(1828 - 1904)

From:
BIOGRAPHIES published in
the "Biographical Record of Kane County, Illinois"
Originally printed by the S.J. Clarke Publishing Company, Chicago, 1898

FRANCIS L. YOUNG is one of the most active and enterprising business men of Kane county, of which he has been a resident for fifty-five years. He is a native of Vermont, born at Strafford, Orange county, December 1, 1828. The Youngs are of Scotch ancestry, three brothers emigrating from that country to the United States in the early part of the eighteenth century, one of whom located in Rhode Island, from whom descended the family of which our subject is a member. The paternal grandfather, Rev. Jacob Young, was a native of Rhode Island, born in 1758. He was a Universalist minister, the first of that denomination to locate in the town of Strafford. On locating there he was given a minister's grant of land in the town. He was a man of more than ordinary ability as a minister and theologian. His son, Nathan Young, was born at New Grantham, New Hampshire, in 1792. He there grew to manhood, and married Hannah Smith, a native of Vermont, and a daughter of Frederick Smith, a large landholder, and of an old family of the Green Mountain state. Nathan Young followed the mercantile business for many years, and was a very prominent man in Orange county, Vermont, serving his county as a member of the state legislature. During the war of 1812, he entered the service, and was orderly sergeant of his company. Later he was commissioned brigadier general of the state militia of Vermont, and served a number of years. Nathan Young left his native state in 1844 and came to Kane county, Illinois, joining his son, Peleg Young, who located here some years previously. The family first located in Blackberry township, on a claim which Peleg had purchased some time previously. He at once commenced the improvement of the claim, and there resided some seven years. In 1846, however, in company with our subject, he took up a claim of one hundred and sixty acres in Kaneville township, and in 1849 built a residence and removed to the place where he spent a number of years. Later he removed to Batavia, where he lived a retired life, his wife there dying in 1866. After her death he returned to the farm, and there resided with our subject until called from this world, in 1868. Both were laid to rest in the Batavia cemetery.
The subject of this sketch was sixteen years old when he came to Kane county, and here he has since continued to reside. In March, 1857, he returned to his old home in Strafford, Vermont, and there married Miss Betty Patterson, also a native of Strafford, Vermont, and a daughter of James and Polly Patterson, and a cousin of United States Senator Morrill. After marriage he returned with his young bride to Kane county, and they began their domestic life on the farm in Kaneville township, where Mr. Young engaged in agricultural pursuits for fourteen years, and then moved to the village of Kaneville, where Mrs. Young died, in November, 1871. She was the mother of three children, one of whom died in in-fancy. Jenny Mary grew to womanhood, and married Charles L. Cary, of Geneva, Illinois; she is now deceased. Frank P. is
married and is engaged in farming in Kaneville township. After the death of his first wife, Mr. Young married her sister, Mrs. Ann Ahnis, nee Patterson, the widow of Eli Annis, by whom she has one daughter, Lou, wife of Charles D. Ames, of Kaneville township.
Politically, Mr. Young was a Whig in early life, casting his first presidential ballot for Zachary Taylor. Being a believer in the freedom of all men, and that no man had a right to hold his fellow men in bond-age, he naturally affiliated with the Republican party on its organization, and has since continued to be an advocate of its principles. He has taken quite an active part in local politics, and has held various positions of honor and trust. He was first elected overseer of highways, and, later, township assessor, clerk of the township, and justice of the peace. In 1879 he was elected county treasurer, and was re-elected at the close of his first term, and by change in the constitution he held over, serving seven consecutive years, the longest term of any man in Kane county. On retiring from that office he was again elected township clerk, and has served in that office for twenty-seven years. He also served two years as supervisor of Kaneville township, and was chairman 6f the county board, of Kane county.
Mr. Young has always been interested in all enterprises calculated to subserve the interest of his adopted county and state. He was one of the originators of the County Line Creamery, which operates two creameries, and was elected manager of the same, serving as such up to the present time. The creamery was incorporated November, 1890. He is a stockholder in the Old Second National Bank of Aurora, and has served as one of its directors for some fifteen years. Fraternally, he is a Mason, and was formerly quite active in the lodge at Kaneville, continuing his active membership in it until it ceased to exist, after its lodge room was destroyed by fire. For more than half a century his face has been a familiar one to the citizens of Kane county. He is well known throughout its length and breadth, and his friends are many in every part of the county.