William H. McIninch, a retired farmer in Auburn, with a fine farm in London precinct, Brownville postoffice, is one of the oldest living settlers of Nemaha county and likewise one of its most successful farmers and businessmen. He began life in youth with no capital and since earning his first money his record has been one of constant progress. He has been one of the large landowners of the county, but most of it he has either sold or allotted to his children. In addition to his material prosperity, he has been generous with personal work and means in aiding the cause of religion and education, and has never failed to give a good account of himself in whatever relation he has been placed with society and his fellow citizens.
Mr. McIninch was born in Tuscarora county, Ohio, March 20, 1836. His grandfather, James McIninch, was born in Ireland and had two children, John and Sarah.
John McIninch, the only son of James McIninch, was born in New York City, July 29, 1808, and died in Nebraska, January 16, 1894. He was reared and educated in New York City, and was a school teacher in Ohio and Missouri. He was married in Tuscarora county, Ohio, April 2, 1829, to Miss Sarah Johnson, who was born on Laurel Hill creek, Pennsylvania, September 22, 1813, and died in Andrew county, Missouri, in 1851. They were parents of eight children: Esop Edgar, born in Tuscarora county, Ohio, in 1830, died in Linn county, Oregon, in 1862, having been a pioneer there in 1852, he was unmarried, and left an estate including the one hundred and sixty acres which had been given him by the United States government. Charles Postly McIninch, was born in 1834, was named after his material great-uncle a prominent and wealthy New Yorker, who has one of the fine monuments that adorn Greenwood
cemetery of that city; C. P. McIninch died in Oklahoma in 1901, leaving a family of sons and daughters who are now scattered throughout the southwest. Benjamin F. McIninch is in Nemaha county. William H. is the fourth of the children. Levi Johnson, a teacher, died while at his work in Canton, Ohio, in the prime of life, leaving a wife and a daughter. Catherine Ann died at the age of twenty-three while with her aunt and uncle Caldwell in New York city. Amos Anderson is a retired merchant in St. Joseph, Missouri, and has three sons. David G. is a farmer east of St. Joseph, and has three daughters and one son.
William H. McIninch was reared on a farm, having limited educational advantages in the primitive schoolhouses of the time and locality. At the age of seventeen, soon after his mother's death, he left home and went with Hux Bivens to drive stock across the plains to Oregon. He was four and a half months from St. Joseph, Missouri, to Albany, Linn county, Oregon, and from there he went to the northwest corner of California in the spring of 1854. He was engaged in placer gold mining there until the fall of 1857, and then returned home by way of New York city, and in the same fall came to this part of Nebraska and pre-empted the one hundred and sixty acres which still forms part of his farm, paying for it with a Mexican land warrant. There were but few settlers here then, the nearest neighbor being a mile away. The landscape presented a picture of an undulating stretch of prairie, covered with wild flowers and grass, and was a dreary scene to one accustomed to the rol1 and woodland of more eastern states. He made his first dwelling of one room, built of poles, and with one door and one window, and its dimensions were fourteen by sixteen feet. He later helped a squatter prove up some land and received a deed for 40 acres on Snow Island, on which he built a log and mud cabin. In 1860, soon after his marriage, he bought seventy-five acres one mile south west of his place, for one
thousand dollars, and his later purchases were: Five acres of timber on the bluffs near Brownville, for one hundred and twenty-five dollars, forty acres of timber for two hundred and fifty-five dollars; eighty acres of prairie southeast of this farm for two thousand dollars; eighty acres west for eighteen hundred; eighty acres of improved land for fifteen hundred; eighty acres which he purchased near by in 1894 for thirty-six hundred; forty acres one mile south at fourteen hundred; and in 1901 he purchased a half a block in Auburn on which he has erected a beautiful home for his permanent residence. He paid two hundred and seventy-five dollars to the Cumberland Presbyterian institution, Missouri Valley College, at Marshall, Missouri, and has a lot there on which he has paid taxes for ten years. He has sold and traded a great deal of land, and his present farm consists of three hundred and sixty acres, and in the family there are over fifteen hundred acres, with eight sets of buildings.
Mr. McIninch, with the help and co-operation of his wife, has made all he has. He earned his first money by working on a farm in Missouri for Tom McDonald at ten dollars and a half a month. The second house which he built in Nebraska was of hewn logs, and it is now doing duty as a stable. This was replaced by the present brick, story and a half, house, which was built twenty-three years ago, and is beautifully surrounded with flowers and groves which make it a bower of beauty, nearly all year. He has an apple orchard of ten acres, besides a large variety of other fruits, especially peaches. He has sold one ten-acre orchard, and has two others, and has planted twenty acres to fruit. His leading crops is corn, of which he plants from one hundred to two hundred and fifty acres, and from one hundred and six acres in 1902 he sold 5750 bushels. He has often raised as much as ten thousand bushels of corn. He and his wife are about to ensconce themselves in the new home in Auburn,
and the maiden daughter and youngest son will remain on the farm and manage it.
