Biography of Perry D. DePew, pages 828/829/830.  History of DeKalb 
County, Indiana; B. F. Bowen & Company, Inc., Indianapolis, 1914.



Perry D. DePew



	To a great extent the prosperity of the agricultural sections of 
our country is due to the honest industry, the sturdy persistence, the 
unswerving perseverance and the wise economy which so prominently 
characterize the farming element of the Hoosier state.  Among this 
class may be mentioned the subject of this life record, who, by reason 
of years of indefatigable labor and  honest effort, has not only 
acquired a well merited material prosperity, but has also richly earned 
the highest esteem of all with whom he is associated.

	Perry D. DePew, a successful farmer and public-spirited citizen 
of Keyser township, was born on June 27, 1876, and is the son of Joseph 
and Nancy (Watson) DePew, who, about 1855, came to DeKalb county, 
Indiana, and bought a tract of land in the northwest part of Keyser 
township.  Here they developed and improved a fine farm and spent the 
remainder of their days, the mother dying on that farm and the father 
in this county also.  When Samuel DePew was about seventeen years of 
age he heard the call for defenders of the national honor and responded 
promptly, becoming a member of the Company F, One Hundred and Twenty-
ninth Regiment Indiana Volunteers, with which he participated in many 
of the most important battles of the great conflict, being in the 
service four years, at the end of which time he received an honorable 
discharge and returned to the pursuits of peace.  On coming back to the 
old home in Keyser township he bought the estate from his parents and 
lived there until 1899, when he moved to Auburn and spent the remainder 
of his days, he death occurring there in 1910.  On July 12, 1867, 
Samuel DePew married Fannie Mason, the daughter of Abraham and Ann 
(Quince) Mason, the latter’s parents being native of Lincolnshire, 
England, where they were married and where five of their children were 
born, the father being a farmer in his native land.  In 1857 they came 
to America and located in Richland county, Ohio, where the father 
followed ditching for a year, then rented a farm and in 1861 moved to 
DeKalb county, locating at Corunna on March 4th of that year. For three 
years he operated rented land and then bought a tract of forty acres 
two miles east of Avilla, where he remained three years.  He then 
bought fifty acres of land three miles southwest of Avilla and later 
added forty acres adjoining.  Eventually he sold that tract and bought 
eighty-two acres of land in the same neighborhood, but finally moved to 
Avilla, where he bought a home and lived until his death.  After that 
event his widow lived with her children in Auburn until she passed.  
Their daughter, now the widow of Samuel DePew, lives on the home farm 
with her son, Perry, the subject of this sketch. The place is well 
improved, including an attractive and well-arranged brick residence, 
good barn and outbuildings and in many other ways the farm is numbered 
among the attractive and profitable agricultural estates in the county.  
To the cultivation of the old home farm, Perry DePew, the immediate 
subject of this sketch, gives his earnest attention and is numbered 
among the progressive and up-to-date farmers of the township.  He is a 
well educated and symmetrically developed gentleman, wide awake to all 
the current issues of the day, and takes deep interest not only in the 
improvement of his material estates, but also in the  advancement of 
the  highest and best interests of the entire community in which he 
lives.  He is one of six children born to his parents, the others being 
Mary, wife of John Cook; Frank; Martha, the wife of William Cook; 
Nettie, the wife of Levi Shirk; Belle, who now lives in Cleveland, 
Ohio, the subject of this sketch being the youngest.

	On December 6, 1899, Perry DePew married Essie B. Lawhead, who 
was born at St. Joe, this county, the daughter of Samuel and Sarah 
(Keagy) Lawhead, who now reside in Richland township, this county.  To 
Mr. and Mrs. DePew have been born two children, Ralph and Harold.  Mr. 
DePew is a representative of one of the honored old families of this 
community and has ably sustained the enviable reputation, which his 
forbears won during their residence here, his efforts being always 
exerted toward the advancement of his own interests as well as those of 
his fellows.  Because of his genial disposition, agreeable nature and 
his kindly attitude to those about him, he has won many warm friends 
and numbers his acquaintances throughout this section of the county.



Submitted by:

Arlene Goodwin

Auburn, Indiana

Agoodwin@ctlnet.con