John Lutz
In making up a list of those residents of Xenia aforetime who contributed actively to the general business and industrial development of the city of Xenia, mention should be made of the life and services of the late John Lutz, a veteran of the Civil War, who for many years was engaged in the blacksmithing and wagon-making business at Xenia and who departed this life at his home in that city on December 17, 1912, and is buried in Woodland cemetery. John Lutz was a native of the state of Maryland, but had been a resident of Xenia since the days of his young manhood. He was born near the village of Clear Spring, Maryland, January 5, 1829, a son of Henry and Frances (Moudy) Lutz, the former of whom was born in the vicinity of Millersburg, in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, in 1802, and the latter, at Williamsport, Maryland. Henry Lutz was a son of Nicholas Lutz, whose father had come to this country from Germany in colonial days and had established the family in Pennsylvania, where and in other sections of the country there is a numerous connection of the family to this day. During the early '50s of the past century, Henry Lutz came with his family to Ohio and located at Xenia, but in 1859 moved over into Indiana and settled on a farm in the vicinity of Ft. Wayne, but after residing there about ten years returned to Xenia and there spent his last days, his death occurring in 1877. His widow survived him about eight years. They were the parents of five children, two sons and three daughters, of whom but two reached maturity, the subject of this memorial sketch having had a sister, Mary, the wife of B. Y. Berry, also a resident of Xenia.
John Lutz was reared in his native Maryland and there received his schooling and became proficient in the use of tools, becoming an expert blacksmith and wagon-maker, and when he arrived in Xenia in November, 1853, he became employed working at his trade, in the employ of James White. In the spring of 1855 he returned to Maryland and was there married to the girl to whom he had plighted his troth before coming to Ohio. Upon his return to Xenia he was accompanied by his father and together they set up in business with a smithy on Church street and were thus engaged until the spring of 1859, when they bought an established wagonmaking shop in Xenia and engaged in that business. In that same year the father left Xenia to go over into Indiana and thereafter John Lutz conducted the business alone and continued so engaged until his retirement from business, not long before his death, having been continuously thus engaged for a period of nearly fifty years. During the later years of his life Mr. Lutz had associated with him in business his eldest son, Jacob H. Lutz, who is still carrying on the business at the same old stand. During the progress of the Civil War, in the early part of 1864, John Lutz enlisted for service, under the four-months call, and went to the front as a member of Company E, One Hundred and Fifty-fourth Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry; with that regiment participated in the battle of New Creek, Virginia, and was mustered out at Camp Denison at the end of his term of service, in September, 1864. Mr. Lutz was a member of Lewis Post No. 347, Grand Army of the Republic, and a member of the local lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. By religious persuasion he was a member of the Reformed church and broke the ground for the erection of the present church edifice of that congregation in Xenia. Politically, he was a Republican.
It was in March, 1855, in Maryland, that John Lutz was united in marriage to Savilla Wolford, who also was born in that state, and to that union were born six children, Jacob Henry, John Edward, Laura B., Cora E., Ida S., and Frances Elizabeth, the latter of whom died in infancy. The mother of these children died at her home in Xenia on March 4, 1907, and is buried in Woodland cemetery, where her husband was carried to be laid by her side in the closing month of 1912, as noted above. Miss Cora E. Lutz is maintaining the old home residence, she having continued as housekeeper for her father after her mother's death, and is very comfortably situated there. She has ever taken an interested part in the general good works of the community.
Jacob H. Lutz, who is continuing the business established so many years ago by his father, has been twice married, his first wife, Anna Cisco, having died at the age of thirty-four years, leaving three children. Myrtle Bell, who married Roy Barnes, of Springfield, Ohio, and now lives in Jacksonville, Florida; Harry DeGroot, also living in Jacksonville, Florida, and John Wilbur, who now lives at Dayton, this state. In 1915 Mr. Lutz married, secondly, Mrs. Susie Matthews, of Dayton. John Edward Lutz also is married and with his family is now living at Vernon, Texas. He has seven children, John, Robert, Mary, Ida, Charles, James and Ruth. Laura B. Lutz married John F. Sanders, of Xenia, and has two sons, both of whom are married. Earl Lutz Sanders, now living at Kansas City, Missouri, and Frank Ira Sanders, living at Detroit, Michigan. Ida S. Lutz married George Sinz, who was engaged in the grocery business at Xenia and who died in 1896. She continues to make her home in Xenia, residing at the old home place with her sister Cora, and conducts the leading millinery establishment in Xenia, a business in which she has been quite successful. Mrs. Sinz has traveled widely having visited England, Holland, Germany, Switzerland and France and has witnessed the Passion Play. She has made thirty trips to New York City in connection with her business, it ever being her endeavor to introduce for the benefit of the patrons of her establishment the latest styles in millinery.
From History of Greene County Ohio, Its People, Industries and Institutions, vol. 2. M.A.Broadstone, editor. B.F.Bowen & Co., Indianapolis. 1918