JOHN M. STOCKDALE. "Hic et ubique" might justly be applied as the motto of the sturdy Scotch-Irish race, who have so deeply made their impress, the wide world over, as champions of liberty and civil rights, and are ever to be found in the van of civilization and progress. Of such strong, hardy and brave people comes the gentleman whose name appears at the opening of this biographical sketch. Mr. Stockdale is a native of Greene county, Penn., born in 1824, a son of William and Hannah Stockdale. James Stockdale, the grandfather of John M., came from the North of Ireland about 1787, on a visit to America, and was led by circumstances to remain. Having exhausted his funds in traveling about the country, he began milling, which business he had learned of his father in Ireland, intending to make money enough to return home; but the Fates ordered otherwise, for he fell in love with and married Miss Weir, and never went back. In 1790 the young couple settled in what was then Washington (now Greene) county, where were born to them children as follows: William, Nancy (now Mrs. Robert Patton, of Fayette county, Penn.), Sarah (wife of Maj. James Ringland) and Elizabeth, wife of Squire Benjamin Jennings, of Waynesburg, Greene Co., Penn. The mother of these children died in 1823, and the father in 1840, at the age of eighty-six years. William Stockdale, father of our subject, was born in 1792, on the homestead in Morris township, Greene Co., Penn., and was brought up there. He married Hannah McQuaid, a daughter of John McQuaid, of Washington county, Penn. Their residence was the old home place, where they passed the remainder of their lives. The children born to them were: (1) James, whose death, at forty-five, was the result of an accident at a railroad station in Lancaster, Ohio; he had lived for a number of years in Baltimore, and was twice a member of the Legislature of Maryland. (2) John M. (3) Robert P., who lives in Mt. Pleasant, Henry Co., Iowa. (4) Thomas R., who left Jefferson College (Penn.) with the class of 1856, and located in Summit, Miss., where he continues to practice law; he has represented his District for several terms in Congress, and is now a member. (5) Mary, the wife of Dr. Thaddeus Dodd. (6) Isabella, who married H.B. Lindley, of Morris township, Washington county, and (7) Sarah P., who married Joseph B. Wise, Esq., of West Bethlehem township, Washington Co., Penn. The father died at the age seventy-one years, on the farm upon which he was born, and the mother in 1873, aged seventy-six years. John M. Stockdale was born and reared on the farm, was sent to an academy to prepare for college, and graduated from Washington College in 1849. He studied law with T.M.T. McKennan, and his son Judge William McKennan, of Washington, Penn., and was admitted to practice in 1852. In 1853 he became the owner and editor of the Waynesburg (Greene county) Messenger, the only Democratic newspaper in the county. In 1854 he was elected, on the Democratic ticket. to represent Greene county in the State Legislature, and was re-elected in 1855. In 1856 he went to the Northwest for recreation and health, but became connected with business matters in Fort Dodge, on the Des Moines river, Iowa, and remained there until 1865. In the meantime he was appointed (in 1857) Register of the Government Land Office in Fort Dodge, which he held until July, 1861. During his residence there he dealt very largely in real estate, having bought and sold more than two hundred thousand acres of land, as the records show; but the Civil war depressed or destroyed, for the time, nearly all land values in the Northwest, and made real estate a hazardous investment. In 1863 Mr. Stockdale, in his absence, was nominated for the State Senate from his district in Iowa, but declined to accept the nomination. In 1864 he was an elector on the McClelland ticket. In 1865 he removed to the city of Baltimore, where he engaged in the wholesale drug trade in the well-known house of Stockdale, Smith & Co., on the corner of Howard and German streets, and also in a Petroleum Oil Refinery near the shipping wharves, until the Standard Oil Co., by methods now well known, secured control of all pipe lines and means of transportation, including heavy special rebates that crushed all competitors. In 1881 Mr. Stockdale removed to Washington, Penn., and published the Review and Examiner until 1886 when he retired from journalistic work and is now in a law office in Washington. In 1884 he received the nomination of the Democratic party for Congress in a District embracing Washington, Beaver and Lawrence counties. In 1883, when the project was untested by experience, he applied for and secured a State Charter, for the transportation and consumption of natural gas for "heat and light." The prosecution of the project by a company of enterprising citizens resulted in the development of natural gas and oil in the immediate vicinity, stimulating enterprise, and Washington, Penn., is now the most beautiful, attractive and flourishing town on the waters of the Ohio. In 1857 Mr. Stockdale married Miss Martha, daughter of Abner Clark, of Ten Mile Valley, Washington Co., Penn., whose grandfather was an early settler of the county. She has a sister, Mrs. Logan, of Philadelphia, Penn., and two brothers, William E. And James E. Clark, both married and living in Washington, D.C. One child, Elizabeth C., has been born to Mr. and Mrs. Stockdale, and lives with them at their home on East Wheeling Street, Washington, Pennsylvania.

Text taken from page 393 of: Beers, J. H. and Co., Commemorative Biographical Record of Washington County, Pennsylvania (Chicago: J. H. Beers & Co., 1893). Transcribed January 1997 by Julie Jolly of Knob Noster, MO as part of the Beers Project. Published January 1997 on the Washington County, PA USGenWeb pages at http://www.chartiers.com/.

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