ABEL W. KEMP
Page 150

As will be seen by the following communication, the gentleman whose name is above was an early inhabitant and an old citizen of Mason county, and very prominently identified with its business interests. We addressed him at his present home, Sparta, Wisconsin, and received the reply copied below: Sparta, Wisconsin, June 26, 1876 J. Cochrane, Esq.: Dear Sir: --In answer to yours of the 14th inst., I would say that I was away from home when yours was received, as an excuse for the delay. I was born August 26, 1802, at Fitchburgh, Massachusetts, and removed to Havana in 1835. For any further information I send you an address given at my golden wedding, two years ago, from which you may find something that may be useful to you in getting my history. Yours truly, A. W. Kemp The address referred to above is so good that we will give it entire, as it would not bear abridgement: Remarks of W. H. Spencer, at the Golden Wedding of Mr. and Mrs. Kemp, of Sparta, on the Evening of August 26th, 1874. Ladies and Gentlemen, Brothers and Sisters, and Friends, all: Somewhat more than fifty years ago, a young man in Troy, New York, a little under the medium size perhaps, with blue eyes, florid complexion, and hair the color of Rufus of England, might have been seen, like Roger Sherman or President Wilson, when a boy, sitting on a shoemaker's bench, plying his trade. Perhaps, if you cold have observed the young man, you might have detected an abstracted, a wandering look in his eyes, while he drove the awl and drew the stitches. You must forgive him if occasionally he forgets to wax the thread, or tips over the box of shoe pegs, or fits the heel to the toe of the boot, for he is thinking, as young men are wont to think, that it is not good to be alone, and his thoughts are away in sweet communion with a dark-eyed maiden of 17 summers, whom he believed would divide his sorrows and double his joys, would fill his soul with perfect peace, and his home with light and love. The thought grew upon him; haunted him day and night, until he said to himself, I must have, I WILL have Sarah Hagarty for my wife, for I do love her with all my might, mind and strength. How this young man managed to communicate his feelings to Miss Sarah is not a matter of history. Suffice it to say, that he found some means of telling her the secret of his heart, as young men are apt to do. But the course of true love does not always run smooth. Sarah, like Clara Peggotty, was "willin'," and Abel, like Barkis, was anxious, but one day when Abel mustered up courage to go up to Sarah's father and say, "Mr. Hagarty, I love your daughter Sarah, may I have her for my wife?" the old gentleman, forgetting, perhaps, that he was once a boy, or for some reason best known to himself, replied, "No! not as long as the sun rises in the East can you have her!" Abel had no intention of changing the course of the sun to please the old man, but he had no notion, either, of giving up Sarah, and as Sarah had no notion of giving up Abel, Sarah and Abel privately resolved to give up the whole world, if necessary, rather than give up each other. The result was that Sarah's father was not invited to a certain wedding which took place just fifty years ago this very day, at the house of one of Sarah's married sisters in Schenectady, N. Y., where the name of Sarah Hagarty was changed to Sarah Kemp, and Abel Wheeler Kemp and Sarah Kemp have proved that their love was true, for since they clasped hands and vowed to love each other and live together, a half century has rolled round, and still the bond of union is unbroken, yea stronger, than when first knit, fifty years ago. It is in honor of this fact that we come, a band of brothers and sisters, to offer this semi-century couple our hearty congratulations, with our hopes that many more years may see that bond unbroken. And the twain, when made one, started out in life. I believe they lived for a short time at Troy, N. Y., and afterwards at Watertown, in the same State. He followed the trade of shoemaker, at which he had served an apprenticeship of seven years. History does not inform us what kind of shoes he made. If his leather was as sound as his religion, I think his customers never grumbled of pasteboard stiffening, pan-cake inner soles and split-leather uppers, sold for best quality French calf. A sound religion cannot possibly make and sell shoddy shoes for A No. 1. As Mr. Kemp attends the services of the First Independent Society of this place, of course, we must believe that he always did turn off first-class work. But the wife, in the meantime, was proving herself a valuable help-mate, for her deft fingers and good taste applied themselves to millinery work in a shop of her own, and thus she added her shilling to his, until shillings made dollars, and dollars made hundreds. In this place four children was born to them-James and Daniel, living in Minnesota, both present on this occasion; Mary, now Mrs. Simpson, and another daughter, Elizabeth, who died in Illinois. In 1833 Mr. Kemp and family left Watertown and went to Canada, thence moving, in 1835, to Illinois, on to a farm in the bottom lands of the Sangamon river, near Havana, Mason county. In those times it was very fashionable to get the ague and deep it, and so Mr. Kemp's family, one and all, immediately joined the company of shakers, and we are told that their faces were of the color of lemon peel, and their teeth did chatter, chatter, as unceasingly as old Goody Blake's, in the melancholy cynic poem. There were no doctors in the neighborhood, which, perhaps, accounts for the fact that they all survived the shakes. In one respect, however, this family did not follow the fashions, for at that time, when the houses were all made of logs, and windows were holes in the wall, perfectly innocent of glass, what did this Mr. Kemp do but fly right in the face of public opinion by purchasing four panes of glass and putting them in the aforesaid holes in the wall. Is it any wonder that his humble neighbors pronounced it one of the vanities of civilization, and looked upon his house as a proud man's castle, and upbraided them as being wickedly extravagant, "big feelin,'" and "sort o' stuck up like?" After viewing this case on all sides, I am, however, disposed to acquit Mr. Kemp of all shame or blame, from what I know of the vanity of women, it is my deliberate conviction that Mrs. Kemp herself was at the bottom of that extravagant idea of getting glass for the windows, and I dare say, if you could have looked inside the house you might have detected other similar innovations on the customs of her green-eyed neighbors. On this farm they had a hard time of it. I believe that he worked at his trade a part of the time and worked on the farm the remainder. But working at anything, with ague fits and fevers alternating, was extremely discouraging. As they had no wagons, everything must be hauled