Mrs. Root in her teens

Mrs. Susan Hall Root
By: Nina Bagley

Susan Hall was born in 1841 in Ely, Cambridgeshire, England. Her parents were Daniel and Mary Hall, both born in England. They had three children: Robert born in 1838, Susan born in 1841 and, after immigrating to America in 1848, Mary born in 1850. During 1815 and 1837, Ely was in general depression, an agricultural community with no work to be found. The townspeople had terrible living conditions and Ely laborers could no longer maintain themselves. The city of Ely’s population was growing more rapidly than it was in the surrounding countryside. Infectious diseases plagued the countryside, then another Cholera outbreak began in England in 1848. There was a heavy death rate, increasing mortality between 1841 and 1848. This might be one of the reasons why Susan’s father decided to embark on a journey to America with his family for better opportunities.

In 1848, Liverpool, England was the most significant immigration port in the world. Traveling from Ely, Cambridgeshire to Liverpool was 250 miles. Once arriving at the port, families waited in lines, sometimes for days just to get on a ship to sail to America. The journey could take forty to ninety days (about three months) with unfavorable winds and harsh weather.

When this occurred, passengers would often run short of food. Bread, biscuits and potatoes were provided by the shipping companies. The food was terrible and, at times, spoiled.

This was not a cruise ship. Passengers had about two square feet of space. It was dirty, with extraordinarily little ventilation, not to mention lice and rodents. It was a long, wearying journey for a young girl of eight, not knowing what the future would bring, leaving her homeland for an unfamiliar land.

Susan’s father decided to farm and raise his family in Medina County, Ohio. In the new homeland, the family prospers and became community members, attending church and farming their land. As a young girl, Susan had no idea that she would grow up to be a driving force in one man’s life or that that man would become a part of history in Medina, Ohio, the place her father would choose to bring his family to have a better life.

As a young girl, Susan had a schoolmate named Sara Root who was very fond of Susan. Sara felt that her friend Susan would make a good wife for her brother. Sara’s brother Amos Ives Root was away for the Winter in Westville, Ohio, on the river, staying with a relative while attending high school. Sara wrote to her brother saying she had found one of the sweetest girls in all the world as a wife for him.

It was a little embarrassing for Amos I. Root when the two first met, knowing that this schoolmate of his sister knew what she had written to him. It was true love at first sight for both.

A.I. Root wrote: “Her honest simplicity and childlike innocence impressed me from the very first; and, as a matter of course, we two proceeded to get acquainted; and I, for my part, I fear, carried out the program so well that the dear sister was a good many times forgotten and ‘left out in the cold’” (Gleanings in Bee Culture, 1923, pg. 58).

Amos would walk miles to Susan’s family’s farm in unbearable weather to spend a few hours in her company. He called on her once in the middle of the week and every Sunday night! Both Amos and Susan were attending school at the time. When visiting in those early days, staying late was much the fashion. Susan would politely tell Amos that her father went to considerable expense so she could attend a particular school for girls. She could not participate in her studies if he stayed so late, and how important it was for her to get a good night’s sleep. Amos was reluctant to go home at the proper time. Finally, Susan said one evening: “Sir, it is time for you to go home.”

Amos was offended and declared that if he went home, he would go and never return. Susan said, “All right. If you refuse to listen to the dictates of good common sense, it will probably be better for both of us that you should go away and never come back” (Gleanings in Bee Culture, Jan. 1923).

Susan was petite with a kind spirit who knew exactly who she was and what she desired. Having their first lover’s quarrel, Amos left with his head up high and a stern look to teach her that he, Amos I. Root, was not to be dictated to in that manner!

It was a dark night, and he was walking quickly. His temper was getting the best of him and flaring up, which it had done most of his life. Amos started reflecting on how he acted and started to slow down a bit. It was the voice of reason or remembrance of his good mother’s teachings. This is what his mother said: “Old Fellow, is it not possible you are taking offense at the wise words of the best friend you have on earth, and that, instead of being offended, you should recognize her as the one whose price is far above rubies?” (Gleanings in Bee Culture, Jan. 1923.)

Amos crossed the bridge, realizing his mistake. He felt a cold chill all over him, and he turned around, walking calmly back to Mr. Hall’s farm as he hurried up to the house he had just left. Above the front door was Susan’s window to her room. He picked up a pebble and gently tossed it up against her window. And the window went flying up just as he expected! He was always quite sure of himself, so this is what Amos I. Root said: “‘Sue, I humbly beg pardon. You were right, and I was wrong. Will you forgive me?’ Susan responded, ‘All right. Good night.’ And down went the window!” (Gleanings, Jan. 1923).

