Kellogg, Ozro Northrup (Hon.)

KELLOGG, CLARK

Posted By: Mary H. Cochrane, Volunteer
Date: 7/1/2019 at 12:12:00

Biographical and Historical Record of Ringgold and Decatur Counties, Iowa, (Lewis Publishing Company (1887)), pp. 471-72:

"HON. OZRO NORTHRUP KELLOGG was born in Onondaga County, New York, April 18, 1815, and went to Crawford County, Ohio, when a young man. He married Miss Harriet N. Clark, a niece of Orville Clark, of Sandy Hook, New York; lived the earlier years of his marriage partly in Ohio, partly in Indiana, and from the latter State, in 1851, he removed in the good company of Hiram Chase, William Davis and Enos Davis and their families to Garden Grove, before the Government of the United States had surveyed the public lands in this, Decatur County. O. N. Kellogg, himself a successful and most intelligent and judicious farmer, judging well the possible resources, natural wealth, climate, and commercial location of Decatur County, soon acquired large tracts of land in this county, highly improving a part of them, and selling the remainder to his numerous friends from the older States, drawing a good class of citizens to Decatur County, and especially to his home in Garden Grove Township, which thus became and has ever since remained, the banner township in culture, intelligence, refinement, wealth and morality for Decatur County. He and his excellent followers were not tardy in building forthwith churches and a public school, so well endowed and well supported that it afterward became a college from which issued the best elements of our fast-rising generation; where, imbued with everlasting gratitude they gathered instruction and laid the foundation of their future welfare, for the glory of God, country and home. O. N. Kellogg, a thoroughly-instructed and learned gentleman, was also a steadfast friend and protector to the needy and oppressed, and as such he eminently proved himself to the then homeless Hungarian exiles who with him flocked to Decatur County, whom he generously and unselfishly assisted in founding new homes, and never tired of giving them the best advice in their new pioneer life. O. N. Kellogg was a most hospitable gentleman, his house being always open for weary wayfarers as well as friends, as the following incident will show: In the pioneer days Judge Forrey and Attorney Hawley were going to Chariton on business, and at Garden Grove one of their horses gave out. Who but O. N. Kellogg could help? He did help, and with his horse they made the trip to Chariton, hither and thither, seventy miles. A few days later they returned the horse. It was late in the evening. Four payment they had to stay and enjoy the hospitality of the noble lender of the horse, over night. Then, unhitching the horses, and leading them to the barn a terrible accident occurred - they being bitten by a horrible rattlesnake. In those pioneer days rattlesnakes were numerous, but as an antidote rattlesnake medicine was always kept on hand, so, through the night they partook freely of the medicine with the best results, and next day not a trace of rattlesnake bite remained but a little headache. O. N. Kellogg died of diabetes, nervous prostration, October 22, 1855, his death being a great loss to Decatur County. He left five children to mourn with all of Decatur County's people, and above all this irreparable loss to whom they owed not only life but what is worth more than life, a highly-moral and intellectual education. The names of his children are: Homer, Josephine, Eugene, Florence and Murray. The last named, Murray, is now a resident of Rosita, Custer County, Colorado, where he is engaged in a successful practice of law. Josephine merits more than a passing mention."

(Submitted to the Decatur County GenWeb site by Christy Jay, email: Jaygenie@aol.com)