History of Michigan, / by Charles Moore. [Vol. 3]

1374

HISTORY OF MICHIGAN

left with a large family, only two of whom were married. Her husband's
confidence in her wisdom was amply justified in the years that followed,
as she was instinctively business-like and just, and always tolerant. The
divisions of many interests was made without recourse to law, to her great
satisfaction.
A much younger but devoted personal friend familiar with her life
history wrote of Mrs. Avery as follows: "Madam Avery was a woman of
strong and unique personality and filled a large place in the towns where
she lived. She had a wide acquaintance and much influence, and at the
time of the great fires of Michigan and of Chicago it was she who helped
to meet the appalling situation with a quick and practical decision and
with thorough arrangement of the work of relief in her own state. She
was generous and unstinted in her service to the poor, sick and sorrowing;
to her friends, to her church and to the various organizations in which she
was actively interested. Her strong common sense, her executive ability,
her clear-cut honesty of spirit, her shrewd insight, her sense of justice,
were qualities which made her associates lean on her. Modest and absolutely without pretence, she was fearless in the face of difficulty. A New
Englander, descended from many lines of early settlers in New England
(John and Priscilla Alden, the Adams family of Quincy, the Fairbanks
of Dedham, etc.), she was naturally a notable housewife and keen thinker.
The flavor of her native state was in her colloquialisms and sincere manner, making her interesting to the last. Loyal to her friends, hosts of
friends were bound to her and sought to brighten her last wearisome years
of feebleness."
She lived to the great age of over eighty-six years, retaining to the last
a spirit of energy and helpfulness in spite of a weak body. Her brave
spirit was an inspiration to all who knew her. Her death occurred at the
family residence, 47 Eliot street, Detroit, April I9, I9II. Her loss was
especially mourned by a large circle of devoted relatives who had looked
upon her as the venerated head of their family for many years. The
children of Newell and Nancy (Eddy) Avery were as follows: Edward
Orlando, born October 23, I844, and who married Flora T. Huntington;
Darius Newell, born January IO, I846, and who married Elizabeth Holbrook Dole; Leonard Cooper, born October I8, 1847, and who died
November I4, I853, at Port Huron, Michigan; Clara Arlette, born January 12, I850, who was liberally educated in Detroit and New York and
became the compiler of a genealogy of her own family and its important
branches; Nancy Margaret, born May I6, I852, who married Henry W.
Skinner; George Edwin, born April I8, I854, married Fannie E. Tarbell;
John Herbert, born July 29, 1855, who married Ella Smith; Horace
Waters, born April 12, I857, married Luella West; Nellie Jane, born
April 29, 186o, married Walter Wheaton Augur; a child born August 20,
I862, died unnamed; Arthur Ware, born October 2I, I864, at Port Huron,'
and died there September I6, I865; Kittie Murphy, born September I3,
I866, and died August 27, I867; and Harry Eugene, born December I3,
i867, at Detroit.
LYMAN T. COVELL. An old-time lumberman of White Hall, a business man of long and successful experience, Lyman T. Covell began his
career without capital, having come to western Michigan when a young
man and starting out as a day laborer in the lumber camp. Since then
he has accumulated a substantial fortune, and while gaining these material rewards for himself has also been an important factor in making
western Michigan a land of homes and of permanent business and industry.
In Bradford county, Pennsylvania, Lyman T. Covell was born Sep