Eli Looker
Agriculture has been an honored vocation from the earliest ages and as a usual thing men of honorable and humane impulses, as well as those of energy and thrift, have been patrons of husbandry. The free, out-of-door life of the farmer has a decided tendency to foster and develop that independence of mind and self-reliance which characterizes true manhood. No better fortune can befall a boy than to be reared in close touch with nature in the healthful, inspiring labor of the fields. It has always been the fruitful soil from which have sprung the moral bone and sinew of the country, and the majority of our nation's great warriors, renowned statesmen and distinguished men of letters were born on the farm and are largely indebted to its early influences for the distinction which they later attained.
Howard W. Looker, the son of Levi and Rebecca (Bennett) Looker, was born December 14, 1869, in Madison county, Ohio. His parents were natives of the same county and reared a family of three children, Byron. Howard W. and Laura. Levi Looker was a son of Joseph and Margaret (Hann) Looker. Joseph Looker came from Virginia and settled in Clark county, Ohio. Seven children were born to Joseph Looker and wife, Joseph, Levi, Delilah, Nathan, Angeline, Thomas and Joshua. Levi Looker was a prominent citizen of this county and served with distinction in the Civil War as a member of the Fifty-fourth Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry.
H. W. Looker received his education in several different schools of Ohio. When seventeen years of age he came to Paint township, in this county, with his father. He quit school at the age of nineteen and began work on a farm. After his marriage he took up farming for his occupation and is classed among the progressive farmers of his township.
Mr. Looker was married February 9, 1893, to Mamie Tway, the daughter of Nathaniel Tway, and to this union have been born five children, Merrill, Loren, Nathaniel, Delbert and Lucile.
Politically, Mr. Looker is identified with the Republican party, but owing to his agricultural interests he has never taken an active part in political matters. Fraternally, he is a member of the Knights of Pythias and the Patrons of Husbandry, while, religiously, he is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church. The career of Mr. Looker contains much that is commendable, and his life work forcibly illustrates what can be accomplished by a man of energy when his plans are rightly laid and his actions governed by right principles and noble aims.
From History of Fayette County Ohio - Her People, Industries and Institutions by Frank M. Allen (1914, R. F. Bowen & Company, Inc.)