USA > Missouri > Pettis County > History of Pettis County, Missouri > Part 43
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dalia; Mrs. Lena Barret, wife of Hinton Gould, west of Sedalia; Mrs. Ora M. Fleming. Mrs. Mary E. (Barret) McClung died on March 9, 1909, at the age of eighty-five years. She was a daughter of Augustus M. and Mary (Marshall) Barret.
Augustus M. Barret was born in Berksville, Kentucky, May 11, 1804. He was married in 1823 to Miss Mary Marshall of Greensburg, Kentucky. Mrs. Mary Barret died in 1828 and he afterwards married Miss Mary Cunningham, of Litchfield, Kentucky, who died shortly afterwards of consumption. In 1837 he married Miss Bereroyal Rountree in Browns- ville, Kentucky. For a long period of twenty-six years Mr. Barret served as clerk of both the Circuit and County Courts of his home county in Kentucky. In 1852 he, with his family moved to Missouri by the over- land route and settled in Georgetown, Pettis County. Mr. Barret resided first on what was called the Delahunt place, northwest of Georgetown. The following spring he moved upon the Court House square, one block west of the old Kidd Hotel. At that time R. R. Speddon was clerk of the court in Georgetown. Speddon being a politician, he did not care to perform the duties of the office, and he therefore installed A. M. Barret as his deputy in the little red brick office (which is still standing). In 1853, Col. John Phillips, a newly fledged lawyer from Kentucky, came to Georgetown, bringing letters of introduction to Mr. Barret who kindly gave him the place of assistant deputy in the clerk's office. This was done so that Mr. Phillips could have time to look around and establish himself in his profession. In 1854 Mr. Barret moved to the farm now occupied by Crown Hill Cemetery, Sedalia. He purchased this land from the government at a cost of $1.25 an acre and made the first settlement on the prairies in that section of the county. His house was the first one built and occupied by his family in that immediate neighborhood which is now the city of Sedalia. His farm was a mile long from north to south and a half mile wide. Mr. Barret was a candidate for circuit clerk in 1857 but his death intervened. He died September 1, 1857.
Mr. Fleming has long been prominent in the affairs of the Demo- cratic party in Pettis County and served for twenty years as committee- man for his precinct. He is a member of Sacred Heart Catholic Church of Sedalia, and is fraternally affiliated with the Knights of Columbus, being a Fourth Degree Knight, and is a member of the Knights of Father Matthew. Mrs. Fleming is a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution Chapter (1812) Gen. David Thomson.
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Joseph B. Johnson .- Sixteen years ago J. B. Johnson of Georgetown, Pettis County, took possession of a worn-out farm adjoining the village on the southwest. He had saved a fund of $2,000, with which he made a first payment on 305 acres of land the total cost of which was $17,750. During this period he has not only paid for his land, but has purchased an additional tract at a cost of $5,000. Mr. Johnson owns 340 acres of land and was engaged in the dairy farming business until 1917, when he sold his fine herd of Holstein cows and is now engaged in general farm- ing. He has both thoroughbred and grade cattle on his place and has been constantly improving and bettering his farm. When he took pos- session of the land the soil was depleted and the buildings were in poor condition. Now, the fertility of the soil has been restored and the farm dwelling is a handsome structure. The Johnson farm is one of the best in Cedar township and Pettis County.
Joseph B. Johnson was born March 15, 1874 in Ford County, now Elliot, Illinois, a son of John B. and Sarah Johnson, natives of Norway, who came to America and followed farming to the end of their days. The mother of J. B. Johnson died in 1880. His father died in 1884, leav- ing six children orphaned, with the youngest child only six months of age. J. B. Johnson was ten years old when his father died, and for the next eight years he worked out for his board and clothes. In 1893 he began to draw a man's wages and received from $22 to $23 per month, very high wages for farm hands even in those days. He worked steadily and saved his money but had the misfortune to lose $500 of his savings through no fault of his own. In 1902 he came to Pettis County and since his coming here prosperity has smiled upon him, all of which is due to the hardest kind of work and good financial management, and the as- sistance of a capable and devoted wife.
Mr. Johnson was married February 12, 1901, to Mary Josephine Hanson, born in Illinois, February 20, 1872, a daughter of Swedish pa- rents. Mrs. Johnson died on September 26, 1918. During the last four years of her life she suffered greatly from cancer. She was a deeply religious woman, a kind and faithful helpmeet to her husband, who at- tributes his success to her counsel and assistance while winning his way in Pettis County. Mr. and Mrs. Johnson fought the good fight side by side and won. They have brought into the world a family of fine chil- dren: Frances Harriet, born January 20, 1902, a junior in Sedalia High School; Lester Charles, born August 23, 1904; Vivian May, born July
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31, 1906, a pupil in the seventh grade; Joseph Bernard, born April 6, 1908, a pupil in the fourth grade of the public school. .
