USA > Idaho > History of Idaho, the gem of the mountains, Volume II > Part 103
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in 1897 and here he turned his attention to the live stock business as a partner of P. G. Johnston, of Blackfoot, Idaho, under the firm name of Johnston, Severson & Com- pany. That business relation was continued for more than twenty years and they largely devoted their time and energies to the sheep industry. They prospered as the years passed on and were among the large wool producers of the state, sometimes own- ing many thousands of head of sheep. Mr. Severson did not move his family to Idaho until about fifteen years ago. In the meantime he sold his Utah farm and purchased land in Jefferson county, near Rigby. He now has two hundred and fifty acres, con- stituting a splendid farm property equipped with all modern conveniences and im- proved with fine buildings. Since 1908 he has also been one of the principal owners . of the Gem State Roller Mills at Ucon, Idaho, two and a half miles from his home ranch, and since 1910 he has been the president and manager of the milling company. His business affairs are carefully and wisely conducted and success is attending his efforts in substantial manner.
On the 19th of October, 1898, Mr. Severson was united in marriage to Miss Annie Olander, who was also born in the Salt Lake valley of Utah and is a representative of a family that has long been connected with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They now have six children, one son and five daughters, namely: Elva, Ray- mond, Ethel, Alice, Lanorma and Geneva. All are still under the parental roof.
The religious faith of the family is that of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Mr. Severson thus adhering to the belief of his parents, and he is now serving as a bishop of Garfield ward in his county, a position which he has occupied for eleven years. His study of the political questions and issues of the day has led him to give his support to the republican party and he is a recognized leader among its prominent representatives in the state. He served for two years as a member of the republican state central committee and his opinions have always carried weight in party councils. In 1918 he was elected to the lower house of the Idaho legislature and is giving his support to much constructive legislation, while of four of the principal committees he is a member.
J. H. MCLAUGHLIN, D. V. S.
Dr. J. H. Mclaughlin, of Caldwell, is the owner of valuable farm property near the city and since 1917 has been devoting his time to the raising of registered Holstein cattle. He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, September 8, 1866, and when twelve years of age accompanied his parents on their removal to Lincoln, Nebraska. His mother, who bore the maiden name of Mary McDermott, is a native of Ireland and is now living in Lincoln at the advanced age of eighty years, but the father has passed away.
Dr. Mclaughlin attended the public schools of Lincoln, pursuing a high school course to the age of nineteen years. He afterward became a student in the St. Joseph Veterinary School at St. Joseph, Missouri, and entered upon the practice of his chosen profession in Long valley, Idaho, where he remained for seven years. He then removed to Caldwell, where he has practiced for the past twelve years, eighty per cent of his work being with cattle. He is extremely successful in his professional work, being regarded as one of the leading veterinary surgeons of this section of the state. He has also been engaged in the dairy business on an extensive scale, having a large dairy about two miles from Caldwell, where he kept forty head of Jersey cows. In 1917, however, he discontinued the dairy business in order that he might devote his time to registered Holstein cattle and thus provide an interesting occupation for his grow- ing son. He also owns a fine farm of two hundred acres, his original home, from which he now derives an excellent annual rental. His residence on South Kimball avenue in Caldwell is a modern home which would be a credit to any city. It is situated op- posite the home of Henry Dorman, manager of the Caldwell Cattle Company, in the finest residence district of the town, and altogether Dr. Mclaughlin pays taxes on thirty-three acres of city property.
In 1897 Dr. Mclaughlin was united in marriage to Miss Margaret A. Dailey, a daughter of James Dailey, of Lincoln, Nebraska, who for twenty-nine years was road- master with the Burlington & Missouri Railroad. They have become the parents of the following children: Hugh J., nineteen years of age, who while attending the Creighton University at Omaha, Nebraska, joined the army but on account of the
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signing of the armistice was not sent overseas; James A., a high school pupil in Cald- well; Margaret, Victor V. and Mary, who are attending the graded schools in Caldwell; and Morris C., who is not yet of school age. Dr. McLaughlin has made for himself a creditable position in professional circles and in connection with the stock raising interests of his section of the state.
