The Death of "Bone"

This obituary from the Lake County Star of 12 Dec. 1920* doesn't explain how Daniel got the nickname, "Bone," but I suspect it came from his middle name, Beauman.

The Rev. T.H. Ball, in his Encyclopedia of Genealogy and Biography of Lake County, Indiana (1904), had this to say:

Daniel Beauman Sturtevant, of section 28, Ross township, has lived in this vicinity all his life, and from his boyhood days of sixty years ago to the present almost the entire development of Lake county has taken place, so that few men are better informed by actual personal experience of the material history of this portion of the county. He has lived continuously on one farm for over fifty-five years, and all the associations and interests of his life are bound up with it, and there it is his good pleasure to pass the remaining days of his busy and prosperous career and await the summons from an activity that has borne much fruit and been worthy and beneficial to the community in general.

Mr. Sturtevant was born in Porter county, Indiana, just three miles east of the farm where he has lived so long, on April 27, 1840. His father, John Sturtevant, was born in the town of Barton, Vermont, in 1806, and was reared, educated and married there. He came to LaPorte county, Indiana, in 1833, being one of the first carpenters to follow his craft in that now populous county. In 1836 he moved to Porter county, locating on the farm where he remained until 1848, when he settled on the old farm in Lake county now owned by his son, and where he died on January 1, 1858. He belongs to the list of early settlers of the county, and was also successful in his general career. He married Miss Louise Cass, who was a native of New Hampshire and a cousin of Dr. Lewis Cass, who was one of the pioneers and foremost men of Lake county. She died at the age of thirty-eight years, having been the mother of three sons and three daughters.

Mr. D.B. Sturtevant, who was the second child and eldest son, was eight years old when he went with his parents to Lake county, so that most of his boyhood was spent on the farm which as a man he has tilled and made the source of his livelihood. He is now the owner of about five hundred acres, some of it in Porter county, and on this he is still actively engaged in general farming and stock-raising. He has about a hundred and fifty head of cattle and a good lot of hogs. His farm is one of the model places of the township, and he has made it so mainly by his own labors and most efficient management. Mr. Sturtevant was a raiser of the registered Herefords for a number of years, but has now retired from that business. He has given his best years and efforts to this life work, but has also taken an intelligent interest in the world about him, co-operating in community affairs and regularly casting his ballot at national elections for Democratic principles.

Mr. Sturtevant was married in 1866 to Miss Eugenie Wood, who was born in Iowa, but came to Lake county in girlhood. They are the parents of four children, John, Judson, Flora and Carrie. John was a student of Valparaiso College. Mrs. Sturtevant was born in Keosauqua, Iowa, October 31, 1844, a daughter of John and Caroline (Brown) Wood. Her father was a native of Vermont and her mother of Virginia. Her great-grandfather, David Wood, was a hero in the Revolutionary war, and the gun he carried in the war is yet in the family as a souvenir.

Mrs. Sturtevant was reared and educated in Ohio, She came from a family of teachers. Mrs. Sturtevant is a member of the Christian church of Deep River, Indiana.

This is how the Sturtevant land appeared on the 1908 Plat Map:**


(Click on image to enlarge)

By the time of the 1926 Plat Book, Charles Gernenz held the 120 acres in Section 20; D.B.'s son John owned the 240 acres in Section 28 (ownership of the 26.6 acres south of E. 89th is not clear); and D.B.'s daughter, Flora Maxwell, owned the 80 acres in Section 21.

Flora's husband was (if I've found the right people in the 1920 Census) Douglas Maxwell, and they lived in Porter County.

John Sturtevant was unmarried.

D.B.'s daughter Carrie married John Prescott. The 1920 Census, in March, shows the Prescotts in Ross Township, with D.B. and Eugenie in their household — which, being on rented land in southeast Ross Township, may be on the Sturtevant land, but I do not know if that could be the "near Ainsworth" mentioned in the obituary above.

I would like to know the story behind D.B.'s death. According to his death certificate, he fell from a third-story window. The accident may have happened at the Allenel Sanitarium, where he was undergoing treatment for some unknown condition.

Now he rests peacefully in Mosier Cemetery, beneath a lovely stone.

____________________
*See also "Funeral of Daniel B. Sturdevant Held Tuesday Afternoon," Hobart News 9 Dec. 1920.
**For Jerome Chester fans, I should mention that the 1900 Census shows him boarding with the Sturtevants.