PAUL RAY SIMMONS. Indiana has been fertile soil for the development of inventive genius. Names of men of the first magnitude in accomplishments in mechanical technology would make a long and impressive list. They have contributed enormously to the development of American technological processes, to broaden production of useful articles and to methods and anpliances for lightening the labor of mankind.

One of these is a resident of Marion, Mr. Paul Ray Simmons, who has probably done more than any other man to develop automatic machinery for the manufacture of paper specialties. Mr. Simmons was born in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, December 12, 1885, his birthplace being a log cabin on his grandfather's farm in the Lehigh Valley. His grandfather was William Simmons, a Pennsylvania coal mine superintendent and engineer, who was killed by the striking miners during the famous Molly McGuire riots in the Pennsylvania coal fields. He was buried at Hazelton, Pennsylvania.

Mr. Paul R. Simmons is a son of Eckley Cox Simmons and Anna Catherine Stegner, the latter of whom was born in Hazelton, Pennsylvania, in 1859. Her father was John Stegner a coal mine superintendent who lost his life in a runaway accident. She has a brother Dr. Adam Stegner, who is a prominent physician at Wyoming, Pennsylvania.

The father of the Indiana inventor, Eckley Cox Simmons, was a man of unusual mechanical genius himself. He was born in Luzerne County in 1856 and at the age of sixteen was put in charge of a coal mine. From coal mining he turned to the paper industry, and is credited with having originated what is now an extensive line of sanitary paper products, the main specialty being a paper pie plate. As early as 1874 he had a factory in Pennsylvania for making pie plates from paper. These plates at first were made largely by hand processes. He devised several labor saving machines. When he was forty years of age, in 1896, he brought his family to Marion, , Indiana, and about two years later started what is now the Economy Pie Plate & Box Company, which had been established in 1885, at Elmhurst, Pennsylvania.

It is reasonable to suppose that Paul R. Simmons inherits at least part of his strong bent for mechanical invention. He was about ten years of age when he came to Marion, and here he finished his education in the grade and high schools, graduating from high school in 1906. The scientific fraternity of Phi Delta Kappa was founded in Marion, and he became a member of this fraternity soon after it was organized. At that time his father owned a sanitary paper pie plate factory in Marion and during several school vacations the buy had earned fifty cents a day in the factory. About the time he graduated from high school he had to take over the management of the factory. The death of his father came in 1910 and Mrs. Simmons, his widow, then became owner of the business. She turned over a share of it to her son, Paul R. In 1914 a part of the plant was sold to the firm of Weesner & Cole, Paul R. Simmons retaining enough of the stock to become first vice president and general manager of the new company. In 1915 he resigned from the Weesner & Cole Company.

Going to Huntington, Indiana, he promoted the Simmons Manufacturing Company, a paper products organization, but in 1919 sold his interest to Economy Box Pie Plate Company. In 1922 he promoted the Paramount Paper Products Company at Indianapolis. Mr. Simmons in the fall of 1928 entered into a contract with Mr. George A. Bell, of Marion, to become the consulting engineer for the Indiana Paver Company of Marion, now known as the Indiana Fiber Products Company, with which corporation he is still identified.

Paper plates and other paper specialties have been on the market for many years, but undoubtedly the greatest impetus to their manufacture and the most important expansions of popular demand for such products have come since the great war. One factor that has contributed to the popularity of the product was a new process of manufacture resulting in a waterproof container and one much cleaner and neater in appearance. Following the trend of popular taste in recent years for the application of color the manufacturers have introduced decorative paper plates. The use of the automobile has been another contributing factor, since millions of Americans are now on the road part of every season, and carrying with them a supply of paper plates and picnic specialties.

