USA > Iowa > Polk County > Pioneers of Polk County, Iowa, and reminiscences of early days, Vol. II > Part 17
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Their home was also headquarters for pioneer preachers and their families. Among the gospel missionaries who frequently stopped there was Father Jessup, Father J. P. Roach and P. T. Russell. Once a week was also held an old-fashioned singing school, to wrestle with the old-style square notes and rehearse good, old Mear, Coronation, Lenox, Dundee, Rock of Ages, and other soul- stirring tunes.
What old-timer does not recall the fugues, especially the para- phrase of the One Hundred and Twenty-third Psalm, respecting
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JOHN F. WINTERROWD
the pleasure of brethren dwelling together in unity, which was "like the precious ointment upen the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard, that went down to the skirts of his gar- ments," for when the singers got warmed up, it would be rolled out something like this, somewhat disjointed, but with force and vigor, getting all together at the close:
"Ran down his beard, and e'er his head-
his rebes,
And o'er his robes
His beard, his robes,
Its costly
moist-
Its-costly-moisture-shed."
Winterrowd was public-spirited, charitable, and took an active part in educational affairs; helped organize the first school district in that section, build the first schoolhouse, and for many years was one of the School Directors. His home was the home of school teachers, free of expense.
Politically, he was a Free Seil Democrat, of the mest radical type, but toek no active part in politics.
In 1874-1875, having acquired a competency and many broad acres-he never sold an acre in his life-and admonished by pass- ing years of the need of rest, he divided up his property, giving each son a farm, the daughter a fine home in Des Moines, and became a resident of the city until his decease, in October, 1905, at the age of eighty-seven, leaving the heritage of a noble, Chris- tian life, devoted to the betterment of society and the good of pos- terity.
April Fifteenth, 1906.
NICHOLAS McDONNELL
NICHOLAS S. McDONNELL
A N old-timer is N. S. McDonnell, or "Nick," as he was best known thirty years ago. Born May Eighth, 1842, on the "Auld Sod," in Tipperary, Ireland, of true Celtic ancestry, he passed his youth on his father's small farmu, abutting the River Shannon, where he marshaled the ducks to water, looked after the pigs, burglarized the hens' nests for the kitchen supply, and did such other stunts as fall to a growing lad on a farm. He attended the National schools, which correspond to the public schools in this country, until he was fourteen years old.
At Cape May, New Jersey, resided an uncle, who wrote such glowing accounts of the country on this side of the "big pond," and told such tales of the chances for a young man to make dollars, "Nick" decided to try it. Rolling his belongings into a bundle, he put them into a bag, and in May, 1857, set sail alone for America, with no mishap en route, except a slight interference with his appe- tite from Nausea Marina, as the doctor would call it, before he got his "sea legs," and a slight attack of nostalgia, as the distance wid- ened between him and father, mother, and the good old Emerald Isle, but he was a disappointed boy on arriving at Cape May, to learn that his uncle had left the country-gone West.
Without money, in a strange land, he had to hunt a job. He learned that Jay Gould had purchased a large tract of timber land in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, and was going to build a big tannery and town there. "Nick" took the trail, and on arriving there his first job was peeling the bark from the trees as they were cut down, and cording it up, at two dollars per week. His next job was attending the tan vats-that is, changing the liquids from one vat to another, according to the time required, a process demanding promptness, precision, and fidelity.
Meanwhile, he kept his eyes open, and when Gould began to lay out and plat his town of Gouldsborough, he was placed in the
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surveying party. His next job was with the builders of the notable big tannery.
He remained at Gouldsborough until 1859, when he had an attack of Western Fever, came to Illinois, looked about a bit, but did not like the country. He turned his face southward and landed in Memphis, Tennessee, where he made an engagement to learn the trade of machinist and boilermaker. He remained there until the Civil War broke out, in 1861, and not being in sympathy with the Southern side of the contest, made tracks northward. He came up the Mississippi to Clinton, thence by railroad to Cedar Rapids, thence across the country to Iowa City, thence by railroad to Marengo, then the terminus of the Rock Island Road. From there he walked to Des Moines, getting the first view of the town one fine April day, from the top of Capitol Hill, which he declares was the most beautiful landscape he ever saw. He surveyed it in all directions and decided to come in and stay. The town was small ; there were but few houses, scattered over the bottoms on the East Side; all trade and business was done on the West Side, on Second Street, and Court Avenue below Third Street.
