Person:Martha Uncles (2)

Obituary

Columbus Dispatch, 9 July 1912, p. 1:

"Death Takes One of City's Oldest Native Residents: Mrs. Martha Merion, Mother of Robert E. Sheldon, Passes Away at Age of 88. Ill Since Christmas. Was Born in Columbus in 1824 When City Was But a Hamlet of Four Hundred"

Mrs. Martha Merion, one of the oldest native residents, if not the oldest, who has seen Columbus grow from a hamlet of four hundred to a city of 200,000 and more, died at the age of 88 years, at the home of her daughter, Mrs. John S. Roberts, 137 West Goodale street, early Tuesday morning. Mrs. Merion had been ill since Christmas, but to the last retained those faculties that endeared her to three generations of friends.

Mrs. Merion was also the mother of Robert E. Sheldon, president of the Sheldon Dry Goods company, and of J. Edwin Merion, auditor of the Vandalia system, at Indianapolis. Eight grandchildren and ten great grand children also survive. The former ar Mrs. S. P. Bush, Butler Sheldon, Miss Harriet Sheldon, Mrs. Carl J. Hoster, Robert E. Sheldon, Jr., Thomas H. Sheldon, Sheldon Roberts, and Miss Helen E. Roberts. The great grandchildren are Prescott S. Bush, Mary E. Bush, Margaret D. Bush, James S. Bush, Ralph Sheldon, Butler Sheldon, Jr., Katherine S. Hoster, George S. Hoster, Margaret Ruth Sheldon, and Robert E. Sheldon III.

Funeral services will be held at the residence of Mrs. John S. Roberts, on Thursday afternoon at 2 o'clock, conducted by Rev. H. W. Kellogg, pater of the Broad Street Methodist church, of which Mrs. Merion has been a member for 68 years.

Born Here in 1824: Mrs Merion had lived in Columbus since her birth in 1824, with the exception of a few years when she lived in Tiffin. She was born in a house standing on the present site of the public school library, which property her father, James Uncles, later gave to the nucleus of the Broad Street M. E. Church, of which he was one of the founders.

She attended the little log schoolhouse, then the only one in Columbus, at the corner of Rich and Third streets, and her teacher was Miss Livingston, later Mrs. David Taylor and the mother of E. L. and Henry Taylor, and the grandmother of Congressman E. L. Taylor, Jr.

Remembers Canal Opening: Mrs. Merion remembered well the opening of the canal and the great celebration that attended it; how the gaily painted boats came in the great gathering at Merioni's Landing, in front of the home of her husband's parents on South High street, adjoining the present Hertenstein stove works. It was the first brick house built in Columbus and shows the handwork of some of the pioneers of the city.

Mr. Loughery, the father of the late Mrs. Awl, had the brick contract; Mrs. David Deshler, father of W. G. Deshler, put in the inside wood work and built the stair case; the Rev. George Jeffries, the first pastor of the first Baptist church in Columbus, had the painting and glazing-- for in those days ministers had to piece out their living by handicraft or farming -- and Mrs. Merion's father, David Uncles did the plastering.

Moved to Large Farm: After her marriage to Mr. Merion, her second husband, she moved to the Merion farm, located between High Street and Parsons avenue, a tract of 1700 acres and densely wooded.

For the past few years she has been making her home with her daughter Mrs. Roberts, the idol of her children, and of every one of her numerous grand children and great grand children, who found no better entertainment anywhere than sitting at her feet and listening to her graphic recitals of pioneer life in Columbus, of which she, herself, was the most authoritative exemplar.

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2} Ohio. Department of Health. Office of Vital Statistics. Certificates of death, 1908–present. (Salt Lake City: Filmed by the Genealogical Society of Utah, 1983–2005)
   cert. 37608 (1912).
2. ↑ ^2.0 2.1 Thomas Stephen Neel's research into the Bush and Pierce trees.

   http://www.thomasstephenneel.com/sheldonthomas.html