Judge John Wesley Mason
West Union, was born on the old Mason farm, four miles east of West Union, September 29, 1845. His father, Samuel S. Mason, was a farmer and shoemaker, and was a prominent character in political circles in Adams County in his time. He served for years as a Justice of the Peace in Tiffin Township. Judge Mason worked on the farm in summer and attended the district school in winter until he acquired sufficient education to teach, which occupation he followed with marked success for several years. Many young people were given financial and professional aid by him that enabled them to make a beginning in the world by teaching school. While teaching, he married Miss Addie Moore, a daughter of Newton Moore, a pioneer of Adams County, April 16, 1872. In the meantime he had been reading law under the tuition of Hon. Thomas J. Mullen, of West Union, and on April 1, 1873, he was admitted to the bar, following the legal profession until 1888, at which time he removed to his farm on East Fork of Ohio Brush Creek, in Bratton Township. While residing there he was nominated and elected on the Democratic ticket, Probate Judge of Adams County, in the autumn of 1896. The legislature had enacted that "buncombe" statute that year, known as the "Garfield Law," or "Corrupt Practice Act," and under its provisions political dyspeptics invoked the aid of the courts and had the Judge removed from office for alleged promises of remuneration for aid in the campaign in which he had so gallantly carried the banner of his party to victory. But the people were in sympathy with the cause of justice, and took up the contest and elected the Judge a second time, after his removal, to the office of Probate Judge, the last time in 1899, the term for which he is now serving.
In politics the Judge is a Jeffersonian Democrat, having the largest faith in the people. He is the original silver advocate in Adams County, in the contest since the Civil War, between the money power and the people. He wrote a pamphlet on the subject in 1878, when a candidate for Congress. He led the fight on the minions of the money power, and won the contest in the selection of delegates in Adams County by the Democratic party in 1895; and again in 1897, when he delivered before the County Convention of delegates a most remarkable speech on the subject of bi-metallism, in which, with reference to the 16 to 1 resolution of the Chicago platform, he declared: "That resolution is the St. Peter of our political faith, and by the blessing of God and the justice of our cause, we will maintain it.”
The Judge is one of the most companionable of men, and reckons his friends by the score. As a Judge of the Probate Court, his career has been entirely satisfactory to the people.
From "History of Adams County, Ohio from its Earliest Settlement to the Present Time" - by Nelson W. Evans and Emmons B. Stivers - West Union, Ohio - Published by E. B. Stivers - 1900