James Parker Woodworth 

        JAMES PARKER WOODWORTH is owner of the Woodworth Storage & Transfer Company at South Bend, a business he founded nearly a quarter of a century ago, and in its growth and development it has reflected his personal enterprise and energy.

        Mr. Woodworth was born at New Haven in Huron County, Ohio, July 17, 1868, a son of James and Lucinda (Shepard) Woodworth, his father a native of the same Ohio county, while his mother was born at Republic, Ohio. In 1887 the family moved to a farm at Hillsdale, Michigan, and some years later James Woodworth retired and lived at Hillsdale until his death at the age of eighty-one.  The mother reached the advanced age for eighty-six. James P. Woodworth had two younger brothers, Charles, living at Hillsdale, and Frank who died 1929.

       Mr. Woodworth's early life was spent on a farm.  After the district schools he attended the Hillsdale College and taught school there for a year.  After one year working in the lumber mills in Montana he returned to Hillsdale and became a buyer among the farmers for J.H. Lane & Company, wholesale dealers in butter and eggs. After two years he established a butter and egg business of his own at Hillsdale, selling that in 1898, in which year he became a resident of South Bend.  For the first three months here he was with the Mills Fruit Company and then established a wholesale butter and egg business, which he conducted for several years.  For a short time he was in the real estate business with Mr. George Eberhart at Mishawaka.

        Mr. Woodworth in June, 1906, started his present business, since known as the Woodworth Storage & Transfer Company.  One small building gave him quarters for his office and storage space and he had only one team.  It was almost entirely a one-man business at the start, and its prompt and efficient service won it a steadily growing patronage.  In 1913 he bought the ground at 409 South St. Joseph Street and put up a three-story warehouse, moving his business from its former location at 222 South Michigan Street.  A few years later he added two more stories, his warehouse today being one of the most perfectly equipped and commodious establishments of the kind in Northern Indiana.  He also has a large fleet of moving vans, trucks and other equipment.  He operates his plant as a general furniture storage and transfer business, and also makes a specialty of transferring heavy machinery.

        Mr. Woodworth married, in 1900, Miss Winnella Merphy.  She was born in Ohio and spent her early years at Sturgis, Michigan and at South Bend.  They have two children, James Zalman and Olga Irene.  James, who is assistant manager of his father's business, is married and has a son, Earl.

        Mr. Woodworth is a past president of the Indiana State Warehouse Men's Association, a member of the National Warehouse Men's Association.  Fraternally he has been for seven years a trustee and member of the advisory board of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and Shriner, member of the Knights of Pythias, the Kiwanis Club, Knife and Fork Club, Chamber of Commerce, and is a Baptist.  He has been much interested in Boy Scout work, and has had charge of the construction of the new buildings of the Boy Scout camp.  His hobby is horseback riding and he owns several fine riding horses.

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INDIANA ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS OF AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT
The Lewis Publishing Company, 1931
Volume III, page 52-53

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HURON COUNTY OHIO - BIOS: WOODWORTH, James Parker (published 1931)

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Contributed to the HURON Co., OH Biographies Project with permission of the OH-FOOTSTEPS Mailing list coordinator (Maggie Stewart-Zimmerman<[email protected]>) and the submitter.

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File contributed to OH-FOOTSTEPS Mailing List by:

Mrs. Gina M. Reasoner
[email protected]
1 August 1999

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