Mr. McIninch volunteered on July 6, 1862, at Brownville, Nebraska and was enrolled in Company G, Second Kansas Cavalry, with which he saw service until the close of the war, for three years. He was under Generals Blunt and Steele in Arkansas. He was captured at Poison Springs, and was held a prisoner for nine months in Tyler and Camp Gross, Texas. After his capture he knew he would be reported among the dead, and he took the first opportunity to ingratiate himself with the Confederate officers, who permitted him to send a letter to his young wife, informing her of his real circumstances. This prison experience was the worst of all his life, and he suffered every physical torment except death, two hundred and ten of his companions in misery dying of disease, mostly of yellow fever. He was finally paroled and sent north, being mustered out at Fort Gibson, Indian Territory, and paid off and discharged at Lawrence, Kansas. The government paid him for his horse and equipment and the clothing he had lost, and he also received twenty-five dollars a month while in the service, having furnished his own horse. He also got four dollars a month pension, which was later raised to eight dollars, and is now twelve.
Mr. McIninch was married on January 27, 1859, to Miss Catherine L. Dunkle, who was born on the banks of the Ohio river, in West Virginia, April 8, 1842, a daughter of Henry and Nancy (Smith) Dunkle. Henry Dunkle was a carpenter and boatbuilder, and died at the age of twenty-six, leaving his wife and this one daughter, having lost one daughter at the age of four. His widow afterward had eight children by James Emmons, and she died at Tecumseh, Nebraska, in the fall of 1902, when nearly eighty-three years of age. Mrs. McIninch came with the family in 1856 by water as far as Omaha, thence to Atchison
county, Missouri, and her step-father took a claim in Nemaha county. The latter died in 1890, when about seventy-eight years old.
Mr. and Mrs. McIninch have had ten children: Ophelia is the wife of Casmer Barnes; James H. is a farmer near here, and has a wife and one son; Willa Kate, born in 1864 while her father was in the army, was named after her father and mother; David P. is a farmer on the Auburn road, and has two sons and one daughter; Clara Belle is the wife of D. E. Zook, a farmer near here, and has six children living; M. S. is an attorney in Auburn, and is married; Charles D. died at the age of sixteen months; Barnett J., unmarried, is on the home farm and in partnership with his father; one son died in infancy; and Julia Nellie is a student in the Auburn high school, class of 1904.
Mr. McIninch now votes the Prohibition ticket, having come over from the Democratic ranks. He is one of the surviving members of the Grand Army of the Republic. He has been a school director, but has had little time for active participation in public or political affairs. He and his wife are members of the Cumberland Presbyterian church, and the children have been baptized in the church. He is an elder, and has been a member of the assembly three times.
Peter Carey is one of the oldest and best known residents of the town of Peru, where for thirty-five years he has been a familiar figure in the streets and personally known to every citizen both through official and business connections and social and personal association. He is the pioneer and oldest established drayman of the place, has carried nearly all the mail that the town has ever received or sent, and in his duties as
chief police officer and representative of the majesty of the law has on more than one occasion made a reputation for coolness and courage while upholding law and order. In every relation of life, whether as soldier on the hardfought battlefield of the great Civil war, as a business man, as a public official, or as a public-spirited citizen, he has been efficient, enterprising, industrious, honest and brave, and deserves the regard and respect which are so gracefully accorded him by all who know him.
Mr. Carey was born in Pike County, Illinois, January 12, 1838, a son of Peter and Matilda (Constantine) Carey, who were of English descent and both natives of New York city, where the former was born February 28, 1811, and they were married in 1832. Peter Carey, Sr., was a baker in New York city, but after his marriage went to Illinois and engaged in farming during the remainder of his life. He died in 1898, and his wife in 1883. They were the parents of five children of whom three are now living: Margaret, who has some ten children; Peter; and Cyrena Claus, who is a widow in Pike county, Illinois, and has two children.
