| 412 | BIOGRAPHICAL AND PORTRAIT CYCLOPEDIA |
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mine foreman at the Osceola coal mines of Clearfield county, a position which he held for twelve years. At the end of that long period of mine-work direction, in 1894, he came to Hastings, and became mine foreman of the Chest Creek Coal and Coke company's mine there. In a short time Mr. Smith and a Mr. Shifford took the contract of mining the coal and manufacturing the coke of the Chest Creek company, which is a branch of the Osceola company. In this last venture Mr. Smith, who still acts as mine foreman, has been successful. He is the oldest and one of the most trusted mine officials in the employ of the company. He is a republican in political opinion, and always supports his party at the polls. On July 3, 1872, Mr. Smith married Hannah Margaret Lamb, daughter of Peter Lamb, who came from England to Luzerne county about 1840. Mr. and Mrs. Smith have had six children: Mary, wife of Herbert Oldham, of Osceola, Clearfield county; Hattie; William, now attending Duff's Business college, of Pittsburg; George and Edward, who are both deceased; and James M., now with a mercantile firm of Hastings.
EDWARD McHUGH, a member, and the general manager of the Stirling Coal company, of Hastings, is a leading wholesale business man of over fifty years' successful experience. He is a son of Dennis and Margery (McHugh) McHugh, and was born near Liverpool, Mifflin, now Juniata county, Pennsylvania, March 16, 1825. Dennis McHugh was born about 1779, in county Donegal, Province of Ulster, Ireland, and was reared to a farmer's life. During the elder John Adams' presidential administration young McHugh came to Pennsylvania, and with his change of country also |
made a change of pursuit, dropping farming and learning the trade of a forgeman at Grube's forge, Birdsboro, Berks county. His trade, although remunerative, was dropped, like farming, when something better came, in contracting on the Union canal, between Philadelphia and Middletown. Pike contracting came next in order, between Lewistown and Bellefonte, and then he removed on a Centre county farm, where he was killed by lightning, on July 2, 1833, while engaged in work on a contract of clearing that he had taken. He was a man of limited education, but possessed energy, good judgment, and keen perception. He was a Catholic, and in eastern Pennsylvania married Margery McHugh, who, although from county Donegal, yet was in no wise related to him. Their children, nine sons and five daughters, were: Miles, a mine overseer; Hannah, married Patrick Supple; Susan, wedded Edward Clute; Mary, married Joshua Edgerton; Bernard, captain of a line of canal boats; Michael, engaged in canal boating; Margaret, wife of John McGraff, a superintendent of coal mines in Blair and Huntingdon counties; Isabella, married James Harset, and, after his death, wedded James Hatton; Dennis, a superintendent of ore and coal mines; James, a superintendent for years of coal mines and coke yards in the great Connellsville coal and coking region, and now a resident of Pittsburg. All of this large family are now dead except James and Edward. Edward McHugh was of delicate constitution as well as of tender years, when his father died and left the family in reduced circumstances, as the result of some previous financial losses. Edward received the advantages of such education as the schools of that early day afforded, and at sixteen years of age |
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