from The History of Hendricks County (Indianapolis: B.F. Bowen & Co., 1914)----pages 609-610
The science of agriculture—for it is a science as well as an art—finds an able demonstrator as well as successful practitioner in the person of J. Wesley Ayers, who is widely known in Hendricks County, Indiana, maintaining a very productive and desirable farm in Franklin Township. He comes of a very highly honored pioneer family, members of which have played well their parts in the general development of this favored section of the great Indiana commonwealth.
J. Wesley Ayers, the son of William P. and Mary E. (Bell) Ayers, was born in Danville, Indiana, April 4, 1865. His father was a native of Maryland, while his mother was born in this county. William P. Ayers came to Indiana from Maryland with his parents when he was about four years of age. He received his education in this county, and after leaving school he worked on his father's farm until his marriage, at the age of twenty. To Mr. and Mrs. William P. Ayers were born ten children: Laura, the wife of Aaron Aldredge; Leander; Alice, who married Bradley Tout and, after his death, Henry Roland; Miranda, the wife of Frank Ryland; Dora, who married James West; Clara, the wife of Charles Garrison and, after his death, Frank Whitlock; Charles, who married Delia Denny; Otis, deceased; Albert, and J. Wesley, the immediate subject of this review.
J. Wesley Ayers secured his education by attending the common and high schools of Danville and attended the Central Norman College of Danville, and upon the completion of his education he came to Indianapolis, where he was in the employ of Sherman, Occidental and Stubbins hotels as clerk for about four years. Upon the death of his father at Danville, he removed to the latter place and took up his father's occupation as brick maker and contractor, and for the succeeding eight years he followed this line of business, erecting, among other buildings, the First National Bank building, of Danville. He then purchased a farm and began operations as an agriculturist, securing his first farm of sixty-two acres north of Danville, and he managed this place for the next ten years, after which time he sold this tract and bought sixty acres two and one-half miles east of Danville. Two years later he sold this land and purchased his present farm of sixty acres in Franklin Township, known as the William Tincher farm, a farm which he has brought to a high state of cultivation and made attractive with a good home, outbuildings and other extensive improvements.
Mr. Ayers was married April 2, 1908, to Ambrosia Hurst, the daughter of Charles R. and Mary E. (Bence) Hurst, and to this union there has been born one child, Mary Elizabeth. Mrs. Ayers' parents were both natives of Harrison County, Indiana, and Mrs. Ayers was born in that county. She has one brother, John, who married Frankie E. Thomas, and they live near Corydon, Indiana.
Mr. Ayers has identified himself since his majority with the Republican Party, but has never been an active participant in the campaigns of his party. He is a member of the Knights of Pythias and also of the Sons of Veterans. He and his wife are loyal and consistent members of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Danville, and are liberal contributors to the support of this denomination. Owing to his genuine worth as a man and his genial disposition, he easily wins friends and has always retained them. He enjoys a marked degree of popularity in the locality where so many of his active years have been spent.