USA > Nebraska > A Biographical and genealogical history of southeastern Nebraska, Vol. I > Part 28
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of August of that year had broken out, narrowly escaping the devasta- tion that the redskins wrought for many miles of territory. In the fall of 1865 they loaded twelve wagons with corn, and with one hundred and fifty head of cattle started for the Black Hills and Fort Halleck, being paid by the government nearly eight dollars a bushel for their freight, and realizing several thousand dollars from their trip. By the fall of 1866 the Union Pacific was completed as far as Kearney, Ne- braska, and the days of the prosperous freighter were over, so they sold their cattle and have since engaged in merchandising at the perma- ment location of Rulo. In the fall of 1866 they erected the first store, which, together with their fine grain elevator and mill, was burned down in the summer of 1883, at a loss of forty thousand dollars, and it was a long time before they secured their insurance of thirteen thousand five hundred dollars. In 1887 they erected their present brick block, which is the largest and best establishment of the kind in Rulo, and through- out the years their trade has increased and prospered and augmented their reliability and high standing in the community. Mr. Hosford owns altogether fifteen hundred acres of Richardson county land, in ten farms, and also has three tenant houses in addition to his own large and com- fortable dwelling, which was one of the early houses of the town.
Mr. Hosford is a prominent Republican, and has been mayor of Rulo three times. He is a veteran member of the school board. In 1868 he was a charter member of the Nemaha Valley, Lincoln City and Loop Fork Railroad Company. It was he who found and buried the body of Sam Gilmore, of Platte county, Missori, who was killed by the Indians in April, 1864, and he has been connected in countless other ways with pioneer life and days of the Missori valley.
He was married in Rulo, to Miss Permelia Mildred Easley, who was born in Franklin county, Missouri, October 30, 1850, a daughter of
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Edward A. and Susan Easley, detailed mention of which worthy people will be found in the sketch of their son, Drury T. Easley. Mr. and Mrs. Hosford have had five children : Lottie H., wife of Edward Nich- ols, of Des Moines, Iowa; Miss Mary Mildred, who is a competent and successful stenographer at Los Angeles, California; Horace G., a civil engineer and engaged in surveying on the Des Moines and Missouri Railroad; James V., a student in the class of 1904 in the Gem City Business College at Quincy, Illinois ; and Newton K., a boy of fifteen. at home.
F. E. KIMBALL.
A well known figure on the streets of Beatrice, Nebraska, and a man occupying a prominent place in the business circles of the city, is F. E. Kimball, proprietor of a laundry and livery, and a stock breeder.
Mr. Kimball was born in the territory of Wisconsin, in November, 1841. The name Kimball is of Scotch origin, but the family to which the subject of this sketch belongs has long been resident of America, the early home having been New England and several generations of the family having been born in New Hampshire. Peter Kimball, the great-grandfather of F. E., was a native of New Hampshire and was a veteran of the Revolutionary war, in which he rendered valiant serv- ice for the cause of independence. Joseph Kimball, Mr. Kimball's grand- « father, was a New Hampshire farmer who was called "Captain." He was twice married and was the father of twelve children, all by his first wife. One of Joseph Kimball's sons was Jesse W. Kimball, born in Sullivan county, New Hampshire, in 1803.
Turning to the maternal ancestry of Mr. Kimball, we find that his mother was before her marriage Miss Emily Cotton. She was a daugh-
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ter of Nathaniel Cotton, a descendant of John Cotton, who came to this country in the Mayflower. The Cottons were members of the Congre- gational church and in the family were several ministers of that denomi- nation.
Jesse W. Kimball and his family left their New England home in 1840 and went to Wisconsin, settling in Walworth township, Walworth county, where they were pioneers and became leading citizens. Later they moved to Galesburg, Illinois, where he died at the age of seventy- four years. His wife's death occurred in Lorain, Ohio, in 1883, at the age of eighty-two years. Both are buried at Galesburg. They were the parents of four children, all of whom, with one exception, grew to adult age, viz .: Rev. Charles Cotton Kimball, D.D., LL.D., who spent many years in eastern Congregational pastorate, and who is now living retired in New Jersey, at the age of seventy years; Mrs. Francis Ann Knight, widow of George H. Knight, who died in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1893; and F. E. Kimball, whose name introduces this article.