Mr. Johnson is a Republican and is a member of the Lutheran Church of which Mrs. Johnson was also a member. He is a member of the Modern Woodmen of America, and the Fraternal Order of Eagles and carries insurance in the Missouri State Mutual.
Mental Parsons Tuck is a native of Pettis County who has made good in the county of his birth, and is one of the best known of the suc- cessful farmers and stockmen of Houstonia. Mr. Tuck is owner of a splendid farm of 400 acres of rich prairie land in Blackwater and Hous- tonia townships. This farm is well improved with a good seven-room house, good farm buildings and fences in a good state of repair. Mr. Tuck, while now a resident of Houstonia, looks after his farm and also owns a tract of forty-six acres on the northern edge of Houstonia. This property is also splendidly improved with an imposing residence.
M. P. Tuck was born May 17, 1852, in Pettis County, the son of Dr. Ryland Tuck who was born in Virginia in 1820 and died in Pettis County in 1903.
Dr. Ryland Tuck was a native of Virginia. His father died in his native State and his widowed mother left the home State and came to Missouri with her three children, during the early thirties. They settled in Cooper County, and here Ryland Tuck was reared to young manhood. In 1844, he made a visit to the old home scenes in Virginia and upon his return he made a settlement on the prairies of northern Pettis County. He was married in this county to Elizabeth Prigmore, who was born in 1820 and died March 27, 1881. She was a daughter of Benjamin Prig- more, a son of one of the earliest of the Pettis County pioneers. Benja- min Prigmore drove the first wagon that ever made a track across the prairies of northern Pettis County, and settled on the South Fork. He was one of the best known of the first pioneer settlers of this section of the county. Seven children were born to Dr. Ryland and Elizabeth Tuck, as follow: Mrs. Mary Frances Rhodes, living on a farm five miles west of Houstonia ; Fendel H., a farmer living in Houstonia; Mental Parsons, of this review; one child died in infancy; Elizabeth Catherine Rhodes, living on a farm eight miles southwest of Houstonia; Pleasant, deceased; Mrs. Jane Johnson, Warrensburg, Missouri.
Dr. Ryland Tuck became a prominent and well-to-do citizen of Pettis County. He became owner of a splendid farm of 440 acres which he im-
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M. P. TUCK.
MRS. M. P. TUCK.
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proved from undeveloped prairie land. Three hundred and twenty acres of the original home place, part of which was purchased directly from the United States Government, is owned by the two sisters of Mrs. Rhodes. Doctor Tuck was a charter member of Sweet Springs Masonic Lodge, and was a leading Democrat in his day. Doctor Tuck studied medicine under the tutelage of Doctor Rockwell, a pioneer physician who was located in the eastern part of Pettis County. He graduated from the Ohio Medical College at Cincinnati and practicced medicine in the vicinity of Houstonia until old age came upon him. Doctor Tuck was one of the best known of the pioneer physicians of his day and he practiced success- fully over a large extent of territory. In his day the doctors went horseback over the country to call upon their patients and the life was a hard one for a professional man. His last days were spent in peaceful retirement at the home of his daughter, Mrs. Fannie Frances Rhodes. In 1880 he and his sons purchased land. The doctor bought 244 acres and added to this about 440 acres, the Tuck estate eventually exceeding 720 acres, in all.
M. P. Tuck received his education in the district school and when a boy he worked upon the home farm. When he attained his majority, he began on his own account as a tiller of the soil. With his savings he in- vested in farm land in 1880, purchasing a quarter section. He improved this tract, sold eighty acres of it and then bought other land. He pur- chased 200 acres of his brother and at his father's death he received 120 acres as his share of the estate. This made a farm of 400 acres upon which Mr. Tuck resided until the spring of 1905 when he moved to Hous- tonia and left his son in charge of the home place. In the spring of 1906 he purchased his present home place of forty-six acres.
Mr. Tuck was married in October, 1887, to Miss Willie Hierony- mous, who was born in Longwood township, Pettis County, in 1864. She is a daughter of Rex Hieronymous and is descended from one of the earliest of the Pettis County pioneers. A fuller account of the Hierony- mous family is given elsewhere in this work in connection with the sketch of R. J. Kemp and Charles J. and Frank Hieronymous.
