USA > Iowa > Story County > History of Story County, Iowa; a record of organization, progress and achievement, Volume II > Part 3
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In politics Dr. Dickey is a republican, while his religious faith is indi- cated by his membership in the Methodist Episcopal church. Fraternally he is identified with the Yeomen, the Modern Woodmen of America and Tabernacle Lodge No. 452, A. F. & A. M., of Cambridge. He maintains the strictest conformity to the highest professional ethics and enjoys in full measure the confidence and respect of his professional brethren as well as of the general public.
FREDERICK WALDEMAR LARSON.
Frederick Waldemar Larson, cashier of the Citizens State Bank of Cam- bridge and one of the valued citizens of the community, was born in Boone county, Illinois, April 7. 1865, and is the son of Jonas T. and Sina ( Nessen) Larson. The parents were both natives of Norway and came to America on the same boat in 1861, their destination being Chicago. They were mar- ried in the Illinois metropolis and subsequently removed to Boone county, where they lived for two years, and then in 1866 came with an emigrant train to Story county, Iowa. The father purchased land two miles west of Cambridge in Union township and became one of the substantial farmers of that section. The mother was called away in 1881, and Mr. Larson was again married, the lady of his choice being Miss Carrie Burreson, also a native of Norway. He had six children by his first marriage and seven by the second, and was summoned from earthly scenes in October, 1908, at the age of seventy-seven years. His second wife is still living. He was a stanch republican politically but being of a modest and retiring nature never sought public office. Religiously he adhered to the Lutheran church.
Frederick Waldemar Larson received his early education in the district schools and, having shown a decided inclination for study, was sent to Augs- burg Seminary at Minneapolis, Minnesota, his parents intending to prepare him for the ministry of the Lutheran church. After two terms in the semi- nary, however, he left that institution and entered the Western Normal College at Shenandoah, Iowa, taking the normal and business courses, from which he was graduated in 1888. He taught school for several terms and was for a time in Chicago. Finally, being attracted to the mercantile busi- ness he came to Cambridge and continued in business with good success for about ten years. In 1901 he disposed of his store and soon afterward ac- cepted the position of cashier of the Citizens State Bank, which he has ever since filled, being also a stockholder and a member of the board of directors
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HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
of the institution. He is regarded as one of the able financiers of the county. and by his close attention to a calling for which he seems eminently adapted he has greatly added to the resources and prestige of the bank. He is also interested with Johnson Brothers in farming, now having charge of more than five hundred acres in this part of the state.
On the 16th of November, 1892, at Des Moines, Mr. Larson was united in marriage to Miss Gustie Nutson, a native of Illinois but of Norwegian parentage, and by this union four children have been born: Florence G. and Jessie, both of whom are attending the high school; Charlotte N., now in the primary school ; and Edna O.
Mr. Larson now gives his support to the prohibitionist party but was for many years a prominent factor in republican councils. He holds member- ship in the Odd Fellows, the Knights of Pythias and the Modern Wood- men of America, and he and his wife are active members of the Methodist Episcopal church, in which he has served as steward and trustee and also as Sunday school superintendent. For nineteen years he has been a mem- ber of the school board and for thirteen years past has filled the chair of president of that body. He takes great interest in educational and church work, devoting a large part of his time in those interests and also contrib- uting very liberally to all worthy demands. He ranks as a leader in Story county, both as a business man and as a self-sacrificing citizen, whose constant aim is to add to the comfort and happiness of others. While he is a banker he is also a great lover of nature and the call of the farm has for him a charm that he often finds hard to resist. He has a host of friends who have been attracted by his spirit of helpfulness, which is one of the most desirable traits that can be possessed by any human being.
JACOB W. McCORD.
