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File contributed to the Fulton County ILGenWeb Project
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Source: Portrait and Biographical Album of Fulton County
Biographical Publishing Co., Chicago, 1890

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The Biography of G. W. HOBBS 

Pages 265-266, transcribed in full by Danni Hopkins 

[Surnames: FIELDS, FRANKLIN, HOBBS, HUMPHREY, McCOY, SIMERAL, WALLACE, WILSON] 

    
G. W. HOBBS, now living in Mound Township, McDonough County, was one of the early pioneers of this county, who was for many years closely identified with its industrial interests, as one of its most successful farmers and skillful mechanics, and is eminently worthy of a place among its representative men in this Biographical Album. 
    
Mr. Hobbs was born in Maryland, not far from the city of Baltimore, in 1817. When he was a child his parents took him to the pioneer wilds of Jefferson County, Ohio, of which they were early settlers. In his youth he was apprenticed to a blacksmith by the name of James Simeral, and during the term of his apprenticeship received his board and clothes. At the expiration of that time he went to work with a noted mechanic, Joseph Fields, and toiled hard for the meagre sum of $2 a month, from which he had to clothe himself, and his board. He followed his trade for two years, and then made a trip to New Orleans on the river. He afterward worked in Washington, Pa., the year of the cholera, until all employment was suspended on account of the dreaded disease. In 1834 he came North from New Orleans, whither he had been sojourning, and worked in Georgetown, Ohio, until 1835, when he came to Illinois. He landed at the mouth of the Spoon River, in company with two blacksmiths and two clothiers who had come from Philadelphia. 
    
Mr. Hobbs and Joseph McCoy, who came with him, worked at the blacksmith's business that year in Monmouth. We may mention in this connection that our subject still has the old anvil with which he worked in that place over fifty-five years ago. It had been bought by his father-in-law from a person in the East, and when it was sold with the other effects of the old gentleman, Mr. Hobbs bought it at the rate of twenty cents a pound. It is of English manufacture and is of the best make. Our subject and his partner pursued their calling very profitably at Monmouth, and at the end of the first six months had $106 each. The former very judiciously invested his when he came to Harris Township from Monmouth in the spring of 1836, in a tract of eighty acres of land. He still worked at his calling, however, in the village of Marietta, where he lived, with the exception of the time of his residence in Lewistown during the war, until about nine years ago, when he sold out and removed to his present place of residence in McDonough County. He had three hundred acres of land in Fulton County, and a full section in McDonough County, which he had purchased when it was cheap. He engaged extensively in raising stock and carried on the business in partnership with Mr. Wilson. At the breaking out of the war they had five hundred head of cattle, and as pasture was plentiful and cheap, they made money fast. This county is greatly indebted to our subject for what he did toward improving stock in the early days by the introduction of horses, cattle and hogs of a high grade. He believed in raising none but good stock, and whenever he made a purchase always bought the best in the market. 
    
When Mr. Hobbs came here he had an idea that if he should be able to get forty acres of land he would be well off, and when he obtained eighty acres he considered himself quite rich. With characteristic enterprise he decided that he would have an orchard, and he sent to an old Quaker friend to have him send him a lot of fruit trees such as he thought he would want. His friend sent him one hundred apple trees and a variety of pears, whieh he planted, and they afterward became famous for their fine fruit. From one of his trees our subject often sold as much as $50 worth of fruit each year, and his orchard was regarded as one of the finest in all the country around. 
    
Our subject was married April 20, 1837, to Miss Eliza Humphrey, and their wedded life of more than fifty years duration has been one of great felicity. Mrs. Hobbs is a most excellent woman, of many Christian virtues, and is a true member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. She is a daughter of William Humphrey, of Ohio. His brother, John Humphrey, of Warren County, Ill., was a Colonel in the Black Hawk War. Mr. and Mrs. Hobbs are fine people, and are in every way worthy of the high regard in which they are held by the people among whom they have settled. They have had six children, four sons and two daughters, of whom the following is recorded: George F. was a young married man of thirty-six years when he died, his wife having died before him; John, who is married, owns and occupies a large tract of land which his father purchased in Cass County, Mo.; Jane married James Wallace, a druggist at Lewistown, and they have one daughter; Addison, who bought of his father the old home place of two hundred acres of land lying near Marietta, is married and has two sons and four daughters; Martha married A. J. Franklin, a merchant of Los Angeles, Cal., and they have three children; William, at home, living on the farm near his father, is married and has three children.