John Lewis Dyer
| John Lewis Dyer | |
|---|---|
| Born |
March 16, 1812 Franklin County, Ohio |
| Died | June 16, 1901 (aged 89) Denver, Colorado |
| Cause of death | Paralysis of the throat |
| Resting place | Cedar Hill Cemetery in Castle Rock, Colorado |
| Residence |
Including, among others: |
| Occupation | Methodist Episcopal clergyman |
| Spouse(s) |
(1) Harriet Foster Dyer (married 1833-1847, her death) |
| Children |
Joshua Dyer (1834-1865) |
| Parent(s) | Samuel and Cassandra Foster Dyer |
Including, among others:
Grant County, Wisconsin
Park County, Colorado
Castle Rock, Douglas County
Colorado
(1) Harriet Foster Dyer (married 1833-1847, her death)
(2) Illegal arrangement with Sarah Whiting (1847- c. 1848)
Joshua Dyer (1834-1865)
Elias Foster Dyer (1836-1875)
Elizabeth "Abbie" Dyer Streeter (born 1842)
Samuel M. Dyer (born 1843)
John Lewis Dyer (March 16, 1812 - June 16, 1901) preached for the Methodist Episcopal for four decades , first in Wisconsin and Minnesota, and then in the mining camps and other communities of his adopted U.S. state Colorado. He became known as Father Dyer, because of his age, relative to the young prospectors of Colorado. He is considered one of the sixteen principal 19th century founders of Colorado, enshrined in the state Capitol rotunda.
Dyer was born in Franklin County in central Ohio, one of eight children of Samuel Dyer (1786-1871) and the former Cassandra Foster (1792-1869) and largely reared thereafter in Illinois. He had little formal education and was considered eccentric. He was converted to Jesus Christ at the age of eighteen. He was a veteran of the Black Hawk War of 1832. The next year, he wed the former Harriet Foster (1812-1847), and the couple had five children.He farmed and then worked in the lead mines near the village of Potosi in Grant County in southwestern Wisconsin. Harriet died at the age of thirty-five, two months later, still 1847, their 13-month-old daughter, also named Harriet, also succumbed. Dyer was quickly remarried to a widow, Sarah Whiting, but he ended the arrangement when he found that she had never been divorced from a former spouse. Whiting subsequently perished in a flood in 1851.
One day in the mine shaft, Dyer felt that he was about to suffocate when he claimed to hear the voice of God calling to him. He left mining and dedicated his remaining years to proselytizing for Christ. Dyer promptly left his four surviving children, Joshua, Elias, Elizabeth "Abbie", and Samuel, in the care of a sister while he accepted the call to the circuit riding ministry, based on the technique used in England by John Wesley. The commitment kept him away from home for weeks at a time. After a decade of circuit riding in Wisconsin and Minnesota, Dyer, at the age of forty-nine in 1861, left Lenore, Minnesota, for Denver. He was likely the oldest of all the circuit riders at the time.
...
Wikipedia