Talbot, Edwin J.

TALBOT, DEARINGER, FORKER

Posted By: Volunteer Transcriber
Date: 8/15/2009 at 13:54:54

Edwin J. Talbot, a farmer residing in Palo Alto Township, Jasper County, is a native of Illinois and was born in Winnebago County on the 2nd of July 1845. He is a son of David F. and Caroline Talbot, the former a native of New York State and a descendant of English ancestors, and the mother born in Massachusetts. At the age of thirteen years he accompanied his parents to Jasper County, Iowa, where he settled in Elk Creek Township upon a tract of raw prairie land. With the exception of several years spent in Des Moines, the elder Mr. Talbot made his home continuously in Elk Creek Township until the time of his death, which occurred on the 28th of February 1892.

In the parental family there are six children now living, namely: Edwin J., the subject of this sketch; Hiram M.; George F.; Alice, wife of C. M. Dearinger; Eugene and Warren. The father of this family was a stanch Republican in his political affiliations, although during the latter part of his life he acquired prohibition sympathies. He served in a number of positions of trust and responsibility, having been Trustee of Elk Creek Township and also filling the office or Assessor, as well as numerous other local posts of honor. He was a man of liberal spirit and progressive tendencies, and in his death Elk Creek Township lost one of its most honored and upright citizens. His widow still survives and, at the age of seventy- five years (1893), is numbered among the aged pioneer women of Elk Creek Township, where she makes her home.

In the public schools of Elk Creek Township, Edwin J. Talbot received the rudiments of his education, and tile knowledge gained in the schoolroom has been supplemented by systematic reading and self-culture. His boyhood years were devoted to farming work, and as soon as large enough he aided in clearing and breaking land, which he afterward brought to a high state of cultivation. On the 20th of November 1873, he was united in marriage with Miss Sarah Forker, a native of West Virginia and a daughter of Jeremiah and Belisen Forker. In her girlhood she accompanied her parents to Iowa and settled in Mahaska County, where she grew to womanhood. Four children have been born of this union, Willie J., Ella Z., Frank O. and Ralph.

In the spring of 1889 Mr. Talbot removed from Elk Creek to Palo Alto Township and settled upon the farm, which is now his home. The property consists of one hundred and forty acres, upon which he has placed such improvements as invariably embellish a first-class farm. He is a man of energy and industry, firm in his convictions and stanch in his support of all progressive measures arid projects, while in his party belief he is a stanch Republican, always casting his ballot for the nominees of that party. In religious connections he and his wife are consistent members of the Methodist Episcopal Church.

During the late war the sympathies of Mr. Talbot were enlisted on the aide of the Union, and in the summer of 1864, although less then twenty years of age, he enlisted as a member of Company E, Fortieth Iowa Infantry. With his regiment he was attached to the Western Army, and under the command of Generals Steele and Reynolds wag engaged in guard duty, principally in Little Rock and Ft. Smith, Ark., and in the Cherokee Nation. At the close of the war he was honorably discharged, in August, 1865, and returned to his home in Jasper County with an honorable record as a soldier, of which he may be justly proud. He is identified with the Grand Army of the Republic and takes an active interest in that organization. Portrait and Biographical Record, Jasper, Marshall and Grundy Counties, IA Page 328.