Jacob W. McCord, an enterprising and progressive agriculturist, is the owner of one hundred and sixty acres of land in Collins township, where he is extensively engaged in the raising of shorthorn cattle and Duroc Jersey hogs. His birth occurred in Des Moines county, Iowa, on the 25th of October, 1851, his parents being Commodore P. and Sarah E. (Smith ) McCord. The father, who was born in Clermont county, Ohio, on the 10th of October. 1826, was reared in the Buckeye state and in 1850 journeyed westward to lowa, locating in Des Moines county. Two years later, in the fall of 1852, he came to Story county, where the remainder of his life was spent. Entering a tract of government land in Collins township, he erected thereon a log cabin and began farming. On the 14th of August. 1862, he enlisted for service in the Civil war, joining Company K, Twenty- third Towa Volunteer Infantry. On the 17th of May, 1863, at the battle of Black River Bridge, Mississippi, he was so severely wounded in the
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HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
left leg that amputation was necessary and on the 13th of August, 1863, he was discharged because of disability, subsequently returning to his home in this county. In 1869 he was elected the first auditor of Story county, ably serving in that capacity for one term. He next purchased and located on the farm which is now in possession of his son, A. S. McCord, residing thereon for a number of years. In 1883 he was stricken with paralysis and soon afterward took up his abode in Nevada, where he passed away on the 2d of October, 1886, when almost sixty years of age. He had met with success in his undertakings as an agriculturist and accumulated about four hundred and twenty acres of Story county's most valuable farm land. His fraternal relations were with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and he was buried with the honors of the Maxwell and Nevada lodges. His political allegiance was given to the republican party and he was widely recognized as one of the representative and most highly esteemed citizens of the community. On the 12th of January, 1851, in Des Moines county, Iowa, he wedded Miss Sarah E. Smith, who was born near Springfield, Illinois. Their children were nine in number, namely: Jacob W., of this review; Mary, the deceased wife of John Ray; Nancy. the wife of James T. White, of Ames, Iowa; Abraham S., living in Collins township, Story county ; Alice, at home; Rachel E., the wife of Clifford Funk, of Des Moines, Iowa; Sherman G., who is a resident of Nevada, Iowa; Elias S., a practicing physician and surgeon of Dehar. Iowa; and Charles P., of Nevada, Iowa.
Jacob W. McCord was reared under the parental roof and in the ac- quirement of an education first attended the district schools, while later he continued his studies in the Nevada city schools. He was married when about twenty-eight years of age and continued farming as a renter for the next five or six years. His present farm of one hundred and sixty acres in Collins township has been his place of abode for the past twenty-six years and he has lived in his present residence since the spring of 1892. In connection with the tilling of the soil he raises shorthorn cattle and Duroc Jersey hogs, keeping only the best blooded stock. This proves a profitable source of income to him and as the years go by he is meeting with the measure of success which always crowns persistent, well directed labor.
On the 4th of February, 1879, Mr. McCord was united in marriage to Miss Martha Dunahoo, a daughter of John Dunahoo, of whom more ex- tended mention is made in the sketch of M. R. Dunahoo, a brother of Mrs. McCord. Mr. McCord gives his political allegiance to the republican party and has served as a member of the board of township trustees for about sixteen years. The cause of education has always found in him a stanch champion and he served for many years as a member of the school board. Hle belongs to Fervent Lodge No. 519. A. F. & A. M., and Crescent Camp. No. 2358, M. W. A., while both he and his wife are members of the Eastern Star at Collins and Sunbeam Lodge No. 181. Mystic Workers of America. They likewise belong to the United Brethren church, of which
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HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
Mr. McCord is one of the trustees and in which he served for several years as steward. A review of his life shows that in business he has been diligent as well as reliable, that in citizenship he has been loyal to the best interests of the community and that his social acquaintances know him as a tried and trusted friend. Brought to Story county when still in his first year, he has since remained within its borders and is widely and favorably known.
LARS F. SESKE.