Amos thought she would come downstairs and give him a kiss of reconciliation; Susan planned nothing of the kind! It was a turning point in his life. Amos finally proposed that the two should be engaged. But Susan insisted that they both were too young to be getting married; Amos was 17 and Susan was 15. Kindly, she told Amos that he did not have the vitality for marriage. A.I. Root was sickly and frail as a child and as a man was not strong. She wanted to postpone marraige for a few years because she was not ready for marriage and wanted to complete her schooling.

A.I. Root would go off and find his way in the big wide world for the next couple of years, making a name for himself, giving lectures and expanding his mind to innovative ideas. He never let the idea go, knowing the two would marry one day. After his lecture tours were over. He returned to his father’s small farm in the woods where he lived as a young man.

Susan’s father feared that Amos could not make a living. Amos would prove him wrong. A.I. Root took a course in watch-repairing and, at twenty-one, started a watch-repairing shop under the pretentious name of A.I. Root & Co. He then proceeded to call on his true love, Miss Susan Hall. Susan’s father was humbled, and he approved them of their marriage.

Mr. and Mrs. Root after they were married.

Three noteworthy events took place in 1861. Abraham Lincoln’s inauguration on March 4, 1861. The Civil War started on April 9, 1861. And, A.I. Root and Susan Hall were married on September 29, 1861. Amos was twenty-one and Susan was nineteen years old.

As the sun rose that Autumn morning after Mr. and Mrs. Root married, they started with horses and carriage on a honeymoon trip. The two were by themselves. Amos put out his hand to Sue as he called her, and she looked smilingly up into his face while he spoke, “Sue, the agreement between us two that we have just entered into is the most sacred and solemn step in our lives. Let us fully consider the new relations that rest on the shoulders of both of us, and may God help us to bear with each other and to bear with patience the new responsibilities that are going to rest on us two. May we two, through thick and thin, for better or for worse, cling to each other.” It was a boyish speech, but it was honest.

Mrs. Susan Hall Root would become his support, “wise counselor” and confidante throughout their marriage, including her husband’s business affairs. Mrs. Root’s hard work and excellent management of the home helped A.I. Root to meet his obligations when they were starting out as a young couple. They would build a homestead and live in Medina, Ohio.

A.I. Root would become a very influential man in many ways, especially in the world of bees. By 1885, the Root name was recognized around the world. Modest and simple in taste, Mrs. Root always avoided publicity, preferring the background of a beautiful home life she had with her husband and children.

Mrs. Root would spend the next sixty years being there for her husband while being an attentive wife and mother, giving birth to five children in twenty years: Ernest R. Root, 1862; Maud E. Root, 1865; Constance M. Root, 1872; Carrie B. Root, 1878; and, having her youngest child at forty-one, Huber Hall Root, 1883. The two would cling together for better or worse, just as they promised one another.

In August 1865, a swarm of bees passed over the A.I. Root & Co. One of the employees of Mr. Root asked jokingly what would you give me if I caught the swarm? Mr. Root replied, a dollar securely boxed. The young man brought A.I. Root the bees, securely boxed, and collected his dollar; the rest is history.

The Root Factory.

A.I. Root founded his bee company in 1869 in his hometown of Medina, Ohio to manufacture beehives and beekeeping equipment. The company was shipping four railroad freight cars of beekeeping equipment everyday, things were going well! A.I. Root was working sixteen-hour days, which sometimes made it difficult to be around him. He started the magazine Gleanings in Bee Culture on January 1, 1873. The first edition of A.I. Root’s book ABC and XYZ of Bee Culture was published in 1879.

Mr. Root constantly worked and expected everyone around him to work just as hard! But that was impossible because Mr. Root was continually working and doing the work of five men until he would exhaust himself to the point that he made himself ill.

Mr. Root would say: “Had I gone on as an evil and angry spirit prompted me to do and not turn back to apologize to my dear wife, Sue, there would have been no A.I. Root Co. There would have been no five dear children brought up in the fear of the Lord, and there would, in all probability, have been no A.I. Root now dictating these words” (Gleanings in Bee Culture, Jan.1923).

Mrs. Root’s children, at some point, all worked for the family business. She was a devoted mother and the most meticulous housekeeper; dust and dirt were her enemies!

Mrs. Root’s daughter Candice Root Boyden authored an article in Gleanings about her mother. The title was “Mother”: “Sweet and modest as the violet of her nature England. Mother always kept herself in the background; only her husband and children, no matter how much credit they had accomplished, should go to her” (Gleanings in Bee Culture, Jan. 1, 1922).

