A history of northwest Missouri, Volume III, Part 7

Author: Williams, Walter, 1864-1935 editor
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 912

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The father of Dr. Joseph S. Halstead was Alexander Halstead, who was born in Geneseo County, New York, and was a tailor by trade. He married Margaret Singer, a native of Philadelphia. They came to the West among the pioneers in the western movement and settled in Lex- ington, Kentucky, and in 1832 moved to Jennings County, Indiana. The father died at the age of ninety-four and his wife aged forty-five. The mother was a member of the Methodist Church, and the father was a whig and later a republican. There were eleven sons and two daugh- ters. One of them, James C., served as a soldier in the Union army.

Doctor Halstead grew up in Kentucky, acquired a good education for his time, and finished the course in the Transylvania College in the medical department in 1840. He began practice in Kentucky, and was married in 1852 to Margaret Wickliffe. For sixty-two years she has been his devoted companion and wife, and is now eighty-five. Her great- grandfather was the noted Gen. Ben Logan of Kentucky. Doctor Hal- stead and wife became the parents of eight children, five sons and three daughters: Nat W., who is an attorney at Beardstown, Kentucky ; Anna Lucy Rozell, of Salt Lake City, Utah; Margaret B., of Chillicothe, Mis- souri; Joseph D., of Phoenix, Arizona, in the lumber business; Charles W., of Breckenridge, Missouri; Jasper N., a lumberman in Iowa ; Logan, of Hamilton, Missouri; Mary Clifford, of Breckenridge. The children were all well educated, and fitted for their respective spheres of useful-

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ness in the world. Doctor Halstead has thirty-four grandchildren and twelve great-grandchildren. Of the large family covering four genera- tions, there have been only three deaths in sixty-two years, and one of them accidental.

Doctor Halstead came to Caldwell County, Missouri, in 1860, took up the practice of medicine, and gave his services to the community through- out the Civil war and for a great many years afterwards. He is one of the old-style gentlemen, and has outlived practically all his contem- poraries, and now in his ninety-sixth year his mind and memory dwell chiefly in the scenes of a long distant past. He is fond of talking of old times, and particularly of events that occurred more than three-quarters of a century ago.

One of the most interesting special articles that appeared in a recent issue of the Kansas City Star had Dr. Halstead as its subject under the title "Henry Clay's Family Physician Is Still Living in Missouri." Without repeating some of the matter of this article already covered, the following will add to the many interesting facts that should be preserved in a sketch of this venerable Breckenridge citizen :

"Dr. Halstead was living in Kentucky during the height of Henry Clay's greatness, except during part of 1841 and 1842, when he came up the river in a steamer and stopped at Richmond, Missouri. There he practiced medicine, but answered the call of his former practice and returned to Kentucky, where he remained until 1860. Then he returned and bought a section of land near Breckenridge, part of which he still owns.

"To the Clay home Dr. Halstead was called many times and he has a very vivid remembrance of the occasion when the 'great pacificator' made his famous statement, 'I would rather be right than be president.' A party of New England capitalists and manufacturers had called upon him to get him to modify his views in some particulars. 'It will defeat you if you don't,' they said. Then he dismissed them with the state- ment which has become history.

"The cane of which the people of Breckenridge are so proud and which Dr. Halstead carries only on special occasions has engraved on the staghorn handle 'W. H. Jenifer, 1819.' Jenifer was representing Missouri in the fight for admission to the Union. Clay made a great speech which virtually brought the state in, and Jenifer gave the cane to Clay after the address, and told him its history. He had cut an olive branch from a spot near the birthplace of Cicero and had had a cane made of it. Clay prized it very highly and after his death Tom Clay, the son, gave it to Dr. Halstead.

"Dr. Halstead was in Kentucky during the great cholera outbreak and his exposure and lack of sleep and food while waiting on the victims caused him to drop from a weight of 140 pounds to 92 pounds. This weight he never regained, and he figures curiously enough that that experience was beneficial rather than detrimental.

"When he came to Missouri in 1860 for the second time, landing at Lexington with his wife and carrying his money in gold in saddlebags, he rode to Plattsburg and bought from the Government 640 acres of land near Breckenridge. This choice area was obtained for two dollars and a half per acre. Dr. Halstead says of his farm that its first owner was the King of Spain, the second Napoleon Bonaparte, with the United States third, and he was the fourth and first individual owner. When he came to Caldwell County it was with the intention of giving up medical practice and engaging as a farmer. However, the Civil war upset his plans. It left him the only physician in the county, and he

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proved himself a real neighbor, even though his farm often was raided in his absence."

