STRONG, Henry: Died 1911

STRONG, ENO, HALSTEAD, DENISON, SHELDON, JAMESON

Posted By: Volunteer: Sherri
Date: 10/5/2016 at 21:09:49

**Handwritten: St. Line Dem. Thurs. 26 Aug. 1911

HENRY STRONG DIED AT DENVER
Extensive Owner of Chicago Realty - Well Known at Keosauqua.

Henry Strong whose parents resided at Keosauqua and died here, and who was a brother of Mrs. E.G. Eno, who resided here until about five years ago, died at Denver Saturday.

Mr. Strong was an attorney at Keokuk during the 60's, was later general attorney for the C.B.&Q., and later president of the Santa Fe railroad. He was a large capitalist, and was one of the greatest men in this country intellectually and possessed immense force of character. Mr. Strong often visited here and was well known to some of the older citizens here including the writer. The Chicago Tribune of Sunday has following concerning Mr. Strong:

Gen. Henry Strong, one of the wealthiest men of Chicago, owner of the Republic building on State street and of extensive properties here and in several states, died at 9 o'clock Saturday morning in Denver.

Gen. Strong was 82 years old. As he could remember passing through Chicago when so young that only the bare recollection of his visit remained in his mind, he always considered himself as among the city's oldest residents. He also was one of the originators of the Chicago colony idea at Lake Geneva, where he had a residence for many years. In recent years he spent his summers there and his winters in California, having given up his town house at Aster and Bank streets when his wife died, early in 1904.

Gen Strong's health had been failing for several months before he went to visit in Denver in May after spending the winter at Coronado beach. He was born in Glasgow, Scotland, May 2, 1830, his father, an American of Scottish descent, being United States consul general there at that time. His parents returned to America when the boy was five years old.

GRADUATE OF ROCHESTER UNIVERSITY.

His childhood was spent in Laporte, Ind., and he received the first two years of his collegiate education at the University of Michigan, where he was a classmate and close friend of the late Ashely Pond of Detroit. His college education was completed at Rochester University, from which he was graduated in the class of 1852. In 1854 Ge. Strong was married to Miss Mary Halstead of Northampton, Mass. He studied medicine and practiced for a time, but soon turned to the law, which he practiced chiefly in Iowa, first to Burlington and later in Keokuk. He became counsel for the C.B.&Q. road, and later went into railway construction work. He helped build the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe of which he later became president, and it was in organizing defenses against the Indians to protect the railroad's building operations that he received the title of general, which stuck to him through life.

In 1874 he came to Chicago and established his Lake Geneva residence, which was his permanent home, although he also maintained a residence in Chicago. In California his residence in Monte Cito, near Santa Barbara, is one of the show places of the district.

MAN OF GREAT ENERGY

Gen. Strong was a great friend of the late Justice Harlan and Justice Miller of the supreme court and of many others in public life with whom he associated in Washington, D.C., where he lived several years. He was a man of great energy, and within the last year or so could pay fifty-four holes of golf in a day without apparently great fatigue.

Recently Chicagoans knew him as the builder of the Republic building, which was his largest single holding in this city; but he also owned property in various parts of town, notably the Wilson avenue district, and also in California, Colorado, Nebraska, Mexico, and elsewhere.

The children who survive him are Mrs. Charles Denison of Denver, Mrs. Theodore Sheldon and Gordon Strong of Chicago, and Mrs. John A. Jameson of Hubbard Woods.

The funeral will be held at the residence of Mrs. Sheldon, 38 Bellevue place, about noon tomorrow, the exact hour to be announced later. The interment will be at Lake Geneva on Tuesday.

Source: Van Buren Co. Genealogical Society Obituary Book G, Page 224, Keosauqua Public Library, Keosauqua, IA