. THOMAS MORAN.
Thomas Moran, a farmer living two miles south of Eagle, took up his ahode upon his present place of forty-seven acres in 1902. Ten years before he had removed from Missouri to Idaho and has since lived in Ada county. His time and energies have always been devoted to agricultural interests, although he was for seven years super- intendent of the Settlers ditch. He purchased his present ranch in 1900 at a low figure as compared to its present value, which is about three hundred dollars per acre. After owning the property for two years he took up his abode upon it, at which time it was a wild and undeveloped tract of land producing nothing but sagebrush. He has put everything upon it, including the buildings and the fences, the orchards, the shade trees and the shrubbery. In its broad and level fields fifty bushels of wheat are pro- duced to the acre. Mr. Moran specializes in handling dairy cows and owns a fine herd of Jerseys, including both registered and graded stock.
Mr. Moran is numbered among the citizens that Missouri has furnished to Idaho, for his birth occurred in St. Clair county of the former state, November 26, 1866, his parents being William and Mary (Newell) Moran. The father died in Arkansas when the son Thomas was but thirteen years of age, and the mother is now living with him at the advanced age of seventy-three years.
Thomas Moran was reared in Missouri and throughout his entire life has devoted his attention to farm work. For twenty-eight years he has now lived in Ada county. He was married on the 23d of December, 1898, to Miss Ida Beasley, who was born in Canyon county, Idaho, October 21, 1879, and is a daughter of George and Sarah Elizabeth (Tribune) Beasley, her people being among the pioneer families of Canyon county. Her father was born in Indiana and her mother in Kentucky, and they came to the northwest about the time of the Civil war. Both have now passed away. Mrs. Moran has spent her entire life in Idaho and by her marriage became the mother of four children, two sons and two daughters: Ethel, the wife of Porter Biddle, of Ada county; Elmer; Mary; and Kenneth.
Mrs. Moran is a member of the Methodist church. Mr. Moran gives his political endorsement to the republican party and has served as road overseer for one year and ditch superintendent for seven years. He is fond of hunting and fishing but has comparatively little leisure time. He has concentrated his efforts and attention upon the development of his farm and the improvement of his herd of Jerseys and owns some of the finest stock of this kind to be found in Idaho.
LEONIDAS J. NIELSEN.
Leonidas J. Nielsen, engaged in farming and wool growing in Bonneville county, his business interests having assumed extensive proportions, was born at Mantua, Boxelder county, Utah, March 18, 1883, a son of Lars P. C. and Sarah (Hansen) Nielsen. The mother died when her son was but ten years of age and the father now lives at Ammon, Idaho, near the home of his son Leonidas. Both the father and mother were Danes. The former was born in Denmark and crossed the ocean in 1867. He and his mother reached Salt Lake City, the only surviving two of a family of five, the father and two children having died of illness while en route and were buried at sea. Leonidas J. Nielsen had three full brothers, but one died at the age of four years, and two full sisters, all residents of Bonneville county.
Leonidas J. Nielsen was reared in Boxelder county, Utah, upon the sheep ranch owned and conducted by his father. He had a good education, including four years spent in the Brigham Young College at Logan, Utah. In 1903 he came to Idaho and purchased a farm in Bonneville county, which he still owns. He at first acquired a tract of only forty acres, for he had no capital when he came to Idaho. As the years
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have passed, however, he has prospered in his undertakings and has become one of the well-to-do citizens of Bonneville county. He has devoted his attention to farming and to the raising of sheep and beef cattle and he also owns and conducts a general store at Ammon. It is near this place that he has his two ranches, which he per- sonally operates, and he likewise owns a third ranch in the same county. He has a thousand thoroughbred Cotswold sheep and is one of the prominent wool producers of his section of the state. He works persistently and energetically, overcoming all obstacles by determined effort and pushing steadily forward to the goal of prosperity.
When twenty years of age Mr. Nielsen was married at Ammon, Idaho, on the 23d of May, 1903, to Miss Eleanor Campbell, a native of Bloomington, Bear Lake county, Idaho, and they have become parents of eight children, of whom two, Leon and Eleanor, are deceased, one having died in infancy and the other at the age of two years, in December, 1918. Those living are Trueman, Beulah, Leota, Muriel, Vincent and Carma.
