History of Muscatine County, Iowa, from the earliest settlements to the present time, Volume I, Part 23

Author: Richman, Irving Berdine, 1861-1933, ed; Clarke (S.J.) Publishing Company, Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1911
Publisher: Chicago, The S.J. Clarke Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 648


USA > Iowa > Muscatine County > History of Muscatine County, Iowa, from the earliest settlements to the present time, Volume I > Part 23


Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).


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Fourteenth Infantry-T. B. Nicholas.


Sixteenth Infantry-H. H. Washburn, N. Reed, T. Purcell, J. Dill, F. Dow, J. H. Howell, P. Hettinger, G. Bradford, M. O. Hallock, O. Mattison, A. Drake, J. Davis, J. Esterline, J. Freybarger, J. Embree, N. D. Younkin, A. H. C. Gott- brecht, W. Weaver, N. Reed.


Seventeenth Infantry-A. G. Fisher.


Eighteenth Infantry-O. T. Stewart, J. G. Pratt, E. Hargraves, A. Heaton, W. Eberling, J. Stanley.


Twentieth Infantry-A. Lindsley, B. Mills, T. Clemmons.


Twenty-seventh Infantry-A. Edwards, C. Lindsley, B. Miller, J. Sissell.


Thirty-fifth Infantry-Colonel S. G. Hill, Major A. John, W. A. Clepper, C. Leary, E. Henet, F. Reed, J. Grossman, J. Temple, F. Harker, C. Hirsch- mann, J. A. Kyrk, H. Blanck, W. S. Chambers, D. Tice, J. Tice, L. Dawson, L. Criner, J. Dill, J. Cargill, P. Harrison, T. Holliday, W. Everett, W. White, J. Strahorn, J. Longthern, T. Jester, E. Jester, J. Reeves, M. Etherton, J. Ram- sey, L. Chappell, J. Carter, A. Davis, D. Block, F. Bowers, C. Mockmore, J.


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Chaudoin, W. Christ, F. Cork, J. Foster, W. Holmes, J. Joice, G. Krauff, W. McCurdy, S. Davis, W. Brown, W. Brady, N. Blackstone, A. Wohlgevant, G. Brownawell, S. Holmes, J. Springer, C. N. Burr, J. W. Beard, L. Hurst, W. Pickering, G. Moore, C. Narbaugh, A. Stoddard, N. Thomas, G. Pickering, B. Stamford, F. Wooden, H. Phelps, G. P. Ruger, C. Sherman, G. Burmeister, G. Wonderlich, G. Leutzbauch, J. Schlegelmilch, H. Richenberg, C. Knoblauch, C. Doerfler, C. Barr, H. Irwin, F. Peterkin, C. Berg, L. Sanelsberg, J. Kurtz, J. Hessler, J. Hanley, S. Knouse, W. Herwig, F. Schmoker, W. Dimick, C. Wright, C. Poole, C. Tyler, P. Nichols, J. Prouty, D. Hammer, 'A. Walder, H. Winning, S. Tschillard, N. Schaffletzel, M. Smith, P. Parsons, M. Maher, J. Greenwood, F. Hill, J. Johnson, C. Hawkins, W. Guild, G. Groters, G. Bischer, W. Biebush, J. Q. Adams, W. White, G. Redman, R. Manvel, J. Dobsen, P. Courtney, T. Cook, J. Connerford, R. Carpenter, S. Keenan, J. Welch, G. Dick- son, E. Doran, P. Slattery, W. Fanning, G. B. Hill, J. H. Graham, J. Regen- bogen, J. Ernst, F. Holtz, H. Schmidt, G. Hill, S. Robshaw, J. C. Edgerton, T. A. Clark, C. C. Clark, E. J. Douglass, M. Cooper, H. T. Neff, W. L. Overman, G. A. Palmer, T. B. Worrall, L. Nitzell, J. Huler, P. Boston, P. D. Patterson, J. B. Welch, O. G. Mathews, F. Peterke, C. Berg, L. Savelsberg, J. McElroy, J. McDonald, J. Alexander, P. Mylot, G. Robshaw, G. Lang, J. Dunn, J. Wal- ton, M. J. Chown, W. Townsley, C. Gore, J. McCoy, W. Bonham; I. Edging- ton, D. Edgington, F. Epperly, T. Epperly, W. Fitzsimmons, H. Hitchcock, J. Bumgardner, F. McDaniels, T. Brown, A. S. Lord, L. Wallingsford, A. Long, H. Sweeney, L. Ware, R. W. Escha, L. Wagner, I. McCartney, C. Parish, W. Ponbeck, E. Stearns, S. Parkhurst, G. Hunt, D. Wilgus, T. Williams, D. Currie, J. Norton, W. D. Conn, J. Evans, J. Lee, A. Lee, P. Reed, H. Devore, B. F. Linnville, R. Miller, J. Crawford, W. H. Hackett, T. Hempfill.


