30, 1830, and descends from a Puritan family of ante-evolutionary distinction in New England, a brief allusion to which family is given below, as written for the Jefferson County Journal of May 30, 1899, on the mournful occasion of the death of Marilla Sawyer, a sister of Mrs. John Bicknell;

Death and funeral of Marilla Sawyer.—This venerable and highly esteemed maiden Lady died at her home here last Friday at the age of nearly eighty-three years. Deceased was the twin daughter of one of our very earliest settlers.  Joseph Sawyer and granddaughter of James Sawyer, of Keene, N. H., a Revolutionary hero. Her mother’s maiden name was Polly Harper, daughter of John Harper, a lieutenant in the Revolutionary war, who was buried in Watertown, Jefferson county, N. Y. Deceased was brought to Watertown, N. Y., when but a maiden of six years of age and came to Mannsville with the family a few years later, where she has since lived.

There were ten children in the family of Joseph Sawyer—five sons and five daughters. Two of the sons early settled on the Western Reserve of Ohio, twenty miles from the city of Cleveland, and became quite wealthy, and three of the family are still living. Joseph Sawyer, maternal grandfather of subject, was a hero of the war of 1812, and was present at the battle of Sackett’s Harbor.

Wilbur J. Bicknell has always been hard working man, and when his father started for the front during the Civil War, the responsibility of caring for the mother and the younger children was placed on his young shoulders. He is almost entirely self-educated, and had to undergo many hardship in getting a start in life. He remained with his parents until he had reached his majority, filial performing his duty on the wild farm, and carrying what little groceries they used on his back from Cedar Spring. Deer and bear were numerous in the farm, as many as nine deer appearing at one time, and the streams abounded with fish. He was a genuine pioneer, and since his boyhood years has been a resident of Michigan, with the exception of a few months passed in Nebraska.

September 11, 1873, Mr. Bicknell married Miss Jennie Karr, a native of Wolcott township, Wayne county, N. Y., and a daughter of John and Polly (Brooks) Karr, who were the parents of four sons and one daughter, of which children three are still living, viz: Jennie (Mrs. Bicknell); Alfred, a general merchant at Williamston, Ingham county, and Frank, a farmer of Pierson, Montcalm county, Mich.

John Karr, father of Mrs. Bicknell, was a native of New York, was a carpenter and joiner by trade and a farmer by calling, and died in Montcalm county, Mich., in 1871, in the faith of the Methodist Episcopal church; his widow, also a native of New York, died in 1873, in the same faith, at the age of forty-six years.

Mr. Bicknell, ever ready to work at anything that would yield him an honest dollar, was employed, all told, about seventeen years

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at saw-milling in Grand Rapids, Big Rapids, Hersey, Evart, and in Montcalm county. When he and his bride commenced life together he did not own a $10. bill, and he kept on working in the saw-mills about eight years after marriage. In 1880 he purchased forty acres of unimproved land in section No. 5, Spencer township, going into debt $300. He and wife settled on the place May 1, 1881, and their first home was a little frame shanty, which served them as a residence, until the spring of 1898. At the start they had one ox, one cow, a stone-boat and very little furniture. Now the farm is in a high state of cultivation, He has a valuable orchard, consisting of apples, many varieties of peaches and plums, together with quinces, grapes, raspberries and strawberries.

In the spring of 1897 Mr. and Mrs. Bicknell decided to erect a substantial and comfortable residence, and they now have a beautiful farm cottage, modern in style, finished in red, black and white oak, and containing ten rooms, closets, cupboards, a cellar perfect in its sanitary construction, and everything else designed as it should be, and all the result of Mrs. Bicknell’s studious planning, her ideas being carried out in detail by Mr. Bicknell. Although they came here in 1881 poor and in debt, they today do not owe a dollar, and have as handsome a place as there is in the township.

Mr. and Mrs. Bicknell have no children of their own, but in the kindness of their hearts took to their home Mertie Parker, when she was but three years of age, and have reared her to womanhood and educated her and cared for her as if she had been their own. She is now married to Henry Hatch, and is the mother of three children, one of whom, Fernie, Mr. and Mrs. Bicknell have also adopted as their own.

Mr. Bicknell cast his first presidential vote for Ulysses S. Grant, but he now affiliates with the democrats, and has been delegate to the county conventions of this party. Officially he is a justice of the peace, has held this position eleven years, and that he has performed his duty well as a justice is evidenced by his long tenure of office. He is a member of Harvard tent, No. 890, K. O. T. M., and Mrs. Bicknell is a member of Trufant hive, No. 756, L. O. T. M. They are devout members of the Methodist Episcopal church at Marbles, Montcalm county, and their home is located three quarters of a mile south of the county line union Sunday-school, of which Mr. Bicknell is the superintendent and his wife a teacher. Mr. Bicknell has been interested in Sunday-school work for nine years, either as teacher or superintendent, and both he and Mrs. Bicknell have been very liberal in their contributions to both the school and the church. They are classed among the kindest-hearted and most progressive residents of Spencer township, and certainly none are more deserving of the high respect in which they are universally held.

Transcriber: Barb Jones
Created: 24 April 2007
URL: http://kent.migenweb.net/bowen/ac/bicknellWilbur.html