USA > Missouri > Bates County > History of Bates County, Missouri > Part 70
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Christian Hegnauer of Pleasant Gap township, has lived nearly all of his life in Bates county, the Hegnauer family coming to this county in 1869 when the country was sparsely settled and the nearest railroad station was at Pleasant Hill, fifty miles away. He began his own career with a team of horses, and, by dint of hard, unremitting labor. year in and year out he has made good and accumulated a splendid farm in Pleasant Gap township. Mr. Hegnauer was born in Madison county, Illinois, May 3, 1868, the son of Leonard Hegnauer, a native of Switzerland and a Union veteran.
Leonard Hegnauer was born in Switzerland, April 25, 1843. His parents were Lucius and Margaret (Bernet) Hegnauer, who were also natives of Switzerland, and immigrated to America in 1856, making a permanent settlement in Madison county, Illinois, where Leonard Hegnauer was reared and educated. When the Civil War began, he enlisted in 1861 for three months service in the Union armies, and in October of the same year he enlisted in Company E, Fourth Missouri Volunteer Infantry and served for eighteen months, receiving his hon- orable discharge in February, 1863. He then returned to his home in Illinois. He was married in Madison county, July 4, 1866, to Miss Susan K. Hirschi, who was born in Switzerland, May 15, 1846. and was a daughter of Christian Hirschi. In 1869, Mr. Hegnauer immigrated to Bates county, Missouri and purchased a farm of one hundred sixty acres in Pleasant Gap township. He became owner of four hundred five acres and was one of the pioneers in the dairy business in this county. Mr. Hegnauer kept a fine herd of Holstein cows and Shorthorn cattle and became a prosperous and highly respected citizen. In 1911 he
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retired from active farin labor and moved to a home in Appleton City, where his death occurred October 31, 1916. His remains were buried in the church yard of the German Reformed church. Mr. and Mrs. Leonard Hegnauer were parents of the following children: Mrs. Mary C. Hammer, Pleasant Gap township; Christian, subject of this review; Leonard, Washington state; Mrs. Katie S. Link, Pleasant Gap town- ship; Margaret M., deceased; and Robert L., Minnesota. Mrs. Susan K. Hegnauer made her home with her daughter, Mrs. Mary C. Ham- mer and Christian Hegnauer until her death February 12, 1918.
Christian Hegnauer was educated in the schools of Bates county and began the work of tilling the soil in his boyhood days. He has fol- lowed the oldest of respectable vocations during his entire life and has made a pronounced success as an agriculturist. He moved to his pres- ent home place in 1887 and after renting it for a few years he purchased the place. He is now owner of eighty acres in Pleasant Gap township and has one hundred sixty-three acres in Rockville township. Since 1886, he has followed the dairy business and has thus increased the fer- tility of the soil on his farm from year to year. He is a firm believer in the universal adaptation of this country to the dairying industry, and thinks, rightly, that it is the only possible way of maintaining soil fertil- ity with the least expense. Mr. Hegnauer milks from twenty-five to thirty cows of the Brown Swiss grade. There are two sets of improve- ments on the Hegnanier farms. The home residence is a nice, seven- room house kept in a good state of repair and nicely painted. The barn is 38 x 64 feet in dimensions and equipped with a silo placed in the inter- ior so as to afford convenience in feeding the cows. The corn crib and machine sheds are each 28 x 32 feet in size and are covered with metal roofing. The second set of improvements are also good and comprise a six-room residence, a large barn 48 x 48 feet in size which is also equipped with a silo built on the inside of the building.
Mr. Hegnauer was married in 1886 to Miss Anna Wirtz of Rock- ville township, a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Wirtz, who came to Bates county in 1881, and are both deceased. Mr. and Mrs. Chris- tian Hegnauer have seven children: Lena, wife of Fred Stevener, Prairie township; Clara, wife of Walter Swezy, Pleasant Gap township; Leonard, a farmer living in Rockville township; Rosa, wife of Louis Steiner, Pleasant Gap township; Lizzie, Christian, and Marie, at home with their parents.
When the Hegnauer family came to Bates county, they made the
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trip across the state from Illinois with all of their worldly possessions loaded on wagons hauled by ox-teams. The trip required three weeks in the making and it was like traveling through a virgin country. Bates county was then only thinly settled and all of the family had a taste of pioneer life, with the nearest market fifty miles away at Pleasant Hill, and wild game abounded in the woods and on the open prairies. Mr. and Mrs. Hegnauer are members of the Reformed Church and are industrious and worthy citizens.
