David B. Peck, BiographyPorter County biographical sketches . . . .
Transcribed biography of David B. Peck
DAVID B. PECK, residing on a farm near Valparaiso, Indiana, is well known in this vicinity, he having lived here since he was a boy, and having served officially in the capacity of justice of the peace for nineteen successive years. A man of local prominence and a representative of a well-known and highly respected family, some personal mention of Mr. Peck is of more than passing interest for his life history is a part of the history of the community.
David B. Peck was born in Erie, Pennsylvania, in 1840, son of Orrin and Almira (Bartram) Peck, the former a native of New York and the latter of Connecticut. In the Peck family were nine children, namely: Alecta, John, Zolman, David B., Etsel, Claretta, Carolina, Ruthven and Bratan, who, on the Indiana frontier developed strong characters and became honorable members of society. It was in 1853 that the Peck family was transplanted from a Pennsylvania home to the one in Porter county, and here in a cabin on his father's farm, a 240-acre tract of land, David B. Peck passed his boyhood. He reached his majority about the time the Civil war cloud gathered, and he showed his loyalty by tendering his services to the Union cause. He enlisted at Valparaiso, and at La Porte was mustered in as a member of Company B, One Hundred and Fifty-first Regiment, with which he went to Nashville, Tennessee, in aid of General Thomas against General Hood. In the fall of 1865, the war being practically over, he was honorably discharged and returned home.
The year following his return from the army Mr. Peck took to himself a wife and settled down to housekeeping on a rented farm in Union township. After cultivating rented land for six years he purchased forty acres in Union township, to which he subsequently added two more forties, making one hundred and twenty acres, in section 27, and here he has lived and labored, keeping pace with the times, until now in his old age he is enjoying the fruits of his early years of toil he built the residence he occupies, the barn and other farm buildings; and the fine shade trees on his lawn, as well as his orchard, are of his own planting.
In 1866, David B. Peck and Miss Nancy T. Campbell were united in marriage, and the fruits of their union are three sons: Almeron, a farmer of Porter county, who married Chloe Hoosline, and has two children, Marvin and Laura; Orrin, also a farmer of Porter county, married Naney McConkey and has one son, Myron; Vance, who married Lulu Schrader, has four children, Harold, Myrtle, Milford and Mabel. Vance and his family are residents of Hobart, where he is employed in drilling wells and erecting wind mills. Mr. and Mrs. Peck reared in addition to their own children a motherless little girl, Henrietta Shearer, whom they took into their home when she was only a year old. She was educated at Valparaiso, where she prepared herself for a teacher, and for several years she taught school. She married Albert Strader, whose death left her a widow, and she afterward became the wife of Archie Riley. She has two children, Harry and Martha, by her first husband, and one, Donald Edwin, by her present husband.
Mrs. David B. Peck is a native of Porter county. She was born in 1844, daughter of Samuel and Elizabeth (Frame) Campbell, the former a native of Tennessee and the latter of Kentucky. Samuel Campbell migrated to Indiana in 1836 and pre-empted one hundred and sixty acres of land in Porter county, on which he settled down to farming, and here in time he became the owner of three hundred and twenty acres. His family comprised the following named children: Newton, William, John, Jane, Elizabeth Amanda, Marcus B. and Nancy E. Mr. and Mrs. Peck are members of the Christian church at Deep River. Politically he started out as a Lincoln Republican. Later in life he became an Independent, and now for a number of years he has given his support to the Prohibition party. For nineteen successive years he filled the office of justice of the peace.
Source: Lewis Publishing Company. 1912. History of Porter County, Indiana: A Narrative Account of its Historical Progress, its People and its Principal Interests. Chicago, Illinois: Lewis Publishing Company. 881 p.
Page(s) in Source: 751-752
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