10th – Went to S.S. & Church. Ate dinner with Dot. After dinner Will White, Helen Smith, Tom Willard, Dot, Otis Smith, Edith Newshafer & I went sleigh riding. Came home & did up chores & then Mary & I went to Church. Drove “Old King”.
Edith Hannah Neuschaeffer was the 15 year-old daughter of Otto Theodore and Nancy Elizabeth Dale Neuschafer. A great example of the American Melting pot, Otto and Lizzie were both born in Missouri, but Otto’s parents were born in Germany and Lizzie’s father was born in England and her mother was born in Missouri. In 1908, Edith married Fredrick Godfrey Schaffner and they were life-long Livingston County residents.
Jesse does not mention it, but his father Jim Bench was mentioned in the Chillicothe Constitution Tribune on this day. Do start a free account so that you can look through the paper too! chillicothe.newspaperarchive.com/
In the 1880s, President Grover Cleveland was not perceived as friendly to war veterans because he vetoed bills and individual applications for veterans’ pensions that he believed were fraudulent. The Grand Army of the Republic (of which Jim Bench was a member) was a large group that lobbied Congress on veterans’ behalf. For example, one of the GAR-influenced bills that Cleveland vetoed was for a pension created for veterans who had disabilities after the war, but not sustained during enlistment. Here is a fabulous article about this specific topic.
