USA > South Dakota > Faulk County > History of Faulk County, South Dakota, together with biographical sketches of pioneers and prominent citizens > Part 13
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TIF NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
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P. H. O'NEIL
MRS. ANNIE CARLINE O'NEIL
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Mrs. O'Neil is a member of the Faulkton Ladies Lit- erary Tuesday Club and is the writer of a chapter in a work of real merit, edited by the club and given the very appro- priate title of "Pen Pictures of Pioneer Life," a work that Mr. Robinson, the state historian, speaks of in most com- plimentary terms. For several years Mrs. O'Neil has rep- resented her club at the annual meetings of the South Da- kota State Federation of Women's Clubs and has been as- signed committee work by the state organizer.
REV. THOMAS SIMMONS was born in Indepen- dence, Richland county, Ohio. December 23, 1841, immi- grating to Iowa with his parents in 1852, where they locat- ed in Tipton, Cedar county, where he grew up to young manhood.
At twenty-three years of age he was converted to God and united with the Methodist Episcopal church. In two years from his conversion he received a call from God to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. He gave up all his plans for his future prosperity and entered Cornell College, at Mount Vernon, Iowa, to fit himself for the ministry. At the close of his college career, he joined the upper Iowa conference and in 1873 and for eleven years thereafter ad- vanced steadily, in rising grades of appointment, until through the efforts of Mr. and Mrs. J. A. Pickler, he took a transfer to the Dakota conference and was assigned to the pastorate of Faulk county. But one feeble Methodist Episcopal church was in existence at that time. He tra- veled the whole county through in 1882-1885 holding eight revival meetings and organizing as a result of his work three good charges. To accomplish this work he traveled
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four thousand miles in an open buggy, through winter's cold and summer's heat. Four church buildings have been erected through his labors, viz: at Faulkton, DeVoe, Orient and Seneca. He was pastor of the first three named from 1884-1885 to 1888 and Seneca from 1906 to 1908. At all these places he left strong church organizations. At Seneca he found but one member and the church paid but a nomi- nal salary when he took the charge. When he closed his pastorate he left a church of forty members able to pay an eight hundred dollar salary.
In 1893 he was appointed by Bishop Nird, presiding elder of the Huron district. This office he faithfully and successfully filled for six years, building up the church and assisting his pastors; witnessing an average increase of five hundred souls brought to Christ each year in his dis- trict. Through all the dark days of Faulk county's history Rev. Mr. Simmons had unbroken faith in its future and all his careful earnings were invested in Faulk county lands, surrounding a pleasant and happy home adjoining the city limits of Faulkton.
God has greatly blessed his labors through all the years of his ministry but nowhere no more marked and signally than in Faulkton and Faulk county. Two most successful revivals were held in Faulkton during the winter of 1886 and 1887, the latter resulting in driving every gambler and saloon keeper out of town to the rejoicing of Israel's hosts.
[By Mrs. A. M. A. Pickler }
MRS. ANNA R. SIMMONS was born in Nashville, Ohio, and came with her parents to Muscatine, Iowa. Later her home was in Tipton, Iowa, where she resided a
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REV. THOMAS SIMMONS
MRS. ANNA R. SIMMONS
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number of years. She was educated at Cornell college, Iowa and ranked among the foremost as a student.
In 1873 she was united in marriage with Rev. Thomas Simmons, an honored member of the South Dakota Annual Conference and Methodist Episcopal church. No woman . who ever lived or worked in South Dakota is more widely known or more thoroughly respected than Mrs. Simmons, who for six years was president of the South Dakota Equal Suffrage Association, and for nine years vice president of the South Dakota Woman's Christian Temperance Union.
For more than twenty-five years, she has labored in reform work, ever seconding her husbands efforts in his ministerial labors, toiling unceasingly for the betterment of humanity.
She has rendered South Dakota most valuable service in legislative work. The passage of the equal suffrage amendment by the state legislature in 1898 was largely due to her efforts. As a speaker she is earnest and convincing, always impressing her hearers with her honesty of purpose and nobility of soul.
A few years ago Miss Susan B. Anthony invited Mrs. Simmons to address the franchise committee of the United States senate. No address before the committee was better received or called forth more enthusiastic applause. Mrs. Simmons' lecture at Lake Madison Chautauqua was pro- nounced strong and logical. Her services have been in demand not only in this, but in every state of the Union.
