Mahlon Harley is Dead.

“At his home near Madison on Monday, January 27, 1896, Mahlon Harley passed away.  He was the oldest citizen in Monroe county.  He was born in Fredericktown, Md., in 1799, and at the time of his death was (95) years old.  In 1845 he moved to this county and for $6 an acre bought the farm on which he lived until the day of his death.  He was the father of eight children all of whom are living, and prominent among the number are the Harley Bros., the well-known and honored merchants of Paris.  Before coming to Missouri, Mr. Harley held various positions of trust in his native state.  At one time he served the people of Monroe count as a judge of the county court.  In politics he was on old line Whig until the dissolution of that party, when he allied himself with the Republican party.  In private life, as well as public life, he was a model citizen, just and honorable in his dealings, and a neighbor whose name stood for hospitality, virtue and integrity.  Mr. Harley had lived during the lifetime of every President of the United States, and had seen his country grow from the condition of an infant among nations to its present position at the head of the wealth and might powers of the world.  He was in the bloom of young manhood before the telegraph was invented, and was an old man when threshing machines and twine bladders were first used.  He had seen the wonderful progress in science that led from the primitive tallow dip to the great electric lights; fro the ox cart to the electric cars; from threshing floors to threshing machines; and from the slow sail boat to the mighty greyhounds of the oceans that have annihilated time and distance and made neighbors of the most distant nations.  At the time of his birth, the United States were made up of 18 states with 5,000,000 souls; at the time of his death they had grown to 45 states reaching from the Atlantic to the Pacific and from the great lakes to the Gulf, with a population of 70,000,000 souls.  During all those changes Mr. Harley kept pace with the times and enjoyed the conveniences the inventive genius of the century had provided for man’s comfort.  He was gathered to his father’s, full of years and honored by all who knew him.  Peace to his ashes.”


Source: Article from unknown newspaper dated Jan/Feb 1896.