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Jasper County, Iowa

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John Simpson

Mr. John Simpson was born in Logan County, Illinois, September 4, 1859, and he is the son of John D. and Isabel (McKee) Simpson.  The paternal grandparents, David and Mary Ann Simpson, were natives of Scotland, from which country they immigrated to America in 1818 and located in Columbia, Illinois, when that country was still practically a wilderness, locating with a Scotch colony in Logan County.  David Simpson was a blacksmith by trade, and when the war with Mexico broke out he took part, making a gallant soldier under our flag.   He and his wife spent their last years in Illinois. The subject's maternal grandparents, John and Ann McKee, were natives of Holland, and from that country they emigrated to the United States about 1823 and they, too, located among the pioneers in Logan County, Illinois. There Mr. McKee ran a mill the rest of his life, he having learned the miller's trade in his native land, though he farmed later in life.  The mother of the subject, who was the second child of her parents born in America, was reared in Illinois, as was also Mr. Simpson's father, and there they married.  There the father learned the blacksmith's trade when a boy, but later he went to farming and became the owner of about two hundred and eighty acres of land just south of East St. Louis, but finally retired from farming, went to speculating and lost what he had accumulated.  He and his wife are both now deceased.  They were the parents of nine children, of whom John, of this sketch, was the oldest and is the only one now living.  He was educated in the public schools of Columbia, Illinois, and reared on the home farm and he took up farming for a livelihood when a young man and there continued agricultural pursuits in his native state with unabating success until 1910.   In that year he married and came to Jasper County, Iowa, and is now successfully operating a neat little farm of sixty-three acres in Lynn Grove Township, which they own; he is also the owner of eighty acres of valuable land in the Pecos valley, Texas.  He is a breeder of Poland-China hogs and shorthorn cattle.

 Politically, Mr. Simpson is independent, but formerly he voted the Democratic ticket.  In Illinois he was constable for several years, also marshal. Both he and his wife are members of the Methodist church and he belongs to the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and both to the Rebekahs, she being a leading member of the latter, having passed all the chairs in the same; she is at present chaplain of the local lodge.

 On August 23, 1910, Mr. Simpson was united in marriage with Mrs. Anna Thompson, widow of J. A. Thompson, her maiden name having been Meredith; her parents were John and Martha (Brown) Meridith, the father born in South Carolina and the mother in Kentucky, he in the year 1809 and she in 1823.  Mr. Meredith's parents died when he was young and he was reared by an uncle and moved to Illinois, but later in life moved to Iowa and here married. Mrs. Simpson's maternal grandparents, Payton and Elizabeth Brown, were natives of Kentucky and at a very early date moved to Illinois, in which state they spent the balance of their lives.   She married a Mr. Sweet in Illinois, by which union five children were born, and about 1874 they came to Jasper County, Iowa, locating in Lynn Grove Township, and here his death occurred.  The father probably married in Kentucky, and he came to Iowa in 1850 and located near Newton.  He was a blacksmith by trade. His wife died in early life and in 1853 he married a second time, the widow Sweet being his second choice.  They moved to Lynn Grove Township, and seven children were born to this union, five of whom arc still living, namely: Henry C., Mrs. Sarah Crews, Mrs. Belle Owens, Jonathan and Mrs. Simpson.

 To Mrs. Simpson four children were born by her first husband, Mr. Thompson, namely:  Orville, deceased; Everett, deceased; Melvin, Alberta is deceased.   The death of Mr. Thompson occurred on September 21, 1907. The death of John Meredith, mentioned above, occurred on April 18, 1888, in Lynn Grove Township, and his wife died on February 14, 1911.

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Last updated: July 23, 2001.