Not finding sufficient employment at his trade, he went to work on a farm in Walnut Township, in the harvest fields, at sixty-five cents per day. For a short time, he worked in Heminway's foun- dry, on the East Side, the first foundry in the town.
Charley Van was building and booming a rival to Des Moines -facetiously called "Vantown," on the south side of the 'Coon. He had built a big mill, several small houses, staked out a promis- ing city, and he offered "Nick" a good factory site, if he would locate there; but it was declined, with thanks.
Soon after, he found a small frame, abandoned building on Des Moines River bank, near "'Coon Point," and, gathering a few tools and other appliances together, he put up his shingle for busi- ness. In the Spring of 1862, the floods came, and one morning, when going to his shop, he saw it sailing down the river toward the Gulf of Mexico.
Discouraged, but not undaunted, he bought a small part of a lot belonging to the estate of Alex. Scott, at the corner of East First and Court Avenue, started again, and inaugurated steam boiler
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making in Des Moines, and he is on the same corner now. There was not much demand for steam boilers then. The first one he made went into the Heminway foundry; the next into the Daily Register office, and he has made every boiler used in that estab- lishment during all its inntations and migrations, to the present time. As business increased, extensions and additions were made to the works, until they now occupy an entire block.
In 1866, James Meara, his old shopmate in Memphis, joined him as partner, the two, and an occasional helper, doing all the work. In 1879, Meara having died, "Nick" purchased his interest, and in 1888, organized the Des Moines Manufacturing and Supply Company, with himself as President and his son, John E., Secre- tary and Treasurer.
During all these years, "Nick" devoted his spare moments to the study of mechanics, and the most advanced literature on that subject. In 1864, he took a course in Muffley's Iowa Business Col- lege, then in the Turner Building, next east of The Register and Leader Building, and the first business college in the city. On the third floor of that building was the first exclusive amusement hall opened in town.
The works are now making all kinds of engines, boilers, mill, clay, and mining machinery. A specialty is machinery complete, of original designs, for gypsum plaster mills, which are success- fully competing with Eastern manufactories. Five mills have been put in at Fort Dodge; others at Syracuse, New York; Fort Clin- ton, Ohio; Manitoba, and in California. The machinery for a mill is massive, and embraces the mining, drying, crushing, grind- ing, calcining, and mixing of gypsum rock for stucco work, a cal- cining pan alone weighing one thousand, nine hundred pounds, and a good mill has four pans.
More than fifty mechanics are employed, and from the first week in 1864, every employé, on Saturday night, has received his week's wages. If the cash box was short, as it sometimes was, "Nick" hustled out and borrowed enough to "pay off," rather than break his inexorable rule, believing that a well-paid and satisfied employé is the best helper.
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Beginning with nothing but brain, brawn and determination, by industry, intelligently directed, sterling integrity, and square- dealing, he has won success, and added to the mechanical industries of the city until the output of his works is now more than two hun- dred thousand dollars per year.
Politically, he is a Republican. He cast his first ballot for the election of "Old Abe" to his second term, but he has not time nor inclination to indulge in politics.
Socially, he is of genial disposition, companionable, esteemed by everybody, and carries a big, warm heart, pulsating with kindness and charity. He is not a member of any secret organization, pre- ferring to keep aloof from all "entangling alliances."
Religiously, he is a Catholic, and active in the church and edu- cational work of that denomination.
He has good health, is always on deck for business, yet his forty- nine years of strenuous labor prompts him to let John E. do the hustling.
December 16, 1906.
GERRIT VAN GINKEL
GERRIT VAN GINKEL
NE of the most active and successful "boosters" of Des Moines thirty years ago was Gerrit Van Ginkel, who not only helped the town, but accumulated wealth, not by spec- ulation, but legitimate business enterprises.