Mr. Carey was reared on his father’s farm in Illinois, and enjoyed common school educational privileges. When the Civil war came on he volunteered, in July, 1861, in Company K, Second Illinois cavalry, and gave four years and two months of loyal and devoted service to the country which he loves so well. He was commissary sergeant of his company. He was many times exposed to the missiles of death and had many narrow escapes, but his reckless courage and and dashing impetuosity seemed invulnerable, although bullets often pierced his clothes and his comrades fell beside him. At Holly Springs, Mississippi, his regiment was captured, and he was the last man to be taken, and it was almost a miracle that he was not shot down for his brave resistance. He was in
hospital at New Orleans, for some two weeks, being afflicted with a peculiar southern fever, which caused him to sleep soundly from sunrise to sunset, and the only cure was a change of climate. When he was captured he weighted one hundred and sixty pounds and only one hundred and twenty-six on his release, but after leaving New Orleans he gained a pound a day until he weighed one hundred and seventy-six pounds. He received his honorable discharge at St. Augustine, Texas, September 25, 1865.
He then returned to Illinois and engaged in farming for two years. he came to Peru, Nebraska, in 1869. For at least thirty years he has carried the mail to and from the trains, seldom being off duty. He started the first regular dray wagon in the town, and is now probably the oldest drayman in the state. He has carried the express for the Normal College for thirty years. A few years ago he was thrown from his dray while the horse was running away and for two weeks was unconscious and given up for dead, and was confined to his bed for two months, but his old veteran spirit brought him safely through and he is once more active and engaged on his regular tasks. He is a stanch Republican in politics and has served his fellow citizens on the town board and also as city marshal. In the latter capacity he has had some narrow escapes from crazy men, but the coolness and courage which he had displayed before on the battlefield here stood him in good stead, and in each case he performed his duty unflinchingly.
Mr. Carey was married in September, 1888, to Mrs. Susan Debuque, who was born in England in 1841, and came across the Atlantic at the age of sixteen years, being a sister of John and Phillip Palmer, who are written of elsewhere in this work. She had been married twice before her union with Mr. Carey, and had five children by her first husbands. Mr. and Mrs. Carey have no children of their own, but have an adopted
son who is the idol of their affections and the cheer of the home. His name is Ezra Peter Carey, and he was born April 18, 1890, a son of Albert Debuque and a grandson of Mrs. Carey. He was adopted at the age of eleven months, and he also has a sister and a brother. He is an industrious little fellow, and he and his foster father own and operate some ninety acres on the Missouri bottoms, for which they paid two hundred dollars in 1901 and which is now worth six hundred. This land was once the bed of the river, and on it they raise corn and also have about thirty acres in vegetables and truck. Mr. Carey also owns two lots and two buildings in town, and his wife has one building. Mrs. Carey was reared in the Methodist faith, and is a most estimable woman and popular among her many friends.
George Buchanan Armstrong, one of the foremost farmers and stock raisers of Nemaha county, residing in Bedford precinct, Howe postoffice, has lived here nearly all his life, since childhood, and has made unqualified success of his ventures. He is a man of progressive ideas and public spirit, and both in matters of individual interest and those affecting the general welfare of his course of action and counsel are reliable, and accomplish results.
Mr. Armstrong's father, Josiah Armstrong, was born near Wheeling, Virginia, April 3, 1821, and died in Nemaha county, on the old home farm which he settled in in 1870. He was married on Thanksgiving day, 1838, in Pennsylvania, to Miss Catherine Morehead, who was born in Pennsylvania, September 10, 1816, and died in Nebraska, September, 19, 1892. They came to Nebraska in 1864, and three years later settled
on the prairie and began, without capital and in the pioneer fashion to make themselves a home. They were successful people, and lived irreproachable lives of industry. They were members of the Methodist church. Their children, all born in Ohio, are as follows: William, who died at the age of three years in Pennsylvania; Robert, a stock rancher in Rooks county, Kansas, has nine children living, eight daughters; one died in infancy; Mary Ann, the widow of Henry Halterman, lives at Verdon Richardson county, Nebraska, and has six children; Telitha, the wife of Albert Douglass, at Hiawatha, Kansas, has seven children living; Elizabeth, wife of George F. Huntington, died in California at the age of fifty, leaving four children; Lauina, the wife of Perry Montgomery, of Stella, Nebraska, has six children; George B. is the eighth in order of birth; Josiah, who was unmarried was killed by his seven-horse team at Oxnard, California, where he was hauling beets for the largest beet-sugar factory in the world.
George B. Armstrong was born in Jackson county, Ohio, June 25, 1856, and was brought to Nehama county, Nebraska, on October 12, 1864. He was reared to farm life and enjoyed a fair amount of schooling, stopping at the ninth grade, then the highest in his nineteenth year. He remained at home until his marriage, which occurred when he was twenty-six years old, and then began farming on his own account. He now owns three hundred and twenty acres in two farms, and he makes stock-raising and buying his leading enterprises. He has as high as two and three hundred head of cattle at a time. He bought his present farm in 1889, paying six thousand dollars for it, and he has built all the buildings except the house. He planted his own orchard, and he has two of the finest barns in the vicinity. The cattle barn is fifty-two by fifty-six feet, with twenty foot posts, and will shelter seventy tons of fodder and fifty cattle. His hay and horse barn is thirty-eight by sixty-four feet,
with twenty-foot posts, and will stall fifty-seven horses and hold eighty tons of hay. He raises about one hundred hogs each year, and about twenty horses.
