USA > Iowa > The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self made men, Iowa volume > Part 38
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Mr. Mathews was in feeble health for two or three years before he died, and for five or six weeks took not enough food in the aggregate for an ordinary meal. How he could live as long as he did is a mystery even to the medical scientists. He was a member of the Masonic order, and was buried ac- cording to their ritual. The number of people in
attendance was so large that no church in town could hold one-third of them, and the services were held in the open air. Between one hundred and fifty and two hundred members of the Masonic fra- ternity were in attendance. It was by Mr. Mathews' request that Judge Fairfield officiated.
The wife of Mr. Mathews died on the 29th of August, 1853. She was the mother of three chil- dren, only one of them now living. A daughter, Anna R., died in infancy, and Oscar, when about ten years old. Ralph C., the only surviving member of the family, was born on the 13th of December, 1836, at Aurora, Illinois, and is consequently forty- one years old. He was trained to business in his father's office at an early day ; was in the mercantile trade several years, commencing in 1860. For the last seven years he has been a banker, all but the first few months in company with his father. He has a wife and one child. His wife was Jennie E. Lumley, daughter of Edward Lumley, of Michigan. Their child, Oscar L., is fourteen years old.
Mr. Mathews is now of the firm of Mathews and Lyon, his partner being O. H. Lyon, many years a merchant in Rockford, and now a member of the legislature. Floyd county has very few better busi- ness men than Mr. Mathews, who inherits from his father the elements of success, namely, honest, energetic industry.
STEPHEN B. OLNEY, M.D.,
FORT DODGE.
A MONG the medical pioneers of Webster county, Iowa, is Stephen Berry Olney, of Fort Dodge. He has been in this city more than twenty years, steadily attending to his professional duties, except when in his country's service, and has a reputation as a physician second to none in the upper Des Moines valley.
Dr. Olney is a New Yorker by birth, and was born in Moreau, Saratoga county, on the 13th of Octo- ber, 1821. His father, Benjamin Olney, was a farmer, and moved to Ohio when Stephen was about thirteen years old. His mother was Mary Eliza- beth Olney nee Berry. His grandfather, Stephen Olney, was a revolutionary soldier. The grandson worked on his father's farm from twelve to eighteen years of age, attending a district school during the winters; he then spent one year or more at the
Maumee City, Ohio, Academy, and at twenty began to study medicine with Dr. Burritt, of Gilead, now Grand Rapids, Ohio. He attended lectures in Cleveland, and graduated in 1847. He practiced the allopathic system until 1865, since then the homopathic.
Dr. Olney practiced medicine four or five years at Damascus, Henry county, and Waterville, Lucas county, Ohio, and in 1855 located in the Des Moines valley, on the spot where his old sign, "S. B. Olney, M.D.," hangs to-day. During the last twenty-one years the doctor has traveled many thousand miles up and down this valley, and over the bluffs on either side, giving relief to the distressed, prolong- ing many lives, and affording comfort in many ways. The first time the author of this brief memoir met Dr. Olney was in January, 1859, when he had just
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performed an operation on a man, now a lawyer at Cedar Falls, by amputating the whole of one and the half of another frozen foot.
While in the practice at Fort Dodge, Dr. Olney acted a short time as first county superintendent of schools, coroner of Webster county, a member of the city school board, and is now chairman of the state visiting committee for the insane hospitals.
In September, 1862, he was commissioned surgeon of the 32d regiment of Iowa Infantry, and served until January, 1865, when sickness compelled him to resign. While in the field he was faithful and un- tiring in the discharge of his duties, and overwork, no doubt, contributed largely to his illness. As a relic of war times, Dr. Olney retains the white horse which he purchased in Dubuque in 1862, and which
he rode during all the time he was at the south, a horse now twenty years old and in good order.
Dr. Olney is a member of the Masonic order, in the blue lodge, chapter and commandery. He has been a republican since there was such a party, before that time was a whig. He is a communicant of the Epis- copal church, and, morally, a very exemplary man.
On the 9th of November, 1849, Dr. Olney mar- ried Miss Stella Badger, of Wood county, Ohio. They have five children. The eldest child, Floyd B. Olney, a printer by trade, is studying medicine with his father,
Dr. Olney is much respected, alike for his skill as a practitioner and his excellent qualities as a citizen. His reputation as a surgeon extends far beyond Webster county.