F. E. Kimball was just emerging from his teens when the trou- blous days of Civil war came on. He was among the first to leave home and chase the "Jay Hawkers." He was mustered into the service. as a private in a Kansas cavalry, in September, 1861, at Leavenworth, and shared the fortunes of his command until the following year, when he was honorably discharged. Mr. Kimball spent twenty of the best years of his life as a locomotive engineer on the Burlington Railroad, running between Galesburg and Chicago, with headquarters at the former place. He came from Galesburg to Nebraska, locating first in Hastings. In 1891 he moved to Beatrice, where he has since resided. He has a pleasant home in Ella street, at No. 813, and he also owns his livery and laundry buildings. In his livery barn he keeps from forty to forty-five head of horses, some of them speedy and blooded and as
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fine stock as will be found anywhere in the country. Three and a half miles east of Beatrice Mr. Kimball has fifty acres of land, where he is making a specialty of raising fine hogs.
Mr. Kimball was married October 24, 1864, to Miss Emma L. Kimball, of Quincy, Illinois, daughter of Rev. Milton Kimball, a Pres- byterian minister of Illinois. They have an only child, Frank J. Kim- ball, who is married and living in Omaha, Nebraska, where he is pro- prietor of the Kimball Laundry. He first engaged in the laundry busi- ness in Beatrice, when a mere youth, and established the business at this place that his father now has charge of.
Mrs. Kimball is a member of the Presbyterian church, the faith in which she was reared. Politically Mr. Kimball is a Republican, always taking a commendable interest in public affairs, but never seeking official honors.
SAMUEL A. KINNEY.
Samuel A. Kinney, proprietor of "Wolf Valley Stock Farm" in Gage county, Nebraska, is one of the prominent farmers of the county. Mr. Kinney was born in Richardson county, Nebraska, January 2, 1861, and is descended from English ancestry. His father, David Kinney, first saw the light of day on the shores of Lake Champlain, in northern Vermont, he being a son of Hammond Kinney, whose father was an Englishiman who came to this country before the Revolutionary war and in that war fought for the independence of the American colonies. Ham- mond Kinney died at the age of eighty-five years. His wife, nee Lucretia Edson, was a native of Vermont. Their son David grew up in the Green Mountain state and there learned the carpenter's trade. When a young man he came west, first to Wisconsin, then to Illinois,
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next to Leavenworth, Kansas, and finally to Richardson county, Ne- braska. Here he met and married Miss Malinda Stumbo, a native of eastern Ohio, and a member of a German family, her father being John Stumbo, one of the first settlers of Richardson county. Mr. David Kinney built the first mill in this county, for his father-in-law. He died here in 1891, at the age of fifty-six years. He was politically a Repub- lican and his religious creed was that of the Evangelical church, in which he was a deacon. His widow is still living, now a resident of Blue Springs, Nebraska. They had a family of six children, namely : Samuel A., Frank Edson, Dora, Henry B., William and Viva.
Samuel A. Kinney was reared on a farm and received a liberal schooling at White Cloud and Manhattan, Kansas, and was a successful teacher for nine years in Kansas and Nebraska. Since leaving the schoolroom he has given his whole attention to farming and stock- raising. He owns Wolf Valley Farm, which comprises eight hundred acres and, he has a good residence and one of the finest barns in Gage county. This barn is seventy-four by forty-four feet in dimensions, has a large basement built of rock, with all modern improvements and is especially fitted for dairy business, having room for twenty-five COWS.
Mr. Kinney was married December 25, 1883, to Julia Smead, who was previous to her marriage a popular and successful teacher. Her father, E. O. Smead, came to Nebraska from New York, and is now a resident of Kearney, this state. He is a veteran of the Civil war. Her mother, whose maiden name was Mary Hitchock, was born in Ohio. In the Smead family were five children, of whom Mrs. Kinney is the oldest, the others being Anna, Arthur, Eugene, and Alvin. Mr. and Mrs. Kinney have had seven children, viz. : Loyette, Earl D., Edith O., Guy, Floyd, Ruth and Glenn. The last named died at the age of
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five years. Like his father before him, Mr. Kinney is a Republican voter.
ROSS W. NELSON.
Occupying a representative position among the leading and success- ful business men of Pawnee county, Nebraska, is Ross W. Nelson, the grain and coal dealer of Bookwalter.
