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| Ackerman, W. F. W. F. Ackerman occupies a most important position as superintendent of the Burlington shops at Havelock. Gradually he has worked his way upward, his ambition and his energy resulting in his advancement, while his life record proves what may be accomplished when there is the will to dare and to do. Mr. Ackerman is a native son of Iowa, his birth having occurred at Mount Pleasant, July 6, 1870. His father, F. G. Ackerman, was born in Germany and at the age of fourteen years came to the United States, making his way to Oxford, Ohio, where he secured employment in a bakery and confectionery establishment. He thus worked until President Lincoln issued his first call for volunteers, when he enlisted for service in the Civil war for three months, joining the Forty-seventh Ohio Volunteer Infantry, On the expiration of his first term, during which it was proven that the war was to be no mere holiday affair but a long drawn out contest between the north and south, he re-enlisted and served in all for four years and three months, participating in many hotly contested engagements, and returned to his home with a most creditable military record. At Burlington, Iowa, where he located after the war, he married Johanna Fennimore, a native of Holland. Removing to Mount Pleasant, Iowa, the father there worked at his trade and was employed for a time in the State Hospital for the Insane at Mount Pleasant. His wife passed away in that city in March, 1885, at the age of forty years, while his last days were spent in the home of his son, W. F. Ackerman, in Havelock, where he died at the age of sixty-seven years. W. F. Ackerman was one of a family of nine children. His boyhood was passed in Mount Pleasant, where he acquired a common school education, supplemented by study in the Howe Academy and principally with the International Correspondence Schools, of Scranton, Pennsylvania. In 1888, when eighteen years of age, he went to Plattsmouth, Nebraska, where he served an apprenticeship as a machinist in the shops of the Burlington Railroad, and in 1894 he went upon the road as a fireman, making his run out of Alliance, Nebraska. From the time of his entrance into the employ of the company he has made steady progress. In 1897 he became gang foreman and later was made erecting foreman at Havelock. In 1899 he was appointed to the position of foreman of the shops at Alliance, Nebraska, and in 1900 he became general inspector for the Burlington Road in Lincoln. In 1901 he was made superintendent of the shops at Havelock and in 1907 he became assistant superintendent of motive power, serving for one year and eight months. On the expiration of that period, at which time new shops were opened in Havelock, he was made superintendent of the shops. He is now serving in that capacity and that he is one of the most trusted and capable employes of the Burlington is indicated by the fact that from the age of eighteen years he has been continuously in the service of the corporation. He is a practical railroad man, as his record shows, and his ability is demonstrated by his promotions. The shops at Havelock are the center of the locomotive industry of the Burlington system and he is in charge at this point. His practical experience in the various departments of the work well qualifies him to direct the labors of the large force of men who are serving under him. He is likewise well known in business circles as a director of the Havelock Building & Loan Association and is a stockholder of the First National Bank of Havelock. In November, 1891, Mr. Ackerman was united in marriage at Plattsmouth to Miss Adelia Steimker, who died in June, 1893, since which time he has wedded Rosa Prescott, of Havelock. He has two children: William P., who is attending the State University; and Eleanor Josephine, at home. The religious faith of the family is that of the Methodist church and in politics Mr. Ackerman is a republican but not an office seeker, preferring to concentrate his time and energies upon his business interests. He is, however, interested in all things pertaining to the welfare of Havelock and is cooperating in many plans and projects for her improvement and upbuilding. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 271-272 |
| Adams, J. M. John M. Adams holds title to eight hundred and forty acres of excellent land and personally supervises the operation of two hundred acres, but gives the greater part of his attention to the conduct of the elevator at Waverly, which he owns. His birth occurred in Jonkoping Ian, Sweden, on the 2d of January, 1860, and he is a son of Jonas and Christina (Magnuson) Adams, also natives of that Ian. In 1883 the family emigrated to the United States and located upon a farm seven miles northwest of Waverly, where the mother died in 1885, and the father on the 12th of July, 1914. John M. Adams, who is the second in order of birth in a family of six children, received the greater part of his education in Sweden but attended school for a short time after removing to the United States, thus acquiring a more thorough knowledge of the English language. He preceded his parents to this country by several years, arriving here in 1876 and locating in Kane county, Illinois. For three and a half years he worked as a farm hand there but at the end of that time came to Nebraska and purchased land seven miles northwest of Waverly. He concentrated his energies upon the improvement and operation of that place until 1900, and as the years passed his resources increased, due to his industry and careful management. On removing from the farm to Waverly he turned his attention to the grain business, in which he was engaged for nine years. He then sold out and purchased another farm, very close to Waverly, which he began operating. He farmed that place for a number of years and at the same time operated an elevator at Waverly, in which he acquired an interest in 1908, In July, 1915. he became sole owner of the elevator and is still conducting that business, which has now reached extensive proportions. He has invested his capital from time to time in land in this county, and his holdings now comprise eight hundred and forty acres, all of which is well improved. He operates a farm of two hundred acres in connection with his grain business and finds little time for outside interests. Mr. Adams was married on the 1st of November, 1889, to Miss Hannah S. Anderson, a native of Sweden, of which country her parents were lifelong residents. She too has been called to the home beyond, her death occurring in 1900. She was the mother of four children, namely: Alvin E., at home; Esther A., who is living at home and is teaching in the Havelock schools; and Harry W. and Lillian W., both of whom are attending school. On the 17th of August, 1904, Mr, Adams was married to Miss Hulda C. Warner, who was born in Lancaster county, a daughter of John and Christina Warner, natives of Sweden. On emigrating to the United States they came to Lancaster county, Nebraska, where the father purchased land. He is still living and now makes his home with his daughter, Mrs. F. E. Peterson, who lives seven miles northwest of Waverly. By his second marriage Mr. Adams has three children: Emery W., Sylvia Christina and Vemett S. Mr. Adams casts his ballot in support of the candidates and measures of the democratic party but has never been an aspirant for office. In religious faith he is a Congregationalist. His keen business insight, his capacity for hard work and his initiative have enabled him to gain financial independence, and at the same time he has won an honored name for he has never stooped to dishonest dealings but on the contrary has conducted his business in accordance with the highest commercial ethics. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 335-336 |
| Adams, Oakley Oakley Adams, who since 1905 has lived retired in Emerald, where he has a pleasant home and eight acres of land, was born in Monroe county, New York, in the town of Hamlin, in March, 1847. His parents. Lewis and Jane (Haggerty) Adams, were natives of New Jersey. The father was a farmer by occupation and followed that pursuit in New York for many years, there passing away in 1897. For more than a quarter of a century he had survived his wife, who died in 1871. Oakley Adams was reared and educated in New York and the total number of days which he spent in school was but two hundred and twenty. At the age of fourteen he joined the army, enlisting for service in the Civil war, but his father brought him back home, feeling that he was too young to serve. When sixteen years of age he began firing on the Atlantic & Great Western Railroad, now the Erie Railroad, and continued in that employ for twelve years, spending the last seven years of that period as an engineer. He next made his way into the oil country of Pennsylvania and devoted three years to putting down oil wells. At the end of that time he was married and in 1880 he came to Lancaster county, Nebraska, here purchasing eighty acres of land on section 22, Middle Creek precinct. He at once began improving this tract and operated it until 1905, when he sold his farm and removed to Emerald, where he purchased a pleasant residence standing in the midst of eight acres of land. He then retired and has since enjoyed a well earned rest, having leisure to engage in those things which are of most interest and pleasure to him. In June, 1880, Mr. Adams was married to Miss Katherine Kinney, of Wellsville. New York, where she was bom March 14, 1859. They never had any children of their own but reared an adopted daughter, Emma Trumbley. now the wife of Ira Davison, residing in Denver. The religious faith of Mr. and Mrs. Adams is that of the Baptist church and he gave an acre of ground to serve as the site upon which to build a house of worship. la politics he is independent and fraternally he is connected with the Masonic lodge of Lincoln. His has been an active and useful life in which diligence and earnest purpose have brought him his success. While upon the farm he spent eighteen years in dairying as well as in general agricultural pursuits and his life record proves what may be accomplished when energy and enterprise lead the way. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 539-540 |
| Aden, A. H. Amos H. Aden is at the head of the Aden Grain, Feed & Coal Company at Havelock, in which connection he is conducting a business of large and gratifying proportions that is bringing to him deserved success. He was born in Germany, May 18, 1863, a son of Habbe L. and Tobke (Frerrich) Aden, who were likewise natives of that country, where they remained until 1869 when they came to the United States. After a year spent at Bentley, now Golden, Illinois, they removed to the vicinity of Carthage, Illinois, and a year later, or in 1871, came to Nebraska, where Mr. Aden homesteaded a claim in Butler county, the place being situated about twenty miles from Columbus, which was their nearest trading point and to reach which they had to ford the Platte river. Their first home was a sod house and they experienced all of the hardships and privations incident to settlement upon the frontier. Through his claim Mr. Alden became the owner of one hundred and sixty acres and afterward obtained a tree claim of eighty acres, while subsequently he purchased a forty acre tract of land. As the years passed he carefully developed and improved his farm and became one of the prosperous and substantial agriculturists of the district. At length he retired to Columbus and his competence was sufficient to enable him to enjoy all the comforts and some of the luxuries of life. There both he and his wife spent their remaining days. Amos H. Aden, who was one of a family of four sons and three daughters, was reared on the old homestead farm in Butler county and shared in the hardships of pioneer life. His educational opportunities were limited to the advantages offered in the district schools and when twenty-one years of age he went to Quincy. Illinois, where he attended the Gem City Business College. Being thus trained for commercial work he embarked in the hardware business at Garrison, Nebraska, having at the time a capital of ten dollars. However, he borrowed four hundred dollars from his father and thus secured his stock. For twelve years he remained in business there, during which period he built up a good trade. During the succeeding year he traveled for the Osbom Hardware Company and then, turning his attention to the grain business, devoted fourteen years to buying grain at David City and at Garrison. Later he spent five years on a ranch in Greeley county, Nebraska, and then because of failing health engaged in no business for a year. Learning that there was an elevator and coal business for sale in Havelock, he came to this city and made purchase of the same in June, 1912. The property was in a dilapidated condition but he rebuilt the elevator and infused into the business his own determination and enthusiasm. It was not long before he made his business a market for the grain raisers of the district and because of the continued growth of his undertaking he admitted his nephew to a partnership on the 1st of March, 1915, under the style of Aden Grain, Feed & Coal Company. Their elevator is situated on the Rock Island track and they are now controlling an ever growing trade. Mr. Aden is happily situated in his home life. He wedded Flora Curry, who was bom at Postvitle, Iowa, and they have become the parents of three children: Ruben, who is married and lives on a farm in Howard county, Nebraska; and Wesley A. and Harold F., both at home. Mr. and Mrs, Aden now reside at University Place. She is a member of the Methodist church, while Mr. Aden belongs to the Ancient Order of United Workmen at Garrison. His political allegiance is given to the republican party and he keeps well informed on the questions and issues of the day, but he does not seek nor desire office, preferring to concentrate his energies upon his business affairs which are carefully managed and are bringing to him gratifying success. He deserves much credit for what he has undertaken and accomplished for he had no special chances at the outset of his career and through laudable ambition, close application and indefatigable energy has worked his way steadily upward. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 198-199 |
| Aden J. G. John G. Aden is an enterprising young business man of Havelock, junior partner in the Aden Grain, Feed & Coal Company, He was born in Butler county, Nebraska, November 28, 1885, and has always continued his residence in this state. His father, John H. Aden, was born in Germany and married Ellen Wisman, a native of Canada. In the year 1871 he came with his parents to Nebraska and has since resided in this state. For a long period he was successfully engaged in farming in Butler county, where he developed and improved a tract of land, making it one of the valuable farm properties of the district. To that occupation he devoted his energies until he put aside all business cares, since which time he has lived retired in University Place. John G. Aden was reared to farm life, having the usual experiences of the farm, brought up with the advantages of district school education and good home training. At length he joined his uncle, Amos H. Aden, in business, entering into the present partnership relation on the 1st of March, 1915, for the conduct of a grain, feed and coal business in Havelock. Mr. Aden was united in marriage to Miss Lulu M. Lucas, a native of Shelby, Nebraska, and they are well known in Havelock, where they have a large circle of warm friends, while the hospitality of the best homes is cordially accorded them. They are members of the Methodist church and Mr, Aden gives his pohtical allegiance to the democratic party, believing that its principles contain the best elements of good government. He belongs to the Masonic lodge and to the Modern Woodmen of America. He stands for prepress and improvement in public affairs and his influence is ever on the side of those interests which are a matter of civic virtue and civic pride. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 373-374 |
| Alford, J. H. J. H. Alford, Deputy Auditor of State, came to Omaha, Neb., April 2, 1867, taking charge of the purchasing department of the Union Pacific Railroad, and remained there until the office was abolished in 1869. In December, 1869, he came to Lincoln in the mercantile trade, and in 1872 was appointed private secretary to Gov. Furnas. He held this during his term of office, in July, 1875, he was appointed bookkeeper in the Auditor's office, and in January, 1879, became deputy. In 1873-74 was acting as Assistant Adjutant General with rank of Colonel. He was born in New York City, May 23, 1843, and lived there until 1861,when he came to Chicago and was connected with the C. & N. W., Railroad, and remained with them until he came to Omaha. He was married in Creston, Iowa, November 12, 1879, to Nora Isabella Coggeshall, a native of Waukegan, Ill. He is a member of the Masonic Order of the Knight Templars and various social organizations. He has always been identified with public interests. |
| Allen, Thomas Stinson Thomas Stinson Allen, United States district attorney for Nebraska and a prominent member of the Lincoln bar, was bom at Payne's Point, Ogle county, Illinois, April 30, 1865. His father, Benjamin Franklin Allen, a retired farmer, died in Lincoln, December 20, 1915, at the age of eighty-three years after residing in this state from 1869. He wae born in New Hampshire, December 10, 1832, and was descended from revolutionary stock, which included the famous Colonel Ethan Allen, who won distinction as commander of the "Green Mountain Boys." On his removal to Nebraska, Benjamin F. Allen became actively connected with its agricultural interests and carried on farming until a few years prior to his death, living near Wabash in Cass county. He was a prominent leader in the Farmers Alliance party of Nebraska, and was instrumental in placing that organization on a firm foundation. He was actively interested in all public questions. He married Harriet Maria Ely, who was born at Hartford, New York, in 1835 and died in Lincoln, January 25, 1912, at the age of seventy-seven years. In their family were six children of whom five are yet living: Esther, now the wife of John T. Feather of Waverly, Nebraska; Thomas S.; Lizzie A., the wife of Charles S. Murfin of Wabash, Nebraska; Grace, of Lincoln; and Oscar H., of Omaha. A daughter, Abbie, the first bom. died in childhood. Thomas S. Allen was about four years of age when brought by his parents to Nebraska in 1869. He acquired his early education in the district schools of Cass county and at the age of seventeen years entered the preparatory department of the University of Nebraska. He spent six years in all in that institution and was graduated in 1889 as valedictorian of his class. He studied law in the office of A, R. Talbot, now a prominent member of the Lincoln bar, and the present partner of Mr. Allen, and the Hon. William Jennings Bryan, Nebraska's distinguished statesman. Mr. Allen pursued his legal studies in their office for two years and at the same time pursued a law course in the old Central Law School, which became the law department of the University of Nebraska before he finished his course, so that his diploma, dated 1891, came to him from the State University. Soon afterward he became a member of the firm of Talbot, Bryan & Allen. Mr. Bryan withdrew from the firm when he was first nominated for the presidency in 1896, since which time the firm name has been Talbot & Allen. Since 1892 Mr. Allen has been in the active practice of law and is an able member of the bar. He possesses comprehensive knowledge of the principles of jurisprudence and is, moreover, a hard worker, careful and systematic in preparing his cases. Mr. Allen is one of the active members of the democratic party in the state. From 1904 until 1909 he was chairman of the democratic state central committee, and prior to that time was chairman of the democratic county committee of Lancaster county. On the 1st of August, 191 5, he was appointed United States district attorney for the state of Nebraska by President Woodrow Wilson and now holds that office. On the 28th of June, 1898, Mr. Allen was married to Miss Mary Elizabeth Bryan at Salem, Illinois. She is the daughter of Silas L. and Maria Elizabeth Bryan and the youngest sister of Hon. William Jennings Bryan. In his fraternal relations Mr. Allen is a thirty-second degree Mason and a member of the Modem W|oodmen of America, the Maccabees, the Knights and Ladies of Security and the Royal Highlanders. He is also a director and the treasurer of the Woodman Accident Association, which has its headquarters in Lincoln. He is a member of the Lincoln Commercial Club, the Nebraska State Bar Association and the Lancaster County Bar Association. The breadth of his interests and activity is thus indicated, and the city recognizes in him one of its prominent citizens who subordinates personal interest to pubhc welfare and partisanship to the general good. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 62-63 |
| Ames, E. C. Ernest Capron Ames, lawyer and referee in bankruptcy in Lincoln, is a native of this city, in which he has spent his entire life. His birth occurred June 14, 1875, in the family residence then situated at the comer of Thirteenth and G streets, and he is the only child of the late Judge John Henry Ames, a lawyer by profession and commissioner of the Nebraska supreme court for several years. He became a resident of Lincoln in 1868 and here remained until his demise in 1911. He was born in the state of New York in 1847, was reared and educated there and was admitted to the bar at Buffalo, New York, when twenty-one years of age. Immediately after, or in 1868, he came to Lincoln to enter upon the practice of law in the middle west, hoping to find here a favorable field for his labors. Only a year before had Lincoln been designated the capital of Nebraska. Judge Ames entered upon law practice in this city and for a third of a century or more occupied a most conspicuous and enviable position at the bar, becoming recognized as one of Lincoln's best known lawyers. For a considerable period he was a member of the law firm of Harwood, Ames & Kelly, which occupied a place in the foremost rank among the distinguished members of the Nebraska bar. He witnessed practically the entire growth of the capital city and contributed largely to its upbuilding. For several years he served as commissioner of the state supreme court, and he also assisted in revising the Nebraska legal statutes in 1875. He wrote the first history of Lincoln that was ever published in book form, it appearing in the form of a pamphlet in 1870. Many copies of it are still in existence. It was in the year 1870 that Judge Ames was married to Miss Lydia Capron, a native of Ohio, who survives him and yet makes her home in Lincoln with her son, Ernest C. She was bom in 1840 and therefore is now in her seventy-sixth year, but is still quite vigorous and well preserved. It was in 1911 that Judge Ames passed away and in his death the community lost one of its most honored and representative citizens and distinguished lawyers and jurists. Ernest Capron Ames, the only surviving child of Judge Ames, began his education in the Lincoln public schools and passed through consecutive grades to the high school, from which he was graduated in 1892. He then continued his studies in the University of Nebraska and won the Bachelor of Arts degree in 1896. He continued there as a law student and in 1898 the LL. B. degree was conferred upon him, at which time he was twenty-three years of age. He then entered upon the practice of law in Lincoln and in the same year was appointed referee in bankruptcy for that part of the state which lies south of the Platte river. He has since continued to serve in that capacity, but since 1903 his chief business has been that of actuary of the Bankers Life Insurance Company of Lincoln. In 1915 he became a fellow in the American Institute of Actuaries. Since 1911 he has had his offices in the fine new Bankers Life building. On the 3d of October, 1907, Mr. Ames was united in marriage to Miss Grace Andrews, of Fairbury, Nebraska. She belongs to the Daughters of the American Revolution and is a 1901 graduate of the University of Nebraska. By her marriage she has become the mother of two children, Margaret Capron and John Henry, who are seven and five years of age respectively. Mr. Ames is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and also a Noble of the Mystic Shrine. He likewise belongs to the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and in politics he is a republican, as was his father before him. He is identified with the Lincoln Commercial Club, the Lincoln Country Club, the Lincoln Automobile Club and is one of the directors of the Bankers Life Insurance Company of Lincoln. He is also entitled to membership with the Sons of the American Revolution, as the Capron family was represented in the war for independence. He is interested in all those forces which work for the development and improvement of the district in which he lives and his activity has been intelligently directed along lines which have advanced the general good as well as upheld the legal status of the community. He is a worthy scion of his race, fortunate in having back of him an ancestry honorable and distinguished, his own lines of life being cast in harmony therewith. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 506, 509-510 |
| Anderson, Andrew Andrew Anderson, foreman stone shop Bullock & Keyes, was born on July 4, 1849, in Sweden, where he was raised and educated, and on July 17, 1869, came to the United States and settled at Topeka, Kas., working in stone quarries there for a short time and in 1869 came to Nebraska City, and was employed by the Midland Railroad Company, and in spring of 1871 came to Lincoln and worked as an apprentice to the stone cutting business for about three years, then engaged with Bullock & Keyes, and was made foreman of their shops. Was married to Miss Katie Sudam in 1881, here. Both members of the Lutheran Church. |
| Anderson, A. O. Andrew O. Anderson, a well-to-do farmer and contractor residing in Waverly, was bom in Horby, Sweden, on Christmas Day of 1866, of the marriage of Ola and Hannah (Olson) Anderson, both of whom were born in that place. The father devoted his life to farming in his native land and also held a number of local offices there, including that of sheriff. He died about 1912, but is survived by the mother. They were the parents of ten children, of whom Andrew O. is the fifth in order of birth. Andrew O. Anderson attended school in Sweden until about fourteen years of age, and when about fifteen years old came to America, joining his brother living on a farm in Saunders county, Nebraska. He attended school at Mead for a short time, thus acquiring a knowledge of English. While still living in Sweden he had worked as a farm hand and he turned his knowledge of agricultural methods to good account after his removal to the United States, working by the month in Saunders county, Nebraska. After a short time, however, he came to Lancaster county, where he remained for a year, but at the end of that time he removed to a farm near Ceresco, A year later he went to Mead, devoting the winter months to attending school and the summers to farming. After spending three years in that way he took up his residence in Omaha, and there learned the carpenter's trade. In 1890 he located in Lincoln, where he worked at the carpenter's trade for a year. He then returned to Sweden on a visit, but in 1891 again became a resident of Omaha. A year later, however, he returned to Lincoln, where he remained until 1895, when he went to Fontanelle, Washington county, Nebraska. He farmed in that vicinity for a year and at the end of that time purchased land in Mill precinct, Lancaster county, upon which he resided until 1909. He then disposed of his farm and purchased thirty acres of land within the town limits of Waverly. He erected there the finest and most modern home in the town and has since resided therein. In 1902 he purchased an interest in a hardware store, his partner being A. E. Sutherland, and in 1905 became the sole owner of the business, which he conducted successfully until the spring of 1916, when he traded it for valuable property in Lincoln. Since 1905 he has owned one hundred and sixty acres adjoining the thirty acres which he bought in Waverly, and he devotes a great deal of his time to the cultivation of his land. He is also engaged in contracting and has erected a large number of buildings in the county. Moreover he is agent for the Independent Machinery Company, and for the Chevrolet Automobile Company and the Fairbanks Windmill Company. His various business interests are well managed and his annual income is a gratifying one. Mr. Anderson was married, on the 23d of November, 1892, to Miss Anna M. Johnson, a native of Sweden, who was brought to this country by her parents when only eighteen months old. Her father engaged in farming in Mill precinct and passed away in 1882. The mother is now a resident of Waverly. To Mr. and Mrs. Anderson have been born five children: Oliver Leo, who is now assisting his father in the operation of the home farm, but who was formerly engaged in the automobile business at Omaha; Elvira Victoria, in the employ of the Morse garage at Lincoln; Harry William, attending school; Merrill Webster, at home; Frances Naomi, also at home. Mr. Anderson is a republican, but votes independently at times. He has not taken an active part in politics as he has preferred to concentrate his energies upon his business affairs. He has not only won a gratifying measure of financial success, but he has also gained the unqualified respect of all who are associated with him. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 405-406 |
| Anderson, C. P. Charles P. Anderson, who owns and manages a shoe store in Waverly, has the distinction of being the oldest business man in the town and has secured a large and lucrative patronage. His birth occurred in Sweden on the 23d of January, 1854, and his parents were Andreas and Christina (Nelson") Peterson, who were lifelong residents of that country, where the father engaged in farming. Charles P. Anderson, who is the second in order of birth in a family of six children, received his education in the schools of his native land and remained at home until he was nineteen years of age, when he began learning the shoemaker's trade. On attaining his majority he entered the Swedish army, where he received military training for two years. After he completed his term of service he again turned his attention to shoemaking and conducted quite a large business, employing five men. In 1881, however, when about twenty-nine years of age, he emigrated to America and after working for three months in a brickyard, engaged in the shoe business at Jacksonville, Illinois, where he remained for three years. At the end of that time, he removed to Waverly, Nebraska, where he has since remained. He has witnessed practically the entire development of the town and has always been found among the leaders in movements seeking the public advancement. He owns the property in which his store is located and his business represents a considerable investment as he carries a large and up-to-date stock of high class shoes. He has been very successful as a merchant and is in excellent circumstances. Aside from his business property he owns an attractive residence in Waverly. Mr. Anderson was united in marriage in October, 1881, to Miss Christina Swanson, who was born in the same section of Sweden as her husband. Her father passed his entire life in Sweden and after his demise the mother came to America and spent her last days with her son-in-law, Alfred Peterson, dying at the venerable age of ninety-three years, about 1911. Mrs. Anderson passed away in 1894, leaving four children; Ella and Carl, both of whom are at home; Anna, the wife of John Betts, a railroad man living in Lincoln; and Eloff. In 1896 Mr. Anderson married Miss Anna Louisa Carlson, who was also born in Sweden. Five daughters have been born to Mr. Anderson's second marriage, namely: Esther, Ollie, Ruth, Effie and Helen, all of whom are at home. Mr. Anderson is an adherent of the republican party and loyally supports its candidates at the polls but has never sought office as a reward for his fealty. He holds membership in the Congregational church and gives his influence to the side of righteousness and moral progress. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 242-243 |