J. LEE CROSS. One of the foremost attorneys of Clinton County, J. Lee Cross, of Cameron, belongs to a family distinguished for its many able members of the legal profession, his father and four brothers all being lawyers of note in Missouri. A native of Caldwell County, he was born, in 1868, in Mirabile, then a frontier village, being the eldest of the five sons of John A. Cross, founder of the well-known legal firm of Cross & Sons, of Lathrop, Clinton County, and of whom a brief biographical sketch appears on another page of this volume.

Having completed his college course, J. Lee Cross, who inherited in no small measure many of the natural gifts of his distinguished father, began the study of law under the direction of his father, receiving advantages and training of exceptional value, lie and his brothers seem- ingly imbibing legal knowledge in the atmosphere of law surrounding the Cross home. One of the first trials that made any very vivid impression upon the minds of the sons of John A. Cross was that of the Crusaders, which was won by their father, and made the name of Cross familiar and famous from the East to the West. In 1894 Mr. J. Lee Cross was admitted to the bar, and since taking up his residence in Cameron he has established a large and constantly growing practice, and is numbered among the esteemed and valued citizens of this section of Clinton County.

Mr. Cross married Miss Maud Green, who was born in Fayette, Missouri, a daughter of the late W. J. Green. Fraternally Mr. Cross is a member of the Knights of Pythias.

CARLTON S. WINSLOW. The constantly increasing tendency of men learned in the law-the natural result of a profession which equips its followers for success in various lines of endeavor-to engage in occupa- tions outside their immediate sphere of activity, has resulted in numerous advantages, among these being the raising of commercial standards, an avoidance of legal complications, and a general simplifying of condi- tions through a knowledge of fundamental principles. In this con- nection, an illustration is given in the career of Carlton S. Winslow, of Bethany, a thoroughly learned member of the Harrison County bar, who, as president of the Crescent Jersey Farm Company, is known as one of the leading stockmen of Northwest Missouri.

Mr. Winslow was born February 9, 1860, in Rutland County, Ver- mont, and is a son of William L. and Julia (Cheedle) Winslow. The family is traced back to the Mayflower and to Massachusetts, and Mr. Winslow's grandfather was Nathaniel Winslow, who was perhaps the founder of the Vermont branch. The grandfather, who was a farmer and passed his life in the Green Mountain State, married as his first wife Miss Clarissa Pettigrew, and their eight sons and two daughters were : Henry, who died in Vermont; Russell, who died at Toledo, Ohio; Ephraim, who spent his life near Monroe, Michigan; Samuel, who spent the greater part of his life in Michigan but died in Vermont; Harris, who lived near Monroe, Michigan, and died there; Stephen, who died in Vermont; Lewis I., who also passed away in that state; William L .; Clarissa, who died at Deerfield, Michigan, as Mrs. Thomas Logan; and Mary, one of the older children of the family, who married Mr. Pierce, and died near Petersburg, Michigan.

William L. Winslow was born in Addison County, Vermont, where he was brought up as a farmer and secured his education in the public schools. He lived a quiet and uneventful life as an agriculturist and

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was successful as a financier, winning prosperity from his business ventures. His connection with the Civil war was confined to his duties as selectman of his town in Vermont, in which capacity, whenever a draft was made for troops, he saw that the bounty was paid and the men raised. In politics he was a republican, he belonged to no frater- nity, and his religions faith was that of the Methodist Church, of which he was a member. Mr. Winslow married Julia Cheedle, a daughter of an artisan and blacksmith who died in Vermont and whose wife was Minerva Snow. The Cheedle children were four in number: John; Elizabeth, who married Almon Cunningham: Timothy B .; and Mrs. Winslow. The last named passed away in 1907, at Bethany, and was laid to rest beside her husband in the Miriam Cemetery. Their children were : Jane E., of Hale Center, Texas, widow of John S. Pryor; Carlton S., of this review; and Hattie A., the wife of U. G. Long, of Harrison County.