Mr. Nelson was born in Van Buren county, Iowa, September 24, 1866. Hugh Nelson, his father, a native of Ohio, was born near Savan- nah, July 2, 1830, and died in Van Buren county, Iowa, June 12, 1900. William Nelson, the grandfather, was also an Ohio man and was en- gaged in farming there for many years. He traded a forty-acre farm in that state for three hundred acres of raw prairie land in Van Buren county, Iowa, in 1845, and this land is still held by members of the family. He lost two sons and three daughters in childhood, and reared three sons: John, William and Hugh.
Mr. Nelson's mother is still living and is now seventy-two years of age. She was before her marriage Miss Hannah Coulter, and was born in Washington county, Pennsylvania, in 1832, daughter of Wil- liam Coulter, a farmer who came west in 1845. In 1864 she was united in marriage to Hugh Nelson, and their children are Ross W. and his two brothers, William E. and Clyde H., who are engaged in farming in Iowa.
Ross W. Nelson was reared to farm life and had the advantage of a common school education only. He remained a member of the home circle until his twenty-second year, after which he engaged in farming with an uncle in western Iowa. He came to Pawnee county, Nebraska, fourteen years ago, in 1889, and was a wage worker on farms here
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for two years. Then he married and settled down, and with the passing years he has met with success and has accumulated a competency. Four years ago he bought the coal and grain business of F. B. Felton, which he has since conducted successfully, handling all kinds of grain and doing and extensive business in coal. His elevator holds ten thousand bushels and he handles on an average one hundred and fifty carloads per year. He owns one hundred and sixty acres of land near Bookwalter and has a pleasant home in town.
December 30, 1891, Mr. Nelson married Miss May E. Laird, daugh- ter of T. A. and Emma Laird, who came to Nebraska from Henry county, Illinois. Mr. and Mrs. Nelson have five children, as follows : Willa, born June 17, 1893; Clyde A., November 24, 1894: Mary I., February 28, 1897; Ruby, March 17, 1899; and Thelma Louise, March 9. 1903.
Politically Mr. Nelson is a Democrat, and while he has never been active in politics he has always taken a commendable interest in public affairs, especially those in his own 'locality, and he has served efficiently as a member of the school board of Bookwalter. He is identified with the Modern Woodmen of America and the Ancient Order of United Workmen, in which he has served officially, in the former holding next to the highest office at this writing. His religious faith is that of the Presbyterian church, of which he is a worthy member.
DRURY T. EASLEY.
Drury T. Easley, of Rulo, is a retired merchant, and was one of the earliest settlers of this portion of Nebraska, having come to Rulo in 1858. He has been continuously in trade for the past forty-five
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years or until his recent retirement from active duties in order to enjoy a well earned rest. He was one of the few men who went to California in the Eldorado days and returned with money to reward his efforts and exposure to the dangers and hardships of the gold coast. He arrived in New York city with over twelve thousand dollars to the good. He had gone across the plains and returned to the States by way of the isthmus. He was the second merchant to establish a business in Rulo, when Nebraska was yet a territory, and his long career enabled him to gain a good competency besides doing well by his family, and when he retired two years ago it was with the well wishes of all his friends and many associates. He has also performed his share of public and church and social obligations, and as a Democratic voter and a member of the Methodist church he has been a valued part of the community life.
Mr. Easley was born in Halifax county, Virginia, March 2, 1831. His grandfather, Drury Easley, was an officer in the Revolution, and was several times wounded in the war. His wife was a Miss Faulkner. and he was a Scotchman and she of English lineage. They followed farming in Halifax county, Virginia, where both lived to good old age.
Edward A. Easley, the father of Drury T., was born in Halifax county, Virignia, April 4, 1807. He married Susan D. Crowley, who was born May 16, 1811, and died October 30, 1854. They were the parents of the following children: Elizabeth F., the widow Poindexter, of Forest City, Missouri, was born in Halifax county, Virginia, in 1829; Drury T. is next; William K., born in May, 1833; Susan Jane, born October II, 1835; Martha Ann, born August 25, 1838; Mary, born in 1842, died in 1844; Virginia C., born in 1846; Edwin A., born Octo- ber 31, 1848; and Millie, born October 30, 1850.