| Anderson, F. O. E. Ferdinand O. E. Anderson, a well known and prominent young man, was born in Waverly, January 13, 1898, a son of John and Jennie (Berg) Anderson. His father was a native of Sweden and a railroad man by occupation. After his death the mother became the wife of Dr. L. B, Woodward, of Lincoln. She is still living and now makes her home in Waverly. Her biography precedes this. Mr. Anderson was educated in the public schools and was engaged in farming at the time of his death. He was a member of the Lincoln Motor Cycle Club, and although a motor cycle enthusiast, was a careful driver. While on his way to work on a farm July 6, 1915, he met death about two and one-half miles north of Waverly. He was found by a boy friend at one o'clock that day and taken to Waverly. After an examination by a physician he was taken to a hospital in Lincoln, where he died at five o'clock on the same evening. His death will always remain a mystery. The machine showed no signs of collision or accident. The physicians pronounced his death caused by concussion of the brain, though no bruises were to be seen. He was the last child in the family, as his brother Carl had previously died, and his mother alone remains to mourn his loss. He was a very popular young man and had a host of friends wherever known. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 780, 783 |
| Anderson, G. A. George A. Anderson met with a gratifying measure of success as a farmer and at the time of his death owned a valuable tract of land in Mill precinct. His birth occurred in Sweden, on the 21st of March, 1854, and he was a son of Andrew Anderson, a lifelong resident of that country. He received his education in his native land and when fourteen or fifteen years of age began working for others. After a few years he came to the United States and spent the first winter in Indianapohs, Indiana, but at the end of that time went to Chicago, whence he removed to Virginia, Illinois. He engaged in farming in that locality for about twelve years but in 1894 came to Lancaster county, Nebraska, and purchased three hundred and twenty acres in Mill precinct. He resided thereon until his death and brought the place to a high state of development. He subsequently secured an additional eighty acre tract and derived a gratifying income from the operation of his farm. Mr. Anderson was married in March, 1883, to Miss Caroline Peterson, who was bom in Sweden and is a daughter of Peter Carl and Marie Elizabeth (Brax) Freg, also natives of that country. Mr. and Mrs. Anderson became the parents of seven children, as follows: Ida Juliet, at home; Mabel R., the wife of Frank Samuelson, a farmer of North Bluff precinct; Nellie G., the wife of Martin Axelson, who is now spending his fifth year in Alaska as a missionary; Philip, who is farming part of the home place and who married Amy Holquist; Esther Phyllis, the wife of Charles Warner, of Waverly precinct; Richard A., who is farming part of the homestead; and Ruth J. H., who is a teacher in Mill precinct and resides at home. Mr. Anderson cast his ballot in support of the candidates and measures of the republican party but never aspired to office. The principles which guided his life were found in the teachings of the Swedish Mission church, to which he belonged, and his proved integrity won him a high place in the respect of his fellowmen. He passed away on the 24th of October, 1911. His wife still resides upon the home farm of four hundred acres. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 635-636 |
| Anderson, J. C. J. C. Anderson, locomotive engineer B. & M. Railroad, was born in Lanarkshire, Scotland, July 1852. He commenced his railroad services when about eleven years old. In 1872 he came to the United States, located in Elkhart, Ind., and entered the service of the L. S. & M S. Railroad, the last two years having charge of an engine. He came to Nebraska in 1880, settled at Red Cloud and engaged in farming until 1881, in which year he entered the services of the B. & M. Railroad. He was married in Elkhart, Ind. January 24, 1878, to Miss Mary Peterson of that city. |
| Andrews, F. P. F. P. ANDREWS, engineer Journal, was born July 17, 1852 in Cleveland, Ohio, and received an education in Ohio and Connecticut until he was eighteen years old and in 1873 went on the lakes as steamboat engineer for about four years, then returned to Ohio and was engaged as engineer to the asylum. In 1877 engaged as engineer to the Atlantic & Great Western Railroad Company for a short time, then with the Cleveland & Pittsburgh Railroad Company. In 1878 was employed by the Cleveland Rolling Mill Company, working on repairs and mill, and in 187 came to Lincoln and worked on the capitol and penitentiary, doing general work for about two years, then was engaged as engineer to the Journal office. Belongs to Newberg Lodge No. 379, Cleveland, Ohio as Master Mason. |
| Andrus, Albert Albert Andrus, loan agent, came to Lincoln in April, 1878, and read law with T. P. Kennard. He was admitted to the bar in 1881 and has practiced for the last year. He was born in Malone, Franklin Co., N. Y., February 19, 1858, and lived there until 1866. He then moved to Hammonton, N. J., where he resided until he came here. He is a member of the firm of Parsons & Andrus, loan agents. |
| Angelo, A. J. Andrew J. Angelo gained a gratifying measure of success as a farmer of Lancaster county and at length retired from active life, taking up his residence in Bethany, where he died in 1913. A native of lllinois, he was born on the 21st of November, 1831, a son of David and Mary (Masters) Angelo. They were born in Pennsylvania but became residents of Illinois at an early day in the history of that state, and there the father engaged in farming during his active life. After retiring he came to Nebraska and made his home with our subject until his death on the 3d of March, 1903. He had survived his wife since 1899. Andrew J. Angelo was reared in the Prairie state and was indebted to its public schools for his education. He gave his father the benefit of his labor until he was twenty-one years of age, when he began farming on his own account, so continuing in that state until 1878, when he came to Lancaster county, Nebraska, and rented land which he operated for seventeen years. He seldom failed to harvest good crops and as he managed his business affairs well his resources steadily increased and at length he gave up the work of the farm and removed to Bethany, purchasing a nice home at No. 134 Holdredge street. After taking up his residence here he did some teaming as he found a life of inactivity very distasteful. His death occurred on the 9th of January, 1913, and his demise was recognized as a loss to his community. Mr. Angelo was married in December, 1876, to Miss Melinda Hobson, a daughter of John and Elizabeth (Cline) Hobson, who were born in North Carolina and Indiana respectively. Her father was a farmer by occupation and in early life removed to Illinois, where he followed agricultural pursuits until his demise in 1853. His wife was called to her final rest in 1857. Mr. Angelo cast his ballot in support of the men and measures of the democratic party but was never an aspirant for office. He held membership in the Highlanders and the Knights and Ladies of Security, and his religious allegiance was given to the Christian church. In all the relations of life be discharged to the full the obligations resting upon him, and those who knew him best were his warmest and sincerest friends. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 191-192 |
| Angle A.M., M.D., Edward John Dr. Edward John Angle, physician and surgeon of Lincoln was born on his father's farm, near Cedarville, Illinois, on the 1st day of April, 1864, the sixth and youngest son of John Bouslough and Jane (Bell) Angle, the former a native of Washington county, Maryland, and the latter of East Hanover township, Dauphin county, Pennsylvania. They were married in Altoona, Pennsylvania, in 1844 and immediately afterward removed to Illinois, becoming pioneers of Stephenson county, where they spent their remaining days, the father devoting his attention to the occupation of farming. His mother was a woman of exceptional character and high ideals, and possessed a very clear view of the true values of life. The name was originally spelled Engel and the family is of Swiss-French origin. Representatives of the name came to America about 1740, settling in northern Maryland. They were members of the Mennonite church and in the home country were known as Swiss Quakers. In Maryland they early affiliated with the Dunkard church. The mother's people were Scotch and of the Covenanter faith and came to the United States soon after the year 1700. They were among those who were persecuted under King James and fled to Ulster, Ireland, in the early period of the seventeenth century. On the matemal side a score or more members of the family from Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, served in the Revolutionary war. Among this number were Private Robert Bell, Lieutenant William Young, Captain James Wilson, who participated in the campaigns of the Jerseys in 1776 and was at Brandywine and Germantown in 1777, and Captain Lazarus Stewart, the intrepid scout and Indian fighter who fell at the head of his company in the Wyoming valley Indian massacre. Richard Swan, who settled in Philadelphia, was one of the signers of the Non-Importation Resolutions of 1765. On account of religious scruples the father's family were largely non-associators. The Mennonites and Dunkards were of unquestioned loyalty and willing to contribute to the support and comfort of the soldiers but seriously objected to military service. Colonel Andrew Rench and Captain John Rench were members of the Committee of Observation of Elizabethtown District, Frederick county Maryland, and were elected delegates to serve in the state convention, September 12, 1775. With them patriotism and loyalty to country were stronger bonds than church and creed. General James Bell, who recently retired from the regular army, is a full cousin of Dr. Angle. Dr. Angle pursued his early education in the public schools of his native village and later prepared for college at the Madison, Wisconsin, high school. He entered the University of Wisconsin in 1882 and upon the completion of the course received the degree of Bachelor of Science. He specialized along biological and chemical lines and was the first student to pursue a systematic course in vertebrate embryology at the university. This was essentially the pre-medical course demanded by the best medical schools today. The University of Wisconsin was scarcely more than a college then and for this fact Dr. Angle has always been thankful, for it permitted a personal contact with and inspiration from teachers which is not always possible in these days of large student bodies. In the summer of 1885 he began preparation for the practice of medicine, entering the office of his brother-in-law. Dr. J. C. Corbus, of La Salle, Illinois. A year was spent in the medical department of the State University of Iowa and in the fall of 1886 he entered the Medical College of Ohio, now the medical department of the University of Cincinnati and graduated the following year. For a year after his graduation in 1887, Dr. Angle was a country practitioner, then moved to La Salle, Illinois, to take over the practice of his brother-in-law, who removed to Chicago. Dr. Angle remained for seven years at La Salle where he built up a large and successful practice. In the fall of 1894 he entered the University of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia, where he was one of the first honor men of the class of 1895. He has since taken postgraduate work in New York, Chicago and St. Louis and has continually promoted his efficiency by broad reading as well as by college work. After locating in Lincoln in 1895 he continued his studies and pursued a special course in the department of zoology and embryology under Professor H. C. Ward of the State University. It was in recognition of his research work that he was awarded the degree of A. M. and a membership in the Sigma Xi, an honorary society whose standard is that of research work in science. Following his graduation in Philadelphia, and after completing postgraduate work in New York he came in the fall of 1895 to Lincoln, where he has since been in continuous practice, possessing marked ability in his specialty, which is the treatment of skin and genito-urinary diseases. His knowledge along that line is so comprehensive as to make his opinions largely accepted as standard among his professional brethem of the city and state. In June, 1889, in Freeport, Illinois, Dr. Angle was united in marriage to Miss Agnes L. Wolf, a daughter of Judge George and Angeline (Fleming) Wolf, tfie former of whom was judge of the probate court. His people were from Center county, Pennsylvania, and of so-called "Dutch" descent, while the mother came from French-English stock from Jefferson county, Virginia. To the Doctor and his wife have been bom five children, as follows: Sarah Jane, who is deceased; Florence Bell, who graduated from the Nebraska State University with the class of 1916, with the honor of membership in the Phi Beta Kappa society; Edward Everett Dupuytren, a sophomore in the Nebraska State University, who is preparing for a medical career; Barbara Josephine, who has passed away; and Agnes Evelyn, who is a student in the graded schools. Dr. Angle is well known in Masonic circles, belonging to Lincoln Lodge, No. 19, F. & A. M.; to Lincoln Chapter, R. A. M.; and St. John's Commandery, K. T. He is also a member of Alpha Tau Omega, a college fraternity. He is a charter member of Lincoln Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution and he is a member of the Lancaster County Medical Society, the Nebraska State Medical Association and the American Medical Association. He is likewise a member of the Medical Society of the Missouri Valley and the American Urological Association and is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and has recently been informed that his name would appear in the forthcoming edition of The Scientists of America, indicating the eminent position to which he has attained in scientific circles. He has closely applied himself to his profession and served for a period of years as professor of skin and urinary diseases in the Nebraska College of Medicine. Several attractive positions in medical colleges have been proffered him. He is now a member of the staff of St. Elizabeth's Hospital of Lincoln and such is his ability that his reputation and his practice extend far beyond the borders of Nebraska. Dr. Angle is a deep lover of nature, and flowers and trees possess for him almost human qualities. Nowhere is he more happy than at their country home, Interlachen, near Park Rapids, where the summers are spent among the beautiful lakes and forests of northern Minnesota. Fishing and hunting are his favorite sports. Many record fish have come to his hook. By nature of a reserved disposition he has never sought publicity or position, finding the greatest pleasure in his profession, bis family and groups of selected friends. He and his wife are members of the Second Presbyterian church. Dr. and Mrs. Angle are well known socially and have a circle of friends almost coextensive with the circle of their acquaintance. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 54, 57-58 |
| Armann, C. H. Charles Henry Armann, who is successfully engaged in farming the family homestead in Centerville precinct, Lancaster county, has never had occasion to regret his choice of an occupation, for he has found agricultural pursuits congenial as well as profitable. His birth occurred in Zaleski, Vinton county, Ohio, on the 10th of May, 1878. His father, Henry Armann, was born in the city of Bremen, Germany, March 21, 1838, and remained there until he was sixteen years old, when he came to the United States, landing in New Orleans. For a short time he resided in Cincinnati, Ohio. There he followed the cabinetmaker's trade, which he had learned in Germany, and later he went to Portsmouth, Ohio, where he worked in the mines and also as a wagon maker in the employ of the mining company. Subsequently he went to Kentucky, where he followed his trade for some time, after which he returned to Ohio. He worked in the coal mines there and also gave some attention to cabinet work, specializing in making coffins. Following the outbreak of the Civil war, he enlisted in 1861 in the Fifty-sixth Ohio Volunteer Infantry and remained at the front until the close of hostilities. He fought in the engagement at Fort Donelson, participated in the capture of Fort Henry, in the battles of Shiloh and Corinth and in the Vicksburg campaign. In the engagements which preceded the taking of that Confederate stronghold he was twice wounded, losing part of one finger and being shot through the head. He recovered from his injuries, however, and after the close of that campaign was assigned to convey prisoners to Ship Island. During the early period of his military service he was in General Hancock's corps and General Osterhaus' brigade, but he was at length transferred to General Banks' command and went on the famous Red River expedition. He also served under General Franz Sigel and was a member of what was known as the Pioneer Corps. He was in all of the battles of the Red River campaign, including that of Pleasant Hill, and subsequently went to New Orleans, where he was discharged in December, 1864. He returned to Cincinnati and soon afterward went to Scioto county, Ohio. In 1865 he reenlisted for another year, this time becoming a member of the Eighth United States Regiment. He was assigned to the defense service and remained with the colors until the end of the war. Mr. Armann then returned to Ohio and took up his residence in Vinton county, where he conducted a general store. Later he removed to Portsmouth, Ohio, and operated a brewery there for some time, but at length removed to Zaleski, where he was employed in the car building shops of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad until 1880. He then came to Lancaster county, Nebraska, and purchased two hundred and forty acres on section 17, Centerville precinct, which was unimproved railroad land. He soon returned to Ohio, and in 1883 came with his two eldest sons to Lancaster county and began placing his homestead under cultivation. They also erected a residence and in the following spring Mrs. Armann and the other children arrived here. Mr. Armann was actively engaged in farming until 1899, when he retired, but he resided upon the homestead until 1910. He then removed to Lincoln and there he made his home until his death, which occurred on the 12th of May, 1916. On the 18th of April, 1866, he married Miss Mary Deutchel, who died February 22, 1875. Of the five children born to them one died in infancy and another at the age of seven years. Those still living are: Frank, a resident of Wheatland, Wyoming; and Mrs. Dora Betten and Abraham, both residents of Martel, Nebraska. Mr. Armann was again married in September, 1876, his second union being with Mrs. Ruhamah Livingstone, a sister of his first wife and a native of Walsa, Germany. She was nine years of age when she accompanied her parents to Ohio, where her father worked in the furnaces for a time and later turned his attention to farming. She is still living and makes her home in Lincoln. The children of the second marriage are: C. H. Armann and Mrs. Emilie Wittsbruck, both of Martel. By her first marriage Mrs. Armann had four children, who are still living, namely: Mrs. H. H. Sieck, of Lincoln; Mrs. S. F. Griffin, of Martel; and Frank and John Livingstone, both of Martel. Besides these children there is also a foster son, William Siecksmeyer, of Martel. Charles H. Armann has resided in Lancaster county since 1884 and received the greater part of his education in the public schools here, although he attended school for six months in Ohio. As a boy and youth he assisted his father on the home farm and after reaching mature years continued to work for the latter until he was twenty-six years old. He then took charge of the operation of the homestead and has since farmed that place, with the exception of one year, which he spent on the Pacific coast. He understands thoroughly the methods of farming which are most efficient in this section and as he is energetic and businesslike he has met with a gratifying measure of success. He grows the usual crops and also raises shorthorn, Red Polled and Holstein cattle and Hampshire hogs. Mr. Armann was married in Lincoln on the 19th day of March, 1903, to Miss Emma Mae Griffin, who was born in Centerville precinct on the 14th of September, 1883. Her parents, S. S. and Mary Emma (Walker) Griffin, were both born in Iowa. The mother has passed away, but the father is still living and is recognized as one of the leading citizens of Lancaster county, Nebraska. He founded the village of Martel and owns and operates a grain elevator there and also conducts a general store under the name of the Martel Mercantile Store. To Mr. and Mrs. Armann have been born two children: Delton Leroy, whose natal day was the 24th of October, 1903; and Esther Treva, bom March 12, 1905. Mr. Armann is a stanch republican in politics and for two years has served in the office of deputy tax assessor. He is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church and fraternally belongs to Damocles Lodge, No. 60, K. P., at Hickman, in which he has served as master at arms, and he was formerly identified with the Modern Woodmen of America at Martel. He is not only respected for his energy and ability, but is also highly esteemed because of his integrity and public spirit. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 664-666 |
| Arnold, C. H. Dr. Charles H. Arnold, possessing all the qualities requisite to success in the practice of medicine, is regarded as one of the eminent physicians and surgeons of Lincoln, enjoying a reputation that many a man of twice his years might well envy. He was born in Dorchester, Nebraska, on the 18th of October, 1888, a son of Henry and Elizabeth (Gifford) Arnold, both of whom were natives of Indiana. On their removal to Nebraska in 1885, Mr. Arnold purchased land five miles southwest of Dorchester, Saline county, where he was engaged in farming until 1905, carefully and systematically cultivating his land, which he converted into an excellent property. He then retired and removed to Dorchester, where he has since resided. Dr. Arnold is a graduate of the Dorchester high school of the class of 1908 and prior to that time he attended the Lincoln Business College, although he did not complete his course there. In the fall of 1908 he entered Cotner University at Lincoln, where he entered upon the literary course but afterward took up the study of medicine. He continued his preparation for the profession until the spring of 1911, when he entered the Chicago College of Medicine and Surgery, from which institution he was graduated with the class of 1913. During his senior year he served as interne in the Garfield Park Hospital and immediately following his graduation he came to Lincoln to enter upon the practice of medicine. Here he has since been located and his developing ability is bringing him constantly to the front. He has offices in the Terminal building and in the period of three years he has built up a remunerative practice, ranking very high in his chosen calling. On the 20th of January, 1912, Dr. Arnold was united in marriage to Miss Irma C. Sears, of Hyannis, Nebraska, by whom he has two children, Hubert Andrew and Faith Elizabeth. He is a member of the official board of the First Christian church, to which he belongs. Fraternally he is identified with Lancaster Lodge, No. 54, A. F. & A. M.; Lincoln Chapter, R. A. M.; Mount Moriah Commandery, No. 4, K. T. ; and Sesostris Temple, A. A. O. N. M. S., of Lincoln, Nebraska. He is most loyal to the teachings of the craft, exemplifying in his life its beneficent spirit. He is also identified with various other beneficial orders and he is a member of the Lincoln Commercial Club, heartily indorsing all of its plans and projects for the benefit and improvement of the city. The interest which holds first place in his attention, however, is his profession and he keeps in touch with the onward march of thought and progress as a member of the Lancaster County Medical Society, the Nebraska State Medical Association and the American Medical Association. He is thorough and systematic in all that he does, conscientious in the performance of every professional duty and is constantly promoting his knowledge and efficiency through study and experience. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 249-250 |
| Atwell, James James Atwell, yard master, B. & M. R. R. of Nebraska, at Lincoln. He was born in Frankfort, Marshall Co., Kas., June 15, 1855. He was educated there and commenced railroading in 1869 as brakeman on the central branch of the U. P. R. R. In 1875 he settled in Lincoln, Neb., and entered the service of the B. & M. R. R., was appointed to his present position in 1876. He was married in Lincoln September 13, 1877, to Miss Wallace, of Lincoln. They have one child, Roy Wallace. |
| Auchmuty, P. E. Peter E. Auchmuty, manager of the Home Lumber Company, is successfully directing the business of that concern and is considered one of the successful men of Waverly. A native of Pennsylvania, he was bom in Snyder county, on the 5th of December, 1851, and is a son of James and Lucy (Strauser) Auchmuty. The father's birth occurred in Pennsylvania, and in early manhood he engaged in teaching there, while later he turned his attention to farming. He passed away in the Keystone state in 1861. and the mother, who was also a native of that state, died there when our subject was about two years old. Peter E. Auchmuty attended the district schools in Pennsylvania but his educational opportunities were limited as he had to begin earning his own livelihood when he was still a child. When about sixteen years of age he was employed as a farm hand and worked in that capacity for two years. At the end of that time he began learning the plasterer's trade, which he followed until 1878. He then came to Lancaster county, Nebraska, and for a year engaged in farm work. Subsequently he resumed work at his trade, which he followed until 1890, when he turned his attention to the butcher business in Waverly. Ten years later he became connected with the Marty & Walker Lumber Company in the capacity of yard man. When the business passed to the ownership of Foster & Smith he continued with the new proprietors and was promoted to the position of manager, which he still holds, ahhough the business is now owned by the Home Lumber Company. He gives the most careful attention to every detail of the business and is constantly seeking opportunities to expand the trade of the company. He owns valuable city property in Waverly and is in excellent circumstances financially. Mr. Auchmuty was married in 1872 to Miss Sarah Catherine Hollenbach, who was born in Pennsylvania of the marriage of Henry and Margaret Eva (Huffman) Hollenbach, natives respectively of Pennsylvania and of Bavaria. The father engaged in shoe manufacturing in the Keystone state and passed away there. The mother died when Mrs. Auchmuty was a small child. Mr. and Mrs. Auchmuty have had six children. Howard C. married Miss Ora Reiter and is now cashier and booklieeper for the Clay-Robinson Commission Company of St. Joseph, Missouri. Henry Huber and Clarence L., the second and third in order of birth, are both deceased. William E. is a resident of Omaha and is employed by a large commission company as hog salesman. Lettie May is the wife of F. F. Cooley, a resident of Lincoln, Nebraska, who is in the distributing department in the postal service. Martha E. is at home, Mr. Auchmuty indorses the principles of the republican party but votes independently when he believes that he can best serve the public welfare by so doing. He was reared in the Lutheran church but is not now identified with that organization. In all relations of life he has measured up to high standards of manhood, and the respect and esteem in which he is held are fully deserved. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 301-302 |
| Aughey, Samuel Samuel Aughey, professor of natural sciences in the University of Nebraska, is a native of Pennsylvania. He was born in Milford Township, Juniata Co. February 8, 1831 His parents were natives of Pennsylvania. His great grandfather emigrated from Germany in 1752 to which country the family had been driven from France by religious persecution. They were therefore of French Huguenot extraction. Samuel Aughey, Sr., father of the subject of this sketch, was a farmer by occupation, young Samuel was engaged on his father's farm until his twentieth year, when he entered the freshman class at Pennsylvania College. Previous to that he attended the common school in winter, attended Tuscarora Academy six months and also taught school in his native district. During his youth he was known as a constant reader of all the books which he could borrow. Before he was aware of the existence of the science of geology he made large collections of fossils and Indian antiquities from his native valley. Every hour of release which he could obtain from the labors of the farm he devoted to reading and laborious study. He was graduated from the Pennsylvania College in 1856. During the remainder of 1856 and until the fall of 1857 he was engaged in teaching in the old Greensburg Academy, continuing at the same time a course of scientific and theological study on which he had entered. In the autumn of 1857 he entered the Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, Penn. Hs was elected pastor of the Lutheran Church at Lionville, Chester Co., Penn., where he remained four years. During this time he continued his scientific studies and also lectured on geology and related sciences. He at this time became somewhat prominent in the abolition movement, and publicly and privately denounced human slavery, and wrote and lectured against the pro-slavery sentiment of the times. His pamphlet on "The Renovation of Politics" produced a division in his church, which finally led to his resignation. after this he was located for a short time at Blairsville, and at Duncannon, Penn. While at these places he continued his favorite botanical and geological studies and labors, while also filling a pulpit on Sunday. In the fall of 1864 he removed to Dakota City, Neb., where for the first three years he was engaged as pastor of the Lutheran Church and also engaged in scientific work. Since 1867 he has been engaged exclusively in scientific work, was also engaged in making geological, mineralogical, botanical and conchological collections, in Dakota, Wyoming, and Nebraska, for scientific institutions, principally for Prof. Henry, of the Smithsonian institute. Was also engaged in making geological surveys in Nebraska and Dakota Territory. When he came to Nebraska there were but 300 botanical species known in the State. He has increased the number to 2,300 and has ransacked every township in Nebraska. He was the first man in the United States who ever determined the exact food of the various birds. Being the pioneer in that line of scientific investigations. He became connected with the State University in September, 1871, having been appointed in June of that year and he removed to Lincoln in August, 1871. He was one of the scientific commissioners to examine the plains east of the Rocky Mountains to determine where water could be obtained for purposes of irrigation. During the coming year he will be connected with Government geological surveys probably in Wyoming. He was appointed territorial geologist for Wyoming in March, 1882, and unanimously confirmed but has not yet accepted, and probably will not. He has written very extensively on scientific and other subjects, his largest work being "The Physical Geography and Geology of Nebraska." This work is the result of laborious and long-continued exhaustive original study, and has received the highest commendations from scientific men. It is admitted by railroad authorities that his geological papers on the soil, etc., of Nebraska have been a most important factor in securing so large an immigration into the State. Of some of his descriptive papers several hundred thousand copies have been circulated. He was married in Hannastown, Westmoreland Co., Pa., October 14, 1858, to Miss Elizabeth C. Welty, a native of that place. They have one child living, Helen B., lost two children, one daughter, Anna A., died at the age of four years and a son Welty, who died at the age of five months. The professor is president of the Academy of Sciences and is secretary of the State Historical Society. He is a member of the St. Louis Academy of Sciences, of the Buffalo Academy and of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences, Iowa Academy of Sciences, and other societies of importance. |
