Richard H. Dodd, BiographyPorter County biographical sketches . . . .
Transcribed biography of Richard H. Dodd
RICHARD H. DODD.
The social, political and business history of this section is filled with the deeds and doings of self-made men, and no man in Porter County, Indiana, is more deserving the appellation than Mr. Dodd, for he marked out his own career in youth and has steadily followed it up to the present, his prosperity being attributable to his earnest and persistent endeavor, as well as to the fact that he always, consistently, tried to do as he would be done by. He is the owner of a well-improved farm of eighty acres, and the admirable manner in which every nook and corner of it is kept, and the fine state of cultivation, in which it now is, has been brought about by the individual efforts of Mr. Dodd, and the result has been as satisfactory as though his farm was a much larger one. He was born in Virginia, and his early home was at the foot of the Blue Ridge mountains, in Amburse County. The family lived there prior to the Civil War, and Mr. Dodd's memory of slavery days is quite good, although he was but a lad at that time. He well remembers that his father was overseer of a neighboring plantation, a position he held for four years, but the blacks on that particular plantation were humanely treated, and but ,little trouble ever occurred while Mr. Dodd had charge of it. In 1836, when Richard H. was about eight years old, he was taken by his parents to Botetourt County, on the James River, from which place they moved to West Virginia about two years later, settling on the Kanawa River, not far from the Ohio. Here the family followed the occupation of farming, and remained four years. From there they came to Hamilton County, Indiana, but six years later Richard H. removed to LaPorte and from there to Porter County, to the farm on which he is now living. While in Hamilton County the father and mother both died, the former at the age of fifty-four, and the latter at the age of seventy-three. The only grandparent of whom our subject has any recollection is his paternal grandmother, with whom the family lived, for several years, while in Virginia. In the Dodd family there were six sons and six daughters: Mary Jane, who married Joshua Cummins, had two children; Eliza, who married William Farley, has six children; Powhattan married Miranda Fouch, and became the father of four children: Richard H.; John married Phoebe Bolt, resides in Iowa, the father of six children; Addison married M. J. Heddy and has eight children; William married M. J. Shields, and had one child, who is dead; Sarah E. married Thomas Dawson, and has four children; Emily J. married Thomas Dawson, became the mother of two children, and is now deceased; Marinda married Henry Burroughs, became the mother of one child, and is now dead; Aurelia married Amisa Hess, lives in Nebraska, and has six children; and Joseph who married and became the father of two children; Richard H. Dodd was married March, 21, 1850, to Miss Anna Bales, daughter of Nathan and Jemimah (Hyatt) Bales, in whose family there were seven children: Martha, Anna, Nathan W., Asa H., Asenath, Jane and Thomas C. One son and one daughter died when comparatively young. Both Mr. and Mrs. Bales died in Kansas, the former in 1888, at the age of eighty-eight years, and the latter in 1883, at the age of eighty years. They were members of the Quaker Church, and came, originally, from the Old North State. To Mr. Dodd and his wife eight children have been given: William, born December 30, 1850, and died when about twenty years old; Nathan, born August 28,1852, married Elizabeth Burgess, by whom he has four children: Elsie, Charence, Leslie and Blanche, and is engaged in farming near the old home; Alfred, born September 4,1854, was married to Mary Kelso, by whom he has two children: Mabel and Ina, and is a farmer of South Dakota; Asa, who married Catherine Lowry and located as a merchant in Ethan, South Dakota. Six years ago that section was swept by a blizzard, and Mrs. Dodd was so severely frozen that it became necessary to amputate her feet; Lincoln married Eliza Jardine, who died, leaving him with one child: Ethel; Walter is married to Callie Daggy; Lora is living and remains at home, and Eddie, who died in infancy. Mr. and Mrs. Dodd have lived on their present farm since 1859, and have a very pleasant, commodious and comfortable farm residence, which was erected in 1862, and which is surrounded by an excellent orchard. Mr. Dodd is quite a thinker on matters of general interest, is a patron of all enterprises that commend themselves to his excellent judgment, and is a stanch supporter of the Republican party. He had four brothers, and his wife had three brothers, in the Union Army during the Civil War.
Source: Goodspeed Brothers. 1894. Pictorial and Biographical Record of La Porte, Porter, Lake and Starke Counties, Indiana. Chicago, Illinois: Goodspeed Brothers. 569 p.
Page(s) in Source: 230-232
This biography has been transcribed exactly as it was originally published in the source. Please note that we do not provide photocopies or digital scans of biographies appearing on this website.
Biography transcribed by Steven R. Shook