SAMUEL W. COLE.
FORT DODGE.
A CHRISTIAN landlord is neither an anomaly nor a novelty. A landlord leading in chris- tian enterprises is certainly a rarity, yet there is no reason why it should be so. An inn-keeper, if so disposed, can conduct his business to the glory of God, as well as a person in any other respectable calling. A bar is not a necessary adjunct to a hotel, and every detail of business in a public house is susceptible of being so conducted as to develop more and more the qualities of the chris- tian gentleman. The subject of this sketch, for more than fourteen years a hotel-keeper, finds noth- ing in his business to conflict with his religious pro- fession, and is known for hundreds of miles around as a model landlord and an earnest christian.
Samuel W. Cole was born on the 25th of Septem- ber, 1822, in Panton, Vermont. His father, Samuel Cole, a soldier in the war of 1812, was suddenly killed by falling under the wheel of an ox-cart, when the son was only six years old, and at that early age the child was sent to live with an uncle in Westport, New York. He remained there until he was nineteen years old, making the best use each winter of the little time which he had for attending school. He was studious, and became master of all the branches ordinarily taught in a district school thirty or forty years ago.
Commencing at the age of nineteen, for twelve winters he taught in different parts of Vermont and
New York, meanwhile spending the summers on his uncle's farm, of which, in 1846, he came into full possession. Prior to owning this property he spent four years on Lake Champlain and the Hudson river, serving the first season as waiter on a steamboat, working his way slowly upward, and in every posi- tion promptly and faithfully performing his duties.
In 1855 Mr. Cole immigrated to Iowa, purchased a hotel at West Union, Fayette county, and was its proprietor for ten years. He then engaged in the book and drug business, changing from it, two or three years later, to the hardware trade, and having afterward the misfortune to lose heavily by fire.
In January, 1868, he was appointed superintend- ent of the Soldiers' Orphans' Home, at Cedar Falls, and the following year removed to Tama City, where he was in the hardware business for five years. Again we find him in hotels at Vinton and Ackley, and he is now the proprietor of the Duncombe House, Fort Dodge, to which city he removed in October, 1875.
Mr. Cole was the first superintendent of public schools in Fayette county, holding the office seven years, and performing its labors with great zeal. He held the office of postmaster two or three years in West Union ; was a regent of the State University for four years, and assisted in organizing the Iowa State Sunday School Association, being its presi- dent for two years.
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He is a member of the Independent Order of Good Templars, and has held all the offices in the lodge. He is an ardent, untiring worker in the temperance cause, and has for years been engaged in organizing "Bands of Hope " among the children.
In political principles, Mr. Cole is an unwavering republican.
In religious belief he is a Baptist, and has been an active member of the church since he was four- teen years old.
On the 30th of March, 1847, he married Miss Maria H. Lewis, of Lewis, Essex county, New , mingle with the young to do them good.
York, and has three children. Carroll, the only son, is with his father in the hotel; Clara, the eld- est daughter, is the wife of A. H. Lawrence, an attorney and land agent at Lemars, lowa; the youngest daughter is eight years old.
Although in his fifty-fifth year, Mr. Cole has been so temperate, so regular and so careful in all his habits, that he looks like a much younger man. He has a spontaneity of cordiality which is truly re- freshing, and his social qualities give him preëmi- nent fitness to preside over a public house, or to
WILLIAM W. WALKER,
CEDAR RAPIDS.
W TILLIAM WILLIAMS WALKER, son of William Ames Walker and Sarah Williams Ingalls Walker, is of strictly New England pedigree. His paternal grandparents were natives of Vermont, his maternal, of Connecticut. He was born in Mid- dlefield, Otsego county, New York, on the 8th of August, 1834, and reared on a farm until he was fourteen years old. He then gave eight years exclu- sively to study : three years at Cortland Academy, Homer, New York; one year at Cherry Valley Academy, New York ; part of a year at Brown Uni- versity, Providence, Rhode Island, and three years at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York. He graduated from the last named school in 1856, when he was the valedictorian of his class, and received the degree of C.E. He had this pursuit in view during his educational course, and hence his studies were mainly in the physical sci- ences and mathematics. His history will show that he has proved a thorough adept in this calling.
