Swobe, Thomas

SWOBE

Posted By: Joyce Hickman (email)
Date: 1/22/2009 at 13:48:27

Thomas Swobe

(From the 1883 History of Pottawattamie County, Iowa, by J. H. Keatley, p.54, Council Bluffs)
Thomas Swobe, hotel, Council Bluffs, came to Council Bluffs in 1878, and opened a hotel in the new Transfer Depot building; he also built the Emigrant House in 1878, and conducts it in connection with the Transfer Hotel. In 1866, he bought out J. M. Palmer, who was running the Transfer Eating House at that time. Mr. Swobe was born in Johnstown, Fulton Co., N. Y., in 1843. His parents moved to Michigan in 1855; he enlisted in the Twelfth Michigan in 1861, as private and returned February 2, 1866, as First Lieutenant. He came to Omaha in August, 1866, and held the position of Secretary of Central land Company till 1868. He was married in November, 1868, and has two children - Edwin T., aged eight years, and Dwight M., aged six years. The firm of which Mr. Swobe is a member is Markell & Swobe. This firm owns, besides the Transfer Hotel and Emigrant House, half interest in the Millard Hotel at Omaha, on the corner of Douglas and Thirtieth streets. They employ about fifty-five assistants, their yearly busines being about $150,000. Mr. Swobe was elected County Clerk of Douglas County, Neb., in the fall of 1869, and served in that office until the fall of 1871.