Lawrence JAQUA
JAQUA, GENTRY, SIEH, MCCAFFREY, BYRNE, OLSON, MUTCHELL
Posted By: Sarah Thorson Little (email)
Date: 9/3/2013 at 19:49:32
September 6, 1896 --- November 8, 1982
Lawrence Jaqua, 86, retired editor and publisher of the Humboldt Newspapers, died Monday morning at Trinity Regional Hospital in Fort Dodge where he had been a patient since Oct. 25. A funeral mass will be conducted at 11 a.m. Thursday at St. Mary's Catholic Church by the Rev. Mervin Hood, pastor. Burial will be in St. Mary's Cemetery. Friends may call at Lindhart Funeral Home after 2 p.m. Wednesday. There will be a Legion of Mary rosary at 3 p.m. Wednesday and a parish rosary at 8 p.m. Casketbearers will be Jerry Howard, Clark Lane, Delmar DeSmidt, Robert H. Christensen, and Harold Dresser.
Mr. Jaqua is survived by his wife, Ethel; a daughter, Mrs. Mary Alice Gentry, Charles City; four grandchildren; two great-grandchildren; and a brother, Franklin of Humboldt. Mr. Jaqua and Franklin were associated with the Humboldt Newspapers for nearly seven decades before they sold their interests in 1964. They followed their father, Frank Jaqua, and his father into the newspaper profession, and the tradition has been continued by Mr. Jaqua's granddaughter Jean Gentry Sieh, who is associate publisher of the Spencer Daily Reporter.
Lawrence Jaqua's grandfather was a pioneer Iowa newspaper editor and publisher in Traer. He and his son Frank purchased the Humboldt County Republican on March 1, 1893, at a time when there were four newspapers published in the City of Humboldt, and Frank Jaqua eventually merged the Republican with its competitors, serving as publisher until his death in 1948 at the age of 78. The Humboldt County Republican was founded at Livermore in 1889 and moved to Humboldt that same year. It floundered under several owners until the Jaquas took it over in 1893. They also purchased the Humboldt Kosmos in 1893 which had been founded in 1866 by Stephen H. Taft, founder of Humboldt, as the Humboldt True Democrat. That paper was renamed the Springvale Republican in 1869 and renamed the Kosmos in 1874 ....
Lawrence, who first worked at the newspapers sweeping out the shop when he was a child, later learned to operate all of the shop's equipment. He worked as a linotype operator for the Fort Dodge Messenger and for the Waterloo Courier before joining the U.S. Army during World War I where he served in the infantry. After his discharge, Mr. Jaqua attended the Chicago Institute of Art studying advertising layout and design. During the 1930s the Jaqua family owned the Wright County Monitor in Clarion, and Lawrence Jaqua managed that newspaper for several years before returning to Humboldt in the 1940s. He took over as editor and publisher of the Republican and Independent when his father died in 1948, and continued in that position until the newspapers were sold to Chase McLaughlin on May 1, 1964.
After his retirement from the newspapers, Mr. Jaqua spent another decade as a newspaper broker, handling the sale of about 30 newspaper properties. He was widely recognized as an expert in the field of community newspapers and was frequently asked to share his knowledge and experience....
Mr. Jaqua was born Sept. 6, 1896, in Humboldt to Frank and Alice McCaffrey Jaqua. He married Margaret Byrne in 1924, and she died at the birth of their second child in 1929. He married Ethel Olson on Nov. 3, 1944. He had actively pursued his many interests until shortly before his death, Mr. Jaqua entered the Humboldt County Memorial Hospital on Oct. 21 for treatment of a respiratory ailment and was transferred to the Fort Dodge hospital on Oct. 26.
He was preceded in death by an infant son, a great grandchild, and a sister, Mrs. John (Ruth) Mitchell, whose husband is a prominent Fort Dodge attorney. The family has suggested that memorials be given to the building fund at St. Mary's Catholic Church.
November 9, 1982
Humboldt County Republican - Humboldt, Iowa
Wright Obituaries maintained by Karen De Groote.
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