Eighth Generation

53. Lydia Ann HARTSHORN¹ was born on 16 Jul 1836 in Ohio. She died on 5 Jun 1916 in Olathe, Johnson Co., KA.. She was buried in Olathe Memorial Cemetery, Olathe, Johnson Co., KS.

Copied from the Olathe Daily Mirror of June 8, 1916

MRS. LYDIA A. HODGES

Lydia A. Hodges was born in the state of Ohio, July 16, 1836, and died at Olathe (Johnson Co.) Kansas, Monday June 5, 1916, thus rounding out almost eighty years of useful, active, and forceful life.

In the broad sense she was a forceful and masterful woman. Pioneer blood was in her veins. Her father, Dr. George Hartshorn was not only a physician, but was Methodist Preacher of the type that the in the early and middle part of the last century carried the Gospel to the Western Wilderness; and so after Lydia Hartshorn in young womanhood had married W. W. Hodges, a young school teacher, the family went to Wisconsin--then frontier country--and finally in 1869 the Missionary, the Schoolteacher,and Home Builder--always the woman-- came to Kansas by wagon over the trail that led to high hopes in the new country that is now Kansas.

The Hodges family pitched its tent and set up its alter on Block 80,Olathe, and there throughout the struggles of Forty-seven years that home has remained and none has departed therefrom save through the gates to the silent city.

Essentially Lydia A. Hodges was home builder, a family builder, and a character builder. She took the very highest pride in keeping her family together on that sacred spot where she fought out for them the problems of early life and imparted to them the strength of character, firmness of purpose, that business and political integrity and manliness which has enabled her sons to take a commanding place in the business and political affairs of the state.

When the younger son went to Topeka in 1913 to be inaugurated as Governor our great state, there was back of her maternal pride a note almost of regret that the family circle was to be broken even temporarily. An intimate friendship of over 40 years with Mrs. Hodges enables the writer to say that whatever of business and political success has come to Frank and George Hodges, they owe their to their mothers's ideals of true manhood and her wise counsel and her insistence of that ideal.

When the time was ripe for civic improvement in Olathe, it was the son of this woman who led the fight for it and won, and today the magnificent street and sewer improvements in Olathe trace back to the home in Block80. If the statute books of Kansas are filled with progressive laws, in a great measure , these laws are to be credited to the legislature and Governor who received his training in that home. Even the great lumber business of Hodges Brothers is a monument to the mother's business sagacity and ideals.

Lydia Ann HARTSHORN and William Wesley HODGES were married estimated 1855. William Wesley HODGES¹ was born in 1829. He was born in 1829 in Virginia. He died in 1883 of Olathe, Kansas. He died in 1883 in Olathe, Johnson Co. KA.. He was also known as William Westley HODGES. He was buried in Olathe Memorial Cemetery, Olathe, Johnson Co., KS. He was in Teacher.

William was a school teacher, a man of fine intellectual and moralcharacter, and while at his death he left his family little materialproperty, he left an honored name and a character which his own childrenstrove to emulate. W. W. Hodges evinced a great fondness for young peopleand had the ability to win their regard and thus did much to influencethe formative character of many youth

Keep in mind the family had arrived in Olathe less than a year prior, wehave not determined when William continued his teaching career in Olathe.

The1870 Olathe City, Olathe Township, Johnson County, Census dated June4,1870, lists William Hodges as a Grocer, Age 31; Lydia as keeping house,Age 24; The oldest child Frank Age 11; George Age 4; Minnie Age 2. Thisresearcher has both William and Lydia as ten years older. If this censuscited age is correct Lydia would have had her first baby at age 13, notan impossibility but improbable from the standards of society at thattime.

The 1850 Census of Richland County, Wisconsin Has Lydia as 14 and thatwould make her age 34 in 1870 which is the correct age as far as thisresearcher can determine. Lydia Ann HARTSHORN and William Wesley HODGES had the following children:

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i.
Eunice Daniels HODGES.
+56
ii.
Frank HODGES.
+57
iii.
George Hartshorn HODGES.
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iv.
Minnie M. HODGES¹ was born in 1869 in Mason City. Cerro Gordo co., IA. She died in 1899 in Olathe, Johnson Co., KS. She was buried in Olathe Memorial Cemetery, Olathe, Johnson Co., KS.

The following excerpts are taken from the publication for the 1957Centennial celebration of Olathe, Johnson Co., KS, "Arrows to Atoms1857-1957" a historical album of Olathe. Kansas, page 42:

An historical photo on page 42 shows members of the social club, TheCatnation club. two of those depicted are Minnie Hodges and Ora Murry,who eventually became Mrs. George Hartshorn Hodges' wife.