| Austin, J. B. During the later years of his life James B. Austin lived retired in Lincoln, but had previously been identified with the grain trade in that city and had become well known as a grain merchant and dealer in live stock in other sections of Nebraska. New England claimed him as a native son, for his birth occurred in Woonsocket, Rhode Island, May 5, 1854. his parents being James S. and Lucy (Allen) Austin, who were also natives of that state. He was one of eleven children, four sons and seven daughters, ten of whom grew to maturity and six of whom survived Mr. Austin. The father was a fanner by occupation and on leaving the east removed to Grundy county, Illinois, in 1855. Later he established his home in Livingston county, that state, where he carried on farming for many years, but finally retired and removed to Dwight, Illinois, where he remained until his death, which occurred in April, 1899, when he had reached the venerable age of eighty-four years. For several years he had survived his wife, who passed away in September, 1894. James B. Austin was reared and educated in Livingston county, Illinois, spending much of his youth in Dwight, and when old enough he began farming on his own account in that locality. He afterward returned to Dwight, where for five years he engaged in the business of importing horses. In September, 1891, he came to Nebraska, settling in Furnas county, and for twelve years he was engaged in the grain trade at Wilsonville. He later removed to Orleans, where he continued in the grain business for three years, and in 1906 he came to Lincoln, where he was well known as a grain merchant until 1909, when he retired from active business. He passed away December 24, 1911, after a short illness. All through the period of his residence in Lincoln he engaged in the real estate business to a greater or less extent. Since his demise Mrs. Austin has erected a fine residence at No. 1941 South Twenty-third street. On the 18th of March. 1879, Mr. Austin was united in marriage to Miss Annetta Boyer, who was born in Blair county, Pennsylvania, a daughter of George W. and Mary A. (Tumbaugh) Boyer, also natives of that state. In 1867 the father removed to Illinois. He had previously followed farming in the east until after the outbreak of the Civil war, when he enlisted as a member of Company G, One Hundred and Fourth Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, with which he served for about a year. On making his way to the middle west he settled in Livingston county, Illinois, where he purchased land and for many years carried on farming, after which he removed to Dwight, where he spent his remaining days in honorable retirement from labor, his death there occurring June 27, 1911, when he had reached the advanced age of eighty-four. His wife was but seventy-one years of age when she was called to her final rest in January, 1899. Mr. and Mrs. Austin became the parents of five children, as follows: George S., who was bom March 31, 1880, and is president of the Orleans State Bank at Orleans, Nebraska; Alfred A., who was born in January, 1882, and died on the 15th of the following month; Eflfie M„ whose birth occurred April 3, 1883, and who is the wife of Ralph W. Thacker, athletic director in the college at Lake Forest, Illinois; Blanche M., who was born March 9, 1886, and is at home; and Maude G., born September 27, 1899, who is attending school. Mr. Austin gave his political support to the republican party and he was a member of the Lincoln Commercial Qub, indorsing and cooperating in all the movements which were instituted by that oiganization. His religious faith was that of the Methodist church and he ever endeavored to guide his life by its teachings, being straightforward and honorable in all his dealings and relations with his fellowmen, so that the genuine worth of his character established him firmly in the warm regard of those with whom he was brought in contact. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 143-144 |
| Avery, Samuel https://archive.org/details/lincolncapitalc00sawygoog/page/144/mode/1up https://archive.org/stream/lincolncapitalc00sawygoog/lincolncapitalc00sawygoog_djvu.txt Chancellor Samuel Avery of the University of Nebraska has lived in this state nearly forty years, and with some short interruptions twenty-five years of his life have been spent in Lincoln. Since Nebraska is still comparatively a new state, it will be some time before its public men can claim that they were born, raised, educated and performed their life work in Nebraska. Chancellor Avery was bom in the state of Illinois, but he came to Lincoln early enough in the life of the state to be classed among its pioneers and early enough in his own life to draw his education, sympathies, and his inspiration as a teacher from the circumstances and conditions which surround the educational profession in Nebraska. Students of colleges and universities who are partially or wholly self-supporting while in school are gradually coming to be regarded as self-made men. Chancellor Avery belongs to this class. Largely by his own economic exertions he graduated from Doane College in 1887, took a degree in science at the University of Nebraska in 1892, and received from the same institution the degree of Master of Arts in 1894. Having become by this time a confirmed and habitual student of chemistry, with a view to preparing himself for educational work in the chemical field, he went to Germany and began the study of chemistry at Heidelberg University. From this institution he received in 1896 the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. With his graduation from Heidelberg, the Chancellor's professional life as a Nebraska educator began. He is called a Nebraska educator for the reason that except for the years 1899 to 1901, during which time he was head of the chemistry department in the University of Idaho, the Chancellor has spent his twenty years of professional life in the University of Nebraska. During the eleven years of service on the faculty of chemistry at the State University. Chancellor Avery was consistently advanced from what might be called the "foot" to the head of the chemistry department, and when Dr. E. Benjamin Andrews resigned Chancellor Avery was transferred from the head professorship of chemistry to his present position. Both during his student days and subsequently in his work as a teacher and scholar, the Chancellor was the recipient of a number of scholastic honors and the author of several publications on chemical subjects. The Chancellor is a member of Phi Beta Kappa, the honorary scholarship fraternity; a member of Sigma Xi, the honorary scientific fraternity; a member of the American Chemical Society; and a member of the Deutsche Chemische Gesselschaft of Berlin, and others. Because of his work in the agricultural experiment stations of Idaho and Nebraska Universities, Chancellor Avery has had the opportunity to do considerable investigation, and he has written and published many articles of interest to chemists among which are tlie following: Nicholson and Avery, Exercises in Chemistry; Aromatic Glutaric Acids; Constitution of Paris Green; Action of Benzyl Cyanide on Cinnamic Ether; Some Aromatic of Succinic Acids. It will soon be eight years since Chancellor Avery assumed his present position. Because of the organization of the University and the large amount of administrative work required of so great an educational institution, the Chancellor's office performs a vast amount of routine labor. Notwithstanding this fact, Chancellor Avery has been able to take his part in the determination of questions of policy concerning the welfare of the University as a whole. During his administration the great project of University expansion was brought to a head and has materialized in the purchase of additional ground for University buildings and in the commencement of building construction both on the city and farm campuses. The funds for University extension were appropriated by the Nebraska legislature of 1913 with a proviso that the voters of the state should decide by initiative and referendum whether they desired to have the University located on the city campus or state farm campus. The details of the work of getting the University location question on the ballot and of getting the building funds released for expansion purposes were left entirely to Chancellor Avery's care, and the larger part of his time during at least two years of his administration was consumed in carrying out the rather intricate compromise between the house and senate on the matter of University expansion, funds and location. Under the direction and control of the board of regents and with the assistance of the University faculty and administrative force, the Chancellor is now mainly employed in supervising the construction of new University buildings and the arrangement of the enlarged campus. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 783-784 |
| Aylsworth, W. P. William P. Aylsworth was one of the founders of Cotner University at Bethany and was for many years president of the institution, but has now reached an age when he considers himself entitled to a period of leisure and has therefore given over the active direction of the school to others and holds the office of chancellor emeritus and is also head of the department of Biblical literature and ministerial training. He was bom in Lake county, Illinois, on the 12tth of December, 1844, and is a son of John and Ann F. (Freeman) Aylsworth, the former a native of Rhode Island and the latter of New York. In 1835 the family removed to Chicago and the father became foreman of the first printing office of that place, a position which he filled for a number of years. Subsequently he purchased land in Lake county and devoted the remainder of his life to its operation. He passed away in March, 1902, after having survived his wife for many years, as she died in January, 1886. They were the parents of two children: John, a minister, who died at Auburn, New York, in 190S; and William P. The latter was reared in his native county and after completing courses offered in the public schools, attended Chicago University and was subsequently a student in Bethany College in West Virginia, graduating therefrom with the class of 1869. He then began the work of the ministry and was stationed at South Bend, Indiana, and in other towns in that state. He also had charge of a church at Columbus, Ohio, but in 1886 he came to Nebraska and for two years was president of Fairfield College, which later merged with Cotner University. In 1889 he located in the town of Bethany and aided in organizing Cotner University, of which he was vice president until 1896, when he was made chancellor. He discharged the duties of that office with marked ability until 1910, when he retired from the active management of the institution and was made chancellor emeritus and head of the department of Biblical literature and ministerial training. He has given many of the best years of his hfe to the upbuilding of the University and the school owes him a debt of gratitude which can never be repaid, for it is especially true of an institution of learning that its development depends upon the personality of the men at its head. He has the satisfaction of knowing that he has done well a work that is worth while and he is held in the highest esteem wherever known. He has also gained a gratifying measure of material prosperity and was a director and stockholder in the First State Bank of Bethany and also owns considerable property which he rents and from which he derives a substantial return. His residence is commodious and well designed and situated in University Place. Mr. Aylsworth was married in December, 1872, to Miss Mary D. Stuzaker and to them were bom four children, as follows: Raymond G., who is in charge of the civil engineering work of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad at Denver, Colorado; Clara F., the wife of Cleveland Kleihauer, a graduate of Cotner University and pastor of the University church at Seattle, Washington; and John W. and William S., the former of whom died in 1885 and the latter in 1875. Mr. Aylsworth is a stanch advocate of the republican principles and supports candidates of that party at the polls. While living in Ohio he was chaplain of the house of representatives. He belongs fraternally to the Modern Woodmen of America and to Phi Kappa Psi. He is one of the leading members of the Christian church in Nebraska and both as a minister and as an educator has done much to further the best interests and increase the influence of that denomination. He has done considerable writing and is the author of a work upon Hebrew prophecy, which is in use as a textbook in his own and other institutions. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 384-385 |
| Baade, Henry B. Henry Baade, who owns seven hundred and sixty acres in Lancaster county, makes his home on section 19, Nemaha precinct, and has given his place the name of Central Farm as it is five and a half miles from Panama, Bennet and Hickman. He was bom in Michigan City, Indiana, in December, 1862, and is a son of Christopher and Annie (Jessel) Baade. The father was born in Mecklenburg, Germany, on the 10th of October, 1835, and remained in that country until he was twenty-five years of age, when, in 18O0, he came to the United States, taking up his residence in Michigan City, Indiana, where he worked as a laborer for six years. At the end of that time he went to Ray Center, Michigan, and purchased land in that locality. There he engaged in famiing for thirty-one years but in 1897 retired and removed to New Haven, Michigan, where he is now living. His wife was also bom in Mecklenburg and their marriage occurred in Germany. She is likewise still living. Henry Baade was four years of age when the family removed from Michigan City, Indiana, to Ray Center, Michigan, where he received his education. He early began assisting his father and remained upon the home farm until he was twenty-three years of age. He then came to Lancaster county, worked as a farm hand for some time and for a year drove a milk wagon in Lincoln. Later he spent three years in Mount Zion, Oloe county, where he owned eighty acres of land. In 1890 he purchased a one hundred and sixty acre tract on section 19, Nemaha precinct, upon which he has since lived and which he calls Central Farm. He has made it a model place and it is acknowledged that his buildings are the finest in his locality. He is very progressive in his methods, profiting by the discoveries made by investigators along agricultural lines, and he manages all his affairs very efficiently. He does general farmng but gives particular attention to the raising of shorthcrn cattle. Aside from his home farm, his holdings comprise seven hundred and sixty acres in Lancaster county, all in Nemaha precinct with the exception of a quarter section in Saltillo precinct. All of his farms are under cultivation and he receives a handsome income herefrom. On the 2d of February, 1888, at Lincoln, Mr. Baade was united in marriage to Miss Sophie Nolte, who was bom in Will county, Illinois, in 1869, a daughter of Fred and Marie (Keeker)Nolte. Her father was born in the province of Hanover, Prussia, in 1820, and in 1852 came to America, locating in Cook county, Illinois. He engaged in farming there until 1875, when he removed to Douglas county, and iii e years later came to Bennet, Lancaster county. In 1885 he bought one hundred and twenty acres of land in Nemaha precinct, on which he resided for a number of years although he never operated the farm, renting it to others. He passed his last days with his daughter, Mrs. Baade, hisdeath occurring on the 30th of May, i89(,, and is buried at Bennet. His wife's birth occurred in Hanover, Prussia, in 1825, and in 1855 she came to America, settling in Will county, Illinois,where she worked for others for a year, after which she was married. She died upon the Nolte farm, two miles east of Bennet, on the 19th of July, 1910, and is buried at Bennet. Mr. and Mrs. Baade have become the parents of four children: Ernest Christopher Frederick, who was born in Mount Zion, Nebraska, on the 1st of November, 1888, and is farming with his father; Emma Lena, who was born upon Central Farm on the 5th of March, 1893, and is now the wife of Elmer Roeder, a farmer of Lancaster county; Louis Adolph, who was bom August 24, 1895, on the home farm and is assisting his father; and Elsie Maria, born on the home place on the 3d of January, 1901. Mr. Baade is a democrat in politics and for two years has served as road overseer, he holds membership in the German Lutheran church, the teachings of which guide his life, and his genuine worth has gained him the friendship of those who have been closely associated with him. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 584-585 |
| Backus, R. O. R. O. Backus, manufacturer of ornamental iron and wood fence, was born June 15, 1847, at Harbor Creek, Erie Co., Pa.; and at the age of three years came with his parents to Illinois, where he was raised, and availed himself of a common school education until he was sixteen years of age. In 1863 he enlisted in the Seventeenth Illinois Cavalry, Company F, under Col. Matelock, and participated in all the battles with his regiment, and was mustered out on October 25, 1865, at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. Returned to Illinois; remained there for about one year, and in 1867 went to Floyd County, Iowa; remaining there for about seven years in general business. Then went to Waterloo, and engaged with the Illinois Central Railroad Company as foreman of the fence department for about two years. Then engaged in business as manufacturer and dealer in plain and ornamental iron and wood fence. In the spring of 1881 came to Lincoln and opened the same business, and put fences around some of the prominent residences in the city. Was married in May, 1877, in Waterloo, Iowa, to Miss Media Tucker. Belongs to the O. C. D. of Waterloo, as high private. Also to the Grand Army of the Republic, Farragut Post, No. 25. |
| Bair, E. M. Ernest M. Bair, who is ably filling the position of cashier of the Citizens State Bank of University Place, was born in Fillmore county, Nebraska, on the 15th of January, 1877, a son of Samuel and Eleanor (French) Bair. The father was born in Bedford county, Pennsylvania, his father being Samuel Bair, also a native of the Keystone state, where he died when about seventy years of age. Our subject's grandmother, later married Ezekiel Horton. He was a farmer by occupation and met with gratifying success. His wife reached seventy-seven years of age and passed away in Fillmore county, Nebraska. The family is of German descent and the name was originally spelled Baer. Samuel Bair, the father of our subject, spent his boyhood in Pennsylvania and attended school there until he was twenty-one years of age. He then went to Knox county, Illinois, where he lived for about four years, or until 1870, when he became a resident of Nebraska, locating in Seward county. After spending a winter there he homesteaded land in Fillmore county, filing on his place on the 5th of April, 1871. He was one of the very first settlers in that county, and his experiences were those common to the pioneers of the middle west. On his removal to Nebraska in 1870, he passed the present site of Lincoln but at that time there was no sign of the now flourishing city. As soon as possible he began breaking his land and in time his farm became a well improved place. He added to his holdings by purchasing one hundred and sixty acres of railroad land, which he also brought to a high state of cultivation. He passed away upon his farm on the 5th of April, 1912, when seventy-five years of age. He was one of the successful farmers of his locality and the competence which he gained was the direct result of his energy and good management. He held membership in the Methodist Episcopal church and in political belief was a republican, although not an office seeker. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Eleanor French, was a granddaughter of Israel French, who removed from England to New York city. Her birth, however, occurred in Pennsylvania, and there she grew to womanhood and was married. She was one of the honored pioneer wives and mothers of Nebraska and lived on the family homestead in Fillmore county for forty-four years, passing away there on the 7th of December, 1915, when seventy-seven years of age. She was a consistent member of the Methodist Episcopal church and was highly esteemed for her many good qualities. She was the mother of nine children, one of whom died in infancy, the others being: Isabel, who married L. R. King of Superior, Nebraska, and died when thirty-nine years old, leaving five children; George W., a resident of Lincoln; William H., a business man of Fairmont, Nebraska; Elizabeth, who married L. W. Frazier, a farmer living at Kearney; Edwin, who is farming in Valley county, this state; S. W., who operates the old homestead Ernest M.; and Clara S., the wife of Charles H. Shoemaker, a farmer of Fillmore county. Ernest M. Bair was reared upon the home farm and received his early education in the public schools, which he attended until he was sixteen years of age. He then entered the Lincoln Normal school, where he spent a year, and at the end of that time engaged in teaching in Fillmore county. He followed that profession for five years and for two years was a student in the Fremont Normal school. In 1903 he removed to Lincoln and there engaged in the grocery business for a year, after which he entered the government service, becoming an employe in the Lincoln postoffice. Later he was transferred to Station A, at the state university, but after remaining there for four months was assigned to the office at University Place, with which he was connected for five years. In 1914, he left the postal service to become secretary and treasurer of the Van Sickle Glass & Paint Company at Lincoln, which office he held until he disposed of his interests in that concern in March, 1915. He had previously purchased stock in the Citizens Bank and on the 19th of March, he was made cashier of the institution. He has since devoted his time and energy to the management of its affairs, and his business acumen and sound judgment have been important factors in its prosperity. He has the full confidence alike of the other officers of the bank and of the general public, and is making a highly creditable record. On Christmas day of 1901, occurred the marriage of Mr, Bair to Miss Allie Cherry, who was born near Whiting, Iowa. After completing the public school course, she attended the Fremont Normal school where she made the acquaintance of Mr. Bair. Before her marriage she taught for some time on the Omaha reservation. Mr. Bair is an advocate of republican principles and is loyal in his support of the candidates and measures of that party, although he has not taken an active part in politics. He is identified with both the Masons and the Odd Fellows and these associations indicate the principles which govern his life. Both he and his wife belong to the Methodist Episcopal church and take a commendable interest in its work. He has gained the warm friendship of many and all who know him respect him highly. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 391-393 |
| Baird, Col. C. N. Col. C. N. Baird, Receiver of Public Moneys, U. S. Land Office, came to Lincoln, April 22, 1868. He engaged in the real estate business with Col. Cropsey until that fall, when he was appointed Postmaster, and served six years and three months. He has engaged in the live stock business in Lancaster since the spring of 1874, having done some farming prior thereto. He was a member of the second City Council, and also a member of the School Board, and of the State Senate for one term. He is now Quarter-Master General on Gov. Nance's Staff. He was appointed Receiver of the Land office in the spring of 1877, assuming the duties of the office April 9. He was born in Ripley, Brown Co., Ohio, April 1, 1833. He left that State when he was twenty-two years old and came to Fairbury, Livingston Co., Ill.; living there and in that vicinity until he came to Nebraska. He, with two others, raised Company E, One hundred and twenty-ninth Illinois Volunteer Infantry, and entered the service in 1862. He was elected Captain of his company when he entered camp. Mustered out June 8, 1865, having served in all the engagements gone through by his command, and some where it did not; having had charge of a company of scouts for a while in the winter of 1863. After leaving the army he returned to Illinois. He was married in Franklin, Harrison Co., Ohio, in July, 1856, to Sarah J. Henderson, a native of Millsboro, Pa. They have five children living: Mary E. (now Mrs. A. S. Raymond), Carrie, Harry H., Maggie C. and Kitty S. They lost two children, Jessie, who died at the age of seven years, ahd Georgie, who died at the age of three months. Capt. B. is a member of the G. A. R., and a director of the Board of Trade. |
| Baker, A. J. A. J. Baker, of Havelock, who is familiarly known as Judge Baker, has been a resident of Lancaster county since the 4th of March, 1880. He and his brother, F. H. Baker, first visited the county in 1878 and each purchased a quarter section of unimproved land near Bennet but did not take up their permanent abode here until two years later. A. J. Baker was born in Pennsylvania, January 14, 1856, and when five or six years of age settled near Amboy, in Lee county, Illinois, whither he was taken by his parents, Jacob and Mary Baker. The father was a native of Germany and the mother of Pennsylvania where they were married, while their last days were spent in Lee county, Illinois. Reared in Illinois, A. J, Baker pursued his education in the public schools of Amboy and in 1880 he returned to Nebraska, then a young man of twenty-four years, in order to locate upon his claim and engage in farming. From 1874 until 1882 he taught in the district schools through the winter seasons. He continued to devote his attention to general agricultural pursuits until 1890, when he came to Havelock. In June, 1892, he took up his permanent abode here and has since been engaged in the real estate and insurance business. His identification with the town begins with the location of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy railroad shops here and he heard the first whistle of the first train to enter the city. He has since dealt in real estate and has negotiated many important property transfers. He has also served as justice of the peace for twelve years and also acted as police judge. In these connections his duties have been discharged with marked fairness and impartiality. On the 5th of February, 1880, Mr. Baker was united in marriage to Miss Jennie C. Youngren, a native of Lee county, Illinois, and a daughter of Charles William and Ann Maria (Marryatt)Youngren. Mr. and Mrs. Baker now have seven children, as follows: Harry, a druggist of Havelock; Walter, who is engaged in the drug business in Wahoo, Nebraska; Lulu, at home; Earl, a student in Rush Medical College of Chicago; and Bessie, Stella and Erma, who are also yet under the parental roof. The religious faith of the family is that of the Methodist church and Mr. Baker gives his political support to the republican party. He is also identified with the Modem Woodmen of America and the Fraternal Aid Union. He, always casts the weight of his influence on the side of right, reform, truth and prepress and his many sterling traits of character commend him to the confidence and good will of all. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 562-563 |
| Baker, L. B. Lewis B. Baker is a young man but he has already gained a position among the most successful farmers of Grant precinct. He was born in Saline county, Nebraska, on the 26th of April, 1886, a son of Eugene F. and Rachel Amy (Hull) Baker, natives of Illinois and Ohio. The father, who was a farmer by occupation, removed to Saline county, Nebraska, about 1883 and followed agricultural pursuits there until 1903, when he sold his farm and came to Grant precinct, Lancaster County, Nebraska, purchasing one hundred and sixty acres on section 14. He made a number of improvements upon the place and cultivated the land until 1908, in which year he retired and removed to Bethany, where he and his wife are still living. Lewis B. Baker was reared in Saline and Lancaster counties, and is a graduate of the Lincoln high school and the Lincoln Business College. He began helping with the farm work as soon as he was old and strong enough and for a number of years farmed in partnership with his father, but upon the latter's removal to Bethany he took entire charge of the operation of the home place. He is both practical and progressive in his methods, watches the markets carefully, manages the business phases of farming well, and as a result of his well directed industry has already accumulated a competence. On the 27th of August, 1913, Mr. Baker was married to Miss Norma Dell Magee, a daughter of John and Florence V. (Stewart) Magee, natives of Ohio, who became early settlers in Lancaster county, Nebraska. The father purchased land in Grant precinct and devoted his time to its operation until his death in 1900. The mother survives and is living with our subject. To Mr. and Mrs. Baker has been born a son, Lowell Fremont, whose natal day was the 1st of January, 1915. Mr. Baker is a republican in politics, in religious faith is a Baptist, and fraternally is connected with the Modern Woodmen of America. He concentrates his energies largely upon his farm work, but also finds time to cooperate with various movements calculated to advance the general good. He is energetic and thoroughly understands farming and stock raising and his continued success in these occupations seems assured. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 343-344 |
| Baldwin, Isaac There is great similarity in the lives of four of Lincoln's respected and worthy citizens in that all have been identified with the pioneer history of Nebraska and all are veterans of the Civil war, having seen active duty at the front as members of the Twentieth Iowa Infantry during the darkest hour in the history of our country. Each, therefore, has the right to wear the little bronze button which proclaims him a Grand Army man, and the four who, more than half a century ago, were "boys in blue" have maintained their friendship uninterrupted to the present time and will remain "comrades until the last tap sounds." Mr. Baldwin was born in La Salle county, Illinois, December 27, 1844, his parents being Samuel and Nancy (Hall) Baldwin, who were natives of Vermont and became early settlers in Michigan. It was in the '30s that they removed to La Salle county. Illinois, being there at the time of the Black Hawk war which occurred in 1832. Their son, Isaac Baldwin, well remembers old Shabbona, the Indian chief, who proved himself a friend of the white men, Samuel Baldwin was a prosperous farmer and when the Michigan and Illinois canal was built he was accorded a contract for building the aqueduct over the Fox river at Ottawa. In 1868 he became a resident of Marshalltown, Iowa, where he lived retired until called to his final rest and his wife also passed away there. A log schoolhouse in La Salle county, Illinois, was the "temple of learning" in which Isaac Baldwin pursued his education. In April, 1862, when seventeen years of age he ran away from home, visited Dixon, Illinois, and Dubuque and Clinton, Iowa, and finally found work at Cedar Rapids. There on the 28th of May, 1862, when in his eighteenth year, he enlisted as a member of Company B, Twentieth Iowa Volunteer Infantry, remaining with that command until March 15, 18<j3, when he was discharged on disability through the influence of a Baptist preacher who was a brother of General Schofield, and who had married Mr. Baldwin's cousin. Mr. Baldwin had been with his command in Missouri and most of the time acted as a nurse in the hospital. At Springfield, Missouri, following the encounter with the troops of the rebel general, Marmaduke, he assisted in burying forty-five Confederate soldiers, but only eleven Union men had been killed in that encounter, though several afterward died of wounds and a man standing in front of Mr. Baldwin had his arm shattered during the fight. After being discharged Mr. Baldwin returned to Illinois and in 1864 at Ottawa assisted in raising a company of which Harry Hossack became captain with Mr. Baldwin lieutenant. They went to Leavenworth, Kansas, and then marched to Topeka looking for the rebel general who had burned Lawrence, Kansas. They proceeded to Springfield, Missouri, and down the Iron Mountain Railroad, capturing some bridge burners. After four months spent in that command, Mr. Baldwin returned to Illinois and taught school southwest of Ottawa, where he also engaged in farming for a year. He next removed to Tama county, Iowa, where for five years he resided upon a cultivated farm, owned by his father, while for two years afterward he engaged in lumbering in Minnesota. He then returned to Iowa, settling at Traer and eight years later, or in 1880, established his home in Holt county, Nebraska, where he secured a government claim of one hundred and sixty acres of raw land on which not a furrow had been turned nor an improvement made. The railroad was then being built through the county and crossed his land, he receiving sixty dollars for the right-of-way, a sum which was of great assistance to him at the time when he had little ready money. He had secured the tract as a soldier's claim and proved up on the place. He afterward conducted an eating house and hotel at Inman in the same county, and was there located when the battle of Wounded Knee occurred, furnishing thirty gallons of coffee to the United States soldiers when they were returning after the engagement, receiving the usual government price of fifty-six cents per gallon for the coffee. He was there during the terribly cold winter of 1888 when thousands of cattle met death on the prairies and many human lives were lost. A train was held snowbound there for three days and Mr. Baldwin had the task of feeding the people, having to bake bread and cook for them. For eleven years he remained at Inman and met with good success during that period. He was also in business at Leads, a suburb of Sioux City, Iowa, and at Chambers, Nebraska, and at length he sold bis homestead and in 1913 removed to Lincoln, retiring from active business life, since which time he has lived at No. 1717 Garfield street. Mr. Baldwin was married March 6, 1866, at Ottawa, Illinois, to Susanna Bent, who was bom in Cambridgeshire, England, January 23, 1847, and is a daughter of John and Sarah (Graves Bent, who were also natives of that country. The father came to America when Mrs. Baldwin was three and a half years of age and soon afterward the mother and their three children attempted the trip, but were shipwrecked and lost all their possessions. One of the children was buried at sea, alter which the mother with the other two returned to England. Later they again started on a voyage to the new world, and this time were successful in reaching their destination, joining the husband and father in New York, where they remained for a time and then removed to Ottawa, Illinois, where Mr. and Mrs, Bent passed away. To Mr. and Mrs. Baldwin were born two children. Ella U. is the wife of" William W., Watson of University Place and they have four children. Earl, Ira, Vema and Neta. The other daughter, Cora L., now Mrs. John Grotty, of Fort Worth, Texas, has two sons, Irwin and Clifford. Mrs. Baldwin belongs to the Christian Science church. Mr. Baldwin is identified with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and gives political allegiance to the prohibition party, being a stanch advocate of the temperance cause. His entire life has been characterized by high principles and manly conduct, and his many good qualities have brought to him the friendship and warm regard of all with whom he has been associated. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 181-183 |
