Orson B. Francisco

FRANCISCO, DAVIS, GULLIFORD, WINN, GRIFFITH

Posted By: Marthann Kohl-Fuhs (email)
Date: 3/27/2009 at 13:41:43

ORSON B. FRANCISCO is the manager of the Green Bay Lumber Company at Gray, Iowa. This company does a large business in the way of handling lumber, cedar posts, lime, hair, cement, stucco, hard and soft coal. Mr. Francisco, who has proven himself a most efficient man for the place, came to Gray in 1884, and took charge of the business which had been established in 1881. He was born in the State of New York, near Schenectady, June 13, 1850, and is the youngest of a family of nine children of Cornelius W. and Mary A. (Davis) Francisco. The parents grew to maturity in their native State, New York, and in 1851 they emigrated to Lake County, Illinois, residing therefor two years. Thence they went to Grant County, Wisconsin, where the father lived the remainder of his days; he died in 1865, and his wife, who survives him, makes her home with her daughter, Mrs. Gulliford, in Sac County, Iowa. She is now in her eighty third year and is in the full possession of all her faculties. Her husband was born in 1805. Their children are named as follows Sarah, Mary, Cornelia, Elizabeth D., Elisha, Nicholas J., D. Marvin, Andrew J., Orson B., and Elizabeth, who died in her twentieth year. Until his fifteenth year Orson B. lived in his native county; he attended the district school, and later the high School of Boscobel, Wisconsin. He taught school thirteen terms, from six to nine months long, in Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota. His father dying when he was but fourteen years old, he was thrown upon his own resources. He did not continue in the profession of teaching, but accepted a position on the government survey through the Territory of Dakota; at the end of one year he made a trip into the Yellowstone country up the Missouri, and then returned to Wisconsin, where he was married to Mary H. Winn, a daughter of John and Maria (Griffith) Winn. Mrs. Francisco was born in the State of Illinois, but grew to womanhood in Wisconsin. They are the parents of four children Mark C., Edgar, Lulu Belle, Winnie O. Edgar died in infancy.Mr. Francisco is a member of Utopia Lodge, No. 161, I. O. O. F., at Gray; of the Knights of Pythias, No. 166, at Manning, Iowa; of the A. O. U. W., Odobolt Lodge, No. 217, and of the Hiawatha Tribe, No. 16, I. O. R. M., at Gray. In politics Mr. Francisco is rather conservative. He served as assistant postmaster nearly four years at Odobolt. The grandfather on the mother's side was Elijah Davis, of German and French extraction. The grandfather on the father's side, Nicholas Francisco, was of French descent, and served in the Revolutionary war. Both families are noted for their longevity.

1889 BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY OF
SHELBY AND AUDUBON COUNTIES, IOWA
W. S. DUNBAR & CO., PUBLISHERS
113 ADAMS STREET, CHICAGO

pages 820-821