Mr. Drury T. Easley married, August 12, 1860, Miss Mary Ann Thomas, who was born in Pennsylvania, June 4, 1838, the daughter of
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a Baptist minister. The following children were born of this union : Fred Drury, born September 8, 1861, met a sad death on the railroad, on April 20, 1895 .; Susan Adaline, born November 3, 1862, is now Mrs. Miles, wife of the well known banker and capitalist, J. H. Miles, of Falls City, and has six children; Mary Mildred, born August 12, 1864, is the wife of J. A. Hinkle, the successor of Mr. Easley in the mercantile business in Rulo; he is a college graduate and a genial gen- tleman and successful business man; they have three children: Edith Hinkle, aged thirteen; John Talbot, aged ten; and Mary Mildred, aged eight. Ida Bell, born November 21, 1867, a talented young lady, died February 8, 1885, just after her graduation. Carrie Alice, born July 14, 1871, died July 31, 1884. Bertha D., born April 2, 1874, is living in Los Angeles, California, and has one daughter. Grace Edna, born August 23, 1877, died September 6, 1877. Mrs. Mary Ann Easley, the mother of this family, died in Falls City, September 29, 1902.
LEWIS HARVLIN MORRIS.
Lewis Harvlin Morris, now living retired in Auburn, Nemaha county, is one of the old-time residents of southeastern Nebraska, and has been successful in everything he has undertaken. He was a farmer in this county for many years, but has been retired since 1900, and now gives his attention mainly to caring for the property which he has gained by many years of diligent labor and careful business man- agement. While not a young man in years, he is one of those peren- nially youthful spirits whom age never touches but lightly, and who are able to bear with joy life's burdens to the end.
Mr. Morris can just remember his grandfather Morris, who was
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sheriff, and who married a Miss Lincoln, a relative of Abraham Lin- coln. His father, Harvlin Morris, was born in Massachusetts, and was a shoemaker by trade, following farming later in life. He was married to Miss Clarissa Bullard in Utica, New York, a daughter of Jonathan Bullard, a farmer and carpenter. These parents lived in Depeyster. St. Lawrence county, New York, for some years, and then moved to Gouverneur, where the father rented and also owned a small place. They had the following children: Lovell died at the age of one year ; Adaline Amanda, the wife of Cephas Smith, died in St. Lawrence county at the age of seventy, without children ; Volney died at the age of sev- enty, August 13, 1894, leaving a son, Bower J .; Jonathan B., a widower with one son, lives in North Wilmington, Massachusetts, and is in business in Boston; M. Duane died in Gouverneur about 1890, leaving a wife and one daughter; Franklin Willard is a retired miller in Gouv- erneur, and has two daughters; Frances, who is a twin of the preceding. died at the age of twenty-one in New York; Orville O. is a miller in Peoria. Illinois, and has a wife and three children.
Lewis Harvlin Morris, who completes the above family, was born at Depeyster, St. Lawrence county, New York, April 28, 1837, and was reared there and at Gouverneur in the same county. He served an apprenticeship at shoemaking and harness-making, and followed this business at Gouverneur for some time. He lived there eight years after his marriage, and he came to Nemaha county, Nebraska, in 1868, settling on the eighty acres which his brother Frank had located two years before, and some time later he bought this land. He lived on this farm and prospered until the spring of 1900, when he sold it for fifty dollars an acre, and moved into his nice home in Auburn. He has also sold two other places in this county and a half section in Chase county. He owns two tenant houses in Auburn and some village lots.
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July 3, 1860, Mr. Morris was married in South Edwards, New York, to Miss Calista Sheldon, who was born in Otsego, Michigan, March 19, 1841, a daughter of Henry and Betsey (Bottsford) Sheldon, the former born in St. Lawrence county, New York, in 1814, and the latter in 1817, and they were married in 1838. Mrs. Morris's mother died in the prime of life, leaving three children : Charles, in Ventura, California, has two sons and two daughters; Mrs. Morris; and George B., who died in Pennsylvania at the age of forty-four, having been born in 1846, and leaving three children. Mr. Sheldon was afterward mar- ried to Martha Aldoes, by whom he had five children : Julia is the wife of Judge Neary, in Gouverneur; Theodore is a superannuated express agent in the hospital at Toledo, Ohio, the ward of the United States Express Company, and he has a wife; Arthur is a widower with one son, in Carthage, New York; Emma is a professional nurse in New York city; and James is cashier of a bank in Gouverneur, and has a wife and one child living. Mr. Sheldon died in Gouverneur at the age of fifty-five years.
