Christie, Hon. Orean W.
Mayor of Ligonier, Ind., and an enterprising business man of no inconsiderable prominence, is a native of Benton township, Elkhart county, Ind., and was born November 18, 1861.
Collins M. and Charlotte H. (Kitson) Christie, the parents of Hon. O. W. Christie and respectively of Scotch and Dutch descent, now residents of the township in which their son was born, are natives of Ohio, and have a family of six children, born in the following order: Orean W.; Milo E., who is cashier in the Lake Shore Railway Company's freight office at La Porte, Ind., is married and stands very high in the esteem of the officers of the railway company and of the residents of La Porte; Delvin E. is a banker in Illinois and is unmarried; Adrian A. is teacher in Elkhart county, Ind.; Leona is the wife of Curtis Green, a prosperous farmer and also a resident of Elkhart county; Laura Edith, who was formerly a teacher, is now postmistress at Benton, Ind., and makes her home with her parents.
Hon. Orean W. Christie was educated primarily in the district schools of Elkhart county, and, secondarily, at the Syracuse Summer Normal School, and at the age of seventeen years he entered upon the perplexing vocation of teaching and for six years followed this profession in his native township where he was both successful and popular as an educator of marked ability. This position he resigned, however, to accept a situation more remunerative and more agreeable with the L. S. & M. S. Railway Company, with whom he remained about three years, when he resigned to accept that of bookkeeper for the Ligonier Milling Company, and this position, responsible and arduous as it is, he has held for eleven years.
Mr. Christie was united in marriage at Warsaw, Ind., July 4, 189, with Miss Theora M. Benner, a native of Kosciusko county, Ind., and a daughter of James Benner. She was educated at Syracuse and there formed the acquaintanceship of Mr. Christie when he also was a devotee at the shrine of knowledge. One child, Marie Cecile, came to crown this union September 6, 1894, anf is now, as may be readily conceived by the reader, the central attraction of the homestead.
In politics Mr. Christie has been a lifelong Republican, and in the spring of 1898 was honored by his party by his election to the responsible office of mayor of Ligonier. He is now filling out the third of the fourt-year term, and has had the satisfaction, in the meantime, of rendering such services in his position as to win the approbation of all citzens, of all parties, save perhaps, that of few disgruntled politicians and envious office-seekers.
In his fraternal relations Mr. Christie is a member of Ligonier Lodge, No. 184, A. F. & A. M., and likewise of Ligonier Lodge, No. 123, K. of P., in the latter of which he is a P.C.C. and has been a member of the standing committee on subordinate lodge, constitutions and by-laws in the Grand Lodge for four years--three years of this period as chairman, his present office; he is also a member of the K. O. T. M. He and his wife are consistent members of the Presbyterian church, in which he is an elder, as well as superintendent of the Sunday-school, and in the work of both the church and school they take an exceeding interest.
Mr. Christie is truly a self-made man in the colloquial sense of the phrase, and too much credit cannot be awarded him for the indomitable courage with which he has overcome the many obstacles which lie in the way of the seeker after a competency and the proper station of usefulness befitting men of his caliber.
Alford's History of Noble County, Indiana, by Samuel E. Alvord, (c) 1902, pp. 151-152.
Collins, Charles
CHARLES COLLINS, foreman of the finishing department of John Deibele's sash, door and blind manufactory, is a native of Pennsylvania, and in 1840 moved with his parents to Ohio. They settled in Defiance County, where, upon a farm, our subject passed his earlier days. He then learned the carpenter's trade, and after a short period, came to Noble County, first locating at Wolcottville. He was identified with the contracting and building interest of Noble and La Grange Counties for over twenty-five years. He came to Kendallville in 1879, and became associated with the establishment of John Deibele, and is now the foreman of the finishing department of that institution. He enlisted in 1863, in Company C, One Hundred and Twenty-ninth Illinois Volunteer Infantry, and served until the close of the war, being mustered out as Second Lieutenant. He passed through some severe and trying service, participating in eight of the leading battles. Mr. Collins was united in marriage, in 1858, to Miss Isabella Newman. They have two children -- Ora and Minnie M.
Goodspeed, Weston A, Richard Collins, Thomas R. Marshall, W. L. Matthews; Counties of Whitley and Noble, Indiana: historical and biographical; Chicago, F. A. Battey & Co., 1882, p. 299-300.