Robert L. McCord (1830-1909)

MCCORD

Posted By: Karon Velau (email)
Date: 3/26/2022 at 16:56:09

Robert Leeper McCord
(August 7, 1830 – December 14, 1909)

Robert L. McCord for many years devoted his life to the ministry, but is now giving his energy to agricultural pursuits in Calhoun County, making his home in Lake City. He was born in Bond County, Illinois, in what was then the town of Bethel, but is now Reno, his birth occurring August 7, 1830. His father, James B. McCord, was born in Franklin County, Georgia, August
15, 1806, and the ancestry of the family can be traced to the north of Ireland, whence the great-grandfather of our subject came to the new world. Robert McCord, the grandfather, was probably a native of Pennsylvania, where different members of the family followed the hatting trade in the city of Pittsburg. In early life, however, he went south passing through Virginia into Georgia. About 1820 he removed to Illinois, taking up his abode in Bond County, when his son James was a youth of fourteen years. For his first wife the grandfather, Robert McCord, married Hannah Black, and after her
death he wedded Rebecca Johnston. The followmg children were of the first union: Matilda, who became Mrs. Dixon; Mrs. Fidelis Leeper; Mrs. Ellen Short; Mrs. R. L. McCord; Mrs. R. L. McCord; Nancy White; William and John, who remained in Columbia, Tennessee, where the family resided for about eleven years before coming to Illinois: Sarah, who became Mrs. Mears; Robert, who resided in Hillsboro, Illinois; Mrs. Fanny Blizzard; and Mrs. Mary Mears. Of the second marriage nine children were born, as follows: James B.; Lucinda; Mrs. Elizabeth Douglas; Anndemy, who married Rev. Robert Stewart, a prominent minister of southern Illinois; Gideon Blackburn; Mrs. Jane Douglas; David T.; one who died in infancy; and Louisa, who died aged twenty — making nineteen children in the family altogether.
The father was a soldier in the Black Hawk war and was actively identified with the early associations which shaped the pioneer history of Illinois. Throughout his entire life he followed farming, and was also a local minister of the Presbyterian church. He died in 1841 in Bond County, Illinois,
when eighty-one years of age. His second wife passed away while in that locality about 1835.
James B. McCord, the father of our subject, accompanied his parents to Tennessee and thence to Illinois. He married Miss Margaret C. Robinson, who was born in Lincoln County. North Carolina, August 22, 1805. In 1845 he removed with his family from Bond County to Platteville, Wisconsin, where he resided until 1866, when he went to Granville, where he was a cabinetmaker and turner, and manufactured grain cradles. At the time of his removal to Wisconsin he found there a wild pioneer region, and took an active part in its development and progress. The marriage of Mr. and Mrs. James B. McCord, which was celebrated in Edwardsville, Illinois, March 2, 1826, was blessed with nine children, namely: William R., who was born March 5, 1827, and resides in Chicago; Joseph B., who was born September 26, 1828, and died May 5, 1873; Robert L., of this review; Theron Baldwin, who was born August 18, 1832, and is now deceased; John D., who was born October 4, 1834, and is pastor of a Congregational church in Chicago ; Edwin K., who was born January 19, 1837, and is living in San Francisco ; Morris F., who was born June 29, 1841, and resides in La Prairie, Illinois; Eliza Jane, who was born September 7, 1843, and is the wife of Warren C. Smith, of Colusa, California; and Mary Olive, who was born in Wisconsin, January 14, 1849, and is principal of one of the Austin schools of Chicago. The father of this family died in Granville, Illinois, August 23, 1874, while the mother passed away in Wisconsin, April 27, 1865. Mr. James B. McCord married for his second wife Miss Martha Mopkins, the marriage being celebrated October 15, 1867.
Robert L. McCord spent the first fourteen years of his life in Illinois, where he attended the common schools and through the summer months followed farming. After the removal of the family to Wisconsin he became a student in the academy at Platteville, where he spent two years. He was also a student in Beloit College for a year and for three years in the Illinois College at Jacksonville, Illinois, where he was graduated in 1856, with the degree of
Bachelor of Arts. On the expiration of that period he matriculated in the Union Theological Seminary in New York City, and for two years was a student in Lane Seminary at Walnut Hills, now Cincinnati, Ohio, where he won the degree of Bachelor of Divinity in 1859, when he was licensed to preach the gospel.
Mr. McCord first located at Lincoln, Illinois, where he was pastor of a Congregational church for live years. After that he was pastor of the Congregational church at Toulon. Illinois, until 1878, after which he
spent four years in New Windsor, Illinois, and a similar period in Lyonsville, Illinois. His next pastorate was in Sheffield, Illinois, where he remained for six years. In 1890 he came to Iowa and labored with the churches at Lake View and at Silver Creek for two or three years, as supply, but since that time he has retired from the ministry, although his interest in the church
and its progress and upbuilding has never abated. On March 1, 1892, he took up his abode at Lake City, and since that time he has given his attention to the improvement of his farm lands. He has an entire section divided into two farm lots, near Lake City.
Mr. McCord was married September 3, 1867, at Granville, Illinois, the lady of his choice being Helen DeArmond Hopkins, a native of that town, where her parents, Joel and Eleanor (Harrison) Hopkins, were early settlers. The former was a native of Red Oak. Ohio, and his wife was born in Harrisburg, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania. When sixteen years of age he accompanied his parents on their removal to Granville, where his family located in 1834. He is still living on the old homestead, but his wife died in 1849. Unto Mr. and Mrs. McCord have been born five children: Joel Hopkins, who is cashier of the bank at Early, Sac County, Iowa; James B., who is a medical missionary to the Zulu mission; Mary Eleanor, who became the wife of Rev. R. B. Larkin, and went with him as missionary to Turkey for two years, and died in Colorado in February 1900; Robert Leigh, who is an attorney in Sac City; and Archibald Wilson, who is assistant cashier of the Salem Bank of South Dakota.
Mr. McCord has voted with the Republican party, but he is a staunch Prohibitionist in principle. His life has been earnest and the greater part of his time and attention have been devoted to the holy calling which he made his life work. His influence has ever been on the side of all movements calculated to promote the welfare of his fellow men and to cultivate their moral development. [Source – Biographical Record of Calhoun County, Iowa, by S. J. Clarke, 1902, p.262]