:

Frances S. Edwards b. 1869
Willard C. Sheldon I
Mary Malvina Sheldon
Willard H. Edwards b. 1865

 

Willard C. Sheldon I, b.1839- d.?  

A manufacturer of corn planters, Willard Sheldon in 1871 discovered at a depth of 161 feet the magnetic mineral springs that gave Grand Haven the name “ Saratoga of the West.”  His two-story, palatial resort and hotel on the northwest corner of Washington and Third Streets attracted visitors for many years, offering them croquet, archery, lawn bowling, and other leisure activities, including bathing in the mineral water for its therapeutic value. Willard also built and lived in a large, lovely home with carriage house at 321 Washington. When the Challenge Corn Planter Company incorporated in 1882, Willard was named President. His son, Willard II, was the company’s bookkeeper in 1893. Sheldon Road was named in honor of this family’s contributions to Grand Haven.  

Willard I was born in Middlesex County, Vermont, on June 1, 1839. On May 26, 1863, in Williston, Vermont, he married Mary Malvina Slayton. Born in Stowe, Vermont, on December 16, 1841, she was the daughter of Samuel Stowe and Malvina Carver Slayton and the sister of Nathaniel and Thomas Orlando Slayton, both of whom moved to Grand Haven. The Sheldons’ son, Willard II, was born in Grand Haven on March 4, 1865 . Other children were Frances Slayton, born on August 22, 1869; and Dwight Cutler, named for one of Grand Haven’s leading citizens, who was born Mary 9, 1873, married Dora Chase on June 14, 1893 in Smyrna, lonia County, and opened a law office in lonia. Dora was born about 1877 in Smyrna and died in lonia County on November 6, 1926. Frances married Willard H. Edwards in Grand Haven on June 6, 1893; he was born about 1865. Records revealed that Malvina Willard I died in Ionia County on November 22, 1912, and was buried with Dora in that county at Highland Park Cemetery.

Charles R. Shupe

Charles R. Shupe, b.1866-d.1927  

Born on December 18, 1866 in St. George, Canada, Charles Shupe came to Grand Haven when Challenge Machinery Company moved from Chicago to Grand Haven in 1903. Challenge was a large printer’s supply company, which Shupe eventually took over as Manager. He also served 12 years on the Board of Education, during which the high school on Seventh Street was built. In 1892 he married Lizzie Lee, daughter of James L. Lee, President of Challenge Machinery. Lizzie was active in various community organizations, and was the first Vice Chairman of the Ottawa County Red Cross when it was officially chartered in 1917. The Shupes lived at 704 Pennoyer, later the site of Christian Haven. Charles died on October 6, 1927 .

Nathaniel Slayton

Nathaniel Volney Slayton, b.1838-d.1889  

Born in Stowe, Vermont on September 15, 1838, Nathaniel was the son of Samuel Stowe and Millison Carver Randall Slayton. In 1858 he visited Michigan, liked what he saw, and returned to settle in Grand Haven. He was employed as a clerk at Dwight Cutler’s store beginning January 28, 1862 . With Willard Sheldon as partner, Nathaniel opened a dry goods store. Bad health forced him to close that business. In September, 1873, he opened a grocery store in the Cutler House block. Nathaniel was one of the original incorporators of the Highland Park Association in 1886. In 1877 he was elected on the Republican ticket as City Treasurer. Slayton Street was named for this early Grand Haven settler.

Nathaniel married Martha “Mattie” Florence, the daughter of George and Sarah Batchellor Shippey, on December 17, 1874. She was born in New York on July 3, 1851 and died in Grand Haven on July 12, 1928 . The Slaytons had one child, Florence, who was born in Grand Haven on February 10, 1877. Florence, who married a man by the name of Berger after Nathaniel’s death, died in Grand Haven on August 14, 1930. She was buried at Lake Forest Cemetery.

Nathaniel’s sister, Mary Malvina, married Willard Sheldon of Grand Haven. Caroline Fidelia, another of Nathaniel’s sister, married Vermont native, Ebenezer Winslow Barnes, onetime Postmaster of Grand Haven. Another sister, Frances Eliza, who lived from October 12, 1831 to March 2, 1892, came to this area as well, as did another brother, Osman Ogilvie, who was born on September 18, 1829 and died on September 20, 1900 . After the death of Nathaniel’s brother, Thomas, in Vermont, his widow, Susan Harris, joined the Slayton family in Grand Haven. Finally, to round out the Slayton family’s Grand Haven contingent, Nathaniel’s mother, Millison, came here to be with her sons and daughter. She lived from 1802 to 1874. Nathaniel died June 29, 1889, and was buried with Florence, Frances, Osman, and Millison at Lake Forest Cemetery. The Slayton home at 314 Washington, then occupied by his widow, was destroyed in the fire of 1889, a few months after Nathaniel died. Apparently his widow then moved to 410 Howard, where she remained until about 1916. [Tribune obituaries March 2 and 4, 1892, and September 28, 1900 .]

