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Daniel Webster Crofts

Daniel Webster Crofts (1828- 1852)
"Dan'l" Crofts, one of ten children, was born on a frontier farm in Columbiana County, Ohio, on December 3, 1828. He was tall and slender, with excellent features and an intelligent face but pale of complexion, appearing to be ill-- as indeed he was much of the time. Realizing that Dan was not equipped for the rigors of farm life, his family decided that he should be given a higher education. He was subsequently sent to "Mr. Holmes' private school" in New Lisbon, Ohio, and then to an academy at West Point, Ohio, where he became sufficiently prepared to enter Jefferson College, in 1844, before his sixteenth birthday. There he was a good student, kindly to those he liked and a bitter hater of those he disliked.

For some reason unknown to us, he was involved in a disagreement with certain members of the faculty and vowed he would not accept a diploma from Jefferson, though the college catalogue and commencement program list him as a graduate of 1848.

Like some of the other founders, Crofts' first endeavor upon leaving college was at teaching school. His private academy enterprise did not prosper, however, and he soon turned to the study of law, being admitted to the bar in Steubenville, Ohio, in 1850.  He was appointed notary public for Columbiana County even before completing his study of Blackstone.