Carlin, James C. died 1908

CARLIN, RIFFLE

Posted By: Doris Hoffman, Volunteer (email)
Date: 11/24/2014 at 18:30:15

DEATH OF JAMES CARLIN

WAS A WELL KNOW cHARACTER IN LE MARS IN EARLY DAYS
SOLD THOUSANDS OF ACRES OF LAND

He Was Employed by Close Bros. in the Palmy Days of the English Colony in Northwest Iowa and Went with Them to Chicago

James C. Carlin, one of the pioneer residents of Plymouth county; died on Monday, March 16th, at Arlington, Iowa, and the remains were brouth here for interment in the city cemetery on Wednesday. Mr. Carlin had made his home with a niece, Mrs. Ayer, who with her husband, Dr. O. O. Ayer, o Arlington, have tenderly nursed and cared for him during the last two years of his life. He was practially helpless the past year, suffering from rheumatism and uraemia. He was seventy-six year, three months, and twenty-eight days old at the time of his death.

James Carlin was a native of Pennsylvania having been born at Meadville. When a young man he went to Australia when the gold fever was at its height, but after mining there for several years he went dead broke and worked his way back to American. In the early sixties he csme west to Minnesota and lived at Fillmore. In 1866 he came to Plymouth county and took up a homestead in America township near where N. Redmon lives and lived there

He was married at Lawrenceville, Pa., on November 8, 1874, to Miss Almeda Riffle. To them three children were born who all died when young with diphtheria and the mother, worn out with watching and nursing, soon followed, dying on April 21, 1884.

Jim Carlin was probably one of the best known men in Le Mars and vicinity at the latter end of the seventies and early eighties when northwest Iowa was the Mecca for Englishmen and hundreds of them bought land in Plymouth, Sioux, Osceola, Lyon and other counties and a big English colony as established in Le Mars and anotehr at Sibley.
Jim Carlin worked for the Clrse. Bros., who in those days owned thousands of acres of land in northwestern Iowa and southern Minnesota. The brothers never picked on a better or shrewder man than Carlin for what he did not know about land deals or any other kind of deals was not worth knowing. He worked for them after they left Le Mars in Minnesota, Kansas, and in Chicago, where they had their head office, and was in their employ up to the time of his death, although unable to do any work the past two years.
"Humpy Jim" as he was familiarly caled by his associates, was a hard drinking, hard swearing, rough spoken man, but with a heart of gold. In the early eighties the tenderfoot young Britsher took to him and Jim put many a callow youth onto the ropes and showed him a trick or turn which stood him in turn in after life. Jim could swear like a pirate and had a number of quaint phrases and expressions which are still in vogue and some of which he coined himself.

He was a good fellow withal, and there are many men in many lands who knew Jim and will recall him and his odd ways, and will pay a tribute to his memory.

He leaves two sister, one living in Brooklyn, N. Y., and one at Grafton, West, Virginia.

The remains were brought to Le Mars for interment on Wednesday. The funeral was held on Tuesday at Arlington. A brief service was held at the graveside, Rev. G. F. Whitfield officiating.

The remains were accompanied here by Dr. and Mrs. O. O. Ayer, of Arlington and Mrs. Ayer's brother, Frank Stevens, of Lime Springs, Iowa. Mr. and MRs. Chas. Riffle and son, Frank Riffle came from Sioux City to attend the funeral.

Le Mars Semi-Weekly Sentinel
Friday, March 20, 1908
Le Mars, Iowa