Liberty County, Montana Biographies

Liberty County, Montana

Biographies

John A. Arthurs
The history of the city of Chester will always give distinction to the name of its first mayor, Mr. J. A. Arthurs, who was the first official chosen to fill this post when the city was incorporated, and is also the present mayor, having been re-elected.
Mr. Arthurs, who has been identified with northern Montana throughout his active career, was born in St. Joseph, .Michigan, March 18, 1880, and was educated in the local schools of that city. He was at an early age thrown upon his own responsibilities, and has won success in business and public honors through the force of his own character and resources. In 1894 he came west and entered the employment of the Benton Cattle Company as a cowboy, his work and headquarters being eighteen miles south of the site of Chester. After eight years with this company, he spent about nine months in Chicago, after which he returned to Montana and started in business for himself at Chester. As a representative business man, his fellow citizens chose him as the first mayor of the new city in 1909, and in May, 191 1, again elected him by a large majority. His politics is Republican, and his church is the Methodist.
Mr. Arthurs was married in Chicago, March 6, 1905, to Miss Beatrice Barnes. They have a comfortable home in Chester, and have a large circle of friends in the city and vicinity.
Mr. Arthurs' father was James A. Arthurs, who was born in Ontario, Canada, in early life moved to St. Joseph, Michigan, and was a prospering farmer, but died when his son was about five years old. His wife was Rosa (Des Broe) Arthurs, a native of Michigan, and now living in Kalispell, Montana, at the age of forty-nine. [Source: "The History of Montana" by Helen Fitzgerald Sanders, Volume 3, 1913 - Sub. by a Friend of Free Genealogy]

Charles F. Baker
Long and successful experience in business has placed Mr. Baker among the leading merchants of Montana, with which state he has been identified for more than twenty years. As president of the Chester Trading Company he is an influential citizen of one of the thriving new towns in the northwestern part of the state.
Charles F. Baker was born at Goshen, Indiana, August 3, 1859, and his early education was obtained in the Catholic schools. His parents were John and Katrine (Ahinger) Baker. The father, a native of Germany, when a young man came to America about 1845 and was one of the early settlers in northwestern Indiana. Farming was his occupation, and he was a prosperous citizen of one of the leading counties of the state. During the Civil war he enlisted in the Union army, was wounded in action, and at the close of the war received an honorable discharge. His death occurred in 1907 at the advanced age of eighty-nine. The mother, also a native of Germany, died in Indiana in 1906, aged eighty-seven.
Charles F., who was the second of four children, has been engaged in the practical affairs of merchandising and other business from the time he left school in Indiana. For two years he was in the drug business, then for two or three years with a hat, cap and fur store, then for seven years in the clothing trade at Wauseon, Ohio, had a similar business at Bryan, Ohio, three years, and was for a year and a half in the general merchandise business at Pioneer, in the same state. In 1889, the year of Montana's admission to the Union, Mr. Baker came to this state and entered the employ of Ben Harris of Helena. In 1892, moving to Great Falls, he began working for Nate Wertheim, with whom he remained for sixteen years. In 1908 Mr. Baker purchased of Bourne & Hamilton a general store at Chester, and by his business capacity and energy has developed this into the large and well known Chester Trading Company, of which he is president. He managed his store all by himself at the start, but now employs five men to assist in attending to the trade. Alexander Wright and John Laird were both business partners in this concern.
Mr. Baker was married in Wauseon, Ohio, in 1885, to Miss Jennie L. Sherwood, and they are the parents of three children, namely : Walter, who was born at Bryan, Ohio, in 1888; Charles H, born at Pioneer, Ohio, in 1890, and now a resident of Great Falls ; and Helen S., born at Helena in 1892.
As a citizen Mr. Baker has been known for his public spirit, and Montana has no more loyal citizen than this Chester merchant. He is Republican in politics, and served as postmaster for Chester in 1909. He is a blue lodge Mason, and his wife is a member of the Congregational church. Hunting and fishing are his outdoor forms of recreation, which he indulges when he can find time from a very busy life. (Source: "History of Montana", Helen Fitzgerald Sanders; pub. Chicago, Lewis Pub. Co., 1913, - Sub. by Lisa Smalley)