| Balis, H. C. Henry C. Balis, a retired farmer living in Waverly, was bom in Benson, Rutland county, Vermont, on the 23d of December, 1859, a son of Henry C. and Margaret (Ketcham) Balis. The father was born in Huberton, Rutland county, on the 25th of April, 1832, and the mother's birth occurred in Sudbury, that county, on the 2d of May, 1832. After farming in his native state for a number of years the father emigrated with his family to Naperville, Illinois, and purchased land in that locality. In 1884, however, he removed to Waverly precinct, Lancaster county, Nebraska, where he became a landowner. He made many improvements upon his home farm and also developed another tract of land in this precinct. He passed away on the 8th of October, 18io, and his wife died Febmary 28, 1908. They were the parents of five children, of whom two survive; Henry, and a younger brother, George, a contractor residing in Lincoln. Henry C. Balis attended school in Vermont and supplemented the education so acquired by one term of study in the Northwestern College at Naperville, Illinois. He assisted his father until he was about twenty-two years of age and then took charge of the home farm in Illinois, but in 1885 came to Nebraska and located upon land adjoining his father's place. He still owns that farm which he continued to operate until 1914, when he removed to Havelock, whence a year later he came to Waverly. He was very successful as an agriculturist and the period of leisure which he is now enjoying is richly deserved. He has two hundred acres of highly improved land and derives a good income from its rental. He has erected a good modern residence in Waverly and also owns an interest in a business block here. Mr. Balis was married, on the 20th of December. 1882, to Miss Hattie Ketcham, a native of Sudbury, Vermont, and a daughter of Franklin and Mary (Miller) Ketcham, both of whom passed their entire lives in Rutland county, that state. To Mr. and Mrs. Balis have been born five children: Mabel Ella, the wife of Charles Bevens, who is operating her father's farm; Dora Ketcham, the wife of Robert Beachell, a retired farmer of Waverly precinct; Fannie Margaret, who is living in Steinauer, Nebraska; Frank, who is farming near Filer, Idaho; and Mary, the wife of Edward Harrison, a contractor of Havelock, Mr. Bahs is an advocate of the principles of the republican party but has conBned his political activity to the exercise of his right of franchise. Fraternally he is connected with the Modem Woodmen of America. His many admirable qualities have gained him a high place in the regard of all who have been intimately associated with him. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 280-281 |
| Ballard, C. F.
C. F. BALLARD, M. D. Dr. C. F. Ballard, actively engaged in medical practice in Havelock and for some years prominently identified with public affairs, has made his life activities of far-reaching effect and benefit to his fellowmen, not only in his professional services but in other connections. In a word Dr. Ballard has ever been a deep thinker, who carefully considers problems that affect mankind and attempts to secure a practical, sane solution therefor. He is highly respected wherever known but most of all in the city of his residence where he is best known. He was born near Indianapolis, Indiana, November 11, 1856, his parents being John R, and Sophronia (Hadley) Ballard, who were also natives of the Hoosier state. The father, who devoted his life to farming and merchandising, came to Nebraska in 1871, settling in Fillmore county, where he became not only closely associated with the material development of the community but also with its public interests. He was a recognized leader in the republican party and for two terms he served as a member of the state legislature, being chairman of the committee on railroads at the time the maximum rate bill was passed. He was also connected with other legislation which has had important bearing upon the welfare, progress and stable prosperity of the state. Both he and his wife passed away in Havelock. Dr. Ballard continued a resident of Indianapolis until fifteen years of age and on the 4th of October, 1871, arrived in Fillmore county, Nebraska, but afterward returned to his native city for professional training and was graduated from the Indianapolis Medical College with the class of 1879. He located for practice at Fairmont, Nebraska, where he entered into partnership with Dr. G. W. Johnson, who afterward became superintendent of the asylum at Hastings. Later Dr. Ballard spent thirteen years in Grafton, Nebraska, and in 1892 arrived in Havelock, where he has since remained. For fifteen years he has been physician for the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad Company and in addition has enjoyed a large private practice which makes constant demands upon his time and energies. He is ever interested in all those things which tend to bring to man the key to the complex mystery which we call life and his reading and investigation have been carried on along the most scientific lines of medicine and surgery. In 1852 Dr. Ballard was united in marriage to Miss Ora Henderson, a native of Michigan and a daughter of C. H. and Hannah Henderson, both of whom are deceased. Our subject and his wife have two children, namely: John F., a playwright of prominence, residing in New York city, where several of his plays have recently been produced with great success; and Mrs. Clara M. Stone, who makes her home in Colorado. Dr. Ballard is a republican in his political views and was Havelock's first mayor, being called to that office at a period which everyone regards as a critical one in a city's development — a period when one must take the initiative in shaping public ipolicy and formulating the plans of action that will have direct bearing upon the welfare and progress of the community for years to come. His fellow townsmen felt that they made wise choice in selecting Dr. Ballard for that position, and he proved his worth in his wise administration, characterized by many practical reforms and improvements and by progressive municipal legislation. This does not cover the scope of his activity for Havelock, however, as along other lines his work has been of an important character attended by far-reaching and beneficial results. For fourteen years he served on the school board and he became one of the founders and a member of the board of the pubhc library. He has been much interested in getting together historical records of Havelock that these things may not be lost which will prove of great value in later years. His religious faith is indicated by his membership in the Congregational church and he also has membership with the Masons, the Knights of Pythias and the United Workmen. These associations indicate the character of his interests and activities, aside from his profession, and the rules which govern his conduct, for he conforms his life to the beneficent teachings of these different organizations. Along strictly professional lines he is connected with the Lancaster County Medical Society, the Nebraska State Medical Society and the American Medical Association and through the meetings of those organizations keeps abreast with modern thought and methods having to do with medical and surgical practice. In 1915 he was appointed by Governor Morehead as a delegate from Nebraska to the International Race Betterment Conference which met in San Francisco, on the 3d to the 7th of August of that year. In the convention when the subject of eugenics was under discussion he made the statement: "Romeo loved his Juliet, eugenics or no eugenics, and it is the same with Pat and Biddy today. I hope we will never see the day when two persons who love each other cannot marry." The position he took was opposed by various members of the convention but Dr. Ballard never makes a statement without having thought widely upon the subject, in fact this is one of his strong characteristics — he studies every vital problem and considers it from the broad standpoint, of the professional man, scientist and humanitarian. He is widely known in his part of Nebraska and is loved and honored wherever known. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 708-712 |
| Barkley, W. E. W. E. BARKLEY, boots and shoes. The business was established in 1881; carries stock of about $6,000. W. E. Barkley was born in Decatur County, Ind., January 24, 1837. In 1865 he commenced mercantile business in Newpoint, Decatur Co. Sold out in 1873, and bought a farm near Cincinnati, Ohio. Sold out in a few months, and located for a short time in Greensburg, Ind. Then settled in Morgantown, Ind., and opened a general store business. Continued this business until 1879, when he sold out and has been engaged in improving his real estate in Indiana, Moved to Lincoln Neb., August 29, 1881. Opened up boot and shoe store October 8, 1881, and took J. Z. Briscoe in as partner December 1, 1881. He was married in Newpoint, Decatur Co., Ind., July 10, 1859, to Miss Nancy E. Hart, of Decatur County. They have five children: William (now in Stanberry, Mo., in charge of the penmanship department of the Normal School), James, John, Laura E., and Robert, living. Alice and Eddie are dead. Mr. B. is a member of the A.. F. & A. M. Lodge of Lincoln, Chapter of Greensburg, Ind. He and wife are members of the Christian Church. April 27, 1882, the firm of Barkley & Briscoe dissolved business by mutual consent-W. E. Barkley continuing. |
| Barkley, William E. WILLIAM E. BARKLEY, who at the time of his death, which occurred July 13, 1905, was president of the Lincoln Safe Deposit Company, was for many years prominently connected with business interests of this city. He arrived here in 1881, removing from his native state of Indiana. His birth occurred January 24, 1837, in Rossburg, Indiana, his parents being William E. and America (Ross) Barkley, the former a native of Kentucky and the latter of Indiana. They were farming people and William E. Barkley, Sr., removed to Indiana during its territorial days. There he purchased raw land which he converted into a rich and productive farm, continuing its cultivation until his life's labors were ended in death in 1839. His widow survived him for almost seventy-five years, passing away in 1913 at the notably old age of ninety-seven years. William E. Barkley, whose name introduces this review, was educated in the schools of Indiana. He was but seventeen months old when his father died and he was reared by his grandfather. When old enough he went ont the farm which his father had left him and for five years engage in the cultivation of that tract of land. He next turned his attention to mercantile pursuits at Newport, Indiana, conducting a store there for twelve years, and during that period he was also active in community affairs, serving for four years as township trustee, and postmaster during two terms of President Grant's administration. He then removed to Morgantown, Morgan county, Indiana, where he conducted a general store for six years, coming from there to Nebraska. It was in August 1881, that Mr. Barkley arrived in Lincoln, Nebraska, where he engaged in merchandising. After two years he joined J. Z. Briscoe in the operation of a ranch which they owned, but after four years he returned to Lincoln and engaged in the real estate business, remaining active in that field for several years. In 1894 his son purchased the business of what is now the Lincoln Safe Deposit Company and William E. Barkley joined him in a partnership, remaining as president of the company until his death. On the 10th of July 1859, Mr. Barkley was married to Miss Nancy E. Hart, a daughter of Aaron and Isabell (Pye) Hart, who were natives of Kentucky, and Columbus, Ohio, respectively. The father followed the occupation of farming in his native state for a number of years and afterward removed to Ripley county, Indiana, where he turned his attention to farming and later to merchandising at Pennington, remaining active in that line of business until his death, which occurred in August, 1855. His widow survived him for almost two decades, passing away in June, 1874. Mr. and Mrs. Barkley became the parents of seven children: William E., born in 1863, who is now president of the Lincoln Safe & Trust Company; James A., born in 1869, who resided in South Africa for fourteen years and now makes his home in Lincoln; John C., whose birth occurred in 1873 and who follows farming at Gooding, Idaho; Mary A., who was born in 1860 and died in 1864, at the age of four years; Edward, whose natal year was 1865 and who passed away in 1870; Laura E., who was born in 1877 and died ten years later; and Robert H., whose birh occurred in 1880 and who died in 1886. At the time of the Civil war Mr. Barkley was a member of the home militia in Indiana and was on active duty for ten days during the raid of the Confederate general, Morgan, exemplified in his life its beneficent spirit and purpose. He also belonged to the Sons of Temperance and the high principles of his life were further indicated in the fact that he held membership in the Christian church. His political allegiance was given to the republican party and he was ever loyal and progressive in maters of citizenship. His entire life as actuated by high principles and worthy purposes and those who knew him entertained for him the warmest regard. He left to his family not only a comfortable competence but also the priceless heritage of an untarnished name. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; ; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 92-93 |
| Bartlett, George M.
GEORGE M. BARTLETT, State Treasurer, came to Nebraska in December, 1866, and lived at Omaha for a few years, serving as cashier of the Omaha Tribune Co. He became Deputy State Treasurer in 1871, and served in that capacity for eight years. In November, 1878, he was elected State Treasurer, and in 1880 was re-elected. Born in Greene Township, Trumbull Co., Ohio, February 13, 1831; lived there until he came to Nebraska. He was married in Mecca, Trumbull Co., Ohio, November 3, 1854, to Charlotte A. Knapp, a native of that place. They have one child living, George K. |
| Baum, Alva LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 607 |
| Baum, Chancey LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 607 |
| Baum, George
LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 606 |
| Baumgartner, J. E.
LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 714 |
| Bax, Adam
LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 686 |
| Beach, Charles C. CHARLES C. BEACH, who is living retired in University Place, was formerly engaged in farming but after removing to town turned his attention to carpentering. His birth occurred in Franklin county, Ohio, on the 1st of January, 1846, and he is a son of Newton Beach, also a native of that county. The father engaged in fanning and also worked in the timber to some extent in the days when the custom was to hew logs and shave shingles. He made the lumber, which was used in the construction of many of the houses and farms in his community and was an excellent workman in that line. In 1852 he removed westward, settling in Iroguois county, Illinois, three miles from Onaga. He cultivated his farm, to which he held title, until 1873 when he went to Kansas with his son-in-law, O. M. Shore, and from that state removed to Cass county, Nebraska, the following year. He passed his remaining days there, his demise occurring in August, 1876. While still a resident of Ohio he was married to Miss Elizabeth Holt, who was born in Vermont, but ws taken to the Buckeye state when a child. She survived her husband for many years, dying in University Place, Nebraska, in April 1910, when eighty-six years old. She was the mother of two children, the sister of our subject being Ella, who is the wife of O. M. Shore and resides at University Place. Charles C. Beach grew to manhood in Ohio and Illinois, and as soon as old and strong enough began assisting his father with the farm work. He continued to reside in Iroquois County, Illinois, for several years following his death, but in 1873 went to Cass County, Nebraska, whence four years later he came to Lancaster county and purchased eighty acres of railroad land in Stevens Creek precinct. At that time this county was undeveloped and the conditions of life were those of a frontier region. His first home was a frame building fourteen by eighteen feet, but shortly after taking up his residence there he erected an addition to his house ad in 1890 he bilt a commodious dwelling. As soon as possible he brought his land under cultivation and as time passed he made many improvements upon his place until it became one of the most valuable farm properties of his locality. He devoted his time and attention to its operation until 1900 when he removed to Prairie Home, where he purchased two lots and erected a residence. In 1905, however, he disposed of his property there and built his present attractive home in University Place. For several years after giving up farming he engaged in carpentering, and although he is practically retired, he still does considerable work in repair his neighbor's houses and in keeping everything about his own place in excellent condition. He never served an apprenticeship at the carpenter's trade, but being of a mechanical turn of mind has developed a high degree of skill in that work. On the 26th of March 1867, in Iroquois county, Illinois, Mr. Beach was united in marriage to Miss Susan Hall, who was born in England but became a resident of Erie county, Ohio, when a child. To this union have been born three children as follows: W. S., who is employed by the Buick Automobile Company of Lincoln, married Miss Bertha Griswald and they have four children, Carl, Clifford, Bernice and Gilbert. Ella is the wife of John Hedges, who is farming our subject's homestead and she has two children, George and Nellie. C. C., the youngest of the family, died when twety years of age. Mr. Beach is a prohibitionist and loyally supports the candidates of that party. While living on the farm he served for three years as justice of the peace and for oe year as assessor and his record in these offices was highly creditable, alike to his ability and his public spirit. In religious faith he is a Methodist and his daily life attests the sincerity of his belief. He has witnessed the greater part of the development of the county and takes great pleasure in the knowledge that he has aided in the agricultural progress of his locality. In the early years of his residence in the county prices for grain wre very low and at times he hauled corn to Lincoln as Tom Lowry, an old time miller there, paid fifteen cents per bushel although the price at Waverly was but twelve cents. The first harvesting machine which he used was a McCormick self-rake which was considered a wonderful invention at the time, although it was a primitive implement compared with the McCormick self-binders which he later owned. He has always been willing to adopt new methods which promise to be of alue and his progressiveness has been one factor in his gratifying success. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 84, 87 |
| Beach, C. G. Calvin G. Beach passed away in Lincoln in November, 1913. He had lived retired during the period of his residence in this city but previously had long been connected with farming and stock raising interests and his life was one of activity and usefulness. He was bom at Painted Post, New York, October 14, 1839, and was a son of Allen R. and Amy (Carpenter) Beach, The father devoted some years to educational work and later became a minister of the Baptist church, devoting a long period to pastoral work in New York. In his later years he retired from the ministry and engaged in farming in the Empire slate, where both he and his wife spent their last days. Reared under the parental roof, Calvin G. Beach completed his education in a college at Fairfield, New York, and afterward took up the profession of teaching, becoming a member of the faculty of Penfield Academy, near Rochester, New York. After devoting a few years to that work he went to the oil fields of Pennsylvania, where he operated in connection with his brother for a few years. In 1872 he removed westward to Blue Rapids, Kansas, purchased land and there engaged in raising cattle and other stock, devoting about three decades to that business, his efforts being attended with gratifying success, so that he was known as one of the representative agriculturists and stockmen of the locality. In 1901 lie retired and removed to Lincoln, purchasing three acres of land on Holdrege street, where he and his wife long resided. Later they removed to a nice residence at No. 645 North Twenty-sixth street, which Mr. Beach purchased and in which he spent his remaining days, passing away in November, 1913, after a long illness. It was on the 14th of March, 1872, that Mr. Beach was married to Miss Charlotte M. Reed, a daughter of Rev. Edwin D. and Sophia (Redfield) Reed, who were natives of Massachusetts and New York respectively, the father removing to the Empire state with his parents when a lad of seven years. He was there educated for the ministry and devoted his entire life to preaching in the Baptist church, following his graduation from Madison University at Hamilton, New York. His labors wrought for great good in the moral development of the localities in which he lived. He passed away April 20, 1888, having for more than a decade and a half survived his wife, who died in August, 1871. Their daughter, Mrs. Beach, became the mother of the following children: Allen R., chief clerk in the Agricultural College at Lincoln; Frank W., a clerk in the Lincoln postoffice; Anna L., who resides with her mother and is engaged in teaching music; E. Carroll, a noted violinist, who taught music in Wahoo Academy, also in Denver, in Stillwater, Oklahoma, and the Nebraska Wesleyan University at University Place and passed away December 8, 1914, while a professor in Drury College at Springfield, Missouri; Anna L., who was formerly a teacher of music in Drury College at Springfield, Missouri; and Calvin C, at home. The family residence is at No. 2445 O street and Mrs. Beach owns eighty acres of land in Kansas and three hundred and twenty acres in. Wright county, Missouri. In his political views Mr. Beach was an earnest republican and in religious faith a Baptist. He took a very active part in the work of the church, in which he held various offices, and his efforts were a potent element in promoting the growth and extending the influence of his denomination and he was also a strong temperance worker. His life ever measured up high standards and he left to his family not only a most comfortable competence but also the priceless heritage of an untarnished name. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 120-121 |
| Beale, R. M. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 243 |
| Bean, John J. John J. Bean, deceased, was a veteran of the Civil war and throughout his entire life manifested the same spirit of loyalty to his country that he displayed when wearing the nation's blue uniform upon the battlefields of the south. For many years he carried on general farming in Greeley county, Nebraska, but in 1907 retired to Lincoln, where he continued to make his home until his demise, which occurred December 18, 1915, when he was in the seventy- fourth year of his age. He was bom in Henniker, New Hampshire, .April 2, 1842. a son of Albert and Arvilla (Connor) Bean, who were also natives of the Old Granite slate. The father was a blacksmith and worked at his trade during the greater part of his life. At an early period in the development of Wisconsin he removed to that state and there continued his residence until called to his final home on the 22d of March, 1872. His widow survived him for a long period, dying May 3, 1886. John J, Bean was reared and educated in New Hampshire and in Wisconsin, continuing his studies in the puWic schools of the latter state following the removal of the family to the middle west when he was a youth of fourteen years. Soon afterward he started out in the business world on his own account and was employed as a clerk in various stores. Later he engaged in general merchandising at Plainfield, Wisconsin, being thus occupied at the time of the outbreak of the Civil war. In 1863, however, feeling that his duty to his country was paramount to all else, he enlisted for service in the Twenty-seventh Wisconsin Infantry, with which he continued for three years, participating in a numiber of hotly contested engagements and proving his loyalty upon many a southern battlefield. When the war was over Mr, Bean returned to Plainfield, Wisconsin, where he conducted a store until 1876, when he removed to Greeley county, Nebraska, and secured a homestead claim. This he successfully conducted for thirty-one years, or until 1907, when he retired and removed to Lincoln, purchasing a nice residence at No. 1347 D street. He was then sixty-five years of age. His remaining days were spent amid the comforts of life, which he had secured through his industry, determination and honorable dealing in former years. In March, 1862, Mr. Bean was united in marriage to Miss Betsey J. Van Allen, who was bom in New York city, October 14, 1842, a daughter of Peter C. and Ann (Van Buren) Van Allen, the latter a cousin of President Martin Van Buren. Mr. and Mrs. Bean became the parents of two children. Mary J. married Edward Wright, who died December 16. 1896, and she passed away August 29, 1914, leaving three children, Earle, Harle and Floyd. William J. Bean resides in Moose Jaw, Canada, where he is manager of a large flour mill. During his residence in Greeley county, Nebraska, Mr. Bean served as county judge for three years. He had prepared for the bar and was qualified for law practice but never followed the profession in this state. Fraternally he was connected with the Grand Army of the Republic and with the Odd Fellows. His political allegiance was given to the democratic party, and his religious faith was that of the Christian Science church. His was a well spent life, characterized by devotion to every public and private duty, and at his passing he left to his family the priceless heritage of an untarnished name. He had many admirable traits of character, not the least of which was his capacity for strong friendships. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 107-108 |
| Beavers, Ralph LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 575 |
| Beck, C. P. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 382 |
| Becker, Carl H. On the list of Lancaster county's native sons appears the name of Carl H. Becker, who was born in Middle Creek precinct April 14, 1879, his parents being Carl F. and Mary (Kloeckmeyer) Becker. The father was born in Wisconsin and the mother in Illinois. Carl F. Becker was a farmer by occupation and in 1867 came to Lancaster county, where he purchased land. He made the trip with his parents, who also bouht land, and he became the owner of the farm which is now operated by his son, Carl H. Becker. His diligence and determination ere soon manifest in the chnged appearance of the place, which he set about improving, operating the farm until 1903, when he retired. He was also engaged in grain business at Emerald for eighteen years and both branches of his business proved profitable. He is now retired, making his home in Emerald, no longer finding it necessary to resort to active business in order to provide for support as he has accumulated a competence sufficient for his remaining days. Carl H. Becker was reared and educated in this county and continued under the parental roof until he reached the age of twenty-three years, when he began farming on his own account by renting the old home place of one hundred and fifty acres. There he continued to reside until 1911, when he purchased eighty acres of that tract-the farm upon which he was born, on section 26, Middle Creek precinct. He has made splendid improvements upon the place and today has one of the fine farm homes in the county. In addition to cultivating his own land he also cultivates a rented farm of one hundred fifty acres, and carefully, systematically and wisely are his interests carried on that a gratifying measure of success has crowned his efforts. He is now conducting a dairy, milking about twenty head of cows, all high grade Jerseys. He is one of the directors of the Lancaster Milk Producers Association and has been one of its stockholders from its organization. He was also formerly a stockholder in the Emerald State Bank. On the 31st of January 1901, Mr. Becker was married to Miss Mary Nobbmann, a daughter of Christian and Wilhemina (Wendt) Nobbmann, both of who were natives of Germany. They came to America in an early day, settling in Iowa, where the father engaged in farming for a number of years, and later they arrived in Lancaster County, Nebraska. There the father purchased land, which he continued to cultivate throughout his remaining days, his death occurring August 28, 1904. His widow still survives and occupies the old homestead in Middle Creek precinct. Mr. and Mrs. Becker became the parents of three children: Otto C., born November 17, 1901; Walter J. H., born April 3, 1903; and Berdina W., born March 2, 1908. Politically Mr. Becker is an earnest republican and for four years he served as assessor of his precinct, while for six years he was road overseer. His religious faith is that of the German Lutheran church and in its teachings he finds the buiding principles of his life, shaping his relations with his fellowmen. Those who know him esteem him highly, recognizing in him one who can be relied upon to follow the dictates of his conscience and to shape his course according to the recognized commercial and business standards. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 579-580 |
| Beecher, R. P.
