TNGenWeb Project
The Goodspeed Publishing Co., History of Tennessee, 1887
Biographical Sketches, Warren County

~ P & R ~

        P. G. Potter, farmer and merchant of Warren County, and now a resident of the Thirteenth Civil District, is the son of Watson and Harriett (Magness) Potter, both natives of DeKalb County, Tenn. The father was born In 1817, of English lineage, and is now a resident of DeKalb County. He has followed the occupation of a farmer and mechanic all his life. He is a member of the Primitive Baptist Church And a Democrat in politics. His wife was born in 1819 and died July 6, 1866. She was a member of the Primitive Baptist Church also. Our subject was born near Smithville, DeKalb County, September 27, 1842, and was the sixth of fourteen children. He lived with his parents until twenty-two years of age, when he moved to Warren County, where he remained two years engaged in farming. He then moved to the mouth of Mountain Creek, at Jessie, and was engaged in mercantile pursuits for six years, when he moved to his present location and followed the same business. He is a man of great energy and enterprise. Although he started with a very light capital, and was burned out once, he now carries a stock of $3,500 and owns 260 acres of land worth $7,000, with a good portion under cultivation. In the fall of 1863 he enlisted in the Twenty-Third Tennessee Regiment (Confederate Army), and was in service about one year when he came home on account of ill health. He was in the battle of Murfreesboro and numerous skirmishes. May 9, 1865, he married Miss Melvinia Webb, a native of Warren County, Tenn., born June 15, 1843, and the daughter of James and Mary Webb. To our subject and wife were born six children; only two are now living: Osee and Clyde. Those deceased are Ella, born in 1868 and died in 1883; Minnie, born in 1871 and died in 1884; James, born in 1873 and died in 1876, and Arthur, born in 1876 and died in 1878. Mr. Potter is a member of the Christian Church and a Democrat in politics. In 1878 he was appointed postmaster at Dibrell, which position he has held ever since; has done as much as any man of his means to build up schools and churches, and to advance the general interests of those he is intimately associated with; is a man of good moral habits and is an active worker in the church to which he belongs.



 

        J. R. Ramsey, of Gwyn & Ramsey, merchants, was born in Warren County May 3, 1862, the son of William and Mary (Taylor) Ramsey, both of Irish origin. The father, born March 9, 1832, in Warren County, was a very extensive stock raiser. The mother was born February 22, 1841, and both were members of the Christian Church. Reared on the farm, our subject in February, 1885, engaged in merchandising at Viola, Tenn., a member of the firm Bonner & Ramsey, the former of whom sold his interest to a C. R. Gwyn in March, 1886, when the present firm was formed. February 10, 1886, our subject married Mattie S., daughter of Col. Porter and C. S. Floyd, and of Irish extraction. Both he and his wife are members of the Christian Church, and among our best citizens.



 

        R. H. Reams, editor of the Southern Standard, was born at Spring Hill, Maury County, June 20, 1857, a son of Joshua M. and Hattie (Haley) Reams. When eleven years old Mr. Reams went to Tuscumbia, Ala., and served three years' apprenticeship in the printing office of the North Alabamian. In the summer of 1876 he came to McMinnville, Tenn., and worked for six years in the New Era office, and was joint publisher of that paper with Mr. D. F. Wallace during the year 1880. In the fall of 1882 he, in partnership with Dr. J. B. Ritchey and H. P Newton, purchased the Southern Standard, and under the style of the Standard Publishing Company they published this paper until the spring of 1884, when Mr. Reams purchased his partners' interests and has since been sole editor and proprietor of this journal. The Southern Standard is purely Democratic. It is one of the leading papers in this section of the country and has a large circulation. Mr. Reams is a member of the Presbyterian Church.


        Cyrus Richmond, a prominent citizen of McMinnville, was born at Batavia, Genesee Co., N. Y., April 29, 1815. He is the third of five children born to Job and Ruth (Barrett) Richmond, both of English descent. Cyrus secured a good academic education in his youth, and early in life began the cultivation of the soil. He was engaged in farming until he immigrated to Tennessee, and for the past ten years has led a retired life. He spent the first thirty years of his life in his native county, and the next ten years in Niagara County. In 1860 Mr. Richmond went to Wisconsin, and settled in Sheboygan County, where he lived sixteen years. In 1876 he immigrated to Tennessee, and settled in McMinnville, where he now lives. He has been an enterprising and energetic man all his life, and has been very successful in accumulating this world's goods. In 1842 Mr. Richmond wedded Miss Caroline Willey, a lady of excellent worth, and a native of Berkshire County, Mass., born in 1822. Mr. Richmond is not a church member, but is a firm believer in the Bible and the Christian religion; Mrs. Richmond is a member of the Missionary Baptist Church.

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