CRANDALL BIOGRAPHIES, Henry County, Missouri
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CRANDALL, B. F. - b: 1838 Crystal Lake, IL
source: 1883 History of Henry Missouri , National Historical Co. - page: 565
residence: Windsor
B. F. Crandall was born at Crystal Lake, Illinois, May 25, 1838, and was the son of Beman Crandall, who was born near Hartford, Connecticut, in October, 1795, emigrating from his native state with his parents about the year 1801, and settling near Syracuse, New York. He married Miss Polly Tuttle, who was also born near Hartford about the year 1802, and she likewise went with her parents and settled near Syracuse. They were married about the year 1822, and had ten children, eight sons and two daughters, seven of whom are still living. The senior Crandall was among the early pioneers of Northern Illinois having moved to that state from New York about the year 1832, when he located in what is now McHenry County, at Crystal Lake, which town was founded by him. He was president of the Virginia settlement, an organization made up by the earliest settlers for their own government and protection, that portion of the state being unorganized at that time, which office he held until McHenry County was organized, when he was elected the first magistrate. This position he held successively for twenty-five years. Emigrating to Missouri in October, 1859, he settled in Saline County, where he resided for two years, when the civil war breaking out, he abandoned the farm and returned to Illinois, where he lost his wife in 1864. After the close of the war he again came to Missouri, and made his home with O. A. Crandall, Esq., of Sedalia. He is still residing in Missouri with his daughter, Mrs. William Parsons, at Blackburn, Saline County, and now at the ripe age of eighty-eight, is active in mind and body, and a fair specimen of the hardy American pioneer.
B. F. CrandalI was the youngest of seven sons. He commenced his early education at Crystal Lake, Illinois, in an old log house, and at the age of seventeen left school with a fair English education. He came to Missouri with his father's family, and was engaged in farming and stock raising until 1862, when owing to the civil war, he discontinued it and engaged as a clerk in the commissary department under Captain J. E. Howard, chief commissary of the Central District of Missouri. In 1864, he went to Louisiana, and was interested in the culture of cotton for five years. In 1868, he returned to Missouri and commenced the study of law with Crandall & Sinnett, of Sedalia, Missouri, and after a thorough course he was admitted to the bar, practicing in all the courts of the state. Not suited with the profession he turned his attention to a mercantile life, in which business he embarked in 1871, and this he has steadily pursued. He is now in the employ of Albert Mayer & Bros., of Cincinnati, looking after their interests west of the Mississippi. In politics he is a Republican. He was married January 12, 1870, to Miss Jessie Hopkirk, of Windsor, Missouri. They had three children: Clarence H., Edward Oscar, and Nellie Josephine. The former two died in infancy. Nellie J. is now a bright little girl of six years.
Walter Hopkirk, the father of Mrs. Crandall, was born February 18, 1821, in Melrose, Roxburghshire, Scotland. At the age of sixteen years he emerged from the schools with not only a good English education, but as a classical scholar. His father, William Hopkirk, a shoemaker by trade, was born December 25, 1780, and worked at his trade for the most of his life. His mother, whose maiden name was Isabella Home, was born in 1782 in Hornecliffe, England, being the last in the line of lineal descendants of the house of Home. They were married in 1804 and had eight children, four of whom are living. Both of his parents died in Scotland. Mr. Hopkirk emigrated from his native country to America in 1837. On arriving here he apprenticed himself to the cabinet trade, serving five years in Steubenville, Ohio He afterward worked at the same place as a journeyman for eight months and then went to Burlington, Iowa, where he worked as a journeyman for one year and six months. Next he removed to Bonaparte, on the Des Moines River, and was there established in business for eight years. December 25, 1848, he married Miss Mary E. Moffitt, of Lexington, Iowa. They had six children, five of whom are still living, two sons and three daughters. He remained at Bonaparte for three years after their marriage, when, in 1851, he joined a company, and, taking the overland route, went to California. He was engaged in mining for four years, when he returned to his family, who had accompanied his wife's father to Henry County, Missouri, where they bought landed property.
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