John H. Wyne. For more than forty-five years Champaign County has been the home of John H. Wyne, and those have been years of achievement in the material sense and also in the acquisition of the riches of community esteem paid him for his worthy life and the influence he has exerted for good.
Mr. Wyne was born in Jefferson County, Indiana, January 24, 1842, a son of William and Margaret (Rutledge) Wyne. His father was a native of Virginia and his mother of Tennessee. His father went to Indiana in the early days, and kept his home in that state on a farm until his death. He was twice married, and by his first marriage had eight children. By his second wife his only child was Mr. John H. Wyne.
The latter attended school in a hewed log schoolhouse with his half brothers and sisters, and at the age of twenty-nine, in 1871, he came to Champaign County to visit his aunt, Marilda Thompson. In this county he found employment on farms, and was a steady worker for others until he was able to conduct a place of his own.
He was also twenty-nine years of age when he married, at Cincinnati, Ohio, Miss Mary Jane Thompson. The one child of that union is Miles Earl Wyne, who was named for his cousin, a prominent lawyer. Miles E. Wyne is a practical farmer in Harwood Township and married Nellie Clifton.
After coming to Champaign County Mr. Wyne worked steadily for a farmer, Mr. Philips, and from that labor saved enough to buy forty acres of land. That was the nucleus of his homestead and farm and his independent efforts have been richly rewarded. When his son ‘was five years of age the beloved wife and mother passed away, and for his second wife Mr. Wyne married Rosa Rigdon, who was born in Parke County, Indiana, a daughter of William and Mellie (Carlin) Rigdon. There were seven children in the Rigdon family and they were all educated in the public schools. Mr. and Mrs. Wyne are active members of the Baptist Church at Rantoul and are among the workers and supporters in that church. Mr. Wyne is affiliated with the Modern Woodmen of America. He has served his community as road overseer and director of the local schools. Throughout Harwood Township Mr. Wyne is known affectionately as Uncle Johnnie. Wyne. His is a most hospitable home, and he has proved a kindly neighbor, so that his name is one that is wreathed with kindly memories. He has always been ready to extend a helping hand where help was needed and the setting sun of his life finds him comfortably situated, with his son near by to relieve him of the heavier duties and cares of life. In politics Mr. Wyne is a stanch Republican. He was reared in a Democratic household, and as a boy he witnessed many of the evils of slavery, and came to have an abomination for that institution. The war and the assassination of President Lincoln turned him definitely into the ranks of the Republican party and he has been a voter for those principles for over fifty years.