March 18, 1883, Mr. Armstrong was married to Miss Lizzie Hughes, who was born near Brownville, April 7, 1861, a daughter of R. V. Hughes and Elizabeth (Cullen) Hughes, the former born near Dayton, Ohio, and the latter in Pennsylvania. They were married in Indiana, and came west in 1859. Mr. Hughes was a lawyer by profession, and was honored with all the offices of the county during his residence here. He had been a school teacher, and was a man of refinement and education, being a deep reader of all current and standard literature. He gathered the collection of fruit which took the premium among the exhibits from Nebraska at the World's fair in Boston. Mrs. Armstrong is one of ten children, and the others now living are: Jennie, the wife of Tom Ross, her second husband, has seven children; Mrs. Armstrong is next in age; Catherine is the wife of Charles Wheeler, of this county, and has eight children; Edward went to California at the age of nineteen and has a farm of one hundred acres there, and is the father of four children; John is unmarried, and living in Howe; Minnie is the wife of Tom Lighthill, in Oklahoma; Rose is the wife of Lee Nunn, in western Nebraska, and has seven children. Mrs. Armstrong was educated in the Brownville high school, and taught for three years.
The following children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Armstrong: Edna, who was educated in the normal and taught for a time, is the wife of Mike Beauchamp, who farms the old homestead; Rosa has finished school and has a teacher's certificate; Boyd, born January 10, 1889, is at home and in school; Hope Mabel was born September 4, 1892; and Bob was born on Christmas day of 1898. Mr. Armstrong has been affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows for the past twenty years,
and has passed all the chairs; he is also a Woodman of the World, and he and his wife are charter members of the Rebekahs. In politics he is a Democrat, and has been school director for nine years. Mr. Armstrong's parents held their golden wedding anniversary on November 29, 1888, and at their death they had the unusual record of leaving thirty-three grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.
Mrs. Sarah Elizabeth Fuller, an honored resident of the city of Nemaha, Nebraska, is the widow of Job Fuller, whose death occurred at his home three miles from Nemaha in 1900, when nearly sixty-nine years of age. He was born in the county of Kent, England, about eight miles west of London, and was reared as a farmer lad, remaining at home until reaching years of maturity. He then sailed from Liverpool to New York city, spending two months on the ocean and during that time celebrated his birthday. He came to this country with small means, as his parents were in limited circumstances, but was a scholarly man and possessed a retentive memory. For about five years Mr. Fuller made his home in Canada, during which time he was employed as a farm hand, and was there married in about 1857. He then removed with his wife and two children to Illinois, in which state his wife died, leading two of the four children born to them. During his residence in that state he also served as a soldier in the Civil War.
Soon after the close of that struggle, in 1866, Mr. Fuller came to Nebraska, and in that year was married to Mrs. Beckwith, the widow of Asal Beckwith and also of Jesse Ewing. She was twice married. She is a daughter of Huston and Lavina (Livingston) Russell, the former of
whom was born in Kentucky in 1807 and the latter in Pennsylvania in 1819. Their marriage was celebrated in 1837, and they became the parents of ten children, only three of whom grew to years of maturity, namely: Mrs. Fuller, who was born in Shelby county, Indiana, August 24, 1836; Tirrell, and agriculturist in Nemaha county and Nathaniel, who died in Auburn, Nebraska, June 17, 1903, leaving a wife and six children and a small estate. He also served as a soldier in the Civil war. Mr. and Mrs. Russell removed from Indiana to Iowa, and about five years later, on the 10th of February, 1855, came to Nemaha county, Nebraska, crossing the river on the ice, and at this time the Indians were plentiful but the white settlers few. The city of Nemaha then contained but one small store, poorly stocked, and with the exception of its proprietor, who was named Brown, the only other resident was a Mr. Edwards. Their worldly possessions at the time of their arrival consisted of two yoke of oxen, two cows and two yearlings, and they pre-empted a quarter section of land three-fourths of a mile from Nemaha. Six children blessed the union of Mr. and Mrs. Fuller, but only three are now living, namely: Dora Mertsheimer, whose husband is engaged in the railroad business in Wyoming, and they have three children; John, a resident of Evanston, Wyoming and the father of five children; and Mary, the wife of Theodore Ginn, by whom she has three children, and the family reside in Auburn, Nebraska.