Immediately after graduating Mr. Walker started for the west, with Wisconsin in his eye, but on reach- ing Chicago changed his plans, and went to Clinton, Iowa. He there obtained a situation as rodman in a construction party on the Chicago, Iowa and Ne- braska, now Chicago and Northwestern, railway. He worked in that position, at a salary of one dollar and fifty cents a day, about one year, until the grad- ing of his division of the road was completed, his headquarters being at Lisbon and Mount Vernon, in Linn county. The financial crash early in the autumn of 1857 suspended nearly all public works; engineers had but little to do, and in September of
that year Mr. Walker accepted the editorship of the Cedar Valley " Times," and removed to Cedar Rap- ids. He made the paper a powerful agent in fur- thering public enterprises.
In May, 1859, Mr. Walker and three or four other enterprising men formed a plan for extending the railway west of Cedar Rapids, which point the road, approaching from the east, reached one month later. The plan was to secure for the line west of Cedar Rapids a land grant of about one million acres, then claimed by the Iowa Central Air Line Railroad Company, which had failed to comply with the con- ditions of the grant. Mr. Walker started westward with fifteen dollars in his pocket, all he could raise, to hold meetings, present this project to the people, and secure the appointment of delegates to a con- vention. which was held in Cedar Rapids the fol- lowing July. At that time the Cedar Rapids and Missouri River Railway Company was organized, and Mr. Walker was appointed its secretary. In December of that year he went to Des Moines to aid in securing the necessary legislation for the transfer of the land grant. The contest was severe, and is memorable in the history of Iowa legislation in behalf of railroads. Mr. Walker went to the seat of war, expecting to be absent about three weeks ; he was gone just three months. His com- pany won, and in May, 1860, he was appointed its chief engineer. That position he held until the road, two hundred and seventy-one miles long, was completed to Council Bluffs, in February, 1867. The last one hundred and fifty miles were built in about ten months, in order to give the Union Pacific rail-
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way an eastern connection. During the year 1866 Mr. Walker had more than six thousand men sent to the work from Chicago alone. The road was a splendid piece of engineering in a double sense. For a number of years, up to 1871, he was vice- president, chief engineer, secretary and assistant treasurer and land commissioner of that company at the same time. During the years 1867 to 1869 he aided in building the Sioux City and Pacific rail- way from Sioux City to Fremont, Nebraska, a dis- tance of one hundred and fifty miles, and was chief engineer, vice-president, general superintendent, sec- retary and assistant treasurer for about five years. From 1869 to 1871 he was chief engineer of the Iowa Falls and Sioux City Railway Company, and built that line between those points, a distance of one hundred and eighty-four miles. The road is now a part of the Iowa line of the Illinois Central road. During the same time Mr. Walker also built the Fremont and Elkhorn Valley railway, fifty miles long, in Nebraska, he acting as chief engineer of the company.
In 1872 he dissolved his connection with these several corporations, and spent most of his time for eighteen or twenty months in Brooklyn, New York. where his children were attending school. During the year 1874 and part of 1875 he was chief engi- neer and general superintendent of the Burlington, Cedar Rapids and Minnesota Railway Company.
Though long and largely identified with railroads, Mr. Walker has devoted some time to other impor- tant enterprises. In 1864 he was one of the organ- izers of the First National Bank of Cedar Rapids, and was its president for seven years. He is now president of the Cedar Rapids Water Company, and of the Cedar Rapids Building and Loan Association. His heart is thoroughly enlisted in every enterprise which will advance the interests of Cedar Rapids or the great northwest.
Mr. Walker was educated a Presbyterian, and sees no reason why he should change his religious senti- ments.
He is a strong republican, and has gone two hun- dred and fifty miles simply to vote, returning by the next train.
On the 15th of October, 1857, he married Miss Mary A. Hitchcock, of Homer, New York. She had three children, and two are living; she died in April, 1862. On the 7th of September, 1864, he married Miss Laura Weare, daughter of John Weare, of Cedar Rapids.
Although in making his frontier surveys years ago Mr. Walker had much experience in roughing it, he has retained all his early polish both of manners and mind, and his fine culture and good conversa- tional powers make him a very agreeable member of society. His mind is fertile in projects, always feasible for the good of the public.
JOHN G. HOUSE, M.I).,
INDEPENDENCE.