Nine children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Morris. Dora Ada- line, born in Gouverneur in 1861, died there at the age of seven; Walter L. is in the state of Washington, and has a wife and three children, one of the sons, aged sixteen, being here with his grandfather; William F. died when thirteen months old, in New York; Merrit Duane is single and in California; Ida is the wife of George B. Skeen, of Medford, Oklahoma, and has three daughters and one son; Fred Henry lives in Nebraska City, and has a wife and three children; Franke is the wife of William Coons, at Custer City, Oklahoma, and has one daughter; Katie is the wife of William Hacker, a farmer in Nemaha precinct, and has two daughters; the ninth child, a daughter, died in infancy in Nebraska. Mr. Morris is a Republican in politics, and has
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served as a school director. He has always been a good horseman, both in riding and driving, and knows and loves a fine steed, taking keen delight in this mode of recreation.
WILLIAM W. JONES.
William W. Jones, near Rulo, Richardson county, is a pioneer of the pioneers, and he and his wife are the most distinguished old couple in this part of Nebraska. It is remarkable that their lives have run side by side for seventy-three years, under the lowering skies as well as the sunshine of life, from that memorable day when they set forth on life's journey together until for a number of years they have been descending the afterslope and are nearing the end of the world's course. It is the hope of all their many friends that they may be living two years hence to celebrate that most uncommon of festivals, the Diamond wed- ding, which would be a most happy culmination to a career of usefulness and happy and true love. In such lives as those of "Uncle Billy Jones" and his wife is found a reminder of the real youth of American institu- tions and history. When they came into the world the republic had hardly been firmly established, and there were heard the mutterings of the second conflict with Great Britain, by which independence was finally asserted and proved. They had passed the third of a century mark when the Mexican war came on, and had reached the full mean of life when the Civil war marked the last great conflict on American soil. And after viewing the varied events of the wonderful nineteenth century in almost their entirety, they are ushered into the still more glorious twentieth, which is as far removed in material development and means of civilization from the earlier decades of their existence as
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light from darkness. It is further worthy of comment that the last years of their lives are being spent in a country that, when they were children, had never been seen by any white men except the very fore- most pathfinders, hunters and explorers. There is no better known char- acter in Richardson county than "Uncle Billy. Jones," who is himself a typical frontiersman, and for many years kept well on the outer edge of the advancing wave of civilization, until it reached the beautiful country of southeastern Nebraska, where he has been content to remain until the final summons to join the "Choir Invisible."
William W. Jones was born in Tazewell county, Virginia, Septem- ber 6, 1812, and his wife, Rebecca Morris, was born in Pennsylvania, January 28, 1810. He was taken to Jackson county, Ohio, at the age of three years, and they were married on August 18, 1831, after which they began farming in Jackson county, and continued there until he was twenty-two years old. He then came west to Fulton county, Illinois, being one of the pioneers of that place. He took a claim of one hundred and sixty acres, and after improving and cultivating it for six years moved still further west to Johnson county, Iowa. He and some twenty other settlers made large claims where Iowa City is now located, but were unable to hold all their land. Mr. Jones improved a good farm of one hundred and sixty acres and lived there until 1854, when he took up his abode in Cass county, Iowa. On March 10, 1855, he arrived in Dakota county, Nebraska, from Council Bluffs; two years later he spent a summer in Leavenworth county, Kansas; during the following winter was at Dallas, Texas; returned to and lived in Leavenworth county for two years, and in the spring of 1861 came to Falls City, Nebraska, where he rented a farm of Bob Whitecloud, two miles west of town. He bought a half section near here, paying at the rate of two dollars and a half an acre and making the payments in horses. On
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May 10, 1863, he and his family, together with five other prairie schooners, started across the plains for Portland, Oregon. On arriving in that now populous city there were fifty-five wagons and many settlers located. In October, 1865, he and his wife and three little sons started back to Nebraska, with ten horses, and were one hundred and twelve days en route to Omaha, where they spent the winter, and then returned to the half section. Here they continued their toils during the remainder of their active careers, and they still live in a cottage on one hundred and sixty acres of the land which they settled nearly forty-five years ago. The farm is owned by their son, whose residence is close to theirs.
Mr. and Mrs. Jones had nine children, as follows: Phebe Ellen Swartz, who died in Atchison, Kansas, and left three children; Charles A., who died on the home place, March 6, 1892, leaving one son and two daughters; William H. Harrison, who when last heard of was in Texas, and unmarried; Cass; Lydia Margaret McCartney, who died in Oklahoma, leaving three children; Rachael Gardner, who died in Leav- enworth, leaving one child; Louisa Renneck, who died in Leavenworth, · leaving one child; Lewis, who owns the home farm as mentioned above and has three children; and Stephen B., who is a farmer in Oklahoma and has two sons and three daughters.
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