Aaron Ferry
AARON FERREY, farmer, P. O. Kent, was born in Belchertown, Mass., July 6, 1808, a son of Aaron and Elizabeth (Gilbert) Ferrey, who settled in Franklin Township, this county, in 1831. His father located on the farm now owned by Harley Judson, most of which he improved, and here he resided up to 1850, when he removed to what is now Kent and there lived until his death. By his first wife, Elizabeth Gilbert, of Belchertown, Mass., Aaron Ferrey, Sr., had eleven children: Eliza (deceased), Aaron, Moses (deceased), Mary (deceased), George (deceased), John (deceased), Ann (wife of George Williams, in Wisconsin), William, Charles (in Indiana), Emeline (deceased) and Frank. His second wife was Mrs. Mary McPherson, nee Dickinson, by whom he had two children; Eliza, wife of Henry Swan, and Byron. Aaron Ferrey. Sr., died in 1860, at the age of seventy-eight years. Our subject was reared in Amherst, Mass., until ten years of age, when his parents removed to Virginia, there they remained five years and then returned to Amherst, and here his father engaged in the manufacture of brick, our subject assisting him until twenty-one years of age, when he embarked in the same business for himself, which he continued for several years in different sections of New England. On May 9, 1837, he was married to Judith, daughter of George and Judith (Hastings) Nutting, of Amherst, Mass., by whom he has had eight children: George W., Charles E. (deceased), Mary E. (deceased), Frank H., Julia A., Fred A., Will D. and John H. In 1842 Mr. Ferrey came to Portage County and engaged in the manufacture of brick in Franklin, furnishing the material for the large building now known as Kent Worsted Mills. In 1846 he removed to Franklin Mills (now Kent), where he resided for twenty years, doing an extensive business, and in 1866 he located in Brimfield, on the farm where he now resides, and in connection with farming, carried on a brick-yard up to 1880, when his sons took charge of that department. Mr. and Mrs. Ferrey and daughters are members of the Congregational Church. In politics he is a Republican.
From History of Portage County, Ohio, Warner, Beers & Co., Chicago, 1885