Daniel I. Stoner, BiographyPorter County biographical sketches . . . .
Transcribed biography of Daniel I. Stoner
DANIEL I. STONER. The name Stoner is inseparably connected with the history of Porter and LaPorte counties and Daniel I. Stoner, of this review, is one of Morgan township's representative and highly esteemed citizens. He is a native of Porter county, his birth having occurred within its pleasant boundaries March 27, 1848, and he is the eighth child in a family numbering eleven, six of whom were sons and five daughters. His parents were Daniel and Elizabeth (Ludy) Stoner and five of the offspring of these worthy people still survive. The subject has passed his entire life in this county and has witnessed its remarkable progress, while at the same time contributing to it in very definite fashion. His boyhood was passed in days when pioneer conditions still existed and he has done much in subjecting and bringing to tillable condition entirely new land. He is engaged at the present time as a practical agriculturist and stockman. The first school he attended was housed in a rude log cabin, which stood on the site of his present residence. The seats were wooden slabs, and there were no backs for the children to lean upon when they studied. How the little backs must have ached! At that time beautiful Valparaiso, with its 9,000 inhabitants and its modernity, was but a village. Mr. Stoner well remembers when the Pennsylvania railway was built across Porter county. In the agricultural work of his young days the old cradle for cutting grain was still used and he himself has driven the oxen to break the virgin sod.
Mr. Stoner remained a member of the parental household until the age of twenty-two years, giving his young strength to the duties of the farm, and when he started out for himself his capital consisted in one horse, which his father gave him. He worked on his father's farm and shared the produce with the elder gentleman. As soon as his circumstances permitted he married, Clara Alice White becoming his wife and helpmeet, and their union being celebrated on the last day of the year, 1874. Three children have been born into their household, but only one is living. The beloved little daughter, Daisy, died at the age of fourteen years and eight months and the son Raymond at the age of eleven months. Willis Gordon was born in Porter county, Indiana, and graduated from the country schools of the county with the class of 1896. Following this he took a four years' course in the Valparaiso high school and was graduated in the class of 1900. For his higher education he matriculated in the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, taking the literary course and receiving his degree in 1904. In the meantime he had come to the conclusion to adopt the law as his profession and finished in the law department with the class of 1906. He then entered the law office of Rosenthal & Hamill, prominent Chicago attorneys, and while thus associated was tendered the position of instructor in the law department of the University of Michigan. At the present time he is assistant instructor and has held this position for two years. In the matter of politics this young man is independent, esteeming the better man and the better principle high above mere partisanship. He is a member of the University Club of Chicago and in the question of church faith is a Methodist. Mr. Stoner is one of the young men whose ability, character and success are such that Morgan township points to them with pride as native sons.
Mrs. Stoner was born in Porter county, July 6, 1853, and is the sixth in order of nativity in a family of eleven children, seven of whom were sons and four daughters. Her parents were William H. and Adeline (Morton) White. The six surviving children of this interesting family are as follows: Fletcher, a resident of Valparaiso, Indiana, and a retired farmer; Francis, a farmer of Morgan township; Mrs. Stoner; Ella, wife of Jacob E. Hall, a real estate dealer of Valparaiso; Martha, wife of Charles Crow, a citizen of Logan, Iowa, formerly superintendent of the city schools; and William, of Visalia, California, a retired farmer. All six are married and the wife of the last named was Geneva Talbot. The father was a native of Ohio and married and began life in his native state. He joined a party of twenty-one of the Whites and started in wagons across the plains in true pioneer fashion with Illinois as an objective point. Sickness came to the little colony, however, and they halted in Porter county, Indiana, the father buying forty acres of land in Center township. He later sold that and bought land in Morgan township, upon which he erected a house, the same being destroyed by fire. He sold his land and purchased another piece and before he died he owned over two hundred acres in the county. This good man was a Republican and he and his wife were Methodists. Church of that denomination was at first held in the rustic school houses and later a church was erected on his farm, he aiding materially in the building of it. The mother was born in the same locality as her husband and they are both interred in the old homestead cemetery.
Mr. and Mrs. Stoner began their agricultural career as renters about three miles east of their present home and it was four years before they owned their home. In that time they acquired a capital of $1,000 and with this bought their present home of eighty acres, going in debt for much of it. Their first habitation was a little "up and down" board affair, with not a foot of plaster in the whole house and the stable was only a temporary place for stock. But although they began at the bottom of the ladder, today they have one hundred and twenty acres of the best land in the county, within two and one half miles of Valparaiso, eighty acres being in Morgan township and forty in Center township. They have a fine, modern residence, excellent outbuildings, and fruitful orchards.
Mr. Stoner is a tried and true Democrat and he takes a public spirited interest in all measures projected for the general welfare. He and his wife are devout members of the Methodist church in Valparaiso, but they originally belonged to the church in Morgan township, Mr. Stoner then being one of the stewards and for six years superintendent of the Sunday school. They are estimable people, worthy of being counted as of the very flower of citizenship.
Source: Lewis Publishing Company. 1912. History of Porter County, Indiana: A Narrative Account of its Historical Progress, its People and its Principal Interests. Chicago, Illinois: Lewis Publishing Company. 881 p.
Page(s) in Source: 484-486
This biography has been transcribed exactly as it was originally published in the source. Please note that we do not provide photocopies or digital scans of biographies appearing on this website.
Biography transcribed by Steven R. Shook