In the manufacturing end the first and chief problem was to devise a machine that would be automatic in action and produce enormous quantities of these plates and other specialties so that they could be sold at what seems nominal cost to the consumer and yet give a profit to the manufacturers. Most of the automatic machines for turning out sanitary paper plates, drinking cups and other containers now so popular are the invention of Mr. Simmons. His first invention was the automatic pie plate machines, for which a patent was allowed him in 1912. The capacity of this machine is 50,000 perfect dishes per day. The original machine after eighteen years of continuous work is still in use, and stands as a remarkable tribute to the designing skill of the young engineer. Even more remarkable is Mr. Simmons statement that he was only twelve years of age when he conceived and made the original drawings for the fundamental parts of this automatic machine. His next invention was a machine for making milk bottle caps, on which he was allowed a patent in 1918. It was bought by the Economy Box & Pie Plate Company of Marion. The milk bottle cap is a simple looking affair, but the machine that produces it is a wonderful organism, capable of automatic action whereby it prints the caps in two colors, cuts, paraffines and delivers them in hoppers at the rate of a million a day. Mr. Simmons in 1919 invented and patented an automatic machine for making ice cream dishes, the machine having a production rate of 60,000 a day, and one of the original machines after eleven years is still in daily use. He also is the inventor and patentee of a machine for turning out a combined metal and paper ice cream dish and holder. In 1923 he was allowed a patent on an automatic Sundae ice cream paper dish making machine, one of which is in daily use by the Paramount Paper Products Company of Indianapolis. One man with this machine turns out 100,000 perfect dishes, automatically packed and ready for shipment. Mr. Simmons in 1928 was granted a patent on a machine for automatically making paper drinking cups, which is also used by the Paramount Company. This machine takes the paper from a roll, cuts it, embosses it with any special design, forms a cup, turns up the bottom, spins it into shape, then glues, counts and packs the cups automatically at the rate of 30,000 per day.

Mr. Simmons married, in 1908, Miss Lou Verna Sherren, in St. Joseph, Michigan, daughter of Charles and Rose Sherren, of Marion, Indiana. Her father was a Grant County farmer. Mr. and Mrs. Simmons have two children. The son, Raymond Richard, born at Marion, April 21, 1910, was educated in the grade and high schools of his native city and at the age of eighteen showed that he inherits the business capacity traditional to this family, being the owner of the Marion Lock, & Type Company. The daughter, LaDial Susan (LaDial being a family name), was born December 14, 1913, and is a student in the Marion High School.

Outside of the field of. invention Mr. Simmons is a popular member of several fraternal orders, and takes great pleasure in mingling with his fellow men, being a genial companion. He is a charter member of De Molay Commandery, K. T. No. 62, at Indianapolis, also a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason, Valley of Fort Wayne, and a member of Huntington, Indiana, Lodge No. 805, B. P. O. Elks.

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INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931


BERNARD AFFORD KELTNER. One of the very able lawyers of Saint Joseph County, Indiana, Bernard A. Keltner, was for two years deputy attorney general, and has had other honors conferred upon him, both professional and personal. He was born at South Bend, Indiana, April 24, 1899, a son of Arthur G. and Anne (Smith) Keltner. The father was born in Saint Joseph County, May 14, 1861, and the mother was born in Huntingtonshire, England, September 28, 1865. The grandfather, Josiah G. Keltner, was born at Liberty, Union County, Indiana, in 1828, a son of Samuel Keltner, and grandson of Michael Keltner, the latter of whom was a Revolutionary soldier in Slade's, company of Pennsylvania Rifles. The name was originally spelled Kelchner, but due to an error in transcribing the records, the present spelling was adopted.

Samuel Keltner the great-grandfather of Bernard A. Keltner, was the pioneer of the family in Indiana, coming here from Pennsylvania as early as 1820, and he died in Saint Joseph County at the advanced age of ninety-four years. His son, Josiah G. Keltner, came to Saint Joseph County at an early day, and became one of its prosperous farmers. He married Elizabeth Gillette, a native of New York State, who died in 1912, aged eighty years, he having passed away in 1908, aged eighty years. Their son, Arthur G. Keltner, was educated in the common and high schools of South Bend, and Franklin College, and when he had completed his studies he went into the hardware business at South Bend, and also dealt in mosaic tiles. Both as a Republican and Baptist he lived up to high ideals of party and church, and was a man universally respected. He and his wife had but two sons, the elder being Harold, born in 1893, now general secretary of the South Side Young Men's Christian Association at Saint Louis, Missouri.

Bernard A. Keltner was graduated from the South Bend High School in 1916, and during the World war was a member of the Student Army Training Corps. After the war he entered Dartmouth College, and was graduated therefrom in 1922, with the degree of Bachelor of Science. He graduated with the law class of 1925 at the University of Michigan with the degree of Bachelor of Laws, and was admitted to the bar that same year. From November, 1926, to January, 1929, he was deputy attorney-general for the State of Indiana, with headquarters at Indianapolis, and during that period he was in eighty-five of the ninety-two counties of Indiana, and became known allover the state. In January, 1929, he returned to South Bend, and since then, in association with Joseph A. Avery, a classmate of the University of Michigan, has been carrying on a very large practice, the firm being admittedly one of the strongest at South Bend. Mr. Keltner is one of the leading Republicans of this region, and served as city election commissioner. He is a member of Gamma Delta Epsilon and of the Phi Kappa Sigma national Greek letter fraternities. Since establishing himself at South Bend he has been a member of the Exchange Club of South Bend, a national organization, and he also is a member of the Young Men's Christian Association. The First Baptist Church of South Bend is his religious home.

