Anson T. Hemingway

Anson Tyler Hemingway, the son of Allen Hemingway and Harriet Louisa Tyler, was born in East Plymouth, Connecticut on August 26, 1844. The family came to Chicago in 1854 and within ten years all three Hemingway brothers had enlisted in the Civil War. Anson served in the Army as a private with the 72nd Illinois Regiment (known as the Young Men's Christian Association regiment) and fought in the deadly Battle of Vicksburg. He later re-enlisted in Company H, US Colored 70th Regiment as 1st Lieutenant and also served as provost marshall of the Freedman's Bureau in Natchez. Anson's other two brothers died during the war.
After his time in the military, Anson attended Wheaton College. After two years of study, as a friend and admirer of Dwight L. Moody, he went on to serve as general secretary of the Chicago YMCA for ten years before establishing a real estate business in Oak Park, Illinois. Hemingway was appointed secretary in 1878. During his tenure Hemingway won the confidence of his associates and of the business men of the city by his devoted and self-sacrificing efforts in behalf of the work and by his never-failing sympathy with young men. The membership and the financial standing of the association increased under his management.
Anson married fellow Wheaton student Adelaide Edmonds, who graduated in 1867. Together they had four sons and two daughters. While living in Oak Park they were members of the First Congregational Church. An avid outdoorsman, Anson gave his grandson Ernest a special tenth birthday present of a 20-gauge shotgun, believed to have sparked the future author's lifelong hunting pursuits. Anson Hemingway passed away in 1926 at the age of eighty-two.