Elmer W. Denison
Northwestern Montana has attracted many enterprising and capable young citizens to the service of its growing business and industrial life, and one of the representatives ot this class is the present city treasurer of Chester, Mr. Elmer W. Denison, who has been identified with this vicinity since 1910, and was formerly engaged in banking and other lines of business in Minnesota.
He is a native of Adair county, Iowa, where he was born August 14, 1879, a son of Neldo and Erma R. (Shirk) Denison. The father, who was born near Hanna, Indiana, his father having come fram Connecticut in an early day, was one of the first prospectors to try the Black Hills diggings. He died in 1882 at the age of thirty. The mother was born at Walnut, Illinois, a daughter of R. L. Shirk, a Pennsylvania German. She is now living with her son in Chester, Montana, and was sixty years old on July 3d of the present year (1912).
Elmer W. Denison obtained his early education in the public schools of Iowa, and also took a special course in law and English in Minnesota. His entrance into business was in the credit department of a large lumber company of Minneapolis, with which he continued seven years, and was then cashier of the Sheldon Brothers Bank until May, 1910, when he resigned and located in Chester. He has built up and now controls a large business in land, town real estate and general real estate brokerage, and is the owner of the Denison Land Company. Mr. Denison has been twice honored with election to the office of treasurer of Chester.
His marriage occurred in the city of Minneapolis, March 24, 1909, to Miss Mary Viets. Her father, W. H. Viets, was formerly a resident of New London, Connecticut, whence he moved west to Minneapolis. Carolyn Ruth Denison, their one Child, was born in Minneapolis, September 19, 1911. Mr. Denison, affiliates with the Masonic order, Lodge No. 65, at Rugby, North Dakota, is a Republican in politics and is a member of the Presbyterian church. He takes much pleasure in the outdoor sports and recreations, and is a citizen of broad interests.
(Source: "History of Montana", Helen Fitzgerald Sanders; pub. Chicago, Lewis Pub. Co., 1913, p. 1809.)

CARL F. HAWKINSON
Since January, 1910, Carl F. Hawkinson has been a resident of Joplin, Montana, and here he is most successfully engaged in the restaurant and general merchandise business. He is one of the pioneers in this town, having come hither when there was but one building in the place. He is loyal and public spirited in his civic attitude and no measure forwarded for the good of progress and improvement fails to receive his most hearty support.
Carl F. Hawkinson was born in Sweden, the date of his nativity being August 24, 1874. He is a son of Hokanson and Kate (Kisa) Hawkinson, both of whom were born and reared in Sweden, where was solemnized their marriage in 1856. The father came, alone, to America in 1882 and located on a farm in Douglas county, Minnesota, where he continued to reside until his demise, in 1902, at the age of sixty-nine years. Mrs. Hawkinson, with a family of nine children, followed her husband to America in 1884 and she is still living, her home being in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Mr. Hawkinson, of this notice, was a child of but ten years of age at the time of his arrival in the United States and he completed his educational training with attendance in the district schools of Douglas county Minnesota. He also pursued a one-year commercial course in Northwestern Business College at Minneapolis. He resided on the home farm with his parents until he had reached his twenty-first year, when he started to farm in Minnesota on his own account. He homesteaded one hundred and sixty acres of land in Red Lake county, Minnesota, and proved up on the same in five years, at the end of which he disposed of that estate and engaged in the general merchandise business at Farwell, Minnesota. He was a resident of Farwell for a period of four years and in 1894 removed to North Dakota, settling at Tolley, where he was variously engaged for the next four years. In January, 1910, he came to Joplin, Montana, and at that date there was but one building in the place. Mr. Hawkinson purchased this structure and immediately engaged in the restaurant business, which he still conducts and in November, 1911, he purchased an additional lot, on which he erected another building, in which he runs a strictly first-class general merchandise store. He also conducts a bakery--the only one in the town--and his different business enterprises are netting him a large and most gratifying profit. Mr. Hawkinson has achIeved success through his own well-directed efforts and for that reason it is the more gratifying to contemplate. In his political convictions he is a stalwart Republican and in religious matters he and his wife are devout members of the Lutheran church.
At Farwell, Minnesota, August 25, 1899, was celebrated the marriage of Mr. Hawkinson to Miss Esther Rystedt, who was born at Farwell and who is a daughter of Andrew Rystedt, a native of Pope county, Minnesota. Mr. and Mrs. Hawkinson have two sons, namely,--Walter, whose birth occurred in Red Lake county, Minnesota, in 1900; and Carl Wenzel, born at Farwell, Minnesota, in 1906.
(Source: "History of Montana", by Helen Fitzgerald Sanders; pub. Chicago, Lewis Pub. Co., 1913, p. 1810.)