James Andrew McDonald
The late James Andrew McDonald, who died at his home in Xenia township in 1894 and whose widow is still living on the old McDonald home farm there, was born on that farm and there spent all his life. He was born on August 6, 1856, son of John Nelson McDonald and wife, the former of whom was born on that same place, son of Isaiah McDonald, a Virginian and one of the first settlers in that part of Greene county, the house in which Mrs. McDonald is now living having been erected there by Isaiah McDonald more than one hundred years ago. It was in the year 1802 that Isaiah McDonald and his wife Edith came here from North Carolina and established their home in what later came to be organized as Caesarscreek township. Their son, Leavitt McDonald, who was a soldier in the War of 1812, married Susan Strong and had ten children, five sons and five daughters. Of these children, John N. McDonald, who was born on January 13, 1808, married Elizabeth Saville and after a continuous residence of sixty-five years on the old McDonald farm moved to an adjoining farm, where he died three years later, June 8, 1887. John N. McDonald was the owner of a farm of two hundred acres. He and his wife were members of the Reformed church and were the parents of three children, the subject of this memorial sketch having had a brother, Charles W. McDonald, a former farmer in Xenia township, who is now making his home in Florida, and a sister, Mildred, who died in the days of her girlhood.
Reared on the home farm in Xenia township, James A. McDonald completed his schooling in a business college at Painsville and after his marriage in the fall of 1877 established his home on the old home place, which had been settled by his grandfather, and became the owner of one hundred and twenty-two acres of the same, continuing engaged in farming there the rest of his life, his death occurring on November 2, 1894. In addition to his general farming Mr. McDonald also for years operated a threshing-machine in his neighborhood. He was a Republican and at one time and another had held various township offices. By religious persuasion he was a member of the Reformed church.
On September 12, 1877, James A. McDonald was united in marriage to Amy E. Ford, who was born in Caesarscreek township, and who survives him, continuing to make her home on her farm. Mrs. McDonald also is a member of one of the old families of Greene county. Her father. James M. Ford, grew up in Caesarscreek township and after his marriage lived for some time on the Jacob Peterson farm, in that township, later buying a farm in that same neighborhood, where he lived until his retirement from the farm and removal to Xenia, where he died at the age of seventy-five years. James M. Ford was twice married, and by his first wife, Mary Peterson, who also was born in this county, daughter of Jacob Peterson, was the father of six children, of whom Mrs. McDonald was the first-bom, the others being Charles, deceased; Chauncey, who is farming in New Jasper township; Hettie, who married Lawson Shambaugh and is now living at New Burlington; Bena, wife of Milton Linkhart, of Wilmington, in the neighboring county of Clinton, and a daughter who died in infancy. The mother of these children died at the age of sixty-two years, after which Mr. Ford married a widow, Mrs. Alton, who died at Xenia in 1916.
To James A. and Amy E. (Ford) McDonald were born nine children, namely: Orville, a farmer of Xenia township, who married Lena Middleton and has two children, Paul and Edith; Leavitt, a farmer of Caesarscreek township, who married Minnie Peterson and has two children, Mildred and Rosella; Ford H., who married Dessie Bayless and died at the age of thirty-five years, leaving three children, Ella May, Helen and Kenneth (deceased); Emma Pearl, who married Ray Huston, a merchant at Xenia, and has two children, Velma and Elizabeth; Mayme Edith, who married Ray Sutton, of New Jasper township, and has one child, a daughter, Cleo; Lucy, who married Volney Harness, of Xenia, and has one child, a daughter, Mabel; Mary, who married Glenn Bartlett, a farmer of New Jasper township and has two children, Elma and Donald; James Ray, a farmer of Xenia township, who married Elsie Fudge and has one child, a son, Wilford, and Melvin, who is unmarried and who continues to make his home with his mother, farming the home place, sixty acres of which Mrs. McDonald continues to retain. Mrs. McDonald is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church.
From History of Greene County Ohio, Its People, Industries and Institutions, vol. 2. M.A.Broadstone, editor. B.F.Bowen & Co., Indianapolis. 1918