Thirty-seventh Infantry-H. Mockmore, J. Tannehill, W. K. Tyler, D. Le- fever, T. Craig, H. B. Brannan, A. Edwards, V. Darland.


Second Cavalry-W. Wiggins, J. Toren, J. Schmeltzer, J. Schiller, J. Hodges, L. C. Loomis, L. H. Waterman, N. F. Avery, L. Avery, G. Brown, J. M. Terry, R. Hutcheson, G. D. Graves, I. R. Dunn, J. Wallingsford, E. Brown, J. Han- cock, M. Lee, A. Opel, J. Simpson, P. Smith, G. Ridgeway, A. Cradock, C. Neuberner, G. W. Heinly, J. Coble, H. Berner, I. Norris, I. M. Smith, J. Thomp- son, J. W. Vanderwort, H. Wigham, J. P. Dunn, G. Darland.


Third Cavalry-F. G. Whittaker.


Eighth Cavalry-L. Loomis, J. Horton, R. Cunningham, W. C. Vail.


Ninth Cavalry-D. T. Watkins, L. Netzel, J. Regenbogen, J. Huler, P. Pos- ton, P. D. Patterson, N. Cooper.


Regiments Unknown-J. Jacks, S. Jackson, W. H. Chapman, B. Lyons, C. Nichols, N. Rhienhart, F. Finn, T. W. Adams, G. W. Sissel, W. R. Aikens, J. Clark.


Second Ohio Infantry-H. M. Pigman.


Fourth Ohio Infantry-J. Brookes.


The monument was formally unveiled and impressively dedicated July 4, 1875. The war governor, Samuel J. Kirkwood, delivered a fitting oration. Civic


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and military displays were made in honor of the occasion, and the observances were commensurate with the importance of the hour and the event.


GRAND ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC.


Shelby Norman Post, No. 231, G. A. R., was organized August 29, 1883, with forty-eight charter members. It received its name in honor of Shelby Norman, a lad in his teens, who was one of the first to enlist in the Civil war from this county, and the first to lose his life in battle. The first officers in- stalled were: Post Commander, Dr. S. W. Robertson; senior vice, Lyman Banks; junior vice, Ben E. Lilly; adjutant, John H. Munroe; quartermaster, Galbraith Bitzer; surgeon, Dr. H. M. Dean; chaplain, R. W. McCampbell; officer of the day, Fred Welker; officer of the guard, J. E. Coe; sergeant major, J. E. Stevens; quartermaster sergeant, W. W. Woodward.


The ranks of this order of patriots are daily becoming thinner and it will be but a few years when a Grand Army post will cease to exist from lack of members. Shelby Norman Post at the present time has something over 150 members now on its rolls, but death has taken from its ranks within a few years past many of its most prominent comrades.


When the new court house was finished in 1909, rooms in the basement of the court house were beautifully furnished and allotted to the post as a per- manent meeting place. There it is installed at the present time.


The past post commanders are herewith appended: 1883-84, W. S. Robert- son; 1885, John H. Monroe; 1886-87, Lyman Banks; 1888, Galbraith Bitzer; 1889-90, Gus Schmidt; 1891, A. D. Carpenter ; 1891, R. D. Vore; 1892, M. M. Brown; 1893, J. H. Carl; 1894-5-6, C. C. Horton; 1897, M. C. Briggs ; 1898, E. H. King; 1899-1900, A. G. Tyler; 1901, H. A. Rath; 1902, Gus Schmidt; 1903, Henry Kneese; 1904, J. B. Jester; 1905, M. O. Stanwood; 1906, J. B. Jester ; 1907, A. B. Rehmel; 1908, J. H. Munroe; 1909, Henry Kneese; 1909- 10, Robert B. Baird; 1910, W. W. Millett; 1911, Herman Schmidt.


WOMAN'S RELIEF CORPS, NO. 122 ..


