Fayette County PA Archives Biographies.....Crawford, Seaborn March 27, 1826 - ????
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/pafiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Marta Burns marta43@juno.com September 1, 2024, 10:09 am

Source: Gresham and Wiley, 1889: Biographical & Portrait Cyclopedia, Fayette Co, PA, pg 259
Author: John H. Gresham & Samuel T. Wiley

    Seaborn Crawford, undertaker and furniture dealer of 
Brownsville, is a son of Nathan Crawford and Mary Carlton 
Crawford.  He was born in West Pike Run township, Washington 
county, Penna, March 27, 1826.  Seaborn Crawford 
(grandfather) came from Maryland, and located in Washington 
county, Penna, and was a farmer and blacksmith.  
    Nathan Crawford (father) was born in West Pike Run 
township, March, 1804, and lived and farmed in that and 
Somerset township until about 1860, when he moved to Luzerne 
village, where he lived until 1884, and died in July of that 
year, aged eighty years.  He married Mary Carlton, who died 
January 2, 1870.  They had seven children: Samuel C 
Crawford, a layer, who died in Little Rock, Arkansas, 
January, 1857; Mark C Crawford, a carpenter who died in 
Canton, Ohio; Richard Crawford, a carpenter; Beulah 
Crawford, widow of Caleb Odbert; Sarah F Crawford, wife of 
Thornton Rogers; Liddia Crawford, a twin sister of Sarah, 
died at the age of four months; and Seaborn Crawford.
    Seaborn Crawford was reared on a farm, attended the 
subscription schools until he was eighteen years of age, 
when he spent three years in learning the trade of carpenter 
with Andrew Hopkins of Bridgeport.  He received board and 
washing and $100 in money for his labor.
    In the fall of 1848 he went to Cincinnati to work at his 
trade, but finding little work in that city he engaged as a 
book agent with a Connecticut Yankee, and successfully 
solicited orders in western Ohio and eastern Indiana until 
the following spring.  
    He returned home and continued or pursued his trade 
until 1850 when he caught the "gold fever" but possessing 
little money, he borrowed $500 of his friend Daniel P 
Griffith.  Leaving Pittsburgh April 10, 1850, Mr Crawford 
and Gideon Allison, a medical student of Brownsville, 
traveled by boat to western Missouri; there they rigged out 
a mule team and started for California, traveling by way of 
Fort Bridger and Salt Lake City.  On their arrival at the 
base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, they cut up their wagon 
and made pack saddles, so as to enable them to carry their 
provisions and clothing across the mountains.  
    Mr Crawford remained between two and three years in 
California, where he was engaged in operating a sawmill and 
mining.  He returned home by way of the isthmus, spent a day 
in Acapulco, Mexico, and one day and night in Jamaica, and 
landed in Norfolk, Virginia, October, 1852.
    In the winter of 1852-53 he attended school at Mt Union, 
Ohio, and in the summer of 1853, he went to Illinois and 
invested in land in Bureau county.  In the fall of 1853 he 
returned to Brownsville and became a member of the dry goods 
firm, D P Griffith & Co of Bridgeport.  He remained in this 
firm until the winter of 1856.  He was married to Miss Edith 
Riley, daughter of John and Edith Riley, May 2, 1854. In 
1857 he removed to Clarke county, Iowa, with his wife and 
one child, and engaged for three years in the flouring and 
sawmill business with Isaac and Loyd Bennett.
    In 1860 he rented his mill interests; with his wife and 
two children he returned to Brownsville.  He started on a 
second trip to the far West, and with an ox team and cow 
crossed the plains, entered the Rocky Mountains at the 
"Golden Gate" and arrived at Central City in June.  He 
remained here for nearly two years, was engaged in erecting 
quartz mills, mining and prospecting.  In the fall of 1861 he 
returned to Denver, and helped to erect the soldiers' 
barracks.  From thence he returned to Brownsville, and 
engaged in carpenter work for two years.  In 1864 he began 
merchandising in the "Neck" at Brownsville, continuing until 
1882.  In that year he engaged in the sawmill business, 
lumber and coal boat siding business. May 1, 1885, he 
engaged in his present furniture and undertaking business in 
Brownsville.  He has in his warerooms such goods as will add 
to the elegance and comfort of any home.  He also 
understands and practices successfully the art of cavity and 
arterial embalming.  Mr Crawford has three children: Charles 
C Crawford, attorney at law in Pittsburgh; Samuel C 
Crawford, in the furniture business; and Luther L Crawford, 
a druggist. Mr Crawford was reared a Friend or Quaker, was 
an anti-slavery man, and is at present an ardent temperance 
advocate, and a member of the Cumberland Presbyterian 
church.  

Additional Comments:
Originally submitted 2000.

This file has been created by a form at http://www.usgwarchives.net/pafiles/

File size: 5.1 Kb