History of  Carroll Counnty, Indiana, 1882; Kingman Brothers Chicago; page 253

Deer Creek Township

DAVID R. HARLEY

Mr. Harley was the elder member of a family of seven children. He was born in Abingdon, Washington Co., Va., April 10, 1822. Cleland and Hannah Harley, his parents were native Virginians. His paternal ancestry was of Irish, and his maternal of German extraction. While yet a lad his parents moved to Franklin County, Ind. The family being of limited means, he was compelled to earn his broad by the "sweat of the brow," and was therefore unable to fully avail himself of the full measure of instruction then imparted in the common schools. This deficiency, however, has been happily overcome by liberal reading in later years. In 1888, he left his home and came to Tippecanoe county, where he engaged as a farm hand to Jonathan Mount, the father of our fellow-townsman, Daniel Mount. He remained in his service until 1840, when he came to Delphi and entered a school conducted by Hugh Miller. After a time thus spent he clerked in the dry goods houses of Enoch Brown, William Bolles and George W. Pigman, respectively, until 1857, when he engaged in the lime business with E.W. Hubbard and the late Robert Mitchell. For several years, he was the business manager of the company, and successful in building up a very large and correspondingly lucrative business. He is yet largely and actively interested in the lime trade as a member of the Delphi Lime Company. Mr. Harley is a fine type of the modern American business man. During his service in clerical positions, he was ever on the alert to grasp everything that might be of service in fitting himself for the independent business relations he sooner or later expected to assume. Gifted with a keen perception of the characters of men, and fully competent to measure results as they would inevitably follow given combinations of circumstances, observation was to him what actual experience was to others. Added to these qualifications, he possessed nerve, prudence and economy – elements in themselves competent to serve successfully every man destined by condition of his youth to build for himself in life. Mr. Harley has been in fact and in deed, the architect of his own fortune, and it is but simple justice to say that his comfortable means abundantly establishes his skill as an architect and builder in this regard. As has already been intimated, his opportunities for acquiring an education in early life were very limited, but he possessed the uncompromising desire to acquire a general information, and his leisure hours were spent in the careful perusal of useful books, as well as the current literature of the day. He has always been an active man in politics – first a Whig and then as a matter of political sequence a Republican. It is proper and just to say that he never interested himself in politics except as matter of principle. He never sought nor wanted political preferment. He has always kept pace with the great questions of the hour, and has been able to grasp them in all their vital relations. His knowledge of public men is broad and comprehensive, and these qualifications, together with a pleasant flow of language renders him a highly entertaining conversationalist, and on competent to instruct. He was united in marriage, June 24, 1848 to Persus J. Hubbard. Two sons and a daughter are living, the fruits of the union. viz.: Charles H., George P. and Ella (Mrs. Edward Rinehart). After years of happy wedded life, he was called to mourn the death of his wife, November 10, 1857. Mr. Harley, in all his relations, has been a highly esteemed and valued citizen. Though nearly sixty years of age, he has yet a reasonable expectancy of several years of useful, happy life.