Born in the land of the canals, windmills and wooden shoes, December Eleventh, 1849, he came, with his parents, to America, landing at New Orleans in 1857. They came up the Mississippi Valley to Pella, and joined the community of sturdy, intelligent Hollanders who had settled there. The father engaged in farming, while Gerrit did what he could find to do, for board and clothes, and attended the excellent schools which have been the notable feature of the town since its foundation, until eleven years old, when he went to learn the printing trade in the office of the Week- blad, published by the well-known banker, Henry Hospers, where he remained until 1867, when, at the age of eighteen, he estab- lished the Pella Gazette, which he published two years, when, his health becoming impaired from overwork, he was compelled to abandon it, for he was a complete bundle of energy and activity, an omnivorous reader, diligent student, and delver for knowledge, giv- ing himself little time for the rest and recuperation necessary in the adolescent period.
He then sought outdoor work of any kind he could get. He husked corn for one dollar a day. When outdoor work was not obtainable, he took the road and worked in printing offices in Chi- cago and other cities. Typesetting in those days was quite differ- ent from what it is to-day. Instead of sitting in a chair and work- ing a keyboard similar to that of a typewriting machine, he had to stand on his feet and pick up each letter with his fingers.
Eventually, he reached Des Moines, in 1869. The best open- ing he saw for work-idleness was foreign to his nature-was truck farming. He purchased a tract of land south of 'Coon River
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and began raising vegetables on a small scale. By industry and strict attention to business, regardless of sunrise or sunset, excellent skill and management, his trade so increased that he enlarged his fields until he became an extensive shipper to other places. In Winter months, he set type in the Register office.
While he was running his gardening enterprise, he prospected for coal on his land, and found, at a depth of one hundred and thirty-five feet, an excellent strata underlying his entire holdings. He at once sunk a shaft, and in 1882-1883, had three mines in operation, employing one hundred and fifty men. He opened yards at First and Court Avenue, and became one of the prominent coal operators in the town, his trade being mostly local. He was always on good terms with the miners and his customers, his rule being to give everyone a fair deal, and his tons to weigh two thousand pounds. In 1890, he went out of the coal business, and his yards were removed to give place to the Brown-Hurley building.
While he was in the coal business, he established a large brick- making plant, which turned out millions of brick annually. He also organized and put in operation the Iowa Mineral and Ochre Paint Works.
In 1885, Doctor M. P. Turner was operating a street railway under a charter granted in 1866, giving him the exclusive use of the streets for cars moved by animal power, and he was occupying several streets in his free-and-easy-going way. He never got in a hurry, and nobody had to run to catch his cars. They were also small and narrow, the track being only three feet gauge. Van Ginkel concluded the service could be greatly improved, and, with H. E. Teachout, in 1886, applied for a franchise for a road of four feet eight and a half inch gauge, the cars to be drawn by horses. At the same time, Van Ginkel and John Weber applied for a charter for a road from 'Coon River bridge to Sevastopol, with the same gauge. Of course, the Doctor vigorously opposed it, and he found friends enough in the City Council to stave it off for a year, but in 1887, both were granted. Construction was com- menced at once and pushed vigorously. On the East Side, track was laid on Locust Street from Sixth to West Fourth, north on Fourth to Center, and west on Center. Streets paralleling the
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Doctor's lines were also taken. The cars were up-to-date, larger, and more comfortable than the Doctor's cars, evidencing the push and energy behind the enterprise. The Doctor became alarmed at the apparent purpose to crowd him out of business, and applied to the District Court for an injunction restraining the use of the broad-gauge cars. Then it was up to the lawyers-the best in the town-and the contest was a vigorous one. The Doctor finally won, Judge Marcus Kavanagh, now one of the most highly esteemed and popular judges in Chicago, granting the injunction prohibiting the use of broad-gauge cars on and after May First, 1888.
Van Ginkel and Teachout at once appealed to the Supreme Court, setting out the claim that the Doctor's charter was for a narrow-gauge road. After some further delay, the court held that the width of the gauge did not affect the Doctor's exclusive right, under his charter, to the use of animal power to move his cars, and affirmed Judge Kavanagh's decree.
Incidentally, during the hearing-it was not set out in the appeal-the question arose as to the right to use other than animal power, but the court, under its general rule not to beg questions nor express extra judicial opinions, and as the question was not in the case at bar, declined to give an opinion. It simply affirmed Kava- nagh's decree. The broad-gauge cars were tied up.
