Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 5.djvu/497

 VIRGINIA BIOGRAPHY

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Dora Adams Hopkins, and has children : William Willoughby Jr., Dorothy Newton, Eliza Darragh. 4. John Newton, born Sep- tember 9, 1865. died 1900.

Emmett J. Riddick. The first mention found of the Riddick family is concerning James Riddick. who was burgess for Nanse- mond county. Virginia, from 1718 to 1722, a large landowner and the founder of an important family. Lemuel Riddick was a burgess from 1736 to 1773, and also a dele- gate to the state convention of 1775. Rev. Samuel Riddick resigned the rectorship of the Protestant Episcopal church, of Suffolk, Virginia, in 1773, after having served con- tinuously for forty years. General Joseph Riddick was a state senator from Gates county, North Carolina, for twenty-eight years. Colonel Willis Riddick was burgess from Nansemond from 1756 to 1775, and delegate to the state conventions of 1775 and 1776. In the line of Emmett J. Riddick, of Suffolk, Virginia, Mills has been a fav- ored name, his father, Mills J., being the fifth in direct line to bear the name, each an eldest son and inheriting the homestead on which Mills J. Riddick yet resides. All were prosperous planters and men of high standing. All of the children of Mills J. Rid- dick, who was born in 1848, and married, in 1878,10 Ella Lee Franklin, born in 1854, were born on the homestead. He is a Democrat in political belief, and prior to his marriage was a communicant of the Protestant Epis- copal church, now belonging to the Meth- odist Episcopal. Children : Mary, died in infancy ; Emmett J., of whom further ; Effie J., born in 1883, married, in 1906, James Britton, and has Virginia Riddick, born in 1908, and John Riddick, born in 1909; Julia A., born in 1885 ; Gertrude E., born in 1888, married in 1909, John B. Pruden ; Arthur E.. born in 1896; Mills A., born in 1901.

Emmett J. Riddick, eldest son and second child of Mills J. and Ella Lee (Franklin) Riddick, was born in 1881. He completed his preparation for the business of life in the Suffolk Business College after preparatory studies in public and private schools. In 1900 Mr. Riddick formed a connection with The Shoop-W'ithers Company, dealers in hay. grain and feed, and was there employed until 1909, when this firm was succeeded by the Cooper Riddick Company, Inc., of which

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Mr. Riddick was president. In 1913 he re- signed this office to accept the general man- agership of the company, and as general manager is in active control of its several departments. The company deals exten- sively in the lines previously mentioned, its business covering a wide field, and its rating is high in the locality. ]\Ir. Riddick gives his entire time and attention to its interests, and the comjjany has profited from his zeal- ous safeguarding of its welfare. The Demo- cratic party is his political choice, and he affiliates with the Protestant Episcopal church.

Emmett J. Riddick married, in 1909, Ur- sula P. Williams, daughter of Norman C. and Virginia (Pruden) Williams, and grand- daughter of Rev. Milton Williams, a minis- ter of the Methodist Episcopal church. Chil- dren of Emmett J. and Ursula P. (Williams) Riddick: Emmett J., Jr., born in 191 1, and Virginia Williams, born in 1914.

Edward Thomas Parham. A descendant of one of the old plantation and slave own- ing families of Brunswick county, Virginia, Edward T. Parham, until eighteen years of age, remained at the old homestead on which his grandfather, Lewis Edward Par- ham, lived and died, and which, until very recently, was owned in the Parham family. He is a son of William James Parham and a grandson of Lewis Edward Parham. The latter a wealthy planter and slave owner of Brunswick county, where he was born, mar- ried Catherine Alason Branch, and there both died, he aged fifty-six years, she aged eighty years. Of their seven children two are yet living: Dr. Marvin Dibrell Parham, a practicing physician of Dinwiddie county, Virginia, aged seventy-two years ; Mrs. Ann W. Goodrich, a widow living in Peters- burg, Virginia, aged sixty-nine years.

William James Parham, son of Lewis Ed- ward Parham. was born in Brunswick coun- ty, Virginia, in 1830. and died there in 1872. He was a farmer, held several county offices, and a veteran of the Confederacy, serving all through the war, 1861-1865, in Mahone's brigade and seeing hard service. He mar- ried Rosa A. Spencer, born in Brunswick county, and there died in 1861, aged twenty- six, leaving an only child, Edward Thomas, who was twelve months old when deprived of a mother's love and care.