Carlton S. Winslow was a lad of eight years when he accompanied his parents to Sherman Township, Harrison County, and remained under the parental roof until reaching the age of seventeen years, at which time he was sent to take a commercial course in Grand River College, Edinburg, Missouri. Succeeding this, he took up the study of law with Alvord & Faucett, of Bethany, with whom he completed his studies, and was admitted to the bar at Gallatin, February 3, 1880, before Judge Samnel A. Richardson. He was the first aspirant to be examined under the law requiring the presence of the entire bar in open court, and in his case there were about forty lawyers on hand, the greater part of a night being spent in completing the proceedings with this lone applicant.

After securing his admission Mr. Winslow started seeking a place for locating, and after a brief stop at Concordia, Kansas, was induced to open an office at Atwood, Kansas, expecting the location of a land office there, but, being disappointed in this, came to Missouri and located at Bethany. He was associated first with Judge W. H. Skinner, as Skinner & Winslow, and later on with E. H. Frisby, as Frisby & Winslow. His primary cases were not of spectacular interest, and the very first one was tried at Atwood, Kansas, where he built the first house on the present townsite. He was defending cattle men and the conditions out there at that time demanded that cattle men carry pistols for personal protection, and on this occasion the court room was full of them.

In 1886, Mr. Winslow left Bethany because of pulmonary trouble and sought the climate of Central Kansas, locating at Marion. While in Kansas he was the western attorney for Lord Scully, the English land baron. He was a factor in republican politics also, and aided in the overthrow of the populist, Judge Doster, from the district bench, after having urged his election as a republican four years before. Mr. Winslow continued his practice and carried on banking, recuperated his health so as to pass two examinations for life insurance, and left after six years and went to Chicago, Illinois. There he was associated with Frank M. Cox and Spencer Ward, as Cox, Winslow & Ward, and each of these men made a professional standing as a lawyer and a citizen. They were in civil practice and Mr. Winslow's work was confined to corporation and chancery business. While in Chicago he was a member of the Hamilton Club, the leading republican organization of Chicago and one of the most prominent in the United States, and was a member of the republican committee of Lake View. Mr. Winslow left Chicago upon the death of his father, in 1899, and returned to Bethany, where

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he resumed the practice of law. He was for five years city attorney, and was the candidate of the Law and Order League before the primaries in 1914 for the office of prosecuting attorney of Harrison County. He is a past chancellor of the Knights of Pythias and was a member of the Illinois Grand Lodge for four years, and while in Chicago was the deputy for the district in which Evanston is located.

Aside from his legal practice, Mr. Winslow has been extensively engaged in breeding Jersey cattle and handling his dairy farm, located two miles northwest of Bethany. His dairy barn in 32 by 54 feet, of brick, with concrete floors, mangers and gutters, and extends into a frame barn, 26 by 64 feet, with shed room and iron stanchions, accom- modating forty-three head of cattle. He built the second silo in the county. "Golden Jubilee's Lad," No. 94,792, a grandson of "Golden Grand," No. 53,568, that splendid son of "Golden Lad," P. S. 1,242 H. C., the most prepotent bull ever imported to this country, heads the herd on Crescent Jersey Farm. He has also a great-grandson of "Diploma," No. 16,219, sire of fifty-five in list, including "Merry Maiden," sweepstakes cow at the Chicago World's Fair, and of "Stoke Pogis of Prospect," No. 29,121, sire of sixty-nine in list. Mr. Winslow has recently added "Undulata Gamboge Chief," No. 120,886, from the herd of R. A. Long of Kansas City, Missouri. "Undulata Gamboge Chief," a son of "Fountain Chieftan," grand champion of Chicago National Dairy Show, 1911, which sold for $5,100, and a grandson of "Noble of Oakland," which sold for $15,000, and a great-grandson of "Gamboge Knight," which brought $6,700.

Mr. Winslow was married July 7, 1880, to Miss Anna M. Bolar, a daughter of William and Eveline (Boyce) Bolar, farming people of Harrison County. Mrs. Winslow is the second in a family of thirteen children. One son has been born to Mr. and Mrs. Winslow, Waldo W., born April 16, 1881, educated in the grammar, high school and the academy of the Northwestern University, Chicago, and now a Harrison County farmer. He married Gertrude Wormouth, a county school teacher and resident of Kansas City, Missouri, where she graduated from the Manual Training High School. Two children have come to this union : Alexander, born in January, 1904; and Edith Ilene, born in February, 1912.

