CHARLIE ORSON PRUSIA, b. 14 Sep 1858

PRUSIA, OSBORN, PAEPKA, SCHMIDT

Posted By: Donna Moldt Walker (email)
Date: 9/16/2004 at 17:51:34

The subject of this notice is accounted one of the most enterprising and prosperious men of Jackson County. He operates 253 acres of fine farming land, which is owned by his father and is the old homestead, lying on sections 15 and 22, in Van Buren Township, and is quite extensively engaged in stock-raising. This homestead possesses for him a more than moneyed value, for it was here he was born, Sept. 14, 1858, and here he has spent the greater part of his life.

The father of our subject is Azariah Prusia, a native of New York. He married Miss Martha L. Osborn, who was born in Tioga County, N.Y., and was an own sister of Ebenezer Osborn. The Prusia family is of German descent, while the Osborns traced their origin to England. The parents of our subject are both living at Preston, the father being now sixty-seven years of age and the mother fifty-six. To them there were born two sons and a daughter, the eldest of whom, George W., is farming in Shiawassa County, Mich.; Charlie Orson, our subject, was the second born; Nettie died when an infant of ten months. The elder Prusia came to this county as early as 1839, took up land from the Government, and constructed a good farm, upon which he resided until his removal to Preston, in 1880.

Our subject pursued his early studies in the district school, and when a lad of twelve years he was so well advanced, that he was permitted to enter the High school at Lyons, Iowa. After completing his studies he gave his attention to farm pursuits, as most congenial to his tastes and capacities. When twenty-three years of age he was married, Dec. 14, 1881, to Miss Anna Henrietta Fredricka Paepka, of this township. This lady was born in Germany Sept 20, 1858, and is the daughter of Charles and Lena (Schmidt) Paepka, the latter a sister of Otto Schmidt, of this township. They were natives of Pomerania. Five of their children were born in the Fatherland, where Mr. Paepka died, and the mother then came to America with her four children - Anna H.F., Amelia K., Paul E., and Mary. They settled in Belleue, where she was married a second time, and became the mother of two more children. Mrs. Prusia was a young girl of fifteen years when she crossed the Atlantic. She completed her education in the public schools of Van Buren, and made her home with her uncle, Otto Schmidt, for a period of eight years, and until becoming the wife of our subject. She is a most excellent lady, and a member in good standing of the Lutheran Church.

Mr. Prusia makes a specialty of Short-horn cattle, and has a dairy of fifteen milch cows. Of horses, he keeps from twelve to fifteen head, and is particularly interested in the breeding of full-blooded Poland-China swine. As a son of one of the earliest pioneers of this region, he is entitled to more than passing notice, while his energy and industry have lifted him to the position of a first-class citizen. He does not have much time to give to politics, but uniformly votes the Democratic ticket.

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