The children born to M. P. and Willie Tuck are as follow: Ruby, an art student at Washington University, St. Louis; Lorene, wife of John R. Higgins, living on a farm southwest of Houstonia; Leland, managing the home farm, married Virginia Sewell and has one child, Leland; Mary Nell, and Joy, at home with their parents; Mary Nell is studying to be-
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come a trained nurse, and has enlisted for service in the Red Cross. Lucille is the youngest of the family.
Mr. Tuck is vice-president of the Farmers Bank of Houstonia and is a leading and influential citizen of his community. He is a Democrat politically, but has held no office except that of district school director and member of the school board of the consolidated school district of Houstonia, a position which he has filled for the past thirty years. During these many years Mr. Tuck has been one of the progressive and fore- most advocates of better education facilities for the young, and has up- held his advanced views along educational lines consistently and per- sistently to the well being of the community. For the past twenty years he has been a member of the Sweet Springs Masonic Lodge.
Alexander Dow .- To have lived several years past the alloted three score and ten given to man according to the Holy Scriptures, endured the hardships of hard-fought campaigns as a Union soldier in the Civil War, then make a home in Pettis County, rearing a splendid family of sons and daughters and yet retaining a keen interest in life with mental faculties unimpaired, a zest for living still uppermost, is the pleasant restrospective of Alexander Dow, for the past thirty-eight years justice of the peace at Georgetown, Missouri. For the same length of time this well-preserved and intelligent old settler has been active in religious and Sunday school works. His has been a useful life.
Alexander Dow was born on a farm located one mile north of Belle- fontaine, Logan County, Ohio, January 6, 1842. He is a son of Duncan and Catherine (Comrie) Dow, natives of Scotland, who emigrated from their native heath in 1840 and settled in Logan County, Ohio. Duncan Dow operated one of the first threshers ever brought to Logan County. This antiquated machine was of the "ground-hog" type with solid cylin- ders which burst one day while its operator was getting up steam in the threshing season of 1847, and Mr. Dow was instantly killed. Three children were fatherless: Peter, who still lives on the old homestead in Ohio; David, died in Knoxville, Tennessee, where he was a well-known merchant; Alexander, subject of this sketch.
When a boy of nineteen, Alexander Dow hearkened to President Lincoln's call for troops to quell the rebellion of the southern states and he enlisted in 1861 in Company C, Fifteenth Regular United States In- fantry, Fourteenth Army Corps, under command of General Thomas. Mr. Dow served for three years, as company clerk and was with his com-
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mand when it participated in the battles of Stone River, Corinth, Missis- sippi, and in the campaign up the Tennessee River, and to Athens, Ala- bama. His command was then ordered to Kentucky and to Louisville, and went in pursuit of General Bragg's Army as far as Stone River. After spending the winter at Chattanooga, following this campaign, the Fourteenth Army Corps went through Kenesaw and to Atlanta, Georgia. At Atlanta the Fifteenth Regiment was detached and sent back to Nash- ville, Tennessee. Soon afterwards, Private Dow's term of enlistment expired and he returned home. In 1865 he went to Illinois with the in- tention to engage in the cattle business in Champaign county. During that winter he taught a term of school and in the spring he rode to Bloomington, Illinois, and began farming for a land owner named Thorn- berry. While driving one of his employer's teams the animals ran away, throwing him from the wagon, breaking his collar bone and causing a curvature of the spine. This accident required that he return home in order to get well again. He did so and for some time sold books and had great success in selling "Horace Greeley's History of the Civil War" in several Ohio counties.
Mr. Dow taught school for one term in Brown County, Ohio, and was for two years engaged in merchandising in Darke county, Ohio. After his marriage he sold his store and in 1869 came west to Sedalia. Upon his arrival in the new and booming town of Sedalia he found every avenue of business so crowded that he was compelled for his own good to make other plans than a mercantile career in Sedalia. He arrived in Sedalia on New Year's day and after a careful survey of the situation he deemed it the better policy to go out in the country where things were not so crowded and buy a farm. This he did and for some time he tilled a farm located five miles west of the city. He then sold out and came to Georgetown where he lived for two years upon a rented farm in Cedar township near the village. He then bought 100 acres adjoining the town of the northeast and moved to the place in the spring of 1878. Mr. Dow's farm now embraces 175 acres and it has been his home for the past forty years. The Dow farm is a beautiful tract of valley and hill land, a por- tion of which is still in a wooded condition.
