AMZI LEWIS BALL

The following family history was sent to Joanne Rabun by Iva Hubbard Cook of Sunnyside, Oregon 1994.
This account was recorded in The History of Lake County, Indiana by T.H. Ball.
Amzi Lewis Ball was JTR'S 4G Grandfather.

Pg. 107, Encyclopedia of Genealogy & Biography of Lake Co., Indiana by Rev. T.H. Ball has this to say about Amzi Lewis BALL: The name Amsi L. BALL, occurs quite frequently in the earliest history of Lake county. He was one of the more mature men active and prominent in laying the foundations of civil and social institutions. He came with his son, John Ball, from the State of New York in 1836. To which band of the large family of Balls emigrating from England between 1630 and 1640 he belonged is not known. In March, 1837, an election was held at his house, also at the house of Russell Eddy and at the house of Samuel D. Bryant, at which election, having received seventy-eight votes for county Commissioner, he was elected for three years; but he resigned this office in the summer in order to be a candidate at the August election for Representative to Indianapolis. Lake county voted for him, but Porter county, with which Lake for some years was united in electing a Representative, did not. He gave up a certainty for an uncertainty and so lost both offices. He was rather tall in person, a fluent speaker, a man capable and ambitious. He was, as the political parties of those days were designed, a Democrat, and Solon Robinson, who had been the "Squatter King" of Lake, was a strong Whig. Politically these two, both ambitious men, were not friendly, and each had the credit in those days of defeating to some extent the political aspirations of the other. Amsi L. Ball, while not holding office, continued to be an influential and prominent citizen, but, about 1851 or soon after, he returned to the State of New York after a residence here of about fifteen years. Of his son's sojourn here but little is known.

From The History of Orange Co., NY, Ruttenber & Clark 1881 pg. 549: "A.L. Ball was appointed May 14th 1821 in Goshen as a member of a committee to solicit funds to help pay for collecting the bones of men killed by the Indians in the battle of Minisink many years before. The remains were to be reburied and a monument erected in their memory. The dedication was held July 22, 1822. Capt. (Samuel?) Ball was one of the aides to the Marshall of the day."

A NOTE FROM JTR: Amzi Lewis BALL returned to Montclair, New Jersey by 1850 when he was living with his wife, Jane (Crane) Ball, and her brother Eleazor on the Federal Census. Both Amzi and Jane died there. I am not sure if Jane went to Indiana with her husband. Amzi also filed papers that showed he served in the War of 1812. He also was one of the first postmasters in Montclair.