Obituary – William Henry WAITS (1845-1927)

Kathy Wait Myers — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:47:01 +0000

WILLIAM HENRY WAITS

William Henry Waits was born in Clermont County Ohio, September 29, 1845. He departed this life at his home in Ruby, Nebraska, January 30, 1927. Age 81 years, 4 months, and one day.

He was united in marriag with Mrs. Elvie Pitt, January 24, 1875. To this union seven children were born, four sons and three daughters. He came to Nebraska in 1873 and Homesteaded in Hamilton County. He later moved to Seward County, and has made Seward County his place of residence until his death.

In 1861 at the opening of the civil war he was in the struggles at Harper’s Ferry; he enlisted in Company H, 53rd regiment Ohio Volunteers and also served in Co. “F” 195th Ohio Regiment.

Mr Waits was a stonemason by trade laying the foundations of the Tishue Block, the Windsor Hotel, and was instrumental in building the Congregational church in Seward, Nebraska.

In 1893 he was converted, acknowledging Jesus Christ as his Saviour, and united with the Methodist Episcopal church at Ruby, Nebraska. He remained a faithful member of that great branch of the Christian faith until his departure.

He leaves to remember him as a faithful husband and father, with the hope if Christ of a meeting beyond this life the following: his faithful wife and helpmeet; four sons; Frederick of Seward, Simeon, Thomas and Edwin, all of Seward County, Nebraska. Three daughters, Mrs Lovina Lunney of Valley county, Mrs Rhoda Davis of Ruby, Nebraska; Mrs Lizzie Davis of Seward County. There are twenty-nine grandchildren, one great grandchild, two brothers, James and Thomas of Western Nebraska, with large company of friends and acquaintances.

The funeral services were held from his home in Ruby, Nebr., on February 1st, conducted by Rev. D. A. McCullough, pastor of the Seward Methodist church. Burial was in Ruby cemetery.

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Review – OBITS OF NEBRASKA Website

Kathy Wait Myers — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:10:09 +0000

I found a new website yesterday called Obits of Nebraska that specializes in pre-1930s obituaries for people who died in Nebraska. Having deep Nebraska roots, I thought I would give it a shot and see if they have any from Seward County. Since it’s such a rural county, there usually aren’t any clippings from their newspapers, but it was free to search!

So I typed in WAITS, and sure enough there was my 2nd GGF William! The listing showed his Name, Birth year, Death year, County, and the date of the publication. So I was absolutely certain that it was MY William! They have a handy “buy now” button right there that linked to their PayPal account, so I clicked away!

Obits of Nebraska charges $4.99 with 50 cents of each purchase donated to the Nebraska State Historical Society. Considering what it would cost me to find this image myself, not to mention the time, I was happy to fork over $5 for it (and even happier that they donate 10% to NSHS)!

There was an error on the landing screen after my purchase, so I forwarded a copy of it to the email address they provided.

According to my PayPal receipt, my order went through at 2:25p on 11/8/09 (Sunday). At 4:30pm the same day, I had an email from Barbara Starks along with a .pdf of William’s obituary! Two hours and 5 minutes on a Sunday afternoon. Not too shabby!

Good afternoon, Kathy

Thank you for your support. Your selection for #20535, William Henry Waits is attached. If you have any questions or problems, please feel free to contact us at:obitsofnebraska@hotmail.com
Our email office hours are from 8:00 am to 8:00 pm. In addition, I have forwarded the error message you received on to technical support.

Thanks again,

Barbara Starks
O’Bits of Nebraska

I was happy to see that the image was labeled with the newspaper name, county, and date. Very useful to include the Source!

Since the file was in .pdf format, I zoomed way out on the image until I could see the whole thing on my screen at once (without scrolling). Then I just clicked on the upper left corner of the image and dragged a box down to the lower right corner. The right-clicked and selected “copy image”. From there, I opened up Paint (which comes standard on almost everyone’s computers these days), clicked “Edit” and then “Paste”. Then “Save As”, named the file WAITS_William_Henry_1845_1927.jpg, then saved it. Taa-Daaaaa!! It’s now a photo. Now I just need to upload the photo onto my tree and I’m done!

I’m not sure why the file isn’t sent as a .jpg file, but in reality it only added a few more steps to my process.

Obits of Nebraska has nine more WAITs on their website, some I recognized immediately and a few from Fillmore County which I don’t think are related. One of those is William’s wife Elve and although I have a copy of her obituary, I may order it anyway. This version of William’s obituary was completely different than the transcript that I got from a cousin. And much longer!

I played around with the Search button and decided to see if I could find ALL of the Seward County obituaries. So I typed in “Seward” and it found 83 obituaries with Seward in them. Eight of which I believe are related as well, so I’ll probably be back to get those too! A few just had Seward somewhere in their name, but the rest were all from Seward County. As I mentioned, Seward County is pretty rural and considering that these are all pre-1930, I think that’s an amazing number!

All in all, I’m very pleased with the quality, service, and helpfulness of Obits of Nebraska and will definitely be back for more!

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Kathy Wait Myers Genealogy» What: Obituary

Obituary – William Henry WAITS (1845-1927)

Review – OBITS OF NEBRASKA Website