OBIT : CLARK, M. B. 1901 CUYAHOGA COUNTY OHIO
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  From the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Sunday, March 10, 1901

ROMANTIC LIFE; PEACEFUL DEATH.
M. B. Clark, a Pioneer, Dies at his Glenville Home.
Was at One Time an Employer of John D. Rockefeller

M. B. Clark, a pioneer resident of this vicinity, and one of the 
wealthiest citizens of Glenville, died at 6 o'clock last evening. 
Death was due to grip [flu] and a complication of diseases, 
for which the grip had paved the way. Mr. Clark was seventy-three 
years old last November. Grip seized him about two weeks ago, but 
Mr. Clark's illness was not regarded as serious until four or five days
ago, since which time his life hung on a slender thread. The end came 
peacefully. Mrs. Clark and her two stepdaughters, Mrs. Teagle and 
Mrs. Coit, and the two  sons-in-law were at the bedside at the last 
moment.

Mr. Clark was well known in Cleveland and vicinity, and leaves a 
host of friends to mourn his loss. He was a man of sterling worth 
and qualities and faithful always to the principles which were the 
mainsprings of his actions. Honesty and integrity were his salient 
virtues and "live and let live" his motto.

Funeral services over the remains will be held Tuesday, at 2 p.m., 
at the late residence, corner of St. Clair street and Eddy road. 
Rev. Dr. J. S. Rutledge of the M. E. church of Glenville will 
officiate. While Mr. Clark had always retained his membership in a 
Wesleyan Methodist congregation, he nevertheless 
attended services at Dr. Rutledge's church, and was for many 
years on intimate terms with the pastor. The remains will be 
laid to rest in Lake View Cemetery.

The story of Mr. Clark's life contains many elements of romance. 
He was born in England and came to this country without a penny 
fifty-two years ago. Since which time he has been able to amass 
a fortunate estimated at half a million. 
That he could have become a millionaire or a multi-millionaire 
had he cared to is conceded by all those who were on familiar terms 
with him; and that he was content to retire from business at an 
age when other men in the reins prefer to 
multiply their wealth is due to the fact that he held personal 
worth and character in higher esteem than dollars and cents. 
Mr. Clark first set foot on American soil at Boston, Mass. 
The first night he spent there he slept in a 
woodshed on a buffalo robe by virtue of the kindness of a 
gentleman whose name has since been forgotten. Next day he 
proffered his services to his benefactor. 
He was willing to do any kind of work and was employed for a 
time as chore boy. Later he ran errands and was employed as 
jack-of-all-trades by farmers in the 
vicinity of Boston. Some months later he left Boston for 
Cleveland, having learned in the meantime that some families 
from his native country had settled 
here and were prosperous. He had also in the meantime read 
in a paper in Boston the since famous advice of Horace Greeley, 
namely, "Go west, young man."

When Mr. Clark landed from a boat in Cleveland from 
Buffalo all his earthly belongings were contained in a red 
bandana handkerchief.

He at once sought employment and found it--rail splitting. 
No work was dishonorable in his eye, and for two years or more 
he cut cord wood in and about Lorain. The wood which he cut and 
split he himself hauled to a profitable market in Cleveland. 
He saved money then--as much as he could--one of his early 
economic theories being that of the money he came by in his 
honest way, no matter how little, he must anyway save some. 
Having laid by a small sum for future contingencies, 
Mr. Clark drifted into canal work. He toiled on the Ohio 
canal, the waterway on which the prosperity of the Cleveland 
of today has been founded, and saw a way to add to his savings 
by buying grain, fruits and vegetables, hauling them to the city 
on the canal and marketing them here. Then and there he laid the 
foundation of his ventures in the grain elevator business 
and the flouring business which John D. Rockefeller, the oil 
king and head of the Standard Oil Co.

The oil king of the twentieth century, whose vast belongings 
and projects astound the world, began his career as a clerk 
in one of Mr. Clark's stores in Cleveland. Eventually 
John D. Rockefeller became his partner in the oil business
and the two organized Standard Oil Co.

Mr. Clark occasioned a dissolution of the partnership later. 
The assignment of one of the competitors of the Standard Oil Co. 
in its early days inspired Mr. Clark to ask for a dissolution 
of partnership.

Rockefeller gave Mr. Clark $100,000 for his interest in the 
Standard Oil Co. at that time, and by virtue of judicious investment 
the fortune was augmented until now it is said to be $500,000.

Mr. Clark next lent all his efforts to the business of the Union 
Elevator Co. and since then became prominently identified with the 
Co-Operative Stove Co. He was also a heavy stockholder in the 
Sheriff Street market house. He owned a farm
of 160 acres in Madison and seventy-six acres in Glenville.

Mr. Clark retired from active service some time ago to a comfortable 
and taste_________ in Glenville. He was twice married __________ 
his only children, two daughters, _________ survive were of the 
first marriage. His second wife was Miss Semlow of ___________. 
[Blanks occur where the newspaper was folded when 
microfilmed and thus some words are obscured.]

NOTES: Maurice's parents were Robert Clark and Eliza Neate Clark 
of Malmesbury, Wiltshire, England. Maurice arrived in this country 
in June 1848. There is a story that he fled his hometown after 
hitting his boss following an argument. In 1851 he became a citizen 
of the US. Maurice married a native of England, 
Mary Clement, in 1853, and as shown in the 1860 US Census, 
they had three children, Belle Amelia (or Amelia Belle), who was 6; 
Herbert, 3; and Edwin, 5 months. After the census was taken, 
children Cassius and Emeline were born. Before the Civil War, 
Maurice was an active abolitionist. Later on, he ran for 
mayor of Cleveland but was not elected; held a position on the 
City Council for a few years in the late 1860s or early 1870s. 
Mary, Maurice's first wife, died in 1881, and at some point after 
that he married Mary Semlow. Maurice's survivors not only included 
his daughters, Belle Teagle and Emeline Coit, but 
his son Cassius's widow Fanny Clark, and some grandchildren 
(names unknown).


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