years old. Mr. and Mrs. McKee have three children: Burton, Abbie and Lawrence. Mr. McKee is a Democrat. He has held the offices of township treasurer and land appraiser.

Christopher McKee, one of the leading farmers and most prominent citizens of the county, was born in Noble Township in 1840. He spent his boyhood on the farm, receiving a common-school education. In 1862 he went to Oregon in a party of twelve men, among whom was his brother David. This journey occupied about three months, Mr. McKee driving an ox-team. On the Pacific coast he engaged in mining for a time, and afterward went to Idaho. He remained at Centerville in that territory until June, 1863, engaged in packing supplies to the miners. He next went to the southern part of the territory, where David and he located a mine, which they worked until the fall of 1865. The mine proved a good one and yielded many thousand dollars' worth of ore, but owing to the cost of living and of working it, they could save but a small part of their earnings. During one winter the snow was so deep that it was piled up six feet higher than their cabin. The brothers left for home in September, 1865, on horseback and reached here in November. On the way they were caught in a Rocky Mountain snow storm, and rode all day through the blinding snow, arriving at night at Fort Halleck. To feed their horses they paid seventy-five cents per pound for corn and twenty-five cents

per pound for hay. At the sutler's Mr. McKee bought a pound of crackers, a box of sardines, and a small bottle of bitters, for which he paid $15. In December, 1865, he married Miss Martha A. Scott. They have had four children-Louis W. (deceased), Irvel K., Cora B. and Mirley. Mr. McKee has followed farming, and has also been engaged in various other enterprises. He has furnished the C. & M. Railroad Company with over five million feet of lumber, and is still engaged in supplying timber to that road, and the B., Z. & C. In 1877 he again went west to the Black Hills; but after an examination of that region, concluded to settle down to farm life. Mr. McKee is a public-spirited citizen, an enterprising, sagacious and successful man of business, and his worth is appreciated in the community.

JOHN NOBLE, SR., was a native of Lancaster County, Pa., and his father served through the Revolutionary War as a soldier from that State. The family were among the early immigrants to Ohio, and located in Washington County, where they remained several years. In 1811 Mr. Noble came to what is now Noble Township, Noble County, and selected land in the valley of the West Fork of Duck Creek. He began an improvement, erected a camp on the bottom, in which he and his sons, Samuel and James, passed the winter, their sister Polly keeping house for them. In 1812 the whole family moved to their new home and took up their abode in a cabin made from