Jefferson D. Brown, a retired merchant and now stockman of Burchard, Nebraska, was born in Miama county, Indiana, May 13, 1842. He is a son of Samuel L. and Harriet (Idson) Brown, the former of whom was born in Virginia and became a successful farmer in Ohio, to which state he emigrated at the age of twenty years. Later he went to Indiana and still later located at Centerville, Iowa, where he died aged sixty-four years. The paternal grandfather of our subject was Samuel Brown, a native of Graceland county, Virginia. The mother of Mr. Brown was born in Ohio and died in Miami county, Indiana, when Mr. Brown was but three years of age. She was the mother of six children, but our subject is the only survivor.
Jefferson D. Brown was reared and educated in Indiana and Iowa. At the first call for men when the rebellion broke out, he enlisted, on July 15, 1861, in Company B, Forty-seventh Illinois Volunteer Infantry under Colonel Daniel Miles and Captain Joe Miles. The regiment was ordered to the front at once, and at the battle of Corinth in October, 1862, he was wounded and taken to the hospital in St. Louis. In May, 1863, he was honorably discharged and returned home. On July 25th of the same year he re-enlisted in the Eighth Iowa Cavalry under Captain M. M. Waldon, and served until the close of the war. In July, 1864, he was wounded and captured with his regiment and taken to Andersonville, where he was kept prisoner for nine months, when he succeeded in making his escape. He enlisted as a private and when he was mustered out he was a commissioned first lieutenant. After his second discharge he returned to his father's farm and soon after opened a livery establishment in Centerville, Iowa.
November 20, 1865, he married Salina F. Dye, who was born in Monroe county, Ohio. She bore him five children, as follows: Frank E.,
a merchant of Lewiston, Nebraska, is married and has two children; Salina M. married George H. Sheik, a merchant of Lewiston, Nebraska, Annetta B. married J. F. Halderman, cashier of the bank of Burchard; Joseph J., a stockman at Virginia, Nebraska; Charles E., a merchant of Tate, Nebraska.
After his marriage, Mr. Brown continued in the livery business a few months and then sold out and retired to a farm near Manhattan, Kansas. In 1873 he was elected sheriff of the county and moved to Manhattan, the county seat, was re-elected in 1875, and for four years he efficiently filled that responsible office. He sold his Kansas property in 1880 and moved to Tecumseh, Nebraska, and opened a hardware store, which he continued until 1884, and then disposed of it, and in May that same year went to Blaine county, Nebraska, where he helped to locate the county seat at Brewster. While there he operated a general store and stock ranch, but after nine years sold his interests and located at Burchard, Nebraska, where he opened the largest general store. This he conducted until August, 1903, when he sold out. He also deals largely in stock. He cast his first vote for Abraham Lincoln in 1860, and has supported the Republican party since that date. Like the majority of the old soldiers he is a member of the G. A. R. post and is connected with W. A. Butler Post No. 172 of Burchard. he has been a member of the Masonic order for thirty-seven years, being the oldest Mason in the vicinity, and he is also a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Knights of Pythias orders. Both he and his wife are members of the Methodist church, where he is as active as in politics and business affairs. Upright and honorable in all his dealings he is one of the most highly respected citizens of Burchard.
George H. Fallstead, until recently of the firm of Powell and Fallstead, leading real estate men of Falls City, is a native son of Richardson county and has passed all his life within its boundaries, making his best successes within call of the place of his nativity. Farming and business transactions have occupied his attention since he left school, and his career has been one of steadily increasing success and prosperity from the first.
Mr. Fallstead was born on a farm not far from Falls City, December 12, 1867. His paternal ancestry is altogether German. His grandfather, John Fallstead, was a German farmer and freeholder, born about 1766, and died in his fatherland when about eighty-four years old. He reared three sons and three daughters. The son John is the father of Mr. G. H. Fallstead, and was born in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, August 28, 1827. He was reared in his native land and well educated in German schools. He entered the German army and took part in several battles, and after coming to this country also had some military experience in fighting with the Indians. He left Bremen in 1853, and after fifty-two days of sailing arrived in New York, having spent forty dollars for his passage, and being worth only twelve dollars in money as he stood on the streets of the foreign and unfamiliar city and country where he was to carve out his destiny and fortune. He first went to Monroe, Michigan, and thence to Toledo, Ohio, where he worked in a brick yard, and later came to near Fort Wayne, Indiana, where he worked as a farm hand and also in a mill. He came to Nebraska in the pioneer times of the sixties, bringing about five hundred dollars which he had managed by his industry to accumulate, and soon purchased the eighty acres which forms part of his presence farmstead. He was married in February, 1867, to Miss Elizabeth Pollard, who was
born in Tennessee in 1847, a daughter of George W. Pollard, a Tennessee farmer. She lost her mother in infancy and was reared by strangers.
Mr. and Mrs. John Fallstead began their domestic life in a most primitive fashion in Nebraska. He had built on his eighty acres a frame house sixteen by eighteen feet, and this was the home until fortune smiled more genially on his diligent efforts. He improved his land and added forty acres thereto and their reared his family and has since made a good property, having been able to equip well all his children for life's duties and still retain a comfortable home for his and his good wife's age. Their three children are: George H.; John W., who lives on the home farm and has one daughter; and Mabel, who is also on the home place
Mr. George H. Fallstead was reared to farm life, and engaged in that pursuit until about nine years ago, when he moved to Falls City, where he owns a nice home in Chase street. He was in the real estate business for about three years, and he and his partner made a reputation as hustling business men, carrying on a very large business in city and farm property. He sold his real estate interest to his partner in June, 1904, and is now engaged in fire and life insurance exclusively.
Mr. Fallstead lived at home until his marriage, on Christmas day, 1889. His wife's maiden name is Annie M. Birdsley. She was born in Iowa, and was two weeks old when brought across the Missouri into Nebraska, in April, 1870. Her parents are Simon Quincy and Ellen (Teeter) Birdsley, who were married in Illinois about 1862, and the former of whom is now about seventy-five years old and the latter some eighteen years younger. Mr. and Mrs. Birdsley lost two children, and the following are living: Charles D., in Falls City, has three children; Hiram, in Washington County, Kansas, has two sons and three
daughters; Viola Chapman lives in Falls City; Fanny, the wife of W. N. Corder, in Kansas, has two children; Mrs. Fallstead is next of the family; Lucy Billips, at Verdon, Nebraska, has one son; Jacob Birdsley is a farmer of this county. These seven living children are all worthy men and women. The two deceased are John, who died at the age of twenty-two, and Asa, who died at the age of sixteen.
Mr. and Mrs. Fallstead have had five children: Milly, a bright girl of thirteen, in the seventh grade and also taking piano instruction; a son that died in infancy; Coral Clyde, aged six, has entered school; Dale Deloss, aged three; and Floyd Francis. Mr. Fallstead is a Democrat; but without political aspirations or longings. He is a prominent Knight of Pythias, and in his lodge is master of finance and keeper of record and seals.
© 1999, Lori L. Laird, NEGenWeb Project