Chester C. W. Naylor
was born in Monroe Township, Adams County, October 20, 1849. His great-grandfather was a native of England, and emigrated to Lexington, Massachusetts. It is tradition in the family that he and five sons, of whom the great-grandfather, James Naylor, was one, participated in the Battle of Lexington. At the close of the war, James Naylor located near Cumberland, Maryland, and later located forty miles west of Pittsburg, in Pennsylvania. He moved his wife and four children on two horses over the Alleghanies. The wife and four children were on one horse and he lead the other horse loaded with their goods. In 1792, he and a neighbor named Mehaffey and a boy named David Young, built a flat-boat and with their effects, floated down the Ohio River. They landed at Limestone after a three days' voyage on high water, though it usually took from six to nine days.
James Naylor located at Washington, Kentucky, and remained till 1796, when he removed to Gift Ridge, Adams County. Mrs. Naylor brought with her from Pennsylvania, a number of apple seeds and planted them in Kentucky. When she removed to Ohio, she dug up the young sprouts and took them with her. She replanted them and from them have come the fainous "Naylor Apple." The trees grew from twenty four to thirty inches in diameter, and the apples were large and juicy. James Naylor had two wives, the first was a Miss Brinket, and the second, Margaret Packet. He had four sons and two daughters. Of the sons, Samuel was the grandfather of our subject. He was born in Washington, Kentucky He married Sallie Tucker and lived and died in Monroe Township. The other brothers went west. One daughter of James Naylor married Mark Pennywit, and the other married John Washburn. Samuel Naylor married Sallie Tucker, and they had seven sons and four daughters. Samuel Parker Naylor, father of our subject, was born on the old homestead November 2, 1827. From 1856 to 1858, he conducted a merchandise business at Wrightsville, and later ran a small steamboat between Cincinnati and Manchester. On January 1, 1849, he was married to Elizabeth Jane Taylor. They had nine children, of whom our subject was the oldest. The latter obtained his education in the schools of Monroe Township and at Manchester. At the age of eleven, he began work at the Manchester pottery and worked there for three years. At the age of seventeen, he began teaching school in Jefferson Township. In 1869, he began the study of law with the late Edward P. Evans, and on October 20, 1870, on his twenty-first birthday, he was admitted to the bar in the district court of Hamilton County. In 1873, he formed a partnership with his legal preceptor as Evans & Naylor. On June 1. 1875, he was married to Miss Nannie Irene Coryell, daughter of the late late Judge James L. Coryell of West Union, and is the father of two gifted, talented daughters, both of whom graduated at the Manchester High School at the age of sixteen, and each was the valedictorian of her class. Both became teachers. Mary, the eldest, taught school at West Union and Manchester, and was for two years assistant at the High School at the latter place. She afterward married Charles B. Ford, and is living at New Richmond, Ohio. Winona, the youngest, is teaching at Manchester and studying law with her father.
In 1880 and 1881, Mr. Naylor was deputy county auditor of Adams County. From 1882 to 1891, he was cashier of the Manchester Bank, conducted by R. H. Ellison. Since 1891, he has applied himself exclusively to the practice of law. He has always been a Republican and taken an active interest in politics. He is not a member of any church, but prefers the Presbyterian.
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