R. P. BEECHER, Postmaster at the penitentiary, and secretary and treasurer for W. H. B. Stout, lessee; was born in Chenango County, N. Y., January 15, 1844. His father, J. P. Beecher, was born in New Haven, Conn. His mother, Sarah A. Stewart Beecher, a descendant of the Scottish Stewarts, is a native of Troy, N. Y. The subject of this sketch removed with his parents to Wellsville, Allegany Co., N. Y. in 1859. In 1863 he enlisted in the Sixteenth Regiment New York Heavy Artillery, and served until the close of the war; was order clerk for Gen. B. F. Tracy. He then returned to Wellsville, and entered a banking house, which he continued until 1869. He then removed to Nebraska and settled in Lincoln, and for a time engaged in the insurance business, and was executive secretary for Gov. Butler. He then engaged as cashier in the banking house of Bowker, Kennard & Co. In 1873 he entered the service of W. H. B. Stout, and was appointed to his present position in 1877. He was married in Wellsville, N. Y., in August, 1866, to Miss Addie L. Stoddard, of Wellsville. They have one child, Blanche. Mr. B. is a member of the Congregational Church, and is a Knight Templar in the Masonic fraternity. |
| Beghtol, M. V. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 595 |
| Bell, Edgar LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 432 |
| Bell, W. Q. W. Q. BELL, attorney-at-law, came to Lincoln, September 1, 1880. Until January, 1881, he was engaged in the study of law; then he was admitted to the bar in the U. S. Circuit Court. He was born in Dalton, Wayne Co., Ohio, August 28, 1855, and lived in Ohio until September, 1874. He then went to Monmouth, Ill., where he attended Monmouth College, graduating in 1878, taking the degree of A. B., and three years later, the degree of A. M. He went to Greenwood, Mo., after graduation, and was principal of Lincoln College for one year, until June, 1879. He then returned to Monmouth and commenced the study of law, remaining there until he came to Nebraska. He was married in Monmouth, September 14, 1881, to Georgia J. Burlingim, a native of Rochelle, Ogle Co., Ill. Mr. Bell is a member of the First Congregational Church, and superintendent of the Sunday-school of that society. |
| Bell, William LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 776 |
| Benadom, Simon P. Simon P. Benadom, a Lincoln pioneer, arrived in this place in April, 1867, when there was only one small shanty where the city now stands. He purchased the small courthouse at Lancaster from Dora Hardenberg, a building thirty-three feet square built of hewn cottonwood timber, and two stories in height, for which he paid eight hundred dollars, using this as a residence for ten years. Mr. Benadom was bom near Lancaster, in Lancaster county, Ohio, November 13, 1826, His father, George Benadom, was professor of mathematics in Mount Vernon College of Ohio and was also born in that state, being a son of John Benadom, who was of German descent. He was a Methodist preacher and was famed for his eloquence. The mother of Simon P. Benadom bore the maiden name of Hannah Myers and was also a native of Lancaster, Ohio. She was a very large woman and lived to be about sixty years of age. She was the mother of six sons and four daughters, the only survivor being the subject of this sketch. Simon P. Benadom was reared and educated in Ohio and at the age of seventeen years began learning the blacksmith's trade, serving a three years' apprenticeship at Winchester, that state. In 1846, accompanied by his wife and one child, he drove a blind horse across the country to Rome, now Olin, in Jones county, Iowa, and cast in his lot with the pioneer settlers of that state. When they crossed the Mississippi river there were fifty-two people on the ferry boat, the largest boat load that had crossed up to that time. He was one of the commissioners who located the capital at Des Moines and was otherwise connected with early events of importance in Iowa. For ten or fifteen years he conducted a blacksmith shop and afterward turned his attention to merchandising, which he followed for several years, being quite successful in that undertaking. He built the first house in Olin, Iowa, owning a tract of land of ten acres where the depot now stands. He was postmaster at Olin for six years during the Buchanan and Lincoln administrations. He drove across the country in 1859 to Nebraska City and at the first land sale in Nebraska laid warrants covering two claims of three hundred and twenty acres near Nebraska City. He then returned to Olin but in 1866 sold out there and removed to Pawnee City, Nebraska, where he spent the winter, during which period he bought furs. In the spring of 1867 his wife joined him at Nebraska City and with a fine horse and buggy they drove over the country to what is now Lincoln. This was the first buggy seen in the embryonic city which is today Nebraska's beautiful capital. He also bought and hauled to Lincoln the first chairs and the first furniture brought from Nebraska City and this he disposed of to his neighbors. He likewise bought and drove to Lincoln the first cows brought here and these he also sold to the early settlers. In 1869 he burned brick where the Burlington depot now stands and with many other "first things" he was prominently and actively identified. On one occasion he killed a deer where the Hargreaves store now stands and he also killed twenty-one wolves on what is now Second street. He built thirty-five mill dams in the state of Nebraska and two in Missouri. Believing that there might be established a beautiful city at Lincoln, he put forth every effort to help on the work. He hired a man to go to Plattsmouth to get Cottonwood sprouts, which he gave to the people, while he himself planted a great many, including all those around the square. It was he who secured the passage of the bill to donate the square to the city and in every available way he used his aid and his influence to further Lincoln's substantial development. He has never missed attending the Nebraska state fair since it was established, twice coming from the Pacific coast in order to attend. In April, 1844. Mr. Benadom was married to Miss Fidelia Burous, a native of Vermont, who was reared in Lancaster county, Ohio, where she was a schoolmate of Mr. Benadom and who died in the Buckeye state. She was the mother of the following children: Almina E., the wife of Charles Smith, of Lincoln; George W., now a prominent business man of Morro, California; Emma, of San Jose, California, who possesses marked literary talent and is well known for her poetic gifts; Carrie, the wife of Norman B. Wilson, of Salome Springs, Arkansas; Alice, who passed away in California; and Wilford O., a prominent Methodist Episcopal minister of Seattle, Washington. He is a man of notable physique, being six feet four inches in height and weighing two hundred and twenty pounds. For his second wife Simon P. Benadom chose Hannah Jones, who passed away in Lancaster county, leaving a daughter, Zella, who was admitted to high school when but seven years of age and died a few days after entering the high school. During the early years of his residence in Lincoln Mr. Benadom purchased all of the furs which were sold in this market. He hired trappers for years to secure furs and did a big business in that line. There is no phase of the city's development and upbuilding with which he is not familiar and his influence has been a most potent force for progress. He called the first democratic meeting in Lincoln, has been active and influential as a supporter of the party ever since and has served as chairman of the democratic central committee for ten years. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 58-60 |
| Bengtson, August LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 583 |
| Bentley, R. L. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 713 |
| Benton, Thomas H.
THOMAS H. BENTON, book-keeper in the State Auditor's office, came to Nebraska in 1868 and located at Fremont. He lived there until 1877, when he came to Lincoln as clerk in the Auditor's office. He was educated at Doane College, Crete, Neb., and at New Haven, Conn., and Fremont, Neb. He was born at New Haven, Conn., October 17, 1858, living there until 1863. He then moved to North Branford, in the same county, and came from there to Nebraska. For one year after leaving school he was engaged in business as a telegraph operator. He then went into the office of the clerk of Dodge County for one year. After that he kept books for the Fremont foundry and machine shop for a year. In 1879 he was elected assistant clerk of the House of Representatives, and resigned in February, 1879, to accept the appointment of book-keeper in the Auditor's office. He is a member of the A., F. & A. M. Lodge, Chapter and Commandery. He is secretary of Lancaster Lodge, No. 54, and Captain of the Host in Lincoln Chapter No. 6. He was married at Lincoln, August 8, 1881, to Fannie McManigal, a native of Fort Wayne, Ind. |
| Bentz, P. J. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 389 |
| Berg, Theophil H. Theophil H. Berg, city clerk and auditor at Lincoln and one of the efficient men in public service in Lancaster county, was born in St. Charles county, Missouri, October 18, 1879, a son of John and Emihe (Beimdick) Berg. The father, a native of Germany, was brought to America by his parents during his infancy, while the mother was a native of Missouri, bom of German parentage. In 1882 they came with their family to Nebraska, arriving in Lancaster county on the 3d of September. Mr. Berg soon afterward purchased a farm ten miles west of Lincobi and resided thereon until 1915, when he sold the property and is now making his home with his children, his wife having departed this life on the loth of October, 1901. Theophil H. Berg was educated in the public schools and in the fall of 1900 came to Lincoln, where he entered the Lincoln Business College, desiring to prepare for work other than that of the fields. On the 9th of May, 1901, he accepted a clerkship in an architect's office, but had occupied that position for only a few months when business became slack and his services were no longer needed by his employer. He then went west to Montana and Wyoming, where he was engaged in railroad survey work. In April, 1902, he returned to Lincoln, where he entered the employ of Leach & Plymm, architects, with whom he had formerly been connected. That he returned to their service is indicative of the fact of their appreciation of his faithfulness and loyalty during the first period of his connection with their business. Subsequently he became associated with the firm of H. O. Barber & Sons, grain merchants, and was thus connected with the grain business until 1905. On the 25th of February of that year he was appointed assistant city clerk under Thomas H. Pratt, so continuing until March 1, 1907, when he was appointed assistant secretary of the Commercial Club. He rendered efficient service in that connection until January 9, 1908, at which time he resigned to accept the appointment of deputy clerk of the district court, remaining in that office until May 15, 1913. when he was appointed under the commission form of government to his present important position, that of city clerk and auditor. It is a matter of record that all of his advancements in public and civic life have come to Mr. Berg without solicitation on his part — a recognition of his ability and trustworthiness. On the 26th of September, 1906, Mr. Berg was married to Miss Clara A. Kapke, of Lincoln, whose birth occurred in this county, and their children are Helen Ruth and Harold Theophil. In his political views Mr, Bei^ is a republican, strong in his advocacy of the party principles yet never bitterly aggressive. He is well known in fraternal circles as a member of Lincoln Lodge, No. 54, A. F. & A. M., of the Knights of the Maccabees, the Ancient Order of United Workmen and the Loyal Order of Moose. He also belongs to the Lincoln Commercial Club and cooperates heartily in its well devised plans for the upbuilding and benefit of the city. He and his wife are members of the Evangelical church and he is serving on its official board. In the work of the church they take an active and helpful interest and their influence is always on the side of prepress and improvement. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 71-72 |
| Bergman, F. H. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 311 |
| Bergman Family
BERGMAN FAMILY. August BERGMAN moved to a ranch near Beaver City, NE and died there. His son, Cleo, stayed on the ranch for a number of years and my family used to travel there to visit them. August passed away, and Cleo eventually sold the ranch, moved to Beatrice, NE for a few years, and eventually settled in Ceresco, NE. Cleo's wife, Donna, and one of their daughters continues to live on the farm at 7605 Agnew Rd, Ceresco. His son, Gary, and family live at RR 1, Box 168C, Raymond, NE. A daughter, Sharon is married and lives in Colorado. A quite informative article about the BERGMAN family is contained in an article, "They Broke the Sods" which was written by my uncle, Rudolph Umland, and published in the "Prairie Schooner" pages 378 through 384 published through the Nebraska Press I believe. I am not sure if you are familiar that publication, but Rudolph Umland had several articles published in it. The Bergman farm was along the county line road between Cass and Lancaster counties a mile west of Eagle and several miles south. The Bergman farm was on the west side of the road in Lancaster County. A private Bergman cemetery remains at that location. I have not been to that cemetery, but have good intentions to locate and visit it one of these days. Our families crossed paths when Minnie Bergman and Rudolph Umland (not the above noted uncle and author, but his father) married May 24, 1893. My father, Herbert G. Umland and Cleo Bergman were good friends and we spent much time visiting Cleo and his family. I still keep in touch with my cousins, at least with an annual Christmas card. Submitted by Art. <ArtSD@aol.com> The following is the article my Uncle Rudolph Umland wrote for the "Prairie Schooner" publication. It provides quite a bit of insight into life from 1850 to 1950 and includes information on the Carl Bergmann family which lived in east central Lancaster county. They Broke the Sods Rudolph Umland Honor to pioneers who broke the sods that man to come might live. - Inscription on Nebraska State Capitol My people were peasant folk who came to America in the middle of the nineteenth century and settled on the prairies of the Middle West. Carl Bergmann, my maternal grandfather, was born in Prussia, May 11, 1835. In November, 1862, when he was twenty-seven years old, he married Wilhelmina Sangbusch, daughter of Jon and Dora Sangbusch. Wilhelmina was born December 10, 1836, and, before her marriage, had worked as a maid for rich families in her native province. During the first few years following their marriage, Carl and Wilhelmina Bergmann managed to save enough money for passage to America. In the early part of 1868 they left their native land, accompanied by three children and Carl's father. They landed at New York city, they were met by Charles Retzlaff, a German from their native province, who took them to his farm on Stevens Creek in Lancaster County. Nebraska had been created a State only the year before. There was a newness about the land, most of which was virgin prairie untouched by plow. For two years the Bergmann's lived in Charles Retzlaff's barn, Carl working as a farm laborer and carefully hoarding his earnings for the purchase of a yoke of oxen, a pig, a wagon, a plow; then the family moved to a 160-acre homestead near by. During their first years in Nebraska, the Bergmann's occasionally drove to Nebraska City, forty miles distant, to market their produce and do their trading. Sometimes Carl Bergmann walked the distance, a bag of meal on his back. Nebraska City was then a flourishing river town, its streets full of immigrants, freighters, ox-teams, mule-teams and covered wagons. The city had grown prosperous in preceding years from the great overland freighting business. Stagecoaches operated at the time between Nebraska City and Lincoln, which was town of only five hundred inhabitants. It was not until after 1870, when the first railroad reached Lincoln, that that town developed as a trace center. Before that settlers went to Lincoln chiefly to obtain salt, large deposits of which lay glistening on the flats west of town. Carl Bergmann's homestead was on a branch of Nemaha Creek in Stockton Precinct. Hungry Oto Indians often stopped at the house to beg for food. The early seventies were hard years for the Bergmann's. Grasshoppers, which came in great swarms, destroyed their crops. Two of their children died of scarlet fever; another died of a skin infection. Of the eleven children born to the Bergmann's, only six-William, Otto, Anna, Minnie, Amanda and August-lived to reach maturity. Two of their first children had been left in graves in the Old Country. During the successive years of grasshopper plague, many of the settlers pulled up stakes and quit the country, but the Bergmann's remained. The most severe visitation of the 'hoppers occurred in 1874. Wilhelmina Bergmann spread quilts over the cabbages in her garden only to have them eastern through the ravenous insects. Even as the discouraged families were moving away, however, the railroads were bringing new settlers to Nebraska. In 1876 came the Umland's. Heinrich Umland, my paternal grandfather, was born in Prussia, October 1, 1827. His mother died shortly after his birth and his father, a gardener by occupation, died eight years later. When Heinrich was thirteen, he was apprenticed to a carpenter. For seven years he had followed the building trade, then he was called for service in the Prussian army to help guard the Duchies of Holstein and Baden from invasion by the French. When the danger of invasion had subsided, Heinrich returned to his trade of carpentry. In the spring of 1851, he embarked on a sailing vessel for the United States, arriving at New York after a voyage of ninety days. He traveled west to Chicago and Milwaukee, but found in neither city the opportunities he was seeking. In the fall of 1851 he went to St. Louis where he engaged in carpentry and farming. He bought land across the river in St. Clair county, Illinois, which he farmed for a short time then sold it and devoted his time wholly to carpentry, taking up his residence in the town of Mascoutah, Illinois. On September 20, 1855, he married Anna Herter, daughter of Rudolph and Margaret (Huber) Herter, Swiss immigrants who had settled on a farm near Mascoutah the previous year. Anna had been born August 25, 1833, near the foot of the Alps, in the Canton of Zurich. There she had resided until she was twenty-one years old, when she embarked with her parents at Havre, France, for America. To Heinrich and Anna Umland seven children were born, six of whom lived: Eliza, Jacob, Rudolph, Annie, William, and Sophia. Heinrich Umland remained at his trade in Mascoutah until 1876, when he migrated with his family to Cass County, Nebraska. He bought either acres of land, fourteen miles east of Lincoln, on which were a small one-room house and a dug-out. The children slept in the dug-out until the following year when an addition to the house provided quarters for them. Heinrich Umland farmed his land and, during his first years in Nebraska, continued to do a little carpentry. One winter, during an epidemic of scarlet fever, he was kept busy making coffins. When the Umland's came to Nebraska, large herds of cattle grazed on the grasslands around Lincoln. There were few fences and the cattle were herded on the open pastures by boys from the farms. Coyotes prowled the draws and sloughs. Prairie chickens and quail winged over the tall grass. Lincoln, growing rapidly, was a city of over five thousand inhavitants, bet it still bore the stamp of the frontier. Immigrant wagons continued to trek through the capital westward, though in fewer numbers since the coming of the railroad. The city's Haymarket Square was usually cluttered with the teams and wagons of immigrants and farmer-folk. The Umland's did most of their trading in Lincoln. Sometimes they hauled produce to the towns of Greenwood and Palmyra. Heinrich Umland gradually acquired more land. By 1885 he owned five hundred acres. He built a new frame house and planted an orchard and grove to provide shade and protect his farmstead from the winds. The Missouri Pacific Railroad laid the rails of a branch line through part of his land, and a mile away, the town of Eagle was laid out, providing a new trading point. The Umland's prospered during the eighties and were content with their new home in Nebraska. Rudolph Umland, my father, was the fourth child of Heinrich and Anna Umland, born at the old home in Mascoutah, Illinois, May 25, 1864, he was twelve years old when the family came to Nebraska. He spent his first summers in Nebraska herding cattle for neighbors on the open pastures near home. Riding horseback, he explored the sloughs, hills, and level expanses of prairie which had known only hunting parties of the Oto and Pawnee a few decades before. One morning he found a slough full of the bones and horns of a herd of Texas cattle that had perished during a blizzard some years previously. In the winter months he attended country school. When he was eighteen he left home and worked for several months in a brickyard and pottery at Lincoln. Falling ill with typhoid fever, he returned home and again assisted his father. During the next ten years he broke many acres of virgin and for his father and for neighbors. In 1892 Heinrich Umland deeded Rudolph the north quarter-section of his farm lands. Upon this Rudolph erected a house and barn. He was twenty-eight years old and ready to start life on his own. One day in March, 1893, he accompanied a neighbor on a visit to the Bergmann's to buy cattle. A few days later he visited the Bergmann's again-this time alone. He spent several hours with Carl Bergmann talking about crops, livestock, and the weather. Thereafter he made frequent visits to the Bergmann's, but it was some time before the real object of his visits became known. One of Carl Bergmann's daughters had taken his fancy. Minnie Bergmann, born April 2, 1876, was a slender handsome girl who had just passed her seventeenth birthday. When informed of Rudolph Umland's interest, she felt piqued. "But he doesn't come to see me; he comes to see Pa!" she exclaimed. Nevertheless, she felt flattered. Her parents encouraged her in accepting the attentions of the young farmer. "Rudolph will make you a good husband," they said. "He's rich. He owns a farm." The courtship of Rudolph Umland and Minnie Bergmann-if a buggy-ride or two can be called such-was brief. In the may 17, 1893 issue of the local weekly, the Eaglet, appeared the following item: "married-Mr. Rudolph Umland to Miss Minnie Bergmann, Wednesday, May 24, 1893, at the home of the bride's parents, seven miles south of Eagle. Mr. Umland is a wealthy young farmer and has lived in this community a number of years. The bride is a daughter of a well-to-do farmer and is liked by all her acquaintances. May their pathway be strewn with flowers and their shadow never grow dim is the wish of the Eaglet." On December 15, 1896, Minnie Umland's mother died. A typical German peasant woman, Wilhelmina Bergmann had worked hard all her life; she was inured to privations. When she was a young girl in Prussia her mother had told her stories about the great reformist Martin Luther and these stories she had remembered and told her own children in the New World. The coffin containing her remains was placed in a lumber-wagon and carried to the top of a pasture hill on the Bergmann homestead. There, beside the graves of the three Bergmann children and Carl's father, it was deposited in the frozen earth. Minnie Umland, twenty at the time, had shortly before been delivered of her third baby. The thought of her mother in the lonely grave on the pasture hill was to haunt her the rest of her life. When her father, Carl Bergmann, died April 1, 1906, the sixth and last mound was added to the little group of graves on the hill. A board fence was put around the graves to keep off the cattle, and a few evergreen trees were planted. One by one the first-comers to the land west of the Missouri died and their bodies were claimed by the prairie earth. Heinrich Umland died May 15, 1905, and Anna, his Swiss wife, June 22, 1913. The pioneers passed on and their sons and daughters remained to take their livelihood from the sods their parents had broken. For over forty years Rudolph and Minne Umland, my parents, were to live on their farm near Eagle, Nebraska, working its soil and rearing their five children. Some of these were happy and prosperous years; others were disappointing and lean. In 1894 hot winds burnt the corn so badly that only a few nubbins were gathered. An item in the Eaglet, April 4, 1895, stated that prairie schooners were passing through town, some going east and some west. The wagons going east carried families who had given up the struggle in Nebraska. In 1910, when drought was curling the leaves of the corn, Rudolph Umland bought fifty acres of land adjoining his quarter-section. He had four sons growing up, four pairs of hands to help soon with field work and chores; and a daughter to help Minnie with the housework. During the warm years of 1917-1918 farm prices in Nebraska soared. Land that the pioneers had purchased from the government for a dollar or two an acres sold for over two hundred dollars an acre. Rudolph Umland refused all offers for his farm; he kept his faith in the land. Perhaps, too, he felt a sentimental regard for the acres which he had been tilling for a quarter of a century. Each year there was the work of planting the corn, harvesting the wheat, putting up the hay in stacks; each year the ties that bound my parents to their farm grew stronger. And the years passed so quickly! The sparsely-settled prairie to which Heinrich Umland had brought his family underwent many changes. In every section of land now, there were three or four farmsteads with white house and red barns, sheltered by orchards and groves of ash, box elder, walnut and cottonwood. Everywhere you looked, you saw fields of corn, wheat, oats, and alfalfa. During the nineteen-twenties, automobiles almost wholly replaced the hose on the road; tractors were replacing the horse in the fields. The children of the pioneers in turn were growing old, their own children marrying and leaving home. My mother, although only fifty, was already starting to complain, 'Ach, I feel the weather in my bones." Like her mother before her, she worked hard; she worked all the time. She had grown heavy after bearing her children and she had grown stooped from work. In the nineteen-thirties hard times came again to the farmers. Corn sold for eight cents a bushel, hogs for two cents a pound. Land prices dropped to less than fifty dollars an acre. In 1934 came drought and hot winds which burnt the crops. My father was getting along in years. One day, in the fall of 1934, he stood in a plowed field examining a handful of dirt. The last few acres of prairie on his farm had been broken and there was something pathetic about my father standing there in a furrow examining that handful of dirt. It was virgin earth that had never been turned over before. The few acres of prairie had been spared all these years, the grass cut for hay each summer and stored in the barn loft. He let the dirt trickle through his fingers. The bit of prairie on his farm had somehow held my father to the past when all the land was prairie; now that it was done, it was like the severance of a last thread. Thoughts passed through his mind as he stood there in the severance of a last thread. Thoughts passed through his mind as he stood there in the plowed field-the many changes he had seen come to the land, the hard work, the disappointments, the realization that he was growing cold. To him the passing of the prairie presaged the passing of his own life. When he as young, the prairie had dominated the land. Roads had been mere wagon tracks through the grass. In crossing sloughs and low places, one hear the swish of the tall grasses against the bottom of the wagon-box. Now that the last of the prairie was done, my father felt his own time running out. It was as if the dirt tricking through his fingers spoke to him and said, "Your work is done." In the fall of 1935, he and my mother moved to a house at Eagle. But their adjustment to town life was slow. My father missed the cos, the pigs, the earth to dig in. My mother missed her chickens and the old farmhouse in which she had lived 42 years. My mother died in a hospital at Lincoln April 27, 1941. During the last two years of her life, she suffered much pain, Lying in bed, she frequently talked of her girlhood. She had attended country school until she was fourteen, then had attended classes in catechism at the German Lutheran church of the neighborhood. Following this she had worked for a time as a maid in private homes in Lincoln, then had returned home and married. One of her earliest childhood memories was of an Indian riding up to the door of her parent's house on a horse. The Indian had dismounted and tied his horse to a sunflower growing in the yard. He wore a red shit and a pair of dirty grey trousers which had a hole in the seat out of which his shirttail stuck in a ludicrous fashion. He came to the door, pointed to his mouth, and said, "Me hungry?" Grandmother Bergmann gave him a plate of ham and my mother sat on the doorstep and watched him eat. In recalling this, my mother laughed and exclaimed, "I can still see the poor starved Indian eat?" Grandfather Bergmann had always raised a few sheep on his farm and the wool from the sheep was made into yarn. My mother remembered how her mother used to sit out-of-doors under an apple tree on warm days spinning the yarn and singing German songs. "My mother could make the spinning wheel turn so fast," she exclaimed. "My! That wheel would whirl!" One evening, a few weeks before she died, my mother lay in her hospital bed and cried. One evening, a few weeks before she died, my mother lay in her hospital bed and cried. It had been raining at intervals for several days and the patter of the raindrops on the hospital windows had filled her with foreboding. She thought of the grave of her mother on the pasture hill of the old homestead. She thought of how the rains for years had been seeping through the earth and through the rude board coffin now rotted and broken through by the weight of the earth. "Poor mother," she murmured. "Oh , how terrible! Please bury me so the rain can't get at me." slowly my mother wasted away, the malignant disease from which she was suffering extending itself through her body. her mind became clouded and confused. Finally she called upon God for deliverance, "Oh , God, oh, my God, help me!" she moaned. "Oh, my God, help me! Come down out of the sky and take me!" After four days of pleading thus to God, she passed into a coma. She was buried in a cemetery near Eagle in a steel vault so that the rains could not reach her. After my mother's death, my father was a lonely old man. He stayed for short periods of time at the homes of his children and neighbors, but was never contented. When staying in Lincoln he liked to walk downtown on sunny afternoons and loiter in the vicinity of Tenth and O Streets, formerly the hub of the farm trade, watching for oldsters like himself with whom he could converse about happenings of years long gone. Such happenings were more important to him than anything that was contemporary, even including the dramatic events of World War II. He had been born in Abraham Lincoln's home State while the Civil War was in progress, and the gap of the years from that far period to the birth of atomic warfare was too great for him to want to bridge. In the early part of 1948, when he was 83, an illness left him helpless and senile. He was place in a nursing home in Lincoln and , this first night there refused to go to bed until he had been assured that the oxen had been fed and bedded down for the night. His mind dwelt almost wholly in the past. When asked what he had been doing during the day, he was likely to reply they had been breaking sod or husking corn with a peg. Sometimes he would move his hands over his face and say, "I can't seem to remember anymore. I keep forgetting." Life continued to flicker in his tired, worn-out body until the evening of January 22, 1949; then the night closed in mercifully. In bitter cold weather, with snow and ice covering the slope of the cemetery hill, the remains of my father were lowered into a grave beside my mother. The prairie earth covered his body as it had that of hers eight years before. It covered, too, something of the pioneer past of Nebraska. From the Prairie Schooner, volume XXIII, number IV (winter 1949) by permission of the University of Nebraska Press. Copyright 1949 University of Nebraska Press. Copyright © renewed 1977 by the University of Nebraska Press. Visit the University of Nebraska Press website at http://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu |
| Bettenhausen, C. C. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 608 |
| Betzer, L. D. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 544 |
| Bidwell, H. A.
