Teaford, Jonathan

Posted By: Steve Koons
Date: 28 October 2004

transcribed from A Biographical History of Darke County Ohio, Lewis Publishing Company, 1900, part II, pp 578:

JONATHAN TEAFORD.

Prominent among the citizens of Darke County who have witnessed the marvelous development of this section of the state in the past seventy-five years and who have, by honest toil and industry, succeeded in accumulating a handsome competence, is the gentlemen whose name introduces this sketch. He was born on his present farm on section 21, German township, February 3, 1824, a son of George and Molly (Ketring) Teaford. The father was born in Virginia and when a young man came to Dark County, locating in German township, where they were married, and the mother was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and was a representative of one of the oldest families of this county. In German township the father of our subject took up a tract of government land and he cleared and improved many acres. He died upon his farm in German township, at the age of seventy-six years. His was an honorable and useful life, in which he secured the confidence and respect of all with whom he came in contact. Of the thirteen children born to him, ten reached manhood or womanhood, but only Jonathan and his twin brother, Barney, of German township, are now living.

During his boyhood and youth Jonathan Teaford remained at home and on the 8th of March, 1848, he married Miss Sophia Smelker, who was born in Germantown, Montgomery county, Ohio, April 4, 1826, and is the third child and oldest daughter in a family of thirteen children. Her parents, Jacob and Christina Smelker, who were early settlers of German township, this county, were born in Germany and were married in Montgomery county, Ohio. Mr. and Mrs. Teaford are the parents of ten children, but only five are now living, namely: Leaner, who married Clara Jeffries and follows farming in Washington township; Mary Jane, the wife of Andy Biddle, of Randolph county, Indiana; Eli, who married Mina Jefferies and lives in Neave township, Darke county; Ephriam, who married Dora a daughter of Henry Mills, and resides in German township, this county; and Elizabeth, the wife of Marshall A. Brown, of New Madison.

For six years after his marriage Mr. Teaford lived upon a rented farm in German township, but at the end of that time he was able to purchase a tract of eighty acres on section 21, just west of where he now lives His first home was a log house, 18X15 feet, which in 1869 he replaced by his present comfortable and substantial residence, erected at a cost of four thousand dollars. As this was soon after the close of the civil war prices were very high, and his barn, built about the same time, cost twenty-five hundred dollars. In business affairs he has steadily prospered, being a man of keen discrimination and sound judgement, and he has given to each of the sons eighty acres and to his daughters forty acres. His success in life may be attributed to his own industry, perseverance and good management, for on starting out in life for himself he had only one hundred and thirty dollars in money. He is one of the most prominent old settlers and highly respected citizens of Darke county, and is certainly deserving of honorable mention in its history. Politically he is identified with the Democratic party

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