Stearns, Clary S. (Squire)

STEARNS, SULLIVAN, ROACHE

Posted By: Mary H. Cochrane, Volunteer
Date: 7/9/2019 at 06:47:40

Biography ~ C.S. Clary Striker "Squire" Stearns

A Narrative History of The People of Iowa with
SPECIAL TREATMENT OF THEIR CHIEF ENTERPRISES IN
EDUCATION, RELIGION, VALOR, INDUSTRY, BUSINESS, ETC.
by EDGAR RUBEY HARLAN, LL. B., A. M.
Curator of the Historical, Memorial and Art Department of Iowa
Volume IV. THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY, Inc.
Chicago and New York. 1931.

CLARY S. STEARNS was a self-reliant and ambitious young man of twenty-five years when he came to Iowa and established his residence at Garden Grove, Decatur County, more than half a century ago, and it was given him to gain place as one of the leading business men and influential citizens of this community, as well as prestige in connection with banking enterprise in Southern Iowa. He was a man whose course was guided and governed by integrity and honor in all relations of life, his success was worthily won and he ever held inviolable place in popular confidence and esteem, the while he did much to aid in the civic and material advancement of his home city and county.

To a host of friends he was familiarly known as "Squire Stearns," a title grained through his having served as justice of the peace.

Clary S. Stearns was born in the State of Ohio, in the year 1853 [June 23], and was one of the best known and most highly honored citizens of Garden Grove, Iowa, at the time of his death, in 1923. He was reared and educated in Ohio, where he received the advantages of an historic old academy at Republic. In 1878, when he was twenty-five years of age, Mr. Stearns severed the ties that linked him to his native state and came to Garden Grove, Iowa, where he became associated with his brother, F. E. Stearns, in the general merchandise business. Later these progressive young business men established the Tiffin Bank at Garden Grove, an institution that they named in honor of the City of Tiffin in their old home county of Seneca, Ohio. This bank later was reorganized and chartered as the First National Bank of Garden City, with Clary S. Stearns as president and his brother F. E. Stearns as vice president.

The subject of this memoir made a record of success and effective communal service in connection with banking and he finally retired from active business, in 1914. He was a citizen of unbounded loyalty and public spirit and was always looked to for much of leadership in the advancing of measures and enterprises projected for the general communal good. His political allegiance was given to the Republican party and in the Masonic fraternity his affiliations included his membership in the order of the Eastern Star, with which his widow has long been prominently identified, as has she also with the P. E. O. Sisterhood, the while she has been a active figure in social, cultural and church circles in her home community. Mr. and Mrs. Stearns were influentially concerned in the organizing of the Garden Grove Public Library, and for many years Mrs. Stearns was president of its board of trustees, her interest in educational affairs having been deep and constructive and this having resulted in her being made an honorary member of the alumni association of the Garden Grove public schools.

In October, 1879, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Stearns to Miss Katharine S. Sullivan, who was born and reared in Iowa and who is a daughter of the late M. J. and Hanora S. (Roache) Sullivan, both of whom were born in Ireland and both of whom were young when the respective families came to the United States and established residence in Ohio. The marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan was solemnized in Ohio, and in 1856 they gained pioneer honors in Iowa, in which state they passed the remainder of their lives. Mr. Sullivan represented the Hawkeye State as a gallant soldier of the Union in the Civil war, he having been a member of Company K, Twenty-fifth Iowa Volunteer Infantry, and with this command having participated in many engagements. In later years he perpetuated his association with his old comrades in arms by maintaining affiliation with the Grand Army of the Republic. Mrs. Stearns still occupies the fine residence that she and her husband erected in the year 1897, and as the gracious chatelaine of this home she has made it a communal center of social activity, even as she has had much of leadership in the general social and cultural affairs of Garden Grove.

Kate and Squire Stearns with race horse Lady Amber

NOTE: C. S. Stearns died October 20, 1923. Katharine (Sullivan) Stearns was born in 1861, and died in 1946. They were interred at Garden Grove Cemetery. The Stearns house is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Transcription by Debbie Clough Gerischer
Note by Sharon R. Becker, March of 2015