Lambert Kniest, one of the earliest settlers of Carroll County, was born in Doetinchen, Holland, March 19, 1819. He was married in the same place July 16, 1843, to Miss Adelaid Wilhelmina Dicker, who died two years subsequently, leaving one son—B. J. Kniest. He was married again in 1846 to Miss Mary A. H. Geselschap, in Doetinchen. In 1847 Mr. Kniest and family immigrated to America, living in Buffalo for a short time, removing from there to Pittsburg, and from there to St. Louis, Missouri, where he engaged in the manufacture of boots and shoes. During the cholera of 1849, which was then raging there, his second wife and her son Henry died of the terrible scourge. On the 17th of May, 1850, at St. Mary’s Church, St. Louis, Missouri, Mr. Kniest was married for the third time to Miss Mary Adelaide Kochs. In 1852 he removed with his family to Dubuque, Iowa, where he immediately engaged in the mercantile business in partnership with Anton B. Linssen. After several years of successful business Mr. Kniest built the largest hotel ever erected in Dubuque at that time, at cost of $40,000, and was known as the Merchants Hotel, but was destroyed by fire about one year later. In 1860 Mr. Kniest was elected assessor, which office he held for several consecutive years. He then engaged in the fire and life insurance business with Abram Williams, now a resident of Chicago. In 1868 Mr. Kniest made his first visit West as far as Carroll County, to look up the country, and finally selected a township of land of 23,000 acres in Carroll County, Iowa, township 85, range 35, and which was afterward named Kniest Township, in honor of its founder, said name being now printed on all State maps. This land he purchased of the Iowa Railroad Land Company, at Cedar Rapids, through its president, the Hon. John I. Blair, for a term of five years, for a nominal sum, on condition that he furnish fifty actual settlers during the first year. It was also provided that all lands remaining unsold after that period were to revert to the Iowa Railroad Land Company. Mr. Kniest then began to advertise the lands extensively, and in the prescribed time furnished the actual fifty settlers, who were Germans, Catholics and Democrats. Near the center of the township a village was begun by Mr. Kniest and named Mt. Carmel in honor of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, on whose feast day he signed his contract with the Iowa Railroad Land Company, July 16, 1868. Here he erected the first Roman Catholic church in the county, which also served as a temporary school. Then other buildings sprang up, and Mt. Carmel was soon known near and far. During the years 1868-’69 Mr. Kniest remained most of the time at Mt. Carmel, doing all the good he could for the settlers, besides using all his means for their comfort and welfare. As some of the new settlers had barely enough means to make the first payment on their land, and being in a new country, they needed assistance, which was always cheerfully given by Mr. Kniest, there being then over eighty families. At the request of Mr. Kniest, Bishop Hennessy, of Dubuque, on July 17, 1869, sent the Rev. F. Heimbucher, a German priest, to minister to the spiritual wants of the settlers, and for whom Mr. Kniest built a parsonage, which he furnished comfortably. This being a Catholic colony, Mr. Kniest only sold to Catholics. In 1871 he removed his family from Dubuque to Carroll, where he engaged in the land and mercantile business until the year 1877, when, his health declining, he retired from all business. His disease being of the lungs, he rapidly grew worse, and on August 14, at midnight, 1879, a second hemorrhage caused his death, almost instantly, in his sixtieth year. The death of one so well known and loved as Mr. Kniest caused a general feeling of surprise and sorrow in the community, and his funeral, which took place August 16, was the largest ever held in Carroll County. People that had known him came from afar to pay their last respects to the good man, and in deference to his memory all places of business were closed during the funeral. Thus ended the career of a man who had passed through life bravely, and who, in the greatest adversity as well as prosperity, always bore a cheerful disposition. He was a kind husband, an indulgent father, a consistent Christian and a devout Catholic, often saying to his children, “Worldly goods were not of so great an importance as was the laying up of treasures for the hereafter.” “All for the greater honor and glory of God,” was his frequent expression, and surely his whole life was in accordance with such a belief. Politically he was a sterling, uncompromising Democrat. Mr. Kniest left a wife and eleven children, all of whom are living, with the exception of one daughter, Agnes, who died of consumption at the age of nineteen years, August 31, 1879. The following are the living children—B. J. Kniest, born in Doetinchen, Holland, May 2, 1844; Hannah A., born in St. Louis, Missouri, September 23, 1851; Mary A., born in Dubuque, Iowa, March 3, 1855; Regina, born in Dubuque, Iowa April 4, 1858; John B., born in Dubuque June 24, 1861; Philomena A., born in Dubuque February 5, 1862; Frank V., born in Dubuque July 21, 1866; Frances E., born in Dubuque September 3, 1868; Lambert, born in Carroll March 12, 1872; Josephine L., born in Carroll February 25, 1874.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~