A conspicuous figure was the late Baker Borton, who died February 12, 1902. Mr. Borton was a native of Fairview, Ohio, where he was educated in the common schools. When twenty-seven years of age he located on a farm near Morris, Grundy county, Illinois, where he resided eight years. He was ingenious and through necessity learned the carpenter trade, working in that capacity for several years. The latter part of March, 1872, he came to Clyde for the purpose of farming, but circumstances were brought about that diverted his intentions and he followed that occupation but a short time. Mr. Borton was an active politician and for the first ten years of his residence in Cloud county he served as deputy sheriff, constable, United States deputy marshal and in 1888 he was elected commissioner of Cloud county and served two terms. In 1882 he opened a real estate and insurance business, becoming one of Clyde's most successful business men. He was a man of many sterling qualities, charitable and kind of heart he never oppressed the poor. He numbered his friends among all classes of people and the foreign element, so numerous In the vicinity of Clyde, had great confidence in him. As if foreseeing the future need of a successor from the family circle, Mr. Borton trained and educated his granddaughter, Ruby M. Cannon, for the position. After graduating from the Clyde high school in 1898 she entered the office as his secretary and during his illness of three years prior to his death she conducted the business. She is well qualified and very successful, retaining the old patrons and adding many new ones.

Mr. Borton was married in 1862 to Miss Sue Osler. The Oslers' ancestry came from England. Mrs. Borton's maternal grandfather was a soldier in the Revolutionary war and her father in the war of 1812. They settled in Maryland in an early day and afterward moved to Ohio, where Mrs. Borton was born. Her mother was Volinda Foreman, of Virginia, where her father was a slaveholder. Her maternal grandparents were Kentuckians, related to the old Dent family.

To Mr. and Mrs. Borton one child has been born, Carrie B., wife of William S. Cannon (see sketch), an attorney of Clyde. Mrs. Borton with her family reside on the corner of Broadway and the Boulevard, which is in Clyde proper and where they located in 1873, when this part of the town was a level prairie and before the streets were surveyed. Thy have one of the most comfortable homes in the city. The family are members of the Methodist Episcopal church.