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Surnames: Calkins, Bently, Sprague, Reed, Wiley, DeRonee, Farrington
Classification: Biography
Message Board URL:
http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/nRH.2ACIB/352
Message Board Post:
SOURCE: Biographical Review of the Leading Citizens of Livingston and Wyoming Counties
New York
Boston, Biographical Review Publishing Company, 1895
Levi B. CALKINS, a retired hotel-keeper, residing in the village of Arcade, N.Y., was born
at St. Albans, VT., October 13, 1820. His father, Jonas CALKINS, and his grandfather,
whose name is unknown to the present writer, were both natives of the Green mountain
State, and were both farmers by vocation. Jonas CALKINS came to Buffalo, N.Y., in his
early manhood, bringing with him his wife and child. He followed farming for a while in
Aurora, Erie County, and later removed to Boston, originally a part of Aurora, where he
died at seventy-two years of age. Jonas CALKINS married Miss Lucy BENTLY, of Vermont,
whose father, a native of that State, died in this locality, having reached the advanced
age of ninety-six. Mrs. Lucy CALKINS bore her husband three children – George, who died
in Michigan in 1890; Charlotte, who died when a young girl,; and Levi B. CALKINS. Mrs.
CALKINS was married a second time to Seth SPRAGUE, of Aurora, by which marriage one son,
Charles SPRA!
GUE, was born.
Levi B. CALKINS was sent to the district schools of the neighborhood in which he lived in
his early years. He was child of twelve when his father moved to Buffalo, which was at
that time a very small village. Mr. CALKINS adopted the miller’s trade for his life work,
and was successively engaged in this business in Aurora, Java, Wales, Warsaw, Pike, and
Wethersfield. In Warsaw he remained for ten years, and was for shorter periods in the
other places of his residence. Milling was after a time abandoned; and Mr. CALKINS made
his first venture in hotel-keeping, purchasing the Arcade House, which was under his
personal management for three years and was then sold by him to a Mr. REED. Mr. CALKINS
then purchased a piece of property in Lockport, and opened a small hotel, which he
conducted for three years. At the expiration of this time he bought a farm of three
hundred and fifty acres in Wethersfield. After three years of agricultural life he sold
this property and!
returned to Arcade, where he repurchased the hotel property, which he remodeled and
entirely renovated before opening to guests. This enterprise was successful and
remunerative, and Mr. CALKINS continued to entertain the traveling public until he felt
justified in retiring from the somewhat arduous duties of host. The handsomely equipped
establishment found a ready purchaser; and he moved to his pleasant home in Arcade, where
he has since remained.
He was married to his first wife, miss Matilda WILEY, the daughter of Mr. Seth WILEY, a
cabinet-maker in Vermont, in 1840. The five children who were the offspring of this union
were: Theodore, who married Miss Addie De RONEE of Lockport, and who died at
five-and-thirty; Judson; Ann D.; Eddie; and one who died in infancy. Judson died aged
eleven years, Ann D., died aged twelve years, and Eddie A. aged three years; and the
mother died in the August of 1835. The second wife of Mr. CALKINS was Emily FARRINGTON
REED who died in 1888. The subject of this memoir is earnestly Democratic in political
convictions. He has held for three terms both the offices of Village Trustee and Excise
Commissioner.