Candice remembered how, as a small child, her mother spent most of her time in the kitchen preparing delicious, healthy foods for the family. Mrs. Root would spend many hours standing over a walnut table with drop leaves while she prepared the family meals. At the end of the table was a shallow drawer to put spoons, cutlery, and other kitchen items. But Mrs. Root would use the drawer for more important things. Neatly filled with toys, the drawer’s contents revealed her love and understanding of a child’s nature.

Mr. and Mrs. Root having a picnic.

The toys were not store-bought, as her daughter would say they were “Treasures, queer bits of metal and wood, an old steel puzzle made by Father, rubber balls, balls of string, little wooden boxes and a little shallow bowl carved from black walnut. But unselfishness, Mother’s dominant characteristic, is revealed in the fact that the drawer, within my recollection, never held anything to help Mother in her work and save her steps.” (Gleanings in Bee Culture, Jan. 1, 1922).

At the time, kitchens were compact, with all their cooking utensils and drawers close by to save the women steps in the kitchen. Mrs. Root was okay with the drawer, which was full of toys for the children. And she did not mind walking back and forth to the big pantry each time she needed something out of it. Mrs. Root often had very severe attacks of pleurisy throughout her life, weakening her heart. She was not a robust woman and sometimes did not have the energy to run around after the children, so the drawer kept their little hands busy and close to their mother.

Mrs. Root would fill a bowl with water and place it on the floor so the children could sail their boats. In the Winter, she would warm the water so their little hands would not get cold. She loved children and had a nurturing way with them.

Mrs. Root did not have the opportunity to attend college, but she took immense pleasure in her children and grandchildren attending college.

Mr. and Mrs. Root would not accompany their family to hotel dinners. They would not go to formal dinners or parties in their honor, but they loved simple picnics in the parks with family around them.

In 1901, A.I. Root built a cabin in the northern part of the Michigan woods and went there to live with his wife. In the forty years of married life, they would finally work side by side, enjoying each other’s companionship.

A.I. Root did not like wintry weather; the cold bothered him. So, a few years after they built their Michigan cabin, they would make another cabin in Florida, where they spent their Winters. Mrs. Root did not like calling it a cabin, so she called it their cottage.

The Roots in their 70s.

The fare from Cleveland, Ohio to Bradenton, Florida was $57.15 a tourist for a round-trip ticket for the Winter. The Roots loved going to their Florida cottage, but Mrs. Root was always overwhelmed with grief to leave all her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren every Winter.

In the early 1900s, they would spend their Summers in Michigan and Winters in Florida.

The Root Men: J.T. Calvert, Huber, Allen and Ernest Root.

Their sons, Ernest and Huber, were involved in the business of the A.I. Root Company along with their daughter Maude’s husband J.T. Calvert who was the bookkeeper. Around 1900, Ernest took over as editor for Gleanings and kept the bee part of the company going while Huber, more of an inventor like his father, experimented with beeswax. Under Huber’s guidance, the Root company started making candles at the request of the Catholic Church. The local priest was looking for better quality beeswax for their candles and a wick that burned longer. A.I. Root’s sons were carrying the torch for their father so he never had to worry about money again and could devote his time to Mrs. Root, the Congregational Church, family, bees and gardening.

Huber started the candles for the Catholic Church.

Mrs. Root, being in her seventies, enjoyed being outdoors, working in her garden in Florida, and enjoyed spending time with her husband. She enjoyed picking vegetables from her garden and sharing them with her family and neighbors.

Her children felt their mother was the most perfect and unselfish of anyone they had ever known. Mrs. Root captured the hearts around her. She had enough love to go around and was happy when she could help those that were needy, lonely, widowed or fatherless.

Her tender heart cared for the neighbor’s chickens, cats and dogs and ensured they were all fed and cared for. And if Mrs. Root felt a horse was being mistreated, she would not stand for it. This most definitely caused her misery.

A.I. Root wrote: “May I be pardoned for saying that the dear little woman has most faithfully kept her part of the pledge year in and year out? Oh! What would I give if I could truthfully say, ‘I have done as well, or even approximately as well?’” (Gleanings in Bee Culture, 1917, pg. 297).

Mrs. Root suddenly passed away on the evening of Tuesday, November 29, 1921 in Bradenton, Florida, where she and her husband had maintained a cottage for several years. The Roots had just returned to Florida a few weeks before her death. She was feeling exceptionally well and was particularly happy to visit her good friend for many years, Mrs. Ed Nettleton of Medina, who also vacationed in Bradenton, Florida, for the Winter.

