There are mysteries about Ebenezer Beam, not the least of which is when he died. He was born in 1825 per multiple census records in either Tewksbury, Hunterdon Co NJ or Washington Twp, Morris Co NJ. The family lived on the county line and are found in both places. As an adult, he lived in Tewksbury. His mother's family lived in Morris County where she was found in the 1840 and 1850 Censuses.

He was the youngest child of Morris Beam and Catherine Fleming. "Early Germans" says his father died in 1822. Obviously not since Ebenezer was born in 1825. His mother remarried Lewis Hoover, and their first son was born in 1829. So it seems his father died between 1824 and 1828.

Ebenezer is found in the 1850, 1860, and 1870 censuses in Tewksbury. He seems to have been a "bachelor farmer," and in 1860 and 1870 he was living with the family of his half-brother, Serring Hoover. He is found in a Civil War draft record in Tewksbury, saying he was a little older than he actually was. Then it all changed.

He married Eliza Brown c 1871 (no record found), had four children, and moved to Wheatland, Bureau Co IL in the late 1870s. Edgar was born c 1871, Elizabeth J. was born 30 Jan 1873 (birth record as Bean), and William was born c 1876, all in New Jersey. The youngest, Amos Tiger Beam, was born 20 Apr 1879 in IL per later records. The family is found in the 1880 Census and in an 1882 agricultural census on 47 rented acres in Bureau Co IL. (Amos Tiger, b 1826 in NJ, was a near neighbor.)

Then they vanish from the record except for the two youngest sons who ended up in Indiana although there are gaps before 1910. Amos died in 1964 in Indianapolis and in 1950 William was living in LaPorte Co IN where he had been since 1910. Their mother, Eliza Brown, identified by Amos' marriage and death records, was born in Indiana--how and why she ended up in New Jersey to marry Ebenezer is another mystery. She vanished from the record after 1880. Something happened.

There are 1885 and 1889 articles in a Noblesville, Hamilton Co IN newspaper about "an" Ebenezer Beam. I do not know if this is the same Ebenezer Beam. Apparently this Ebenezer was living with John Weeks near Perkinsville, Madison Co IN. They got into a fight, and Weeks hit Beam with an ax doing terrible damage. They thought Beam would die, but two months later he was still alive. Weeks was convicted of assault with intent to kill. It seems unlikely that the family man of 1880 would end up in a "burlesque of a bachelor's hall" "living in filth and wretchedness in a shanty" with another man less than ten years later.

However, his son Amos T. Beam married his first wife in Hamilton Co IN in 1901 listing his parents. He then lived in Lapel, IN on the Hamilton/Madison County line and later lived for many years in Madison Co IN before moving to Indianapolis late in life. This doesn't seem like a coincidence.

There was a 1900 newspaper reference to the estate of Ebenezer S. Beam and a lawsuit vs. the estate of Samuel Stephenson. This may or may not have been the same man.

A death certificate was not found in either Madison or Hamilton Counties.

Mysteries remain.