SAMUEL
MCCLURE, agent and general manager of the Stewart Iron Company,
Limited, of Sharon, Mercer county, is one of the veteran leaders in the
founding, management and development of the industrial and financial
institutions of the Shenango valley. He was born in Little Beaver
township, Beaver county, Pennsylvania, January 3, 1839, and is the
eldest son of Joseph and Nancy (Clark) McClure, of Clarksville,
Pennsylvania. The father was born in the parish of Convoy, county of
Donegal, Ireland, in April, 1810, and was a son of Nathaniel and
Catherine (Noble) McClure, natives of the same place. In 1831
Nathaniel and wife, with three sons, Joseph, John and
Thomas, emigrated to Little Beaver township, Beaver county,
Pennsylvania, where they settled on a farm and where the father resided
until his death. During the construction of the Beaver and Erie canal
Joseph McClure began working on that improvement in Beaver county and
while thus engaged learned the stone-cutter’s trade. He continued
working and contracting on the same public improvement until he arrived
at Clarksville, Mercer county. He there met and married Miss
Nancy, daughter of Samuel and Mary Clark.
Samuel Clark was born
near the Lehigh river, in Northampton county, Pennsylvania, January 17,
1770. Seven months after his father’s death, in the latter part of
1771, his mother returned to Wallpack, Sussex county, New Jersey, where
she had been reared. Her people were Germans, and little Samuel first
learned to speak that language. By her industry the mother supported
her family in their infancy, all through the tedious war of the
Revolution, and was often subjected to much trouble and annoyance (the
Indians being on the north and west and the British army on the south
and east) and more than once she was forced to seek safety in the fort.
At the age of fourteen Samuel was bound out to John Dimon, a carpenter
and wagonmaker, and served through seven years of drudgery. On April
18, 1792, he married Mary Custer, by whom he had ten children, as
follows: William, born June 8, 1794, in Sussex county, New Jersey;
Samuel, born in New Jersey, August 13, 1796, died near Sharon;
Catherine, born in Jefferson county, Ohio, April 12, 1798,
married James Simonton; Abraham, born in Jefferson county, Ohio, May
21, 1800, died in Clarksville in October, 1888; Mary, born in Jefferson
county, Ohio, March 10, 1802, married John Conley; Sarah, born in
Jefferson county, Ohio, April 11, 1804, married John Gillespie;
Susannah, deceased, born in Pymatuning township, Mercer county,
Pennsylvania, July 15, 1806, married John Fruit; Jane, born in Mercer
county, January 8, 1811; Nancy, born in Mercer county, September 6,
1813, and died April 17, 1890, the wife of Joseph McClure, of
Clarksville; and Jacob. Samuel Clark, Sr., the father, died October 29,
1860, aged ninety years. nine months and twelve days, and his widow,
Mary (Custer) Clark, died October 7, 1863. aged ninety-one years,
eleven months and twenty-three days. Her family gave to the world the
brave General Custer, who was killed by the Sioux Indians in June, 1876.
Soon after his marriage Joseph McClure returned to the old home in
Beaver county, where he remained until 1840, when he sold the farm and
removed to Clarksville, which was the headquarters of a general
business, with branches at other points in Mercer county. His mother,
with his brothers, John and Thomas, afterward removed to Girard,
Pennsylvania, where John and the mother resided until their
decease, and where Thomas still lives. In 1846 Joseph
McClure, with his brother John, formed a partnership with B. B. Vincent
and David Himrod, and, under the firm name of Vincent, Himrod &
Co., erected the first blast furnace in Sharpsville, this county, and
Joseph located at that point. After a trial of several years, this
venture proving unsuccessful, he returned to Clarksville and resumed
the merchandise business in connection with farming and contracting
until his death.
To Joseph and Nancy McClure were born ten
children: Samuel, Joseph N., Thomas, Catherine, Mary, Nancy, Sarah,
John, Nathaniel and Rebecca, all whom are living except
Catherine, who died July 22, 1883, John, who died March 8, 1892,
and Joseph N., who died in May, 1898. Mr. McClure was a Whig until
1854, when the growth of Knownothingism made him a Democrat, which he
remained until the breaking out of the war ; he then voted with the
Republicans until 1863. when he again became a Democrat, supporting the
principles of that party until the time of his death. He was a member
of the United Presbyterian church, and was largely connected with the
growth and development of the Shenango valley for nearly half a century.
Samuel
McClure received the usual common school education and then spent
several years at the Girard (Pennsylvania) Academy. He grew to manhood
under the parental roof, working on the farm and clerking in his
father’s store during boyhood, and in 1861 he began clerking in
Clarksville. In 1862 he entered the employ of James Wood & Son, of
Pittsburg, and was sent to Homewood Furnace, Lawrence county,
Pennsylvania, to take the management of the firm’s store at that place,
being transferred during the following year to Wheatland as cashier and
bookkeeper of its interests there. He filled these positions, as well
as those of superintendent and manager, until 1873, when the firm
failed, and he then went to West Middlesex as manager of a blast
furnace at that place.
In January, 1874, Mr. McClure came to
Sharon to accept the position of superintendent of the Stewart Iron
Company, Limited. In October, 1889, he acquired an interest and was
elected one of the managers, as well as being general manager of the
iron business of this company in the Shenango valley and of its coking
interests at Uniontown, Fayette county, Pennsylvania, the plant at the
latter point being tinder his direction. Under Mr. McClure’s able
management the business of this firm has grown prosperous and stands
second to none in the valley. In 1886 he became associated with F. H.
Buhl and Daniel Eagan in the organization of the Sharon Steel Casting
Company, of which he was elected vice president. This company was later
acquired by the American Steel Casting Company, which in 1902 became a
constituent company of the American Steel Foundries. Mr. McClure is
president of the Sharon Savings and Trust Company and is also president
of the Union Lime stone Company, the Valley Connecting Railroad Company
and the Shenango Machine Company. Professionally he is a member of the
American Institute of Mining Engineers and of the British Iron and
Steel Institute; fraternally, a Mason, and, socially, a member of the
Duquesne Club of Pittsburg and numerous other organizations. Mr.
McClure was initiated into Sharon Lodge No. 250, A. F. & A. M., in
1865, and is one of its oldest members. He also belongs to Norman
Chapter No. 244,R. A. M.; Rebecca Commandery No. 50, K. T., of which he
is past eminent commander.
On July 1, 1863, Mr. McClure married
Miss Augusta R. Dickson, of Clarksville, to which union three
daughters have been born, all living; Mary A., who on August 30, 1883,
married Charles F. Phillips, assistant manager of the Stewart Iron
Company, Sharon; Anna D., who in October, 1895, married David M.
Forker; and Jennie, wife of Dr. Clifford Marshall. Mr. McClure is a
leading Republican and in 1884 was elected state senator for the
Forty-seventh district and was the choice of his county for
renomination.
Source: (Twentieth Century History of Mercer County, 1909, pages 364-367)
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