Success in farming, as in every other branch of business endeavor, only comes to him who has the intelligence and capacity for industry to apply to his chosen vocation in life, as is exemplified by the career of Lars F. Seske, who, at the age of twenty-two years, started out in life for himself and is today one of the successful and progressive agriculturists of Union town- ship. There he was born April 18, 1864, a son of John and Helga (Staat- feit) Seske, both of whom were natives of Norway. The father was born March 1, 1826, his parents being Frederick and Eugene ( Frederick) Seske, who died in Norway. John Seske obtained such education as was avail- able in the schools of his locality and later was apprenticed to the trade of a shoemaker. Desiring to better his condition in life, for as a youth he was very ambitious, he decided to come to America and made the ocean voyage in 1857. Locating in New York city, he continued to follow his early vocation for a period of three months, after which time he removed to Racine, Wisconsin, where he secured employment in a shoe factory. From here he went to Franklin county, Kansas, and in 1860 came to Story county, where he saw the agricultural advantages and purchased forty acres of land. Here he continued to till the soil and by thrift and industry he was able to add to his property, until his personal holdings amount to three hundred and ninety-six acres in Union township, at the present time being one of the largest landowners in Story county.
In 1858 John Seske was married to Miss Helga Staatfeit, and by this union six children were born, namely: John; Elizabeth, now Mrs. Oster- man, living in Polk county, Iowa; Nels H .; Lars F .; Carl L .; Jacob S. Mr. Seske has the unusual distinction of being the grandfather of thirty- eight children. Mrs. Seske departed this life July 29, 1904. In politics Mr. Seske has allied himself with the republican party and has served his town- ship with faithfulness and unaltering loyalty in various public offices. In his religious belief he is a consistent adherent of the Lutheran church.
The independent spirit manifested itself in Lars F. Seske when, shortly after reaching his majority he rented and operated a farm on his own account for two years, during which time he acquired invaluable knowledge regarding the science of agriculture, profiting by this to such an extent that
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HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
he was able in 1888 to purchase the farm on which he now resides and which consists of eighty acres. He is one of the progressive and well-to- do men of the community and by virtue of his individual industry is now reaping the benefits of his carly efforts.
In 1891 Mr. Seske was united in marriage to Miss Elizabeth Johnson. of Polk county, lowa, whose father was John Johnson who came to this country from Norway at an early day. To Mr. and Mrs. Seske were born the following children : Mattie, Martin, Henry. Ella, Joseph, Frances, Eldon and Anna.
In politics Mr. Seske casts his vote with the republican party. and in religion he and his family are faithful members of the Lutheran church. Ile is interested in everything that stands for the betterment of the com- munity in which he resides and is always willing to give his support to those projects which are working for the public good. He has the respect and esteem of his many friends as a public-spirited citizen of Union town- ship.
WILLIAM PIERCE PAYNE.
William Pierce Payne, the senior editor of the Nevada Representative. will celebrate his eightieth birthday on December 22, 1911. and Mrs. Ada- line Maria Payne, his wife, will celebrate her seventy-seventh birthday on November 12, 1911. They celebrated together their golden wedding at Nevada on January 16, 1900. When their years are considered they are a very exceptionally active couple, still giving daily attention to business and current affairs and being in the full enjoyment of most excellent health. They have been identified with Nevada and Story county since 1875 and this identification still continues, not merely as a courtesy but as a conse- quence of present relation to people and events.
Mr. Payne was the second son of Samuel Pierce and Juliaette ( Ball ) Payne, and he was born in the south part of the town of Rutland. Jeffer- son county, New York, on December 22. 1831. Ile grew up in the neigh- borhood where he was born. much of his youth being spent with his uncle. Henry M. Ball, on an adjoining farm. lle attended the district and vil- lage school and about the time he was getting through his teens began teaching in the district schools of the neighborhood. After a few winters of teaching he went to the New York State Normal School at Albany. where he spent one year and was graduated in February, 1854. Sub-e- quently he taught for two or three years at Sacketts Harbor on the eastern shore of Lake Ontario, while in 1857 he went to Tufts College near Bos- ton. Massachusetts, which he attended for two years. At the end of this period, in 1859. he completed his education and was ordained in the min- istry of the Universalist church. His first pastorate was at Lynn, Massa-
W. P. PAYNE
MRS. W. P. PAYNE
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HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
chusetts, and during the first year thereof he was married at South Rut- land, New York, on January 16, 1859, to Adaline M. Brown. He took his bride to Lynn, where their only son, William O., was born May 7. 1860. The pastorate at Lynn closed in 1862 and after a year at Cambridgeport, attending lectures at Harvard, he removed with his family to Clinton, New York, where he became pastor of the Universalist parish and also taught in the Clinton Liberal Institute, which was then a flourishing school of the Universalist denomination. He remained for nine years at Clinton and in 1872 removed to Nyack-on-the-Hudson, where he lived for two years. In 1874 the removal west was made, the destination being Mitchellville in Polk county, Iowa. At that place he had charge as principal of Mitchell Seminary, which had been established as the school for the Universalist de- nomination in this state and the main building of which has since become the nucleus of the State Industrial School for Girls. After a year at Mitch- ellville the family removed about thirty miles northward to Nevada.
