F.M. HUNTER TELLS INTERESTING STORY

HUNTER

Posted By: Gloria Dodds (email)
Date: 10/29/2002 at 19:02:07

Thursday, August 15, 1935 The Keosauqua Republican Page Seventy-Nine 80 year Anniversary edition 1855-1935

F.M. HUNTER TELLS INTERESTING STORY

Judge F.M. Hunter, Ottumwa, who was born and raised in Van Buren county, furnishes the information for the following story:
When Judge Hunter's father's people came to Van Buren county they settled on the first farm on Mt. Zion. One of the relatives left behind when they came from Pennsylvania to Iowa, was Judge Hunter's grandmother's 12 year old sister.
The years went by. The cost of sending a letter to the people back home was 75 cents a letter, and money was scarce so very few letters were written.
Gradually the family in Van Buren county lost all account of their relatives at home.
One Saturday evening three covered wagons stopped to spend Sunday across the road from the Hunter home, at a grove of big elm trees, near the present location of the Mt. Zion school house. Many travelers were accustomed to stop here and camp.
Judge Hunter's grandmother went across to visit with the newcomers and discovered that one of the women was the sister she had left in Pennsylvania. She was now married and going with her husband to Missouri to live.
After they moved on the next day the families again lost all trace of each other.
About 20 years ago when Judge Hunter, grandson of the Hunters mentioned in this story, was traveling by way of train from Burlington to Albia, he assisted an elderly woman with her luggage. She asked him his name, and told him hers, and they discovered they were relatives. She was a daughter of the young woman who had camped across from her sister's home in Van Buren county, and he was the grandson of that sister.