George C. Youngman

    George C. Youngman, a man of large experience in various avocations, and who has now passed his three score, and ten years, will form the subject of this memoir, which very fittingly finds place in this connection, it being the story of one of the pioneer characters who has forged his way to the front in the developing of Sullivan County as well as other sections of the middle west. Mr. Youngman was born at the thriving city of Greencastle, Putnam County, Indiana, August 13, 1837, a son from out of the family of fourteen children born to Stacy R. and Laurena B. (Mark) Youngman. The parents were both born in Kentucky, which state has furnished so many acceptable "first settlers" in many of the counties of Indiana. the father was born August 24, 1813, and the mother in 1816. They came to Indiana in 1831, locating near Greencastle, on a farm owned by his father. Stacy R. Youngman was a practicing physician of considerable note. He lived at Greencastle until about 1846, when he moved to Cloverdale, in the same county, settling in Williamson, where he resided until 1853. He then moved to Greencastle again, and continued his medical practice until  1855 at that place. In 1861 he moved to West Liberty, Illinois, and followed his profession until his death, September 1, 1904. His good wife died about 1898. They were the parents of fourteen children, seven of whom are still living, as follows:

    George C. Youngman obtained his education under many a difficulty unknown to the youth of the twentieth century. He attended the district schools north of Greencastle, Indiana, where there was not a single window light in the entire building, and had other trials which only the stout-hearted can endure and develop under. He was thrown upon his own resources at an early age, his father having a large family to support from a limited means. He went to live with an uncle when aged about eighty years, and continued to live with him as long as he worked for others. These good people, Richard J. and Rebecca Tolin, were people who commanded the esteem of all for their sterling traits of character. During the years of 1850 and 1852 he was on a mail route, the first year between Bloomington and Crawfordsville, Indiana. He traveled on horseback a distance of seventy miles, and on the entire route there were but three bridges; but he practically never missed a trip on account of bad roads or high water. His salary was the princely sum of seven dollars a month. On his first trip to Bloomington in 1850 he was served with a cup of coffee, which was the first and last cup he ever tasted. In 1860 he rented a farm in this county, and also began threshing wheat with his uncle as early as 1855, and has continued practically ever since that time to be near the busy hum of a threshing machine in its annual season. In 1866 he purchased a house in New Lebanon, which after a few months he sold at a handsome profit. He also engaged in operating a sawmill for a time, but sold and bought his farm, consisting of seventy-four acres, and moved to the premises in the month of March, 1869. Here he has added many valuable and attractive improvements and carried on general farming operations. He purchased forty acres more land not far distant from his home farm, and this he sold in 1908.

    It will be observed, as stated in the commencement, that Mr. Youngman has seen many of life's changing scenes, but not near all of his history has been told. For five years he traveled for the Robinson Machine Company, of Richmond, Indiana, as their salesman. Again, he had a touch of Civil War military life, which should not be omitted from this narrative. In January, 1865, the last year of the rebellion, he enlisted as a member of Company G, of the One Hundred and Forty-ninth Indiana Regiment. He entered as a private soldier and was promoted to the rank of Sergeant and mustered out of the U. S. service September 27, 1865.

    In his politics Mr. Youngman is a stanch Republican, and takes high ground on the subject of temperance; and in his religious connection he was reared a Methodist, but he is not a member of any church organization. He was married March 2, 1862, to Margaret E. Gill, a daughter of George N. and ____ (Graham) Gill. The grandfather was born in North Carolina and the grandmother in Tennessee. It is believed that her parents were born in Sullivan County, Indiana. Her father was a farmer and also followed the trade of millwright. He removed to Wisconsin, settled near Boscobel, remained a few years, and then went to Arkansas, and finally returned to Sullivan County, Indiana, and remained on his farm until his death in 1867. The mother of Mrs. Youngman died several years before the death of the father.

    Mr. and Mrs. Youngman are the parents of three children, but the eldest, born March 3, 1863, died in infancy. Albion D., born June 3, 1864, died in 1904. He was first married to Miss Emma Sherman, born in this county, and they had two children -Ernest, born March 7, 1888, now with the subject, and Ivan, born May 21, 1889. He married secondly, Miss Jennie Newsom, a native of Illinois, born near Olney, and they had two children -Margaret, born September 4, 1898, and Albion Duane, born February 2, 1900, and died August 11, 1908. These children, with the mother, are with Mr. and Mrs. Youngman.

    Mr. Youngman was a candidate for Trustee of the Township and was defeated by only ten votes. He was also a candidate for Sheriff, Auditor, County Commissioner, and County Treasurer, and in a county of eighteen hundred Democratic majority he was defeated by only three hundred and eighty-one majority votes. He is also a member of Silver's Grand Army of the Republic Post No. 435, and filled all the offices, at New Lebanon, Indiana, and has attended Grand Encampments at different times.

Source: A History of Sullivan County, Indiana. Closing of the first century’s history of the county and showing the growth of its people, institutions, industries and wealth. Thomas J. Wolfe, Editor. The Lewis Publishing Company, 1909, page 307, 308, 309.