T' HE subject of this brief memoir is of New- England ancestry, both parents being natives of Connecticut. He inherited the best traits of the New-England character, and early laid the founda- tion of an eminently useful life on the solid virtues, industry, integrity and perseverance, in an upward course.
John Gates House was born at Cazenovia, New York, on the 25th of April, 1816. His father was John House ; his mother, Sally Fuller House. The former died near Independence two years ago, in his ninety-first year, always having lived a temperate and for many of his later years a strictly christian life. In 1824 he moved with his family to a farm near Springville, Erie county, New York, and the son remained at home until he was sixteen, attend-
ing school part of the time each year, but having in those early days only very ordinary school advan- tages. About 1833 he entered Springville Academy, an excellent institution, which elevated the moral as well as literary tone of Springville society. Spend- ing nearly four years at that academy, Dr. House gratified, to a liberal extent, his strong love of study.
At the age of twenty-one years he commenced the study of medicine with Dr. Carlos Emmons, of Springville, and spent one year in his office. He then studied two years with Dr. Austin Flint, the eminent medical author, then residing in Buffalo. He attended one course of lectures at Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, and another at Co- lumbian College, Washington, District of Columbia,
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whence he graduated in 1841. He practiced medi- cine about eighteen years in Clarence, Springville and Buffalo, all in Erie county. Directly after leaving Springville, and before going to Buffalo, he passed eighteen months in St. Louis, Missouri, for the ben- efit of his family, not intending to settle there.
On the Ist of May, 1861, Dr. House removed to Independence, Iowa, where he has followed his pro- fession with great diligence, building up in northern Iowa, as in western New York, an enviable reputa- tion as a medical practitioner and an honorable citi- zen. Some men excel in the practice of medicine, others in surgery; Dr. House excels in both. His rides are very extensive,- too extensive for a man who has seen his sixtieth winter,-but the people of Buchanan county are reluctant to relinquish his valuable services. .
Dr. House is a member of the Iowa Medical Society, and presided at its meeting in 1875. He was offered the presidency of the society for the next year, but declined to accept it. He has been a trustee of the Hospital for the Insane at Inde- pendence, and secretary of the board since 1872, and at times has rendered valuable services in this con- nection as medical adviser. He has been examining surgeon for pensions since 1863.
Dr. House has been a member of the Baptist church nearly forty years.
On the 6th of July, 1841, he was married to Miss Julia A. Pratt, of Buffalo, New York, a daughter of Pascal Pratt, an early settler in that city ; she died in 1863, leaving four children, two of them now liv- ing. In November, 1864, he married Miss Rachel C. Freeman, of Independence ; has one child by her.
JOHN F. ELY, M.D.,
CEDAR RAPIDS.
A MONG a number of citizens of Cedar Rapids, whose efforts in the interest of the city have left a deep impress, is Dr. John Fellows Ely. He has been a resident of the place nearly thirty years, and during that time no plan for its improvement has failed to enlist his warm support.
Dr. Ely was born in Rochester, New York, on the 25th of June, 1821, his parents being Elisha and Hannah Dickinson Ely. His grandfather and other ancestral relatives shared in the perils of the first war with England. The mother of young Ely died of cholera in 1832, and he was sent to a rela- tive at Stockbridge, Massachusetts. He had been kept at school from an early age, and having been fitted for college, though only eleven years of age, he never entered. After residing in Massachusetts three years, he accompanied his father to Allegan, Michigan, spending four or five years there in study and manual labor.
In 1841 he returned to Rochester, and devoted two years or more to studies under Professor Dewey, mainly the physical sciences. Returning to Michigan he commenced the study of medicine with Dr. L. B. Coates, of Allegan; went to New York city, and continued his studies for three years with Dr. Willard Parker; attended lectures at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, and graduated in the spring of 1848.
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In October of the same year we find Dr. Ely at Cedar Rapids, where his brother, A. L. Ely, had recently died. The young town was full of promise because of its excellent water privileges, and was gradually being reinforced with men of unusual en- terprise. Dr. Ely opened a medical office, but from the start paid some attention to milling, real estate and the development of the water-power. He con- tinued the general practice of medicine for five or six years, and after that period did little more than consultation practice.
The real-estate business he made a specialty for several years, being successful in his operations, and continuing them until the south rebelled against the Union.
