Col. James W. Conger
Col. James W. Conger, merchant, manufacturer, real estate man, and one of Ohio's veteran soldiers, has had a long and interesting life and is identified with Cleveland by many prominent associations.
His birth occurred in Washington County, Pennsylvania, August 6, 1845. His parents were William Henry Harrison and Martha (Auld) Conger, the latter dying when Colonel Conger was thirteen months old and the former when the son was six years of age. His paternal ancestors came out of Northumberland, England, and have lived in America upwards of three centuries. The old home was at Morristown, New Jersey. Colonel Conger's grandfather moved from there to Washington County, Pennsylvania, in 1796. William Henry Harrison Conger was also a native of Washington County, and spent his life as a farmer and stock raiser. His wife, Martha Auld, was a native of Pennsylvania. Her father, Archibald Auld, was born in the north of Ireland of Scotch descent, and both he and his wife, Rebecca Carroll, were brought to America as children.
At the age of seven years James W. Conger went to Mount Gilead, Morrow County, Ohio, to make his home with his grandfather Archibald Auld, who was then farming in that locality. Here he attended district schools, and between the ages of eleven and sixteen assisted his aged grandfather on the farm.
In September, 1861, at the age of sixteen, he enlisted as a member of Company B of the Forty-third Ohio Infantry, and was in continuous service until July, 1865. He veteranized and re-enlisted for a second three year term in December, 1863. During the latter part of his service he was quartermaster sergeant. He was in the armies of the West, went with Sherman to the sea, was at the surrender of General Johnston in North Carolina, and marched with Sherman's great army in the Grand Review at Washington. He was given his honorable discharge at Louisville, Kentucky, in July, 1865. Through his entire service he was never in a hospital or absent from his regiment for a day. He has always taken a keen interest in Grand Army matters, and assisted in preparing a history of Fuller's Ohio Brigade, of which he was a member. The long business association which he has enjoyed with his cousin, David Auld, was practically formed in 1862. At the battle of Corinth David Auld drew a sketch of the battlefield and he and Mr. Conger entered upon a business agreement as a result of which then had the sketch lithographed and sold many copies of it. this drawing was used by General Rosecrans in his book "Battles and Leaders."
When Mr. Conger returned home after the war his grandfather had gone West and he then entered a business college at Columbus and completed the course. In the meantime he had made his home with an uncle. In 1867 he and others formed a corporation under the name Columbus Steam Brick Company, and there established the first steam brick plant in the state. They sold this business a year later and Colonel Conger then entered the office of his uncle, an architect and building contractor. In 1870 he formed an active partnership with David Auld and engaged in general contracting at Columbus. In the fall of that year they took a contract for one of the largest churches at Steubenville, Ohio, moving to that town. They also established a brick plant at Steubenville, and their business as contractors developed until they were handling slate roofing and jobbing contracts throughout the state.
In 1873 Mr. Conger and Mr. Auld moved to Cleveland and established in this city the largest slate jobbing business in Ohio. In 1885, to supply their raw material, they acquired a quarry in Poultney, Vermont, and afterwards in Northhampton County, Pennsylvania. The firm of Auld & Conger Company was developed to one of the chief manufacturers and dealers in roofing, slate, grates, mantels and tiles in the country.
Though more than half a century has elapsed since the Civil war Colonel Conger is still carrying a heavy weight of responsibilities and business affairs. He is president and treasurer of the Aulcon Building Company, vice president and treasurer of the Bangor Building Company, vice president of the Greenleaf Realty Company, and president of the Conger-Helper Realty Company, with offices in the Garfield Building.
Colonel Conger has given much of his time and means to politics, though never as an office seeker or for the sake of individual honor. He was presidential elector in 1896 and in 1912 was chosen a delegate to the Republican National Convention, later was appointed a delegate to the Progressive National Convention and was chairman of the committee who notified Theodore Roosevelt of his nomination. As elector at large he headed the state progressive ticket of that year. Colonel Conger is a trustee of the Pulte Medical College, a trustee of the Calvary Presbyterian Church, and has membership with the Grand Army of the Republic, the Colonial Club, of which he was one of the organizers; Cleveland Athletic Club, Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, City Club, Civic League, and is chairman of the Exemption Board of District No. 1 at Cleveland, being the only Civil war veteran in the entire city and county to have that honor. He was also a member of the various Masonic bodies. Fishing is his chief source of recreation, and he is a large, athletic man, splendidly preserved for all the weight of his years, and in character and achievement is one of the front rank of Cleveland's citizens.
In 1869, at Columbus, Ohio, he married Miss Anna M. Higgins. She died at Cleveland February 11, 1912, the mother of two sons and a daughter, Mrs. L. J. Braddock, of Chicago, wife of the assistant manager of the Insurance Company of North America, the oldest insurance company in the country; Frank H., an active real estate man of Cleveland, and Howard, who was lost off a steamer going from Washington, D. C., to New York City on October 11, 1911. On November 18, 1914, Mr. Conger married Miss Maude A. Miller, of Cleveland, Ohio. They went to the Orient on their honeymoon and were in a shipwreck on the Japanese Sea, April 11, 1910, (sic) and were taken off the ship on life boats.
From Cleveland - Special Limited Edition, The Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago & New York, 1918 v.1