The auxiliary to the G. A. R., which has done so much good to the old soldiers and their families, is the Woman's Relief Corps organized September 13, 1887, with the following twenty-one charter members: Jane Madden, Tamson Musser, Hattie Cadle, Martha Hill, Emma Banks, Vida Wing, Lillie Baird, Lyda Shaf- nit, Annie Kennedy, Annie Foulke, Ellen Coe, Jennie Wilson, Frances Richie, Anna Cummins, Sarah Hoover, Emma Dean, Addie Munroe, Barbara Detwiler, Era Klepper, Amanda Coriel and Ella Raff.


Since its organization many women have associated themselves with the Woman's Relief Corps and the history of this body of women covers so many acts of kindness and nobility as to preclude the mention of them for want of another volume of this work.


COMPANY C, FIFTY-FOURTH REGIMENT.


Company C of the Fifty-fourth Regiment, Iowa National Guards, is stationed at Muscatine and has contributed no small share in making the reputation of the regiment state wide. The Fifty-fourth was organized February 18, 1876,


BENJAMIN F. STEPHENSON


Founder of the Grand Army of the Republic, First Commander Department of Illinois, First Commander in Chief, G. A. R.


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one of the first military organizations to be formed in the state since the Civil war. Responding to a strong demand, Colonel Alexander McQueen took up the work of organization and in a short time a number of companies were raised, which became the units of regiments about to be formed. Colonel McQueen be- came commander of the Fifty-fourth Regiment, with headquarters at Keokuk. Since that time the following have been in chief command of the Fifty-fourth : G. A. Henry, Keosaqua ; Samuel C. Farmer, Fairfield; H. H. Wright, Center- ville, and later adjutant general of Iowa; Park W. McManus, Davenport ; James A. Guest, Burlington, later adjutant general of the state; D. V. Jackson, Muscatine; E. E. Lambert, Newton; F. E. Caughlin, Ottumwa; F. W. Bishop.


The Fifty-fourth has high rank in rifle shooting and has a number of trophies to its credit. At the time of the Spanish-American war this regiment was called out by the governor and April 26, 1898, Company C left Muscatine to go into camp at Des Moines. The company was in charge of the following officers : Captain, F. W. Bishop, and First Lieutenant Dolsen. At that time the regi- ment had not the required number of men in its companies and Sergeant Lyle Horton was sent back from Des Moines to Muscatine for recruits, in which he was successful and in July the regiment went into quarters in Camp "Cuba Libre," at Jacksonville, Florida, where the boys remained, "eating their hearts out," with impatience, disappointment and mortification until the latter part of September, when they were sent back to Iowa and after thirty days' furlough were mustered out of the service on the 30th day of November, 1898, without striking a blow at the hated Dons, or leaving their native soil. This was a source of intense disappointment and bitterness of spirit to Company C but the actual camp experience of its members was of more than ordinary value from a mili- tary standpoint.


Full roster of Company C in the Spanish-American war follows :


Captain, Frank W. Bishop; first lieutenant, Frank T. Dolsen; second lieu- tenant, Jacob L. Smeenk.


SERGEANTS.


First sergeant, Chester A. S. Howard; quartermaster sergeant, Harry Kern; Charles U. Frack; Andrew Link; Fred Norwood; James L. Horton.


CORPORALS.


Edward A. Erb, William Powers, Joseph R. Hanley, John J. Brees, William Schoenig, Albert Capps, Benjamin Hannan, Emil Moore, Ralph Lillibridge. Musician, Joseph King. Artificer, Winne C. Strong. Wagoner, Frederick A. Deutschman.


PRIVATES.


George Albrand, Bert Ames, J. Edward Anderson, Guy B. Baker, Charles A. Baldwin, John N. Berry, Chester Bridgman, Frederick E. Bogart, Fred Bosten, C. B. Bond, George Bullis, John Cooney, Lloyd Covertson, Earl Cromer, Glen Carlisle, George M. Dallas, Louis Dondar, Emery Duncan, James Earl, Vol. I-13


