MOORE, George E. - 1906 - Fountain County INGenWeb Project

George E. Moore, son of Squire and Alice Moore, was born in Sugar Creek township, Parke County, Ind. It was there that He spent his boyhood and early manhood. In his early business career he was engaged for some years in running a saw mill and also farming in Parke and Fountain counties. He afterwards for twelve years successfully managed the Kingman flouring mill which he sold in the autumn of 1904. He then was editor of the Kingman Star for a little more than a year. He was married to Effie E. Baccus Dec. 21, 1880. He died March 4, 1906, at the age of 48 years, 9 months and 12 days. Such in brief outline is the story of him that is gone. It is hard indeed for us to reconcile ourselves to this degree of inscrutable Providence. Yet our sorrow is somewhat assuaved and our spirit of censure wholly removed when we reflect that that same Providence gave to us and to the world so splendid a character. The quality of his mind—the mettle of which he was made showed itself at an early age. As a school boy he showed a ready intelligence and was exemplary in his conduct of life. As a man he was all that the boy gave promise to be. He was honest. He was up right. It was so natural for him to do the right thing that no one thought of anything else. He was a home lover. He took much pleasure in the fireside circle which was bound together by a bond that could never he broken, except as it is broken now. The chief joy of his life was not in seeking things for himself, but in providing for his family those things which would help them to become useful and respected members of society. Although a member of no church he was a staunch supporter of chose institutions that help men to live a larger and better life. He was a member of the fraternal orders of Modern Woodmen, Kingman Temple Pythias. He appreciated their service in the making of men. He often remarked upon the Utopian conditions that would prevail if the world lived up to the noble teachings of these orders. The public school had in him a friend that never wavered. He saw in it the strongest safeguard of those liberties that he held dear. He believed with all his heart that the enlightenment of the public conscience would lessen and finally abolish those wrongs which appear in popular government. He was a man of singular purity of thought and deed. No business in which he was engaged ever led him to forget that he was first of all a gentleman. The paper while under his management was reflection of the man. He was not ensnared by Siren song of expediency. He did not cater to anyone’s depraved appetite for the unclean. To the columns of that paper which he sent as a weekly messenger to the homes of his fellow men he admitted nothing that might not be engraved upon a shrine of purity. He was not an example of passive goodness. He was virile. He was one of the world’s workers. He was not the man to sit supremely down and wail at the wickedness of the world. He did not vituperate against modern politics and held himself aloof. He realized that if popular government is to reach its highest efficiency it must have the best service of the best men. That he might give his best service to his fellowmen he early identified himself with a political party. To this party he was loyal without being its slave. He looked upon it as a means and not an end. He rejoiced when it played a noble part. He was quick to detect in it any departure from the right and grieved after it. He leaves a wife and eight children to mourn his loss. All the influence of his life shall long be felt in the community in which he lived. His forceful, upright character gives us peculiar pleasure in the thought that our echoes roll from soul to soul and grow forever and ever. The “echo” of his life is the “echo” of purity, of purpose and heroic endeavor. – jlr