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Joseph M. Shew was one of the citizens of Noble
County whose memory deserve to be cherished long
among his former associates and in the permanent
records of the county. He was a man of great
enterprise and usefulness, though physically a cripple, and did a great service as a teacher, an occupation he followed many years, and also at one time
held the office of county treasurer.
He was born in Ohio May 21, 1841, and came
with his parents to Noble County, Indiana, when a
boy. The family located in York Township, three
miles north of Albion, and in that locality he grew
up attending the common schools and also the
college at Wolcottville. He had a well trained mind,
and used it as a teacher in the public schools of
this county for twenty-eight terms.
All the time
he was teaching he lived on the farm. In 1889 he
was s elected county treasurer, and filled that office
with signal ability for four years. He was always
active as a republican and was a member of the
Knights of Pythias and Independent Order of Odd
Fellows at Albion.
He married for his first wife Melissa A. Niles,
who died at the age of twenty-six. She was the
mother of two children : Clarence W., cashier in Campbell & Felters Bank at Kendallville, and
Bertha, wife of Clyde Bowman, a resident of Chicago. Mr. Shew married for his second wife Mrs.
Almeda (Deater) Spencer, widow of Clifford
Spencer. Mrs. Shew, who is still living in Washington Township, on the farm of 110 acres, which is
cultivated by renters, was born at Albion, Indiana, in 1860. By her first husband, Clifford Spencer, she
had one son, who died at the age of fourteen months.
Mrs. Shew is the mother of three children: Paul N., a mechanic at Warsaw, Indiana; Leila, wife of
Floyd Fetters, of Noble County; and William B.,
who lives with his mother. Mrs. Shew is a member
of the Baptist Church and is affiliated with the
Rebekah Lodge.