WILLIAM MCCULLOCH DUNN. The distinguishing quality of Wil- liam M. Dunn during his residence of nearly fifty years in Bethany was his activity as a merchant. For nearly forty years Mr. Dunn was one of the men who sold goods and developed the commercial interests of Bethany. To his thorough experience and natural ability as a mer- chant, Mr. Dunn brought that integrity of character which always goes with the successful merchant, and his record throughout has been without a stain. He is now retired from merchandising, but is still a director in the Harrison County Bank at Bethany.

William McCulloch Dunn was born in Washington County, Virginia, January 9, 1839. His early environment was that of a farm boy, his father being a small planter, and he grew up with the other children in the rural districts of old Virginia. His education came from one of the old Field schools of Virginia, and the building which he knew as a schoolhouse was constructed of logs with perhaps better than ordinary furnishings and equipments. By attendance at school he gleaned a knowledge of geography, grammar, history and physics and thus acquired sufficient knowledge to qualify him as a teacher. Not long after reach- ing manhood, the terrible struggle between the states began, and early

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in the year 1861 he enlisted for service, and was for four years a member of the Southern army battling for the Confederacy. He was commissioned captain, quartermaster and paymaster, and assigned to the Thirty-sixth Virginia Regiment of Infantry. That regiment was a part of the army of Northern Virginia, but his first service was in Western Virginia and in the Mississippi Valley. In 1861 he participated in his first battle at Gauley, under the command of General Floyd, and was also present at Cloyd's Farm and several other minor engagements. He was with the troops that in the early part of 1862 were concentrated along the Cumberland and Tennessee rivers, and was under the com- mand of Floyd at Fort Donelson. Just before the surrender of that post he and his command escaped by boat up the Tennessee River and he traveled on the same boat on which Generals Pillow and Floyd were partners. Later he saw service under the noted Gen. Jubal A. Early, up and down the Shenandoah Valley, and was at the battle of Winchester, Cedar Creek, and was captured at Waynesboro, but managed to make his escape a few minutes later, leaving behind all his money and his surplus clothes down to his tooth brush. He walked across the country to Lynchburg, and there joined Breckenridge's command. Towards the end of the war his regiment was at Christiansburg on its way to Peters- burg and Richmond to join Lee's army, and the command was disbanded, its commander being then General Echols. Though in service for four years, Mr. Dunn escaped wounds, and was acting quartermaster of a brigade when the war closed.

Mr. Dunn resumed civil pursuits in Virginia as a teacher, but a single term of that experience sufficed and he then turned to a more congenial field in commercial pursuits. It was in 1866, not long after the war, that Mr. Dunn came west and located in Bethany. He traveled by railroad as far as Chillicothe, and there took a stage across country to Bethany. Here he found a town twenty years old, with several hundred inhabitants, and the center of a good trading community. His career began as clerk for H. M. Cuddy, and after a year he became partner of Mr. Cuddy. A year later he bought an interest in the firm of Munson & McGeorge, and for several years the firm of McGeorge & Dunn had a large share of the local trade. Mr. McGeorge then sold out to Robert H. Dunn, a brother of William M., and the firm became William M. Dunn & Brother. Somewhat later a nephew, W. F. Cuddy, came into the firm, and it was then reorganized as Dunn Bros. & Co. After more than thirty years of active merchandising Mr. Dunn retired from the firm in 1902, and has since been engaged with his private interests.

While a democrat, Mr. Dunn has never been identified with politics, except as a voter. Fraternally he is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. In 1870, at Bethany, Mr. Dunn married Miss Desdemona Munson, a daughter of Thomas Munson, who came to Mis- souri from Kentucky. When Mrs. Dunn died, in 1874, she left a son, William Victor, who for a time was associated with his father in business, then went to Kansas City, was a successful real estate dealer there and died March 12, 1907. William Victor Dunn married Louisa Morrison, and she is now living in Kansas City with her son, Stewart William Victor Dunn, aged fifteen.

Mr. Dunn comes of an old Virginia family of Scotch-Irish stock, and besides his own record as a soldier of the Confederacy the descendants are entitled to membership in the patriotic societies that commemorate service in the early Colonial and Revolutionary wars. His grandfather was William Dunn, who came from Ireland and founded the family

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in Virginia. He reached America in time to take part in the Revolu- tionary war as a soldier. His children were: William; John; Doctor Samuel; Mary, who married Caleb Logan; Katie, who married Shaw Logan; Lydia, who married Jonas Smith. William Dunn of these children came to Missouri, but all the others spent all their lives in Virginia.

