Another Westerville Cattleman - Tom Dempsey
If you fight the southbound traffic on Westerville Road past the I-270 exit, the first street you come to is Dempsey Road. The reason it is named Dempsey is that there, right across from today’s Speedway, was a 190-acre cattle farm owned by Tom and Ursula Dempsey. Under the pavement sprawl was the farm where Tom Dempsey raised Jersey cattle for many years. Unlike Joe Morris (see previous post), Dempsey raised cattle and made cattle sales his lifelong profession. Here are a few gleanings from his story.
Tom Dempsey (1879-1947) was born in Ironton, Ohio. He came to Westerville to attend Otterbein University’s Academy, and never left the Westerville area. At Otterbein, he was a member of the college’s football team, a fact which was noted at the 1947 centennial celebration.[i] Tom Dempsey did duty as a left end. The December 1895 Otterbein Aegis summarized his football skills thusly:
“Tom" is a remarkably good player for his age. This was his first season, and he won his position by hard, steady work. He has· a bright future before him on the football field if he continues to improve as he did this season.
Playing football was a good, if roundabout, way to prepare to spend a lifetime wrestling with cattle. From 1910 onward, Dempsey worked with Jersey cows. He was a sales manager for “some of the most prominent cattle breeders” in the U. S. and Canada.[ii] For example, he conducted the Annual Sale of the Ohio Jersey Cattle Club at the State Fairgrounds in Columbus on July 14, 1926. There he supervised the sale of such cows as “Oxford Ixie’s Royal,” “Hamley’s Magic Mail,” and “Tiddledywink’s Majesty.[iii] “ His obituary intoned that he was a prominent cattle judge at state fairs nationwide, including the 1915 World’s Fair in San Francisco.[iv]
That Tom Dempsey was much in demand for organizing livestock sales can be seen by even a partial list of auctions he ran. His name appears in auction records for Richmond, Indiana, Bangor, Maine, and West Palm Beach, Florida. He was listed as a “prominent visitor” at the fair at Thomasville, Georgia in 1921.[v] In 1913, he was one of the judges at the Pacific International Livestock Show in Portland, Oregon.[vi] Dempsey also bought and sold Jersey cattle for his own use. He bought several bulls, including two that had somewhat intimidating names, “Major Tormentor” and “Huge Rioter Lad.”[vii]
Tom and his wife Ursula had no children, yet Tom Dempsey left a heritage that many children enjoyed. When the city foreclosed on the Glengarry public swimming pool during the Great Depression, Mr. Dempsey was one of three investors who kept the pool afloat (pun intended). We are not sure how long Dempsey money was invested, but many children, sweltering through a pre-air conditioned summer, benefited from his philanthropy.
In the last year of his life, Dempsey served as a trustee of the Otterbein Cemetery Association. When he died, in November of that year, Tom was buried in the mausoleum there. It seems appropriate somehow, that a man who gave so much to Westerville should be buried on the banks of Alum Creek.
Photo: The 1897 Otterbein Football Team. Tom Dempsey in the middle, just to the right of the football. (Otterbein University Archives)
[i] Otterbein Towers, December 1947.
[iii] Ohio Jerseys. . . Annual Sale to be Held by The Ohio Jersey Cattle Club, Wednesday, July 14, 1926 . . . . [auction catalog]. Westerville Public Library.
[iv] Public Opinion.
[v] https://gahistoricnewspapers.galileo.usg.edu/lccn/sn88054087/1921-07-05/ed-1/seq-5/
[vi] https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn83045782/1913-12-07/ed-1/seq-18/
[vii] The Jersey Bulletin, November 28, 1906.