| A.Fletcher Howell, Vice President of the wholesale grocery firm of Joseph A. Goddard & Company at Muncie and a resident of that city for the past thirty years and more, is a native Hoosier and has lived in this state all his life. Mr. Howell was born in the village of Blountsville, over the line in Henry County, January 5, 1872, and is a son of Jonathan B. and Rebecca Ann (Fletcher) Howell, both members of pioneer families in that same neighborhood. The late Jonathan B. Howell, a one-time merchant at Muncie, whose last days were spent at Albany, this county, was born in the Blountsville settlement on November 7, 1844, a son of Hilary and Fannie (Bedwell) Howell, who were among the pioneers of that neighborhood. As a young man Jonathan B. Howell worked for some time as a harness maker but after his marriage became engaged in merchandising at Blountsville, later moving to Montpelier, in the neighboring county of Blackford, where he continued in business as a grocery merchant until 1892, when he moved to Muncie. For some time he was engaged in business in the latter city and then moved to Albany, where his last days were spent, his death occurring there on January 1, 1900. His widow survived him for nearly twenty years, her death occurring at her home in the New Burlington neighborhood in this county on September 17, 1919. It was in that neighborhood, in Perry Township, that she was born, October 20, 1849. She was a daughter of David and Asenath (Thornburg) Fletcher, the latter a member of the pioneer Thornburg family which had settled there back in the early 1820s, in the days before Delaware County as now constituted had come into civic being, as is set out elsewhere in this work. David Fletcher, a son of John Fletcher, came over here from Hillsboro, Ohio, in 1826, the year before Delaware County was organized, he then being two years of age, and became one of the substantial pioneers of Perry Township. Jonathan B. Howell was a member of the Christian Church and his wife was a Methodist. He was a Republican and for some time during his residence in Henry County served as a Justice of the Peace in and for his home township. He was affiliated for many years with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. To him and his wife were born three children, all of whom are still living, the subject of this sketch, and the second in order of birth, having a sister, Orpha, and a brother, Charles Ross Howell. Reared at Blountsville and at Montpelier, A. Fletcher Howell received a common-school education and from the days of his boyhood was trained to the ways of merchandising in his father's grocery. He was twenty years of age when his parents moved to Muncie in 1892 and not long afterward he fund congenial employment in the establishment of Joseph A. Goddard, which then occupied the building at the southeast corner of Walnut and Adams streets. With this establishment, which h in 1905 occupied the commodious building in which its business is now carried on in Seymour Street, Mr. Howell ever since has been connected, a period of more than thirty-two years, and has been serving as a director of the concern ever since its reorganization as Joseph A. Goddard & Co. in 1901. Mr. Howell became connected with this establishment in 1892 and he thus has been a witness to and a participant in the expansion, which has made it one of the important wholesale grocery houses in Indiana. He started in as a stock clerk, presently was made receiving clerk and at the end of his first year in the establishment was promoted to the office as office salesman. He later was made buyer and sales manager and in 1901, when the present company was organized he became a member of the directorate and on January 1, 1923, was elected Vice President of the company. Mr. Howell is a Republican, a member of the Muncie Chamber of Commerce and a charter member of the Silver Shield Lodge of the Knight of Pythias. In 1895, at Montpelier, Indian, A. Fletcher Howell was united in marriage to Myrtle Maddox, who was born in Blackford County, Daughter of Dr. Leander E. Maddox, a physician and banker at Montpelier, and to this union three sons have been born, Leander Fletcher, Joseph Maddox and William Dean Howell, the first named of whom rendered military service in camp during the time of this country's participation in World War I. Mr. Howell is a member of the High Street Methodist Episcopal Church and is the President of the men's Bible class in the Sunday school of that congregation. In 1917 Mr. Howell moved onto a farm of fifty-three acres he had bought on the Yorktown road and he and his family are interested in the breeding of purebred Jersey cattle. They also operate a greenhouse for flowers for the Muncie markets. Mrs. Howell oversees the greenhouse. |
