Otto W Heynen, b 9 Oct 1846

HEYNEN, SIPES, WORTON, KRENZER

Posted By: Donna Moldt Walker (email)
Date: 5/8/2004 at 21:05:36

The connection of Mr. Heynen with the religious and educational interests of this county deserves more than a passing mention. He has been willing to contribute both time and money for the furtherance of those objects having the view the best good of the people, socially, morally, and financially. He has ever been a warm friend of the temperance movement, and during his incumbency of the office of Justice of the Peace, after the State Legislature had passed the prohibitory amendment, he was often assailed and frequently threatened with personal injury from the liquor element. He meted out justice to them however, unmoved and according to the letter of the law, and there is no doubt would have suffered the loss of his life rather than the compromise of his principles.

Mr. Heynen is German both by birth and ancestry, having been born in Ronsdorf, Prussia, Oct. 9, 1846. His first recollections, however, are of Freeport, Stephenson Co., Ill., to which he was brought by his parents when a child of three years. He attended the public school at Naperville, and at a very early age exhibited a predeliction for mercantile business. His career in this line began as a clerk in a store at Naperville, when he was a youth of sixteen years. Later he emigrated to Chicago, where he was similarly engaged for a time, and we next find him at Freeport, as the employee of Mr. Maynard, one of the pioneer merchants of that place.

Our subject, in February, 1870, came to Iowa, and engaged as a clerk at Maquoketa, but later became interested in buying butter and eggs. In 1876 he changed the scene of his operations to Miles, where he permanently established himself, and has grown wealthy. At Freeport, on the 27th of February, 1872, he was united in marriage with Miss Elizabeth M. Sipes. This lady was born in Blairsville, Indiana Co., Pa., and is the daughter of Henry and Jane E. (Worton) Sipes, the former of whom was a native of Baltimore, Md., and the latter of Pennsylvania. The father early in life emigrated to the Keystone State, where he was married to Miss Worton, and in 1868 they removed to Illinois, where the father intended to engage in the grocery business at Freeport. His plans, however, were cut short by his death, which occurred soon after his arrival, when he was sixty-eight years old. The mother later returned to Pennsylvania, and died at the home of her son, in February, 1889, at the age of seventy-nine years. They were the parents of ten children, and Mrs. Heynen was the eighth in order of birth. She was reared to womanhood at Lock Haven, Pa., receiving a good education in the common school. Of her union with our subject there have been born six children, namely: Ada M., Alvin C., Edward O., Arthur W., Wilfred, and Ruth.

The butter and egg enterprise of Mr. Heynen at Maquoketa proved a failure, and he lost heavily. Consequently upon coming to Miles he was obliged to start at the foot of the ladder again. Without receiving a dollar of assistance from any one he slowly fought his way upward, and is now one of the most solid men financially of this part of the county. In the interval he has made many warm personal friends, who have stood by him through good and evil report. He is recognized as a thorough business man, one possessing a strong sense of honor. He has had the happy faculty of being able to engineer successfully several enterprises of the kind, and while it would seem that his own private interests were sufficient to employ one man's thoughts, such as been his mental activity and capacity that he has been enabled to give much time and attention to the interests of the community around him. He was instrumental in establishing the Congregational Church in Miles, of which he is an honored member, and has been a Trustee for the past twelve years; he also has been closely identified with Sunday-school work. He labored in this manner likewise two years at Maquoketa. He has been President of the Village Library at Miles since 1877, and it is largely through his influence that it has prospered. It is now the pride of the place, and comprises 600 volumes of choice reading.

Mr. Heynen has served as Secretary of the Board of Education at Miles for the past eight years, and took an active part in the erection of the High School building. He has been an earnest supporter of the Republican party since becoming a voter, and has been true to his principles, especially in connection with the cause of temperance, although it has cost him great loss in business, as the liquor men naturally withdrew from him their patronage during the time he was prosecuting them for violation of the law. He occupies a pleasant home in the eastern part of the city, and, besides this, is the owner of his commodious store building, which is situated on one of the main streets.

The family history of our subject is one of more than usual interest. He can trace his ancestry on his mother's side as far back as 1680, and on the side of his father to 1724. The parents were Ernest W. and Matilda (Krenzer) Heynen, who were, with their son, natives of Rondorf, Prussia, and are still living, residing on their farm in DuPage County, Ill. They emigrated to America in the year 1848, settling first at Freeport, Ill., but soon afterward removed to Naperville, DuPage County. Their family consisted of five sons and two daughters, four of whom are living, and our subject next to the eldest. The oldest son, Ernest, during the late Civil War, enlisted in the 105th Illinois Infantry, served until just before the surrender of Lee, and was killed in the last battle fought between the two armies at Fayetteville, N.C. The others are residents of Iowa and Illinois.

Mr. Heynen established the first creamery in this county, and probably the first in the State of Iowa, having the building erected at Miles in 1870. Of this he is one of the principal stockholders, and the enterprise owes much of its success to his excellent judgment and assistance. He was the first man to introduce the centrifugal separator system into the county. He, in company with a partner, operates a large creamery at Andover, in Clinton County, besides one in Spragueville, and Mr. Heynen owns a creamery at Green Island. The business in 1886 reached the climax, the corporation paying out for milk, cream, hired help, etc., $54,875.75. These creameries are all running to good advantage, and have proved paying investments.

("Portrait and Biographical Album of Jackson County, Iowa", originally published in 1889, by the Chapman Brothers, of Chicago, Illinois.)