In 1862 Dr. Ely was appointed surgeon of the 24th regiment Iowa Infantry; served until June, 1863, and then resigned on account of disability. Much of the time while in the service he was med- ical director of the divisions under Generals C. B. Fisk and A. P. Hovey, and his excellent medical skill, his cool judgment and great executive abili- ties were called into requisition, and with deep regret General Hovey signed his papers of dis- charge.
Dr. Ely has never fully recovered from the effects of his military service. Of late years he has spent more or less time in travels. When at home he
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gives his time largely to the furtherance of local enterprises. His magnetic influence has been felt by every railroad which has found its way into Cedar Rapids. Religious and educational interests have always found in him a true friend. He has freely given time and money to aid in founding and building up literary institutions.
Dr. Ely is a Presbyterian, and has been an elder in the first church of the city for many years. He is a liberal contributor, not only to religious enter-
prises, but to many other benevolent and charitable objects.
Dr. Ely was a warm friend and ardent admirer of Stephen A. Douglas, and a democrat until 1861, since then he has voted with the republican party.
In January, 1853, he was united in marriage with Mrs. Mary A. Ely, of Cedar Rapids. They have had three children; two are living. Mrs. Ely is a woman of noble impulses, an inspiration to her hus- band in every line of duty.
S. P. POND,
KEOKUK.
S. P. POND was born at Wrentham, Massachu- setts, on the 16th of March, 1830, his parents being A. A. and Henrietta (Cobb) Pond. His father was a farmer, and the son's opportunities for educa- tion were limited to the common schools of the state, which he attended only during the winters, his summers being devoted to assisting his father on the farm. At the age of twenty years he removed to Troy, New York, where he engaged in the grocery business, which he continued very successfully for about three years, when he sold out his stock and went to Detroit, Michigan. Here he opened a hotel known as the Garrison House, which at that time was one of the best and most popular houses in the place. He remained in the business in Detroit until 1857, when he removed to Keokuk, lowa, and again engaged in the grocery trade, but only con- ducted it for one year, when he commenced the business in which he now remains, and in which he has met with such marked success. Few people are aware that Keokuk is one of the largest depots for
' the shipment of eggs in the United States, and that its preëminence in this respect has been gained almost entirely through the business sagacity and untiring energy of Mr. Pond. When he commenced this business in 1858 he did all his own packing and shipping; now he employs fifty men in his estab- lishment in Keokuk; has branch houses at both Burlington, Iowa, and Quincy, Illinois, and eggs packed in his establishments always bring from one to two cents per dozen more than other brands. His present yearly shipments are about six hundred car loads, each car load being ten thousand dozens. in all about six million dozens per year.
Mr. Pond is an active member of the Baptist church, having been connected with it for a number of years.
He is a republican in politics, and has served as alderman for four years. He is also a director in the Keokuk National Bank.
He was married on the 22d of October, 1853, to Miss Lydia A. Rickards, of Troy, New York.
HON. LEWIS B. DUNHAM, MAQUOKETA.
MONG the best business men and successful bankers of eastern lowa is Lewis Brigham Dunham, a native of Connecticut. He was born on the 6th of October, 1812, his parents being Lewis Dunham, merchant, and Mary Brigham. His ma- ternal grandfather was in the revolutionary army. The Dunhams were from England, and the Brig- hams from Massachusetts, Lewis spent his earlier
years in procuring an education, preparing for col- lege at Monson, Massachusetts, under the instruc- tion of Rev. Simeon Colton ; was graduated from Union College in 1829. He read law at Utica, New York, with Judge Beardsley; traveled through most of the states of the Union and Canada, and was admitted to the bar in Brookfield, Jefferson county, Pennsylvania, in 1836.
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Mr. Dunham practiced at Brookfield, the county seat, twelve years, and during four years of that time, when David R. Porter was in the gubernatorial chair, was deputy state's attorney. In 1845 he came as far west as Rock Island, Illinois, and spent two years in prospecting. Returning to Pennsylvania, he practiced in Jefferson county until the spring of 1856, when he returned to the west, this time cross- ing the Mississippi river and settling at Maquoketa, Iowa. Here, in company with O. Von Schrader, he started a private bank, which was subsequently merged into the State Bank of Iowa, and still later into the First National Bank of Maquoketa.
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