Biography - Joel Proctor
JOEL H. PROCTOR. Conspicuous among the business men of Johnson County stands Mr. Proctor, who is a successful merchant at Regent. He was born in Jackson County, Tenn., on the 14th of June, 1847. His father, James Proctor, of the same county, was a son of Henry Proctor, of South Carolina, and of Irish ancestry. He died in Tennessee in middle life, leaving a family of five sons and two daughters. James was his fourth child and second son, and married Frances Henley, daughter of Pleasant and Martha (Wats) Henley, both from South Carolina. The maternal grandparents came from Tennessee to southern Illinois in 1858, the grandmother dying about 1869, aged seventy-seven years. She left but one child, the mother of Joel H. Proctor. Grandfather Henley survived until 1888, and died at the home of Joel H., at the age of eighty-eight, strong and healthy until his last sickness. He left an estate worth about $6,000.
The parents of our subject came to southern Illinois, and settled in Union County in 1860. They at first located on forty acres of land, which they sold ten years later, and removed to Johnson County, where they bought one hundred acres of improved land in Goreville Township. Here they lived until 1882, when they went to Pope County to live with their daughter, Mary King. The mother died in May, 1883, and the father followed in November, she dying at the age of sixty-five, and he at seventy-three. They had buried two children, one son at one year, and a daughter, Martha, in 1865, twenty-two years old. The living ones are Joel H.; Mary, wife of John F. King; and Thaddeus Q., a merchant of Elvira Township.
Joel H. lived at home until his marriage at twenty-five years of age, April 24, 1873, to Jessiefia Kelley, daughter of William and Sarah (Weddel) Kelley, who came from Indiana about 1862. He died in 1878, aged sixty-three; his widow is still living. Mrs. Proctor has three brothers, John R., Isaac N. and Calvin, all farmers of Johnson County. Mr. and Mrs. Proctor have buried two infant sons, and have one daughter living, Daisy, Mrs. John A. Gresham, who is eighteen years old. Mr. Proctor followed farming until December, 1884, when he sold the one hundred acres bought of the heirs of his father, and removed to Regent, where he bought a one-half interest in the general merchandising business of W. D. Toler. Three years later he bought the remaining one-half interest, and has since conducted the business alone. He was appointed Postmaster in 1888, and though a Republican, he took the place vacated by his partner under Cleveland. He has been a Notary Public for the past three years. He is a well-informed, well-balanced, genial gentleman, and attracts people to him, making them lasting friends.
Extracted 16 Dec 2016 by Norma Hass from 1893 Biographical Review of Johnson, Massac, Pope, and Hardin Counties, Illinois, page 524.