Although the family knew it was coming for some time, her life was swiftly ended; the family felt it was due to her arteries being weak from pleurisy attacks over the years.

Mr. and Mrs. Root with a grandchild.

Mrs. Root’s aged husband was too feeble and was advised not to make the long trip back home with the body of his long-time companion.

Mrs. Root’s funeral was held at the home of Ernest Root, her son, on Friday, December 2, 1921, at the old homestead. Mrs. Root was eighty years old. Mr. and Mrs. Root had their sixtieth wedding anniversary a few weeks before her death. She left behind her husband, five children, eleven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Mrs. Root was a Medina County, Ohio resident for over seventy years and a friend to all. Mrs. Root is buried in the Spring Grove Cemetery in Medina County, Ohio.

A few years later, Mr. Root caught pneumonia on his way home to Medina, Ohio from Bradenton, Florida. Being feeble, weak and bedridden for several days, the doctor was called, but Mr. Root, knowing it was time, looked at his son Ernest one last time, feeling at peace. He was ready to meet his maker and join his true love, Mrs. Susan Hall Root. A.I. Root took a deep breath and passed away on April 29, 1923, with his children by his side. A.I. Root is buried beside his wife in the Spring Grove Cemetery in Medina County, Ohio.

Ten to twenty percent of the people fleeing Europe in the 1800s did not survive. Not only did Mrs. Root survive, but she survived childbirth, raising five children, cooking and cleaning, washing and ironing in the mid-1800s, and tending to a husband who was constantly inventing and taking chances.

Mrs. Root’s children would have children, and their children would have children, and it has continued for five generations.

The A.I. Root Company is still in business today. The magazine is still being published but instead of Gleanings in Bee Culture it is called Bee Culture: The Magazine of American Beekeeping. Today, A.I. Root is the largest supplier of liturgical candles for Catholic churches. A hundred and fifty-four years later, Brad Root continues the family tradition like his father and grandfathers before him. He is the fifth generation of the Root family. So, the next time you light a Root Candle, think of Mrs. Susan Hall Root who was a friend to all.

I agree with A.I. Root that there would be no A.I. Root Co. if not for a tenacious young girl, Susan Hall Root!

“There is a great woman behind every great man.”

Nina Bagley
Ohio Queen Bee
Columbus, Ohio

Miss Lillian Love was born into a Quaker family in Marion, Indiana on October 24, 1880. Her family was from Decatur, Indiana. Her father, Granville Love, was born in Indiana. In 1860, he married Nancy J. Gillibrand. Her family came from England and settled in the vicinity of Indianapolis. The two were married on August 11, 1868, in Morgan County, Indiana. Granville was a farmer and ran a huckster wagon, which proved a good business. Mrs. Nancy Love had nine children from 1869 to 1892. She died on January 31, 1936, at eighty-six, in Decatur, Indiana. Lillian’s father, Granville Love, died May 7, 1925, in Guilford, Indiana. All the children would be trained in English and piano at Central Normal College in Danville, Indiana.

Lillian’s parents, Granville and Nancy Love.

Lillian had two years of college, became a teacher, and taught in Indiana and Florida. Women still couldn’t find jobs other than teaching. Lillian and her youngest sister Flossie were involved in women’s rights and equal opportunity for women; they supported women’s rights to vote.

In 1904, Lillian moved to Tacoma, Washington, where she taught for several years. Finding her husband in 1907, she married Jay Levant Hill, who was twenty-five years older than her. Lillian’s husband, Jay, was an inventor who owned his own lumber business. Lillian said that her husband’s “brain was mechanically bent.”

Miss Lillian Love, taken in Washington State prior to her marriage to J. Levant Hill.

Their home would be Mount Shadow Ranch, a two-hundred-acre farm with a charming yellow California-style bungalow, two and a half miles from Elbe, Washington. Surrounding the farm were the bee’s favorite purple hills of fireweed.

Fireweed is a plant that enjoys cool and moist climates and thrives in Pacific Northwest forestlands. It is also considered one of the most prolific plants for honey production, with its nectar having a high sugar concentration. It has a “lightly spicy” or “buttery” flavor.

If you shut your eyes and listen, you can hear the train whistle in the distance as it stops at Park Junction Station in the middle of Mount Shadow Ranch.

1926 – Lillian Hill at Mt. Rainier
Apiary. Image featured in American Bee Journal

“We have some thirty acres under cultivation,” said Mrs. Hill; The rest of the farm is logged-off land which we use to pasture our herd of fifty cattle.”
—American Bee Journal, April 1926.