F. H. Diehl, of Hudson township, successful farmer and stockman, was born in Tipton, Missouri, in 1868, and is the son of F. H. Diehl, a native of Germany who was a veteran of the war between Germany and France in 1847-1848. He was a member of a company of soldiers who had taken part in the conquest of Alsace, the northern province of France over which the contending armies are now struggling in the great world war. During the advance of the German armies into French territory he was taken prisoner by the French but later made his escape. He was born in 1829 and immigrated to America at the age of nine- teen years, in 1848. Having learned the trade of miller he followed it in this country and became owner of a mill at Tipton, Missouri, which he operated for a number of years. He was conducting this mill at the outbreak of the Civil War, when, imbued with a love of his adopted country, and filled with the old time martial fervor, he enlisted in the regular army as a private with the intention of giving his life, if necessary, to his adopted country. However, when the military authorities learned that he was a capable miller they declined to let him serve and he was honorably discharged from the Union service in order that he might continue the operation of his mill. The Tipton Mill was later burned down and he came 'to Bates county in 1870. He purchased an interest in the flouring mill then being operated by a Mr. Schafer at Papinsville and took charge of this mill, and also operated a carding factory for a period of ten years. In 1880, he bought the John Sisson farm and improved the place which was his residence until his death in 1906. His remains were interred in Willow Branch cemetery. He married Philippine Remeley, a native of Germany, who bore him children as follow: F. H., subject of this review: George H., Rich Hill, Missouri; Annie, wife of Ira M. Brown, Hudson township; Rosa, wife of W. E. Cumpton, Deepwater township; John, a farmer in Pleasant Gap township: Bertha, wife of Joseph Wix, Pleasant Gap township; Fritz H., a farmer in Pleasant Gap township.
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F. 11. Diehl was educated in the Papinsville school and the district school of his home neighborhood. He has practically grown up with Bates county and has prospered as the county has gained in wealth and population. He is owner of a splendid farm of three hundred forty-two acres, which are in a fine state of cultivation and boast good improvements. There are three sets of farm buildings on his large farm, his home place having a beautiful setting upon a rise of ground overlooking the rich bottoms which comprise the greater part of his farm land. One hundred twenty-six acres of this farm are a part of the old home place in Hudson township. His residence is a good structure of six rooms from which nearly all of the farm can be overlooked. One of the best assets to the Diehl place is a drilled well, two hundred twenty-two feet in depth which is filled with water constantly to within twenty feet of the top.
The marriage of F. H. Diehl and Annie Pontius took place in 1894 and has been blessed with a large family of eleven children: Henry William, Walter Albert, Lucy Ella, Charles D., Katie Anna, Polly Philippine, Otto Frank, Everett Robert, Julius Arthur, Laura Ger- trude, and Grace Mildred, all living on the home place of the family. Mrs. Anna Diehl was born in 1852, and is a daughter of Amos D. Pontius, who came to Bates county from Shelbyville, Illinois, in 1869 and settled in Pleasant Gap township. Mr. Pontius was born in Peoria county, Illinois, was reared to young manhood in that state and served for three years in an Ilinois regiment during the Civil War. He is now living retired at Rich Hill, Missouri. Mrs. Pontius died on July 20. 1915, and her remains were interred in Rich Hill cemetery.
During Mr. Diehl's boyhood the country around about was in an unsettled state and there were practically no fences between his father's farm and the town of Papinsville. Much of the land was open prairie and travelers went directly across country following the trails. For a good many years their only trading point was Papinsville. Mrs. Diehl, during her girlhood days, attended the Elmer, now the Beaver school house, where church services were also held. Her first teacher was William Bonnefield and the school stood on the John Sisson farm. Mr. and Mrs. Diehl are industrious, thrifty people who have to their credit the rearing of one of the large families of the county.
