Irwin, Samuel (1879-1972)

IRWIN

Posted By: Karon Velau (email)
Date: 6/23/2021 at 11:20:25

Samuel Irwin
(November 5, 1879 - April 7, 1972)

Source: History of Warren County, Iowa, by Gerard Schultz and Don L. Berry, The Record and Tribune Co., Indianola, Iowa, 1953, p.311

SAMUEL IRWIN
Samuel Irwin, farmer, semi-retired, of New Virginia was born in Virginia Township Nov. 5, 1879, the son of Samuel and Isabelle Steele Irwin. Christmas day, 1901, he married Grace Marie Keiser, daughter of William Henry and Lettie (Hoagland) Keiser. Their one son Fon was born July 4, 1905, and now lives on the farm home southwest of New Virginia.
Mr. Irwin says nothing unusual or eventful has happened in his life, just the life of an average Warren County farmer, spent in and around New Virginia except 11 years in Madison county near by. He keeps himself from growing stale by looking after a little stock and two great-grandsons on a small farm near New Virginia. He still owns 160 of the 200 acres his father bought in 1855 adjoining the then village of Dorrville. His grandfather had settled in the neighborhood and his father bought the 200 acres after returning from the California gold rush. His father was born in Ireland in 1834 and had immigrated to Ohio in 1842.
His father enlisted in the War Between the States in 1861, was advanced from private to captain in service, and spent 32 months in Confederate prisons, the privations of which undermined his health so that he died at 45 years of age, two months before the birth of the subject of this sketch. In his comparatively short life the father had, however, served seven years as county supervisor and one term in the state legislature. His death left his widow with seven children, whom she reared successfully, being, as Mr. Irwin says, as good a mother as ever lived. Politically Mr. Irwin is a Republican, religiously a Methodist, and fraternally a Mason.