One day in 1913, an old man came peddling bees. “You have a wonderful place here for bees,” he said, convincing Mrs. Hill to invest in six swarms. Before the older man came along, she had never seen a swarm of bees before. Her six swarms increased and produced so much honey that in 1914 Lillian Hill invested in twenty more swarms, giving her forty hives. That year she harvested 6,500 pounds of pure honey. Lillian had an entrepreneurial spirit and determination to succeed in a male-dominated industry.

Lillian’s marriage to J. Hill.

I don’t know how she accomplished so much. Mrs. Lillian Hill kept a tidy home, raised beef cattle, Duroc-Jersey hogs, geese and ducks, and grew vegetables in the garden. But it would be the bees she loved the most!

Lillian was part owner of the Ranch and owner of the Mount Shadow Apiary. She had a gentle personality. She was independent and had a fire in her eyes that you could see demanded respect.

Being a novice beekeeper found her unprepared. In 1915, she encountered her first obstacle, European Foulbrood that would bring havoc to her beeyard. Words that no beekeeper wanted to hear or experience, the only cure, the dreadful burning of the hives. After that horrible experience with “American Foulbrood,” she only kept a dozen colonies of bees providing honey for her family and neighbors. (American Bee Journal, April 1926.)

“I never camp,” confessed Lillian Hill. “On either the trail of my successes or my failures. I go right on.” That’s her philosophy in a nut-shell.

Although childless, she cared for the children from reform schools, orphan asylums or neighboring farms; she taught the boys and girls everything about beekeeping so they could pay their way through school. She believed that the best and safest way to help any human being is to help him help himself. Particularly, those who needed guidance and education.

In the 1900s, the U.S. was a diverse nation, and its children lived in various circumstances. For years, she had been the leader of the Boys’ and Girls’ Bee Club of Elbe. One of her boys won nearly $80.00 with his exhibits of bees and honey at the Western Washington Fair.

Lillian increased her hives to twenty-six to help one of her boys and it didn’t stop there!

In 1924, to help one of her girls through school, she invested in thirty more hives and loaned them to the girl. The girl lived next door to an abandoned schoolhouse on an acre of ground, which got Mrs. Hill thinking, “I could rent the schoolhouse and land from the school board.”

1921 – Freddie May with his siblings before they were placed in the Washington Children’s Home.

One day in 1924, a young man showed up at the Ranch. His name was Freddie May, and he was born in 1912 in Denver, Colorado. When he was eight years old, he lived in Wenatchee, Washington. His father abandoned the family, and their mother could not care for six children. The children were placed in the Washington Children’s Home in Wenatchee, Washington, in 1921.

Mount Rainier Apiary. Freddie May and Mrs. Lillian Hill.

Freddie somehow got his hands on a newspaper. He came across the ad for a permanent position in beekeeping work. Freddie wanted to learn about the beekeeping business under the leadership of Mrs. Lillian Hill, so he rode on “a bicycle” from Wenatchee, Washington to Elbe, Washington, a hundred and ninety five miles! He was energetic and full of fire and wanted to learn beekeeping.

Lillian took a liking to Freddie and wanted to help him make money to pay his way through school, so she furnished Freddie with plenty of bees on a commission basis of fifty-fifty. In four months, the Colorado cyclist made five hundred dollars for himself.

Freddie would consider Mrs. Lillian Hill his mother and next of kin. Lillian and her husband would become Freddie’s foster parents giving him a home with security. He would attend Eatonville High School and work on the Ranch. He would continue beekeeping and eventually marry and have a family.

During the season of 1925, Mrs. Hill was able to establish the Colorado youth in the schoolhouse helping young boys and girls in need teaching them beekeeping.

In 1926, Lillian Hill had over one hundred and fifty hives of Italian bees, eighty-five at the schoolhouse and sixty-five at home. She produced at least 10,000 sections of comb honey. Mrs. Hill would advertise in the newspapers to get workers “Wanted – an experienced farmer for a permanent position.”

Most of the marketing she did herself in her Buick car. She supplied the best stores in Tacoma and Seattle. “I don’t have to hunt for a market,” declared this energetic woman. In one year, Mrs. Hill raised sixty queens. That was the part of her business that she enjoyed most of all. Mrs. Hill was the president of the Pierce County Beekeepers’ Association for two years.

Mount Rainier

Both triumphs and disasters have knocked often at Lillian Hill’s door on the Mount Shadow Ranch, but neither one ever fazed her. This woman had grit and plenty of it!

