Notes
Note N1115
Index
Served as a private from Bucks County, Penn Militia
Notes
Note N1116
Index
Cabinet Maker
Notes
Note N1117
Index
Occupation: Farmer
Notes
Note N1118
Index
According to Middleton, Michael B Hartzell went to Rock Island IL in the spring of 1835 with his new wife, Nancy, his sisters Catherine and her husband Loudon Case and Clara and her husband Abraham Frick. There were other members of the extended family and friends. They went by canal boat to Pittsburg. Here they loaded their goods on a steamboat going down the Ohio River and then up the Mississippi River to the Rock River side of the river. Here on the 4th of June 1835 the tired but exuberant group ended their trip. Michael Hartzell purchased a tract of land for his father Adam. Michael made the trip back to Mt. Pleasant the following year. His father and mother, Adam and Catherine accompanied him back to Moline. His brother John B Hartzell also came with him to Moline.
Michael was a cabinet maker in Pennsylvania before heading out west and eventually owning a cabinet making shop.
Find-a-Grave Entry
Birth: Aug. 21, 1810
Death: Aug. 20, 1899
Michael Hartzell, a prominent citizen of Moline, was born in Westmoreland Co., Pa., Aug. 21, 1810, his parents being Adam and Catharine (Bash) Hartzell. He was brought up on a farm and at mechanical work ; came to Illinois in 1835, landing at Rock Island April 30. The place was not yet named, there being only five or six cabins on the bottom land. He erected a hewed-log house, two stories high-the first two-story structure in the place. In the spring of 1836 he returned to the East, where he was married May 5, that year, to Miss Nancy W., daughter of John and Margaret (Worman) Stopher, who was a native of Westmoreland Co., Pa. He soon afterward returned to Illinois, and for the first five years resided in Rock Island ; then moved upon a claim in Iowa, where he passed four years; then was one year in this county on a farm, and came in the spring of 1843 to Moline. That village was laid out the year following.
Mr. and Mrs. Hartzell became the parents of 13 children, namely: Margaret S., who was born in Rock Island, then called "Stephenson," May 22, 1837 ; Tohn W., who is married and lives in Wichita, Kan.; Rev. Joseph C, who married Jennie Culver, and is now residing in Cincinnati, Ohio; Mary, now Mrs. John Rapp; Asenath, now the wife of William W. Wallace, and residing at Little Rock, Ark. ; Eva, the wife of T. J. Hayes, of Louisville, Kan.; Alice, now Mrs. L. L. McCoy, of Moline; Lizzie P., who became the wife of T. A. Wallace, of Davenport, and died June 28, 1881; Lillie I., her twin sister; Esther, the wife of John F. Jaques, and resides at Clinton, Iowa; and Frank H., who married Jennie Cooper, and resides at Wichita, Kan.
Mr. Hartzell was formerly in the undertaker's business, being the first in that line in Rock Island. In his political views he is a Republican, with Prohibition sympathies. He united with the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1S32, and his wife united with that denomination a short time previously.
Rev. Joseph C. Hartzell, D. D., attended the Northwestern University at Evanston, Ill., and graduated in 1860, at the Garrett Biblical Institute there. Thence he visited Bloomington, Ill, and graduated at the Illinois Wesleyan University there, spending seven years in those two institutions of learning; then joined the Central Illinois Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church. His first appointment was at Pekin, Ill., but was thence transferred to New Orleans, to take charge of Ames Chapel, when its pastor, Rev. J. P. Newman, was appointed Chaplain under Gen. Grant. During six years he edited the Southwestern Christian Advocate, after which the paper was turned over to the Methodist Book Concern, and Mr. Hartzell was appointed Presiding Elder for that district, which position he held until elected Assistant Secretary of the Freedmen's Aid Society, with headquarters at Cincinnati, where he still remains, an able, eloquent and energetic worker
in the cause.
Mr. J. Wesley Hartzell was born Oct. 6, 1839, in Iowa, but was brought up, attended school and graduated at Moline, Ill. He was engaged in farming, teaching school and in the livery business until 1877, when he emigrated to Kansas, settling at Topeka, where he remained until 1883, during which time he became proprietor of the Tefft House in that city, which was the political headquarters of the State. Selling out to the veteran landlord of Davenport Iowa-Mr. Burtis -Mr. Hartzell then became owner and manager of the Topeka Freight, Omnibus and Baggage Lines, working 40 horses, having charge of the consignment of all freight of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad at that point, and sale of the dead freight of that railroad between Colorado, New Mexico and the Missouri River. He then organized
a company, and projected and built the street horse railroad in Topeka, his associates in that enterprise being S. W. Wheelock, of Moline, Ill. ; W. B. Strong, President; George 0. Manchester, Assistant General Manager; and E. Wilder, Treasurer of the Santa Fe Railroad. In 1882 Mr. Hartzell obtained the franchise, organized a company and built the water works in Topeka, meantime laying off and establishing a beautiful park (bearing his name) in that city.