James Raynor, a retired farmer of Auburn, Nebraska, dates his birth in Nottinghamshire, England, May 1, 1834. He is a son of Thomas Raynor, who was born in Lincolnshire, England, December 18, 1796, and who emigrated with his family to America in 1837. Three times
married, by his first wife he had one daughter, by his second wife one son and one daughter, and by his third wife eight children. His third wife was Jane Wetherell, an innkeeper. Their eight children were as follows: Elizabeth, wife of George W. McIntyre, of Lowell, Massachusetts, has one son; Thomas Wetherell, a retired railroad man of Jackson, Michigan, has one son and one daughter; George, who died in Waterville, Maine, left a widow and one daughter; James, whose name introduces this sketch; Jane, wife of B. S. Gillman, of San Francisco, California; Robert W., a locomotive engineer and foreman of the round-house at Battle Creek, Michigan, has four sons; John w., who died in Kansas City, Missouri, April 26, 1896; and William B., of Muskegon, Michigan, has been twice married and has one son and two daughters. The father of this large family died in Orange, Cuyahoga county, Ohio, March 16, 1864, and the motehr died at the home of her son in Mount Vernon, Illinois, in April 1875, at the age of seventy-four years.
James Raynor was three years old when he was brought by his parents ot this country., and his boyhood days were spent in Vermont, the removal of the family to Ohio being in 1854, when he was twenty. He attended the public schools up to the time he was seventeen, when he began learning the trade of carriage painter. After serving an apprenticeship of three years to this trade, he continued work at it until the outbreak of the Civil war.
August 15, 1861, Mr. Raynor volunteered his services for the protection of the country into which he had been adopted. At this time he was in Albany, Green county, Wisconsin. As a member of Company E, Thirteenth Wisconsin, he served one year to the day. He was then transferred to the Thirty-first Regiment, Company E, the fortunes of which he shared until July 6, 1865, when he was mustered out at Madison,
Wisconsin. He was during the first year of his army life made a second lieutenant, later was promoted to first lieutenant; and was in command of the company twenty-two months, as first lieutenant. He was brevetted captain. Mr. Raynor was in four hard-fought battles--Parksville, Peach Tree Creek, Nashville and Decatur.
After the war, Mr. Raynor returned to Albany, Wisconsin, and engaged in the manufacture of wagons and carriages, under the firm name of The Tilleys & Raynor. Selling his interest in the establishment in December, 1869, Mr. Raynor came further west the following year, landing in Washington county, Kansas, in June, where he engaged in farming. He still owns one hundred and sixty acres of land in Barnes township, Washington county, Kansas.
April 9, 1854, Mr. Raynor married Miss Harriet Vrooman, a native of Ohio, born in 1831, daughter of Frederick and Elizabeth (Becker) Vrooman, both of Otsego county, New York. To Mr. and Mrs. Raynor were given two sons. One died in infancy and the other, Willis J., is a practicing physician of Auburn. Mrs. Raynor died October 31, 1902, in Barnes, Washington county, Kansas, at the age of seventy-two years, after the term of their married life had lengthened out to nearly fifty years. A true wife, living mother, noble woman-her death was a sad loss to Mr. Raynor.
Fraternally, Mr. Raynor is identified with the Free and Accepted Masons, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Grand Army of the Republic. In the last named organization he was post commander three terms, two terms in Beadle Post, Nebraska, and one in Barnes Post, Washington county, Kansas. He has been a life-long Republican. He was a justice of the peace and police judge for many years in both Kansas and Nebraska. Mr. Raynor may be called a self-educated man. All his life has been a close observer and a careful and constant reader.
Naturally of a genial disposition and with a retentive memory, both physically and mentally well preserved, and with a rare store of interesting reminiscences, he is indeed a cheerful companion for both young and old.
Willis James Raynor, son of James and Harriet Raynor, was born in Wisconsin, January 14, 1856. He attended the district and high schools in his native state, spent two years in the Kansas State Normal School, and then took a course in the Medical College of Ohio, at Cincinnati, where he graduated in 1880. He has also taken two post-graduate courses in New York. After finishing his studies in Cincinnati, Dr. Raynor located in Hardy, Nebraska, where he was engaged in the practice of his profession twelve years. In 1896 he removed to Denver, Colorado, where he had a nice home and where he spent one year practicing medicine. In 1898 he enlisted in the United States service, as assistant surgeon, and was on duty at Fort Logan, Colorado, until June 1899, in full charge of the hospital. With the Twenty-fifth United States Infantry he was ordered to the Philippines, where they landed in due time and where he was in the field during the Lawton campaign. Afterward he was transferred to the general hospital of the regular army, and remained on duty until August, 1900. At this time he secured a leave of absence and came home, being away seven months and returning, accompanied by his family, and with the rank of captain. He was mustered out in December, 1902, and at once embarked for home. He landed in San Francisco, California, the day his mother died in Kansas, but it was not until a week afterward that he reached the old home place and his bereaved father.
