Carroll County IAGenWeb

HISTORY OF CARROLL COUNTY IOWA

A Record of Settlement, Organization, Progress and Achievement

VOLUME II ILLUSTRATED

CHICAGO THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY 1912

Transcribed and donated by Vance Tigges & Kathy Weaver.

One of the competent and successful lawyers of the Carroll county bar is Charles C. Helmer, who has actively engaged in practice at Carroll for seven years past. He is a native of Iowa, born in Cedar county, August 25, 1876, a son of Orlando H. and Letitia (Briggs) Helmer, the former of whom is of German parentage. The mother was born in Ohio and is of English descent. Mr. Helmer, Sr., was educated as a physician and at the time of the Civil war entered the Union army as a hospital steward. Later he was appointed assistant surgeon of the Forty-fifth Indiana Volunteer Infantry, with the rank of first lieutenant, continuing in the service until honorably discharged at the close of the war. His brother, Melchert F. Helmer, was a member of the same regiment. He enlisted as a private and was mustered out as quartermaster-sergeant. In 1865 Orlando H. Helmer came to Iowa and located on a farm in Cedar county, devoting his attention to agriculture and stock-raising rather than to the practice of medicine. He is now living retired with his wife at Mechanicsville, having arrived at the age of seventy-four years, while Mrs. Helmer is sixty-one years of age. They are both members of the Methodist Episcopal church and fraternally Mr. Helmer is connected with the Masonic order and with the Grand Army of the Republic. Politically he votes the republican ticket which he has supported ever since he reached manhood. He has served as county treasurer and also for a number of years as a member of the board of county supervisors, being one of the most respected citizens of the county.

Charles C. Helmer, the fourth in order of birth in a family of five children, received his early education in the public schools of Tipton and Mechanicsville. He attended Iowa State College at Ames and while securing his college education taught school two winters. In the spring of 1898, at the outbreak of the Spanish-American war, moved by the same patriotic spirit that had stirred the heart of his father nearly forty years before, he enlisted in Company F, Forty-ninth Iowa Volunteer Infantry. The company went into camp at Des Moines, Iowa, proceeding thence to Jacksonville, Florida, where the regiment was made a part of the Seventh Army Corps under General Fitzhugh Lee. The regiment was ordered to Savannah, Georgia, and on the 19th of December, 1898, embarked for Cuba. After arriving on the island the command went into camp near Havana and there remained about four months. Private Helmer was mustered out at Savannah, Georgia, in May, 1899. He returned home and in the following fall entered the law department of the Iowa State University at Iowa City, graduating with the degree of LL.B. in June, 1901. A few months later he began practice at Manning where he continued until January, 1904, when he moved to Carroll and has since given his attention with highly satisfactory results to the general practice of law. In 1904 he was elected county attorney of Carroll county and served one term, discharging his duties in such a way as to meet the approval of the best citizens of the county, irrespective of party. In 1908 he was appointed city attorney and has since served in that office.

On the 15th of May, 1905, Mr. Helmer was united in marriage to Miss Jennie Willey, who was born at St. Louis, October 7, 1880. Three children have come to brighten their home: Jane Esther, who was born March 7, 1906; Charles B., born September 15, 1907; and Orlando, born September 12, 1909. Mr. Helmer has been an adherent of the republican party ever since he reached his majority and is an effective campaign speaker whose services are often called into requisition in advancing the interests of the organization. He is not identified with any religious denomination, but his wife is a consistent member of the Episcopal church. Socially he is connected with the Masonic order. He is thoroughly in earnest in anything he undertakes and is recognized as a man of comprehensive and discriminating mind who is in complete sympathy with the advancing spirit of the times. On the 10th of May, 1910, he was elected captain of Company D, Fifty-sixth Infantry, I. N. G., a position for which he is thoroughly fitted by natural qualifications and by experience and which he is now filling to the satisfaction of all concerned.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~