In 1832 Joseph and his young wife moved to Amherst Township in Lorain County, Ohio, making the journey bvy canal to Buffalo and then on lake boats to Lorain, settling on the land trhat his father had received in compensation for his services as a Revolutionary soldier.
The tract of land contained 147 acres, but it was in its original state, undeveloped and unimproved. when Joseph and his wife took up residence there. So it fell to him to have to clear the land and begin its cultivation. Joseph had been to the property many years before, in 1819, staying there for a year in order to secure it as a home for himself and his eventual family. He lived on the land from 1932 until his death.
He very well read, and had a very retentive memory. He suffered a long illness leading to his death at age 60.
Joseph was a farmer and a judge, and was called "Judge Whiton."
The following is an extract from Joseph's obituary article, published in a local newspaper at the time of his death. (Keep in mind that obituary writers in those days wrote very flowery, flamboyant obituaries, but that the element of truth lies in amongst all the excessive prose. The most pertinent elements are near the end of the obituary.):
"It is with unfeigned diffidence we attempt to speak of this truly great and good man. Having chosen the plain and inconspicuous occupation of a farmer, an avocation to which the labors of his life were mainly devoted, his great abilities were shaded from public view by the retirement of his rural retreat, and were best known to his immediate neighbors and the friends who sought his counsel and opportunities to draw instruction from his ample stores of knowledge and wisdom.
Had he selected for the exercise of the great natural powers with which his Creator endowed him the broad theater of statesmanship, for which his abilities so eminently qualified him, his death would have been the signal of National mourning, and the stainless purity of his character, his sterling integrity, which no ambitious motives, no inducements of personal gain could serve, would have served as a luminous example in this epoch of National calamity and political degeneracy to point the young and aspiring throughout the entire country to the true and only path that leads to a cloudless and unsullied renown.
"It is impossible that such a man as Judge Whiton, with whose clear and deep convictions that spring from mature reflection and ample knowledge, should entertain other than the most fixed and earnest opinions upon all subjects in which he was interested or had made the subject of examination. Such was the character of his political convictions. His infant car almost caught the dying echoes of the Revolution. He lived in the living presence of the Fathers of the Republic. The vigor of his manhood was wrought up to enthusiasm by the conflicts of those intellectual giants, Webster, Clay, Calhoun, Wright and Benton.
"He deeply and earnestly studied the great problems of free government that engaged the highest faculties of those powerful minds. His admiration for the free, unostentatious government of the earlier days of the Republic ripened into patriotic zeal for its perpetuation in its pristine purity. His close attention to history led him to apprehend that this that this admirable system might be overthrown by the gradual and stealthy approaches of the machinery and methods of oppression. To the last day of his life he carefully weighed the changing phases in our political phenomena, and was greatly exercised by hopes and fears in regard to the future of his Country. "In his political associations he was a Democrat, and gave the last days of his active labors, and the almost hallowed aspirations of his fading life, to the re-establishment of the principles of that party.
"Though he received no special legal education, h was seven years an Associate Justice of the Court of Common Pleas. He represented his County in the Legislature, and for twelve years filled the office of Justice of the Peace. In every position, the man dignified the office, not the office the man. His knowledge of the nature and character of mankind was ample. So accurate was his analysis of cause and effect in the affairs of State, that his predictions of future results from present policy was almost prophetic.
"He was a constant student, and in daily communion with the best authors and greatest intellects of the past and present. His death is a public loss, and the vacancy he has left in the community will not soon be filled."
The tract of land contained 147 acres, but it was in its original state, undeveloped and unimproved. when Joseph and his wife took up residence there. So it fell to him to have to clear the land and begin its cultivation. Joseph had been to the property many years before, in 1819, staying there for a year in order to secure it as a home for himself and his eventual family. He lived on the land from 1932 until his death.
He very well read, and had a very retentive memory. He suffered a long illness leading to his death at age 60.
Joseph was a farmer and a judge, and was called "Judge Whiton."
The following is an extract from Joseph's obituary article, published in a local newspaper at the time of his death. (Keep in mind that obituary writers in those days wrote very flowery, flamboyant obituaries, but that the element of truth lies in amongst all the excessive prose. The most pertinent elements are near the end of the obituary.):
"It is with unfeigned diffidence we attempt to speak of this truly great and good man. Having chosen the plain and inconspicuous occupation of a farmer, an avocation to which the labors of his life were mainly devoted, his great abilities were shaded from public view by the retirement of his rural retreat, and were best known to his immediate neighbors and the friends who sought his counsel and opportunities to draw instruction from his ample stores of knowledge and wisdom.