The religious faith of the Nielsen family is that of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Mr. Nielsen was for eleven years ward clerk. In politics he has always been a republican, active in the work of the party, and recognition of his in- terest in political affairs and his devotion to the upbuilding of the community and state led to his selection to public office. For two years he was county commissioner of Bonneville and for eight years was chairman of the village board of Ammon. He likewise served as clerk of the school board for ten years and in 1918 was elected on the republican ticket to represent his county in the state legislature, where he has been made chairman of the irrigation committee and a member of the county lines and boundaries committee and of the railroad committee. He is likewise the treas- urer of the Progressive Irrigation District of Idaho Falls and gives generous and con- tinued aid to all measures and movements that have for their object the advance- ment and upbuilding of community and state.
JOHN A. BRIDGER.
John A. Bridger, a retired farmer living at Albion, Cassia county, has been iden- tified with this section of the state since 1875 and has therefore witnessed practically its entire development and improvement. For a long period he was actively connected with its agricultural progress and through the careful conduct of his business affairs won a measure of success that now enables him to rest from further labor. He was born in Greenbrier county, West Virginia, October 24, 1847, a son of Josiah and Mar- garet (Sea) Bridger. He left Virginia with his parents when a small boy, the family removing to Cedar county, Iowa, and subsequently to Linn county, Kansas, where the father took up one hundred and sixty acres of wild land as a homestead claim. This he developed and improved and afterward returned to Iowa, where he again lived for two years.
When John A. Bridger left Iowa for a second time he went to Macon county, Missouri, and worked on the Hannibal & St. Joseph Railroad. Subsequently he was in . Kansas and on leaving the Sunflower state came to Idaho in 1875, settling on what is now the site of Albion, although there was no town here at the time. There was nothing to be seen but wild prairie and little indication of what the future had in store for the country. He took up a ranch of one hundred and sixty acres and built thereon a log house, after which he began the work of improving and developing the property. He also engaged in freighting from this district for a number of years and for a long period continued in active agricultural work. Year after year his financia! resources increased owing to his excellent business ability, close application and inde- fatigable energy. As he prospered he kept adding to his land until he became the owner of six hundred and eighty acres, which he still owns and which is now a highly improved property, returning to him a gratifying annual income. He continued the cultivation of the place until 1916, when he retired, taking up his abode at Albion, where he now makes his home.
In 1873 Mr. Bridger was married to Miss Anna Nicholson, a native of Scott county, Illinois, and a daughter of Alfred O. and Mary (Pierce) Nicholson. They have become parents of five children: A. T., John, Paul, Virgil and James.
In his political views Mr. Bridger has always been a democrat but has never sought or desired office, always preferring to give his attention to his business affairs.
MR. AND MRS. JOHN A. BRIDGER
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He deserves mention among the honored pioneer settlers of Cassia county, for he arrived here at a time when the Indians were numerous in the district and he is today one of the oldest living settlers in this part of Idaho. He shared in all the hardships and privations incident to frontier life in order to gain a start upon the western frontier and he has lived to see the region transformed into a populous and prosperous district, the center of a rich agricultural and stock raising country.
C. P. JENSMA.
A native of Friesland, Holland, C. P. Jensma is a worthy representative of that sturdy stock of seafarers and merchants in this country. He was born June 13, 1877, and attended the common and high schools of Friesland. At the age of eighteen he took up dairying with his father, in which line the latter was successfully engaged. Two years later, at the age of twenty, C. P. Jensma came to the United States and made his way to Galveston, Texas, although at that time he did not expect to remain in this country, but to some extent intended to study it and its history. After he had become acquainted with a number of its institutions, interests and advantages, how- ever, he concluded to remain. His next move took him to Chicago and from there he sought the far west, going to Spokane, Washington, where he became connected with the Walla Walla Creamery Company, at the same time taking a course in agri- culture at the State College of Washington at Pullman.
