Bio: Elijah Ellenberger 1822- : Fayette Co

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The following article 14 February 1912, is taken from a scrapbook in possession of the 
Pennsylvania Room at Uniontown Pennsylvania Library, Uniontown Faith Co. Penna.


                 Dunbar Man Has Over 100 Living Descendants

Ninety years of healthy, industrious life, 63 years of wedded happiness, and more than 100 
descendants form the rare combination of blessings vouchsafed to ELIJAH ELLENBERGER, 
of this town, who is celebrating his birthday today and receiving the congratulations of many 
relatives and friends.  His wife, who will be 81 years old next July, is sharing in the honors.
"I was always a boy and I'm a boy yet," said Elijah in referring to his anniversary.  "I was 
ways light and jolly and never worried.  I'm a colt yet and I ain't fell once this winter.  
During this cold weather I had a severe sick spell and was housed up four weeks, but 
Thank God, I'm not dead yet.  God is leaving me here for some purpose.  There's a part
 God wants me to fulfill.  I'm ready to go whenever he calls me and I'm not making any 
calculations on how long I'll live.
"I never run across the man yet who could pick up a cradle or scythe and go away from me. 
 We worked from sun to sun, and if necessary, a good while after the sun went down.  We
 didn't care for the eight or nine hour system.  I always worked for other people and never
 had any trouble getting work.  In the early days the wages were very small and I've worked 
for 20 cents a day and board after I was full grown man.
"When I was 10 years old I began working on my own for a living and  I've   been making
 it ever since. I did nothing else but farm work and I'd like to be there yet, if I was able to work.
 I'd like to travel with you two weeks and show you the farm where I worked for the 
STRICKLER'S, COCHRANS and HUSTON'S. I was raised where the town of Dawson 
now is.  It was all farm land then and the best land too.
"Somerset County was my birthplace 24 February 1822, but my parents brought me to Fayette
 when I was about 2 1/2 years old. Grandfather ELLENBERGER lived in Upper Tyrone Township
 at the upper end of the Stewart STRICKLER coke ovens.  The first coke I can remember was
 made in these ovens.  They shipped coke to Louisville and Cincinnati and all down the river on
 flat boats, and I went on two or three trips, once to New Orleans.
"The first coke oven STRICKLER built he just ricked it up and covered it just like a big lime 
kiln, and I claim his coke was better than that made now.  They didn't make such large ovens 
in those days and their coke came round quicker.
 I've known all the old families around Dawson.  I know M.M. COCHRAN of Uniontown, 
and I knew his great-grandfather too. What do you think of that?  His father was as nice a
 man as ever I seen.
"After my marriage I worked eight years  for the late Joseph STRICKLER of Upper Tyrone,
 whose widow. Mrs. Barbara STRICKLER now lives in McKeesport, and  she was 90 years 
old last November.  I worked on a farm until we moved to Dunbar 7 years ago.
	
"On 1st February 1849, at 8 o'clock in the morning, I was married to Miss Jane M. Bales, as fine
 a woman as there is in God's  world.  I never regretted my bargain and I like 
her better now than when I married her over 63 years ago, when I was 27 years
 old and she was not yet 18.
"It was a trip of 25 or 30 miles on horseback that I took to get my bride.  I was working for 
John W. STAUFFER on Jacobs Creek near Scottdale, and they let me take grand-mother 
STAUFFER'S riding horse to go after the girl.  I got her at Youngstown at the foot of the ridge
 east of Greensburg.  The day after the wedding she and I rode horseback to the place where 
I was working, and we started housekeeping in a log house.
"For three years, during the Civil War, I was away from my family.  My wife had seven children 
to take care of  when I was in the Army, but she was as stout as a horse and could bind sheaves
 after the cradle, cut corn, and wash, or do anything.
"When I was in Harrisburg I was two years too old to get in the army, but I told a lie and got
 accepted and fought through the war.  I get a pension of  $20 a month now and ought to
 have more at my age in life.  I was in Co. B, 16th Cavalry, enlisting in Connellsville.  My
 brother John was also in the army.  Brother Henry was born a cripple and went as far as 
Camp Howe, Pittsburg and was sent home.
"We've had a round dozen of children, and nine are living now.  We lost three girls, two of
 them died of diphtheria the same night in 1878.
"I've been a member of the M.P. Church since 1872, and my wife is a member too.  Every 
Sunday I'm able I go to Church and Sunday School and I tie up some of your smart, 
educated people on the scripture sometimes.  I didn't go to school hardly any, but studied 
the Bible.  When I was a boy we had to go four or five miles to school and the snow was 
very deep in the winter and we had to work in the summer.
"I was raised a republican, but the last few years I've voted for the man and not the party, 
unless the man was a Socialist."
Mr. and Mrs. ELLENBERGER and their living descendants number 105, counting the wives 
and husbands of the married ones.  There is one descendant of the 5th generation, this 
great-great-grandchild being the 18 month old son of Mr. and Mrs. Roy SHERAW of Hunker.
The nine children of this old couple are Mrs. Mary MCNALLY of Ruffsdale, James D. of Dunbar,
 Joseph formerly of Ruffsdale, Stewart of Iron Bridge, Mrs. John REED of Westmoreland County,
 Mrs. Buell TARR of Dunbar, Mrs. Ezekiel WILSON of New Castle, Mrs. John SHIREY of 
Layton, and Mrs. John INGOLD of Ruffsdale.
One of the granddaughters, Miss Sadie LOUCKS of Ruffsdale, who is here for the celebration,
 observes the same birthday as her grandfather, having also been born on February 24th.
Mrs. ELLENBERGER is in excellent health and works and reads without glasses   During the
 past six years she has quilted 48 quilts.