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Surnames: HELLER, WEYANDT, CORBUS, ARMSTRONG, PETERSON, KUNKEL
Classification: Biography
Message Board URL:
http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/kh.2ADE/1172
Message Board Post:
From "Standard History of Adams & Wells Counties,
Indiana,"
Chicago: Lewis Publishing Co., 1918, pp. 931, 932.
JOHN HERBERT HELLER
John Herbert Heller, whose co-operation and direct assistance have contributed in great
measure to the preparation of the history of Adams County, is editor and proprietor of the
Decatur Daily Democrat and president of the Democrat Company. He is a native of Decatur,
born in that city May 4, 1873.
His father, the late Judge Daniel David Heller, was born in Harrison County, Ohio, March
29, 1839, a son of Henry B. and Mary A. (Weyandt) Heller. The grandparents were natives
of Greene County, Pennsylvania, but after their marriage made their permanent home in
Harrison County, Ohio, where Henry B. Heller died in September 1881, and his wife in
1874.
Judge Heller grew up on a farm and was educated in the country schools of Ohio and at
Hagerstown Academy. For several years he alternated between teaching and the study of
law. In 1863 he was admitted to the bar of Ohio and in August of the same year located at
Millersburg in that state. In 18867 he came to Decatur, Indiana, and was one of the
prominent members of the bar for fifty years. In 1872 he was appointed county school
examiner, and in 1873 was elected the first county superintendent of schools. He resigned
the office after eighteen months. In 1887 he was elected mayor of Decatur for a term of
two years. Subsequently he was called from his private practice to the office of judge of
the Twenty-sixth Judicial Circuit, and for twelve years presided with dignity and
scholarly wisdom over this branch of the judiciary. His death occurred January 2, 1917.
Judge Heller married July 15, 1869, Annie J. Corbus, a native of Ohio, and a daughter of
John and Mary (Armstro!
ng) Corbus. She is still living.
John Herbert Heller was educated in the local schools of Decatur, graduating from the high
school in 1890. In 1886, at the age of thirteen, he began learning the printer’s trade
with the old Decatur Journal. He worked at the trade when not in school for nine years,
and at the same time carried on his law studies and was graduated from the Indianapolis
Law School in 1897. In 1898 he became city editor of the Decatur Democrat, and has ever
since been actively connected with that paper.
The Decatur Democrat is a lineal descendant of the old Decatur Eagle, which was founded in
February, 1857, by H. L. Phillips. William G. Spencer was later a partner of Mr. Phillips
and in 1859
They sold the business to A. J. Hill, who was its publisher for fifteen years. In
November, 1874, the plant was bought by Joseph McGonagle, who changed the name to the
Decatur Democrat. In 1879 S. Ray Williams became proprietor and in 1881 A. J. Hill again
bought the paper and published it two years. In 1883 Norval Blackburn became the active
factor in the management of the paper. In 1896 Mr. Blackburn sold his interest to Lew G.
Ellingham, who was identified with the paper until he was elected secretary of the State
of Indiana, and since June, 1916, on retiring from that office, Mr. Ellingham bought the
Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette and has been its editor.
In June, 1916, Mr. Heller bought the interest of Mr. Ellingham and became president of the
company. When the company was first incorporated Mr. Heller acquired $10,000 of its stock
and became secretary and manager. In 1903 he assisted in founding the Daily Democrat,
which has been largely under his immediate management ever since. The Democrat was issued
both as a weekly and daily until 1908, when the weekly issue was suspended. The Democrat
has been built up until it now enjoys a circulation of 3,000 and has the tone and dignity
of a metropolitan paper. It has a leased lien of the United Press for general news. The
Democrat for many years has stood ably behind every movement for progress in Adams County,
and when any enterprise worth while is launched there is no hesitation as to what stand
the Democrat will take. Associated with Mr. Heller in the Democrat Company is Arthur R.
Holthouse, secretary and treasurer of the company, and a newspaper man of much ability for
!
one of his age.
Mr. Heller has taken an active part in politics but has never allowed his name to be
connected with the candidacy for an office. In 1909 he was clerk in the Legislature and
served as an alternate to the National Convention at Baltimore in 1912 and was a regular
delegate to the convention at St. Louis in 1916. He was secretary of the Democratic State
Convention of Indiana in 1912 and 1914. Mr. Heller is a Thirty-second degree Scottish
Rite Mason with membership in the Consistory at Fort Wayne and is a member of the
Presbyterian Church.
November 29, 1899, he married Miss Martha A. Peterson. She graduated from the same class
of the Decatur High School at Mr. Heller. Mrs. Heller is a daughter of Robert S. and
Fannie (Kunkel) Peterson. Robert S. Peterson was born in St. Mary’s Township of Adams
County, February 1, 1845, a son of John W. and Hannah (Smith) Peterson, who were married
in Adams County in 1840. Robert S. Peterson saw active service as a Union soldier during
the last year of the Civil war, later studied law with judge David Studabaker, and was
admitted to the bar in 1868. He was for many years a prominent figure in the community,
as a lawyer, banker and as a public spirited citizen. Hew as once a candidate for
Congress in the old Eleventh District. He served as president of the Board of Trustees of
the Village of Decatur for the five years before the adoption of a city charter in 1882,
and is given credit for doing much to perfect the sewerage system of Decatur at that time.
He also !
helped organize and secret the construction of the Narrow Gauge Railroad through the
county, now the Clover Leaf system, and was also a stimulating factor in building the old
Chicago & Atlantic, now the Erie Railway. Robert S. Peterson died in 1914, and his
widow, whose maiden name was Fannie C. Kunkel, is still living in Decatur. Mr. And Mrs.
Heller have two children, Fanny E. and Dick D. The former graduated with the class of
1918 in the Decatur High School and the latter is a junior in high school.
[poster is not related to this family and has no further information]