George N. Bickner, Montgomery County

George N. Bickner's (1886 - 1963) first stop in Illinois was Montgomery County, where he was taken from the train by William H. Applegate in May of 1895. Unfortunately, Mr. Applegate died in 1900, and George became the charge of George and Mary Ferguson, another farming family in Hillsboro, Illinois.

George apparently had opportunities for schooling in Montgomery County, because by the age of 24 he was working in Washington D.C. as a government clerk. This probably supported his education at the National University Law School in Washington D. C., where he was senior class treasurer in 1910.

George did not return to Illinois, but was practicing law in Paducah, Kentucky in 1916. In 1918 he married Nellie Burslem in Patterson, New Jersey. When they later moved to New York, George's geographic life had come full circle. The Bickners did not stay in New York but moved around the country, living in Tennessee and Arkansas. They seemed to have settled once they reached Florida, where George became a judge in Pinellas County in 1930. They had four children, George, Katherine, Dorothy and Robert.

George died in Plant City, Florida in February of 1963, after a fruitful life as an attorney, judge and real estate agent.