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HISTORY OF MUSCATINE COUNTY


Lon L. Eldred, Bert Eldred, Milton Frack, Clyde Frack, Henry J. Fuller, Carl Garver, Fred Groth, Robert Hackett, George Halstead, Almon Hayworth, Will- iam Heitman, William Hillmer, James B. Hill, Frank O. Horton, Charles Hub- bard, Roy Hendrix, Fred Hogue, Jesse Holt, George Ingham, Lee Jarboe, Sam- uel Jamison, Louis Knopp, Benjamin Kramer, Louis Kautz, William Killough, William Lamar, Otto Leindecker, Henry J. Leindecker, Henry Lemkau, Charles Lindner, Wallace Longstreth, Harry Ludlow, George Luckhardt, John W. Lilly, Frank Lewis, Willard Lewis, Willard Lindsay, B. E. Lockwood, Frank S. Mc- Coy, Lemuel Massey, Joseph W. Morrison, Harry Marshall, Fred Martin, Will- iam Mccullough, Ralph Neidig, Charles Nichols, Joseph E. Norwood, William C. Ochiltree, Pleasant Parish, Hugh Paisley, Frank Paisley, Arthur Rankin, Fred Reed, Fred Rohrback, Glen Rehmel, Earl Reynolds, Louis Robertson, Hugo Schlipf, Emery Smith, William Schenck, Carl Tiecke, Archie Tyler, Harry Thompson, Cleod Thompson, Carl Thompson, Charles Timm, 'Andrew Vetter, Henry Von Krog, Garrett Wiggers, John Wilson, George Young.


CHAPTER X.


HONORABLE MENTION.


MEN WHO LEFT THE IMPRESS OF CHARACTER ON THE COMMUNITY-FIRST SECRE- TARY TO GOVERNOR LUCAS, LAWYER, HISTORIAN, MASTER MASON-ECCENTRIC AND BRILLIANT METHODIST PREACHER, A "COPPERHEAD"-HISTORIANS OF MUS- CATINE COUNTY AND MEN OF THE "RIGHT SPIRIT"-OTHER NOTABLE PIONEERS.


THEODORE SUTTON PARVIN.


Theodore Sutton Parvin attained distinction in many walks of life, but pos- sibly of all his titles to fame the most clearly established was his right to take rank as an untiring and almost universal collector. The generality of these collectors are a close handed sort of folk. Things must be retained or there can be no collection. But Mr. Parvin, although so earnest and devoted a col- lector himself, was always generous and helpful to others engaged in the same work. On more than one occasion he has been known to hand over rare and cherished objects to a brother collector, who seemed to be looking upon them with longing eyes. He was anxious that other state collections besides the one which was the object of his chief solicitude should be kept growing. Neither selfishness nor envy entered into his mental constitution.


To the library of the Davenport Academy of Sciences, the library of the State University, the State Library, the State Historical Society, the State His- torical Department, and the Aldrich Collection he was an open handed, liberal contributor and to all but the two last named, for a longer period than the life time of a generation.


His memory will be perpetuated in all the directions named. The memories of men stand little chance of preservation unless they are embalmed in printed books which are gathered into public libraries. If memories are not so perpet- uated they speedily perish. But in the libraries I have named the reader in future (and distant) years, will find most precious gifts from the free and ever generous hand of the patriarch and nestor of the state. No other resident in Iowa has built for himself so many, or such permanent and abiding monuments, and if, to use the words of Daniel Webster, when speaking of himself, "the mold shall gather upon his memory," there will be a legion of students of Iowa his- tory, both general and Masonic, to compete for the distinction of scraping the moss from the inscriptions.


Theodore Sutton Parvin was born in Cedarville, Cumberland county, New Jersey, January 15, 1817. His death occurred at Cedar Rapids, Iowa, June 28, 1901. He had therefore entered upon his eighty-fifth year.


195


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HISTORY OF MUSCATINE COUNTY


When a mere child, Mr. Parvin was afflicted with rheumatism, which from his fifth to his seventeenth year compelled him to walk with crutches and en- tailed a permanent lameness. But what to the lad and his friends must have seemed an intolerable affliction, was not without its compensating advantages. Debarred from the usual sports of boyhood and youth, he was thrown back on sedentary enjoyments, and thus was begun a course of omnivorous reading which continued throughout life. His memory was also unusually retentive and habits of order and classification, early formed, made all the treasures of gath- ered fact and stored sentiment available for the work of later years.


In the fall of 1829 his father and family removed to Cincinnati, then the metropolis of the west. Here young Parvin, who had exhausted the educational facilities of his native village, at once entered the public schools. His aptitude for acquiring knowledge was so great as to command the high respect of his teacher, who gave him special instruction in the classics and the higher mathe- matics, in both of which the youthful scholar excelled. At the closing examina- tion of his course of study, a wealthy gentleman present proposed, first of all to the teacher, and afterward to the parents, to send the boy to college. The offer was accepted and therefore through the kindness of a stranger young Par- vin was enabled to pursue in the first instance a classical course and subsequently to secure a legal education, after which he selected the law as his vocation in life, and in 1837 began the practice of his profession.


