snydert
Transcribed from "An Illustrated History of The Big Bend Country, embracing
Lincoln, Douglas, Adams and Franklin counties, State of Washington",
published by Western Historical Publishing Co., 1904.
THOMAS M. SNYDER, a farmer living
two miles north of Egypt, Washington, came to his present home in the fall
of 1887 with nothing of value except the team and wagon with which he came.
He now is a man of plenty and to spare, and enjoys the trust and good will
of a wide circle of social and business friends.
Mr. Snyder was born in Clinton county, Pennsylvania,
October 5, 1844, the son of Peter and Sarah (Rogers) Snyder, also natives
of Pennsylvania, both of whom are dead. The paternal family came
originally from Germany.
In 1853 the family removed to Warren county,
Illinois; and August 11, 1862, Thomas M. enlisted in Company B, One Hundred
and Second Illinois Infantry, under General Sherman, and went to war.
At a battle near Bentonville he was shot in the hand, which together with
sickness, so disabled him that he was unable to participate in the many
battles of his regiment, yet he was not discharged until the close of the
war. Upon leaving the army he returned to his home, and in the spring
of 1866 started across the plains, and drove a freight team from Nebraska
City to Salt Lake. The following spring he went to Nevada, where
he spent some time among the mines, then crossed the mountains on horseback
to Visalia, California.
Mr. Snyder was married November 8, 1871, to
Saran A. Keener, a native of Texas, and daughter of John D. and Eleanor
(Bolinger) Keener. The family of Mrs. Snyder came to Whitman county,
Washington, in 1879, and to the Egypt country one year later, where it
was the second family to locate. In 1900 the father and mother returned
to California, where the former died and where the mother is still living.
Mr. Snyder was engaged in farming in California
until 1878, when he came in a wagon to Portland, Oregon, and to Whitman
county, Washington, the year following. He settled on a homestead
near Tekoa, which in 1887 he sold to come to his present location, where
he owns four hundred and eighty acres of ground, three hundred acres of
which are suitable for raising grain. He has good modern improvements,
plenty of stock, and a first class orchard. Mr. Snyder belongs to
the A. O. U. W., of Davenport, and he and Mrs. Snyder are members of the
Methodist Episcopal church.
They have six children; Regina, wife of J.
H. Moore, of Egypt; John H., a student in the state normal school at Cheney;
Edna N., wife of Lovie Brooks, Lincoln county; LeRoy R., married to Meta
Knappant, also of Lincoln county; Charles H., and Maud E., wife of J. L.
Mints, near Larene. Mrs. Brooks was at one time a school teacher
in this vicinity.
Mr. Snyder is thoroughly satisfied with this
locality, after having traveled over a great portion of the United States,
and expresses himself as being content to spend the remaining years of
his life here.
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