on sleds, even in summer time. Flour must be brought from St. Louis at great expense, and all kinds of groceries was so dear, that the cost of supporting a large family there ate a big hole in the sack of earnings stored away. There is one bright oasis in this desert time that I must call attention to. However much the ague shook them, we may offer laus Deo that it did not shake the religion out of them. As proof of this, I may adduce this fact, that one time while here Mr. Kemp, and I think, Mrs. Kemp, also, went ten miles to a camp meeting, and that, too, riding after an ox team. Now, a man or woman who will do that will unquestionably be saved. They might have walked, no doubt, but for the sake of religion they were willing to sacrifice ease and comfort, and ride. Happy the day when they decided to quit this ague farm. It happened in this wise. Mr. Kemp was preparing to build a new house on the old ground, determined, apparently, to fight it out on that line, if he shook all his life. But when the foundation was laid Mrs. Kemp came to look at it, and it seemed to her that she was looking at her grave. With sallow face and chattering teeth, she admonished him that she could not survive another year on the old, bilious farm, and begged him to kick the dust of it off his feet, and pitch his tent where she should direct. Like a good, obedient husband, he did just what he ought to have done-he left his farm and saved his wife; he followed where she led. Riding over the prairie several miles from the site of the first farm, she pointed to a spot, and said: "There, Abel, is where I want my house." He alighted and drove a stake there, bought the land of the government, and built his house on the very spot, in the midst of one hundred and twenty acres of rich soil. From that day the ebbing tide in his fortune stopped, and the flow set in. Health, that had been so long a stranger, returned, and prosperity smiled upon them. The moral is, be sure you get a wife of sound judgment, and then implicitly obey her. After remaining several years on this farm, he moved into the little village of Havana, where he kept a hardware store in connection with a foundry. I believe it was here that he was first made justice of the peace. While holding this office it does not appear from the records (so far as I have examined them) that he ever accepted any bribe, or was engaged in any "ring" speculations, in which respect he departed from the custom of many in these latter days. While in Illinois, N. J. Kemp and Frances (now Mrs. John M. Palmer) were born, making in all eight children, three of whom are not living, John, Elizabeth and Sarah, all of whom died in Illinois. In 1865, Mr. and Mrs. Kemp came on a visit to their children, (Mr. and Mrs. Simpson) in this place, and very naturally fell in love with our beautiful village, and decided to make it their future home. Here they moved, and for nine years have lived, surrounded by affectionate children and a host of friends. In religious belief, Mr. Kemp and wife are Universalists, and for many years have been constant readers of the New Covenant, but as they are unsectarian, every liberal movement in religion receives their sympathy, by whatever name it may be called, while their charity is broad enough to love and receive the truth which dwells in all faiths. Mr. Kemp has been a member of the I. O. O. F. for twenty-five years. He is therefore a veteran in our ranks-the patriarch of the family. No one is more regular in attendance at the lodge than he, and this week he has shown his interest as well as physical vigor, by riding fifteen or twenty miles to attend the funeral of a brother. If he enjoys the social intercourse and hearty hand-shakes which he receives there, let him be assured that every member of that lodge feels a welcome in his heart whenever the white hairs crowning the venerable form of Father Kemp, are seen entering the old lodge room. May he long live to be welcomed there! Mr. and Mrs. Kemp: Dear Friends-One word to you and I am done. Fifty years, with winged feet, have glided by since you, a young man of twenty-two, and you, a maiden of seventeen, clasped each others hands, and with hearts full of love, vowed to live in love together till death should sever you. Nobly and well have you kept your troth. We honor you for it. In the sunshine of prosperity you have rejoiced together. When sorrow has come with her heavy clouds, you have bowed your heads and wept together. When hard trials have borne down heavily upon you, you have not despaired nor deserted, but resolutely joined hands and struggled unitedly against them until the storm has past. When sickness has cast its shadow over your household, and death its deeper shadow, we have seen you mingling your tears in the shadow of a common sorrow. For fifty long years you have been faithful, fond and true to each other as you promised to be fifty years ago to-day. For your fidelity and devotion we honor-from our deepest hearts we honor you. And more, we congratulate you. It is true that three of your children dear, have fallen out of the ranks, grown weary in the march of life, but you have still five remaining, who are to you all that sons and daughters could be. Around you cluster children and grandchildren, and even four great-grandchildren have already risen up to call you blessed. To very few of Earth's children is granted such a rich inheritance. May your hearts be thankful to the Great Giver of all, that the evening of your lives is made radiant with so much domestic happiness, filial affection, social respect and esteem. We honor and congratulate you on this fiftieth anniversary of your wedding, and as a token of our esteem for you as a man of integrity, our respect for you as an honorable citizen, our affection for you as a brother, a long-tried, true, trusty and faithful Odd Fellow, allow me, in behalf of many members of our order here, to present you this cane. Let its golden head symbolize the fifty golden years that crown your golden life, so full of honor and joy. It is a staff which you may lean upon, not as a broken reed, but a staff as strong as the love of your friends, which will ever bear you up as you walk through your declining years. And to you, Mrs. Kemp, in congratulation of this event, and as a little token of their esteem, the daughters of Rebecca, through me, present this silver cup, gold lined, and other friends present this gold watch. And now, dear friends, may this only be a joyful surprise to you. May you still live long to enjoy the life that began fifty years ago, and the society of your many friends, many of whom are here met to-night to rejoice with you, and when at last the summons is heard-"Come up higher"-may you hear it calmly, trustingly, and obey it as cheerfully as "One who wraps the drapery of his couch about him, And lies down to pleasant dreams."

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