John Bever Historical Debate
Bever Street, locally pronounced “Beaver”, is named after John Bever, who surveyed Columbiana, Wayne, and Stark counties in the early 1800s.1 The town of Wooster largely agrees on the spelling and pronunciation of the name. However, Bever’s family history actually leaves it open to debate. Bever’s obituary in the Wooster Republican in 1875 shows that confusion existed as it admitted to a “considerable division of opinion to the orthography and pronunciation of the name”.2 The confusion stems from his heritage, because Bever’s father was German and his mother was Irish. The traditional Irish pronunciation is Beaver, while the traditional German pronunciation is Bever with the “e” pronounced as in ever. It seems even the family never definitively solved the problem, as land deeds and newspaper articles used both. Today, locals joke that they took the “a” out of Beaver and put it in Beall.
1 Thomas J. Malone, John Bever, Pioneer Surveyor who explored the wilderness that was northeast Ohio in the early 19th century and found it good (East Liverpool Historical Society, 1975), 5.
1 “Obituary- Reminiscences of the Beaver Family,” Wooster Republican, April 15, 1875.
Although Bever’s family name may still be up for debate, the town uses the common Irish pronunciation and the common German spelling for the street named in his honor: a seamless combination of his cultural background.
The obituary traces Bever’s interesting family history as he emigrated to the United States from Ireland after leaving Germany for unspecified religious reasons. The article also details the origin of the confusion about his family name, which still causes some debate within the town today.