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BIRD, ARTHUR CRANSON
William Livingston, Livingstone's History Of The Republican Party, Press of Winn & Hammond, Detroit (1900), Vol. II, p. 51
ARTHUR CRANSON BIRD was born in Highland, Oakland County, Mich., May 22, 1864, his father being Joseph Johnson Bird, a farmer, and his mother, Elizabeth Cranson Bird. The ancestry was English on both sides. The Bird and Cranson families were in the first company of settlers in Livingston County, Mich., Gardner Bird and Job Cranson being the heads. Job Cranson was the well known banker at Fenton, Genesee County, during the last twenty years of his life. Joseph Johnson Bird was the first white child born in Livingston County.
Arthtur Cranson Bird received his education at the Michigan Agricultural College, graduating and receiving the degree of Bachelor of Science in 1883. He was granted the degree of Master of Agriculture in 1884. From 1883 to 1898 he combined the business of farming with those of loaning money for Eastern capitalists and conducting a real estate business. He began on a farm of 110 acres in Highland. Oakland County, and soon enlarged it to 260 acres. He also has farms in other parts of the State, and is the heaviest stockholder in the West Michigan Nurseries at Benton Harbor. In addition to paying attention to these extensive interests he was, for five years, associate editor of the Michigan Farmer. He was member of the State Board of Agriculture from 1897 to 1899, and is now its Secretary. He was one of the founders of the State Association of Farmers' Clubs, and has served as its Secretary and President.
In politics Mr. Bird was always a Republican. He cast his first Presidential vote for Harrison, and was delegate to the Republican State Conventions of 1890 and 1896. His only society connections are with the Masonic order. He was married August 16th. 1889, to Josephine St. John, of Highland, Mich., and has two sons, Harold S. and Clarence S.