The arrival at Nevada was in the fall of 1875. Mr. Payne had in the previous spring been elected principal of the public schools at this place and Mrs. Payne became an assistant in the high school. The time was when the more enterprising towns of this class in Iowa were beginning to organize regular high schools, and Nevada was just completing a fine new brick school building, suitable to its new and higher educational aspirations. Indeed the completion was so delayed that school did not open until the first week in November; but in time the building was completed and the school opened with much enthusiasm. Then for the first time was there in the school here a definite course of study at the completion of which diplomas of graduation would be given. The conditions were highly fa- vorable for good work by teachers and pupils, and at the end of the second year, in June. 1877. the first class was graduated, numbering nine. Five years were spent by Mr. and Mrs. Payne in this work and in this time were established relations with young people who have here and elsewhere made their impress on affairs-relations which in a local sense have grown closer and closer with all the passing years.
In 1880 the Paynes retired from the school here and Mr. Payne went to Boone, where he gained his first initiation into newspaper work on the staff of the Boone Republican. This initiation lasted for two years and at the end of that time, in the summer of 1882, he returned to Nevada and bought the Nevada Representative. the original newspaper in Story county and one that has always been identified with the county.
Thus after only a brief intermission the residence of the Paynes in Ne- vada was resumed. Mrs. Payne at once joined with her husband in his newspaper work and a year later the only son returned from college and became connected with the work also. With the increased force the work gradually differentiated, and the senior Payne gave his attention chiefly to the business and to the outside interests of the paper. In this work he be- came widely acquainted over the county. For nearly thirty years this work
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HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
has now continued; the county has thickened; the town has grown; the in- terests of all have progressed; and in whatever has been for the general advancement there has always been ready editorial and personal cooperation.
In respect to cooperation of this order for the general good, the rela- tion of Mr. Payne to the Nevada public library deserves first mention. Back in the time of his teaching days here the town had voted to establish a public library and Mr. Payne had been on the first committee to select books; also in the early 'gos a local organization had been formed unoffi- cially for the general purpose of boosting the library, and of this organiza- tion Mr. Payne was the first and only president; so, when in 1894 a law was enacted for the creation of a board of library trustees to have charge of the library, he was named by William Gates, then as now mayor of Ne- vada, as the first upon the new board. He was at once elected president of the board and this position he has held continuously since. To the uplift- ing work thus put in his charge he has given very much of time and strength ( not to mention other contributions ) and in the development of the library, in the housing of it in a splendid building ( which was built wholly from local resources) and in the finishing and furnishing of that building he has always been a moving spirit. At the same time Mrs. Payne, as a worker in the women's organizations and president for several years of the city federation of women's clubs, was assisting, while the need continued, in raising money for the library and in making it what it is. In due time, through the especial appreciation of Mrs. Dillin, one of the library trus- tees, and by action of the trustees, their portraits were conspicuously hung in the library. From such antecedents it may be seen that when the time came for the golden wedding of Mr. and Mrs. Payne the event was cele- brated in the ample parlors of the library and was an occasion memorable among occasions of that kind. It was the occasion, significant above any other. of the part they have borne in Nevada and of the local appreciation of that part.
MRS. ADALINE MARIA PAYNE.