On July 14,1927, Mr. Keltner was married to Miss Catherine Harvey, of Hartford City, Indiana, a graduate of its high school, and a student of DePauw University for two years. Prior to her marriage she taught in the public schools of Hartford City. Mr. and Mrs. Keltner maintain their beautiful home at Roseland Woods, Roseland, South Bend, where their many warm personal friends are welcomed with characteristic cordiality.

INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931


J. WILLARD SHIDLER, proprietor of the Willard Furniture Company, at 312 South Michigan Street, South Bend, a business man of forty years' experience, has been a merchant and manufacturer, and his enterprise has brought additional distinctions to a family that has been prominent in St. Joseph County for three-quarters of a century.

Mr. Shidler was born on a farm in Union Township, St. Joseph County, July 3, 1867, one of the nine children of Adam W. and Mary (Klopfenstine) Shidler. The Shidler family came originally from Switzerland, first settling in England, and in the United States became residents of Western Pennsylvania. His grandfather, George W. Shidler, was born in Washington County, Pennsylvania, where he married Catherine Wise. About 1810 they moved to Stark County, Ohio, where George W. Shidler operated a saw mill and grist mill and a farm. Both he and his wife lived to a good old age.

Adam W. Shidler was born in Stark County, Ohio, October 30, 1832. In 1854 he and his brother Jacob erected a saw mill near Lakeville in Union Township, St. Joseph County. He was interested in the operation of this mill until the close of the Civil war, and subsequently acquired his farm nine miles south of South Bend, on which he lived out the rest of his life. In addition to general farming he operated portable saw mills. He was a keen observer and saw many ways in which to improve methods of doing things on his farm. At one time he was granted a patent for a sugar sap evaporator. He began voting as a Whig and from 1856 supported the Republican national candidates. He served as township trustee. He and his wife were members of the Christian Church and for many years he was affiliated with the Masonic Lodge. He married in 1853 Mary .M. Klopfenstine. They gave their children liberal educational opportunities, all but one of them becoming teachers. Several of the sons attended Valparaiso University and two of them became physicians and one is dentist.

J. Willard Shidler spent his early life at the old homestead, was educated in district schools and Valparaiso University, and for many years was closely associated in his activ-ities with his brother Adam. He taught school in St. Joseph County two years and then with his brother went to Ellisville, Illinois, where they taught for two years and for three years were in the retail hardware business there. In 1894 they returned to South Bend and were hardware merchants in that city. Mr. Willard Shidler from 1896 to 1928 was president of the Shidler Brothers Manufacturing Company, an old established business specializing in the manufacture of dining and office tables. He retired from that business in 1928, and in April, 1929, established the Willard Furniture Store, one of the high class retail houses of South Bend.

Mr. Shidler married, November 26, 1895, Miss Charlotte Webb, who was born at Bloomington, Illinois, a daughter of Benjamin Webb. She was graduated from the Illinois Normal University and taught in that state. They have three children: Genevieve, at home; Evelyn S., the wife of George A. Robertson, Jr., sales manager of the Robertson Brothers Company of South Bend, and they have three children, Joe Ann, George III and John S. The third daughter, Miss Betty, is at home. Mr. Shidler is a Knight Templar Mason, member of the South Bend Country Club and Rotary Club and the First Presbyterian Church.

INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931


GEORGE GROVER FELDMAN. The South Bend bar has been honored by the services of two very able lawyers named Feldman, father and son, both named George G.

George G. Feldman, Sr., was a comparatively young man when he passed away, yet had won substantial honors as a lawyer and citizen. He was born near Bourbon in Marshall County, Indiana, June 27, 1861, a son of Augustus and Barbara (Michael) Feldman. His parents came from Germany and were early settlers in Marshall County, Indiana, where they lived for many years, but spent their last days in South Bend, where Augustus Feldman died in 1908 and his wife in 1909. George G. Feldman, Sr., after the common schools attended Valparaiso University and held three degrees from that institution, Bachelor of Science, Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Laws. He entered upon his career as a practicing attorney at South Bend in 1892, and made splendid use of the opportunities presented him in the twenty years before his death, which occurred January 14, 1912. In 1902 he was elected the first city judge of South Bend, and by reelection in 1906 was on the city bench until 1910. In 1894 he was a Democratic candidate for the Legislature and from 1896 to 1898 was chairman of the Democratic county and city central committees, Judge Feldman took a prominent part in fraternal organizations, being a member of South Bend Lodge No. 294, A. F. and A. M., South Bend Chapter No. 29, Royal Arch Masons, was a member of the Knights Templar Commandery, was a past chancellor of Crusade Lodge No. 14, Knights of Pythias, and a member of South Bend Lodge No. 235, B. P. O. Elks. He was a Methodist.

