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Mrs Mary A. Phillips, the widow of Joseph Phillips, resides on a well-improved farm of one hundred and fifty-four acres in Elkhart township. She was born in that township, her parents being Robert P. and Nancy (Barger) Lawrence. The father, who was a native of Dayton, Ohio, came to Logan county, Illinois, in the ‘40s and was actively and successfully identified with agriculture interests here until the time of his death in 1856. His wife followed him to the grave one year later.

In early womanhood, Miss Mary A. Lawrence gave her hand in marriage to Joseph Phillips, who died in 1905 at the age of sixty-five years. During the dark days of the Civil war he enlisted in the Twenty-first Illinois Volunteer Infantry and remained in the service for over three years, participating in a number of important engagements. He was wounded during the battle of Murfreesboro. At the close of the war he returned home with an honorable military record and later was a member of the Elkhart Post, G. A. R. In his political affiliations he was a republican.

Mrs Phillips has two sons: Oran who is thirty-eight years of age and resides on the home farm; and Lee, who is thirty-nine years old and follows farming in Iowa. Mrs. Phillips has an extensive circle of friends throughout the community in which she lives, having won the kindly regards and esteem of all with whom she has come in contact.

Source: History of Logan County, Illinois, by Lawrence B. Stringer. Chicago: Pioneer Publishing Company [1911]. Vol. 2, pp. 328-329.