#13 Joseph Vance

Joseph Vance

Born: March 21, 1786

Died: August 24, 1852

Political Party: Whig

Term of Office: December 12, 1836 - December 13, 1838

Buried: Oak Dale Cemetery Urbana, Ohio

No. 30 of 58

   On previous posts the total number of Ohio Governor gravesites that we were counting up to was 56. But since 2 more have passed away our number that we are aiming for is now 58. 

   Joseph Vance was born in Pennsylvania. His family moved to Kentucky for a few years before finally settling in Ohio in 1805. He was a salt peddler and farmer. During the War of 1812 he rose to the rank of Major General. His military career lead to his entering politics. He served a few terms in the Ohio House of Representatives before being elected in 1820 to the U.S. House of Representatives. After 7 terms in the House he lost reelection to an 8th term. He came back 2 years later and became the first Whig to become Governor of Ohio, where he served one, uneventful 2 year term before loosing reelection in 1838. 

     As Governor, Vance tried to abolish the death penalty, supported canal construction and supported state funding of schools. After being Governor he returned to politics by serving a term in the Ohio State Senate and 2 more terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. He also served as a delegate to the 1848 Whig National Convention and was elected to the Ohio Constitutional Convention in 1850. He passed away at his Urbana, Ohio home in 1852. 

   When I visited Oak Dale Cemetery in Urbana I had 2 stops in mind. Governor Joseph Vance's grave and also the grave of frontiersman Simon Kenton. When I got there signs lead me to Kenton's grave very easily. But it actually took me about an hour of looking before I found Governor Vance. I had some pictures to go off of, but there were literally hundreds of tombstone that looked like the one marking Governor Vance's final resting place.

 Governor Vance and I