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

Transcriptions by Mona Sarratt Knight placed on this site with her permission.

Among the prominently known farmers of Carroll County is Emery F. Smith, who was born at Coon Rapids April 16, 1860, and has since made his home at this place. He is a son of Ezra Meade and Sarah Clarissa (Smith) Smith, the former of whom was born in Vermont and the latter in New York state, in December, 1830. The father was reared at Rutland, Vermont, and became a foreman in a marble mill of Rutland. After his marriage, which took place in Michigan, he came with his wife to Iowa in 1854 and located at Coon Rapids where he purchased land, which he developed into a good farm. At one time he was the owner of seven hundred acres. He died March 24, 1900, at the age of seventy-three years, but his widow still survives and resides on the old homestead. She has been blind for thirty years and is the oldest settler in Carroll County in point of continuous residence. She and her husband in their younger days were members of the Baptist church but later affiliated with the Seventh Day Adventists. Mr. Smith was a lover of music and for many years taught singing in the old-fashioned singing schools. The only public office he ever held was that of school director. He was a good business man and became one of the prominent and successful farmers of Carroll county. There were six children in the family of Mr. and Mrs. Smith: Charles, deceased; Francelia, the wife of Daniel Smith, of Forsyth, Missouri; Byron, who makes his home at Mears, Oklahoma; Emery F.; Maria, who married Warren Fell, of Spirit Lake, Iowa; and George A., who died at the age of twelve and one-half years.

The paternal grandfather of our subject was a native of Vermont and engaged in farming. The maiden name of his wife was Lodena Blanchard. There were six children in their family, Franklin, Clarissa, Ezra, Laura, Adeline and Julia. The maternal grandfather was Alanson Smith, a native of New York who engaged in mercantile business for a number of years near Ithaca. He married Maria Gridley and they moved to Michigan and settled in New Hudson. He died at the age of seventy-four and his wife was called away at the age of eighty-three years. In their family were five children, Harriet E., Sarah Clarissa, Edgar, Isadore and Martin. Mrs. Ezra Smith was twice married, her first husband being Luman Franklin Smith. He died and she married his brother, Ezra Meade Smith. There were no children by the first marriage. The ancestors of Mrs. Smith were of English stock, one of them being Baron D. Gridley. The American branch of the Gridley family is descended from progenitors who settled at Hartford, Connecticut, the early records showing that Thomas Gridley, grandfather of Mrs. Smith on her mother's side, married Sarah Hitchcock. The family of which Mrs. Smith's father was a member settled near Ithaca, New York. Thomas Gridley, the grandfather on the mother's side, was a soldier of the Revolutionary war, enlisting when he was sixteen years of age.

Emery F. Smith, the subject of this sketch, was reared in Coon Rapids and secured advantages of education in the public schools. As he grew to manhood he assisted upon his father's farm and has since continued on the old homestead of which he is in charge. He devotes his attention to general farming and stock-raising, and his labors are rewarded with ample harvests, yielding a goodly annual income. Politically he is an adherent of the Republican Party whose candidates and principles receive his earnest support. A native of Coon Rapids, he is greatly interested in its development and is always ready to put his shoulder to the wheel to assist in promoting the welfare of the community.

On the 27th of November 1884, Mr. Smith was married to Miss Mary E. Morgan, who was born in Mahaska County, Iowa, February 3, 1861, a daughter of Richard and Lodena (Oldham) Morgan. Mr. and Mrs. Smith are the parents of four children, Chalon E., Raymond, Carl, and one who died in infancy. Chalon E. Smith, the eldest, married Miss Pearl S. Lloyd, of Key West, Florida. He has recently returned home after serving three years as a member of the Ninth Band of the Coast Artillery Corps of the United States Army.

Richard Morgan, the father of Mrs. Emery F. Smith, was born in Kentucky and his wife was born in Indiana. They came to Mahaska County, Iowa, where they resided a number of years. Mrs. Morgan died at Coon Rapids in 1907, having reached the age of sixty-nine, but Mr. Morgan is now living at Independence, Oklahoma. They had twelve children: Melvina May, Fred, Mary Ellen, Robert, Lizzie, Alexander, Addie, Carrie, Florence, deceased, Mettie, Gertie and Jesse. The grandfather of Mrs. Smith on the paternal side was John Morgan, a native of Kentucky, and the maiden name of his wife was Elizabeth Myers. He died in middle life but Mrs. Morgan was over eighty-eight years of age when her death occurred. There were seven children in their family: Dorcas, Nancy, Amanda, Richard, Alexander, Susan and Mary. The maternal grandfather was Robert Oldham, a native of Indiana, who married Nicy Bollibaugh. He died at the age of seventy-four, his widow being called away after she had passed the eighty-ninth milestone of life. They were the parents of nine children: Serena, Christina, Lodena, Nancy, Mary, Adam, Aaron, Zadoc and William.

Mrs. Ezra Smith retains a distinct recollection of many interesting events of the pioneer days. When she and her husband arrived at Coon Rapids fifty-seven years ago, there were few white people in this part of the state. In 1855, the year following their arrival, Mr. and Mrs. Zadoc Titus and their family of six children became residents of the neighborhood and during the same year came Mr. and Mrs. Conrad Geiselhart and their family of four children. The three families all lived in one log house, Mr. and Mrs. Smith also being the parents of two children, so that there were twelve children and six grown persons, making eighteen in all, who lived together peaceably and happily. The heads of the families are all now dead except Mrs. Smith. They finally built an addition to the house so that it had seven rooms and was one of the most commodious residences in this region. They passed through a number of exciting experiences, fighting prairie fires in which the women gave valuable assistance in saving their property. The principal means of travel was on horseback and Mrs. Smith became a skillful rider. When she took up her residence here the nearest white family, bearing the name of Niles, was five miles away. These neighbors moved to New Mexico and Mrs. Smith is now the oldest settler in the county. She owns the homestead on which she and her husband located more than a half-century ago but has disposed of a portion of the land, still retaining about one hundred and twenty acres all of which except thirty acres is within the corporate limits of Coon Rapids. Although she is now in her eighty-first year she is well preserved physically for one of her age and is remarkably bright mentally. She is well informed as to the growth of Carroll County, having witnessed its development from a wilderness. She endured the hardships of pioneer life and now enjoys a competency and the companionship and the loving ministrations of younger persons who were not called upon to endure the privations through which she and her early associates were obliged to pass. To the pioneers the present generation owes a debt of gratitude, which it is impossible to pay.

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