Around 1927, Freddie would accidentally run over Lillian’s foot crushing it while she was teaching him how to drive the tractor. An unfortunate outcome was that the doctors had to amputate her leg due to blood poisoning. Lillian had a prosthetic leg from the knee down, but that didn’t stop her. She took it in stride and persevered. In 1929, unfortunately, her husband died. He was the youngest of five and the last of his siblings. He was seventy-one years old. I will say some lives have more trial or tribulations than others, to be sure, but no life is without events that test and challenge us.

In the 1930 census, Lillian is listed as a widow forty-nine years old, with fifty men aged eighteen to sixty-six listed as boarders at the Mount Shadow Ranch and working for Lillian Hill. That’s a lot of men to manage. You would have to have grit and be firm! Among the fifty men working on the farm was Freddie May, the youngest, who was eighteen. His occupation was a Logger.

Not being able to care for the Ranch and losing her husband, not to mention the tractor accident, left her feeling like it would be time to sell the Ranch. Lillian Hill would place the Ranch up for sale.

Advertised in the Tacoma Daily Ledger Sunday, June 23, 1929. “Mountain Shadow Ranch. It is one of the best-stocked Dairy Farms in western Washington, with running water in every field and excellent soil. Forty acres cleared; 120 acres fenced for hogs and cattle; stocked and making money; good seven-room house with school buses to Elbe and Eatonville high school. The farm is a must-see to appreciate it. We will consider small trade—a price of $15,000. Write to Lillian L. Hill for an appointment.”

Family photo of Albert Cook, first wife Nora and their children.

Lillian’s family Bible.

A lot happened in 1930. The Ranch sold, and Lillian Hill married Albert Cook, a widower who worked in the lumber industry. His wife Nora passed away in March of 1929 at the age of fifty-one; they had six children together. Lillian didn’t mind an extended family. She was raising her niece Esther who she adopted at a young age and her foster son Freddie May. After all, Lillian loved children and teaching. Her first husband was in the lumber business so she probably knew Albert Cook.

Albert would marry Lillian in 1930, build apartment buildings and retire from the lumber industry. The two would live in Tacoma, Washington. Lillian’s beekeeping days came to an end, her new occupation would be owner and landlord of her apartment buildings.

Lillian had a very loving relationship for nineteen years with her husband Albert. In May of 1949, Albert passed away at the age of seventy-three. He was buried beside his first wife, Nora, in Tacoma, Pierce, Washington.

The income from the apartments and other investments would give Lillian a comfortable life for the next sixteen years. She lived to be eighty-eight and passed away August 19, 1969 in Tacoma, Pierce, Washington Lillian was a Sixth Avenue Baptist church member. She was buried next to her first husband, Jay Levant Hill.

Freddie May lived to be eighty-three years old. Freddie kept his surname May. He went by Fred (Cook) May, Sr. “Commander” as best by everyone who loved him.

Lillian in her sister Flossie’s backyard. Her dress is purple and black print. She and her sister Flossie always had a matching rhinestone necklace.

Lillian’s youngest sister Flossie, who she remained close with, lived in California. Flossie had a granddaughter Karla who enjoyed her aunt Lillian’s visits. She remembers sitting on her grandmother’s hunter green “davenport” with her aunt Lillian. Her grandma Flossie would sit in her desk chair across the room and the two sisters would talk for hours.

Lillian’s great-niece Karla also remembers how “intriguing” her aunt was. Lillian had blue eyes, was fair-haired and had rosy cheeks. She wore her hair in a braid reaching her waist until one day; she cut it off, curled it up, and put it in a small box for keeping. Karla remembers her Aunt Lillian as sweet but at the same time, tough and gutsy!

Marcus Aurelius was a stoic philosopher. His quote reminded me of Mrs. Lillian Love, her struggles as a woman in the 1900’s and how she put others before her, passing her knowledge about beekeeping on to so many young boys and girls in need. I would like to thank Lillian’s great-niece Karla Babcock for sharing her memories of her Aunt Lillian and grandmother Flossie.

“A life of sacrifice and putting the well being collective first, just like the bees.”
—Marcus Aurelius

Ohioqueenbee
Nina M. Bagley
Columbus, Ohio.

Mrs. Helen Goodsell Acklin

Ethel Acklin Calvert, circa 1929

Breezing through my 1900s Gleanings in Bee Culture Magazines, I found a beekeeping woman and her daughter who caught my interest: Mrs. Helen Goodsell Acklin and her daughter Miss Ethel Acklin from St. Paul, Minnesota. Ethel would marry Howard Root Calvert, son of Maude Root Calvert, who was the daughter of A. I. Root.