In the following year, at the house of a mutual friend in Cincinnati, he met General Robert Lucas, who had retired from the governorship of Ohio, receiv- ing from President Martin Van Buren the appointment of first governor of the new territory of Iowa. Governor Lucas was at once most favorably impressed with the young man, whom he invited to accompany him to Iowa as his private secretary. The offer was accepted and Mr. Parvin went with the Governor to Burlington, where they arrived in the early summer of 1838. In August of the same year, and while still private secretary to Governor Lucas, Mr. Parvin was admitted to practice law in the territorial courts and in connection with this event an anecdote has been related which is of interest as throwing a sidelight on the men and manners of the time.


Upon his arrival at the then little village of Dubuque, Mr. Parvin repaired at once to the residence of Judge Wilson. On knocking at the door, it was opened by a very young man, a mere boy in appearance. After the first greet- ing the caller asked: "Is your father at home?" "He is not here," was the re- ply, "but what do you wish?" "Why, I came to see Judge Wilson." "Well, sir, I am Judge Wilson. What can I do for you?" Quickly recovering from his surprise, the other said: "I came to apply for admission to the practice of the law." He was at once and cordially invited to come in. None of the particu- lars of the examination have come to us but when the budding lawyer left the house he carried with him a certificate of admission "to practice in all courts of record in the territory aforesaid."


During the same year (1838) Governor Lucas appointed his young secretary to the position of territorial librarian and the latter was sent to Cincinnati and Philadelphia, where he succeeded in obtaining a valuable collection of books- the nucleus of the present State Library-for which he paid $5,000 in cash.


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Here it will be permissible to digress for a moment with the remark, that from the date of his executing the commission with which he had been entrusted in 1838, until the day on which he drew his last breath, Mr. Parvin was the custodian of books, either as state librarian, librarian of the university, or as "Castellan" of the imposing structure at Cedar Rapids, where is enshrined the magnificent collection which it was his life's labor to amass, for the instruction and delectation of the society which had the first place in his thoughts.


The next position to which Mr. Parvin was appointed was that of district attorney for the middle district of Iowa in the year 1839. In the following year he was elected secretary of the territorial council. From 1847 to 1857 he was clerk of the United States district court. In 1840-50 he was county judge. This was in those days a position of much power and responsibility, as these so-called judges not only exercised all the duties of surrogates or probate judges, but also, with more of real power, discharged most of the functions now exercised by the boards of county supervisors. They could lay out county roads, build bridges or court houses and run their counties into almost any depth of indebtedness. Some northwestern counties were more than twenty years paying the debts incurred in the reign of the county judges. The eastern coun- ties happily had little or no difficulty in that direction. Mr. Parvin's adminis- tration was both stainless and successful. He was for one term registrar of the state land office, in 1857-8.


It would almost seem that the activities already enumerated would suffice to fill the entire period of one man's usefulness. But as yet I have only touched on the period of preparation, and with the aim of following the order in which the subject of this sketch placed the importance of his life's work. The office holding portion of his career passed away when he took up the more congenial duties of an educator. In the law he was well skilled, a born fighter, and a splen- did advocate. In the arena of politics his zeal was perhaps not always tempered by discretion and while his language towards political opponents was always forceful, it often lacked the gentle touch which deprives even the most cutting words of a portion of their sting. But it was in the quieter atmosphere of the class room and in the realms of literature that the best that was in the man was developed into a living force, and this will have an influence upon Iowa schools and Iowa culture long after the memory of "Professor Parvin" shall have faded to merely an honored name upon the rolls of her teachers.


In 1859 he retired from the state land office and was appointed one of the trustees of the then new Iowa State University, becoming in the following year a member of its faculty. For more than twenty years as founder, regent, cura- tor, librarian, member of the executive committee, or professor of history, he was active in the university life. From 1869 to the date of his death, while no longer officially connected with the university, he continued, nevertheless, to be its firm friend and its constant benefactor. He bestowed upon it valuable col- lections and presented it with complete sets of rare works. Day by day he added some benefaction unknown to the world at large but known to the students and professors there.


The indefatigable zeal displayed by the subject of this memoir as a collector and preserver of books has already been, in part, referred to, and it next be-


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comes my duty to record that he was also a writer of great elegance, accuracy and force. A bibliography, however, of his literary work, even if the files of periodicals for the past sixty years (in which they are principally contained) were readily accessible, would carry me too far, and necessitate the expansion of what is only designed to be a slight sketch of a remarkable personality, into a formal biography.