Alexander Dow was married in 1868 to Louise Dill, who was born in Darke County, Ohio, a daughter of Major Dill, a well-known merchant of that county. Mrs. Dow died in 1894. This marriage was blessed with children as follow: Charles G., died at the age of two years; John P., a
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druggist in business at Lafayette, Colorado; Walter A., a merchant at Coleman, New Mexico; Harvey D., a prominent attorney of Sedalia ; Augustus C., an insurance man of Topeka, Kansas; Ralph W., with the insurance firm of Meriweather and Dow, Sedalia; Arthur I., a conductor on the Santa Fe railroad, Raton, New Mexico; Mary L., wife of James A. DeJarnette, Cedar township. Mr. Dow's second marriage occurred on December 31, 1895 with Mrs. Sarah Elizabeth Erskine, a widow who by her former marriage, has four children: James, manager of the farming ouerations at the County Home Farm; Mrs. Sallie Rodecker, Sedalia; E. J. Erskine, a merchant, Sedalia; Mrs. Hallie DeJarnette, Cedar town- ship.
Mr. Dow is prominent in the affairs of the Republican party of Pettis County and has filled the office of justice of the peace of Cedar township since 1880, except a period of four years, holding probably the record for Pettis County in the number of years he has served in this capacity. Since 1880 he has been superintendent of the Methodist Episcopal Sunday school at Georgetown, and in many ways this fine old gentleman has endeared himself to the people of his neighborhood. His record has been a clean and honorable one, and he has good and just right to be proud of the ambitious sons whom he has reared. Mr. Dow, despite his age, is mentally keen, enjoys reading, and has been a student during his entire life, being well informed concerning public and world events.
Ernest W. Jones, attorney and stockman, Hughesville township, has a splendid farm of four hundred and twenty-six acres, which is well improved with new and modern buildings. Mr. Jones erected a handsome bungalow of eight rooms in 1914, which is modern in every respect. He is an extensive producer of Duroc Jersey swine, the annual output of the farm running from three hundred to four hundred head of fat porkers each year. General farming operations are carried on this large farm, one hundred and sixty acres of the place being sown to wheat for the season of 1919.
Ernest W. Jones was born at Rolla, Phelps County, Missouri, July 21, 1887. He is a son of Hon. Thomas M. and Lucy B. (Morse) Jones, of El Paso, Texas. Thomas M. Jones was born in Franklin County, Missouri, a son of Thomas A. Jones, a son of Virginia parents and a direct descendant of the Jones family of Maryland, a member of whom was Governor Thomas Jones, who was chief executive of the State of
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Maryland during the early period of the nation's history. Thomas M. Jones was born in 1862, and was educated for the legal profession. He practiced law in Phelps County for a period of twenty-five years, and served as prosecuting attorney of the county for four terms. In 1902 he located in El Paso, Texas, where he has an extensive law practice and is one of the leaders of the bar in the border city. Four children were born to Thomas M. and Lucy B. Jones, as follow: Harold Ambrose, deceased; Ernest W., of this review; Thomas M., El Paso, Texas; Lucy Fay, deceased.
Ernest W. Jones was educated in the Rolla public schools and grad- uated from the El Paso, Texas, High School in 1905. He then entered the University of Missouri and graduated from the law department of the State University in 1909. He began the practice of his profession at El Paso in 1909, and continued in the legal profession in that city until 1913. During his residence in El Paso he represented his county in the State legislature as senator. In 1913 he came to Sedalia, and practiced his profession for a little over a year and then took up his residence on the farm in Hughesville township.
On June 26, 1912, Ernest W. Jones and Erna Lucille McClure were united in marriage. Mrs. Erna Lucille Jones is a daughter of the late John Wesley McClure, an extended biography of whom appears in this volume. One child has blessed this marriage-Ernest Walter Jones, born April, 1914.
Mr. Jones is a Democrat. He is a member of the Methodist Epis- copal Church, as is Mrs. Jones. He is affiliated fraternally with the Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.
William A. Claycomb .- Twenty years ago, when W. A. Claycomb purchased the old Thornton place of 100.5 acres, in the southwest part of Longwood township, Pettis County, he had very little money and was obliged to incur an indebtedness at the very beginning of his career. Since 1898 he has been constantly adding to his acreage, and now has a splendid estate of 672 acres. Mr. Claycomb's policy has been to buy land, even if he had to go in debt for it, a method of procedure which was invariable during his whole career, and make the land pay for itself with a succession of crops. His plan has proved successful. On the heights overlooking the valley of the Muddy River, Mr. Claycomb erected, in 1917, one of the finest farm mansions in this section of Missouri. It is a splendid modern brick structure of ten rooms, fitted with every
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modern convenience to make living comfortable, and finished in hardwood throughout. The lawn facing the highway to the west is enclosed with a stone wall, in keeping with the general plan of the building. Mr. Clay- comb has been an extensive feeder of live stock for years, and annually produces over one hundred and fifty head of swine for the markets. He also feeds and fattens over one hundred head of cattle annually.
