Oran P. Mitman
Oran P. Mitman, a member of the Greene county board of education and first president of that board, a landowner of this county and a former banker at Osborn, where he is now living and where he is engaged in the insurance business, was born on a farm in Bath township on February 25, 1871, son of Lewis C. and Laura L (Bryan) Mitman, both of whom also were born in this county and the latter of whom is still living, a resident of Osborn for many years.
Lewis C. Mitman was born in Bath township, a son of Peter and Anna Mitman, who had come to this country from Pennsylvania and had settled in the northern part of the county, where they spent their last days. Reared on the farm, Lewis C. Mitman received his schooling in the neighborhood schools and after his marriage established his home on a farm in his home township and there engaged in farming until about 1897, when he retired from the farm and moved to Osborn, where he died on December 2, 1907, and where his widow is still living. Lewis C. Mitman for a number of years served as trustee of Bath township and was also for some time president of the local school board. He and his wife were the parents of two children, the subject of this sketch having had a sister, Nettie, who died in 1904.
Reared on the home farm in Bath township, Oran P. Mitman received his early schooling in the local schools and supplemented the same by attendance at Wittenberg College at Springfield, from which institution he was graduated in 1893 with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. For two years after leaving college Mr. Mitman taught school and then he became a bookkeeper in the Osborn Bank and was thus engaged for three years, at the end of which time he married and returned to the home farm and was there engaged in farming for ten years. He then returned to Osborn and resumed connection with the Osborn Bank, for five years serving that institution as assistant cashier, after which he began to devote his chief attention to the fire and life insurance business, in which he already had become more or less interested, and has since been engaged in that business. Mr. Mitman is the owner of two farms in this county, aggregating two hundred and ninety acres. He is now a member of the county board of education, of which he was the first president, and is also a member of the local school board at Osborn. By political persuasion he is a Democrat, with "independent" leanings on local issues.
On December 22, 1897, Oran P. Mitman was united in marriage to Edith K. Mouk, daughter of Andrew and Susan Mouk. and to this union two children have been born, Clarence L., who is now a student in th.e Stanton Military Academy, Virgina, and Mildred Mae, who is in school at Osborn. The Mitmans are members of the Lutheran church at Osborn, of which Mr. Mitman is an elder. He is also treasurer of the congregation and superintendent of the Sunday school. Mr. Mitman is a Scottish Rite (32°) Mason, affiliated with the consistory at Dayton, and a member of the local lodge of the Knights of Pythias at Osborn, which latter now seems doomed to a cessation of its wonted activities by reason of the project looking to flood prevention, which, if carried out as contemplated, will necessitate the abandonment of Osborn.
From History of Greene County Ohio, Its People, Industries and Institutions, vol. 2. M.A.Broadstone, editor. B.F.Bowen & Co., Indianapolis. 1918