Thomas C. Maulsby (1854-1935)

MAULSBY

Posted By: Karon Velau (email)
Date: 4/6/2022 at 13:33:54

Thomas Clarkson Maulsby
(March 11, 1854 – September 13, 1935)

Among the most successful farmers and highly respected citizens of Garfield Township is numbered Thomas C. Maulsby, who for the past twelve years has been actively identified with the agricultural interests of this county. A native of Indiana, he was born in Porter County, on the 11th of March, 1854, and is a son of Benjamin and Rhoda (Williams) Maulsby, who were pioneers of that county. The father was a native of Ohio, while the mother was born in Wayne County, Indiana. Going to Porter County, Indiana, at an early day Benjamin Maulsby cleared and improved a farm in the midst of the forest and there made his home for a quarter of a century. At the end of that time he removed to Marshall County, Iowa, where he bought land and continued to reside throughout the remainder of his life, dying there at about the age of sixty-five years. By birthright he was a Quaker and always adhered to that faith. In politics he was an ardent Republican, and his life was ever such as to commend him to the confidence and high regard of all who knew him. His estimable wife was nearly seventy years of age at the time of her death. Unto them were born twelve children, but Edwin and Irwin died in infancy. Erastus, Melvina and Luna are now deceased, the last named having died in the Andersonville prison during the Civil war. The others are Lewis, Thomas C, Wendell, Elizabeth, Marissa, Viola and one that died unnamed.
The subject of this sketch was but eleven years of age on the removal of the family to Iowa. He received a good district school
education and early acquired an excellent knowledge of every department of farm work. The first land which he owned was a tract of eighty acres in Marshall County, Iowa, which he successfully operated for four years, and then rented it for six years. At the end of that period he sold the place, and in 1889 bought one hundred and sixty acres of his present farm in Garfield Township, Calhoun County, on which he located the following year. He has since added to this a tract of forty acres, and has made many useful and valuable improvements upon the place, so that he now has a very valuable farm of two hundred acres under a high state of cultivation and supplied with all the conveniences and accessories found upon a model farm of the present day. He raises about seventy acres of corn and a like amount of small grain, the remainder of his farm being meadow and pasture land. He keeps from ten to fifteen head of cattle and a number of hogs, but gives his attention principally to the raising of cereals.
Mr. Maulsby was married March 16, 1875, to Miss Christie Ann Beeson, who was born in Marshall County, Iowa, September 27, 1858, and is a daughter of Joseph and Nancy E. (Ferguson) Beeson, both natives of Ohio. The latter died April 24, 1902, aged sixty-eight years. On coming to Iowa in 1853 they located in Marshall county, where the father followed farming for many years and later engaged in mercantile business, but is now living a retired life in Albion, that county. He is a Quaker in religious faith and is a supporter of the Republican party. In his family were seven children who reached man and womanhood, namely: Warren A.; Franklin; Elmer, deceased; Christie Ann: Isaphine; Ida, deceased; and Blanch. Mr. and Mrs. Maulsby also have a family of eight children: Jennie M., Clara M., Cora B., Maud E., Hazel F., Elma E., T. Irvin and Evelyn L. Mr. Maulsby is treasurer and trustee of the Methodist Episcopal church at Lavinia, and is a member of the Legion of Honor. His political support is always given the Republican party and its principles and he is now most efficiently serving as president of the school board, which office he has held for two years. Through the combined efforts of himself and wife he has steadily prospered since coming to this county, and is today the owner of a nice home and good farm, which stand as monuments to his thrift and industry. [Source – Biographical Record of Calhoun County, Iowa, by S. J. Clarke, 1902, p.307]