Western Pennsylvania Genealogy
Compiled by Douglas H. Lusher


Family Group Record



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Dr. Joseph Mayhew Harding and Thankful Slingerland




Husband Dr. Joseph Mayhew Harding 1 2

           Born: 3 Feb 1828 - Sullivan, Tioga Co, PA 2
     Christened: 
           Died: 1903 - Little Meadows, Susquehanna Co, PA 2
         Buried:  - Grove Hill Cemetery, Oil City, Venango Co, PA


         Father: Joseph Mayhew Harding (1794-1876) 1 2
         Mother: Permelia Meltire Hayden (1802-1849) 1 3


       Marriage: 1849 - Sullivan, Tioga Co, PA 4

   Other Spouse: Elizabeth Wells Graves (1834-1924) 4 5 - 14 Feb 1860 4



Wife Thankful Slingerland 4 5

           Born: 
     Christened: 
           Died: 1859 5
         Buried: 


Children
1 F Francella Harding 4

            AKA: Frank Harding 5
           Born: 20 Jun 1851 - Sullivan, Tioga Co, PA 4
     Christened: 
           Died: 24 Dec 1895 - Meadville, Crawford Co, PA 4
         Buried: 
         Spouse: John G. Ogden (      -      ) 4


2 F Jennie Ceven Harding 4 5 6

           Born: 22 May 1853 - Warren Twp, Bradford Co, PA 4
     Christened: 
           Died: 3 Oct 1937 - Oil City, Venango Co, PA 7
         Buried:  - Grove Hill Cemetery, Oil City, Venango Co, PA
         Spouse: Wilson R. Barr (1839-1912) 4 6
           Marr: 30 Jun 1874 8


3 F Medora Harding 4 5

           Born: 21 Aug 1856 - Warren, Warren Co, PA 4
     Christened: 
           Died: 
         Buried: 
         Spouse: Jacob Goettel (      -      ) 4
           Marr: 25 Mar 1880 - Oil City, Venango Co, PA 4



General Notes: Husband - Dr. Joseph Mayhew Harding


He was born in Bradford County, Pennsylvania, February 3, 1829. [HVC 1890, 866]

He was educated in the common schools and Troy Academy. At the age of twenty years he began the study of medicine under the instruction of Doctor F. H. White of Tioga County, Pennsylvania, who lived to be one hundred and seven years old. After two years of hard study with Doctor White he entered the office of Doctor D. H. Sweeny of Burlington, Bradford County, where he remained three years, afterward attending Geneva Medical College one term. He began practice in Herrick, Bradford County, and one year later bought the office of Doctor Parenett of Warren, where he practiced for seven years, and then located at Apalachin, Tioga County, New York, remaining there seven years. In 1867 he removed to Oil City, where he has since remained. He has discovered two special medicines for catarrh and lung trouble.
He was a member of the Oil City council, and became a member of the New York State Eclectic Society in 1874, and was a charter member of the National Eclectic Medical Society. He was graduated at the United States Medical College at New York in 1882, was acting president of the Pennsylvania State Eclectic Medical Society, and was the organizer and first president of the first Eclectic medical society in western Pennsylvania, of which he was an active member. He was one of the trustees of Burton's Medical College of Philadelphia. He was a member of the Masonic order since 1874, and belonged to the chapter in Oswego, New York, and New Jerusalem No. 47 of the same city; he was a Knight Templar belonging to Talbot Commandery, No. 43, Oil City, and was a member of the A. O. U. W. In politics he was an independent Republican, and his entire family belonged to the Methodist church.

After his general education had been acquired, he studied medicine under the leading physician of Sullivan, Pennsylvania. He was admitted to practice when about twenty-one years of age, and located at Warren Center, Pennsylvania, removing later to Little Meadows, in the same county. Remaining there for awhile, he then removed to Apalachin, New York, where he continued practice for five years. During these first years of his practice he became connected with a lecture course and spent much time in that field, and while thus engaged he visited Oil City, Pennsylvania, and other places in the western portion of the state, as well as different portions of New York state. He became so impressed with Oil City that he finally located there, opening a practice and establishing his home. In 1890, wishing to take up the study of surgery, he removed to New York City and entered the New York Medical College, becoming a member of the hospital and a lecturer of the college. He at the same time established a practice in which he engaged for seven years. On account of failing health, however, he gave up his residence in New York and returned to Little Meadows, Pennsylvania, where his wife's people resided and passed the remainder of his life there. His health had been much improved and his life prolonged by the change to country air, and he followed his profession to the end.

Dr. Harding was closely related to a number of persons in public life and of distinguished attainments; Colonel Harding, a commander of the Union forces during the civil war, was a cousin of his, as were also George and William Harding, of Philadelphia. The well-known authoress, Rebecca Harding Davis, sister of George and William Harding, was also a cousin of the doctor; she married Mr. L. Clarke Davis, of Philadelphia, who died in 1904, and has two sons, Richard Harding and Charles Belmont, and one daughter. Mr. Davis was a man of great prominence in Philadelphia, and after his marriage to Miss Harding became editor of the Philadelphia Public Ledger. Mrs. Davis has won great distinction by her writings, being one of the most popular contributors to the leading magazines in the country; her infancy was passed in Alabama, and she subsequently made her residence in Wheeling, West Virginia, where she was married in 1863. Her equally distinguished son, Richard Harding Davis, was born the following year in Philadelphia, and has become one of the best known novelists and playwrights of modern times; he was educated at Lehigh and Johns Hopkins univer-sities, and became war correspondent for the London Times and New York Herald during the Turkish-Greek, Spanish-American, and Russian-Japanese wars. He is a member of many distinguished societies and clubs; and in 1899 was married to Cecil, daughter of J. M. Clarke, of Chicago. Another sister of these two Philadelphia Hardings married Charles E. Warburton, founder of the Philadelphia Evening Telegraph; their son, Barclay H. Warburton, born in 1866, afterward became publisher of this paper and president of the company. He married Mary B., daughter of John Wanamaker, and lives at Wyncote, Pennsylvania. Richard Harding, the father of George and William Harding, Mrs. Davis and Mrs. Warburton, left Massachusetts at an early day with Samuel and another brother, settling in the west. The family was of English ancestry, their progenitors having settled in the north of Ireland during Queen Elizabeth's reign.

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Sources


1 —, History of Venango County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: Brown, Runk, & Co., Publishers, 1890), Pg 866.

2 John W. Jordan, LL.D., Genealogical and Personal History of the Allegheny Valley, Pennsylvania (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1913), Pg 1136.

3 John W. Jordan, LL.D., Genealogical and Personal History of the Allegheny Valley, Pennsylvania (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1913), Pg 1135.

4 John W. Jordan, LL.D., Genealogical and Personal History of the Allegheny Valley, Pennsylvania (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1913), Pg 1137.

5 —, History of Venango County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: Brown, Runk, & Co., Publishers, 1890), Pg 867.

6 Charles A. Babcock, Venango County, Pennsylvania, Her Pioneers and People (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Co., 1919), Pg 651.

7 Joseph Riesenman, Jr., History of Northwestern Pennsylvania, Vol. III (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Co., Inc., 1943), Pg 62.

8 John W. Jordan, LL.D., Genealogical and Personal History of the Allegheny Valley, Pennsylvania (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1913), Pg 1139.


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