H. A. BIDWELL, came to Lincoln February 2, 1882. He was born in Madison County, Ohio, December 18, 1856. He was educated at the Wooster University, and spent one year at the Ohio College, Athens, Ohio. He was married at Wooster, Ohio, June 9, 1880, to Miss Gennette R. Spink. In June, 1881 he went to Marysville, Union Co., Ohio, and read law there. He was admitted to the bar by the Supreme Court of Ohio, November 2, 1881. |
| Bignell, E. E. BIGNELL, master mechanic B. & M. R. R. of Nebraska, at Lincoln. Entered the service of the B. & M. R. R. in 1871. He moved to Lincoln in October, 1881, to take his present position. Mr. B. is a member of the A., F. & A. M. Plattsmouth Lodge No. 6. |
| Billingsley, L. W.
L. W. BILLINGSLEY, attorney at law of the law firm of Lamb, Billingsley & Lambertson, came to Lincoln, October 19, 1869, and has practiced here since that time, engaging also in real estate speculations. He has been United States Commissioner for the last eight years. For two terms he was President of the City Council, and was President of the Board of Education in Lincoln. He was born in Putnam County, Ind., September 14, 1841, living a number of years in Indianapolis. In 1852 he graduated from Franklin College. He enlisted in Company I, Seventh Indiana Volunteer Infantry in April, 1861, a Company being formed of the college students for three months' service. In the summer of 1862, after graduation, he enlisted in the Fourth Indiana Cavalry as corporal. After one year's service in that regiment he was appointed Lieutenant in the Fourteenth U. S. Colored Infantry, and Captain in the Forty-fourth Colored Infantry. He was with Sherman's army until the capture of Atlanta. He was at the battle of Nashville and Black House No. 2. In 1865 he resigned and returned to Indianapolis and soon after was married to Miss E. J. Labarre, of Cincinnati, who died in a few months after. He then went to Arkansas and had charge of a large cotton plantation for a year. In 1867 he went to Des Moines and commenced the study of law, graduating at the Iowa Law College in 1869. He was again married at Indianaola, Iowa, September 15, 1869, to Ella A. Knox, a native of Knox County, Ohio. Mr. B. is a member of the K. of P., G. A. R. and of the T. of H. |
| Bing, J. R. J. R. BING, contractor and builder, was born April 7, 1828, in Gallia County, Ohio, where he was reared and educated and after leaving school served his time as carpenter to J. Morton & Co., Ohio, for about five years. Then went to Athens and commenced contracting and built and completed the Odd Fellows' hall and several prominent stores there, as well as private dwellings, and in the spring of 1856 went to Platt County, Ill., and acted as foreman on the Monticello Court House in same county. Then engaged as a master mechanic on board the steamboat John Strader, the first low pressure steamboat ever built, and in 1860 came West to Leavenworth, Kan., working at his trade for about one year. Then to St. Joe, Mo. Thence to Cameron where he built the Cameron Hotel. In 1862 enlisted in the Twenty-ninth Missouri Infantry, Company H, under Gen. Steel, and in 1863 was transferred to the Mississippi squadron on the gun boat Sirine, by recommendation of the naval constructor, Charles Kendal, and in 1865 was discharged at Mound City, Mo. Returned to Cameron, Mo., to his family and remained there until 1872, during which time he contracted for and built more than half of the buildings in that town. Then came West and located at Lincoln, working at his trade until 1879, when he established himself in business as a contractor and builder and built some of the most prominent dwelling houses here. Was married at Athens, Ohio, July 7, 1854, to Miss Maggie Barnes, of Gallipolis, Ohio, who died July 7, 1855, and was buried there. In 1860 married again to Miss Louisa J. Smith, who was born in De Kalb County, Mo., and married about four miles north of Cameron. Has four children, Ella, Emma, William Sherman, and Edward Russell. His eldest daughter, Ella, is considered to be one of the finest artists in the city as a retoucher of paintings and photographs, and also is a natural sculptor and took the gold medal at the State Fair here on statues and paintings, never having had any instruction in the art. His oldest son is a natural mechanic and fine mathematician. Mr. Bing is a member of the I. O. O. F. Capitol Lodge No. 11, as P. G. Also of the Temple of Honor and of the Grand Army of the Republic, Farragut Post No. 25. |
| Birge, Earl Ray
Earl Ray Birge, deputy collector of customs in the Omaha district, with headquarters at Lincoln, was bom at Fargo, North Dakota, May 13, 1885, a son of Richard M. and Emma (Smith) Birge, who now reside in Kansas City. He began his education in the schools of Fargo and continued his studies in Omaha but when fourteen years of age put aside his textbooks and spent eight years thereafter in the service of the Burlington Railroad Company at South Omaha, his work being of a clerical character. He afterward spent three years in Arkansas and Missouri, engaged in railway work, and in 1910 he entered the customs service at Kansas City, Missouri, as a statistical clerk in the office of the collector of customs. There he remained until September, 1913, after which he held a similar position in St. Louis until January, 1914, when he was appointed deputy collector of customs in the office at Lincoln and is now occupying that position. His six years of connection with this line of work indicates his ability and fidelity. On the 21st of March, 1909, Mr. Birge was united in marriage to Miss Alma Fuller, a daughter of Hon. George W. Fuller, who is a member of the Nebraska legislature and resides at Seward, Nebraska. Our subject and his wife have three sons, namely: Richard F., born January 31, 1910; Edmund E., whose birth occurred on the 1st of November, 1911; and Ervin R., whose natal day was December 2, 1914. The parents are members of the Presbyterian church. During their residence in Lincoln they have gained many friends, warm regard being entertained for them by all who know them. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 121-122 |
| Birney, M. M. BIRNEY, locomotive engineer B. & M. R. R. Was born in Ohio, October 14, 1853. His parents moved from there to Leroy, Ill. In 1869 he commenced his railroad life on the C. & A. R. R. in Illinois. In 1881, he moved to Nebraska, located in Lincoln, and entered the service of the B. & M. R. R. in his present position. He was married in Champaign, Ill., December 22, 1877, to Miss Sarah C. Busey, of that city. They have one child, Mary. Mr. B. is a member of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers. |
| Black, Edward Franklin Among the men in Lancaster county who have pushed forward the wheels of progress is numbered Edward Franklin Black, now deceased. He did much to raise the standard of live stock in this section of the state and the material development of the community was accordingly enhanced. In all of his business career he was found thoroughly rehable and progressive and his well directed energy and keen insight brought to him very gratifying success. His birth occurred at Whitby, near Toronto, Ontario, Canada, February 12, 1846, his parents being David and Sarah Black. The father was bom near Whitby. Ontario, acquired his education in the schools of that locality and afterward learned the carpenter's trade. In addition to working at his trade he engaged in preaching in Canada and there remained until 1884, when he removed to Raymond, Nebraska, where he organized a congregation and built the first churth. He was also instrumental in building 2 parsonage there and for a considerable time engaged in preaching at that place. At length he and his wife removed to Council Bluffs, Iowa, where both passed away. Edward Franklin Black was indebted to the public school system of Canada for the educational opportunities which he enjoyed, and when his textbooks were put aside he began learning the jeweler's trade. Working his way upward in that connection, he at length conducted several jewelry stores and in addition he took up as a side interest the importation of fine horses. When his health failed he determined to engage in business that would not be so confining as the jewelry trade and, disposing of his stores in Canada, he removed to Nebraska. He had previously engaged in importing pure bred Shire, Clyde and Percheron stallions from Scotland and other points in Europe and he also made many trips to the south, from which point he brought fine horses to Raymond, Lancaster county, where he operated an extensive horse bam. There at one time he was also engaged in general merchandising but the importation and breeding of live stock claimed the greater part of his attention. After removing to Lancaster county he purchased seven hundred and twenty acres in Oak township and established his home in Raymond, where he continued in the business of importing high grade stallions. On account of his popularity in this section of the state he was frequently called upon to act as auctioneer in the sale of live stock and in that way he became widely known throughout his part of the country, being everywhere called Colonel Black. He was an expert horseman and he had comprehensive knowledge of the business of importing, breeding and selling fine stock. Although he owned more than seven hundred acres of fine agricultural land in Oak township, he never cultivated the farm but left its development and improvement to his sons and concentrated his efforts along other lines, in which he continued up to the time of his death. Mr. Black was united in marriage to Miss Elizabeth Dixon Lees, who was bom in Roxburyshire, Scotland, March 1, 1851, a daughter of George and Mary (Montgomery) Lees, who were also natives of the land of hills and heather, whence they crossed the briny deep to Canada. In early life her father was a saddler of Scotland and after reaching Canada in 1858 he turned his attention to gardening. Both he and his wife departed this life in Canada and were laid to rest in the Toronto cemetery. Mrs. Black was taken to Canada by her parents when but seven years of age and was there educated and married. In 1886 she accompanied her husband to Lancaster county and has since made her home in Raymond. She has a very attractive residence in this city, which she erected after her husband's death. To Mr. and Mrs. Black were bom three children: Robert J.; Mabel, who is the wife of J. M. Cameron, a resident farmer of Lancaster county living near Raymond; and Paul, who follows farming in the same county. The death of Mr, Black occurred in Raymond, March 2, 1904, and he was laid to rest in Oak Creek cemetery. His political allegiance was given to the democratic party and he filled his office of justice of the peace, serving in that capacity until his death, and was also a member of the town board and chaimian of the school board. He belonged to the Presbyterian church, of which his widow is also a member, and his life was ever guided by the teachings of that organization, making him a man whom to know was to respect and honor. When death called him friends came from all parts of the county to attend his funeral services, for wherever he was known he was held in the highest regard. He was very charitable and benevolent, constantly holding out a helping hand where aid was needed, and he was also most progressive. He never deviated from a course which he believed to be right between himself and his fellowmen. In manner he was genial and his unfeigned cordiality won him the respect and good will of all with whom he came in contact. His circle of friends was large and their high regard came to him as the direct consequence of a well spent life. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 20, 25-26 |
| Blake, George W.
GEORGE W. BLAKE, contractor, was born on the 13th of March 1843, at Hanover, Jo Daviess Co., Ill. Went to school up to the age of twelve, and then went farming with his parents in same county, and in 1866 worked with his team for a woolen manufacturing company for about one year at Galena. In 1869 moved to Clinton, Iowa, and engaged in the hotel business, in connection with his brother and a Mr. Marshall, for about one year, then sold his interest out and worked at mason work for Pilcher & Lord, for one season, and in the following spring went into partnership with J. B. Allen, contracting until 1873, when he dissolved partnership and went into the butcher business with Mr. Tifney until April, 1874; then sold out and went into the contracting business on his own account. Came to Lincoln and went to work for Keyes & Bullock for about six months; then went into partnership with his brother, S. R. Blake, until December, 1880, since which time he has been doing business on his own account. Mr. Blake contracted for and built all the stone work on the following buildings: State Journal, Umphrey Bros., Osborn Building, Veith's, Leyton & Brown's, Walsh & Putnam's, J. J. Butler's, D. B. Alexander's, here: also the Deaf and Dumb Institute at Omaha, and the stone work for the hotel at Calvert. Was married to Miss Celina B. Jackson at Galena, Ill., 11th of April, 1867; has seven children, Fred Clarence, W. Russell, Lora Vale, Aldon Milton, Harry Wilson, William Samuel and Winfield Scott, four of whom are now attending school. Mr. B. enlisted in 1875 in the Iowa State Militia, First Regiment, Company C. Capt. Hess; enlisted as private and was promoted to Third Sergeant, and in April, 1879, resigned. |
| Blasier, Squire SQUIRE BLASIER, contractor and builder, was born in 1836 at Rome, Oneida Co., N. Y., and up to the age of twenty-five was with his parents farming and learning his trade, and in 1863 went to Iowa and remained there till 1868, farming and other occupations. He moved to Nebraska in spring of 1868; came and located in Lincoln. He first engaged in the butcher business for about two years; he opened the first shop and killed the first two steers and hogs in Lincoln. Then sold out and engaged at this business, has since increased his business to a considerable extent. Was married in the fall of 1856 to Miss Nancy Blasier. Has four children now living, Louisa Dora, Carry O., Freddie and Lilly. Was in the State Militia of New York, Forty-sixth Regiment, Company K; entered as Orderly and was promoted to Second Lieutenant, and discharged in 1862 at Rome, N. Y. Belongs to Red Ribbon Club; has been a member for last four years. |
| Blodgett, H. H.
H. H. BLODGETT, attorney at law, was born at Copenhagen, September 7, 1845. He resided there until 1857, when he removed to Morrison, Ill., living there until 1868. In that year he came to Nebraska, and in 1869 located here permanently. He was admitted to the bar in 1870, and has been engaged in practice since that time. |
| Blundell, A. F.
A. F. BLUNDELL, manager Lincoln Telephone Exchange Company, was born in Luton, Bedfordshire, England, March 7, 1856. He moved to Montreal, in 1870, and from there to Cincinnati, Ohio; then to Fort Madison, Iowa, where he learned telegraphing. He engaged in this for a time, and then went on the road with theatrical companies, until 1878, when he settled in Lincoln, and entered the land department of the B. & M. R. R. in which he continued until September, 1881, when he was appointed to his present position. Mr. B. is a member of the First Methodist Episcopal Church, and of the K. of P. of Iowa. |
| Boehmer, Frank A.
Frank A. Boehmer is the senior partner in the law firm of Boehmer & Boehmer, his associates being his two sons, Edwin C. and Rupert A. He has resided continuously in Lincoln since November 9. 1884. or for nearly a third of a century, removing lo this city from Warrenton, Missouri, where he was born on the 21st of July, 1855. He was the only child of Diedrich Boehmer and his wife, whose maiden name was Wilhelmina Forderhase, both of whom were bom near Hanover, Germany. They became acquainted and were married, however, in the state of Missouri, the father having been brought to the United States by his parents in 1837, while the mother crossed the Atlantic with her parents in 1835 when a maiden of thirteen years. Diedrich Boehmer learned the carpenter's trade and devoted his attention chiefly to the building of gristmills. Following his marriage he resided in Warrenton, Missouri, and its vicinity until 1884, when he removed to Lincoln, he and his wife spending their remaining days in the home of their son, Frank A. The father died in 1886, at the age of seventy-six years, and the mother survived until she reached the age of eighty-one years, when she was laid to rest by the side of her husband in Wyuka cemetery. Reared in his native city, Frank A. Boehmer there attended the public schools until he reached the age of fifteen, when he entered the Central Wesleyan College of Warrenton, which he attended until he finished the scientific and commercial courses. He afterward taught school in Warren county for two years and later entered the law department of the University of Missouri at Columbia, being there graduated in 1880. He was admitted to the bar at Warrenton, where he practiced for four years before coming to Lincoln. During that same period he edited and published a German weekly newspaper called the Warrenton Volksfreund, which he established on the ist of October, 1880, and which is still in existence but which he sold in 1884 upon his removal to Lincoln. From 1880 until 1884 he served as deputy county clerk of Warren county. Since his arrival in the capital Mr. Boehmer has continuously practiced law and has also given much attention to real estate matters. His sons. Edwin C. and Rupert A. Boehmer, became his partners in 1815 and the firm is accorded a liberal and distinctively representative clientage. In 1886 he was instrumental in organizing the German National Bank of Lincoln and served as a director and as attorney for the bank for several years. In 1907 he assisted in organizing the German Building & Loan Association and was its president for three years. In the early part of 1916 he became one of the organizers of the Midwest Savings & Loan Association of Lincoln and is now one of its board of directors and its legal adviser. On the 22d of November, 188r, Mr. Boehmer was united in marriage to Miss Alwene Wessel, a native of Warren county, Missouri, by whom he has eight children, four sons and four daughters, namely; Olivia, now the wife of Albert E. Rische, of Lincoln; Edwin C. and Rupert A., who are associated with their father in law practice; and Edna, Frank C., Emil, Marie and Helen, all at home. In his political views Mr. Boehmer is a republican but aside from four years service as a member of the city council from the fourth ward, from 1887 until 1891, he has never held nor sought office, though frequently importuned to become a candidate. He belongs to the Ancient Order of United Workmen and to the German Evangelical St. Paul's church, of which he has served as a trustee almost throughout the entire period of his residence in Lincoln, being now president of the board, a position which he has held for many years. He speaks and reads both German and English with equal fluency. He is a forcible public speaker and his services have been in great demand on the stump in political campaigns in both county and state. He has taken an active part in several presidential campaigns in the state, being able to address audiences in either German or English. He frequently delivers addresses before German societies and for several years has been president of the German Men's Society, an auxiliary of his church. For two successive years, 1910 and 1911, he was chairman of the day committee in connection with the German Day celebrations, on which occasions large parades were held. The great flower parade in Lincoln, held on German Day in October, 1911, when he was chairman of the committee, was one of the finest parades ever seen in Lincoln. For several years he was president of the Nebraska Saengerbund, an organization of all German siting societies of the state, and under his direction the State Saengerfest was held in Lincoln in 1912. It will thus be seen that his interests are broad and varied, that he keeps in touch with the trend of modern thought and prepress and is htitiself a leader in public thought and action in this city. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 129-130 |
| Boggs, Charles T.
CHARLES T. BOGGS, insurance agent, came to Lincoln in March, 1870, and has been engaged in his present business since. He also deals in real estate to some extent. He was born in Chicago, Ill., in 1846, and reared in Havana, Mason Co., Ill. He came from the latter place to Lincoln. During the war he served in Company E. Twenty-seventh Illinois Volunteer Infantry, as a private soldier. Mr. Boggs was married at Havana, Mason Co., Ill., February 20, 1873, to Mary E. Caffyn, a native of Indiana. |
| Bohanan Bros. BOHANAN BROS., proprietors of the Central meat market, established June, 1868. they pack in summer, twenty to forty head of hogs weekly. Sign of the black horse livery stable, Bohanan Bros. proprietors, established in 1875. Have in stock seventy-five head of horses, with carriages, hearse, etc. Capitol hack line, Bohanan Bros., proprietors, established in 1878, have five busses, six hacks, one baggage and one band wagon, and four herdicks. Mr. M. G. B., of the above firm was born in Peoria County, Ill., March 14, 1842; learned the trade of a butcher, with his father. Came to Nebraska, in February, 1868, located in Lincoln and opened a meat market. He was married in Lincoln, October 29, 1872, to Miss Lydia S. Rakestraw. They have three children, Edward Isaac, Myrtle Agnes and Clarence Otis. Mr. B. is a member of the Baptist Church, and the I. O. O. F. Lodge and Encampment, also of the butchers' Union of Lincoln. F. H. Bohanan, of above firm, was born in Peoria County, Ill., October 14, 1844. Learned the trade of butcher with his father. Came to Lincoln, Neb., in 1868, and opened a meat market. He was married in Peoria, in 1867, to Miss Brudencia C. Mosher. They have two children, William Franklin, and Phillip Edward. Mr. B. is a member of the I. O. O. F. Lodge and Encampment. |
| Bohl, Edward F.