Had he selected for the exercise of the great natural powers with which his Creator endowed him the broad theater of statesmanship, for which his abilities so eminently qualified him, his death would have been the signal of National mourning, and the stainless purity of his character, his sterling integrity, which no ambitious motives, no inducements of personal gain could serve, would have served as a luminous example in this epoch of National calamity and political degeneracy to point the young and aspiring throughout the entire country to the true and only path that leads to a cloudless and unsullied renown.
"It is impossible that such a man as Judge Whiton, with whose clear and deep convictions that spring from mature reflection and ample knowledge, should entertain other than the most fixed and earnest opinions upon all subjects in which he was interested or had made the subject of examination. Such was the character of his political convictions. His infant car almost caught the dying echoes of the Revolution. He lived in the living presence of the Fathers of the Republic. The vigor of his manhood was wrought up to enthusiasm by the conflicts of those intellectual giants, Webster, Clay, Calhoun, Wright and Benton.
"He deeply and earnestly studied the great problems of free government that engaged the highest faculties of those powerful minds. His admiration for the free, unostentatious government of the earlier days of the Republic ripened into patriotic zeal for its perpetuation in its pristine purity. His close attention to history led him to apprehend that this that this admirable system might be overthrown by the gradual and stealthy approaches of the machinery and methods of oppression. To the last day of his life he carefully weighed the changing phases in our political phenomena, and was greatly exercised by hopes and fears in regard to the future of his Country. "In his political associations he was a Democrat, and gave the last days of his active labors, and the almost hallowed aspirations of his fading life, to the re-establishment of the principles of that party.
"Though he received no special legal education, h was seven years an Associate Justice of the Court of Common Pleas. He represented his County in the Legislature, and for twelve years filled the office of Justice of the Peace. In every position, the man dignified the office, not the office the man. His knowledge of the nature and character of mankind was ample. So accurate was his analysis of cause and effect in the affairs of State, that his predictions of future results from present policy was almost prophetic.
"He was a constant student, and in daily communion with the best authors and greatest intellects of the past and present. His death is a public loss, and the vacancy he has left in the community will not soon be filled."
In 1832 Joseph and his young wife moved to Amherst Township in Lorain County, Ohio, making the journey bvy canal to Buffalo and then on lake boats to Lorain, settling on the land trhat his father had received in compensation for his services as a Revolutionary soldier.
The tract of land contained 147 acres, but it was in its original state, undeveloped and unimproved. when Joseph and his wife took up residence there. So it fell to him to have to clear the land and begin its cultivation. Joseph had been to the property many years before, in 1819, staying there for a year in order to secure it as a home for himself and his eventual family. He lived on the land from 1932 until his death.
He very well read, and had a very retentive memory. He suffered a long illness leading to his death at age 60.
Joseph was a farmer and a judge, and was called "Judge Whiton."
The following is an extract from Joseph's obituary article, published in a local newspaper at the time of his death. (Keep in mind that obituary writers in those days wrote very flowery, flamboyant obituaries, but that the element of truth lies in amongst all the excessive prose. The most pertinent elements are near the end of the obituary.):
"It is with unfeigned diffidence we attempt to speak of this truly great and good man. Having chosen the plain and inconspicuous occupation of a farmer, an avocation to which the labors of his life were mainly devoted, his great abilities were shaded from public view by the retirement of his rural retreat, and were best known to his immediate neighbors and the friends who sought his counsel and opportunities to draw instruction from his ample stores of knowledge and wisdom.
Had he selected for the exercise of the great natural powers with which his Creator endowed him the broad theater of statesmanship, for which his abilities so eminently qualified him, his death would have been the signal of National mourning, and the stainless purity of his character, his sterling integrity, which no ambitious motives, no inducements of personal gain could serve, would have served as a luminous example in this epoch of National calamity and political degeneracy to point the young and aspiring throughout the entire country to the true and only path that leads to a cloudless and unsullied renown.
"It is impossible that such a man as Judge Whiton, with whose clear and deep convictions that spring from mature reflection and ample knowledge, should entertain other than the most fixed and earnest opinions upon all subjects in which he was interested or had made the subject of examination. Such was the character of his political convictions. His infant car almost caught the dying echoes of the Revolution. He lived in the living presence of the Fathers of the Republic. The vigor of his manhood was wrought up to enthusiasm by the conflicts of those intellectual giants, Webster, Clay, Calhoun, Wright and Benton.
