LOCKIN, Joseph C. - 1914

LOCKIN, GREGG, BATSON, TINKHAM

Posted By: Colette Miles (email)
Date: 6/30/2009 at 10:01:16

HISTORY OF
Cherokee County
IOWA
VOLUME II
ILLUSTRATED
CHICAGO
THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY
1914
By Thomas McCulla

JOSEPH C. LOCKIN.

Joseph C. Lockin, conducting a large realestate, loan and insurance business in Aurelia, is numbered among the early settlers in Cherokee county, his residence here dating from 1876. He was born in Wisconsin in 1853 anJoseph C. Lockin acquired his education in the public and high schools of his native state and he afterward engaged in teaching in Wisconsin and Iowa for two years. In 1875 he purchased land in Cherokee county, this state, and settled in Aurelia in the following year, engaging in teaching until 1878. In that year he moved on to his farm, a mile and a half northeast of the town, and there followed farming successfully until 1900. In that year he again moved into Aurelia and built a grain elevator there, which he operated for ten years. He also engaged in the realestate, loan and insurance business, and at present he pays special attention to this latter branch of his activities, owning valuable property interests and controlling a large and representative patronage. He has over four thousand acres of land lying in Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota and Texas and also a fine home and other property in Aurelia. Since the organization of the Maple Valley Insurance Association in 1882 he has served as secretary and manager and he is also secretary of Morningside College, Sioux City, Iowa, and has the management of the endowment fund of that institution. He is a director in the Farmers National Bank, which he assisted in organizing, and director and treasurer of the Hoskins Impervious Brick Company of Sioux City, Iowa.

On September 24, 1878, Mr. Lockin married Miss Josephine Batson, who was born in Wisconsin, a daughter of Josiah and Arabella Batson, the former of whom was born in England and the latter in Pennsylvania. They were pioneers in Wisconsin and in that state the mother died in 1889. Her husband survives her. To their union were born four children: Josephine, the wife of the subject of this review; Warren A., of Tucson, Arizona; Fay, of Wisconsin, and Laura B. Tinkham, of Winnebago, Minnesota,. Mr. and Mrs. Lockin became the parents of three children. John W. was born in 1879 and died at the age of twentyfive, when he was completing his medical course. Harold H. was born in 1883 and after graduating from the Aurelia high school attended Morningside College for three years. He is now operating one of his fathers farms and is a member of the firm of J. C. Lockin & Son. Mary died in 1897, when she was ten years of age. Mr. and Mrs. Lockin have also an adopted daughter, Margaret J., who is now attending Morningside College. The family are devout members of the Methodist Episcopal church and Mr. and Mrs. Lockin are active religious workers, the former being superintendent of the Aurelia Sunday school.

Mr. Lockin gives his political allegiance to the republican party and has held various positions of trust and responsibility, serving from 1886 to 1888 as a member of the state legislature and having been for many years a member of the school board. While in the legislature he was chairman of the committee on animal husbandry and served on the judiciary, the ways and means and the temperance committees. This assembly, the twentysecond, passed a number of bills of importance, among them the railroad bill, regulating railroad tariffs. Mr. Lockin always faithfully and consistently supported those measures which seemed to him for the best interests of the people. He is connected fraternally with the Knights of Pythias in Aurelia. He has witnessed a great deal of the growth and progress of this county and has been closely associated with its improvement, cooperating in many movements that have been of material benefit to the community at large.