While Mrs. Simmons has been wonderfully successful as a reformer, there are few who would undergo the per- sonal sacrifice and hardship which have come to her. She has more than once tested the truthfulness of the words,
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'no lonliness is more lonely, no separation more absolute, no tears more hot and bitter than is experienced in the lot of those who would change the world's destiny, heal its sores and quiet its pains," but believing she was doing the Master's service, she has gone forward with steadfastness of purpose and unfaltering faith.
Rev. and Mrs. Simmons came to Dakota in 1884, and their work in this state has been a benediction to many lives.
Long may this gentle comrade live to work and pray! "For the cause that lacks assistance,
For the wrongs that need resistence,
For the future in the distance,
And the good that she can do."
I. ALLEN CORNWELL was born in Arcade, New York, March 18th, 1853, and is a son of John Cornwell, who was born and reared in England and served for some- time as a marine in the British navy. About 1830 the father came to this country and devoted his time and at- tention to farming. In 1834 he married Miss Viletta Sea- mon, a daughter of Peter Seamon, a full blooded Yankee and a farmer by occupation, spending his last days in Can- ada. Mr. Cornwell is the youngest of a family of six chil- dren. Two brothers died in the service of their country during the Civil War.
In his native place I. Allen Cornwell grew to man- hood and completed his literary education in the Arcade Academy. From 1876 to 1879 he devoted his attention to the study of law and then conducted the Arcade Leader of Arcade until the spring of 1883 when he came to Faulk
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FAULK COUNTY ABSTRACT BUILDING, FAULKTON, S. D.
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county, Dakota Territory, with three companions. He located on land three miles from the town of LaFoon in a shanty 10 by 12 feet which he erected upon his place. He lived alone for two years, hauling his supplies from Red- field, a distance of thirty-five miles. On September 27th, 1885, Mr. Cornwell was united im marriage with Miss Katie M. Derr, a daughter of Hon. C. H. Derr, a pioneer of Faulk county and who served for twelve years as county judge of this county.
To Mr. and Mrs. Cornwell have been born six children, viz: Gertrude, Frances, Mary, John, Essie and Inez.
Mr. Cornwell continued to reside upon his farm until the fall of 1886, when he was elected register of deeds for Faulk county on the people's ticket, and removed to Faulk- ton to assume the duties of the office.
While filling that position he became interested in the real estate business in partnership with P. H. Wilson, and in 1888 also started the Faulk County Abstract Company, a business that has been exceedingly profitable and is 110w owned and controlled by himself and wife, and successfully managed from their commodious office, in their fine new building, within a stone's throw of the county court house. Socially Mr. Cornwell is affable and congenial and is sur- rounded by many warm and devoted friends.
Politically he is a democrat and has held an almost commanding influence in the party in this county, but his friendship and sociability is not confined to party lines, he is ever ready to aid any worthy enterprise. Mr. Cornwell be- came a Royal Arch Mason and has served as master of the blue lodge four terms and as high priest of the chapter.
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FRED ANDREW SEAMAN was born in Arcade, Wyoming county, New York, on March 11, 1857. His parents were Andrew and Mary A. (Jackman) Seaman, the former a native of Holland, who came to America when he was seventeen years of age, with his parents. The mother was born in Sardinia, Erie county, New York. The father died in 1882 and the mother has made her home in Faulk- ton, being in her 76th year.
Fred A. Seaman resided in Arcade, New York, until he was twenty-five years of age. He received a common school and academic education.
He came to Dakota Territory in 1882 and located at LaFoon which afterwards became the county seat upon the organization of Faulk county. He organized the Faulk county bank in LaFoon in 1885 and became its cashier. He removed to Faulkton in the fall of 1886, moving the bank from LaFoon. The bank was closed in 1890. For the past seven years Mr. Seaman has been engaged in the real estate business and insurance, both fire and life, in Faulkton.
He was united in marriage, December 2nd, 1886, to Miss Julia E. Smith of LaFoon, daughter of Hon. D. S. Smith who has served in the South Dakota state senate. To Mr. and Mrs. Seaman have been born nine children of whom two sons and two daughters are living, Leonard 17, Paul 12, Sylvia 3 and Fae Harriet 4 months. Mr. Seaman is a Mason being a member of the blue lodge and chapter. Also a member of the Modern Woodman of America, the Ancient Order of the Royal Arcanun and A. O. U. W. He is a member of the Congregational church.