Judge Feldman married, June 27, 1897, Miss Louise A. Wenger, of a pioneer family of South Bend, where she was born October 6, 1864. Her father, Gustavus Wenger, was born at Strassburg, then a German city, now on French soil. His wife was Miss Uhl, a native of Baden, Germany. They came to South Bend in the early 1850s and Gustavus Wenger conducted the first furniture shop in Saint Joseph County. George G. Feldman, Sr., and wife had three children: Horace Wenger, Earl Russell and George Grover.

George G. Feldman, Jr., was born in South Bend, January 26, 1904. He was graduated from high school in 1921, and then spent a year in Purdue University. From there he entered the University of Michigan, and after one year in the academic department enrolled in the law school, where he was graduated in 1926. Since his admission to the bar Mr. Feldman has built up a profitable general practice and has offices in the Building & Loan Tower. He became a life member of the University of Michigan Union. Mr. Feldman, who resides at 1527 Sunnymede Avenue, married, August 19, 1925, Miss Dolores Vinece, of Ann Arbor, Michigan.

INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931


ROY HOSTETTER WOLFE, Doctor of Veterinary Surgery, is the oldest graduate veterinarian in point of years of experience in Saint Joseph County. Doctor Wolfe has a reputation as a man of wonderful skill and ability in his chosen field.

He was born at Walkerton in Lincoln Township, Saint Joseph County, April 29, 1881, son of William J. and Calista (Hostetter) Wolfe. His father was a native of Saint Joseph County, and during the Civil war was in the One Hundred Forty-second Indiana Volunteer Infantry. After the war he resumed farming, and in 1884 accepted an appointment in the Government Indian Bureau, going to Fort Randall, South Dakota, where he had charge of the issue of Government rations to the Indians. He remained in the West until 1907, when he retired and spent his last years in Indiana. He died in 1913. His wife was born at Ligonier, Noble County, Indiana, and passed away in 1888. Her brother, Simon Hostetter, was the first white boy born in Noble County.

Dr. Roy H. Wolfe attended the grade and high schools of South Bend, for one year was a student in the Grand Rapids Veterinary College, in Michigan, and in 1907 was graduated from the McKillip Veterinary College of Chicago. In the same year he took up his practice at South Bend. Doctor Wolfe for the past ten years has been specializing in the care and treatment of small animals, especially dogs and cats, and nearly every dog and cat owner in the county knows the wonderful facilities which Doctor Wolfe has provided. He has an ideal location, a tract of eight acres of ground near the city limits on the Edwardsburg Road, at the corner of Ironwood Drive and South Bend Avenue. Adjoining his attractive country home there he has provided buildings and special equipment as a hospital and hotel for dogs and cats. Another feature, almost unique in an institution of this kind, is a cemetery for pets, which is well known for many miles around South Bend.

Doctor Wolfe during the World war acted as Government inspector of horses for Saint Joseph County. He is an active Republican but never sought any public office until 1930, when he was a candidate at the primaries for the nomination for sheriff. He is a past secretary and director of the Interstate Fair Association of Saint Joseph County. Doctor Wolfe has interested himself in community projects affecting his particular locality. This is a rapidly growing district and he is given much credit for securing such important up-to-date municipal improvements as gas, lights, water and pavement.

Doctor Wolfe is a past president of the Northern Indiana Veterinary Association and is a member of the Indiana Veterinary Association. Fraternally he is affiliated with the Knights of Pythias and B. P. O. Elks.

He married Miss Adda O'Riley, daughter of the late William and Sarah O'Riley, who were pioneer farmers of Elkhart County, Indiana, where Mrs. Wolfe was born. They have a daughter, Calista Sarah Wolfe, born December 25, 1915.

INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931


ISAAC HAYDEN DOOLITTLE, M. D., of South Bend, was born at West Fork, Indiana, April 13, 1862, son of John C. Doolittle, grandson of Samuel Doolittle, great-grandson of Moses Doolittle, and great-great-grandson of Col. Ephraim Doolittle of the Revoluntionary army. Doctor Doolittle was educated in the worth High School, Marengo Academy Kentucky School of Medicine, undergraduate honor, 1886, honor graduate, 1887 (G-U Medal). He was at the Illinois Post Graduate, 1895, Rush Medical College, 1895, Illinois Post Graduate, 1902. He is a member of the Mitchell District Medical Society, Monon Academy of Medicine, International Association of Railway Surgeons, and since 1919 genito-urinary specialist at South Bend.

