Hon. Alexander Moffit, who was a member of the sixteenth general assembly and has many years been known as a representative farmer and breeder of thoroughbred Hereford cattle in Cedar county, was born in County Tyrone, Ireland, April 24, 1829. His parents were William and Elizabeth (Armstrong) Moffit, also natives of the Emerald Isle. The former was born June 21, 1779, and the latter on the 12th of November, 1774. They became the parents of ten children, all of whom were born in Ireland and emigrated to America, namely: Andrew, born in 1805, died July 2, 1851; Robert died in Philadelphia, July 10, 1869; Margery, born in 1812, became the wife of William Neely, her death occurring in Tipton, October 22, 1886; William died in Philadelphia, as did Elizabeth Armstrong; Mrs. Lucinda Hardacre, born March 1, 1816, died near Tipton, Iowa, April 1, 1888; Thomas, born November 5, 1821, died near Tipton, January 18, 1867; Francis, January 21, 1824, died March 16, 1901; Mrs. Margaret Smythe, born October 21, 1826, died March 28, 1904; and Alexander completes the family.
William Moffit, the father, emigrated from Ireland with his wife and five youngest children in 1840, making his way direct to Cedar county, Iowa. They left their home near Ballinamallard near the north line of County Fermanagh on the 1st of April and took passage at Liverpool on a sailing vessel which was six weeks in reaching the harbor of Philadelphia. The elder children had already come to America and some of them were located in that city. The first to leave Ireland was Robert Moffit, who came in 1828. Andrew followed in 1835 and came to Cedar county in 1839. He located the claim that was the family homestead on a creek near the south side of Mason’s Grove in Cass township. The land was not then open to entry and in fact was not upon the market until the spring of 1840.
After visiting for a brief time in Philadelphia, the family proceeded to Pittsburg and thence to Muscatine, Iowa. The passengers on the boat brought the news of the election of President Harrison. In those days few newspapers were published and communication was by word of mouth from travelers. The Moffit family arrived at Muscatine early in November, where the household goods and the women of the party were loaded in a wagon, while the men walked. They proceeded thus to Cedar county, arriving on the 20th of November. They spent the first night in this county with the family of Henry Buchanan but in a short time were installed in their own little home.
Alexander Moffit lived at home on the farm with his father except in the winter seasons when he would avail himself of the opportunity of attending school anywhere in this part of the state where a school was in session. The first school he attended was in the Smythe neighborhood about two miles southwest of Mount Vernon. In the spring of 1852 with his brother Francis, he started overland for California with five yoke of oxen and a pony. They were four months in making the trip over the plains, the long stretches of hot sand, and through the mountain passes. Because of ill health Francis Moffit returned at the end of a year. Alexander remained in California until 1857, making but one visit home during that time. On the return trip he proceeded by water to the Isthmus of Panama, after crossing which he again boarded a vessel bound for New York.
On the 20th of September, 1859, Mr. Moffit was united in marriage to Miss Martha Jane Poteet, a neighbor’s daughter, and as the years passed eleven children were born to them, of whom three died in infancy. The eight that reached adult age are: John T.; Cassius C.; William A.; Albert H.; Edwin B.; Mary L, now Mrs. Ralph M. Reeder; Martha J., now Mrs. C. G. Stookey; and Lulu. All are yet livingin Cedar county with the exception of Cassius C., a banker of Brewster, Minnesota. On the 20th of September, 1909 Mr. and Mrs. Moffit celebratedtheir golden wedding on their farm where they had lived so many years and where their children were born and reared.
For a year after his marriage Alexander Moffit resided near the old homestead and then removed to the farm which he now occupies near the northern part of Linn township, about three and one-half miles south of Mechanicsville. He is the last surviving member of a large pioneer family that from the earliest development of this section of the state has been closely, actively and honorably associated with its growth and improvement.
Mr. Moffit is one of the really old settlers of Cedar county. There are only a few now who are older than he. He is a regular attendant at, and takes an active part in the Cedar County Old Settlers Association. He is a familiar face at all the annual meetings.
Mr. Moffit has often said, in talking with his friends, that it is hard for the young people of today with automobiles, telephones, rural free delivery, steam-heated and gas-lighted farm homes with bathrooms and water pumped throughout the house and barns and all over the farm with power, to understand the changed conditions.
The families in those days, and they were large families, often lived in a cabin that seldom had more than two rooms. These cabins were always built on a creek and near timber. There were no wells or well drilling machinery, nosteam wood saws in those days. There were no fences, no roads, no bridges. Just a vast expanse of prairie with here and there a settler’s cabin on the border of the prairie near water and timber.
The only post office in Cedar county was at Rochester. This again shows what comes with time and changed tide.At that time Rochester had ambitions to be a metropolis. It now does not even have a postoffice. In those days mail only came occasionally. Settlers living as far away as Marion often passed the Moffit cabin on foot to get the mail at Rochester for their neighborhood. Letters were luxuries. The postage was twenty-five cents and it had to be paid by the person who received the letter. Twenty-five cents it must be remembered at that time was considerable money. The Moffits lived in Cedar county fifteen years before a railroad touched its border. Land was here in plenty; was everywhere to be had for one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre, and few people could raise the one dollar and twenty-five cents.
Now a telegram is received at noon advising as to the Chicago market on hogs. The neighbors are called by telephone; they assemble at the meeting place, the hogs are loaded, hauled to the station, loaded on the cars and delivered at Chicago in the morning at nine dollars and seventy-five cents per hundred weight gross. In those days the hogs were butchered at home, and the dressed hogs hauled by wagon thirty-five miles to Muscatine and then sold at two dollars and fifty cents per hundred weight dressed. The teams then returned the next day loaded with lumber. During the winter season Mr. Moffit frequently made two trips per week to Muscatine, hauling dressed hogs and grain and returning with lumber and provisions. And there are still people complaining about the hard way they have to get along.
During his residence here Alexander Moffit has continuously carried on farming and stock-raising and has extensively engaged in the breeding of thoroughbred stock. His business interests are carefully and systematically conducted, bringing to him a substantial measure of success. He has ever manifested great care in the discharge of public duties, serving as a member of the board of supervisors, and also as a township school officer. Still higher honors, however, were conferred upon him when, in 1875, he was elected to represent his district in the sixteenth general assembly. He has ever been loyal to the confidence and trust reposed in him, whether in business, political or social relations and his upright life commends him to the confidence and good will of all.
