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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 Ferdinand WEIRATHER 

Page 490, transcribed in full by Danni Hopkins 

[Surnames: WEIDENSEE, WEIRATHER] 

    
FERDINAND WEIRATHER, a well-to-do farmer, resident of Lewistown Township, was born in Baden, Germany, on January, 1825. His father, Francis Joseph Weirather, was a native of the same place. He was a shoemaker by trade, and spent his entire live in the Fatherland. He was a descendant of an ancient family that emigrated from Italy to Germany during the Roman conquest. 
    
Ferdinand was the only son of his father, and was very young when the latter died. He was cared for by his mother and stepfather and received a sound education in the schools of his native land, which he attended until he was fourteen years old. At that age he was apprenticed to learn the trade of a cabinet-maker at which he served two and one-half years. At the expiration of that time, as was then the custom, he traveled and worked in different cities in Germany the ensuing three years. He was ambitious to better his condition and in March, 1846, emigrated to America to find what life held for him here. He went first to Liverpool, England, and from there set sail on a vessel bound for these shores and landed at New York after a voyage of thirty-five days. A stranger in a strange land who could not talk the language of its people and without money, our subject was in a forlorn condition when he arrived. But with good courage he set out to find work, and soon obtained employment at his trade in the city. He remained in New York two years, and then went to New Orleans. After a short stay there he ascended the Mississippi River to Quincy and worked there for a time. He then boarded a steamer bound for Peoria, but on his arrival at that place he was disappointed to find it a much smaller village than he expected, so he did not land but kept on to Peru, and thence went by canal to Chicago. That city was not then a very large town and though he could get work there he could not get his pay in cash, but had to take it in orders on a store. That did not suit him so he concluded to go further eastward and pushed on to Buffalo by the way of the Lakes and then by railraod and Hudson River, and finally found himself once again in New York City. He secured employment in a piano factory and remained there until 1855. 
    
In that year our subject returned to Illinois, and for one year worked at his trade in Peoria. During that time he visited Fulton County, and bought the farm where he now resides which is pleasantly located on section 6, Lewistown Township. He settled on the place in 1856 and has since made his home here. His farm is one of the choice farms of the township, is under excellent cultivation and is provided with neat and well-built frame buildings and everything for carrying on agriculture advantageously. 
    Mr. Weirather has proved as capable a farmer as he has shown himself to be a skilled mechanic, and has been well prospered in his agricultural ventures. He is a man of sold virtues, sensible and thoughtful in his views, and in him and his wife the Baptist Church finds two Christian members. 
    
Mr. Weirather was married in 1850 to Nathalie Weidensee, a native of Saxony, Germany. They have been eminently happy in their domestic relations and have been blessed by ten children: Ferdinand, Edward J., Herman, Amelia, Charles, Mary, Ida, George, Sidney and Harrie, all living.