Randolph  County,  Indiana

Isaiah  W. Kemp


            As the day with its morning of hope and promise, its noontide of activity and accomplishment, its evening of completed and successful efforts, ending in the grateful rest and quiet of the night, so was the life of the late Isaiah W. Kemp. His career was a long, useful and busy one, fraught with much good to himself, his family and to humanity, and his memory will long be revered by those who had occasion to come into contact with him on life's highway. His activities in a material way added to his individual prosperity and to the locality of his residence. Devoting the major part of his time and attention to the development of his general agricultural interests in Randolph county, he never allowed the pursuit of wealth to warp his kindly nature, but preserved his faculties and the warmth of his heart for the broadening and helpful influence of human life, being to the end a kindly, genial friend and gentleman whom it was a pleasure to meet.
            Mr. Kemp was born on January 1, 1840, at Dayton, Ohio. He was a son of Nathaniel and Margaret (Boyer) Kemp, whose family consisted of eight children, five of whom survive at this writing. The father was a native of Pennsylvania where his earlier years were spent and from which state he removed to Ohio, thence to Indiana, his son, Isaiah W., being four years old when the family settled in the Hoosier state. They located in Randolph county where a good farm was developed through hard work and good management and here the father spent the rest of his life, and the son, our subject, also devoted his active life to general farming and stock raising with much success, eventually becoming one of the leading farmers in the community, having remained in the same vicinity where he had spent his boyhood and received his education. The mother of our subject was a native of Maryland, and was a good woman and faithful helpmeet.
            Isaiah W. Kemp was twice married, first, to Mary J. Wysong, of Randolph county. Her death occurred in 1874, and Mr. Kemp subsequently married Mary E. Hippenhimer, a daughter of Jacob Hippenhimer, a native of Pennsylvania. His wife was born in Maryland. The date of our subject's second marriage was January 5, 1876. To this union three sons were born, namely: Harry, who is farming on the old homestead, married Ethel Peacock, and they have one child, Ronald, born February 23, 1908; Troy W., a machinist in Muncie, Indiana, married Mary E. Thornburg, and they have two children, Edith, born May 23, 1905, and Alice, born September 23. 1908; George married Florence Kratzer, June 22, 1913.
            The death of Isaiah W. Kemp occurred on April 8, 1909, having nearly attained his three-score and ten.
            Mr. Kemp was a gallant soldier in the Civil war, serving four years in all, three of which were in the Eighty-fourth Indiana Volunteer Infantry He was a Republican in politics.
Past and Present of Randolph County, Indiana, 1914.
Contributed by Gina Richardson

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