He married, in 1888, Sue Collins, a Bachelor of Science graduate from Valparaiso University of 1887. Their daughter, Gail, born at Campbellsburg, Indiana, April 25, 1889, graduated from New Albany High School in 1906 (honor roll), attended Indiana University, 1912-15, was chosen a Phi Beta Kappa, 1914, graduated A. B., 1915, "with distinction." She was married, October 1, 1917 to Paul Kunschik, who was born at Medora, Indiana, in 1886, graduated A. B. From Indiana University in 1914 and A. M., 1916, and is now vice president and general manager of the Carl Fisher Properties at Miami Beach, Florida.

The second daughter, Ada, born at Campbellsburg October 27, 1894, graduated from Shortridge High School, Indianapolis, 1912 (honor roll), Indiana University, 1915, magna cum laude, and elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She was married to John M. Powell, who was born at Bryant, Indiana, in 1894, graduated from the Bryant High School in 1909, Indiana University, 1914, and is now actuary with the Columbian National Life Insurance Company, Boston.

Doctor Doolittle married, in 1907, Mrs. Della Fesler Doolittle, of Doolittle Mills, Indiana. Their son, Glenn Fesler, born in 1909, graduated from South Bend High School in 1930, with special proficiency in orchestra, band, glee club, quartette, and in aviation won license as private pilot, limited commercial, in 1929, and transport in 1930, and is now a student in the Commercial College at Notre Dame University, and a member of the University Band. The second son, Wayne LaRue, born in 1911, graduated from the South Bend High School in 1929, was class officer, in class plays, on honor roll, member of Playmakers, and is now taking the scientific course and medical preparatory course at Notre Dame University. The daughter, Naomi Ruth, born in 1913, is in the South Bend Junior High School and a student of piano and voice.

INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931


CHURCHILL F. WORRELL, physician and surgeon at Peru, was in the military service during the World war, and came to Peru as surgeon of the Wabash Railway Hospital, remaining here to engage in private practice. He has a high standing in his professional work and has continued his interest in military affairs and military organizations since the war.

Doctor Worrell was born in Carroll County, Southwestern Virginia, July 31, 1893. The Worrells were early settlers in Virginia. The history of the family runs back to the time of the Norman Conquest of England. A disinguished Norman knight, Sir Herbert Worrell, was presented with three coats-of-arms in honor of the three sons who were killed in the battle of Hastings in 1066. The branch of the family that came to America acquired land on which the City of Philadelphia is now located. On the maternal side Doctor Worrell is a descendant of the Governor Spotwood family of Virginia. Doctor Worrell's father, Dexter A. L. Worrell, was a native of Virginia.

Doctor Worrell attended school in Virginia, graduating from the Dublin High School and for two years was a student in the Virginia Military Institute. He was graduated M.D., from the University of Maryland, at Baltimore, in 1917. For a year he was an interne in the Maryland General Hospital and was then inducted into the Medical Corps of the United States army, as a first lieutenant. He was on duty at the Rockefeller Institute at New York, at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, and was then assigned duty with the American Siberian Expedition, arriving at Vladivostok November 1, 1918. He was honorably discharged at San Francisco, May 8, 1919. Folowing that for a time he was on the staff and resident surgeon of St. Joseph's Hospital at Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and on May 1, 1920, located at Peru, Indiana, as resident surgeon for the Wabash Railway Hospital. Since May, 1922, he has engaged in general practice. He is consulting surgeon for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway and a member of the staff of the County Hospital. Doctor Worrell is a member of the Miami County, Indiana, State and American Medical Associations and served as county coroner from 1922 to 1926.

He married Miss Hazel B. Arnold, a native of Peru, and they have a daughter, Mary Ann. Doctor Worrell for one year was president of the Miami County Medical Society. He was honored with the office of commander of the American Legion Post in 1922 and is county chairman of the Civilian Military Training Camp. Doctor Worrell has his Masonic affiliations with Henry Clay Lodge at Dublin, Virginia, is a Scottish Rite Mason, member of Alsevar Temple of the Mystic Shrine at San Antonio, Texas, and belongs to the Peru Lodge, Knights of Pythias.

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INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT Vol. 3
By Charles Roll, A.M.
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931


Deb Murray