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Jasper County, Iowa
Historical and Genealogical Data Exchange
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Maynard
Ellsworth Penquite Distinguished
as an official, an attorney and public-spirited citizen, the name of Maynard
Ellsworth Penquite, the present popular and efficient mayor of Colfax, has long
been closely interwoven with the history and development of Jasper County; in
fact, few men in this locality are better or more favorably known and none have
exercised a more potent influence in moulding and directing public opinion.
The family of which he is an honorable representative is old and
eminently respectable. Mr.
Penquite was born in this County on January 20, 1872, and he is the son of
William H. and Sarah I. (Hoping) Penquite.
The father came to this County in 1866, locating near Greencastle and
there became well established through years of hard and consecutive endeavor in
general farming. He was a veteran
of the Civil War, having enlisted in the Twenty-second Ohio Heavy Artillery at
Wilmington, Ohio, in 1863 and he served very gallantly and faithfully for three
years; however, his knee having been injured early in the service, he was on
detached duty most of the time. He
was the first postmaster at Mingo and for some time he was clerk of his
Township. He was a member of the
Grand Army of the Republic, Duncan Post No. 258.
His parents, John and Mary Penquite, spent their lives in Ohio, of which
state he was a native. The
death of William H. Penquite occurred on October 24, 1909. His wife was the
daughter of Jeremiah and Jane (Stewart) Hoping, who came to Jasper County, Iowa,
in 1857, having formerly lived near Xenia, Ohio. They located near Greencastle
and there they both died. Maynard
E. Penquite was the only son in a family of four children, his sisters being
Claudia, the wife of Emanuel Fry, of Mingo; Bessie is the wife of J. T. Stitt,
of Des Moines; Mae Penquite lives at Ira, Iowa, and is the wife of Leon
Richardson. The subject's mother owns the old home place which she has kept well-improved
and well cultivated. Mr.
Penquite was married in Jasper County to Lola E. Warell, a most worthy
representative of an excellent family, being the daughter of Charles and Eva
Warell, the father having located in Clear Creek Township when a boy and here
grew up with the country. His wife
was known in her maidenhood as Eva Clapper, daughter of Harman and Katherine
(Harsh) Clapper, who came to Jasper County in the latter forties or early
fifties and located in Clear Creek Township.
To Mr. and Mrs. Penquite the following children have been born: Leon
Maynard, Gladys Mae, Vergil Ellsworth, Morris Oral and Helen Lola. The
subject grew up on the home farm where he worked during his boyhood while not
attending the public schools. Turning
his attention to the law, he took a course in the Law Department of Drake
University at Des Moines, where he made a splendid record, and from which
institution he was graduated in 1899. Soon
afterwards he was admitted to the bar and he began practice at Collins, Story
County. January 1, 1903, he came to Colfax, where he has continued to the
present time with ever-increasing success, being regarded as a painstaking,
persistent and honorable advocate, ever vigilant of his client's interests and a
forceful and logical pleader before a jury.
He has figured prominently in the local courts for the past ten years and
takes ran with the leading legal lights of the County.
He has been justice of the peace for three terms, discharging the duties
of this office in a most worthy manner his decisions being characterized by
fairness to all parties and given in a manner as to indicate his familiarity
with all phases of jurisprudence. In
spring of 1909 he was elected mayor of the town of Colfax, which office he held
to the present time in a manner that reflects much credit upon himself an to the
entire satisfaction of all concerned. Mr. Penquite is a pleasant man to know personally, genial, honest an Straight forward in all his transactions, a man eminently meriting the high esteem in which he is held. The Past and Present of Jasper County, Gen. James B. Weaver, Editor-In-Chief, 1912 B.F. Bowen Co., Indianapolis, IN, p. 635. |
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