Helen Goodsell was born in New York on May 3, 1857. Her parents, Jessie and Laura Goodsell, were both born in New York. Helen was the youngest of five children. Her parents moved to Wisconsin when she was very young. She attended a country school and then a village school, preparing her for a career in teaching. Her passion for honey bees started at a young age. In her teens, she told herself that she would have bees someday, but it would be a while before this happened.

Helen’s Divorce Paper, Dec. 8, 1885

At fifteen, Helen married her first husband, Phillip P. Jewell on November 11, 1872. He was ten years older than Helen. I couldn’t find much information about Phillip other than he was in the Civil War and that Helen served him divorce papers. In 1885 you needed proof and a reason for getting divorced. The grounds for divorce were adultery, desertion and abuse. The ink had faded on her divorce papers and was hard to make out. I’m sure she had her reasons- the Civil War was brutal and many men suffered long term mental and physical illnesses from serving in it.

Phillip P. Jewell didn’t show up for court. Helen was granted her divorce on December 8, 1885 at the State of Wisconsin Circuit Court for Polk County. While living in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1884, she met her second husband. James C. Acklin, who was working as a contractor. He had been married before and had a daughter, Annie. The two married on December 8, 1885. The same day Helen was granted her divorce. She was 28 years old. What a courageous young woman! Talk about killing two birds with one stone.

James C. Acklin was born in Pennsylvania in 1857. He was a contractor and builder, and was a prosperous man. A. I. Root described him as dignified, gentlemanly, quiet and significantly large in stature. The time for bees finally came for Helen shortly after they were married. Fortunately, some bees were on the lot where they were building a home and thus began their beekeeping journey. For a present to his wife, Mr. Acklin, made her seventeen colonies of American hives. The bees were not the most friendly, so they replaced them with a gentler stock. The frames were all glued together and made a mess out of the hives. It took some doing to pull them apart.

J.C Acklin
July 1, 1906 The Western Edition

Helen G. Acklin
Gleanings Eastern edition February 15,1906

Nevertheless, Mr. Acklin meant well, and Mrs. Acklin transferred them to Langstroth hives with the assistance of her husband. In 1890, they went west to California, but in the Fall of 1891, they returned to St. Paul, where they planned on building a life together. Their daughter Ethel was born in the Winter of 1892. And the following Spring, 1893, they began handling beekeeping supplies. Very little building was going on during the hard times, and Mr. Acklin secured a position as a lumber inspector with the Great Northern Railway. He worked for several years. Both of them tried their best to prevail. Mrs. Acklin kept a watchful eye on their daughter and ran the bee supply business. Like any good business, with a vision and hard work, it will grow over time, and this is what happened. The work became overwhelming! Her husband effectively resigned from his position with the railroad to help his wife out full-time with the bee supply business. He devoted his time to his family and the business of bees. Mr. and Mrs. Acklin both were active in the Minnesota Beekeepers Association. They both were closely associated with helping each other and working side by side until Mr. Acklin’s sudden death in 1906.

After the death of her husband, Mrs. Acklin continued with beekeeping, having her ups and downs working her bees. She had over 100 hives and several out-apiaries. Even then, disaster sometimes comes knocking on one’s door. One morning she realized water overflowed the cellar apiary, and sand was running into the entrances and drowning the bees. I’m sure if you kept bees long enough, you would have had issues with your bees. But can you imagine the cellar filling up with water? The colonies floated around like fishing bobbers until rescued by men with rubber boots and a long pole!

Ethel Helen Acklin, 13
1913

A woman with less love for the honey bee and less perseverance would have surrendered in despair, and to add to it, she felt alone. But Mrs. Acklin kept on, learning something by hard knocks, and from experience and her bee books, she followed Doolittle’s method of raising queens. It would be discouraging and make one choose another occupation, but with her guiding principles, she prevailed. With her small beginnings, Mrs. Acklin was one of the most successful beekeepers in St. Paul, Minnesota. And she was well known in Wisconsin too. Running a sizeable queen-rearing apiary at her home, she was a prominent dealer in beekeeping supplies for over fifteen years, alongside being an attentive mother.

“MISS ETHEL ACKLIN AND HER BEE-KEEPING SONGS AT THE CHICAGO CONVENTION.”

