GEORGE H. ESCHER

The farming and stock-raising interests of Cedar county have no more worthy representative than George H. Escher, now residing in section 19, Red Oak township. He is proprietor of the well known Outlook Stock Farm, two miles north of Tipton, and he is widely known throughout the state as a stock-dealer. A native of Cedar county, he was born on the 12th of May, 1862, three miles south of Tipton in Center township and resided there until three years of age, when he accompanied his parents, Jacob and Fredericka (Grabb) Escher, on their removal to his present farm. Here he grew to manhood, receiving a good education, attending first the country schools near his home and later the Tipton high school, while for one year he was a student at a college in Naperville, Illinois.

Mr. Escher remained with his parents until his marriage and then purchased one hundred and sixty acres of land five miles west of Tipton, whereon he lived for four years, but at the end of that time returned to the old homestead, which now comprises seven hundred and twenty-four acres of very productive land, three hundred and twenty-one acres being on sections 9, 10 and 12, Red Oak township; four hundred and three on sections 19, 18 and 24, the same township; and thirty-four acres in Fairfield township. All are well improved and under a high state of cultivation. In 1903 Mr. Escher erected upon his farm a beautiful twelve-room residence, at a cost of ten thousand dollars, and he has also built three modern barns, up-to-date in all their appointments, one being forty-six by eighty feet in dimensions; the second forty by eighty feet, and a third sixty-three by one hundred and two feet. He also has two hog houses, one twenty-two by sixty feet and the other twenty by forty-eight feet, and three sets of double corn cribs, one thirty-six by sixty feet and twelve feet high; another twenty-six by forty-four feet and the same height; and the third thirty-two by twenty-four feet and ten feet high. He operates in all seven hundred acres of land and in connection with its cultivation is quite extensively engaged in stock-raising, feeding on an average about nine carloads of stock annually. He employs six men in the operation of his land and has twenty-five head of good work horses, used in the cultivation of his fields. He makes a specialty of the breeding of Shire horses, polled Angus cattle and Poland China hogs, while his wife gives particular attention to Buff Orphington and Plymouth Rock chickens, being a member of the Cedar County Poultry Association.

It was on the 12th of February, 1885, that Mr. Escher was united in marriage to Miss Carrie Fraseur, who was born in Center township, this county, December 5, 1866, a daughter of Montgomery Fraseur, of whom mention is made on another page of this work. Of the children born of this union Earl M. J. is the eldest. He received a good education, attending the public schools of Tipton for some time and later a business college at Cedar Rapids. After leaving that institution he entered the Agricultural College at Ames and on completing his studies there returned home. He now assists his father in the operation of the farm, in the work of which he is greatly interested, and is one of the model young men of the community. Ernest Lee is now a student in the high school of Tipton, while Edna Jane is attending the same institution.

Mr. Escher is a republican in politics but does not care for political honors. He is a director of the Farmers & Merchants Saving Bank in Tipton and also of the Cedar County Fair Association. In business he has shown excellent ability and sound judgment in investment and as the years have gone by has won substantial success that now numbers him among the men of affluence in his community. So worthy has his prosperity been gained that the most envious cannot grudge him his success. He is one of the leading members of the Lutheran church of Tipton, with which his family is also connected, and he is now serving as elder of the same, having succeeded his father in that office. During his long residence in this county he has enjoyed the respect of his fellowmen because his life has been an honorable and upright one.