Hassler, James P.

JAMES P. HASSLER, M.D, physician, Cochranton, was born at Mt. Pleasant, Westmoreland Co., Penn., February 13, 1835, son of John and Sarah (Shearer) Hassler, who were parents of twelve children, viz.: Samuel, a Methodist minister, died in 1852; Joseph, died in 1849; Lucinda, died in infancy; Rebecca, died of acute disease; Melinda; David S., in mercantile business at Mt. Union, Ohio; John Frederick, killed by lightning in 1854; Elmira, died of acute disease; Cyrus M., in mercantile business in Findlay, Ohio; James P.; Augustus E., editor of the Pawnee Republican, Pawnee City, Neb.; and May Elizabeth, died in infancy. In 1835 John Hassler moved to a farm in Rostraver Township, same county, where the family were brought up. At fourteen years of age our subject was sent to school at Greensburg, and subsequently to Mt. Pleasant, and when seventeen entered Allegheny College, where he graduated in 1856. He spent several years in teaching, spending a year in Kentucky and two years in Michigan. Afterward he read medicine at Meadville, in the office of Dr. J.C. Cotton, and graduated from the Medical Department of the University of Michigan in 1864. The summer of the same year he spent in the United States General Hospital, at Point Lookout, and in the fall returned to Meadville and resumed the practice of medicine with Dr. Cotton. In the summer of 1865 he removed to Cochranton, a village ten miles from Meadville on the Franklin branch of the New York, Pennsylvania & Ohio Railroad; here he has since resided, diligently and laboriously engaged in the practice of his profession, and with satisfactory success. He was married August, 1860, to Miss Ella, daughter of the Hon. William Davis, of Meadville, a gentleman of great personal popularity in the county, as was shown by his election for three terms to the position of Associate Judge. Their family consists of three sons and three daughters. Their eldest son is destined to be "a newspaper man," and at present has a position in Pittsburgh. Dr. Hassler has given considerable time and attention to educational matters, having been on the Board of Education at Cochranton for fifteen years and for several years a member of the Board of Control of Allegheny College. He has written extensively for the press, local and professional, and occasionally takes a hand in the political discussions of the day. In church relations, a Methodist; in social organizations, a Knight Templar; belongs also to several benevolent societies in the town where he lives. In politics he is a quiet but somewhat determined adherent to the Democratic party, with charity for others who hold a different opinion.