John Dunn, father of the Bethany business man, was born in Wash- ington County, Virginia, and died there in 1845. He married Mary McCulloch, a daughter of Robert McCulloch and a granddaughter of Thomas McCulloch, the McCullochs having come originally from Scot- land. Grandfather Thomas McCulloch was a Colonial soldier during the Revolution and was killed in the battle of Kings Mountain. Robert McCulloch married Sarah Clark. Mrs. John Dunn died in Virginia in 1891, when nearly eighty-six years of age. She was a member of the Methodist Church. Her children were: Mary, who married David Cuddy, and spent her life in Virginia; Theophilus, who was a soldier in the Thirty-seventh Virginia Infantry during the war, was wounded in the battle of Kernstown under Stonewall Jackson, was for many years a Virginia merchant, came to Missouri in 1904 and now lives at Gilman ; William M., who was next among the children; Robert H., of Bethany; and John F., who was also a Confederate soldier and is a farmer in Washington County, Virginia.

HERMAN ROLEKE, who has lived at Bethany since 1880, and who has been a merchant tailor all these years, is, as his name would indicate, of German birth, his native province being that of Hanover and his town the city of that name. He was born April 2, 1862, and was reared in the home of a tailor, his father being Joseph Roleke, a tailor and a native of the same locality, where he spent his life as had his ancestors back to 1640. The family seems to have included a long line of mechanics, and all soldiered when needed by the fatherland, an uncle of Mr. Roleke being a distinguished German army officer during the Franco-Prussian war. Joseph Roleke married Amelia Schulze, and to them there were born seven children, of whom Herman, of this review, is the only one of the family to come to the United States.

Herman Roleke secured his education in the public schools and the commercial college of Hanover, and learned his trade under the capable preceptorship of his father. He learned something of the opportunities in America from having a cousin who came over before the Civil war and was lost as an engineer in the Federal navy during that struggle, and while the young man, of course, did not gain his knowledge of America from that uncle, the impetus which started him westward and across the Atlantic was that given by the presence of the uncle here. Mr. Roleke sailed from the City of Bremen, Germany, on the German Lloyd steamer Rhein, bound for New York, and landed after a trip devoid of special incident some fourteen days later. Subsequently, while en route west he stopped at Chicago and Quincy, Illinois, and chanced to make some acquaintances before Bethany was reached, these influencing him to stop at this point. At that time this town was the end of the railroad and he was forced to stop here, so that he had an excellent chance of noting the opportunities and advantages, and finally decided to make this place his permanent home. For two years Mr. Roleke was employed at his trade for the old tailor here at that time, one McCurry, and then established a place of business of his own.

During the next thirty-two years, Mr. Roleke's history as a business man of Bethany is expressed briefly by a career of industry. He dis- played his interest in public affairs, was one of the promoters of the Vol. III-4

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Young Men's Improvement Club, and was elected himself to the town council more than twenty years ago. The stimulating cry at that time was for macadam roads, electric lights and waterworks, and this was achieved by bonding the town, the first issue of bonds for any purpose by the corporation. After serving a term Mr. Roleke refused to again become a candidate for the position of alderman, and his career was ended as a public official, although he has never ceased his "boosting." Mr. Roleke laid out the "Park Addition" to Bethany, being associated with McCollum Brothers in that movement. This comprised an addi- tion in the east part of the town, the best one here. Mr. Roleke subse- quently built Roleke Park, called by Bob Taylor, Hobson and other chautauqua men "Beautiful Roleke Park," and in it the chautauqua meetings of Bethany have been held for nine years. Mr. Roleke has built there one of the most beautiful landscape gardens to be found in Missouri, this comprising ten acres laid off by Mr. Roleke himself from a barren tract of land, and its improvements have given Bethany a park which rivals anything in the state in attractiveness. The Allen Park, in the east part of Bethany, is also a product of Mr. Roleke's genius for park building. It is a small plaza at the junction of three streets, and is equipped with a fountain. The place was once a mere wallow and an eyesore to the town. When Mr. Roleke took up the question of making a park of it and urged it, as only he can, it assumed other shape than an "undesirable spot" rapidly.

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A history of northwest Missouri, Volume III, Part 7

Author: Williams, Walter, 1864-1935 editor Publication date: 1915 Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company Number of Pages: 912

Author: Williams, Walter, 1864-1935 editor
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 912