Walker, Samuel B.

WALKER, BELLAMY, PRIESTLY, EVERHART

Posted By: Volunteer Transcribers
Date: 2/14/2003 at 17:15:12

SAMUEL B. WALKER
Prominent among the business men of Calamus is Samuel B. Walker, who for nearly thirty years has been closely identified with the history of that place, and his name is inseparably connected with its commercial and banking interests. He was born at North Augusta, Ontario, Canada, October 28, 1848, and is a son of William and Nancy (Bellamy) Walker. The father was also a native of Canada, where he continued to make his home until twenty-two years of age, when he went to Akron, Ohio, where he became a naturalized American citizen, and was engaged in the grocery business at that place. In 1847 he married his second wife, the mother of our subject.  
On leaving home at the age of sixteen years, Samuel B. Walker went to Watertown, New York, where he was employed as office boy in a hotel for a time. Later he spent a short time in Albany working on the canal, and then went to New York city, being there when President Lincoln was elected for a second term in 1864. Returning home, he taught school through the following winter, and in March, 1865, went to Titusville, Pennsylvania, where he remained until the fall of 1866. He then attended school for nearly a year, and receiving a certificate to teach, he taught school in Canada for one year, after which he was variously employed for a time.  
On the 14th of August, 1868, Mr. Walker arrived in DeWitt, Iowa, and found employment with the firm of Meredith & Walker, furniture dealers of that place, for whom he opened a branch store in Clarence, Iowa, remaining there until December, 1868, when they sold out. Mr. Walker then went to Cedar Rapids, where he engaged in the grocery business for a time. In 1869 he came to Calamus, and after teaching school north of the village for four months he bought a small stock of groceries and embarked in business there. Soon afterward he turned his attention to the drug business, but sold out in 1870 and went to Lyons, where en engaged in the hotel business under the firm name of Carr & walker for a short time. On disposing of his interest in that enterprise he engaged in the fire insurance business in Calamus until
February 14, 1872, when he again embarked in the drug and grocery trade, carrying on business at that place with John Du Bois until the latter's death, in April, 1875, when he gained entire control and continued in that line of business until 1889, when he sold out and has since engaged in the furniture business. He has been president of the Exchange Bank of Calamus since its organization; and a director of the First National Bank and the Farmers and Citizens Bank of DeWitt since they were incorporated. Integrity, activity and energy have been the crowning points of his success, and his connection with various business enterprises have been of decided advantage to his section of the county, promoting its material welfare in no uncertain manner.

Mr. Walker was married at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, January 8, 1880, to Miss Henrietta Priestly, a native of Clinton county, and a daughter of George and Roxanna Priestly, who were residents of Calamus, Iowa. The father was a native of England, the mother of Illinois. Throughout his active business career Mr. Priestly followed farming, and spent most of his life in Iowa, where he died at the age of fifty-eight years. His widow still survives him, and continues to make her home in Calamus. The children born to Mr. and Mrs. Walker are as follows: Ethel, now the wife of N. M. Everhart, a merchant of Oxford Junction, Iowa, by whom she has one child, Ray; Alice, who is now attending Drake University at Des Moines, Iowa; Charles, at home, Frances, who is attending school in Calamus; and Ray, who died on the eight anniversary of his birth.

Fraternally Mr. Walker is a member of Zeredatha Lodge, No. 184, A. F. & A. M., of Wheatland, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows at Grand Mound, the Modern Woodmen of America and the Yeoman Brotherhood of America, in all of which lodges he has held office. His life is a living illustration of what ability, energy and force of character can accomplish, and it is to such men that the west owes its prosperity, its rapid progress and its advancement.
Source: The 1901 Biographical Record of Clinton Co., Iowa, Illustrated published: Chicago : S. J. Clarke Pub. Co., 1901.