Parke Davis Biological Farm

I was looking for information about Morgan J. Smead, who according to one family tree, died in 1913. Instead of finding evidence of his death having occurred in 1913, I found evidence that he was very much alive as late as 1942. Many of his records indicate that he was involved for many years with the Parke Davis Biological Farm in Oakland County, Michigan.

Morgan Smead was born in Pavilion Township, Genesee County, New York. His parents and siblings seem to have remained in New York. However, Morgan studied veterinary medicine at Toronto and then settled in Michigan. He married Alice Elizabeth Stevens, the daughter of John Brown Stevens and Angeline Elizabeth Stoutenburg, in Port Huron, Michigan in 1909.

Veterinarian Morgan and his wife, Alice, were living with her parents in Yale, Michigan in 1910. Morgan's father-in-law was a veterinarian. Alice's older brother, Chauncey was not a member of household in 1910. I have not located his whereabouts in 1910 but by 1918 he was working as a veterinarian in Michigan. As it turns out, Chauncey graduated in 1902 from Ontario Veterinary College, Toronto, Canada. (The Journal of Comparative Medicine and Veterinary Archives Vol. XXIII June 1902 No. 6 Edited by W. Horace Hoskins. Philadelphia: Office of Publication, 1902. Page 381}

Alice's younger brother, Walker, was enumerated with her parents, her husband and herself in 1910. Walker was a student. He apparently was a student in Toronto studying veterinary medicine in Toronto as his obituary claimed that he was the last surviving member of the Class of 1911 of the Ontario Veterinary College in Toronto.

Alice and Morgan met due to the fact that her brothers were veterinarians who studied at the same school as had Morgan.

Intrigued that someone would think that Morgan Smead had died in 1913 yet there was much evidence that he was living as late as 1942, I tried to come up with an answer. I discovered that Alice and Morgan has a daughter who was born in 1913 and lived only 5 days. The death certificate names her as "infant M J Smead" and says that she died of "fevers Parthenia following a difficult birth." For whatever reason, Morgan and Alice had no children after the death of that 5-day-old daughter.

As I looked at records concerning Morgan, it was clear that he had a long relationship with the Parke Davis Biological Farm, where he was employed for many years starting only a few years after the farm was established.

The Parke Davis Biological Farm was established in 1908 near Rochester, Michigan. According to page 416 History of Oakland County Michigan by Thaddeus D. Seeley, the farm consisted of 340 acres adjacent to the village of Rochester to the east. The Clinton River crossed the farm from the west and the Stony Creek crossed the farm from the north. Stony Creek joined the Clinton River on the farm proper. Morgan and Alice resided on Parkdale Road in Avon Township.


Looking at a 2015 map of Rochester, Michigan, I believe that a portion Bloomer Park is located at the site of the Parke Davis farm. Parkdale Road runs along the northern edge of the park and Stony Creek joins the Clinton River within the bounds of the park. Parke Davis added another 160 acres along the Michigan Central Raiload line to the farm. The site of the JHP Pharmaceuticals Manufacturing off of Parkdale Road is what remains of the Parke Davis Biological Farm.


I looked at Plat Maps of Avon Township for the years, 1872, 1896, 1925 and 1947. The Parke Davis farm appears in the 1925 and 1947 Plat Maps. In 1872, a C. Parker owned 340 acres at the approximate location of the Parke Davis farm. However, by 1896, the Parker farm was divided and sold to others. The History of Oakland County Michigan suggests that Parke Davis & Company purchased a 340-acre farm, not several farms that together formed 340 acres.

I was able to identify C. Parker. as Calvin Parker who was born in New York about 1820. He was living in Avon Township by 1850 when he and his wife, Mary, were enumerated in the census of that year. They owned a farm valued at $2350, which was valued about twice as much as his neighbor's farms. I found Calvin Parker in the 1860, 1870 and 1880 censuses in Avon Township, Oakland County, Michigan. In 1870, his farm was valued at $19,000. So it would seem that Calvin Parker owned a large farm.

He died on May 12, 1888 in Avon Township, according a Michigan Death Index. It is likely that his heirs sold the property between 1888 and 1896. In 1925, Parke Davis & Company owned 458 acres in the SE quarter of Section 11 and S half of Section 12.

In 1947, Parke Davis owned about 540 acres in Sections 11-14 with the largest portions in Sections 11 and 12. Bloomer State Park No. 2 was shown on the 1947 Plat Map. The company at some time between 1925 and 1947 acquired 160 acres along the Michigan Central Railroad line. Although I am speculating, it would seem that Parke Davis Company and Bloomer family jointly donated property or the Parke Davis sold land to the Bloomer family to form the Bloomer State Park.

Now back to Morgan J. Smead...

He was a Masonic Grand Master from 1950 to 1951 in Michigan. He died in 1962 in Rochester, Michigan.

Von Limburg is not Dutch

I came across a family tree on Ancestry.com that included General Lewis Cass. I was very much interested in this tree as Lewis Cass' daughter, Matilda was married to a very distant cousin of mine, Henry Ledyard. When I say very distant, he is my 6th cousin 4 times removed.

General Cass was the governor of the Michigan Territory, which at that time included the current states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa and parts of North and South Dakota. While researching my family, I found family in Cass County, in most of these states. My grandparents are buried in Cass County, Minnesota. I hadn't connected why so many of these states had a Cass County until I learned about Lewis Cass.

I generally don't spend much time on the ancestors of people who marry into my family. Typically, I try to find out birth, death and marriage dates for the parents of a person who married a relative. When I searched for Lewis Cass, I was surprised how much was written about him. I was also surprised at some of the things written about him or his family that were not correct.

