REED, BENJAMIN F.

REED, MISHLER, LANTIS, BENNET, FAY, BURTIS, HUDSON, GRIFFITH, ADAMS, FANNING, HALLOCK

Posted By: Jean Kramer (email)
Date: 9/9/2003 at 21:50:12

Biography reproduced from page 278 of the History of Kossuth and Humboldt Counties, Iowa published in 1884:

Benjamin F. Reed, son of Samuel Reed, of Irvington, was born at Lincoln, Logan Co., Ill., May 16, 1848. When five years old, his parents emigrated to Marshall Co., Iowa, where he received the rudiments of his early education in the pioneer log school house. In May, 1858, the family removed to Kossuth county, and settled in Irvington township, where they endured the hardships and privations of early settlers. It was here that “Ben,” as he is familiarly known, grew to manhood, working on the farm during the summers and attending school during the winters. Having here acquired a general education, he subsequently taught school for about five years, with marked success, employing his leisure time in reading law. In June, 1873, he was admitted to the bar, after graduating from the law department of the Iowa State University. During 1874-5 he was law partner of G. C. Wright, of Waverly, Iowa, after which he returned to Algona, and was for some time the junior member of the firm of Hawkins & Reed. In the fall of 1875 he was married to Stella E., daughter of Dr. M. H. Hudson. And now with their two children—Fay and Lee, they enjoy life in their beautiful residence on McGregor street, owing no man a single dollar. Mr. Reed has been identified with Kossuth county for over twenty-five years. He has seen the rude cabins by the grove transformed into comfortable houses upon gigantic farms. He is of a social disposition, and has always taken an active part in the educational interests of his county. Politically he is a republican, and has been for years one of the most energetic workers and supporters of that party. Although never a candidate for office himself, yet he has taken the deepest interest in the political issues of the country. As an orator and “stump speaker,” he has won considerable distinction. Also his ability as a campaign solo singer and song writer has called forth the finest encomiums of the press. His original songs as sung by him during the republican canvass of 1883—“Rally at the polls” and “Sherman’s Victory,” were sung in different parts of the State with telling effect.
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Biography reproduced from page 120 of Volume II of the History of Kossuth County written by Benjamin F. Reed and published in 1913:

In a little log cabin with a puncheon floor and door, located on Sugar creek, five miles north of Postville (now Lincoln), Logan county, Illinois, on May 16, 1848, Benjamin F. Reed first saw the light of day. He knows little concerning his father’s ancestors further than that they were of German stock and spoke that language. He can track their location no further back than to the clay hills of York county, Pennsylvania, where lived his great-grandparents, Martin and Anna (Mishler) Reed, and where their son John was born in July, 1796. Martin Reed having died, the widowed mother, her son John and the other children moved to Muhlenberg county, Kentucky, in 1811, where the children grew to maturity and were married. John Reed, falling in love with Catherine Lantis, eloped with her by taking her behind him on horseback a distance of fifty miles through the wilderness to Springfield, Tennessee, where the marriage ceremony was performed. They returned and in due course of time, while in Muhlenberg county, raised a large family, their eldest, Samuel, having been born January 10, 1819.

In November, 1827, John Reed moved his family to Logan county, Illinois, where Samuel, the father of the subject of this sketch, grew to manhood and engaged in milling. It was while there that he met and married Ellen Bennet at Postville, December 15, 1841. She was born July 27, 1824, at Mayo, Maynalty, County Meath, Ireland. Her parents, Patrick and Margaret (Fay) Bennet, died while she was quite young, and she came to America about a year before her marriage. She was able to trace the Fay ancestry back in an unbroken line to 1196 when William De La Fay lived at Rochelle, France. Later her ancestors settled in Ireland. Some of them had been immensely wealthy, but Cromwell had them attainted and their property confiscated for espousing the cause of the king. Furthermore, some of them had a little of the blood of the nobility in their veins and were officers in the army.

In the fall of 1853 Samuel and Ellen (Bennet) Reed moved their family from Illinois to Lafayette (now Albion), Marshall county, Iowa, where the former again engaged in milling until May, 1858, when the family came to Irvington in this county, arriving on the 12th of that month. After a long term of years of residence and hard labor on their “Ridge” farm, and after the children had grown up and left home, they moved to Algona, where the father died April 29, 1903, and the mother, March 17, 1897, both being members of the Methodist Episcopal church. Of their eleven children, John, a veteran of Company A, Thirty-second Iowa Infantry, died at Des Moines. Catherine and Joseph died in infancy in Illinois. Celestia passed away at Algona, and Emmet was murdered, November 2, 1887, in Taylor county, Iowa. The subject of this sketch and Albert and Will live at Algona, while Mrs. Martha Burtis and Delia make their home at Seattle, Washington. James B. resides at Luverne, Minnesota.