William A. Claycomb was born in Sedalia, in 1869, a son of John D. and Augusta (Washburn) Claycomb, natives of Virginia. John D. Clay- comb was a "Forty-Niner" who crossed the plains in 1850 and delved in the gold mines of California for a few years. Upon his return to Missouri he came to Sedalia, after a residence in Saline County for a few years. He eventually made a settlement on the plains above the Muddy River, and resided upon his farm for forty years. In his old age he removed to a home in Sedalia, where he died in January, 1918, aged eighty-five years. He was father of four children: O. W. Claycomb, Guymon, Oklahoma; William A., of this review; Robert O., Lawton, Okla- homa; Mrs. Kate Powell, Hughesville township. The old home place of the Claycombs is now owned by the subject of this sketch, the homestead being located just northwest of the new home recently erected by Mr. Claycomb. An extended biography of John D. Claycomb is written in this volume.
The early schooling of William A. Claycomb was obtained in the Sedalia public schools and Fayette College, and the old log school house known as the Fristoe School. He has always resided in Pettis County, with the exception of some years spent in southwest Missouri, during the nineties. After farming the home place for some time after reaching his majority, he purchased his own farm, as herein stated, and eventually became owner of the home place.
Mr. Claycomb was married in 1892 to Miss Mollie Talbert, who was born in Indiana, a daughter of William Talbert, who moved from his native State to Barry County, Missouri, and died there. The children born to W. A. and Mollie Claycomb are as follow: William Talbert, a farmer, resides in Saline County, married Rosella Claycomb, and has one child, William Talbert, Jr .; Ruth, wife of Joseph Menefee, Jr., living at home; Lawrence, died in 1916, at the age of twelve years; Bruce and Dorothy, at home, and Marjorie Ann, born November 7, 1918.
Mr. Claycomb is a Republican in politics, and he and the members of his family belong to the Methodist Episcopal Church. He is a hard
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working, industrious citizen, who has the welfare of his community and family at heart, and believes in building up the land which has come into his possession.
Padfield N. Kemp, probably the oldest living native-born pioneer of Heath's Creek township, was born February 28, 1843, and is now owner of one hundred acres of the farm upon which he was born, over seventy-six years ago. He is a son of Thomas Hall and Regina (Newbill) Kemp, both of whom were natives of old Virginia. Thomas A. Kemp was born January 12, 1792, and died September 17, 1846. He first settled in Callaway County, far back in the old days, when the first pioneers came to Missouri up the Missouri River, in order to make homes in the wilderness. During the early twenties he located in Pettis County, bought a small place, and afterwards entered government land. Maria R. (Newbill) Kemp was born July 14, 1788, and died March 25, 1872. There were eleven children born to this pioneer couple; Sanford, deceased; William Giles, deceased; Amanda De Jarnette, deceased; Mrs. Bettie or Elizabeth Scott, James T., Ezekiel Franklin, all deceased; Susan Maria Estes, of Sedalia; Robert Jordan Kemp, Heaths Creek township; Padfield N., of this review; Sarah Theresa Brooks, St. Louis, Missouri, and Josephus, deceased.
Schools during the boyhood days of P. N. Kemp were likely to be held in the summer season, as well as in the winter, and the term was but for three months in the year. School was held in a log building fitted with benches made of rough split logs. The only light let in the building was from an opening cut out of one of the logs in the side of the struc- ture. A wide fireplace occupied one side of the room, and it was filled with blazing logs in winter. Wooden chimneys served as a flue in the school house, as well as for the Kemp home, which was also built of hewn logs. Hunting was good in those days, and wild game abounded. Mr. Kemp recalls that the first court of Pettis County was held in a little store at Pinhook, the court house or county seat later being located at Georgetown. Thomas A. Kemp owned, during his lifetime, 400 acres of land. At his death this estate was divided and Padfield Kemp received forty acres. To this he added a ten-acre tract, and then fifty acres. He moved to his farm at the time of his marriage, in December, 1868, to Margaret Lavina Steele.
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