Shaver, F. A., Arthur P. Rose, R. F. Steele, and A. E. Adams, compilers.  "An
Illustrated History of Central Oregon." ("Embracing Wasco, Sherman, Gilliam,
Wheeler, Crook, Lake, & Klamath Counties")  Spokane, WA: Western Historical
Publishing Co., 1905.  p. 517.
 
HON. ROBERT J. GINN

     Manager of the Moro Implement Company, of Moro, Sherman county, is a
Canadian, having been born in Stormont county, Eastern Ontario, December 15,
1857.  His father, Richard Ginn, was a native of Scotland, dying at Walla Walla,
Washington, in 1899.  His mother, Catherine (Kinnere) Ginn is a native of
Canada, of Irish descent, and at present resides at Walla Walla.  The family
removed to Minnesota when our subject was nearly three years of age in the fall
of 1860, arriving there on the day Abraham Lincoln was elected president of the
United States.  There they remained ten years, and in the fall of 1870 came to
Oregon, via the railroad to Kelton, Utah.  Here the father, who had preceded
them in the spring, met them with teams, and they all took their way thence to
Umatilla county, Oregon.  They located one mile from Weston where they lived
until 1897 and then moved to Walla Walla, Washington.
     In the public schools of Weston our subject received his education,
remaining with his parents until 1880.  He then migrated to Sherman county, then
Wasco county, and located a preemption claim, May 17, 1880.  Alexander D.
McDonald, now of Spokane, Washington, came with him and they were the only
settlers one mile east of what is now De Moss Springs.  At that period no claims
had been taken up south of them and but a few north, in the county.  He sowed
one hundred and eighty acres to wheat in the fall of 1881; harvested it in 1882
and hauled it to Grants, the first load ever taken out of the county.  He
purchased more land, originally railroad land, but later reverted to the
government and school.  He had one thousand two hundred and twenty-eight acres
in one tract, and tracts of four hundred and eighty and one thousand and forty
acres, which he purchased since, nearly all of which is tillable.  Of this land
Mr. Ginn cultivates one thousand two hundred and twenty-eight acres and rents
the rest.  In February, 1888, he left the farm and repairing to Biggs, where he
conducted a warehouse and sold farm machinery for Staver & Walker, of Portland
until May, 1892.  Then he came to Moro and engaged in the hardware and
agricultural machinery business.  Subsequently he was one of the incorporators
of the Moro Mercantile Company which was afterward sold to the Sherman Trading
Company.  In June, 1904, Mr. Ginn and Moore Brothers purchased the hardware and
farming implement stock of from $16,000 to $18,000 worth of implements and
hardware.
     In October, 1882, Mr. Ginn was united in marriage to Jeanette McDonald,
sister of Dixon McDonald, subscriber's partner at Biggs, in the warehouse
business.  She died at Biggs, December 29, 1889.  November 22, 1894, at The
Dalles, Mr. Ginn was married to Carrie B. Coleman, a native of Iowa.  She is the
daughter of William and Mary (Woods) Coleman.  Her father died when she was
about four years of age, from an accident while operating a threshing machine.
Her mother, a native of Pennsylvania, lives at Moro.  Our subject has five
sisters living; Ellen, wife of John R. Morrison, of British Columbia, near Fort
Langley; Annie, wife of William Elliott, a Umatilla county farmer; Caroline,
wife of Thomas Thompson, a farmer near Pendleton, Oregon; Maggie, wife of
Alexander Brady, of Marysville, Washington, a congregational minister; and
Minnie, wife of Howard Haley, a railroad man of Walla Walla.  Mrs. Ginn has two
half-brothers, James and Leslie, farmers in Nebraska; Leslie was treasurer of
his county two terms.  She also has one half sister, widow of Robert McKeown, of
Kansas.  She has three full sisters, Agnes, wife of Archie Smiley, of College
Springs, Iowa; Maggie, wife of Thomas R. McGinnis, ex-sheriff of Sherman county;
and Mary L., widow of R. E. Hoskenson, of Moro.  Mr. Ginn has two brothers,
Walter and George, farmers near Walla Walla.
     Our subject has six children; by his first wife, Arthur, Ellwood and
Jennie, and by his second wife, Harold, Faith and Richard.  both he and wife are
members of the Methodist Episcopal church.  During the past seven years he has
been superintendent of that Sunday school, and in May, 1904, he was delegate
from the Columbia River Conference to the Methodist General Conference at Los
Angeles, California.  Fraternally he is a member of the W. W, of Moro, and Mrs.
Ginn is president of the W. C. T. U., of Sherman county.  His political
affiliations are with the Republican party and in 1902 he was elected member of
the state legislature, running far ahead of his ticket.  During his term he
introduced and secured the passage of the Portage railroad bill, from The Dalles
to Celilo.  He has served two terms in the city council and is serving his third
term as school director.


*******************

Submitted to the Oregon Bios. Project in April 2006 by Diana Smith.  Submitter
has no additional information about the person(s) or family mentioned above.