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Jasper County, Iowa
Historical and Genealogical Data Exchange
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P.
C. Norton Mr. C. P.
Norton was born in Concord, Ohio, July 18, 1831.
He is the son of Eden P. and Louisa (Wells) Norton, the father born in
Vermont and the mother in Connecticut. They were married in Ohio. The elder
Norton was a descendant of the famous Mayflower band.
He was a shoemaker all his life. In 1845 he came west as far as the
Mississippi river, having peddled shoes all the way, through the wild and
practically unimproved country. Returning
to Ohio, he spent the remainder of his life there; however, his death occurred
at Monmouth, Illinois, while on a visit to his children, being then sixty-two
years of age. His widow died at the home of their son, C. P., of this sketch, in
Prairie City, Iowa, at the age of seventy-nine years.
They were the parents of eight children, only two or whom are yet living,
C. P. and H. M., the latter a physician of Kent, Iowa.
Timothy died in infancy; Sidney G. died when ten years of age; W. W. died
in Kent, Iowa, in 1911; L. D. died in Cincinnati, where he was for years
superintendent of the Power Hall; he was a man of prominence, a fine mechanic;
he was one of the Ohio commissioners to the Centennial Exposition at
Philadelphia in 1876. Flavia A. Norton, who married Thomas Cannon, is deceased;
N. J. died in Louisville, Kentucky. When
seventeen years of age C. P. Norton went to Buffalo, New York, to learn the
mechanic's trade, and after remaining there two years he went back to Ohio,
where, with two brothers, he engaged in the manufacture of forks, etc.
Two years later he went to North Norfolk, Connecticut, and married
Aurelia R. Norton, of that place. They
were not related. The young couple at once started west, having but fifty
dollars capital, going by rail and water to New Boston, Iowa. The first work he
did was carpentering in Toolsboro. He
and his wife started to housekeeping in a blacksmith shop in 1854. He made all
his own furniture except one chair, which he found in a pile of driftwood in the
river. For three years he remained there and did all kinds of building, his wife
teaching school the meanwhile. He
then moved to Warren County, Illinois, and ran a sawmill for five years. He then
went to Roseville, that state, and began the repair of wagons and later the
manufacture of shanghai corn plows. Later
he secured a patent on a double corn plow, which he manufactured two years.
It was forty-six years ago that he came to Prairie City, Iowa.
He sold McCormick harvesters for three years, then sold the various
machines manufactured by the Fairbanks-Morse company for two years, after which
he began the hardware business by himself, later taking Julius Bisbee as a
partner, the firm being known as Norton & Bisbee, and they continued with
much success for a period of twenty years, enjoying an extensive trade with the
surrounding country. At the end of that time the firm was forced to take over a
clothing store on a debt, and this they operated for two years, then sold out.
Since then Mr. Norton has led a retired life, having laid by a
competency. For twenty-four winters he has gone to Florida and other southern
points, and he made one trip to Cuba and there narrowly escaped being
quarantined on account of yellow fever. Mr.
Norton proved his patriotism by enlisting in the Union army, in the fall of
1863, being a member of the noted Mechanics Corps, and was sent to the front,
and assigned to such work as road and bridge building, and he saw much hard and
laborious service. He had attempted
to enlist in 1861 as a regular soldier, but was refused on account of a
defective eye and the loss of a finger. After
receiving an honorable discharge he returned to Monmouth, Illinois. Four
children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Norton, three of whom died in infancy, and
the other, Abbie, died when six years old.
Mrs. Norton's death occurred in January 1910, in Florida and she was
buried there. Had she lived until March 4, 1910, less than two months
longer, they would have been married fifty-four years.
They raised Hannah Adams, who married Fred Heaton, who has been with the
hardware firm of Little & Gill nineteen years. They also reared a boy, Thomas Stevens, who goes by the name
of Norton. Mr.
Norton is a worthy member of the Methodist church. He is a strong Republican and
is deeply interested in temperance work. The Past and Present of Jasper County, Gen. James B. Weaver, Editor-In-Chief, 1912 B.F. Bowen Co., Indianapolis, IN, p. 1194. |
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