B. M. Wix, the progressive merchant and postmaster of Pleasant Gap, was born in 1880, in the state of Washington, the son of the late Joseph and Rosa (Deweese) Wix, who were pioneer settlers of Bates
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county, the former coming to this county in 1839, and becoming promi- nently identified with the carly and creative period of the county's history. A biographical sketch of Joseph Wix appears elsewhere in this volume in connection with the biography of Clark Wix. B. M. Wix was practically reared in Bates county, his father and mother returning from Washington to this county in 1881. He attended the district schools and the Appleton City Academy, and taught school for a period of six years, one year of which was spent in Washington, where he went in 1912. He was the first city mail carrier appointed for the city of Butler. In May of 1913 he purchased the stock of goods and building owned by Judge R. B. Camp, who had been engaged in the mercantile business in Pleasant Gap since 1883. The store build- ing owned by Mr. Wix was erected by the contractors, Burk & Tal- mage and the lumber hauled from Pleasant Hill, Missouri. The busi- ness growth of the Wix establishment has been so great during the past five years that Mr. Wix has found it necessary to find larger quar- ters. In consequence he has set about the erecting of a large concrete store building, 30 x 60 feet in size, of two stories, the lower floor of which will be used for store purposes and the upper floor which will be a hall room, will serve as the headquarters of the Pleasant Gap Boosters' Club. Mr. Wix hauls his goods retailed from his store from Appleton City, a distance of nine and a half miles. The Wix store carries a general stock of groceries, dry goods, and clothing, hardware, etc. and a trading depot for the convenience of the farmers of this section is conducted whereby Mr. Wix handles the produce produced upon the farms in the vicinity of Pleasant Gap. He does a large annual business in this manner, and his wagons which haul the store goods from Appleton City, usually go loaded with farm produce for ship- ment from Appleton City.
Mr. Wix was married in 1905 to Lillian G. Casperson, a daughter of James and Alice Casperson. They have no children. Mr. Wix was reared on a farm and he has never lost his love for the soil. He is owner of a fine one hundred forty acre farm located one and a half miles north of Pleasant Gap which he oversees. He is postmaster of Pleasant Gap and is one of the live wires of this hustling community whose farmers around about are banded together in a Pleasant Gap Boosters' Club which is organized on lines similar to a city commercial club. The region around Pleasant Gap is one of the richest and most progressive sections of western Missouri and the building of the large
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hall in connection with the Wix store is the work of the Boosters' Club, which will dedicate the building for use as a community hall for the entire neighborhood. It is such movements as these which band the farmers together and make for better homes and more progress and prosperity in the agricultural districts.
The .Pleasant Gap Boosters' Club was organized in 1915 and the club has held three successful fairs or agricultural and livestock exhibits since its organization and done more to create a spirit of co-operation and emulation and make for better farming than any one agency ever introduced into this section.
W. W. Perry, the well-known owner of the "Prairie Home Herd" of big bone Poland China hogs, one of Bates county's most intelligent, progressive, young stockmen and leading citizens, is a native son of Shaw- nee township, Bates county, one of the boys of yesterday who have "made good." Mr. Perry became interested in raising Poland China hogs in February. 1915, when he purchased five brood sows at the Charters sale and at the present time, in 1918, he has one hundred head of splendid animals in the "Prairie Home Herd" and is having no diffi- culty whatever to find a ready market for his stock in the vicinity of his home in Shawnee township and abroad, a farm located fourteen miles northeast of Butler and seven miles northwest of Spruce. Mr. Perry recently built on the farm a modern hog house, sexangle style in imitation of the sale barn of W. B. Wallace at Bunceton in Cooper county, Missouri, with breeding pens around all sides, concrete floor, the light furnished from overhead and by fourteen windows around the sides of the building, a model house of its kind. W. W. Perry completed a course in animal husbandry at the Missouri State University, Colum- bia, Missouri, and has mastered the art of judging stock. At the uni- versity, he was obliged to judge stock six days in the week and after keeping that up for several months one soon learns something about good stock and forms some conception of what a fine specimen is and how to produce it and care for it after it has been produced. Mr. Perry has in his herd two exceptionally fine pigs, one of them a prize winner, namely: "Chief" and "Royal Cross Third." The latter won first prize for the best pig under two and over one year of age at the Butler Fair in 1916. The prize was a silver set of twenty-six pieces, which Mr. Perry prizes highly. He has the following extraordinarily good boars registered: "Prairie Home Bob." out of "Jumbo Bob," dam, "Charters' Giantess," dam "Long Giantess," which is the largest dam ever shown
W. W. PERRY.
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at the Missouri State Fair, shown at Sedalia in 1917, purchased by Mr. Perry for two hundred sixty dollars; and "Perry's King Joe," out of "King Joe," that sold for one thousand two hundred fifty dollars, a record- breaking prize at the time, dam, "Maid Wonder," which cost two hundred forty dollars. These two boars are Mr. Perry's head animals and are well worth the attention of all breeders interested in raising better hogs. Another sow, "Wonder Maid," won first prize at the Missouri State Fair in 1915 as the best junior yearling brood sow on exhibition. W. W. Perry is a member of the Farm Club of Bates County and has an established reputation in western Missouri as one of the most successful stockmen and breeders of high-grade animals in the state and his work is being more and more appreciated by the prominent stockmen of his home county.
