William Durfee Eaton 1834-1923

EATON, BUELL, SHATTUCK

Posted By: Michael J. Kearney (email)
Date: 11/25/2005 at 16:32:29

The Clinton Herald Monday July 2, 1923 p. 8 The death of W.D. Eaton, aged 89 years, editor and publisher of The Mirror for sixty-one years, which occurred Saturday at Jane Lamb hospital at 4:30 o'clock, removes from the community and particularly from Lyons, one of its oldest and best beloved residents. The end came peacefully and was due principally to the infirmities of old age. The also was the cause of his retirement from the newspaper field last September, when he disposed of the Mirror, one of the oldest newspapers in Iowa, established in 1854, and from 1861 edited by Mr. Eaton. His death marks the passing of one of the few remaining editors of the old school of journalism. Mr. Eaton is survived by his wife who had been at Jane Lamb hosptial where they had been making their home the past few months, but who is now at the J.C. Snyder home in Fulton, Ill., one daughter, Miss Edith Eaton of Washington, D.C., who is here now, and a niece, Miss Adella Eaton. The funeral will be held Tuesday afternoon with services at 2 o'clock at Oakland chapel. The Rev. N.A. McAulay of Tacoma, Wash., will officiate at the burial services. Interment will be in Oakland cemetery. In the meantime the body reposes at Shadduck's undertaking parlors. Editor W.D. Eaton was one of the unique and interesting characters who are seldom met with in our age as he linked the experiences of pioneer days with the modernity of the present time. His grand intellectual development and mental grasp, which enabled him to associate events were as keen in the declining years of his life as they had been in the stirring days of the rebellion. In politics he was a Republican and his paper always upheld strongly the policies of the party, and had not left the older doctrines to become an insurgent. Always independent in thought and action, he had made some enemies, as such men will and as every man does who stands for something, but he had as well many friends, and even his enemies testified to his honesty and straight-forwardness. William Durfee Eaton was born March 1, 1834, at Colt's Station, Erie county, Pennsylvania, the son of Ebenezer and Eunice (Shattuck) Eaton. His father was the son of Ebenezer Eaton, of English ancestory, and was born in New Hampshire, in March 1800. When the father of W.D. Eaton was be three weeks old his mother and father died and he was adopted by Mr. and Mrs. Addison, who had just lost their first born, and with them he remained until his marriage. He first attended school in New Hampshire, later in New York, the Addisons moving to Cattaraugus county, New York, later to Jamestown, then in 1812 to Colt's Station, Pennsylvania, within ten miles of Lake Erie. Ebenezer Eaton was married at Colt's Station to Eunice Shattuck, daughter of Sewell Shattuck, of Scottish descent. She was born in Vermont in 1807. Their married life was spent near Colt's Station with the exception of two or three years spent in Iowa, to which state they moved in 1863, but later returned to Pennsylvania, where Mrs. Eaton died in 1872, and Mr. Eaton in 1874. Mr. Eaton was by occupation a farmer, living seven miles from the village, and was a man of such a nature that he was greatly respected by those who knew him. In politics he was earlier a Whig, and later a Republican. His wife and her parents were Methodists. Mr. and Mrs. Ebenezer Eaton were the parents of eleven children, two of whom died in infancy. Those growing to maturity were: Elzabeth, who married Luther Jones, of Erie county, Pennsylvania, and died in 1851; Clarinda, who married the Rev. Lester Perkins, and lived in Des Moines, her husband dying in February, 1911; Marie, now Mrs. Conrad Ewer, who lived in Corry, Pennsylvania; Charles A., of Erie county, Pennsylvania; Julie, widow of Ambrose Powers, Afton, Iowa; Wilber of Des Moines; Matilda, married to Edward A. Nattinger of Lyons, Iowa, died at Ottawa, Ill., in 1907; Perham S. Eaton of Lyons, died June 30, 1918, and until his death was associated with his brother in the publication of the Mirror and the late W.D. Eaton, the last of his family. W.D. Eaton attended the common schools until sixteen, and then entered the office of the Erie Chronicle as apprentice. Three years later he went to Cleveland, Ohio, and worked at this trade there three and one-half years, working at one time for Joseph Medill, later of the Chicago Tribune. In the fall of 1856 he came to Webster City, Iowa, remained during the winter,then in the spring of 1857 went to Kossuth county, and pre-empted a quarter section of public land, and built a cabin with black walnut shingles, shaved from the log after the sashion of those days. The wet summer and the panic together floored him and he walked to Des Mones, working his way to get a job as job printer. There he worked onthe Journal for Siltson Hutchins, until he got money enough to go back and remove his family. In March 1862