Mrs. Adaline Maria Payne, wife of William P. Payne, was born Ada- line M. Brown. She was the eklest daughter of Orville and Lovisa ( Phelps) Brown and was born at South Champion, Jefferson county, New York, November 12, 1834. The place was just over the line from the town of Rutland, in which her husband was born, and to that town her parents removed while she was but a small child. Her father's homestead was es- tablished just outside of the village of Tylerville, which is officially known as South Rutland, and there she spent the years of her girlhood and youth. She attended the local school and in the summer when she was fourteen the taught her first term of district school. After that experience she
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HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
taught regularly during the term of the summer schools and after a time taught the winter schools also. In 1853-4 she also attended the State Nor- mal School at Albany, being graduated therefrom in July, 1854. Later she taught for a few years, much of the time in the city of Watertown, and on January 16, 1859, she was married, as above stated, to William P. Payne. She taught no more after the regular fashion for many years; but her son was home educated up to the high school, and after the family came west she was matron of the seminary at Mitchellville during the year of their residence there. As before stated, she also taught in the high school at Nevada for five years, and during the residence at Boone she taught there for one year. Beyond this, she taught in teachers' institutes four years in New York in early womanhood and afterward taught in institutes for ten or more years in Story, Boone and other counties in Iowa.
Returning to Nevada , she took part at first in the general work of the newspaper, the Nevada Representative, but after a number of years she came to give especial attention-along with the other work-to a depart- ment for "Busy Women," which has now for many years been a recog- nized feature of the paper. When the movement for the formation of women's clubs reached Nevada she was one of the very first to become in- terested and she was a charter member of the Nevada Woman's Club, which was the first of the modern clubs to be organized in this city. With the movement for federation of such clubs she attended as a delegate the first state convention of the federation and was one of the first state officers. Since then she has been many times a delegate to such conventions, and later she was active in federating the different clubs in the city and was long president of the city federation. Her interest in all such matters con- tinues with slight. if any, abatement. She has been hardly less active than her husband in behalf of the public library, as the highest concrete local ex- pression of general educational progress ; and at her golden wedding in the library parlors she wore the dress, necessarily remodeled, in which she had been married fifty years before.
WILLIAM ORSON PAYNE.
William Orson Payne, editor of the Nevada Representative and com- piler of the first volume of this history, is the only son of Mr. and Mrs. William P. Payne and was born at Lynn, Massachusetts, May 7, 1860. His babyhood was spent at Lynn and at Cambridgeport, where the family lived for only a short time, and his earlier boyhood was spent at Clinton, New York, where he had some associations never to be forgotten. After two more years of boyhood on the Hudson at Nyack his parents brought him west to grow up with the country. There was a year at Mitchellville and then the high school at Nevada. Two years in the high school and he grad-
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HISTORY OF STORY COUNTY
uated as one of its first class of nine, of whom six remain in Story county and five in or very near to Nevada. In the next year he clerked a few months in a justice's office and completed his preparation for college. In the fall of 1878 he entered the State University of Jowa at Iowa City, where be it recorded that he was an active member of the Zetagathian Lit- erary Society. Four years were spent in college in due course and he graduated in the class of 1882. Returning to the university for another year, he took his degree in law in 1883 and was admitted to the bar but never entered the active practice. Instead he returned to Nevada and be- came associated with his father and mother in the publication of the Ne- vada Representative. Always interested in public affairs, he has been a quite voluminous writer of political editorials, many of which have been more or less extensively quoted. lle has held the local offices of justice of the peace and member of the city council, has attended very many po- litical conventions and has gained a considerable acquaintance in the state. Ile was a delegate in 1900 to the republican national convention at Phila- delphia which nominated Mckinley and Roosevelt and has been frequently mentioned in connection with the republican nomination for congress in the seventh district of Iowa. He was assistant clerk of the general assembly in 1888 and two years later was clerk of the committee on coinage, weights and measures of the house of representatives through the famous fifty-first congress. Ile has been for nearly thirty years on the Nevada Representa- tive, is now fifty years of age and hopes that his best work is yet before him,
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