The third son, Benjamin F.–B.F. for short or Ben for common—was five years old when he came with his parents to Marshall county and ten when he came to Kossuth. At that time the forts, built the year before as a protection against the Indians, were still standing at Algona and Irvington. During the next ten years he helped his father on contract work, building the first courthouse, the first bridge, and two other bridges across the Des Moines and doing other similar service, besides helping on the farm. He attended the country schools in winter when he could, and later he was a student at the Wooster seminary and at old Algona College and then graduated from the State University Law school.

His educational work consisted in teaching for a few years and then in being county superintendent of Kossuth county schools for ten years. He was admitted to the bar at Iowa City in June, 1873, and after clerking for the law firm of Hartshorn & Flint at Mason City for a short time became associated in the practice with G. C. Wright at Waverly. He returned to this county in 1875, opened an office in Algona and soon thereafter was associated with J. H. Hawkins in the law business. Later he was the second member of the law firm of Raymond, Reed & Raymond. Beginning with the fall of 1901, he was for seven years editor of the Advance, and for some time before he retired he had been sole owner of the printing equipment and building. Superintending the improvement of his Walnut Grove farm in Cresco township, next occupied his attention for two or three years. Nearly fifteen miles of tiling were laid on the half section, and numerous buildings were erected. The writing of the “History of Kossuth County” in the year 1912 was his last enterprise up to that date.

His marriage to Stella E. Hudson occurred September 22, 1875. Three children have been born to them. Fay F., the eldest son, born May 21, 1877, married Mabel Griffith, on February 28, 1900, and lives at Tracy, Minnesota, where he has been for several years transfer foreman for the Northwestern Railroad. They have one child, Esther Lenona, born November 20, 1900. Lee H., the second son, born September 22, 1880, married Pearl Adams on April 14, 1906. He assists in the management of the S. H. Adams Stave factories at Portland and Decatur, Indiana. Two children have been born to this couple: Lee Adams, born July 25, 1907; and Mary Elizabeth, born June 4, 1910. Ruth Esther, their youngest child, born February 15, 1886, graduated with an A. B. degree in June 1907 from Grinnell College. She is a Phi Beta Kappa, a member of the Congregational church and has been teaching in the Algona high school, from which she graduated in 1903.

Mrs. Stella E. Reed, wife of the subject of this sketch, was born at Greenport, Long Island, March 26, 1852. Her father, Dr. Matthew H. Hudson, born in Suffolk county, Long Island, September 22, 1818, was a son of Joseph and Mahitable (Fanning) Hudson. Through the Fanning line he could trace his ancestry back to 1640. Some of them fought in King Philip’s war, some were Continental minute men, and one, his great-grandfather, Colonel Phineas Fanning, was an officer in Washington’s army. After graduating from the Berkshire Medical College, Dr. Hudson practised in Brooklyn, New York, until 1849, when he sailed around Cape Horn on his way to the California gold fields, being four months on the voyage. Returning after a couple of years by the way of the Isthmus, with a belt of gold dust on his person, he practised again on Long Island until 1857, when he moved his family to Paw Paw, Illinois. In the fall of 1864 he came to Kossuth and entered a homestead five miles east of Algona, and then moved his family here the following year. Twenty years later they moved to Algona where he died December 6, 1903, after having been for nearly half a century a deacon in the Congregational church. Of the sons, Quincy lives at Claremont, California; Henry at Letcher, South Dakota; and Joseph E., at Marseilles, Illinois. Cheever is deceased.

The mother of Mrs. Stella E. Reed—Mrs. Esther P. (Hallock) Hudson, who was born in Suffolk county, Long Island, December 25, 1826—was a lineal descendant of Peter Hallock who settled at what is now known as Hallock’s Neck on the shore of Long Island in 1640. Ezra Hallock was of the seventh generation of that line. By his marriage to Lydia Young he became the father of Mrs. Hudson. The latter is a member of the Congregational church and is residing temporarily at Claremont, California.