The fifth of the 13 children of Joseph Fisher and the 10 children of his first wife, Orythia (Selden) Fisher, Susan was raised and educated in the Congregationalist tradition on the homestead farm two miles outside of the village of Chester, Vermont. She was educated at the local district school and at Chester Academy and taught in that area for three years before she and her sister Joanna applied as teachers to the Board of National Popular Education and were sent west in 1851 to teach together in Noblesville, Indiana. There Susan became the second wife of widower Dr. Griffin M. Shaw on August 16, 1852, and stepmother to his two small children, Griff, Jr. and Lucy. Together Dr. Shaw and Susan had a son, Charlie, born in Indiana who died of malaria, and then they moved in 1854 to Paddy's Run (today called Shandon) in Butler Co., Ohio, Dr. Shaw's home town, where they had two more children, Mary Georgiana and Albert Shaw.
Susan and her children remained in Paddy's Run for 20 years, through the turbulent Civil War and after Dr. Shaw died in 1863. In the 1870s Susan became a supporter of the temperance movement, and participated in picketing saloons in Paddy's Run. Even though she was a shy person, she had strong moral and religious convictions and was not afraid to do her duty as she saw it. She moved with Mary and Albert to Grinnell, Iowa (where several of her relatives lived) in 1875. Thereafter she mostly made her home with son Albert, relocating with him to Minnesota when he worked as editor for the Minneapolis Tribune (c. 1883-1888). Circa 1888-1889 she lived with her daughter Mary's family stationed in Beirut, Syria (today Lebanon), and returned with them to the U.S. in 1889 when Mary's husband, Dr. John C. Fisher, moved his family to his hometown of Warsaw, New York and established the first salt-bath sanitarium in North America there. Susan lived in Warsaw with them at the sanitarium until her death at age 64, probably of a lung ailment which had plagued her for some time. Her last words were "I am so tired."
Her children, Albert, Lucy Stephenson and her husband Judge Richard Stephenson, and Mary and Dr. John Fisher, who had been gathered together in Warsaw, accompanied her body on the train back to Shandon, Ohio, along with an old friend, the Rev. Mark Williams from Shandon, who officiated at the funeral in the Congregationalist church filled with former neighbors and friends. In Rev. Williams' words, she was "a saint indeed."
Susan and her children remained in Paddy's Run for 20 years, through the turbulent Civil War and after Dr. Shaw died in 1863. In the 1870s Susan became a supporter of the temperance movement, and participated in picketing saloons in Paddy's Run. Even though she was a shy person, she had strong moral and religious convictions and was not afraid to do her duty as she saw it. She moved with Mary and Albert to Grinnell, Iowa (where several of her relatives lived) in 1875. Thereafter she mostly made her home with son Albert, relocating with him to Minnesota when he worked as editor for the Minneapolis Tribune (c. 1883-1888). Circa 1888-1889 she lived with her daughter Mary's family stationed in Beirut, Syria (today Lebanon), and returned with them to the U.S. in 1889 when Mary's husband, Dr. John C. Fisher, moved his family to his hometown of Warsaw, New York and established the first salt-bath sanitarium in North America there. Susan lived in Warsaw with them at the sanitarium until her death at age 64, probably of a lung ailment which had plagued her for some time. Her last words were "I am so tired."
Her children, Albert, Lucy Stephenson and her husband Judge Richard Stephenson, and Mary and Dr. John Fisher, who had been gathered together in Warsaw, accompanied her body on the train back to Shandon, Ohio, along with an old friend, the Rev. Mark Williams from Shandon, who officiated at the funeral in the Congregationalist church filled with former neighbors and friends. In Rev. Williams' words, she was "a saint indeed."
The fifth of the 13 children of Joseph Fisher and the 10 children of his first wife, Orythia (Selden) Fisher, Susan was raised and educated in the Congregationalist tradition on the homestead farm two miles outside of the village of Chester, Vermont. She was educated at the local district school and at Chester Academy and taught in that area for three years before she and her sister Joanna applied as teachers to the Board of National Popular Education and were sent west in 1851 to teach together in Noblesville, Indiana. There Susan became the second wife of widower Dr. Griffin M. Shaw on August 16, 1852, and stepmother to his two small children, Griff, Jr. and Lucy. Together Dr. Shaw and Susan had a son, Charlie, born in Indiana who died of malaria, and then they moved in 1854 to Paddy's Run (today called Shandon) in Butler Co., Ohio, Dr. Shaw's home town, where they had two more children, Mary Georgiana and Albert Shaw.
Susan and her children remained in Paddy's Run for 20 years, through the turbulent Civil War and after Dr. Shaw died in 1863. In the 1870s Susan became a supporter of the temperance movement, and participated in picketing saloons in Paddy's Run. Even though she was a shy person, she had strong moral and religious convictions and was not afraid to do her duty as she saw it. She moved with Mary and Albert to Grinnell, Iowa (where several of her relatives lived) in 1875. Thereafter she mostly made her home with son Albert, relocating with him to Minnesota when he worked as editor for the Minneapolis Tribune (c. 1883-1888). Circa 1888-1889 she lived with her daughter Mary's family stationed in Beirut, Syria (today Lebanon), and returned with them to the U.S. in 1889 when Mary's husband, Dr. John C. Fisher, moved his family to his hometown of Warsaw, New York and established the first salt-bath sanitarium in North America there. Susan lived in Warsaw with them at the sanitarium until her death at age 64, probably of a lung ailment which had plagued her for some time. Her last words were "I am so tired."
Her children, Albert, Lucy Stephenson and her husband Judge Richard Stephenson, and Mary and Dr. John Fisher, who had been gathered together in Warsaw, accompanied her body on the train back to Shandon, Ohio, along with an old friend, the Rev. Mark Williams from Shandon, who officiated at the funeral in the Congregationalist church filled with former neighbors and friends. In Rev. Williams' words, she was "a saint indeed."
Susan and her children remained in Paddy's Run for 20 years, through the turbulent Civil War and after Dr. Shaw died in 1863. In the 1870s Susan became a supporter of the temperance movement, and participated in picketing saloons in Paddy's Run. Even though she was a shy person, she had strong moral and religious convictions and was not afraid to do her duty as she saw it. She moved with Mary and Albert to Grinnell, Iowa (where several of her relatives lived) in 1875. Thereafter she mostly made her home with son Albert, relocating with him to Minnesota when he worked as editor for the Minneapolis Tribune (c. 1883-1888). Circa 1888-1889 she lived with her daughter Mary's family stationed in Beirut, Syria (today Lebanon), and returned with them to the U.S. in 1889 when Mary's husband, Dr. John C. Fisher, moved his family to his hometown of Warsaw, New York and established the first salt-bath sanitarium in North America there. Susan lived in Warsaw with them at the sanitarium until her death at age 64, probably of a lung ailment which had plagued her for some time. Her last words were "I am so tired."
Her children, Albert, Lucy Stephenson and her husband Judge Richard Stephenson, and Mary and Dr. John Fisher, who had been gathered together in Warsaw, accompanied her body on the train back to Shandon, Ohio, along with an old friend, the Rev. Mark Williams from Shandon, who officiated at the funeral in the Congregationalist church filled with former neighbors and friends. In Rev. Williams' words, she was "a saint indeed."
Inscription
G.M. Shaw M.D.
Died
Aug. 25, 1863
Aged
46 Y's & 6 Mo.
SHAW
----
Griffin M. Shaw, Jr.
Died Dec. 31, 1872
Aged
25 Y's & 10 Mo.
---
Susan F. Shaw
Died
June 29, 1892
Aged
64 Ys 2 Mo & 21 Ds.