Then I came across another tree that sent a red flag up the pole when I saw it. Lewis Cass had another daughter, Isabella. This tree claimed that she married Baron Theodorus Marinus Roest Von Linburg who was the Dutch Foreign Minister to the United States. The words baron and von were the triggers.

The word Von is German, not Dutch. It translate to the English word of just as the Dutch word van would translate. However, the German word "Von" signifies a person of the nobility of that place whereas the Dutch word "van" simply means of or from. Baron is a title used in the regions that today comprise Germany. It is not a Dutch title.

I came across an inventory of letters and documents relating to the family Roest van Limburg from 1604 to 1978 at the Archives of the Netherlands. Theodorus Marinus Roest van Limburg is addressed in letters as Mr. not as Baron. So where did the author of the tree get this idea that Theodorus was a baron?

So I decided to search further. I found a book that was printed in 1922, "The City of Detroit, Michigan, 1701-1922 Volume II." There it was, big as life! But that same search found another book. Only this book is recent (1996). It is entitled "Lewis Cass and Politics of Moderation" by Willard Carl Klunder at Kent State University. To me it looks like Mr. Klunder lifted the text from the 1922 book.

Since it was published by Kent State University, I can hardly blame someone researching Lewis Cass and his descendants for incorporating this junk into their tree.

General Lewis Cass, Michigan Territory Governor

I am a descendant of Elizabeth Case. Tracing her ancestors has proven to be somewhat troublesome for me. I was hitting walls until one day I discovered an article in the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society's Record, a quarterly publication. That article indicated that her grandfather was known as Nathan Case and Nathan Cass.

At this point, I began to search for information about Nathan Cass. I came across the Cass name in New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Rhode Island records. I am still trying to find the links among the names I discovered, but I am encouraged.

The name Lewis Cass cropped up frequently as I searched for information on the Cass family. I found several books written about this man, many written before 1900. I learned that he was appointed governor of the Michigan Territory from October 1813 to August 1931 when he resigned because President Andrew Jackson appointed him Secretary of War.

It did not surprise me to find a county in Michigan called Cass, named after Gov. Lewis Cass. Then I had an "ah ha" moment because my mother went to high school in Cass County, Minnesota. In addition, I recently found relatives who were living in Cass County, Iowa in the late 1800s. So I decided to see if these counties were named in General Cass' honor.

Indeed, they were. Not only did I learn that County in Minnesota, Iowa and Michigan were named in his honor, but I found counties in Illinois, Missouri, Nebraska, Indiana and Texas named on his behalf. Bartow County, Georgia was called Cass County until the American Civil War at which time the name was changed. However, the county seat remained Cassville.

Cass County, North Dakota was not named for Lewis Cass but for his nephew, George Washington Cass. This revelation led me down another research expedition about which I will write at another time.

Curious to see what other places may have been named in Lewis Cass' honor, I came up with two lakes and one river: Cass Lake, Minnesota and Michigan and Cass River, Michigan. I found townships in Oklahoma, Illinois, 8 in Indiana, 10 in Iowa, 4 in Missouri, 3 in Ohio, and 2 in Pennsylvania. There is Cass, WV, Cass City, MI, Casstown, OH and the town of Cassville in Wisconsin. In addition to the city in Georgia, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Ohio all have cities, Cassville, named after Lewis Cass.

Streets, schools and buildings have also been named for this man. However, I found the naming of a ship and a fort most interesting. The ship was a cargo ship built in World War II. These ships were called Liberty Ships and one was christened SS Lewis Cass. The fort near Charleston, Tennessee was established in 1835, during the time that Lewis Cass was Secretary of War under President Andrew Jackson.

With so many places named for Lewis Cass, I was driven to know more about him.

Lewis Cass was born in 1782 in Exeter, New Hampshire. His father, a major in the American Revolution, moved his family to Ohio in 1800 when Lewis was eighteen. It seems that Lewis followed in his father's footsteps and was a brigadier general during the War of 1812. In October of 1813, President James Madison appointed Cass governor of the Michigan Territory.

The territory was established in 1805 and existed until 1837 when Michigan became a state and the Wisconsin Territory was created. Prior to 1833, Michigan Territory encompassed an eastern portion of Minnesota and all of Wisconsin and Michigan. In that year the territory was expanded to include all of Minnesota and Iowa and the eastern portions of North and South Dakota. Of the three territorial governors of Michigan Territory, Lewis Cass was governor the longest, a few months shy of 18 years.

He resigned his governorship August 1, 1831 when he became Secretary of War, a position that he held until October 5, 1836. From that date to November 2, 1842, he was the ambassador to France. Lewis Cass retained this position under four presidents: Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison and John Tyler.

He ran for US Senator from the State of Michigan and was seated March 4, 1845. He resigned May 29, 1848 to run as the Democratic candidate for US President. After losing to Zachary Taylor, he ran again for the US Senate. Lewis Cass won the election and served as US Senator from March 4, 1847 through March 3, 1857.

President James Buchanan appointed Cass Secretary of State effective March 6, 1857. He disagreed with the way in which Buchanan was handling the Federal interests in the south and left office December 14, 1860. Political historians have generally classified James Buchanan as one of America's worst presidents.

General Lewis Cass retired to Detroit, Michigan where he died in 1866 at the age of 83. I found an account of his funeral that showed how much this man was beloved in Michigan.

Sources:

Life and Times of Lewis Cass by William L. G. Smith. New York: Derby & Jackson, 1856.

Lewis Cass by Andrew Cunningham McLaughlin. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1891 and 1919.