CHARLES A. BINGHAM is achieving unusual success as a farmer and fruit grower in section 5 , Southfield township, Oakland county, Michigan. His estate is known as Pinehurst Farm and it comprises one hun dred and six acres of some of the most arable land in the entire county. He is an active business man and manifests a deep and sincere interest in all matters tending to forward progress and improvement in this sec tion of the state .

A native of Oakland county, Michigan, Charles A. Bingham was born in West Bloomfield township, May 31 , 1875 , and he is a son of David and Mary (Simpson) Bingham , the former of whom was born in Lincolnshire, England, in 1839, and the latter in West Bloomfield township, this county, in 1845. David Bingham was reared to the age of eighteen years in his native land and there received a fair education in the public schools. In 1857 he immigrated to America, alone, and settled first at Pontiac, Michigan , where he worked for some time by the day. He purchased a farm in West Bloomfield township, Oakland county, in 1872, but sold that place in 1880 and moved to the present Bingham homestead of one hundred and six acres, living here until his death in 1899. He had been twice married , his first wife having been Eliza For man , who passed to the life eternal in 1869, the mother of five children , namely , Lorenzo D., of Southfield township ; George of Southfield township ; Adie, wife of Ezra Bristol; Ida, wife of J. M. Rainey, now deceased ; and William J. , who died in 1881. In 1870 Mr. Bingham was united in marriage to Mary Simpson, a daughter of Peter and Elizabeth ( Patten ) Simpson, the former a native of Scotland and the latter of America. Two children were born to the second marriage, Floy, who died in 1888, and Charles A. , the immediate subject of this review.

To the district schools of Southfield township, Charles A. Bingham is indebted for his rudimentary educational training. He was a student in the Birmingham high school for one year and also pursued a commercial course in the Business College of Fenton . He remained at home and worked on his father's farm until he had reached histwenty - first year, when he bought an interest in his present home, Pinehurst Farm. Mr. Bingham is engaged in agricultural pursuits and the raising of fruit, making a specialty of peaches and apples. His farm consists of one hundred and six acres and is eligibly located one and one-half miles distant from the village of Franklin and four and one-half miles from Birmingham. In politics Wr. Bingham is a stanch supporter of the principles promul gated by the Republican party and in a fraternal way he is affiliated with Bingham Lodge, No. 44, Free and Accepted Masons, being junior war den of that organization at the present time, and of Bingham Chapter, No. 93 , Royal Arch Masons. He is likewise a valued and appreciative member of the Independent Order of Foresters, being chief ranger of that organization at the present time, in 1912. On November 25, 1895 , Mr. Bingham was united in marriage to Miss Jennie Covert, who was born and reared in Oakland county and who is a daughter of Isaac M. Covert, formerly of Southfield township but who later moved to Missouri. Isaac Covert was born in the state of New York and traces his ancestry back to stanch Holland stock . Mr. and Mrs. Bingham are the parents of three children, H. Kenneth , Cameron A. and Carson C. , the first two of whom are attending school in Southfield township. Mrs. Bingham is a devout member of the Methodist Protestant church, in whose faith she was reared. Mr. and Mrs. Bing ham are popular citizens in their home community, where they are accorded the unqualified esteem of all who know them .