Samuel LAW, farmer. Ohio Grove, Mercer County, is a prominent, successful and influential citizen, born in 1854 on the farm in Monmouth Township, Warren County, on which he lived until 1902, a son of James and Mary (SKINNER) LAW, natives respectively of Washington County, Penn., and of Ohio. James LAW emigrated early in life to Ohio, married there, and, in 1849, drove to Warren County, Ill., and bought land in Monmouth Township of Gen. A. C. HARDING, who had bought it from a man who had pre-empted it. He improved a fine farm of one hundred and sixty acres, on which he died in 1884, his wife in 1889. He had previously entered another piece of land which he had sold. A man of good abilities, he was a leader in local affairs and an active member of the First United Presbyterian church of Monmouth.

His wife bore him ten children: Helen, who married C. P. AVENELL, of Monmouth Township; Robert, of Ringgold, Iowa; Mary, who married Dr. HOME, of Mt. Ayr, Iowa; Sarah, of Monmouth; Samuel; William, of Monmouth; and Charles, Marcia, Lucy and James, all of whom died in Monmouth Township.

Samuel LAW attended the public school near his home in Monmouth Township, took a commercial course in Monmouth, and settled down to the contented and profitable life of a farmer who loves the land and knows how too make it yield abundantly. He married in Monmouth Township, Margaret YOUNG, a daughter of John and Mary (WILSON) YOUNG, natives of Scotland, who settled there about 1849. Mr. YOUNG, who was a farmer, died there in 1888; his widow lives in Nebraska.

Mr. and Mrs. LAW are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and are prominent in all good work in their vicinity. They have five children — Ivan, Lola, Wilma, Helen and Harold. In 1902 Mr. LAW bought a farm of 200 acres in Ohio Grove Township, Mercer County, where he now resides.

SOURCE: "Warren County, Monmouth Township" Chapt. 43. Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois p. 65. 1903

Transcription by Sharon R. Becker, March of 2010