Alva Archibald Brown, or 'Uncle Alva,' as we had all learned to call him, died at his home in Milton on Wednesday evening, March 16th, after a long and painful illness, in the 81st year of his age. He was the third son and third child, in a family of six sons and three daughters, of Fitch Brown and Ruth Babcock Brown, most of whom were born in the town of Scott, Cortland county, N. Y. All of these have now passed away, except the widow of the late George Huffman, who is a helpless invalid at Gentry, Arkansas, where she suffered, a year or two ago, a severe stroke of paralysis.
Mr. Brown the senior brought his family to Wisconsin, from Indiana in 1844, and soon settled upon a farm in the town of Lima, which since the death of the father, 'Uncle Alva' has owned until his death. Soon after the settlement upon this farm, the three older sons, of whom Alva was the youngest, went into what was then Marquette county, and bought land in the town of Berlin. The meeting house of the Seventh-day Baptist people in that township stands upon the corner of an 80-acre lot owned by Alva Brown, he having donated the site for that purpose.
He did not remain long in that place, but returned to Milton and purchased a farm in the town of Lima adjoining that of his father. Upon this farm the greater part of his life was spent. The later years of his life he has lived in the village of Milton on West High street, where he died as already mentioned.
Mr. Brown was too well known in Milton to need extended mention. To the casual observer, he seemed rough and sometimes heartless; to those who knew him better, he was kind and tender hearted. He despised shams and mere pretenses. He would not assume to be better than he was, and his brusque way of expressing his contempt for what he believed in others a false show, often made him appear worse than he was. An old neighbor expressed it well when he said, 'Outside he was rough, but inside he was tender.' The writer of this sketch has known him for more than fifty years and he has found this true.
His son, Elmer Brown, who has for several years lived in North Dakota, was with him for a week or two during the latter part of his final sickness, and came back for the funeral. His home has been kept for several years past, by the widow of an older brother. Too much can hardly be said in praise of the way in which she and her sons have cared for 'Uncle Alva' in his long and painful illness.
The funeral was held on Saturday afternoon, at 2 o'clock, at the late residence on High Street, and the large numbers of old neighbors and acquaintances who thronged the house bore testimony to the esteem in which he was held by those who knew him. The services were conducted by Dr. Platts, assisted by Rev. T. W. North, and a quartet of young men sang some beautiful and appropriate selections, and elderly men, old acquaintances, bore the weary body to its final resting place in the beautiful Milton cemetery.