Edward F. Bohl was a successful farmer of Centerville precinct and his demise, which occurred in 1904, was recognized as a loss to his community. A native of Lancaster county, his birth occurred in Highland precinct on the 7th of January 1878, and he was a son of Nicholas Bohl. He passed his boyhood and youth upon the home farm and when not attending the public schools devoted his time to assisting his father. On reaching mature years he determined to make farming his life work and purchased eighty acres of land on section 20, Centerville precinct, on which he made his home until called by death on the 11th of October, 1904. He made many improvements upon his farm and his well directed labors as a farmer and stock raiser were rewarded by a good financial return. Mr. Bohl was married in Lincoln on the 22nd of January 1901, to Miss Amelia Frohn, who was born in Centerville precinct and is a daughter of William Frohn, a sketch of whom appears elsewhere in this work. To this union were born two sons, Elmer William and Clarence Nicholas. Mr. Bohl was a stanch advocate of the principles of the democratic party and loyally supported its candidates at the polls, but never sought office. He had a wide acquaintance throughout the county and was most highly esteemed where best known as his dominant qualities were those which characterize the highest type of manhood. His wife resided in Martel for a number of years after his death in order to afford her toils the advantages of the schools there, but in the spring of 1910 returned to the farm. Mrs. Bohl is a member of the Centerville Methodist church and highly respected in her community. |
| Bonnell, George W.
GEORGE W. BONNELL, ticket agent of the Burlington and Missouri River Railroad, in Nebraska, was born in Dover, Lee Co., Iowa, October 8, 1849. In 1859 he removed to Mount Pleasant, Iowa, finished his education at the Fort Madison Academy. In 1868 he studied telegraphing and took charge of the office of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, at Fort Madison and at other points; was then transferred to Burlington, two years later he returned to Fort Madison and took the position of ticket agent and operator there. In 1878 he removed to Nebraska, locating in Lincoln, and took the position of assistant cashier, in the Burlington and Missouri Land Department. Was appointed to present position in March, 1880. He was married in Fort Madison, Iowa, September 18, 1873, to Miss Libbie M. Frow, eldest daughter of J. W. Frow, Postmaster at Fort Madison. They have two children, Daisy F. and Winnie B. Mr. B. is a member of the Congregational Church, and of the Knights of Pythias of Lincoln, and the A. O. U. W. of Fort Madison. |
| Bonnell, John C.
JOHN C. BONNELL, assistant land commissioner of the Burlington and Missouri River Railroad, in Nebraska, was born in Newark, N. J., July 28, 1841. His parents moved to the then Territory of Iowa, in 1843, settling in Fort Madison. The subject of this sketch received his schooling in that vicinity. In 1862 he enlisted in the Nineteenth Regiment, Iowa Volunteers, Company E. Commissioned First Lieutenant in September, 1864. Served until the close of the war, then returned to Fort Madison, and engaged in merchandising and milling until 1869, then entered the service of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, at Fort Madison. In 1870 he was transferred to Burlington, and was employed in the passenger department and as traveling agent. In 1873 he changed into the passenger and land department of the Atchison, Topeka and Sante Fe Railroad, and returned to the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad in 1875. Was then appointed secretary of the Iowa Land Department. In 1876 he was commissioned by Gov. Garber, of Nebraska, to arrange a display in Agricultural Hall, at the Centennial Exhibition. He designed and completed the display, and returned to Burlington, Iowa, leaving a man in charge. He removed to Nebraska in 1879, located in Omaha as general agent of the Burlington and Missouri River Railroad, and in 1880 he moved to Lincoln and took his present position. He was married in Fort Madison, Iowa, June 4, 1866, to Miss Sarah E. Arnold, of Fort Madison. They have five children, Lizzie, Jennie, Ida, Pearl and Ralph A. Mr. B. is a member of the M. E. Church. He is a prominent member of the G. A. R., being Commander of the Post, A. A. A., General of the State, and is a delegate to the Grand Encampment at Baltimore, in 1882. |
| Bonsall, Lemuel
J. Lemuel J. Bonsall, whose family resides in Lincoln, was for many years actively'and prominently connected with the agricultural development of Nebraska, owning and operating a large tract of land in Greeley county. He was born in Illinois, January 7, 1855, and traced his. ancestry back to one of the Pilgrims who came to the new world on the Mayflower. He was a son of Jesse and Margaret (Smith) Bonsall, who were natives of the Keystone state, the former bom in 1817. In their family were thirteen children. In early life Jesse Bonsall removed westward to Illinois, where he purchased land, devoting the greater part of his remaining days to its development and further cultivation. Finally he retired from active business life and removed to Charles City, Iowa, where he died in February, 1897, having for more than three years survived his wife, who passed away in August, 1893. Lemuel J. Bonsall spent his youthful days in his native state and mastered the branches of learning taught in the public schools. With his parents he afterward removed to Iowa and there engaged in farming, purchasing land in Floyd county, which he owned and cultivated until 1888. In that year he removed to Greeley county, Nebraska, where he bought a farm, giving his attention throughout his remaining days to its further improvement, his labors converting it into one of the valuable farm properties of the district. On the 7th of October, 1877, in Charles City, Iowa, Lemuel J. Bonsall was married to Miss May Rogers, a daughter of Ehsha and Fidelia (Hill) Rogers, who were natives of New York. The father, who was a merchant, removed to Illinois at an early day and thence went to Charles City, Iowa, where he engaged in business for several years. Later he became a resident of Scotia, Greeley county, Nebraska, where he remained until 1897, when he went to Colorado. There his wife died in 1905 and he passed away in Fowler, Colorado, in 1914. To Mr. and Mrs. Bonsall were bom three children, of whom the first born died in infancy. Delia May, bom in January, 1885, is the wife of Fred C. Vertrees, of Lincoln, to whom she was married October 25, 1906, and they have two children : Clifford, eight years of age ; and Earl B., in his first year. The son. Jesse L. Bonsall, who is now farthing the old homestead in Greeley county, Nebraska, was born m December, 1888, and on the nth of August, 1909, married Jennie P. Burton. The death of Lemuel J. Bonsall occurred September 15, 1905, after about a year's illness. Mrs. Bonsall continued to reside uopn the old home farm until 1913, when she removed to Lincoln and now resides at No, 2525 O street. She still owns the old home property and also considerable real estate in Beatrice, Nebraska. In his political views Mr. Bonsall was a republican, always supporting the men and measures of the party, yet not seeking office. He belonged to the Masonic fraternity and was a loyal member of the Presbyterian church. His life was active, useful and well spent. He endeavored always to follow the golden rule and his many good qualities insured him the friendship and kindly regard of those with whom he was associated. His business affairs were carefully managed and brought to him merited and well deserved success, so that he left his family in comfortable financial circumstances. LINCOLN The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 127-128 |
| Booge & Prather BOOGE & PRATHER, money brokers, and dealers in scrip and warrants of all kinds. In Lancaster County loans on chattel security is made a specialty. Business established in October, 1881. J. I. Booge, of above firm, was born in Coburg, Canada, May 27, 1846. His parents moved to DeKalb County, Ind., about 1850, where he received his education. About 1862 he settled in Sioux City, Iowa, where he engaged in the mercantile business until 1877. Was then engaged as traveling salesman until he settled in Lincoln, Neb., in October, 1881. He was married in Sioux City, Iowa, December 24, 1868, to Miss Alice Goewey, of that city. They have three children, Annie, Lutie and Harry. Mr. B. is a Royal Arch Mason. H. R. Prather, of above firm, was born in Franklin County, Penn., January 5, 1852. Educated there, and in 1871 moved to Louisville, Ky., remaining until 1874. Then went to Atlantic, Iowa, and from there to Sioux City. In 1880 he located in Topeka, Kas., and from there moved to Lincoln, Neb., in October, 1881. Mr. P. was engaged in bookkeeping during these years, in the different places mentioned, with the exception of two years of his residence in Sioux City, during which time he was superintendent of the Niobrara Branch Railroad. He was married in Council Bluffs, Iowa, November 26, 1875, to Miss Mary A. Baugh, a native of Centralia, Ill. They have one child, Henry Pawling. |
| Bowen M.D., Arthur H.
ARTHUR H. BOWEN, M. D., physician and surgeon, came to Lincoln February 27, 1881. He was born at Waterford, Washington Co., Ohio, December 7, 1852. He lived there until he came to Lincoln. He was educated at Marietta College in the classical course, and graduated from the Ohio Medical College at Cincinnati in 1876. The following winter he took a post graduate course in New York City, connecting himself with the College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Bellevue Hospital Medical College, taking a clinical course in the hospitals and dispensaries. He commenced practice at Waterford, Ohio, in 1877, remaining there until he came to Lincoln. He is a member of the Delta Upsilon Fraternity, and a member of the Ohio State, Nebraska State and Lincoln Medical Societies. He is the senior member of the firm of Bowen & Hart, physicians and surgeons, and assistant surgeon to the B. & M. Railroad in Nebraska and leased lines. |
| Bower, George F.
GEORGE F. BOWER, freight agent of the Burlington and Missouri River Railroad, in Lincoln, Neb., was born in La Harpe, Ill., July 1, 1852; has been engaged since 1872, in freight and telegraph departments of railroads. In 1874 he moved to Iowa, and from there in 1878, to Nebraska. He first located in Brownville, in the service of the Burlington and Missouri River Railroad, from there he moved to Central City, Hastings, and to Lincoln, November, 1881, and took his present position. He was married in Knoxville, Iowa, January 3, 1878, to Miss E. M. Ely. |
| Bowers, Herbert S.
HERBERT S. BOWERS, County Superintendent of Schools, came to Nebraska, in the spring of 1873, and located in Yankee Hill Precinct. He taught in the schools of Lancaster County, for several years. In the spring of 1878 he was at Friendville and had charge of the village schools there, during the spring term. In the fall of 1878 he became principal of the graded schools at Palmyra, Otoe Co., Neb., and remained there until the close of the winter term. He then returned to Lancaster County, and in the fall of 1879, he was elected to his present position, and was re-elected in the year 1881. He was born in Fishkill, Dutchess Co., N. Y., October 25, 1854. When quite young his parents moved to Ohio, and a year later to Indiana, locating at Seymour. He remained there most of the time until he came to Nebraska. He was educated at the Seymour high school, and married at Wabash, Ind., February 19, 1881, to Nannie J. Lehmer, a native of Somerset, Ind. Mr. B. now edits the educational department of the Nebraska State Journal. He is a son of Joseph Bowers, a native of Massachusetts, who was born September 21, 1794, and died March 20, 1881. His mother's maiden name was Maria Stevens, a native of Massachusetts. They have seven children, four of whom, Arthur E., Dudley W., Edward H. and William E., are now living on Section 31, Yankee Hill Precinct, Lancaster Co., Neb. Mr. George E. Bowers, another son, is a machinist at Fitchburgh, Mass., and superintendent of a large factory there. Abbie Ellen, now Mrs. M. Osborn, lives on Section 20, Yankee Hill Precinct. Joseph Bowers had a daughter and a son by a previous marriage, Dr. Joseph Bowers of New York City, and Mrs. Annie B. Marshall, wife of Dr. J. A. Marshall, of Washington, D. C. |
| Boyd, Charles H.
CHARLES H. BOYD, engineer of Lowry's mills, was born March 7, 1846, in St. Joseph County, Ind., where he was raised and educated, and was for one year at college, at Green Castle, Ind., after which he went to work for the St. Joseph Manfacturing Company, as machinist, for about three years. In 1874 he went to Elkhart and engaged with the L. M. & S. R. R. Co., as machinist, working in their shops for about two and one-half years. Then returned to St. Joseph, Ind., and worked for the Perkins Wind Mill Company; then to South Bend, as engineer and machinist, for the Burtzell Manufacturing Company, and in the fall of 1878 came to Lincoln, and acted as agent for the sale of wind mills, pumps and agricultural implements, for about three years. Then engaged with the A. & N. R. R. Co., for a short time and in January, 1880, engaged with Mr. Lowry, as machinist and engineer to his elevator and mill. Was married to his second wife, August 14, 1881, a Mrs. Franklin, who was born in Sweden. Has two children, Carl Joan Franklin, and Annie Thomisen Boyd. Is a member of the I. O. O. F., Monitor Lodge No. 286, Indiana; also member of the Machinists' and Blacksmiths' Union, of Elkhart, Ind., since 1876, and was appointed recording secretary and treasurer of the union, during the time he was in Indiana. |
| Boyer, W. H. W. H. BOYER, meat market, business established in 1869. Mr. B. was born in Tuscarawas County, Ohio in 1841. He enlisted January 1, 1862, in Company H, Eighty-second Regiment Ohio Volunteers, and served until the close of the war. Was detailed on sharpshooting service under Gen. Mulroy, the organization being known as "Mulroy's Foot Cavalry," and engaged in leading the advance and defending the retreat of our forces. He was mustered out in 1865 and returned to Ohio. He then engaged in stock dealing and farming. Moved from Ohio to Iowa, residing about five years in Ottumwa, Iowa. In 1868 he moved to Nebraska, settled in Lincoln, and a few months afteward, commenced his present business. He was married in Lincoln in February, 1875, to Miss Cole, a native of Iowa City, Iowa, and a graduate of Leavenworth College. They have had three children, of which there survives but one son, Reginald Ralph. |
| Brahmstad, John
Frederick
From "LINCOLN The Capitol City and Lancaster County, Nebraska" Published Chicago, Illinois The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company 1916 John Frederick Brahmstadt was a well known farmer of Olive Branch precinct and his demise was the occasion of much sincere regret. A native of Germany, he was born in Mecklenburg on the 7th of November 1838, a son of Frederick Brahmstadt, who engaged in blacksmithing in Germany. Our subject remained in the fatherland until he was seventeen years old, when, in company with his brothers, Henry and William, he came to America and made his way to Chicago, Illinois. He worked as a laborer there for a time and subsequently was employed as a farm hand. Following his marriage, which occurred in Chicago, he farmed in Cook county for several years and then went to Effingham, Illinois, where he established a general store. He engaged in business there for a number of years but at the end of that time lost his store by fire and in 1870 he became a resident of York, Nebraska, which was then but a tiny hamlet. He built the second house in the town and started a general store, which he conducted for eight years. In 1878 Mr. Brahmstadt removed to Cherry county, Nebraska, and became the first settler in that county. Previous to his arrival there the only white residents of the county were the soldiers in the fort, and he experienced all of the hardships and dangers incident to life upon the western frontier. For fourteen years he operated a cattle ranch but disposed of that place in 1892 and went to Blair, Nebraska, where he purchased ten acres of orchard land. Eight years later, in 1900, he came to Lancaster County, Nebraska, and began farming three hundred and twenty acres of land in section 9, Olive Branch precinct, which belonged to his wife. He concentrated his energies upon the operation of that farm during his remaining years, dying there on the 6th of November 1913, and was buried in the Methodist cemetery at Kramer. Mr. Brahmstadt and Miss Henrietta Fritz were married in 1857 in Chicago, Illinois. She was born in Germany but emigrated to America in her girlhood and located near Effingham, Illinois. She passed away in Chicago in 1876, leaving six children: John, who is a horse trainer by occupation; Gustave, who is farming in Idaho; Edward, deceased, who was a rancher of Cherry county. Nebraska; Louis, who is operating a sawmill in Arbor, Washington; Emma, the wife of Henry Hollman, a farmer of Olive Branch precinct, Lancaster county Nebraska; and William Henry, who is operating the home place in Lancaster county. Mr. Brahmstadt's second marriage occurred on the 2nd of May 1877, on the old Kramer farm in Olive Branch precinct, his bride being Mrs. William Hollman, nee Sophie Kramer. Her parents, Henry and Margaret (Schaeper) Kramer, were born in the province of Westphalia, Germany. The latter engaged in farming there for some time but in 1845 came to America and first located in St. Louis, Missouri, whence he went to Clayton county, Iowa. There he bought government land which he farmed until his removal to Lancaster county, Nebraska in 1865. He filed On ninety acres of raw land on section 9, Olive Branch precinct, and at once began improving his place. For three years he lived in a dugout but at the end of that time erected a log house. He resided upon the homestead during his remaining days, his death occurring on the 6th of January, 1914, when he had reached the venerable age of ninety-three years. He was buried in the Methodist cemetery at Kramer. His wife passed away on the 6th of August 1900, and was also buried at Kramer. He gave the land on which the town of Kramer is built to the Missouri Pacific Railroad and the town is named in his honor. Mrs. Brahmstadt was born in Clayton county, Iowa, on the 2nd of April 1852, but when thirteen years of age came with her parents by wagon to Lancaster county, Nebraska. By her marriage she became the mother of eight children, of whom four survive, namely: Benjamin, who is operating an elevator in Kramer; Sophie, the wife of Frank Thompson, who is depot agent at Kramer; Elsie, who married Edwin Hollman, a farmer of Gage county; and Justus Fred, who owns the elevator at Kramer in connection with his brother. Mr. Brahmstadt was a republican in his political belief and was one of the first commissioners of Cherry county, Nebraska, and also served on the school board there. His religious faith was that of the Methodist Episcopal church and he often filled the pulpit at Kramer when the regular minister was absent. His life measured up to high standards of morality, and his genuine worth gained him a high place in the estimation of all who knew him. |
| Branson, Charles M.
Charles M. Branson, living on section 10, Yankee Hill precinct, where his time and energies are given to agricultural interests, was born in Fulton county, Illinois July 19, 1853, a son of Zebulon and Rachel (Braucher) Branson, both of whom were natives of Ohio. The paternal ancestors came to America in 1628 from Wales and in the maternal line he is descended from "ancestors who came from Holland about 1760. His father was a farmer by occupation and in 1820 removed to Illinois, settling in Sangamon county. He afterward became a resident of Fulton county, that state, and in 1862, when forty-five years of age, he enlisted as a member of Company I, One Hundred and Third Illinois Infantry. He became captain of Company B and met death in the battle of Kenesaw Mountain, in Georgia. He had participated in nineteen regular engagements and his uniform at Lookout Mountain was pierced with twenty-seven bullets. Charles M. Branson was reared and educated in Illinois, being graduated from Hedding College, at Abingdon, in 1874, with the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy, while in 1877 the master's degree was conferred upon him. Going to New York he taught school there for a year. After a year spent in the east he returned to Illinois where he again engaged in teaching until 1878. The last school of which he was principal was that at Altoona, Illinois. On the 22nd of August, 1877, Mr. Branson was united in marriage to Miss Ida D. Currier of Bureau county, Illinois, a daughter of Jonathan T. and Martha J. (Hoblit ) Currier, who were natives of Vermont and Ohio respectively. The father, a farmer by occupation, removed to Bureau county, Illinois, at an early period in the development of that locality and there he engaged extensively in farming for many years, adding to his holdings from time to time until he became the owner of many farms. He died in February, 1908, but his widow still survives. To Mr. and Mrs. Branson have been born four children: Lois Stewart, the wife of Frank S. Camp, of Lincoln, by whom she has one son, Daniel Branson Camp; Bernice Marie, an illustrator, living at home; Charles Blaine, a dentist of Seattle, Washington, who married La Vinia Young and has two children, Rachel Marion and Bernine Elizabeth; and Joe Braucher, living at home. In 1878 Mr. Branson, after his marriage, began farming in Stark county, Illinois, but in 1880 returned to the old home in Fulton county, Illinois, where he remained until 1883. In that year he came to Lancaster County, Nebraska, and purchased his present farm of two hundred and fifty acres on sections 10 and 11, Yankee Hill precinct. He has made splendid improvements upon the place and now has one of the attractive farm properties of the county on which ate three sets of buildings. This is known as Riverside Place and was first developed by T. H. Leavitt, of the Burlington Railroad. Mr. Branson began dealing in shorthorn cattle and has continued in that business for many years, being widely known as a breeder of shorthorn cattle and also of Poland China hogs. He has had on hand as many as two hundred and fifty head of fine shorthorn cattle at a time. Since taking up his abode upon his farm in 1883 he has resided continuously thereon save for a period of eight years which he spent in Lincoln to educate his children. In 1913 he was sent to Panama as revenue collector and thus served until the Adamson act came into effect in April 1914. To his farm property he has added by further purchase until he is now the owner of over three hundred acres of finely improved land. Mr. Branson is well known in the Masonic fraternity, being a member of Lincoln Lodge, No.19, A. F. & A. M., Lancaster Chapter, No.6, R. A. M., and Lincoln Commandery, N 0. 4, K. T. He is also identified with the Mystic Shrine. He votes with the democratic party. |
| Briscoe, J. Z.
J. Z. BRISCOE, lately of Barkley & Briscoe, and Secretary Lancaster County Agricultural Association, was born in Somerset, Somerset Co., Pa., March 1, 1838. Removed with his parents to La Porte County, Ind., in 1855, and from there to Jasper County, and in 1864 he moved with them to Sarpy County, Nebraska and engaged in farming. In 1871 he settled in Lancaster County. Was County Commissioner in Sarpy County, and in 1872 was appointed to same position in Lancaster County. Moved into the City of Lincoln in December, 1880. He was married in Oakland, Alleghany Co., Md., September 16, 1858, to Miss Ellie B. Brant of Oakland. They have one daughter, Florence. Mr. B. is a member of the Christian Church. |
| Brock, Nelson C.
NELSON C. BROCK, vice-president of the State bank, came to Nebraska in April, 1865, and engaged in the banking business with his uncle, James Sweet, continuing thereat until he came to Lincoln. He was born at Milford, Otsego Co., N. Y., November 13, 1843, and resided at Davenport, Iowa for six years prior to coming to Nebraska. For five years he was engaged in the milling business in partnership with S. W. Little. Mr. B. has been Deputy Collector and Deputy State Treasurer under Mr. Sweet. |
| Brown, Anson & A. H. ANSON & A. H. BROWN, proprietors of the Lincoln Marble Works. The business was established by Anson Brown in 1876, present firm was organized in the spring of 1877. They employ ten men and upwards. Anson Brown of the above firm was born near Mount Vernon December, 25, 1820. Was engaged in mercantile business in Mount Vernon, Bellefontaine and Columbus, Ohio, for over thirty-five years. Moved to Lincoln, Neb., in 1875. He was married in Logan County, Ohio, May 10, 1843, to Miss M. A. Hartley of same county. They had four children of whom three survive, A. Hartley, of the above firm, Mary A., now Mrs. J. H. Rhodes, Anna L., now Mrs. C. R. Cornell. A. H. Brown was born in Logan County, Ohio, February 16, 1844. Received his education in Ohio and New York City. Was married to Miss S. A. Nevin, of Bellefontaine, Ohio, April 10, 1867. They have four children, Emma N., Carrie S., Ernest H. and Bertha M. Removed to Lincoln, Neb., from Columbus, Ohio in the spring of 1876. |
| Brown, D. C. D. C. BROWN, carpenter, builder and agriculturist. He is a native of Mississippi County, Mo., and was born October 10, 1845, when quite young he removed with his parents to Indiana, locating near Valparaiso, his father Presley Brown being among the pioneers of that section. Here the subject was raised to manhood and educated, making the pursuits of agriculture his chief aim in life. In 1870, he came to Nebraska, and after a temporary sojourn returned to Indiana, and in 1872, again came to the State, locating in Sandy Hill Township, Lancaster County, five and a half miles south of Lincoln, engaging in farming and was identified among Lancaster County soil tillers, until the autumn of 1881, when Lincoln became his abiding place, and at present he follows carpenter work. Mr. B. is an industrious, go-a-head gentleman, and Lancaster County has room for plenty such men. On the 6th of October, 1870, Miss E. S. Miles, a native of Indiana, became his wife. They have two children, Minnie C., and Ella. |
| Brown, E. E. E. E. BROWN, attorney, came to Lincoln, in June, 1870, and has practiced here since. He is a director of the State National Bank and attorney for a number of counties in their tax litigation. He has been prominent in the defense of cases in which railroad tax litigation was involved. Born at Jordan, Onondaga Co., N. Y. He read law in the office of Wright & Pomeroy, and was admitted to the bar in December, 1861. He commenced practice at Moravia, Cayuga Co., N. Y., and continued practice here until he came to Nebraska. He has been Mayor of Lincoln and member of the State Senate, one term. |
| Brown, Francis W.