Her daughter Ethel knew more about bees than most young women and men. She accompanied her mother and father to the bee conventions. Ethel remembers in 1900 when she was nine, singing solo and chorus songs, the music by Dr. C.C Miller, during the National Convention in Chicago. How she enjoyed the time with her parents. The death of her father was not easy on both mother and daughter.

Mrs. Acklin continued her business for a few more years, but her failing health made her make a change of her occupation and climate. So she moved back to California in 1908, eighteen years since she had last been there. She didn’t entirely give up on bees. At fifty-one, Mrs. Acklin, with her daughter, bought a home in Glendora, California, and purchased an orange grove twenty-five miles outside of Los Angeles. She became a rancher and an orange grocer keeping a few hives.

She also attended the bee conventions. She edited the Beekeeping in Southern California department in Gleanings. Mrs. Acklin was against beekeepers that sold adulterated honey and worked aggressively to put them out of business! She wrote in Gleanings in Bee Culture: “I wonder how many beekeepers know that honey adulteration is happening right in our midst; if beekeepers work together, these swindlers can be put out of business. Whether it be the small grocer who puts just a little glucose in the honey to keep it liquid or the wholesale man who mixes tons, the effect is the same. People soon take a dislike to glucose honey. They stop eating honey altogether. So beekeepers lose money on two counts, less honey being consumed while the output increases. How can this adulteration be stopped? All beekeeper’s associations in our State, whether county clubs, district unions or State organizations, should unite under one banner in fighting this evil, and send a large and enthusiastic delegation, composed of delegates from each society, to the legislature this Winter to represent the beekeeping industry of our State.” Gleanings, 1910 (pg. 749).

When A. I. Root Co. established a branch office in San Francisco, Mrs. Acklin was given charge of it and continued to work until her death on May 30, 1915. A. I. Root enjoyed visiting Mrs. Acklin’s home in Oakland when he was on business in California. And found her to be commendable, a good businesswoman and a loving mother.

Howard Root Calvert
1923

A. I. Root’s grandson Howard Root Calvert took care of the A. I. Root Company’s exhibit booths at the San Francisco expositions. And it was during one of these visits Howard would meet Miss Ethel Acklin. They announced their engagement to be married. Ethel’s mother passed away a few months before the wedding. The two were married on Tuesday, July 6, 1915, at the home of the groom’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. J. T. Calvert, in Medina, Ohio. Ethel was grieving her mother, her last surviving relative, and is said to have held up bravely. The death of the bride’s mother made it necessary for Ethel to be married in Medina, Ohio.

Mr. and Mrs. Howard Root Calvert

Immediately following the ceremony, the couple drove to Elyria, Ohio where they started their long trip back to California. Mr. and Mrs. Calvert were both in charge of the San Francisco office, taking hold where Ethel’s mother left off. Mr. and Mrs. Calvert dealt with life’s realities and an active bee business. Ethel was said to have been “the bee man” of the establishment. In 1916, Mr. and Mrs. Calvert returned to live in Medina, Ohio, where they would start their family. Howard continued working for his family’s business, the A. I. Root Company.

The family had ultimate happiness and then ultimate loss. Mrs. Calvert’s husband died suddenly as a young father at thirty-two in a tragic plane crash while giving lessons on June 27, 1924, in Akron, Ohio. He was not flying the plane but the student, Mrs. Whichershelm, was. What a tragedy! Now widowed at a young age, Ethel had three young daughters to think about. Rebecca, seven; Roberta, five; and Ruth, four. Her daughters were all she had left, falling back on her husband Howard’s strength, her mother’s tenacity, and her own will and faith, Ethel would return to California and overcome by providing for her girls, owning her own home and bee supplies company just like her mother had done.

Alfred Francis Nippell yearbook picture

It would be thirty-six years before Ethel would remarry. But I always say, “there’s a lid for every pot.” In 1960, she married Mr. Alfred Francis Nippell. He was fifty years old, his occupation was a bookkeeper, and he had never been married; Ethel was sixty-seven. They were married for twenty-eight years. Ethel slowed down regarding the bees, just keeping some bees in the country. Ethel was ninety-five when she passed away with her family by her side on January 8, 1988.

She shared the love of the honey bee. Endured the loss of her parents and her husband at a young age. She raised three daughters who were related to the Root family. She had four grandchildren and eleven great-grandchildren, which gave her much joy. Her second husband Alfred provided her with love, companionship and security. He passed away at the age of ninety in 2000 in San Diego, California. Mother and daughter both having parallel lives. “I admired their tenacity, entrepreneurship and strength; the busy bee has no time for sorrow.” —William Blake

Nina Bagley
Ohio Queen Bee
Columbus, Ohio