It was then again up to the lawyers. But Van Ginkel decided to take the bull by the horns, as it were, and electrify the road. New and larger cars were ordered, the horse cars remodeled, the track relaid. Electricity for moving railway cars was then in an experimental stage. Its utility had not yet been satisfactorily determined, but Van Ginkel, from his study of the subject, was satisfied it would be a success, and the first contract made by the now extensive Thomson-Houston Electric Company for an elec- trical railway equipment was for this Des Moines road.
So soon as the cars were running, the Doctor pounced on them again for an injunction, claiming he had the exclusive right to the use of the streets of the city for railway purposes; that the city could not give the right to another, and thus destroy his business. Again, the matter went up to the Supreme Court, and to save time, on an agreed case between the parties. On that appeal, the court
VOL. II-(15).
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held that, while the Doctor's charter of 1866, gave him the exclu- sive right to the use of the streets for a railway operated by animal power, the City Council was not precluded from granting the use of the streets for cars run by some other power. His right was to use horse cars, with all improvements that could be devised, but nothing more. "As well," said the court, "might the owner of a rope ferry forty years ago insist that his exclusive right prohibited the use of steam." The decision of the court below was reversed, which sealed the doom of the horse cars, and in 1889, Jeff. Polk purchased the franchise and property of all the lines, and consoli- dated them with his own chartered steam roads, in the present system.
Van Ginkel then sought other fields, and in June, 1890, went to Springfield, Illinois, and started another electric street railway system. Though an entire stranger to the people, his energy and activity elicited the good-will of the community, and in three months he had cars running. On the opening day a mass meeting was held to celebrate the event. There were brass bands, fireworks, and oratorical pyrotechnics galore. The whole town was out. One of the speechmakers, named Graham, said he did not know Van Ginkel, had never seen him before, nor had he ever spoken to him, but he had just returned from a short stop at Des Moines, where he learned that he was well known there as a man who does things. Before they got through with the jollification, Van was called up and presented with a beautiful gold-headed cane as an expression of the public esteem of him.
While he was operating at Springfield, he and Colonel M. T. V. Bowman, of Des Moines, established an electric street car system in South Bend, Indiana.
In 1894, Van returned to Des Moines, and decided to invest some of his surplus dollars in a testimonial of his faith in his home town. He leased, for a term of ninety years, the corner of Fourth and Locust, and ordered plans made for a ten-story building. Soon after, he was having a frolic at home with his own and other little children, when he received a bruise on the temple, causing a blood- clot on the optic nerve, resulting in total blindness. The building plans were completed, but he would not allow work to begin unless
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he could see the plans. While he was in darkness, his eldest daugh- ter sickened and died, thus adding more to his burden of sorrow.
His total blindness extended several months, but suddenly, one evening, passed away, when his building was pushed to completion, in the early part of 1896, at a cost of one hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars, exclusive of the ground rental. It is ten stories high and contains one hundred and forty business offices. Above the roof is a cupola five stories high. The roof is encircled with a guard-rail and fitted up for roof-garden entertainments in Sum- mer. It is an ornament to the city, and a testimonial of the energy, enterprise, business capacity, and boosting faith in the town of a young man who landed in it with just twenty dollars in his pocket.
In 1899, he had another attack of street railway fever, and went to Dallas, Texas, where he found an embryo city with six horse car lines of railway in operation, with little system or profit. About twelve miles distant was Exall Lake, a favorite pleasure resort. Lakes are scarce in Texas, hence, to him, its apparent prospective importance. He at once built an electric line to the lake, then pur- chased the other lines, consolidated them with his own line, and operated them under a system similar to that in Des Moines, with great success, until June Eleventh, 1901, when he sold it, having made preliminary arrangements to build an electric road from Omaha to Lincoln, in Nebraska.
A few days after the sale, he attended a picnic at the lake, in the evening. A car was to come after the party, but was delayed some time, when Van and a friend started up the track to learn what caused the delay. After going a short distance, Van said he was very tired, and stopped. His friend said he would go on and meet the car. Van warned him to be cautious, as it was dangerous. He went on, met the car, boarded it and it ran to the lake. Being down grade, it made little noise, the power being cut off. Just before reaching the lake, it suddenly struck an object, which proved to be Van. He was badly injured, and death came before the town could be reached.