W. W. Perry was born in 1881 at the Perry homestead in Shawnee township, Bates county, and was reared on the farm of one hundred twenty acres of land, purchased by his father in 1879, one of the excel- lent stock farms of Shawnee township. Mr. Perry is a son of M. F. and Mary O. (Waldo) Perry. M. F. Perry was born in Henry county, Mis- souri, in 1847, a son of William T. and Mary (Cooper) Perry, the former, a native of Virginia and the latter, of Kentucky. William T. Perry came to Missouri in 1836 and settled on a tract of land, which he entered from the government, in Henry county, and on his farm in that county spent the remainder of his life. He died in 1888 and interment was made in the cemetery near his home place.
M. F. Perry obtained his education in the "subscription schools" of Henry county, as there were no public schools in this state until after the Civil War. He was reared on his father's farm in Henry county and practically all his life has been interested in agricultural pursuits. He came to Bates county, Missouri, in 1879 and purchased his present country home in Shawnee township, a farm comprising one hundred twenty acres of valuable land, nicely improved and conveniently located. fourteen miles from Butler and seven miles from Spruce. Mr. Perry is very much interested in horticulture and had a splendid little orchard on his place until the cyclone of 1916 destroyed it. He has since planted another orchard and hopes to be one of those who will enjoy the fruit from it in the days to come.
The marriage of M. F. Perry and Mary O. Waldo was solemnized in 1876. Mrs. Perry is a daughter of Col. Calvin and Mrs. Matilda (Odineal) Waldo, of St. Clair county, Missouri. To this union have
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been born three children: Mrs. C. A. Webb, at home with her parents ; Mrs. Robert Powers, Butler, Missouri; and W. W., of whom mention has been made in this sketch. Mr. and Mrs. Perry are highly respected in Shawnee township, where their family has long been enrolled among the most valued and best families and Mr. Perry has at many different times been honored with offices of public trust in his township. He has served as justice of the peace in Shawnee township, as clerk, as assessor, and has just completed a very satisfactory term in the office of deputy collector. He is public-spirited and takes a deep and abiding interest in all matters relative to the upbuilding and betterment of his commun- ity. M. F. Perry is a most worthy representative of a noble, old, pio- neer family of Henry county and Bates county, one of the first families of Missouri.
Herbert E. Page, proprietor of a fine farm of four hundred twenty acres in Hudson township, is a native son of Bates county who has "made good" in the county of his birth. The farm which he owns has been in possession of the Page family for over fifty years, Mr. Page first buying one hundred sixty acres of the old home place when he began his career in this county on his own account twenty-two years ago. Since that time he has accumulated one of the large and highly productive farms in this section of Missouri and has fitted up the place with splendid improvements. Mr. Page has a splendid barn 40 x 50 feet in dimensions, and a silo having a capacity of one hundred fifty tons of silage-a modern adjunct to the proper feeding of live stock which Mr. Page considers one of the best assets of his farm. He has eighty head of cattle and at the present writing (January, 1918) is feeding a carload for the markets. He usually keeps from seventy- five to one hundred head of good hogs on the place, and adds to the income of his farm by feeding and raising a good variety of porkers. One of the best things on the place in Mr. Page's opinion is a drilled well, two hundred feet in depth, which supplies soft water for any and all purposes. The water from this well is piped to his modern eight- room residence and supplies an infallible flow for the livestock on the farm.
