My Genealogy Hound

FRANCIS H. COBB is well known among the residents of the village of Cortland as the senior member of F. H. Cobb & Co., wholesale dealers in fruits, candies and tobaccos, located on Railroad Street. He is thoroughly familiar in all the departments of his business, for he has been engaged in it for the past twenty-five years, in which time he has won the patronage of a large and desirable portion of the community, and has made his business a success in every way.

His father, Chester Cobb, was born in New Hampshire, the “Granite State,” in whose common schools he obtained the rudiments of his education. When a young man he removed to Homer township, Cortland County, and followed agricultural pursuits throughout his life, which, however, terminated when our subject was a boy of eight years, on April 4, 1859. In his political views, Chester Cobb was a Republican. He was an upright, Christian gentleman, and was a member of the Presbyterian Church of Homer, N. Y. Our subject’s mother, whose maiden name was Juliett Fairbanks, died in 1896. The children in the parental family were three in number: Alice Louisa, born at Scott, December 7, 1846, married Joab Price, March 1, 1865, and lives with her husband at Kalkaska, Northern Michigan; Marietta, born August 4, 1849, at Scott, graduated from the State Normal School at Cortland, and is teaching in the high school of Oakland, Cal.; and Francis H., the subject of this personal notice, whose birth occurred in the town of Homer, Cortland County, February 22, 1851, and who grew up in the country, attending the district schools, and working at agricultural pursuits until he became of age. When twenty-one years old, he engaged in the bakery and confectionery business in the village of Cortland, and his success and the increased demands on his business, made by the growth of the village, encouraged him to remove in 1892 to his present location on Railroad Street. The business, which he has built up by his own efforts and by the unvarying excellence of his goods, is a large and lucrative one, and he merits every bit of the success that has come to him. He is a Republican in his politics, and has served as a village trustee and as president of the village of Cortland; at present he is a member of the board of sewer commissioners of the village. Mr. Cobb is popular, well-liked, and has a host of friends, many of whom with him are members of the local lodge of the Masonic Order. At the Baptist Church he is a constant and regular attendant. On October 3, 1877, Mr. Cobb was joined in marriage with Florence Walworth, daughter of Nelson P. Walworth, a leading and well-to-do farmer of Cortland.