John J. Whaley
John J. Whaley, commercial traveler and the owner of a home and a tract of land adjoining the village of Osborn, where he has made his home for many years, is a native of the Empire state, but has been a resident of Ohio since he was three years of age. He was born at Utica, New York, June 23, 1850, a son of Daniel and Mary (Cain) Whaley, natives of Ireland, the former born in 1813 and the latter, in 1814, who came to Ohio in 1853 and settled in Clark county, where Daniel Whaley died in 1862. His widow later bought a piece of land in Clark county and there spent the rest of her life, her death occurring in 1903. Daniel Whaley and his wife were the parents of seven children, of whom the subject of this sketch was the sixth in order of birth, the others being Thomas, deceased; James, deceased; William, who lives at Osborn, his home place adjoining that of his brother John; Mary, wife of John Mahoney, of Roanoke, Virginia; Catherine, who married S. M. Morris and who, as well as her husband, is now deceased; and Margaret, who died recently, unmarried.
As rioted above, John J. Whaley was but three years of age when his parents came to Ohio and he received his early schooling in the common schools in the neighborhood of his boyhood home in Clark county, supplementing the same by a course in the Clark County Academy. He then learned telegraphy and two years later, in 1872, was appointed station agent for the railroad company at Osborn, which position he occupied until 1883, in which year he moved to Akron as agent for the Erie railroad, remaining there for eighteen months, at the end of which time he moved back to Osborn, which ever since has been his home. In 1897 he became a traveling representative of the Thomas Phillips Company, paper manufacturers at Akron, which position he ever since has occupied. Mr. Whaley resides just at the east edge of the village of Osborn and owns there a farm of one hundred and sixteen acres, thirty acres of which lies in Greene county and the remainder over the line in Clark county, renting his land for farming purposes. Mr. Whaley is a Democrat on national issues, but reserves his right to vote independently in local elections. He and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal church.
On August 24, 1874, John J. Whaley was united in marriage to Mary E. Miranda, who was born at New Carlisle, in the neighboring county of Clark, where she was reared and where she received her schooling, and to this union have been born five children, namely: Earl E. Whaley, editor of The Implement Age, a trade paper published at Springfield, this state; Paul M. Whaley, a resident of Columbus, this state, and a traveling salesman for the Fisk Rubber Company; William Marvin Whaley, proprietor of a flour-mill at Arcanum, in Darke county, this state; Mary E., wife of Dr. R. B. Hoover, of Dayton, and Cora A., wife of Fred McConnell, a Dayton lawver.
From History of Greene County Ohio, Its People, Industries and Institutions, vol. 2. M.A.Broadstone, editor. B.F.Bowen & Co., Indianapolis. 1918