H. E. Page was born in Hudson township, April 9, 1869, and is the son of Ava and Mary ( Robords) Page, pioneer settlers of Hudson township. Ava E. Page, his father, was born in Livingston county, New York, January 5, 1834. His parents were Albert and Jerusha (Tyler) Page, both of whom were natives of Connecticut. Albert Page
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was born March 31, 1800, and moved to New York with his parents when a youth and grew to manhood there and married. He was promi- nent in the affairs of Livingston county, and filled several county offices during his residence there. He died in August, 1876. When Ava E. Page was seventeen years old he taught a term of school and in the fall of 1850 he went to Tennessee, where he taught for two years. In January, 1857, he removed to Wisconsin and located at Milwaukee, where he served for two years as deputy sheriff of Milwaukee county. He came to Missouri in May, 1859, and made settlement in Bates county, buying land in Hudson township which he improved from raw, un- broken prairie land and created a fine farm. He bought the home place which is now owned by his son, Herbert E., in 1866, and became owner of two hundred seventy acres. He set out an orchard of over five hundred trees of all kinds of fruit, and created one of the best country estates in the county. Mr. Page was also heavily engaged in the live stock business. He resided on his farm until 1896 and then moved to Roswell, New Mexico and resided there until 1909, when he went to California, and died at Pomona on July 4. 1910. Mr. Page was mar- ried in Henry county, August 1, 1861, to Miss Mary E. Robords, of New York City, a daughter of Rev. Israel Robords of Scotch descent. Mrs. Page moved to Missouri with her parents when eight years of age, but was educated at Rochester, New York. The following chil- dren were born to Ava E. and Mary Page: Florence I., wife of J. B. Baker, Upper Lake, California ; Clifford, Arcadia, Florida; Herbert E., subject of this review; and Minnie, wife of William Wilson, Roswell, New Mexico.
During the Civil War. Ava E. Page enlisted in the Sixth Missouri Cavalry and served as lieutenant of Company C in his regiment. He participated in many engagements and was in the battle of Marshall in Saline county. In 1864 he was appointed one of the county judge iní Bates county, and served as presiding judge of the county co for two years. He was prominently identified with the Republican party and served as delegate to the state conventions of his party at various times. He was one of the leaders in the Grange movement and in every way was a leading citizen of the county, for some years serving as state lecturer of the Grange in Missouri.
Herbert E. Page was educated in the common schools of Bates county and studied in the State Normal at Warrensburg for one year. He then spent three years in the West and then returned to the home
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farm where he has since followed farming. He first purchased one hundred sixty acres of the home place and by thrift, good management and hard work-as he says-on the eight-hour system, which calls for "eight-hour forenoon" and "eight-hour afternoon," he has made good and is owner of four hundred twenty acres of farm lands which are among the most valuable in Bates county.
On October 24, 1895, Herbert E. Page and Miss Elfie Brown were united in marriage. This marriage has been blessed with children as follow: Harley H., one of his father's assistants on the farm, a grad- uate of the Appleton City High School; George Ava, a student in the district school. Mrs. Elfie (Brown) Page is a daughter of W. G. and Mary Brown of Hudson township. Her father is well known in Hud- son township and her mother is deceased. See biography of William G. Brown.
Anthony Lindsay, pioneer and retired mail route manager, who after an eventful and busy life is living in comfortable retirement at his pleasant home, 509 West Fort Scott street, Butler, Missouri, was born in Nova Scotia, Dominion of Canada, September 23, 1849. He was. a son of James and Mary (Stewart) Lindsay, the former of whom was a native of Nova Scotia and the latter a native of Scotland. James Lindsay removed from Nova Scotia to Canada in 1854 and to Illinois in 1857, and in the fall of 1868 he located on a farm in Linn county, Kansas, near the present site of the town of Prescott. He died there in 1873. Mrs. Mary Lindsay died at Prescott in April, 1901, and both are buried in the Prescott cemetery. They were parents of eight chi !- dren, of whom three survive, namely: John, lives in Oklahoma; Mrs. Mima Bowers, Pasadena, California; Anthony Lindsay, subject of this sketch.
Mr. Lindsay was educated in the common schools of Canada and Illinois and accompanied his parents to Linn county, Kansas in 1868. Two years later, in 1870, he located in Bates county, and took charge of the contract for carrying the mails from Butler, Missouri, to La Cygne, Kansas. This route provided for a daily mail delivery with a stage coach in connection, the routes leading from Butler to Appleton City and thence to Osceola, and Butler to La Cygne and return. The trip involved a distance of sixty miles from Butler to La Cygne and return and was made daily. Mr. Lindsay operated three routes. In 1876 he and his brother, Albert S., built a stable at Appleton City, and did a livery business in addition to carrying the mails. The stage route
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