Death of Mrs. Elias Conover, 1881
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Princeton Press, Saturday, September 17, 1881: There are few men in Princeton better known or more respected than Elias Conover. He has known a whole generation of seminary students, and a whole generation of students, many of them scattered over the country and the world, have known him. He has outlived every Professor who was in the Institution when he first became its Janitor. Mr. Conover was born a slave in Monmouth County, and served out his apprenticeship. Going to New York, he became employed by one of the Hunts, famous cloth men in the city, in their day. Here he married his wife, who had come a child from the eastern shore of Maryland, to Frankford, Pa., thence to a place on the Jersey coast, and from thence to New York. Together they came to Princeton, or its vicinity, and were first in the employ of Doctor George Maclean, on his farm, and then by the Clarkes. Thirty-four years ago, Elias became connected with the Seminary, and has remained so to this day. Last Saturday night, his wife, who had been ill a week with quinzy sore throat, died. She was a good woman. Fifty-one years ago she became a member of the church, and was over forty years a member of the one in Princeton. Here she was a deaconess, a superintendent of the Sabbath school, founder and chief support, for many years, of the choir, and active in every good work. When the A. M. E. Church was built in Witherspoon St., she was foremost in raising, and paying over, the funds. A very large concourse attended her funeral, on Wednesday afternoon, in the church; among them several white persons. Four colored clergymen officiated. Rev. Mr. Morgan, her pastor, preached a very excellent and appropriate discourse. Professor Moffat representing the seminary, was present, also otaer [sic] clergymen. She was sixty-seven years of age and leaves three daughters surviving her. Mr. Conover has met with a very great loss, in which he has the sympathy and kind feeling of all who know him. |
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