Within the space of 18 months he obtained franchises, organized companies, built and had in successful operation roads in Wichita, Emporia, Kan., and Carthage, Mo. He is now President of Wichita, McPherson & Denver Railroad, for which road bonds to the amount of $4,000 per mile is voted for 100 miles, from Wichita to Elmore. Just at present Mr. Hartzell is in Moline, Ill., energetically engaged in organizing a new street railroad to and between Moline and Rock Island, with excellent chances of success.
H. Frank Hartzell is a graduate of the Moline High School, learned the telegraph business, but when 16 years old migrated to Topeka, Kan., and clerked in the Tefft House until his brother sold out the hotel, whereupon he became Secretary of the Topeka Freight and Omnibus Lines, then Secretary of the Wichita Horse Railroad Co. until 1883, when he obtained the mail contract for delivery of mail in Topeka, which position he held until March 1, 1884, when he returned to Wichita and organized the Kansas Furniture Company, of which he is now Secretary. The firm are wholesale and retail dealers in furniture, and are doing a prosperous business.--FindAGrave
"Michael Hartzell was 25 years old at that time. He build a plastered cabin for the family on what is now Coaltown Road. It was located a block or two east of what is now the south end of 27th St. Above the site of that original Hartzell home is beautiful Rock River View Cemetery, once the Hartzell family grave yard. (An account of that cemetery appeared in a recent Off the Beaten Path article.)
In 1836, a year after having located in Rock River Valley south of Moline, Michael Hartzell went back to Pennsylvania and on May 5, 1836, married his boyhood sweetheart, Nancy Worman Stoffer (later spelled Stauffer), and brought her back to Rock River Valley. They were accompanied by a number of other families, neighbors and relatives, including the Fricks.
Mr. and Mrs. Michael Hartzell lived in the home which Michael had built a year earlier. It was the first plastered house in Rock Island County and was located on an old Indian trail.
First White Girl Born Here. In that home, on May 22, 1837, the first child, a daughter, was born to Michael and Nancy Hartzell. That daughter, Margaret Stauffer Hartzell, was the first white girl born in Rock Island County. (Clyde Hartzell Burgston of Moline, the well known research metallurgist of the Deere & Co. department of materials and methods research laboratory) is a grandson of that first white girl born in this county. Another is Glenn Burgston of Rock Island, Clyde's brother. Their mother, Adda Jackson (Mrs Fred) Burgston, prominent in the First Methodist Church and various women's organizations, was a daughter of Margaret Hartzell. She died in 1943 at the age of 82, and like her mother, is buried in the Hartzell lot in Rock River View Cemetery. Her mother died in 1916.
Michael Hartzell and his family, in 1838, moved to Davenport, where Mr. Hartzell engaged in the building business. In 1840, after the death of his father, Adam Hartzell, Michael returned to Rock River Valley.
(Note: Adam Hartzell was the first person buried in the Hartzell grave yard -- a picture of his grave stone appeared with the Rock River View Cemetery article last week. Adam Hartzell's widow, who died March 8, 1851, is also buried in that cemetery, as are many of the descendants of this pioneer family.)
Michael Hartzell bought out the land interests of his brothers and sisters. Shortly after that, he replaced the original Hartzell cabin with a substantial 2-story house. This, it is said, was the first two-story house built in Rock Island County.
By 1860, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report for that year, Michael Hartzell owned 4,900 acres of land on South Moline township. The original Hartzell farm, purchased in 1835 from the government at $1.25 an acre is reported to have consisted of 120 acres.
Some Now in Moline. BPart of the present city of Moline, especially Villa Park addition which is on both sides of 27th St. and south of 24th Ave., was 100 years ago part of the Hartzell land.
Michael Hartzell organized nad superintended the first Methodist Sunday School in Rock Island county. In addition to managing a large farm, he operated a cabinet making establishment and sevearal lovely pieces of mahogany furniture, made in his shop, are now treasured by his descendants.
During the Civil war, Mr. and Mrs. Michael Hartzell frequently entertained wounded Civil War soldiers in their home. Three of the Hartzell daughters met their future husbands that way.
Mr. Hartzell became a leader in the community as well as in the church. He died on Aug. 20, 1899, a day before his 89th birthday anniversary. Mrs. Hartzell died Oct. 13, 1909, at the age of 93. Both are buried in Rock River View Cemetery.
Some of the Michael Hartzell sons and daughters remained in this vicinity and many of their descendants are to be found here. Some moved and their descendants are located in various parts of America. A number attained considerable distrinction.
The second child of the Michael Hartzells, John Wesley Hartzell, built the first waterworks and the first street railway in Topeka, Kas."--2 Jun 1952, The (Moline, Ill) Dispatch. Part of a longer article titled "Off the Beaten Path).