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HISTORY OF ERIE COUNTY 59
Fish, was born in ToAvnsend Township, Huron County, Ohio, October
2, 1872. lie pursued his later studies in Oberlin and in the L'niversify
of Wisconsin, and for a number of years taught schaol in Florence and
Berlin tOAvnships. He Avas married April 12, 1910\to Anna Sophia,
daughter of Boardman Henry Packer and Mary Annie Hanson Packer
of Greenville, Michigan, and later of Chicago. Tlieir only child, John
Boardman, was born December 29, 1910, in Chicago. They live on their
fine farm on the bluffs overlooking the beautiful valley ofc-the Vermilion
River, about one mile south of Birmingham, Erie County, Avhere they
are enthusiastically engaged in agriculture and horticulture.
These children, eight of tliem^ are college bred. But IIOAV mature
men and Avomen all of them, they knoAv that at the old home, under the
careful training of their mother 'when they were children, and later in
their father's school of all schools, they received all the vital part of
tlieir training.
The Fish home is of some historic interest. It is situated in Florence
Township near the western line thereof, and on the old State Road Avhich
for a century has been a thoroughfare—in the earliest days carrying a
procession of settlers' moving Avagons, many of which were drawn by
oxen; later the regular stage coach shuttling travelers to and fro, and
IIOAV an automobile route betAveen Cleveland and Toledo. The land upon
AA'hich it. is situated was bought in 1824 by James Clark Judson of Connecticut,
a mechanic and land surveyor, noted for sound sense, good
heart, industry and rectitude; an excellent companion, a first-rate teller
of stories, interspersed ahvays with flashes of his OAVH humor, who in 1828
erected on the place the substantial house greatly in advance of the times
for that locality in its character and furnishings, and set out an apple
orchard Avhich flourished for more than fifty years and disappeared only
Avith the fall of the last tree in a summer storm of 1915.
Churches of various denominations have been founded at different
times. The first religious meetings were held at the house of Eli S.
Barnum, at Florence Corners, at which itinerant preachers officiated.
The first church organization Avas the Congregational. The meeting
Avas held at the Barnum house by a missionary named Loomis. This
society included members from Vermillion, Wakeman and Clarksfield.
The present Congregational Church was organized January 7. 1832, by
a committee of the Presbytery of Huron, consisting of J. B. Bradstreet.
'Xenophon Betts and Samuel Dunton. It had at that time seventeen
members, and Uriah HaAvley was chosqii clerk. A church building, costing
$2,012, was completed in 1842. The lot was donated by Jessup
Wakeman. For several years this church had to depend upon preachers
from neighboring towns. In 1842 Rev. Eldad Barber was called as its
first regular pastor. He remained until 1871, and Avas folloAved by
Hubbard Lawrence, who remained until 1878. Rev. Mr. Hale served
from April until August of that year, being succeeded by Mr. Wright.
The First, Congregational Church of Birmingham was originally
Presbyterian. It AA'as organized in 1838 by a committee consisting of
Philo Wells and Xenophon Betts, of Vermillion, and Joseph Swift, of
Henrietta. In 1845 the church adopted the Congregational form, but
continued under the care of the presbytery until 1874, AA'hen it Avith-