LeMoyne Smith

Le Moyne [Lemoyne] Seth Smith, b.1808-d.1894  

Born in Tompkins County, New York, on February 8, 1808, Le Moyne Smith arrived in lonia County as a Presbyterian minister in 1837 and reportedly came to Ottawa County ten years later. However, he was recorded as having married Bridget Ann Hopkins in Ottawa County on November 18, 1838. Bridget was the daughter of Benjamin and Catherine Lowe Hopkins. On April 2, 1849 Le Moyne was elected Moderator and Treasurer at the first meeting of electors for the organization of Mill Point, where he had lived for two years running the Mill Point Cheap Cash Store on the northeast corner of Park and Barber Streets. He was first Postmaster of Spring Lake, from May 1, 1851 until his resignation in 1857, at a salary of $75 per year. Le Moyne planted a small orchard of apple and peach trees in Spring Lake in 1852. He helped in the formation of the Presbyterian Society of Mill Point in 1853. On December 1, 1855 he bought 36.64 acres in Section 18 of Crockery Township. The next year he was on a committee of the Ottawa County Agriculture Society.  

Evidently something happened to Bridget, because in 1859 Le Moyne married Phebe L. Parmelee of Lyons, lonia County [Kitchel, page 120], where Le Moyne was known to have preached. Phebe was a native of New York, where she was born around 1821. Le Moyne and his new wife settled in Grand Haven in 1862, and the next year he became publisher and editor of the Grand Haven Union. Healy C. Akeley was a silent partner until Le Moyne bought out his share. Republican in its leanings, the paper was sold to Nathan Church in June, 1872, who ran it as an organ of the Democratic Party until after the 1872 election, when it ceased publication. Le Moyne was appointed by President Hayes to be Postmaster in Grand Haven, a position he held from 1881 to 1885. For a period of time, Le Moyne was also Assistant Revenue Assessor. He lived on the corner of Fourth and Washington. A great lover of nature, he wrote a number of poems for many occasions and conducted Sunday School at his home. Le Moyne died on January 23, 1894 and was buried at Lake Forest Cemetery. [Tribune obituary, January 23, 1894.

Lora A. Smith

Lora Avery Smith, b.1853-d.?  

Born in New York about 1853, Lora Smith began teaching at Grand Haven High School in 1877 and became Principal two years later.  In the 1880 census she was listed under the name Laura Smith as a single woman and teacher residing with Healy C. Akeley and his family.

Robert Stuart

Robert Stuart, b.1785-d.1848  

Robert Stuart was born in Callander, Scotland on February 19, 1785. At the age of 22, at the solicitation of his uncle, David Stuart, he immigrated to Montreal, Canada. He was fluent in French. In 1810, along with John Jacob Astor, Robert organized the Pacific Fur Company. In the same year he took the ship Tonquin on an expedition to the Columbia River and aided in laying the foundation of the city of Astoria, Oregon. Washington Irving chronicled this voyage in his book about Astoria. Robert married Emma Elizabeth Sullivan on July 21, 1813, in New York City. She was born June 27, 1792, in Brooklyn, New York, and died in Detroit on September 26, 1866. Of their 12 children, none was born nor lived in Ottawa County.  

In 1819 Robert went to Mackinac to manage the American Fur Company headquarters for 15 years. Rev. Ferry converted him to Christianity, and it was through Robert’s urging that Ferry in 1833 made a circuit of Lake Michigan, beginning and ending at Mackinac, but stopping at the mouth of the Grand River along the way. Robert supplied much of the capital needed for the Grand Haven settlement that followed shortly. Ferry wished to name the community “Stuart” in his honor, but Rix Robinson already had registered the name Grand Haven. In 1834 Stuart was an equal partner with Robinson and Ferry of the Grand Haven Company for the purpose of buying pinelands, erecting mills, lumbering, etc. In 1835 Stuart was Government Indian Agent for the Northwest. In 1846 he and his wife conveyed Block 13 of Akeley’s Addition to Ottawa County for public buildings. The county court house, offices, and jail were built on this site. Robert died in Chicago on October 29, 1848 .