Page:Sketches of representative women of New England.djvu/531

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398
REPRESENTATIVE WOMEN OF NEW ENGLAND

His name is on the Revolutionary Rolls of New Hampshire as having enlisted in the army. His daughter Lucy, sister of Dolly, ways the mother of the late Hon. Rufus Frost, ex-Mayor of Chelsea, Mass. David was a son of Joseph^ and Deborah (Whitney) Wheeler and grandson of John' and Elizabeth (Wells) Wheeler, who settled in Marlboro, Mass. John' Wheeler was born in Concord, Mass., in 1661, son of Thomas^ and Hannah (Harrod, now spelled Harwood) Wheeler. According to the accounts of the Wheeler family given in the histories of Marlboro, Mass., and Marlboro, N.H., Thomas^ was a son of Thomas Wheeler, who was in Concord, Mass., in 1640, was a Captain in King Philip's War, and was wounded at Quaboag (now Brookfield), Mass., in August, 1675, when his horse was shot from under him. His son Thomas placed him on a horse whose rider had been slain, and both succeeded in escaping.

Mr. and Mrs. Luther R. Grover have two children: Elvira Anna (Mrs. Tibbetts) ; and Stillman Richmond Grover, a prosperous jewelry manufacturer in Attleboro, Mass. Stillman R. Grover married December 25, 1873, Thedora Ashley, of Taunton, Mass. They have one child, Esther Elvira, born in October, 1887, now a student in the Attleboro High School.

Elvira A. Grover completed her education at the Foxboro English Classical School, a private high school in the centre of the town. She taught school several terms in Dighton and Wrentham. On June 11, 1873, she was married to John Chase Tibbetts, a native of Hamilton, Mass.

Mr. Tibbetts was born November 15, 1846. He is a descendant of Aquila Chase, who came from England and settled at Hampton, N.H., as early as 1640, and a few years later removed to Newbury, Mass. Mr. Tibbetts has been successfully engaged in mercantile business since 1869. He is a public-spirited citizen of South Boston, interested in all that pertains to its welfare. He is one of the founders of the Boston Retail Grocers' Association; is a Past Noble Grand of Tremont Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, of Boston; has served as District Deputy of the order, and is a member of Massachusetts Encampment, I. 0. of 0. F. He is a member of the South Boston Citizens' Association, is treasurer and a Deacon of the Phillips Congregational Church on Broadway, and is an associate member of Dahlgren Post, No. 2, Grand Army of the Republic. It has been said of him that "his career is one that adds lustre to the history of South Boston."

Mrs. Tibbetts is interested in charitable and patriotic work. She joined the Ladies' Aid Association of the Soldiers' Home in Massachusetts soon after it was organized. She has served as visitor and director many years, and often visits the home on Powder Horn Hill in Chelsea. She has been a member of the Helping Hand Society and also of the Home for Aged Couples. She attends the Phillips Congregational Church. Mrs. Tibbetts is one of the charter members of the Charity Club, and served two years on its Board of Directors. She has charter membership in the Floral Emblem Society of Massachusetts, and is a member of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union at Upham's Corner, Dorchester, of which Mrs. Julia K. Dyer is president. Mr. and Mrs. Tibbetts have had two children: Alva Grover, born September 9, 1878, in Foxboro; and John Richmond, born in Foxboro, January 7, 1882 (died when ten months old). Alva Grover Tibbetts is a student in the Law School of Boston University. Mrs. Tibbetts, although deeply interested in public work, is devoted to her home. She enjoys the society of her friends, and a friendship once formed with her is never broken. Her house is situated on a part of Dorchester Heights, the historic ground where Washington viewed the departure of the British troops from Boston. From the tower of her house can be seen the ships in the harbor and many places associated with the history of Boston.


ABBIE TRASK USHER, for four years President of the Woman's Relief Corps, auxiliary to A. W. Bartlett Post, G. A. R. of Newburyport, was born in Roxbury, Mass., September 19, 1847, a daughter of John Bowdlear and his wife, Mary Seeley. Educated in the public schools of Roxbury, Abbie Trask Bowdlear shortly after her gradua-