Dr. Raynor was married June 5, 1883, at Hardy, Nebraska, to Miss Mary A. Shore, a native of Pennsylvania. She was born May 9, 1858, daughter of Charles and Elizabeth (Whitehead) Shore, both now de-
ceased, her mother having died at the age of sixty-five years and her father at seventy-three. Mrs. Raymond [sic] is one of a family of five children, four of whom reached maturity. To the Doctor and his wife have been given five children: Ivy, May, Iris, Ruth and Willis James, Jr. The son and youngest child was born in the Philippines, April 13, 1902. Like his father before him, Dr. Raynor is a Republican and a member of the Masonic order.
James Cowel, who died at his late home in Bedford precinct, Howe postoffice, Nemaha county, July 4, 1903, at the age of fifty years, was one of the honored old settlers of Southeastern Nebraska, having come here before the admission of the state to the Union. Although he finished his life's work early, his career was filled with useful efforts and was successful from every point of view. His citizenship and manhood were above reproach, and to his family he was generous in fatherly devotion, kind in action, and himself a high ideal for their subsequent life. Both he and his wife were taken from their children when their parental affection and counsel and aid were indispensable, but the son and daughters have bravely taken up the duties of home and life and are carving for themselves honorable places in the world.
Mr. Cowel was a son of Reuben Cowel, who was a farmer of Ohio, from which state he came to Cass county, Indiana, and in 1868 followed his son to Nebraska, where he farmed during the rest of his life. He was a soldier in the Civil war, and was a man of character and ability in every sphere of life. He was twice married, having ten children by his first wife, who died in Delaware county, Ohio. Of the eight sons
and two daughters, two sons died in infancy, and the four now living are : Lida, wife of Adam Wilson, at Red Oak, Iowa; Jay and Andy, farmers of Oklahoma; and the latter a stock dealer; and Uriah, in Lawrence, Michigan.
James Cowel was born in Delaware county, Ohio, December 13, 1852. He came to Nebraska in 1865, and began as a tenant farmer in Nemaha county. He came ot the present homestead of one hundred and sixty acres in 1886, and in 1888 bought it for thirty-five dollars an acre, but it is now worth considerably more. He was a good farmer, and longer life would undoubtedly have made him one of the most prosperous men of the county.
August 21, 1880, Mr. Cowel was married in Sheridan (now Auburn) to Miss Margaret Hughes, a daughter of A. D. T. Hughes, one of the pioneers of this part of the state and whose brother William homesteaded the Cowel farm. Mr. and Mrs. Cowel had four children: Oliver C., who since his father's death has assumed the conduct of the home farm and is doing well; Clara E., who is a teacher and living at home; Dollie C., who is just out of school; and Neva N., aged eleven years and in school. They were all educated in Auburn, and Oliver graduated in 1901, and the two sisters were in the classes of 1903 and 1905 when their parents died. Mrs Cowel died February 13, 1903, of dropsy, while her husband was afflicted with rheumatism and Bright's disease. Mr. Cowel was a Master Mason, and in politics a Democrat, but later a Populist. His wife was a Methodist, and he was reared up in the Lutheran church, but throughout his life placed deeds above creeds. By his will he left estate to his children, and notwithstanding their sore bereavement they are reflecting credit on their noble and worthy parents by the manner in which they have taken up the burdens of life.
Lieutenant Joseph K. Pittman, of Nemaha township, Gage county, Nebraska, is a resident here of fifteen years' standing. His life of over sixty years has been passed in various localities, all of which have been honored by his substantial citizenship and worthy performance of every duty devolving upon him. When in the flush of young manhood he gave his services to the nation to preserve union and personal liberty, and the meritorious and gallant part which he took on the field of battle is attested by the title which he won. Since that time he has gained success equally great in civil life, has devoted himself without reserve to individual work and the discharge of those responsibilities which come up between man and man, and for all this deserves the honor and esteem which are shown him and his excellent family.
Lieutenant Pittman was born in Bedford county, Pennsylvania, in 1840, and comes of a family well known in that state, some of whose members took part in the early wars of the colonies and republic. His great-grandfather Benjamin, his grandfather Joseph and his father, Ezra, were all born in Pennsylvania. Ezra Pittman was a native of Bedford county, followed farming there all his life, was a Democrat of the Jacksonian type, and a church member and honored citizen. His wife was Elizabeth Knable, a native of Bedford county and a daughter of John Knable, of an old Pennsylvania Dutch family. She is also deceased.