The year 1907 witnessed Mr. Jensma's arrival in Nampa, Idaho. Here lie found conditions that at once interested him because of his thorough experience in dairy- ing and agriculture not only in this country hut in the old world. The Cocperative Creamery, which had completely failed under its previous management, was revived under the name of the Jensma Creamery and it has become one of the most success- ful enterprises of Nampa and vicinity. A considerable amount of the product is shipped outside of the state, in fact is sold throughout the entire northwest in whole- sale lots. The company ships annually about five hundred thousand pounds of butter, thousands of gallons of ice cream and many cars of produce, including poultry. They employ twenty-five people. Their supplies are purchased direct from the farmers and buying stations are maintained throughout the state. Their plant is located at the corner of Ninth and First South streets. The great success of this important enterprise is entirely due to the business initiative and long experience of Mr. Jensma, who found here a productive field for his talents.
Mr. Jensma was united in marriage to Emma Hannan, of Portland, Oregon, and to them has been born a daughter, Elizabeth. The family are highly esteemed in Nampa, where they have many friends. The father and mother of our subject, who ever re- mained residents of Friesland, Holland, have passed away.
Mr. Jensma has become a public-spirited and valuable American citizen. In his political affiliation he is a republican and he has taken an important part in party work although he has never sought nor desired office. There is great credit dne him for what he has achieved as he has made his way in this country practically un- assisted and now occupies an important position in Nampa as owner of one of the large and prosperous industrial enterprises of his district.
A. H. BLISS.
Since 1904 A. H. Bliss has made his home at New Plymouth, where he follows the occupation of farming, and he is regarded as one of the best informed men on the subject of irrigation in the state. He was born in Lake county, Illinois, August 28, 1849. His father, Ambrose Bliss, was a native of Vermont, as was his grandfather, whose progenitors came from England during the period of early colonization in the new world. The mother of A. H. Bliss bore the maiden name of Esther Varney and was likewise a native of Vermont, being of Scotch lineage, the surname of the family being originally McVarney. In the early '40s the parents of A. H. Bliss removed to Illinois, where the father followed farming until 1856 and then took his family to Grant county, Wisconsin, making the journey with horse teams and ox teams. In Wisconsin he purchased land for fifty cents an acre. There the family suffered many
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privations and hardships due to a most severe winter and unavoidable exposure, and they lost nearly all of their stock owing to the intense cold of that first winter. This constituted a financial loss from which the father never fully recovered.
A. H. Bliss was largely reared in Wisconsin and shared with the family in all of the difficulties and privations of life on the frontier. The father went across the plains to California in 1849 and there followed mining with meager success for three years, but in 1853 returned to Illinois. He and his wife died upon the old homestead in Wisconsin. A. H. Bliss took up the occupation of farming, which he followed in Wis- consin, however, without any notable measure of success. In 1880 he married Miss Emma E. Hunter, a daughter of Hiram and Elizabeth (Fry) Hunter, who were pioneers of Fennimore Center, Wisconsin, to which state they went in 1852 from Mercer county, Pennsylvania, and there they both passed away. In 1888 Mr. Bliss, his wife and three children, journeyed westward to Cheyenne county, Nebraska, where he followed farm- ing for three years. He then went to Colorado, where he worked at the carpenter's trade for thirteen years in the city of Eaton, and in 1904 he came with his family to Idaho. After a month's residence at Weiser they came to New Plymouth, where Mr. Bliss has since made his home and carried on truck farming. He has brought his land under a high state of cultivation and now has excellent town property, which annually yields to him a substantial income. He has closely studied the subject of irrigation from every possible standpoint, knows the value of the land when water can be added thereto and has done much to promote irrigation projects.
Mr. and Mrs. Bliss have become the parents of five children. Ora G., thirty-six years of age, is a printer by trade and resides at home. Floyd E., aged thirty-four, married Nell A. Henry, a native of Iowa, and they have two children, Leal and Jay, aged respectively seventeen and fourteen years. Raymond G., aged thirty-three, mar- ried Dorothy L. Merritt and they have three children, Leonard D., Delbert L. and an infant. Alma A. is the wife of B. H. Hull and has two children, Alice and Benita. Alice B. is the wife of Fred Barrett and has two children, Bessie and Hiram B.