"He deeply and earnestly studied the great problems of free government that engaged the highest faculties of those powerful minds. His admiration for the free, unostentatious government of the earlier days of the Republic ripened into patriotic zeal for its perpetuation in its pristine purity. His close attention to history led him to apprehend that this that this admirable system might be overthrown by the gradual and stealthy approaches of the machinery and methods of oppression. To the last day of his life he carefully weighed the changing phases in our political phenomena, and was greatly exercised by hopes and fears in regard to the future of his Country. "In his political associations he was a Democrat, and gave the last days of his active labors, and the almost hallowed aspirations of his fading life, to the re-establishment of the principles of that party.
"Though he received no special legal education, h was seven years an Associate Justice of the Court of Common Pleas. He represented his County in the Legislature, and for twelve years filled the office of Justice of the Peace. In every position, the man dignified the office, not the office the man. His knowledge of the nature and character of mankind was ample. So accurate was his analysis of cause and effect in the affairs of State, that his predictions of future results from present policy was almost prophetic.
"He was a constant student, and in daily communion with the best authors and greatest intellects of the past and present. His death is a public loss, and the vacancy he has left in the community will not soon be filled."
The tract of land contained 147 acres, but it was in its original state, undeveloped and unimproved. when Joseph and his wife took up residence there. So it fell to him to have to clear the land and begin its cultivation. Joseph had been to the property many years before, in 1819, staying there for a year in order to secure it as a home for himself and his eventual family. He lived on the land from 1932 until his death.
He very well read, and had a very retentive memory. He suffered a long illness leading to his death at age 60.
Joseph was a farmer and a judge, and was called "Judge Whiton."
The following is an extract from Joseph's obituary article, published in a local newspaper at the time of his death. (Keep in mind that obituary writers in those days wrote very flowery, flamboyant obituaries, but that the element of truth lies in amongst all the excessive prose. The most pertinent elements are near the end of the obituary.):
"It is with unfeigned diffidence we attempt to speak of this truly great and good man. Having chosen the plain and inconspicuous occupation of a farmer, an avocation to which the labors of his life were mainly devoted, his great abilities were shaded from public view by the retirement of his rural retreat, and were best known to his immediate neighbors and the friends who sought his counsel and opportunities to draw instruction from his ample stores of knowledge and wisdom.
Had he selected for the exercise of the great natural powers with which his Creator endowed him the broad theater of statesmanship, for which his abilities so eminently qualified him, his death would have been the signal of National mourning, and the stainless purity of his character, his sterling integrity, which no ambitious motives, no inducements of personal gain could serve, would have served as a luminous example in this epoch of National calamity and political degeneracy to point the young and aspiring throughout the entire country to the true and only path that leads to a cloudless and unsullied renown.
"It is impossible that such a man as Judge Whiton, with whose clear and deep convictions that spring from mature reflection and ample knowledge, should entertain other than the most fixed and earnest opinions upon all subjects in which he was interested or had made the subject of examination. Such was the character of his political convictions. His infant car almost caught the dying echoes of the Revolution. He lived in the living presence of the Fathers of the Republic. The vigor of his manhood was wrought up to enthusiasm by the conflicts of those intellectual giants, Webster, Clay, Calhoun, Wright and Benton.
"He deeply and earnestly studied the great problems of free government that engaged the highest faculties of those powerful minds. His admiration for the free, unostentatious government of the earlier days of the Republic ripened into patriotic zeal for its perpetuation in its pristine purity. His close attention to history led him to apprehend that this that this admirable system might be overthrown by the gradual and stealthy approaches of the machinery and methods of oppression. To the last day of his life he carefully weighed the changing phases in our political phenomena, and was greatly exercised by hopes and fears in regard to the future of his Country. "In his political associations he was a Democrat, and gave the last days of his active labors, and the almost hallowed aspirations of his fading life, to the re-establishment of the principles of that party.
"Though he received no special legal education, h was seven years an Associate Justice of the Court of Common Pleas. He represented his County in the Legislature, and for twelve years filled the office of Justice of the Peace. In every position, the man dignified the office, not the office the man. His knowledge of the nature and character of mankind was ample. So accurate was his analysis of cause and effect in the affairs of State, that his predictions of future results from present policy was almost prophetic.
"He was a constant student, and in daily communion with the best authors and greatest intellects of the past and present. His death is a public loss, and the vacancy he has left in the community will not soon be filled."
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