John Lockwood Dana (1826-1906)

DANA, DAVIS, COREY, LOCKWOOD

Posted By: Dorian Myhre (email)
Date: 7/12/2014 at 15:45:13

From Nevada Representative June 6, 1906

OBITUARY

DEATH OF J. L. DANA

Hon. John Lockwood Dana, on the oldest and most prominent and respected citizens of Nevada and Story County, passed away at his home in this city at 10:15 last evening, aged 80 years, 2 months and eleven days. Mr. Dana had been in failing health through the winter, and has lost about forty pounds in weight, but when he returned a few weeks ago from Seattle, where he and Mrs. Dana had been with their children for the few previous months, he seemed to his friends upon the business street to be in about his usual condition. he was around looking after his business matters, and it is now understood that he was trying to put them in shape, for him to leave them. As an incident of this effort, upon his very last trip down town on Tuesday forenoon of last week he called at the Representative office to leave for preservation a document of historical value that he had found in looking over his papers; and the fact that he should have done this illustrates both his carefulness and that he must have been feeling fairly well at the time. But about six o'clock on the same day, he was suddenly seized with a chill, which developed rapidly into uraemia, and he sank almost immediately into a coma, from which he never wholly emerged. He survived in this condition for a week and died as stated on Tuesday evening of this week.

Mr. Dana was born near New Haven, Huron county, Ohio, March 25, 1826, and died at Nevada, Iowa, June 5, 1906. He spend his boyhood on a farm near Fremont, Ohio, attended Olberlin College, and also attended a law school in Cincinnati, was admitted to the bar, was married at Fostoria, Ohio, February 16, 1854, to Harriet A. Davis. In the fall of the same year he moved to Iowa, locating first at Sigourney in Keokuk county. About a year later he moved to Marshalltown, and in April, 1856, he located finally at Nevada, where he ever afterward had his home. He early gained recognition in this pioneer community, an d in the election of 1857 he was elected to the general assembly as representative for the counties of Story, Hardin and Grundy. In the session that followed the state located its "Agricultural Farm" in this county, and from this beginning there was developed the Iowa State College. Just what may have been Mr. Dana's share in securing the location of this institution is lost in the mazes of fifty years, but from the way such things go in legislation and politics the assumption is that his responsibility and credit were large. In the years of the war he had a young family and did not go to the front, but he was captain of a company of "home guards" and in everything that a patriotic citizen could do to forward the cause of the Union he was active and effective and prominent. In the years that followed he prospered in law and business, and he especially enjoyed the patronage and confidence of the old soldiers as their pension attorney. For the past dozen years or so he had been for the most part in comfortable retirement, dividing his time between home here and the home of his children in Seattle.

Mr. Dana leaves a wife and two of his children, his son Frank L. and his daughter, Mrs. Florence D. Corey, both of Seattle. His other daughter, Mrs. Mabel Lockwood, also of Seattle, died there three years ago this summer. Mrs. Dana was with him at all times and through his sickness; and his son-in-law Mr. J. D. Corey arrived Wednesday evening. Mrs. Corey has not been able to come; but Mr. Clyde Lockwood, the other son-in-law, will be here for the funeral Saturday.

Mr. Dana was a man of marked force of character, and all through his active years he was a factor in this community. He was singularly diligent in the matters to which he gave his attention, and he was an example of of uprightness to those about him. he was one the earliest builders of the county; and he has been one of the last of their numbers to remain upon the field of life's activities. He will be widely honored and sincerely mourned.