Francis W. Brown was prominent in business circles of Lincoln as the president of the F. W. Drown Lumber Company and was also a leader in public affairs, having served as mayor of the city and being at the time of his demise postmaster. A native of Missouri, he was bom in Boonville on the 16th of June, 1854, and was a son of Elisha W. and Mary (Brent) Brown, the former born in Kentucky and the latter in Virginia. At an early day in the history of Missouri, they took up their residence in that state and the father engaged in banking at Sedalia and at Boonville, but during the Civil war he went to Jacksonville, Illinois, where he conducted a bank for several years. Later he returned to Sedalia, Missouri, where he passed the remainder of his life. His wife is also deceased, Francis W, Brown was reared under the parental roof and was given excellent educational opportunities. He attended the Kemper Military Institute of Boonville, Missouri, and the Illinois College at Jacksonville, thus making thorough preparation for assuming the duties and responsibilities of life. On leaving school he became connected with the lumber business and remained in Jacksonville until 1878, when he established a lumberyard on his own account at New Berlin, Illinois, which he operated for three years. At the end of that time he accepted a position as traveling salesman for S. K. Martin Lumber Company of Chicago, which he represented on the road for seven years, during which time he made his home in Chicago. Subsequently he became vice president of the Henry & Coatsman Lumber Company of Kansas City, which concern owned a line of yards in Nebraska and Missouri, Mr. Brown removed to Omaha, where the purchasing office of the company was located, and took over that department of the business. Some time later he was induced to remove his office to Lincoln, where the main yard of the company had been established and to assume its management in addition to his work as purchasing agent. He removed here in 1891 and when the company went out of business two years later he purchased the yard, which was subsequently conducted under the style of the F. W. Brown Lumber Company, of which he was president and treasurer. He continued to direct its affairs until his demise and also had many other financial interests of importance. He was for a time a director of the Columbia National Bank, and his excellent judgment and keen business insight were factors in the success of that institution. In 1906 he erected a beautiful home at 1521 South Twentieth street and there Mrs. Brown still resides. Mr. Brown was married on the 22d of December, 1880, to Miss Jennie Bennett, whose parents, Samuel F. and Cornelia (Rogers) Bennett, were born in New York. Her father engaged in merchandising in that state until 1876, when he removed to Omaha and continued in that line of business until his death. His wife passed away there in 1891. Two children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Brown, namely: Frank W., whose birth occurred on the 18th of August, 1882, and who is now editor of the Kearney Morning Times of Kearney, Nebraska; and Howard B., who was bom on the 8th of July, 1888, and died on the 2d of February, 1899. Mr. Brown was one of the prominent democrats of the state and was his party's candidate for congress and almost secured the election, being defeated by E. M. Pollard by only a small majority. He was twice mayor of Lincoln and during his term of office secured many needed improvements in the city government. It was during his administration that the first of the land now comprised in Antelope Park was purchased. He also held a number of other municipal offices and in the fall of 1914 was appointed postmaster, in which position he was serving at the time of his death, which occurred on the 7th of July, 1915. In 1908 Mr. Brown was a delegate to the democratic national convention at Denver, which nominated Hon. William Jennings Bryan for the presidency, and he served as the member from Nebraska on the resolutions committee. He always considered a public office a public trust and discharged his duties with an eye single to the general welfare. He was a member of the Benevolent Protective Order of Elks, and his personality was such that he made and retained friends easily. In religious faith he was an Episcopalian. His demise was widely regretted and in his death Lincoln sustained a heavy loss. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 26-27 |
| Brown, Guy A.
GUY A. BROWN, State Librarian, came to Nebraska City in 1867 and remained there until 1871, when he came to Lincoln. He was Clerk of the District Court in Otoe County for three years. He has been State Librarian since 1871, and Clerk of the Supreme Court since 1868. Since 1875 he has been Supreme Court Reporter. Is the author of two editions of the Nebraska Statutes. He was Secretary of the Constitutional Convention in 1875. Born in Batavia, Genesee Co., N. Y., December 8, 1846. Enlisted in the Twenty-second New York Battery, August 22, 1862, and was mustered out September 29, 1865. Appointed Corporal September 4, 1862, Sergeant June, 1863, Sergeant Major, April 4, 1864, First Lieutenant, December 4, 1864, Adjutant December 12, 1864, Brevet Captain April 2, 1865, promoted to Captain August 7, 1865. He participated in all the engagements after Grant took command. He was married at Nebraska City, July 22, 1869, to Mary E. Holmes, a native of Terre Haute, Ind. They have three children, Edward P., Eugene W. and Larue. They lost one son, Lawrence A., who died at the age of four months. Mr. B. is a member of the K. of H., and has been for many years a vestryman in the Episcopal Church. |
| Brown, Henry W.
HENRY W. BROWN, of the firm of Leighton & Brown, wholesale druggists, came to Lincoln, in June, 1868, from Leavenworth, Kansas, where for two and a half years he had been engaged in the mercantile business. He is a native of Sidney, Kennebec Co., Maine. In August, 1861, enlisted in Company E, Sixty-fifth New York Volunteer Infantry. On two different occasions was sent to New York City on recruiting service, where he remained, in the aggregate, about ten months. With the exception of this time, was constantly with his regiment, and participated in nearly all the battles of the Army of the Potomac, up to the 10th of May, 1864, when, at the battle of Spottsylvania Court House, he was taken prisoner. Was confined in Andersonville and Florence prisons until March 1, 1865, when he was liberated, sent to his regiment and discharged in August, 1865. Was married in Lowell, Mass., September, 1868, to Harriet L. Brown, a native of Lowell. They have one daughter, Florence L. |
| Brown, J. M. J. M. BROWN, engineer Little's Elevator, was born in the State of New York, in 1844. Left the State at an early age, and went with his parents to Columbia County, Wis., remaining on a farm with them for about two years, then engaged with the Milwaukee & La Crosse R. R. Company, as machinist, for one year, then went South, to Nashville, Tenn., and was employed by the government as machinist and engineer, to their saw mills, and in March, 1865, came to Saltillo, Neb., and engaged in teaming with oxen across the plains, from here to the Rocky Mountains and back, and in 1867, homesteaded a farm of 160 acres in this county, resided on the same until 1873, when he sold out, and went to work for the B. & M. R. R. Company as general helper in their round house, for about three years, and engaged again in farming in Greeley County, for about one year, and from thence to the Black Hills and Kansas, and in 1878, came to Lincoln, and was engaged as machinist and engineer to Little, Brown & Kerson elevator. Was married to a Miss Mary E. Walker, of Ohio, who died in 1875, leaving one child, Eliza S. He was married again in October, 1876, to Miss Annie Franke, who was born in Wisconsin. |
| Brown, Joseph H.
JOSEPH H. BROWN, Justice of the Peace, came to Plattsmouth, Neb., April 27, 1855, and located there to hold the town site. An Indian trader named Hugh Martin, died there in 1854, and William Garrison succeeded to the trade, locating there December 25, 1854. He now lives at Castle Rock, Col. Mr. B. was elected Clerk of the Legislature, in the winter of 1855 and 1856. In 1856 he was elected County Clerk, and served one term. In 1861 he was appointed Clerk of the Court and held that office nine years. He was also Clerk of the first State Legislature in 1866, he then made a trip to the mountains, and came to Lincoln, in 1873. He was tax agent for the B. & M. R. R. for five years, and was employed one year by the C. B. & Q. R. R. in Iowa. Since 1879 he has been Justice of the Peace, in the city of Lincoln. In the year 1856 three companies were organized to pursue the Pawnees, who had robbed some surveying parties. O. P. Mason, Gideon Bennett and J. H. Brown, commanded them. They were organized at Nebraska City, Bennett's Ferry and Plattsmouth, respectively. Mr. B. was born at Salina, Onondaga Co., N., Y., and lived there until nine years old, then he came to Fulton County, Ill., where he lived until he came to Nebraska. |
| Brown, L. E. L. E. BROWN, of the firm of Butts & Brown, commission merchants, deserving of mention among the business men of Lincoln, is the subject. He is a native of New York, and was born in Tioga County, December 3, 1833. When young he removed with his parents to Broome County, where he was raised to manhood and learned the blacksmith trade in the town of Windsor. When he attained his majority he went to Susquehanna County, Pa., where he embarked in the blacksmithing business, continuing two years, when the West attracted his attention and he became a resident of Galesburg, Ill., engaging in his vocation and in due course of time became one of the leading manufacturers of that city. 1877 found him in Lincoln, and for several years was acknowledged among the leading vulcans of this part of the country, carrying on and doing a lucrative business. In August, 1880, he engaged in the present line. Mr. Brown was married in Susquehanna County, Pa., in 1856 to Miss Emma Whitney, of that State, and by the union they have five children, two of who are living, Edith and Harry. They lost three, Emma, Frank and Charlie. Mr. Brown is a courteous gentleman and by his affability has made a host of friends in the business and private walks of life. He is a member of the I. O. O. F. Encampment and the Temple of Honor. |
| Brugmann, Henry HENRY BRUGMANN, hardware, stoves, tinware and house furnishing goods, business established in 1879 by Mr. Brugmann. He carries a stock of about $6,000 and employs five men. Mr. Brugmann was born in Hamburg, Germany, January 15, 1845. In 1869 he came to the United States and settled in New Orleans. He removed to Chicago and from there to Nebraska in 1879. He was married in Chicago October, 1870 to Miss Mary Prinnan, a native of Hamburg. They have three children, Hermann, Mary and William. Mr. Brugmann is a member of the German Lutheran Church. He is president of the German Mannerchor Society and is a member of the Harmonic and I. O. O. F. |
| Buckstaff, J. A. J. A. BUCKSTAFF, banker, real estate dealer and money loaner, is the proprietor of the opera house at Fairbury and the Lincoln Tanning company, established in 1881. He employs from thirteen to fifteen men, operating under the Dobson process. S. J. Dobson is the practical tanner in charge of the establishment, and patentee of the process. Up to 1881 Mr. Buckstaff became engaged in the lumber business. He is now engaged in the above mentioned business, and is also proprietor of the Farmers and Merchants' Bank at Fairbury, and does a general banking business. Bonds and well secured notes bought and sold. Special attention given to collections. Long-time loans placed on first-class real estate security. Mr. Buckstaff is a native of New Brunswick and was raised at Oshkosh, Wis., coming from there to Nebraska. He was married at Lincoln, October, 1875, to Sarah E. Montgomery, a native of Sparta, Wis. They have two children, Allen Frank and Clara C. He is a member of the A., F. & A. M. |
| Bumstead M.D., Lucius J. LUCIUS J. BUMSTEAD, M. D., homeopathic physician and surgeon, came to Lincoln in December, 1871, and has practiced here since that time. He was born in Bloomfield, Hartford Co., Conn., May 8, 1840. When he was seven years old his parents moved to La Porte, Ind. In 1861 he moved to Sheffield, Bureau Co., Ill., living there until 1865, when he went to the Rocky Mountains and spent eighteen months in Montana, Idaho and Utah. He was educated at Lombard University, Galesburg, Ill., and graduated from the Hahnemann Medical College at Philadelphia, attending there in 1868-69. He commenced practice in New Jersey, and kept it up until he came here. He was married at Lincoln, May 5, 1874, to Celinda A. Ross, a native of St. Joseph County, Ind. They have two children, Royal E. and Lloyd Garrison. The doctor is a member of the Nebraska State Medical Society and of the Northwestern Academy of Medicine. He also belongs to the A., F. & A. M. |
| Burling, Hon. Thomas R. Hon. Thomas R. Burling, deceased, a successful merchant, farmer and banker who was the owner of about seven hundred acres of valuable land in Lancaster county, was bom in England, March 15, 1846, a son of John and Mary (Harry) Burling, the former a native of Cambridge, England, and the latter of Wales. The father followed farming about five miles south of Cambridge until 1854, when he brought his family to the United States, landing after a voyage of twenty-eight days. For eighteen months they remained residents of New York city, after which Mr. Burling removed to Bureau county, Illinois, and purchased a farm near Buda. There his wife passed away in 1862. He continued to carry on farming in that locality throughout his remaining days, his death occurring in 1876, Thomas R. Burling began his education in the schools of England, being a lad of eight years when the family crossed the ocean. He further studied in New York city and in Illinois. His older brother enlisted for service in the Civil war and he and a younger brother had to remain at home to care for the farm. He resided on the old homestead until he attained his majority and in 1868 made his way to Lincoln, after which he pre-empted eighty acres of land in section 24, Buda precinct. He at once set about improving the place and continued its cultivation until 1887, when he removed to Firth, Lancaster county, where he conducted a mercantile establishment for five years, at the end of which time his store was destroyed by fire. He next removed to Cortland, Nebraska, where he engaged in the banking business throughout his remaining days. He was a very successful farmer, banker and merchant and his property possessions in Lancaster county comprised seven hundred acres of rich and valuable land. On the 22d of October, 1868, Mr. Burling was united in marriage to Miss Mary A. Streetor, a daughter of Alson J. and Deborah (Boone) Streetor, who were natives of Pennsylvania and New York respectively. Removing to Illinois, the father engaged in farming in Mercer county throughout the remainder of his life save for a brief period which he spent on the Pacific coast. Following the discovery of gold he spent six months in crossing the plains to California, accompanied by Hiram Boone, his brother-in-law, who worked in the gold mines for four years and now makes his home with Mrs. Burling, He served for four years during the Civil war as a member of Company D, One Hundred and Second Illinois Volunteer Infantry, although he at first enlisted as a veterinary surgeon with the Second Illinois Infantry. At the present writing he is eighty-six years of age. The city of Streator, Illinois, was named in honor of the family of which Mrs. Burling is a representative. Her father was at one time a candidate for president of the United States on the union labor ticket soon after the Civil war. He died in January, 1903, and his widow survived for only a brief period, passing away in February of the same year. To Mr. and Mrs. Burling were born seven children: Harry H., who was bom December 5, 1869, and passed away in January, 1896; Fanny E., who was born November 9, 1871, and is the wife of George H. Dietz, of Lincoln; Frank A., who was bom October 14, 1874, and is living in Lincoln; G, Worthington, who was bom August 5, 1880, and died December 7, 1888; Perry R., who was bom November 6, 1881, and is a farmer living near Cortland, Nebraska; Blanche E., who was bom February 27, 1884, and is the wife of L. L. Kurtz, of Lincoln; and Earl Reece, who was born in June, 1886, and died March 8, 1887. Mr. Burling was quite prominent in political circles and in 1878 was elected to the state legislature, in which he served for one term, during which period he was largely instrumental in securing the passage of some wise and beneficial laws. His life was one of intense activity and usefulness and when he died after an operation on the nth of May, 1898, at the age of fifty-two years, his demise was the occasion of deep and widespread regret. He belonged to the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and his religious faith was that of the Presbyterian church, to which he always loyally ahered. In 1909 Mrs. Burling removed to Lincoln and purchased a pleasant home at No. 2039 South Twenty-third street, where she has since resided. She is well known in the county and has the high esteem of all with whom she has been brought in contact. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 10, 13 |
| Burnham, S. W. S. W. BURNHAM, farmer and stock dealer, was born in 1845, in Maine, and after leaving school, at the age of seventeen, enlisted in the army in the Seventeenth Maine, Company C, and participated in all of the principal battles of the army of the Potomac, and after the battle of Chauntillise was presented with a gold medal for acts of bravery, by Gen. Sickles, and during active service was promoted to First Lieutenant, and mustered out in 1865, at Portland, Me. After which engaged in the nursery business, in Maine, for about five years. Sold out and went to Kentucky, remaining there four years, carrying on the same business, and in 1876 came to Lincoln, Neb., and purchased an improved farm of some 200 acres, as well as a section and a half of herd land west of the farm, all situated in Yankee Precinct, Section 3 and 4, Township 9, Range 6, and engaged in stock raising, his herd consisting principally of graded cattle and hogs, and is considered to be one of the most prominent dealers in stock in the county. Was married to a Miss Sarah Deep, of Glasgow, Ky. Has been a Mason for sixteen years, and belongs to Lodge 55, State of Maine; also a member of the Grand Army of the Republic. |
| Burnham, Silas H. SILAS H. BURNHAM, attorney at law, came to Lincoln in December, 1880, and has been engaged in practice here since January 1, 1881, though he gives most of his attention to money loaning on real estate and other good security. He was born in Norway, Oxford Co., Me., April 12, 1848. That was his home until he came to Lincoln. He was educated at the schools of his native place and at Dartmouth College, graduating there in 1874. He was married at Glasgow, Ky., in October, 1876, to Eliza Lewis, a native of Kentucky. They have two children--Sarah L., and Joseph. Mr. B. is a member of K. of P., and of the Union Club. |
| Burr, A. D. A. D. BURR, Clerk of the District Court for Lancaster County, came to Nebraska in the spring of 1869, and made several trips between that date and his permanent location, in the spring of 1874. In the summer of 1875 he was appointed Deputy County Clerk, which position he held two years. September 7, 1878, by authority of the Legislature, Hon. S. B. Pound, Judge of the District Court, Second Judicial District of Nebraska, appointed Mr. Burr Clerk of the District Court for Lancaster County, and the Legislature of 1879 making that office an elective one, he was elected to that position, October, 1879. His term expires in 1884. He was born at St. Charles, Kane Co., Ill., January 20, 1845. From 1852 to 1862 he lived at Dixon, Lee Co., and then enlisted in Battery D, First Illinois Artillery, serving three years. After the fall of Atlanta in 1864, and until his discharge at Louisville, Ky., June, 1865, he was private secretary for Maj.-Gen. Frank P. Blair, commanding the Seventeenth Army Corps. He located at Chicago and entered the army of commercial tourists, known as traveling men, and followed that profession until the fire in October, 1871, which swept occupation and home, No. 186 N. Dearborn street, into ashes. He then went to New York City, No. 93 Wall street, in the brokerage business, and there remained until he came to Nebraska. He is a member of G. A. R., and is Ex-quartermaster of Farragut Post, No. 25, Department of Nebraska, and was a Delegate to the last National Encampment at Indianapolis, Ind. He is also an A., F. & A. M. |
| Burr, Carlos C. CARLOS C. BURR, attorney at law, came to Lincoln June 26, 1868, and has been engaged in practice all of the time since, except he worked for bread and butter for a time at the carpenters' trade, and helped to build the Statesman's office, old Catholic Church and other buildings. He was a member of the first City Council, and of the State Legislature in 1873-74. He was born at St. Charles, Kane Co. Ill., and reared at Dixon, Lee County. He read law with Hon. J. K. Edsall, at Dixon. He was married to Mary E. Smith, a native of Lee County, at Dixon, Ill., June 22, 1868. They have four children--Frank S., Bertie O., Grace and Helen. Mr. B. is a member of the K. of P. He enlisted in Company E, One Hundred and Fortieth Illinois Volunteer Infantry, in March, 1864, and served until February, 1865, when he re enlisted in Company D, Fifteenth Illinois Volunteer Infantry, joining the regiment at Raleigh, N. C. He has President Lincoln's thanks for meritorious services, and was finally mustered out in November, 1865. |
| Burr, Lionel C. LIONEL C. BURR, attorney at law, was born at St. Charles, Kane Co., Ill. in July, 1847, and was reared at Dixon, Ill. He lived at the latter place until he entered the army in December, 1862, in Battery F, Illinois Artillery. He served until the summer of 1865, when he was mustered out. He was engaged in the Atlanta campaign up to the capture of that place, and was laid up from wounds only two weeks during his service. He returned to Dixon, and for four years prior to coming to Lincoln, in October, 1872, he read law at Winona, Minn. He commenced his practice here. He was married at Dixon, Ill., October 12, 1868, to Aldana Giles, a native of New Hampton, N. H. They have two children--Charles L., aged twelve; and May A., aged seven. |
|
DANIEL MERCER BUTLER.
Daniel Mercer Butler, founder and publisher of the Nebraska Legal News, was for about eighteen years a resident of Lincoln. He was bom in Springdale, Iowa, January 3, 1853, a son of Moses V. and Emily (Schooley) Butler, who were natives of Ohio and were adherents of the Society of Friends, or Quakers. The father devoted his life to merchandising and in early manhood removed to Springdale, Iowa, where his remaining days were passed. He there died in 1886, while his wife died in 1907. Daniel M. Butler supplemented a public school education by study in the State University of Iowa at Iowa City and later he took up the study of law, graduating from the Des Moines Law School. He located for practice at Northwood, Iowa, where he remained for a short time, but in 1883 removed to Osceola, Nebraska, where he turned his attention to newspaper publication, becoming the owner and editor of the Osceola Record. After eight years there spent he went to David City, Nebraska, where he published the David City Tribune until 1892. In that year he arrived in Lincoln and established the Nebraska Legal News, which he continued to publish until his death, which occurred January 9, 1910, after a short illness. Mr. Butler had been married in June, i88z, to Miss Mary E. Pershing, a daughter of John F. and Mary E. (Thompson) Pershing, who were natives of Pennsylvania and Tennessee respectively. The father, who engaged in merchandising, removed to Missouri, settling at Laclede, the county seat of Linn county. While there residing he enlisted for service in the Civil war and was engaged in military duty for four years, operating a sutler's store during that period. Subsequently he went to Chicago, where he engaged in business throughout his remaining days. His wife died in 1904, while he passed away in March. 1907. In their family were nine children, of whom four are yet living, including General John J. Pershing of the United States Army, who is now (1916), the center of interest because of his operations upon the Mexican border. Their daughter, Mrs. Butler, still makes her home in Lincoln and since the death of her husband has continued the publication of the Nebraska Legal News with office at Eleventh and M streets. She is a member of the Episcopal church while Mr. Butler adhered to the Society of Friends. He was also a member of the Masonic fraternity and of the Sons and Daughters of Protection. His political allegiance was given to the republican party and he was very active in politics and in public affairs, cooperating earnestly in all measures that he deemed beneficial to the public and occupying a position of leadership in relation to many plans and projects for general improvement and development. As the editor of the Legal News he gave to the profession a publication of marked value, his previous connection with the bar well qualifying him to understand the needs of the profession. The publication sets forth the latest decisions of widespread interest and many other legal points of worth. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 131-132 |
| Butler, Levi W. Levi W., Butler of University Place is now living retired save for the supervision which he gives to his business interests. He was bom in Erie county, Pennsylvania, on the 2nd of August, 1841, and was reared and educated in that county, remaining upon the home farm until he was about twenty-one years of age when he was married and began his independent career, turning his attention to farming and dairying. He followed those occupations until 1879 when he came to Nebraska and purchased a farm in Saunders county. He bought his land from the railroad and it was totally unimproved when it came into his possession, but as soon as possible he brought it under cultivation and erected substantia] buildings thereon. He resided there until 1890 when he removed to University Place as he desired his children to take advantage of the excellent educational opportunities here. Not long after taking up his residence in the town he erected a livery bam and he continued in the livery business for eleven or twelve years. During part of that time he also operated a hack line to Havelock, but on the building of a street car line to that place he discontinued his hack service. Later he also disposed of his livery business and he subsequently turned his attention to dealing in brick, sand and concrete, etc., furnishing these materials for a great many buildings. In 1910 he erected the building in which the postoffice is situated and in 1913 built the remainder of the Butler building. The entire structure is fifty by ninety' feet in dimensions and is two stories high. On the first floor, in addition to the postoffice, there are a number of stores and also Dr. Walker's office, and Judge Gaylord's office is located on the second floor, although the greater part of it is given over to modem apartments. Mr. Butler gives careful attention to his investments, which yield him a good return, and also collects for the gas company. On New Year's Day, 1862, occurred the marriage of Mr. Butler and Miss Mary Owen, a native of Erie county, Pennsylvania, where she grew to womanhood. She is still living and, like her husband, is vigorous and active. To their union have been bom four children : Jennie, who married Horace Godden and died at the age of thirty-nine years; Alva E., who is deputy sheriff of Lancaster county; Gary L., who was one of the first students in the Nebraska Wesleyan University and who owns a barber shop in his father's building; and Clyde A., who is conducting a cleaning and pressing establishment also located in his father's block. Mr. and Mrs. Butler have been members of the Methodist church since they were in their teens and they have taken an active part in the work of that organization. Mr. Butler aided materially in the erection of the local church edifice, has served as trustee, and contributes liberally to the support of the church and of the Nebraska Wesleyan University. He was a charter member of the Knights of Pythias Lodge of Havelock and in his life exemplifies the spirit of fraternity upon which the order is based. He has gained many friends since his removal to University Place and those who are most closely associated with him hold him in the highest esteem, which is proof of his genuine worth. LINCOLN: The Capitol City and Lancaster Co., NE, Vol. 2; Chicago, Illinois, The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, (c) 1916, pp. 31-32 |
| Butt, O. F. O. F. BUTT, locomotive engineer, B. & M. R. R., in Nebraska, was born in Burlington, Iowa, June 6, 1857. Came to Nebraska in 1875, and located at Plattsmouth. He then entered the service of the B. & M. R. R., as engineer on the Ferry Line, between Plattsmouth and East Plattsmouth. Has been in charge of a locomotive about three years. |