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ABRAHAM D. GRIFFEE is a native of the state of Iowa, having been born in the city of Oskaloosa on the 21st day of September, 1861, and being a son of Abraham and Nancy (Higgenbothom) Griffee, the former of whom was born in Virginia and the latter in Ohio.
The Griffee family is of German extraction and was founded in the old patrician state of Virginia in the early colonial era, with whose history the name has been promi- nently identified. The father of the subject was reared and educated in Virginia and as a young man removed to Ohio, where he maintained his residence for a few years, and then about 1840, made the long overland journey to Iowa with team and wagon, being accompanied by his wife and their three children, the other four children being born in the Hawkeye state. He became one of the pioneers of Mahaska county where he reclaimed and improved a valua- ble farm and where he continued to reside until his death which occurred in 1886. He became a man of prominence and distinctive influence in the community and passed away in the fullness of years and well earned honors. His devoted wife was summoned into eternal rest in 1899. Their children, all are living, the subject of this sketch be- ing the sixth in order of birth.
Abraham D. Griffee was born in the town of Oskaloosa, Iowa, and from his sixtlı year was reared on a farm, and in youth was accorded the advantages of the excellent public schools of his native state, completing a course in the high school of Oskaloosa. He continued to be associated with the work and management of the home farm until 1884, when he came to Dakota Territory and took up land in Faulk countv, whose organization had been effected about a
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year previously. Upon his preemption claim he made good improvements, the place being eligibly located near the village of Seneca, and there he continued to be engaged in farming and stock growing until it appreciated in value in the intervening years. In the year mentioned he came to Gettysburg, the official center of Potter county, and here en- gaged in the grain business, owning an interest in the ele- vator at that place, and he continued to be identified with this line of business for the ensuing five years. At the ex- piration of that time he disposed of his interest in the same and turned his attention to the lumber business at which he was engaged until 1900. In that year he was elected to the office of register of deeds for Potter county, where he gave an able and systematic administration of the office and was chosen to succeed himself in 1902 for a 'second term of two years. In 1904 Mr. Griffee returned to Faulk county and located at Faulkton where he has been engaged in business. In January of 1909 he entered into co-part- nership with Mr. A. W. Phelps and they are carrying on a very successful real estate business.
Mr. Griffee takes a lively interest in public affairs. Politically he is a democrat and an active worker in the party. He is a man of ability and strict integrity, and highly respected in the community. Fraternally he is identified with the Masonic Order, Knights of Pythias, Ancient Order of United Workman, Modern Woodmen of America and Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
On the 2nd of February, 1886, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Griffee to Miss Mary E. Douglas, who was born and raised in Lonaconing, Maryland, being a daughter of Capt. John W. and Ellen Douglas. Mr. and Mrs. Griffee have one daughter, Rhea, who was born July 10th 1887.
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D. H. LATHAM
MRS. NELLIE A. LATHAM
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HON. D. H. LATHAM is one of the prominent law- yers and public spirited citizens now practicing at the bar of Faulk county. He is a man who has brought his keen discrimination and thorough wisdom to bear, not alone in professional paths but also for the benefit of the county and state, which has been his home since pioneer days and with whose interest he has been thoroughly identified.
The story of his life is one that offers a typical example of that alert American spirit which has enabled many a person without means, to rise from obscurity to affluence and worth solely through native talent, indomitable perse- verance and good judgment.
Mr. Latham was born in Wayne county, Michigan, December 23rd, 1859. The father and mother of our sub- ject were Scotch Irish. His father was a pioneer of Michi- gan where he settled upon a new farm in the year of 1839.
Our subject worked on a farm and taught school, thus raising the funds to complete a course in the State Normal school and afterwards pursued his legal studies in Detroit.
The call of the west had always been strong with him and in April, 1884, seized with a desire to try his fortune in the west, he came to South Dakota, landing at Huron with a total capital of fifty dollars. He secured a first grade teacher's certificate and taught in the schools of Beadle county for one year. In 1885 he came to Faulk county and filed upon land in DeVoe township where he secured title to three hundred and twenty acres of land under the preemption and homestead laws. In April, 1888, he was admitted to the bar at the first term of court held in Faulk county. He practiced at DeVoe until 1890, when he opened an office in Faulkton.
