Coopersville Observer, December 22, 1922
Aged Resident of Lamont Dies Last Thursday
Civil War - 10th Michigan Cavalry
Bethuel Rice
Bethuel Rice, a resident of Kent and Ottawa counties nearly all of his eighty-one years, died Thursday at his home in Lamont after an extended illness. The body was taken to Detroit for cremation, following funeral services Friday afternoon.
Mr. Rice was born in what was said to be the first frame house in Grand Rapids, his parents having come to that place from Albany, New York, when Grand Rapids was only a small village of log huts. His father was the first blacksmith in the state, patrons coming to his shop from miles around.
During the Civil War, Mr. Rice served in the Tenth Michigan Cavalry and afterwards settled in Tallmadge Township where he lived nearly sixty years. A son, John Rice of Lamont, survives. Mr. Rice was very well known by a great many of the residents of Coopersville.