Mother, whose maiden name was Sallie M. Thompson, was born in Boone County, Missouri, Aug. 8, 1819, and died Feb. 20, 1897, at 1 o'clock and 25 minutes A.M., age 77 years, 6 months and 12 days.  She was buried in Groff Cemetery about 3 miles North West of Spickard.

My father, Elder William Reid, was born near Richmond, Madison Co., Kentucky, Dec. 2, 1811, and died Feb. 23, 1897, at 6:25 P.M., age 85 years, 2 months and 21 days.

My father had never been wealthy and at the time of his death was in very poor circumstances, financially possessing only a small house and lot in Spickard.  The A.F. & A.M. of which he was a member, kindly performed their duties to him and interred him by the side of my mother in the silent City of the Dead.

At an early date father removed with his parents from Kentucky to Monroe Co., Mo., where he met mother.  They were united in marriage June 17, 1834.  They were the parents of six children:

Delilah S. (Reid) Wilson, resides South West of Spickard
Thomas T., who died at the age of 4 or 5 years
John C., resides at Topsy, Mo.
Mary A. (Reid) Stanturf at Millgrove, Mo.
George T., of Spickard
Corena J. (Reid) Wilson of Spickard

In January, 1839, my father and grandfather Thompson "removed" from Monroe Co., to Grundy Co., Mo.  Father took a claim adjoining Mercer Co. line, one half mile South of the "Subsequent" Town of Middlebury.  He sold this claim and in the next year, 1840, moved 5 miles due West where he took another claim, partly situated in Sec. 7, 3W, P-63-R14.  Here he built a hewed log house in Mercer Co. -- only a few yards from the Grundy Co. line, where he resided many years.

At this time the country was a wild wilderness inhabited principally by Indians -- there being but few white people here.  There were no school houses, churches or mills.  No roads or bridges.  The life of the early settlers was a life of privation and continual self-denial, yet while they had sorry, they also had their joys, and faith in the future.  Father began to preach at an early age.  His services were rendered almost entirely in North Missouri, usually in Putnam, Sullivan, Linn, Livingston, occasionally in Daviess & Harrison.  Politically father was a Whig.