BAKER, Addison Martin

BAKER, CASE, WOOD, HOPPER, PECK, HENDERSON, PAUL

Posted By: Sharon R Becker (email)
Date: 2/2/2014 at 11:34:15

HISTORY of CERRO GORDO COUNTY, IOWA
WHEELER, J.H. Vol. II. Pp. 727-27. Lewis Pub. Co. Chicago. 1910

BIOGRAPHY ~ ADDISON MARTIN BAKER

A. M. Baker, farmer and dairyman, is a well known resident of Lake township, where he owns and operates a farm of three hundred and twenty acres finely improved by himself. This is located in sections 9 and 4 and is a valuable piece of property. Mr. Baker was born in Rock county, Wisconsin, August 15, 1846, and is a son of Benjamin C. and Lydia (Case) Baker, natives of New York, who early moved to Wisconsin. The father was a farmer and died at a comparatively [young] age, [April 15, 1865]. He left five children, all of whom are living. They are B. F., a farmer residing near Clear Lake; William H., who lives in Dakota ; Mrs. A. W. Wood, of Lake Township; Mrs. Charles Searles, of West Union, Iowa; and Mr. Baker. The mother survived until November 21, 1897, her age being seventy-eight years.

Mr. Baker's political convictions are Republican and he is the friend of progress and all that tends to works towards the common good of the community. He has served in various departments of agriculture. He was very young at the beginning of the Civil war, but in 1864, when he became eighteen, he enlisted in Company D of the Thirty-eight Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry and served in the Army of the Potomac until 1865. He returned home and took up farming, marrying in 1870. In the spring of 1892 he resolved upon a change of location, and recognizing the superior advantages of Cerro Gordo county, located there, purchasing his present home farm. For the past three years he has been engaged in dairying and sells milk and cream at Clear Lake. He owns seventy cows, all of them of good grades, and has achieved unqualified success in his new calling.

Mr. Baker's political convictions are Republican and he is the friend of progress and all that tends to work towards the common good of the community. He has served in various county and school offices. He has several pleasant affiliations, among them membership in the Masonic order and the Tom Howard Post, No. 101 of the Grand Army of the Republic. Mrs. Baker belongs to the Women's Relief Corps.

Mr. Baker was married in 1870, in Wisconsin, to Miss Melissa Wood, who died in Eldorado, Kansas, in 1882, leaving three children: Orin, now of California; Mrs. Charles Hopper, of Beloit, Wisconsin; and Arthur, a farmer living in Lake township. He was married a second time, in 1884, to Mrs. Hattie (Peck) Henderson, of Wisconsin, and the following eight children have been born to them: Perley, married, who is living at home; Etheline, wife of Frank Paul of Union township; Hazel, Benjamin H., Jessie Joy, A. M. Jr., Vaida and Lois. The Baker post office is Clear Lake. Mrs. Baker had a son by her former marriage, William H. Henderson, a farmer in Lake township.

NOTE: Melissa (Wood) Baker was born December 12, 1852, and died December 20, 1882, with interment at Belle Vista Cemetery, El Dorado KS. Hattie Belle (Peck) Baker was born in 1868, and died in 1924. Addison Martin Baker died on August 24, 1940. They were interred at Fairhaven Memorial Park, Santa Ana CA.

Transcription and note by Sharon R. Becker, January of 2014