The Shearers: Calvin Howard, Howard Calvin, and Calvin Something-or-Other

Once the Ainsworth columns ended, sometimes even being born couldn't get an Ainsworth person into the newspapers. When Calvin Howard Shearer came into the world on August 31, 1914, nobody bothered to mention it. He was the son of Howard Calvin Shearer, who was the son of Calvin C. — what was his middle name, I wonder? It wasn't Howard, anyway. Maybe it was Calvin.*

And it's not as if the Shearers were unknown, either. Since the early 1860s Calvin C.'s parents, Jerome (or Jeronomy) and Margaret, had been farming near Hobart, and they were still Hobart residents when Jerome died in 1912. Calvin C. had lived in Hobart for some time, working as a butcher. Soon after the turn of the century he and his wife Huldah moved with their three children (Maude, Howard and Bliss) down to the Ainsworth area of Ross Township and went into farming, on rented land at first, then on 80 acres bought in 1906 from the A.C. Thompson farm (which bordered on the northwest intersection of present-day Route 30 and State Road 51). Even after that purchase, he rented additional land to farm.

After moving to Ross Township, Calvin C. was elected to the township's Advisory Board, and in November 1908 he was elected township trustee. In August 1910 he was appointed gravel road inspector, to fill the office left vacant by the death of Morgan Blachly. A working relationship and friendship with Hobart Township Trustee Lewis E. Barnes developed, around 1912, into a business venture as the two partnered up in teaming and contracting work. In the summer of 1914, for example, the Barnes & Shearer firm landed a contract for road work on the Hobart-Ainsworth road (now S.R. 51) where it crosses the Deep River. In December 1914, as Calvin C.'s term as trustee drew toward its close, he announced that he would move his family back to Hobart and take a more active role in the operation of Barnes & Shearer.

… And the foregoing recitation of dry facts has no purpose but to help you, dear Reader, share in my puzzlement that Calvin Howard's birth went unreported.

The marriage that produced him had not gone unreported — it had rated a long paragraph in the Ross Township column of the News (long, that is, as such things are measured in social columns). On February 12, 1913, Howard Calvin Shearer married Elsie Wojahn, the youngest daughter of Julius and Alvina Wojahn, who also farmed near Ainsworth. The quiet ceremony in Crown Point was followed by a dinner for both families at the bride's home. A couple days later the newlyweds left for a two-week honeymoon, which consisted of visits to relatives in Chicago, Illinois and in Ridgeland, Mississippi, where Howard's Uncle Walter lived. They returned on March 1 to take up residence on the Shearer farm. And a year-and-a-half later, they were the parents of a very cute baby:


(Click on image to enlarge)
Calvin Howard Shearer as a baby, circa 1915. Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

Little Calvin H. would grow up to be a significant person in Ainsworth, as a resident and businessman. For now, however, he is just a baby.

♦    ♦    ♦
Howard and Elsie's marriage was long and (I hope) happy. The Hobart Historical Society Museum has a photo of them celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary in 1963:



As I mentioned earlier, the Ainsworth picture file at the Hobart Historical Society Museum contains some postcard correspondence between Elsie and Howard before they were married:














(Click on images to enlarge)
The last postcard was not postmarked, so I don't really know where it fits in.
All images courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

______________________________
*Joke.


Sources:
♦ 1870 Census.
♦ 1891 Plat Book.
♦ 1900 Census.
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ "Additional Local News." Hobart Gazette 7 Aug. 1914.
♦ "Ainsworth Pick-Ups." Hobart Gazette 26 Aug. 1910.
♦ "Ainsworth." Hobart News 21 Sept. 1911.
♦ "Farmers Make Changes." Hobart Gazette 12 Dec. 1902.
♦ "General News Items." Hobart Gazette 28 Sept. 1906
♦ "Jerome Shearer Passes Away." Hobart Gazette 12 Jan. 1912.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 18 Dec. 1908; 24 Mar. 1911; 23 June 1911; 18 Dec. 1914.
♦ "Political Notes." Hobart Gazette 6 Nov. 1908.
♦ "Ross Township." Hobart News 20 Feb. 1913.
♦ Social Security Death Index.
♦ "Two Pioneers Pass Away." Hobart News 11 Jan. 1912.