MOREY, Nelson L.

MOREY, HOLDRIDGE, QUAKENBUSH, LEED

Posted By: Annette Lucas (email)
Date: 5/23/2021 at 08:59:22

SOURCE: Biographical History of Shelby and Audubon Counties, Iowa; W. S. Dunbar & Co., Publishers, 1889

NELSON L. MOREY, a farmer of Leroy Township, was born in North Adams, Berkshire County, Massachusetts, February 16, 1836. His father was Samuel Morey, a native of Rhode Island. He was a shoemaker in early life, but later emigrated to Ashtabula County, Ohio, and engaged in farming. The mother was Orvilla Holdridge, a native of the State of Massachusetts, and the mother of twelve children, ten of whom lived to maturity. Milton [sic] L. was a child when his parents removed to Ohio. The trip was made via the lakes and canal, the country being then a dense forest. The new home was a truly pioneer one, having no conveniences and scarcely the necessities. The school-house in which our subject received his first lessons was the typical log house of that day. He passed his youth on the farm with his parents, assisting in cleaning out the farm. At the age of twenty-one years he came to Iowa and settled in Clinton County, where he worked on a farm by the month for three years. He then returned to his old home in Ohio, where he engaged in farming for some years. In 1868 Mr. Morey was married to Julia A., daughter of Martin Quakenbush, a Canadian by birth. Mrs. Morey was born in the State of New York, near Troy. After his marriage Mr. Morey remained in Ohio for seven years, and then returned to Iowa, renting a farm in Clinton County; here he remained until 1878, when he came to Audubon County, and bought 160 acres of raw prairie in Leroy Township. Mr. Morey has made many valuable improvements, and is a successful farmer — paying special attention to the raising of live-stock. Samuel Morey, the father of our subject, was a soldier in the war of 1812, and was a fifer in the battle of Sackett's Harbor. He dropped dead of heart disease. Mrs. Moray's mother was Lucy Leed; her father died in the war of the Revolution.