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In 1894, he was united in marriage to Nellie A. Alt, a native of Iowa, where her parents were pioneer settlers, her father having settled in Johnson county, Iowa, in 1839. In March, 1882, Mrs. Latham came to Faulk county with the family of her sister, Mrs. J. A. Pickler, and filed upon government land near Faulkton and still owns the three hundred and twenty acres upon which she made final proof in the early years.
In political sentiment Mr. Latham is an ardent repub- lican and he has ever taken an active interest in county and state politics.
In 1894, he was elected state's attorney and re-elected in 1896, 1902 and 1904, serving in all eight years in a most creditable and satisfactory manner.
As one of the early settlers he takes great interest in the Faulk County Old Settlers' Picnic, held at Miller's grove each year, and has been chairman of the committee on -arrangements for many years. Mr. Latham has always had great faith in the value of our black prairie soil and had the good judgment to invest largely in our cheap lands years ago and is now the possessor of over two thousand acres of the best farm land in the county.
ALBERT J. SPRAGUE was born August 23, 1838, in Erie county, Pennsylvania. When about one and one- half years old his parents removed to the state of Illinois and located in Kane county where he grew up to manhood. In 1855 he removed to Wisconsin and afterwards to Illinois, but in 1861 became a permanent resident of Wisconsin, and in 1862 enlisted on the 20th of August in Company B, Twelfth Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry, and served until
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the end of the war, being mustered out of the service in Washington on May 31, 1865. He then returned to Wis- consin and took up the duties of civil life.
Mr. Sprague remained a resident of Toronto, in the county of Sauk, until 1883, when he took up his residence in Faulk county, Territory of Dakota, locating upon the north-west quarter of section 19, township 117, range 67, and resided there until 1902, when he removed to Faulk- ton.
On the 13th of October, 1860, he was united in mar- riage to Miss Susan A. Kinnemon of Ironton, Wisconsin. To them have been born six children: Almeda Jane, now Mrs. Breytenbach; Henry C., who now is a resident of Faulk county; Mary F .; Ada A .; Theresa M., now Mrs. Wm. Lester, and Herald H., who now resides in Illinois.
Comrade Sprague is a member of Phil Sheridan Post in Faulkton.
Politically he is identified with the republican party.
WILLIAM G. FAULKNER was born of Scotch parents in December, 1853; his parents' names were John and Catherine. He emigrated to this country at the age of seventeen and with a boy companion landed in New York, where he had relatives, and spent his first year in that locality, then went to Bay City, Michigan, remaining there twelve years. At the end of that time he made a tour of Montana and North and South Dakota (then Da- kota Territory) and settled on the south-west quarter of section 20, township 118, north of range 70, Faulk county, as a preemption, June, 1883. He proved up on the same and filed a homestead, being the south-west quarter of
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section 30, township 118, north of range 70. This land is located near Burkmere, then Harrington.
The board of county commissioners appointed Mr. Faulkner one of the four county justices upon the organi- zation and he was elected to that position in the succeeding general election. . In 1885 he was appointed one of the state enumerators to take the census of the county for that year. In 1889, he was elected county commissioner from the third commissioner district holding the office continu- ously until elected county auditor in the fall of of 1894, and after an interim of four years he was again elected county auditor, his last term expiring in 1906. The peo- ple of the county during this time having voted $50,000 bonds for the erection of a court house. Mr. Faulkner as auditor in his official capacity had a large part in the con- struction and management of the beautiful and convenient building that contains the priceless records of Faulk county. At present he is serving as a member of the State Board of Agriculture.
Mr. Faulkner was married in 1885, to Miss Kate E. Alt, one of the girls who came front Iowa City, Iowa, in 1883, who took advantage of Uncle Sam's offer to file on government land. Her preemption was the south-east quarter of section 34, township 119, north of range 69. They have seven children, Maud C., student of Dakota Wesleyan University at Mitchell and teacher in the county schools; John A .; Hugh A .; May A., now a student at Dakota Wesleyan University; George W .; Drew J., and James D.
