Page 421

     CORNELIUS ELLIS died at Vinton, June 3, 1909. His death was the passing of one of the most notable of Benton county's pioneers. For fifty-three years he had lived in Vinton, na dhe had achieved a foremost place in business and citizenship. In business the Ellis Lumber Company, of which he was president at the time of his death, is one of the most important corporate enterprises in this section of Iowa.

    Cornelius Ellis was born at Willston, Alabama, on the Cherokee Indian reservation, November 21, 1827. HIs father, Sylvester Ellis, was a Presbyterian missionary among the Cherokees at that time, and was married in Alabama to Sarah Hoyt. When Cornelius was five years old his parents moved to Ohio, and when he was about ten the family home was established in Indiana, near Indianapolis, where he was reared to manhood. Sylvester Ellis became one of the early residents of Benton county, having come here in 1855, but after several years returned and spent the rest of his life in Indiana.

    Cornelius Ellis became a resident of Benton county in 1856. He made a homestead in the pioneer conditions of the time and was engaged in farming for a few years. He was a carpenter by trade, and was more or less actively engaged in contracting and building up to 1879, having put up many of the early buildings in town and country. In 1864 he and his brother (A. H. Ellis), established the Ellis lumber yard, the origianl enterprise from which the present corporation has been developed. It is the oldest business of the kind in the county, and Mr. Ellis continued its active head until his death. The business was incorporated January 1, 1898.

    The late Mr. Ellis married, in Indiana, March 4, 1852, Miss Mary Colley. She was born in Virginia but was brought to Indiana in childhood, and died in 1894, aged sixty-seven. They were the parents of six children, three of whom are now living: W. C. Ellis, Anna Taggart and Abbie Brown. Mr. Ellis was a member and elder of the Presbyterian church throughout his adult years, (p. 422) was a liberal contributor to the Vinton church, and gave much of his means to church and charity.

Page 422

    W. C. ELLIS is the successor of his father, the late Cornelius Ellis, in the promotion of the extensive business affairs which were found and developed for so many years by the great energy of the later. Besides being at the head of the Ellis Lumber Company, with whcih he began when he was thirteen years old, he has become prominently identified with other business, and financial enterprises of this vicinity.

    He is vice president of the Farmers National Bank of Vinton and president of the Vinton Savings Bank. He is vice president of the Iowa Canning Company, the largest corn-canning establishment in the world. This company was organized in 1892, with a capital of $20,000, and the capital has since been increased to $200,000 and the business expanded accordingly. Four plants are now operated, at Vinton, LaPorte City, Garrison, Shellsburg. Their output varies from year to year, ten million cans being the highest amount, and the average is perhaps eight million cans. This immense food product is distributed through jobbers all over the Mississippi valley and the Pacific coat. The officers of this company are: C. C. Griffin, president; W. C. Ellis, vice president; F. G. Ray, secretary, and George Knox, treasurer.

    Mr. Ellis was born near Indianapolis, Indiana, July 4, 1853, at three years of age came to Benton county, and grew up in Vinton and obtained his education in the town schools. He began working in the Ellis lumber yard when thirteen years old, and after the retirement of his uncle in 1876 the firm became C. Ellis & Son, the latter being W. C. Ellis. Since the incorporation of the business in 1898, one of Mr. Ellis' sons, Robert C., was secretary until his death in 1904, and A. H. Ellis, another son, now holds that position.

    Mr. W. C. Ellis, as a Republican in national politics, has taken a somewhat active interest in local public affairs, having served as city treasurer and in other minor offices.

    He married, in Vinton, in 1875, Miss Gitty H. Young. She was born in Big Grove township, an dis a daughter of the Benton county pioneer, Robert N. Young (whose history is given below.) Mr. and Mrs. Ellis' children are: Robert C., who died in 1904, at the age of twenty-seven, leaving a wife and one son, who are now residents of Omaha; A. H., secretary of the Ellis Lumber Company, who is married; Mattie, wife of T. J. Bracken, assistant cashier of the First National Bank of Tama; Hazel, at home, a graduate of the State Teachers College at Cedar Falls; Lawrence W., in his senior year at Tilford Academy.

Page 423

ROBERT N. YOUNG, or "Uncle Bob" as he is affectionately known in Benton county, is a pioneer whose associations with this vicinity are for a longer continuous period than any other living citizen can claim. He first penetrated the region now known as Benton county in 1849. Vinton was not a town then, only two log cabins being on the site, one near the ned of the present river bridge, and the other inwhat is the northeast part of town.