Joseph K. Pittman was reared on the home farm in Pennsylvania, and during limited seasons attended school, but the greater part of the practical training which has helped him through life was acquired by experience which began when he was a boy. He was twenty-one years old when the Civil war came on, and on November 19, 1861, he enlisted at Werefordsburg, Pennsylvania, in Company B, and taken into the
Third Maryland Volunteer Infantry, under Captain Cardiff and Colonel Downey, and gave three years and three months of faithful service. He participated in the battle at Harper's Ferry and in many of the engagements in Virginia, and assisted in repelling General Mosby's raiders from the northern states. He was in West Virginia for some time, and his regiment was ordered to Gettysburg, but arriving there too late to take part in the crucial conflict of the war. Mr. Pittman entered the service as a private, was made corporal, orderly sergeant, and then promoted to first lieutenant, with which rank he was honorably discharged, with the commendation of his superiors and the personal regard of the men of his company. In 1865, after he had returned from the war, he came west to Knox county, Illinois, and was engaged in farming near Galesburg for thirteen years. In 1878 he moved to Lincoln county, Kansas, and in that new country took up a homestead, on which he lived until 1888, when he came to Gage county, and since then has been successfully engaged in farming and stock-raising.
In 1868 Mr Pittman was married in Knox county, Illinois, to Miss Mary F. Bower, and they have enjoyed a most happy union of over thirty-five years, gladdened with life's pleasures and made sweeter and closer by its sorrows. She is a native of Ohio, and a daughter of Jacob and Susan (Bryan) Bower, both of whom are deceased, the latter at the age of seventy-eight. Twelve children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Pittman. One sone died in childhood, and the others are: Jasper D., Joseph, Ulysses G., Ezra, William, Edwin, Roy, Robert, Susan, Jessie, and Mary. Mr. Pittman is a stanch Republican, and enjoys old army comradeship with the Sergeant Cox Post No. 100, G. A. R., at Adams. He is also a Mason, and he and his wife are members of the Baptist church. He is a well informed man, genial and frank with his
associates and his home is a place of hospitality and good cheer for all who enter its doors.
Casner Barnes, a prominent farmer near South Auburn, on mail route No. 2, has been a resident of Nemaha county for forty-five years, from the pioneer epoch down to the twentieth century present. He has been a successful farmer from youth, and has made a reputation in his line, as also as a citizen and man. Few men could have put their diligent efforts to better use than Mr. Barnes has in making one of the fine farms for which this county is noted, and to whatever he has turned his hand he has done well.
Mr. Barnes is a grandson of John Barnes, a Pennsylvania farmer, who in 1840 came west to Lee county, Iowa, where he died in 1860, at the age of seventy-five. He had nine children, five sons and four daughters, and the only survivor is Alexander, living in Smith county, Kansas. John Barnes, the father of Casner Barnes, was born in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, in 1821, and died at Nemaha city, Nebraska, September 8, 1896. He and his wife inherited eighty acres of land in Iowa and in 1857 they came to Richardson county, Nebraska, and two weeks later to Nemaha city, settling one mile north on one hundred and sixty acres of land, only ten acres of which had been broken, and they paid the claimant seventeen hundred dollars for his "squatter sovereignty" and then pre-empted. He bought and sold several farms and was in good circumstances. He was a Republican in politics, and was county commissioner and register of voters. He and his wife were Presbyterians, and he was an elder in the church at Brownville. He was married in 1846, at West Point, Iowa, to Miss Elizabeth Harger, who was born in
Indiana, December 20, 1829, and died at Nemaha city, June 20, 1883. They were the parents of the following children: Casner, Catherine E., wife of James H. Drain, at Red Cloud, Nebraska, has nine children; Amanda is the wife of Charles M. Welton, of Johnson, Nebraska; Isham B. is a farmer of Coolidge, Kansas, and has seven children; John S. is a farmer of Smith county, Kansas, and has seven children living; Luther H. is a farmer, real estate man and contractor in Bison, Oklahoma, and has six children living; David, who was county superintendent of schools at Lamar, Colorado, died at the age of thirty-four, leaving a wife and three children; Lydia H. is the wife of H. O. Hermle, in California, and has two children; Mary E. is the wife of B. L. Shellhorn, M.D., of Peru, Nebraska, and has two children living.
Casner Barnes was born at West Point, Lee county, Iowa, November 14, 1847, and was reared on the farm and lived at home until his marriage in 1877. He bought his first land, ninety-two acres, in 1873. He now owns three hundred and twenty acres of choice land, upon which he has placed all the improvements, including three acres of orchard and shade trees. He does general farming and stock-raising, and in 1903 had in one hundred and thirty-five acres of corn and sixty of wheat. His cattle are of mixed breeds. He has been especially successful in the feeding of hogs and ships about two carloads each year and always keeps on hand about a hundred.