Mr. Faulkner with his sons have developed one of the finest farms in Faulk county, with a comfortable home,
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artesian well, immense stock barn, good granaries and buildings of every kind needed on the large farm which, with pastures, covers two sections of land. He raises Percheron pedigreed horses, and good breeds of cattle, hogs and sheep. Mr. Faulkner as a pioneer office holder and farmer has fulfilled his duties both in public and pri- vate with tenacity of purpose and strict integrity and is rated as one of the substantial and prosperous men of Faulk county. .
JOHN H. SHIRK was born in Lancaster county Penn- sylvania, March 12th, 1835; was a descendent of Uhlrich Scherch (now spelled Shirk), a French Huguenot, who upon the revocation of the edict of Nantes in 1685 by Louis XIV, fled to Switzerland.
His son Uhlrich, from whom our branch of the Shirk family are direct descendants, in company with two broth- ers, emigrated from Switzerland to America about the year 1729 and settled in eastern Pennsylvania.
The subject of this sketch worked on the farm, with the exception of about four months schooling each winter, until eighteen years of age, then worked at the blacksmith trade two years, after which he attended. a summer term of ten weeks at a normal institute at Millersville, Pa., con- ducted by Hon. J. P. Wikersham, then county superin- tendent, afterwards state superintendent of schools, colonel of a Pennsylvania regiment in the Civil War and United States Minister to the Netherlands.
Mr. Shirk taught his first term of school in Salisbury township, Lancaster county, Pa., in the winter of 1855-56, and followed this occupation most of the time until the
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outbreak of the Civil War, when he enlisted in Co. E. 79th Pa. Vol. Inf. in September, 1861, and was mustered into service October 8th, 1861, at Pittsburg, Pa., and assigned with the 77th and 78th Pa. into a brigade commanded by General James S. Negley, and embarked on steam boats to Louisville. He served in the army of the Ohio, first under General Anderson of Fort Sumpter fame, and subsequently under General Sherman. In August, 1862, the brigade was assigned to McCook's corps and participated in the Buell-Bragg campaign. In December, 1862, they were assigned to the 14th army corps under General (Pap) Thomas, where they remained until after the battle of Chickamauga, when Thomas succeeded Rosecrans in com- mand of the army of the Cumberland. Mr. Shirk was tak- en prisoner September 19th, 1863, at the battle of Chicka- mauga and taken to Richmond where the prisoners were · confined in large tobacco warehouses, under the name of Libby prison. About December 12th they were transferred to Danville, Va., and confined in the prison at that place. He was in No. 5 military prison from which in February, 1864, in company with a few trusty comrades, he dug a tunnel and about one hundred and twenty-five prison- ers crawled through, at last to breathe God's fresh air again, if not to regain liberty.
The squad he was with was out twenty-one days and got within eight miles of our lines near Suffolk, Va., when they were recaptured and sent back to Richmond and con- fined in Libby prison dungeon and Belle Island until about June 1st, 1864, when they were transferred to Anderson- ville prison. In September, 1864, when the rebels feared that Gen. Sherman would release the prisoners at that place, they sent them to different parts of the confederacy.
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The detachment, he was with was sent to Charleston, S. C., where they herded them on the grounds of the race track for a month, until the stockade at Florence, S. C., was completed, to which place they were then transferred October, 1864, and kept until Sherman, on his famous march, had already paralleled theni, then were loaded 011 trains and taken under a flag of truce without exchange or parole within three miles of Wilmington, N. C., and within our lines just one week after Wilmington surrendered.
They there, for the first time in nearly eighteen months beheld the glorious Stars and Stripes supported by Uncle Sam's boys in blue, a sight never to be forgotten. From Wilmington he was sent on a transport to parole camp at Annapolis, Md., and home to Lancaster, Pa., just three days before Richmond fell.
Mr. Shirk was married in 1867 to Margaret J. Kuhn and in the spring of 1872 moved to Iowa. The climate of south-eastern Iowa not agreeing with him, in the spring of 1883 he came to Faulk county, S. D.
He was a member of the school board of Bryant school township from its first organization, 1884, except one year, until 1889 when elected register of deeds and served two consecutive terms, since which time he has held no public office.
ORLANDO L. STONE was born July 24th, 1861, in Madison county, New York, and came to Wisconsin with his mother when eight years of age.
Mr. Stone cannot remember of ever seeing his father, who was a soldier in the Civil War, who suffered a horrible imprisonment in Libby prison, and amid tortures worse
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