Mattie Lear taught at Mt. Morris College from 1879 - 1881. On the verso of the portrait is a typewritten history:
MATTIE NICHOLAS LEAR (Mrs. John Lear)
1838 - 1903
Mattie Apgar Lear born in Hunterdon County, New Jersey, August 17, 1838;
left an orphan at fourteen; married John Lear in December 1858; one daughter,
United with Methodist Church in 1850, with Church of the Brethren in 1862;
licensed to preach at Hudson, Illinois about 1897, though she had preached
for twenty years before. One of the early students at the state teachers' college at Normal, Illinois. Wrote much for church papers, taught in Mt. Morris College, 1879 - 1881 and led in organizing the first Brethren Sunday-school in Mt. Morris. Died on Jan. 1, at Hudson, Ill. in 1903.
Page 193, Brethren in Northern Illinois and Wisconsin, by John heckman and J. E. Miller
Photo picture on page 172 (center of page) of same book.
Note: - Mattie Lear was the mother of Hortense Lear. who lived the latter years of her life at LaVerne, California. She gave liberally to Hillcrest Homes, (amount listed).
Hortense Lear died on October 22, 1953 at La Verne, Calif.
