AARON FRY is the owner of 240 acres of well-improved land on section 34, Kent Township. Mr. Fry is a native of Pennsylvania, his parents being John and Catherine (Ervin) Fry, who lived in that State at the time of his birth, settling on Lancaster County on their arrival in this country. Thence they moved to Ohio, where they remained for a time, when they became citizens of Indiana, and resided there until 1847, when they were induced by the glowing accounts of Pennsylvanians who had preceded them, to move to Stephenson County, Ill., which by this time had become almost a new Pennsylvania. They settled in Loran Township, where they passed one year and then removed to Kent Township. Here they remained until 1870, when they removed to Nebraska, where they now live at an advanced age, having been in their lives residents of five States at a time when they were passing through their first stages of settlement and civilization. They had eight children, six of whom lived to ages of maturity.

The subject of this sketch was born on the 1st of July, 1839, and was about eight years of age when his parents landed in Stephenson County. He has lived in this county since 1847, and during that time has been exclusively engaged in agricultural pursuits. He is the owner of a farm of 240 acres, 200 of which are improved, and are as fertile and well cultivated as the sun shines on. Realizing that the log cabin days have long since passed, such buildings have disappeared from his farm, and have been replaced by comfortable structures.

In the year 1863, at the age of twenty-four, Mr. Fry concluded to form a matrimonial alliance, and on the 20th of September, of that year, was married to Mary Finkenbinder, daughter of William and Catherine Finkenbinder. Her father died in Kent Township on the 4th of January, 1869. Their family consisted of eleven children, six girls and five boys. Mrs. Fry was the eldest of the family, being born in Somerset County, Ohio, on the 23d of November, 1844. Mr. and Mrs. Fry are the parents of five children – George, Edward, William, Katie M. and John A. Katie died when she was three months old. Mr. and Mrs. Fry are members of the German Baptist Church, to which organization they are much devoted. In their own way, and without ostentation, they seek to do as much good as possible. Mr. Fry cares little for politics, but generally interests himself to the extent of exercising the right of franchise in the selection of public officers, and votes for the best men regardless of politics.

Contributed by Carol Parrish Portrait and Biographical Album of Stephenson County, Ill. (1888), p. 732