April 1, 1877, Mr. Barnes was married to Miss Ophelia McIninch, who was born February 4, 1860, on a part of Nemaha county that has since been washed into the turbulent waters of the Missouri river. Her parents, W. H. and Catherine (Dunkle) McIninch, the former a native of Ohio, and the latter of Virginia, came to Nebraska in 1857, and are still living on the old farm near Auburn. They had eight children: Mrs. Barnes is the eldest; James H. McIninch is a farmer near Brown-
ville; Miss Wille Kate is at home; David C. is a farmer near Auburn; Belle is the wife of D. E. Zook, a farmer near Auburn; M. S. McIninch is an attorney in Auburn; Barnett is at Brownville; and Julia, aged eighteen is in school at Auburn.
Nine children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Barnes. Katie E. is the wife of W. H. Linn, a dentist of Auburn, Nebraska; Miss Mattie M. is a teacher in Auburn, having taken the training course in the normal at Peru; Miss Lydia B. is a student in Auburn; Welton C. is also in the Auburn schools; Edna T. attends the district school at home; Mary; Delbert M. is eight years old; Guy died at the age of five; and Isham Bartlett is a boy of three. Mr. Barnes is a Republican in politics, and was once a candidate for county commissioner, and has been on the school board for twenty-five years. He and his wife are members of the Cumberland Presbyterian church.
Louis H. Rohmeyer, editor and publisher of the Westlicher Beobachter, the official organ of the German Farmers' Insurance Company in Nebraska and the leading German paper in the southeastern part of the state, is a thoroughly Americanized German. Bringing with him to this country the characteristic energy and enterprise of the German and taking advantage of the opportunities for advancement which he found here, he has pushed his way to the front and is justly deserving of the representative position which he holds among the leading citizens of the locality in which he lives.
Mr. Rohmeyer is a native of Hanover, Germany, and was born February 5, 1860. His ancestors were tradesmen, noted for honesty and
industry, and longevity as well. Frederick Nolte, his maternal grandfather, lived to the advanced age of ninety-six years and retained his faculties, mental and physical, to the close of his life, his death occurring in Hanover in 1865. Mr. Rohmeyer's father, William Rohmeyer, a shoe merchant of Hanover, is now past eighty years of age and is still active in business. The fiftieth anniversary of his marriage to Johanna Nolte was celebrated September 6, 1902. Their pictures in the souvenir designed and published by their son, Louis H., in memory of this anniversary, show them to be still well preserved. Of their four children, Louis H. is the only son now living. His two brothers, Williams and August, died in Hanover-- the former at the age of nine years and the latter on his fourtieth birthday, leaving a widow and three children. His sister, Louise Frerichs, now resides in Bremerhaven, Germany.
Louis H. Rohmeyer received a common and high-school education in his native city. In 1874, at the age of fourteen years, he began work at the printer’s trade, and served an apprenticeship of four years. Afterwards he worked in Switzerland and Germany as a journeyman printer for several years, until 1890, when he came to America. His first location in this country was at St. Louis, where he was for some time employed as compositor on a German newspaper, and from whence, in 1898, he moved to Lincoln, Nebraska. Up to this time he had been able to save but very little if any of his earnings, and when he landed in Lincoln he had only thirty-five dollars. The following year he opened a job printing office, which he successfully conducted in Lincoln for nearly two years, at the end of which time, December 1, 1900, he came to Auburn and purchased the Western Observer, which had been established ten months previous to that date. Mr. Rohmeyer has increased the circulation of his paper to two thousand three hundred, six times its original subscription list, and not only has the circulation of the paper been
increased but the standard of the publication also has been raised. He owns the plant, and in connection with running the paper he does a large job printing business in both German and English.
Mr Rohmeyer married in Hanover, Germany, in 1884, Miss Johanna Tieman, and they have had five children, all of whom are living except Alfred, who was born in St. Louis, Missouri, October 29, 1891, and died at the age of four years. Amelia and William were born in Hanover, the former September 5, 1885, and the latter, September 2, 1887. Louis was born in St. Louis, January 6, 1894, and Elizabeth in Lincoln, January, 1, 1892.
Fraternally Mr. Rohmeyer is identified with a number of fraternal organizations, including the Ancient Order of United Workmen, Knights of Maccabees, Sons of Herman, and the German Society of Lincoln. Politically he is a Republican.
© 1999, Lori L. Laird, NEGenWeb Project