~The Champaign County News; Wed, Mar 8, 1916; Page 11

J.J. GLEASON DIES AT HOME OF SON – MAHOMET RESIDENT, HURT BY TRAIN SIX MONTHS AGO, EXPIRES IN URBANA

After a lingering illness of six months, Johnson J. Gleason died at 7:15 o'clock Monday night at the home of his son Wallace, 212 West Nevada street. The body will be taken to Mahomet on Wednesday morning and the funeral will be held from the First Baptist church, with burial in Riverside cemetery. A short prayer service will be held at the Urbana home at 10:30 o'clock.

The decedent was born in Vermont, on March 17, 1835, and came to Chicago with his parents in 1844. The family moved to a farm near Genoa where they lived until the death of Mr. Gleason's mother in 1847. With his father he went to Eddyville, Ia. where he married Sarah Jane Kepler on Feb. 24, 1856. She died on July 6, 1893. After a short residence on a farm near Bellflower, 18 miles northwest of Mahomet, the couple moved to a farm adjoining the village of Mahomet in 1857, where the decedent resided for 58 years. On September 10, 1915, his right foot was mashed by a Big Four train, and he came to Urbana to reside with his son. Death was due indirectly to the accident from which he never recovered.

Four boys and six girls were born to the couple, of whom three boys and three girls are now living. The deceased boy was named Stewart, and the girls – Mattie, Ida and Stella. The surviving boys are Wallace Gleason 212 West Nevada street; Frank Gleason, a member of the Urbana police force, 306 West Washington street, Urbana; and Valentine Gleason, East Water street, Urbana. The daughters are: Ellie Clellen of McKinsey, Mont., Olive Lawrence of Chinook, Kans. and Mertie Wells of Mahomet. One sister, Mrs. G.W. Pittman, Illinois street and Urbana avenue, Urbana also survives.