    The little party of pioneers of which he was a member contained also his brother, J. F. YOurn, who had been in this vicinity the previous year, and a Mr. Doane. They had come overland with team and wagon through Danville and Bloomington, Illinois, and crossed the Mississippi at Muscatine. Arriving in Benton county they bought a quantity of timber land and also took claims on the prairie in Big Grove township. Their nearest market was a Cedar Rapids, twenty-five miles away.

    Mr. Young built a cabin on his land,which adjoined the farms of two of his brothers, and he lived there until he had improved his land and developed a fine farm. After the war he sold out and moved to Vinton, where for twenty-five years he was in the boot,shoe and grocery business, and since then has lived retired.

    Robert N. Young was born in Johnson county, Indiana, January 25, 1828. His parents were Joseph and Nancy (Gilchrist) Young. Mr. Young and HOn. G. M. Gilchrist are cousins. The parents moved into Benton county in the latter fifties, and after living several years on a farm in Taylor township, east of Vinton, moved to town. The mother passed away first, and the father, who spent the last two years of his life with his son Robert, was past ninety-three when he died. Besides Robert, there is a son, B. D. Young, living in Waterloo, and a daughter, Mrs. Nancy Freeman, at Bentonville, Arkansas.

    "Uncle Bob" has been a member of the Presbyterian church ever since he was a boy, and has voted Republican tickets since that party first came into existence.

    He married, in Indiana in 1850, Miss Sarah J. Freeman. She was born in Union county, Indiana, October 26, 1830, and died April 15, 1909, when nearly seventy-nine years of age. She was likewise an active Presbyterian. Seven children were born of their marriage, two fo them dying in infancy. The others are: Miss Sarah Belle, who manages her father's household; Mrs. W. C. Ellis, of Vinton; Miss Lulu, at home; E. F., an undertaker at Vinton; Mrs. Werner Stripple, of Vinton.

Page 424

    FRANK G. RAY, secretary of the Iowa Canning Company, has been identified with the business life of Vinton for the past thirty-six years, since January, 1873. Until recently he was chiefly interested in the implement and coal business and on coming to Vinton became connected with that business with F. T. Verharen, and became the latter's partner in January, 1875, the firm being Verharen & Ray. Later Mr. Verharen went to Spencer as manager of the branch which they had opened there, while Mr. Ray continued at Vinton. In March, 1884, the partnership was disolved, and Mr. Ray became owner of the Vinton business and continued its active management until January 4, 1909, when he sold it to Bryner & Bruner. However, he still owns the buildings, the coal yards, barns and other realty connected with the business; which is a large and progressive one. In 1886 he erected, for the purposes of his business, the building at the corner of Concord and Washington streets, this being the present postoffice building, and he still owns this and the building adjoining. He erected the implement house in 1896. Since retiring from the coal and implement business he has given his attention to the Iowa Canning Company.

    Mr. Ray was born in Whiteside county, Illinois, December 31, 1851. His parents wree Guy and Louisa (Pomeroy) Ray, who were residents of Vinton from 1876 until the time they died, the father in 1881, aged seventy-five. Guy Ray was originally from Berkshire county, Massachusetts, of an old New England family, and both the Rays and Pomeroys were of English stock. The father moved to Illinois in 1835, and in 1836 located in Whiteside county, whre he was the first county clerk. He had two daughters by a first marriage, Louisa Pomeroy being his second wife. Mrs. Isadore Shaw of Vinton, is a daughter by this second marriage.

    Frank G. Ray was reared on his father's farm in Whiteside county, attended school there and in Genesco, Illinois, and the Mount Morris Seminary, and later spent one winter in Oberlin College. He was teacher in his home district for one term, and at the age of twnety-two came to Vinton.

    Mr. Ray shares with Dr. C. C. Griffin the honor of being the only thirty-third degree Mason of Benton county. He is a member of lodge, chapter and commandery at Vinton, and of the DeMolay Consistory at Clinton. In politics he is a Republican.

    Mr. Ray was married in Ohio, in September, 1876, to Miss Emma Whiteside of Pomeroy, Ohio. She was a daughter of early residents of Meigs county, and she was educated in Ohio, taught school there, and for three years was a teacher in the schools at (p. 425) Vinton, where she met Mr. Ray. She is a member of the Vinton Literary Society and of the Presbyterian church. Mr. and Mrs. Ray have two children: Earl K., is cashier of the Citizens Savings Bank of Anamosa, in which his father is interested, and is married and has a daughter aged seven; Miss Belle, at home, graduated from the Vinton high school and is also a graduate of Miss Mason's School at Castle-on-Hudson, New York.