Oliver K. Studebaker ⁶⁴¹

   Cause of his death was Suicide.⁶⁴¹

  General Notes:

Farmed in Union Township, Indiana (Delaware County).

Oliver committed suicide by hanging on 9 May 1918. He was a victim of depression at times and also of alcoholism. At the time of his death he had a fine farm and a fine team of draft horses. It was said that he was fearful of overworking his horses and would stop them to rest several times from one end of a field to the other end. He had also been fearful of being sent to an asylum for treatment. Abe Rench, his first cousin, was Sexton for more than thirty years of the Union Cemetery which adjoined Oliver's farm. W. Keith Fisher started working at the Union Cemetery in the summer of 1927 when Abe was still living. It is believed that Abe was the one who discovered Oliver's suicide. Abe Rench once took W. Keith Fisher over to the bank barn where the event happened, before his team of horses, and showed Keith the nail to which the rope was attached which hanged him.

Late in 1988, W. Keith Fisher was visiting Helen Minnich Mohler, daughter of Charlie Minnich, he asked Helen what she remembered about Oliver. She liked to visit with her Uncle Ol and Aunt Met and remembered him as a pleasant and kindly gentleman. She remembered hearing that Met didn't hesitate to enter the saloon in Eaton, Indiana (although women in saloons were frowned upon) and extricate her husband from its confines. ⁶⁴¹

Oliver married Melvinna Grace "Met" Minnich, daughter of Reuben Minnich and Nancy Frances Boggs, on 21 Oct 1893. (Melvinna Grace "Met" Minnich was born on 5 Jan 1875 in Newberry Township, Miami, Ohio, USA ⁶⁴¹ and died on 1 Oct 1942 in Eaton, Delaware, Indiana, USA ⁶⁴¹.)