Politically, he was always a Republican, took an active part in civic affairs, yet gave little or no attention to partisan politics. Socially, he was public-spirited. His benefactions for educational
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and church purposes were little known, for he avoided public notice -so much so, that he would never consent to pose for a photo- graph, and the picture presented herewith was snapped by a kodak a few hours before his decease. He was a firm believer in the Sal- vation Army, frequently stopped and listened to their service, but seldom left without placing fifty cents or a dollar on the drum. He was fond of children, a sincere friend of the laboring man, and an active member of the Order of Odd Fellows. He built a two-story brick in Sevastopol, and donated it to Lodge Number Sixty-five, conditioned that the lower story be equipped and permanently maintained as a public library. It is now a branch of the City Library. In recognition of the gift, he was made a life member of the lodge. He was also a prominent member of the Masonic fraternity, and the Elks. He was plain of speech, reticent, posi- tive, and highly esteemed by those who new him best.
December Ninth, 1906.
J. K. HOBAUGH
JOHN K. HOBAUGH
I N the very early days, one of the best known men in Polk County was John K. Hobaugh, a Buckeye production, though his ances- try dated back to 1793, in Pennsylvania.
Born in Washington, Logan County, Ohio, April Seventh, 1820, where his parents resided until 1835, when they moved to Grant County, Indiana. They were poor, yet with very limited advantages, John acquired the rudiments of an education in the log schoolhouses of that section.
When fifteen years old, he was apprenticed to learn the shoe- makers' trade, at which he worked during the Winter. In Summer, he did what he could find to do, always industrious and frugal. On reaching his majority, he turned his back to his boyhood home, and set out in the world's race for himself. He worked on a farm for twelve dollars a month during the Summer, and in Winter did shoemaking, with rail-splitting as a side line. With economy and industry, he accumulated sufficient money to purchase forty acres of timbered land, which he cleared for cultivation, and on which he labored during the growing season. When his crops were gath- ered and stored for the Winter, he went to his bench and lasts, where he worked until Spring opened. Thus he continued until the Spring of 1853, when he disposed of his property in Grant County, loaded his household goods into a wagon, and, with his good wife, headed for Polk County. Arriving here, he went up to the Indian Creek Settlement, in the extreme northeast corner of the county, through which flows the creek southeasterly across the county, and from which the settlement took its name. The creek was skirted with a timber belt, an important factor with a pioneer settler.
From 1843 to 1845, settlers came into the county and settled along the various streams of water, for the emigrant from the East could not be induced to settle on the bleak, broad, open prairie. He
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must have a house to live in, fuel for heating, fence rails to enclose his cultivated fields, and water for his live-stock. There were no railroads to bring lumber from Eastern markets, and no coal for fuel. Thus the county was divided into settlements, as Big Creek, Four Mile, Camp Creek (including those on Mud Creek and Spring Creek), Skunk River, Indian Creek, Beaver Creek, and Walnut Creek. So it was, the civilization of the county began along the rivers, and as time passed, spread out over the prairies.
Hobangh purchased one hundred and sixty acres in the extreme northeast corner of the county, and entered a claim for eighty acres more. The land was not far from the creek. It was in what was originally Skunk Township, which embraced what is now Donglas, Elkhart, Franklin, and Washington townships, but in 1851, the settlers petitioned the County Commissioners to change the name -it was too odorous-to Elkhart, and it was done.
When Houbaugh arrived there were but four families in the township, an area of twelve miles square. He built a small log cabin, with board roof and puncheon floor, turned over the prairie soil for the first erop of sod corn, and began life in true pioneer style. When Winter came, snow blew through the chinking of the cabin logs, so that sometimes two inches of snow on the floor was the greeting for bare feet crawling out of bed to start the morning fire for breakfast. Provisions in the culinary department some- times got scarce, and Fort Des Moines was twenty-five miles away. A want of bacon, however, was compensated by prairie chickens, quail, squirrels, and rabbits, which were abundant. Good, whole- some bread could be made from corn ground in a hand mill. The hardships and discomforts were accepted complacently by him and his helpmate, with the firm faith that they would have a good home some time.
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