KAVANAUGH, MICHAEL, who owns and occupies a handsome home on Peoria Road, Springfield, has been engaged in mining since he was eight years of age. He was born in Lancashire, England, July 15, 1845, son of Martin and Andrea (Flanagan) Kavanaugh, both of whom died in early life in England. The father was employed on a railroad. One brother of Michael Kavanaugh came to America in 1862 and located in Atlanta, Ga., and became employed in a cotton mill, but he has not ben heard from in twenty years. Michael Kavanaugh attended school in his native place and when a small boy won a prize of $500 for good scholarship. After coming to Sangamon County he attended night school in the village hall in Ridgeley, during the winter of 1885. He was employed in the West Shaft Mine in 1876. Later in the same year he made a trip to the Black Hills, and then walked nine hundred miles through Dakota, Montana, Idaho and part of Utah, but was not successful and came back to Springfield. While going through Idaho he was held up by seven men, who searched him but found no valuables, and let him proceed on his way. He returned to Springfield and has continued mining in Sangamon County from then to the present time. He is a member of the Miners' Union and takes an active interest in all public affairs. He is an industrious and conscientious worker and has the confidence of his associates. In politics he is a Republican and he is a member of the Episcopal Church. He has lived in his present home since about 1900 and has lived in the neighborhood of his home since first settling in the county.

Mr. Kavanaugh was married in Springfield, March 16, 1878, to Margaret Wickline, a daughter of Jacob and Mary Wickline, and was born in Shippensburg, Pa., March 2, 1846. Her father came from Germany to the United States as a young man and her mother was born in Shippensburg. Mr. and Mrs. Kavanaugh became parents of three sons and two daughters: Margaret, David John, Frank S., Charles W., and Andrea, all single and at home. By her first marriage Mrs. Kavanaugh had two children: Martha, wife of John Aller, an electrician, living in California, and Mary F., a widow, whose husband took part in the Spanish-American War.