I shall restrict myself, therefore, to a survey of his writings as connected with the literature of the craft and these are so closely interwoven with the varied stages of his long and distinguished career as a Free Mason, that the convenience of the reader will be most effectually ensured by my proceeding in the first in- stance with a recital of the successive steps by means of which Mr. Parvin be- came in the commonwealth of Iowa, the foremost representative of our society.


Theodore Sutton Parvin was raised to the degree of a Master Mason at Cin- cinnati, Ohio, in 1838. He was a founder of the first lodge, Des Moines, No. I, in Iowa, 1840, and of the second lodge, Iowa No. 2, at Muscatine, 1841. In the latter he filled the offices of senior deacon, worshipful master and secre- tary. At the organization of the grand lodge of Iowa in 1844, he was elected grand secretary and held the office continuously until his demise, with the ex- ception of one year, 1852, during which time he occupied the station of grand master. In his first term as grand secretary (1844) he founded the grand lodge library, was appointed grand librarian and held the position without a break during the remainder of his life. He was grand master in 1852; reporter on foreign correspondence, 1845-52, 1857, 1859, and 1878-92; and grand orator on the celebration of the twentieth anniversary of the grand lodge, 1863, again on the laying of the corner stone of the library building at Cedar Rapids, 1884, and lastly, at the commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the grand lodge in * * 1894. *


The Masonic library of Iowa is, however, Mr. Parvin's most enduring monu- ment. To it he gave the best years and the best endeavors of his life. With one poor volume, perhaps the only Masonic work in the state, he began his task and was privileged to witness the full fruition of his labors. Through his timely and persistent efforts the library of the grand lodge was established in its present permanent headquarters at Cedar Rapids in 1885. A fund of some $20,000 had been accumulated and this was wisely devoted to the erection of a large fire proof grand lodge museum and library building. *


* The literary labors of Mr. Parvin which fall within the scope of these remarks have their greatest and best exemplar in the Proceedings of the Grand Lodge of Iowa, the whole of which he edited and compiled. In 1859-60 he edited the Western Free- mason, at Muscatine and the Evergreen at Davenport in 1871-2. He was the editor of the Iowa department of Gouley's Magazine, published at St. Louis in 1873, and the author of Templarism in the United States, which forms one of the Addenda to the "American Edition" of my own History of Freemasonry. *


In May, 1843, Mr. Parvin was united in marriage to Miss Agnes McCully, whose death a few years ago brought a burden of sorrow from which he never fully recovered. He is survived by three sons: Newton R., for many years his deputy and now his successor in office as grand secretary; Theodore W. and


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Frederick O., who are engaged in railroad and mining engineering in Mexico; and Mrs. J. Walter Lee, of Chicago. A beautiful memorial window in Close Hall commemorates a daughter who died some years ago.


HENRY CLAY DEAN.


Henry Clay Dean was born in Fayette county, Pennsylvania, October 27, 1822. He was a graduate of Madison College, Pennsylvania, taught for a time and studied law. In 1845 he joined the Methodist Episcopal conference of Vir- ginia and began to preach in the mountain region of that state, where he re- mained for four years. In 1850 he removed to Iowa, locating at Pittsburg, Van Buren county, where he preached to the Keosauqua circuit, joining the Fair- field conference. It was a short time after that that he was stationed at Mus- catine. He preached here but a short time but made a lasting impression. The Methodist church was not a large one at that time but Dean would fill it every Sunday. Through the influence of General George W. Jones, one of the first United States senators from Iowa, he was chosen as chaplain of the senate. He was one of the trustees of the Iowa Wesleyan University at Mt. Pleasant, Iowa. Mr. Dean was admitted to the bar but did not practice law. He was a public speaker of rare eloquence and was frequently invited to deliver lectures, among which was a Reply to Ingersoll, The Constitution, Declaration of Independence and many other topics. During the Civil war he was arrested for disloyal utter- ances and confined in prison for several months by order of government officials. Upon his release he wrote and published a book with the title Crimes of the Civil War. It was a bitter assault upon President Lincoln and the administra- tion in the great work of subduing the rebellion. He removed to a farm in Putnam county, Missouri, which he named Rebel Cove. It was four miles from a station on the Burlington railroad, where a postoffice was named Dean. There he spent his last days, reading and writing. His great library was destroyed by fire at that place. He died on his farm in 1887, and thus passed a great char- acter of history.




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