Crisis (Columbus, OH) published Mar. 16, 1864, page 61:
John Rowley Knapp (1787 - 1864)
"OBITUARY.
ANOTHER PIONEER GONE — It is with no ordinary feeling of sorrow that we record the death of John R. Knapp, Esqr., one of the Pioneers of this county and for the past five years one of our most intimate and faithful friends. He died last Wednesday morning at his residence of Erysipelas fever after an illness of short duration, at the advanced age of 77 years.
Mr. Knapp was born at New Canaan, New York, on the 27th of July, 1787, and consequently had he lived until July next we would have been seventy-seven years of age. In 1836 he moved to Ohio, and settled in Marion, which place continued to be his residence until the day of his death. For many years he was the Post Master of Marion and also Justice of the Peace, the duties of which offices he discharged with signal ability and strict fidelity. For the last twenty-eight years his cheerful face and hearty welcome have been familiar to all. His death, therefore, although at an age when he was ripe with years and ready for the sickle of the Great Harvester, is universally deplored, and the sympathy of our community with his afflicted family is general and heart felt. The community always mourns when a good man falls....
'Green grow the turf above the,
Friend of our better years.'"