Through the years of his residence in Payette county Mr. Bliss has become widely and favorably known as the result of his spirit of enterprise and progress, his thorough reliability in business and his determination to not only make the most of his op- portunities in the acquirement of success but also to advance the best interests of the community at large.
E. P. GILBERT.
E. P. Gilbert is engaged in farming in the lower Boise valley, occupying a farm not far from the old homestead upon which he was born January 26, 1871. He is a son . of Frank G. and Anna ( Hargrave) Gilbert, the former a native of New York, while the latter was born in North Carolina. They were among the earliest of the pioneers of the Boise valley and during frontier days experienced much trouble with the Indians and many times were forced to take refuge in the old fort about six miles from their home. It was in 1858 that Frank G. Gilbert secured the old homestead as a claim and erected the first house built of lumber in the lower Boise, this being the birthplace of E. P. Gilbert. The father was for many years actively identified with farming but is now living retired and makes his home at Caldwell.
E. P. Gilbert acquired his education in the common schools and in a business col- lege at Boise. He afterward took up the occupation of farming with his father and was thus engaged until his marriage in 1893. The following year he. purchased his present farm property of one hundred and three acres, which at that time was raw land cov- ered with sagebrush but which is now all under cultivation. He turned the first fur- rows upon the place and prepared it for the crops and is now extensively engaged in raising alfalfa. He also has twenty-four hundred head of sheep and as many lambs, together with fourteen head of cattle and fifteen head of horses and mules. He has his sheep upon the range in the summer but feeds them in the winter and through the lambing season. Each year he sells the lambs and keeps the ewes, which he sells every three years and every three years replenishes. He is thus conducting his farm- ing and sheep raising interests along progressive and scientific lines productive of splendid results.
In 1893 Mr. Gilbert was married to Miss Anna Ronan, a daughter of Patrick Ronan, a farmer of Brantford, Canada. They have in their home today the piano which was
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brought by Mrs. Gilbert from Canada. It was the first piano in the Boise valley and the inhabitants of an early day would come from miles around to see it and hear her play upon it. Mr. and Mrs. Gilbert have become parents of seven children, all born upon the home farm, as follows: Gladys, who is the wife of G. E. McWilliam, of Cald- well; Nina, at home; Martin, who is nine years of age; and Katherine, Edgar P., Nellie Ethel and Kenneth H., all of whom have passed away.
Mr. Gilbert belongs to the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, his membership be- ing in the lodge at Caldwell. For sixteen years he has been a member of the school board in his district and the cause of education finds in him a stalwart champion. He is interested in all that pertains to the welfare and upbuilding of the region in which he lives and which he has seen converted from a wild and unproductive district into one of rich fertility, of well kept fields and orchards and of fine stock farms. Many conditions of frontier life have constituted a part of his own early experience and he rejoices in what has been accomplished as the work of progress and improvement has been carried steadily forward.
C. F. SMITH.
It is a matter deserving of comment and of credit when one attains to a posi- tion of leadership as has C. F. Smith, whose superiority in the production of pota- toes in a state that is famous for its fine and remarkably large tubers has won for him the nickname of "Potato Smith." He is of a nature that could never be content with mediocrity and he would not be satisfied to produce anything inferior to the crops of his neighbors. Accordingly he has utilized the most approved modern methods in the development of his land, which was a tract of sagebrush when it came into his possession and is now an eighty acre farm of great productivity.
Mr. Smith was born in "Batavia, Illinois, March 2, 1862. His father, Michael Smith, came from Germany to America in early youth, settling first in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, while subsequently he removed to Illinois and was employed in the steel mills of the latter state. He left Germany to escape the oppression of the military class. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Elizabeth Rosenberg, was also a native of that country and they were married before leaving for the new world. To them were born nine children: Maggie, deceased; Sophia; Frances; William, who died at the age of seven years; George, who died at the age of twenty-seven; Mary, who has passed away; C. F .; Frank, deceased; and Annie. The father of this family passed away at the age of eighty-four years, and the mother died at the notable old age of ninety, so that it will be seen that C. F. Smith comes from a family noted for longevity.
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