This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: PENNELL, GREEN, MCCROSSEN, HAZEN, AYER Classification: Biography Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/kFB.2ACE/4175 Message Board Post: In the death of John Wesley Pennell, Kent County lost another of that generation of agriculturists upon whose energy, industry and foresight so much of the material greatness of the county was builded. He, with other men of his day, passed through an important period of the country's growth and assisted in the establishing of high agricultural standards and principles. Courage, faith and will belonged to the men of that day and John W. Pennell shared those manly virtues fully. His reward was success in a measure than any man might hope for and the respect of his fellow men which all men covet. He was born at Richmond, Ontario County, New York, April 21, 1832, son of John and Sallie (Green) Pennell, natives of Massachusetts and Vermont respectively, and farming people of New York who died at Richmond, to which place the paternal grandfather had removed from Colerain, Mass., many years before. John Welsey Pennell was reared and educated in the town of Richmond, N.Y. He followe! d farming about a year near Canandaigua, and in December, 1856, came to the West and located in Kent County, taking up his residence on a farm one mile south of the present city limits of Grand Rapids, in April, 1857, and on this farm he continued to be engaged in agricultural operations until his retirement in November, 1893. At that time he settled down to quietly enjoy the evening of his life in his comfortable home at Burton Heights, where his death occurred, Oct. 15, 1915. In spite of all that he accomplished as a successful agriculturist, Mr. Pennell was prouder of the fact that he had accomplished all this by himself than of his material success. He knew the struggles and hardships of his early days and what he had overcome, and so he appreciated what he had acquired more as a triumph over difficult circumstances than as a mere accumulation of means. He was a Republican, but did not seek public office, and his religious relations were with the Universalist Church. Mr.! Pennell was married March 29, 1855, to Celia D., daughter of Isaac D. and Susan (McCrossen) Hazen. She was born, reared and educated in the town of Richmond, N.Y., where her father was a merchant. Her parents came to Grand Rapids in 1855, both Mr. and Mrs. Hazen dying in this city after some years of retirement. She survives her husband and resides in an attractive home at No. 1839 Division Avenue, South. Mr. and Mrs. Pennell became the parents of the following children: John W., a resident of Irvington, Ala., and the father of two children – Susan Hazen, deceased and Mrs. La Myra P. Ayer, of San Francisco, Cal.; Harriet P., of Boulder, Colo., who is married and the mother of three children – Jessie H., Gerald Leroy Weatherwax, and George W., deceased; James H., deceased; Jessie E., who is unmarried and makes her home with her mother at Grand Rapids; Charles G., of Bay City, Mich., who has five children – John W., Hamilton Adams, Elizabeth, Janet and! Charles G., Jr.; and Don Hazen, of Irvington, Ala., who has three children – J. Hazen, Roderick Pratt and Helen Adalaide.