This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list.
Surnames: Brooks, Banich, Peters, Stoudt, Kiester,
Classification: Biography
Message Board URL:
http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/Bk.2ADE/1246
Message Board Post:
This book has no cover, and no index, and no author. I bought it on Ebay; it just has the
insides, but it is full of Indiana biographies. I am not researching this family, just
thought I would share. I do not know anymore about these families or these surnames. NOTE:
I don’t know if there is any additional mention of this family in the book, it has no
index. I do not want to sell this book. I am typing the biographies from it.
Typed by Lora Radiches:
Surnames in this biography are: Brooks, Banich, Peters, Stoudt, Kiester,
Russell R. BROOKS in his career as a business man and citizen has for many years been a
resident of Union City, Indiana, where he owns and conducts one of the leading funeral
homes and undertaking establishments, at 340 Union Street. Mr. Brooks was born in Darke
County, Ohio, in 1886, a son of William H. and Rachael (Fisher) Brooks, his father a
native of Piqua, Ohio, and his mother of Darke County. His grandparents were John and
Nancy (Banich) Brooks, the former a native of West Virginia and the latter of Cynthiana,
Kentucky. John Brooks moved from West Virginia to Western Ohio about 1840. The Brooks
family came from England to America about 1626 and first settled at Worcester,
Massachusetts. William H. Brooks was a farmer and also an auctioneer by profession. He
died in 1909. His widow, who now lives at Union City, is a daughter of Henry and Sarah
(Peters) Fisher, the former born near Columbus, Ohio, and the latter in Darke County.
Russell R. Brooks was reared on a farm i!
n Western Ohio, attended common schools, and as a young man came to Union City, where for
eight years he was a piano merchant. While in that business he took up undertaking, and
since 1912 has conducted his funeral home. He has assembled modern equipment and is well
qualified by personal character and by training for the work of a modern mortician. He had
special training in the Askins Training School for Embalmers at Indianapolis. Mr. Brooks
married, in 1908, Miss Sylvia May Stoudt, who was born in Darke County, Ohio, daughter of
Samuel and Levina (Kiester) Stoudt. Her parents came from Germany. Mr. and Mrs. Brooks
have four children: Audrie, born August 28, 1909, a trained nurse; Roger R., Earl S. and
Lucien. Mr. Brooks is a member of the Church of Christ and for ten years has held the
office of superintendent of the Sunday school. He is also a former deacon and elder of the
church. Mr. Brooks is a Republican, a member of the Masonic fraternity, Independent Order
of Odd Fe!
llows, Junior Order United American Mechanics, Modern Woodmen of America, and the Union
City Country Club.