ALEXANDEER YULE

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Alexander Yule, Mrs. Alexander Yule and Clela V.E. Yule

Scotland has furnished to the United States many of her most enterprising and substantial citizens and numbered among these now residing in Cedar county is Alexander Yule, whose home is on section 3, Red Oak township. He was born in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, September 30, 1822, and is a son of John and Ann (Calder) Yule, also natives of that country. There the father spent his entire life, dying in1840, but the mother came to the United States about ten years after our subject located here and her death occurred at Virginia Grove, Iowa, January 9, 1861. The father was twice married and by the first union had seven children, while by the mother of our subject he had three sons and two daughters, namely: Samuel, James, Isabelle, Ann and Alexander, all now deceased with the exception of our subject.

The schools of his native land afforded Alexander Yule his educational privileges and he remained in Scotland until 1845, when he crossed the ocean in company with his sister Isabelle and came direct to Cedar county, Iowa, where they joined a brother and a half-brother. They were six weeks in making the voyage from Glasgow to New York on a sailing vessel and were sevenweeks in coming from New York to this county. They traveled by canal boat to Buffalo, by lake to Toledo, Ohio, by canal boat toCincinnati and then down the Ohio river and up the Mississippi to Muscatine, Iowa. For a time Mr. Yule made his home with his brother Samuel, who had been in America for ten years, and he commenced work here as a common laborer at fifty cents per day, taking his pay in wheat or other produce, as there was little money in circulation at that time.

At the end of two years he commenced farming on his own account upon rented land and it was not until 1852 that he purchased his present farm, giving in exchange two horses valued at one hundred and sixty dollars for a land warrant of one hundred and sixty acres. He had previously purchased forty acres of timber land , upon which was a stone quarry, and he has successfully operated the same, taking out several thousand feet of stone from it. After purchasing his present farm he located thereon, building a house sixteen by twenty-six feet and a story and a half in height, but while breaking the land he operated a rented farm for some time. Success crowned his well directed efforts and at one time he owned five hundred and twenty acres, some of which he has disposed of to his children but still has three hundred and sixty acres in the home farm, which is today a well improved and highly cultivated property.

Mr. Yule was married in May, 1858, to Mrs. Letitia Martin, who was born in Coleraine, Ireland, February 2, 1830, and died in Red Oak township, this county, on the 17th of January, 1892. She was the youngest daughter of Samuel and Hattie Mars and was left an orphan at the age of eight years. Four years later she emigrated to the United States and first located in Philadelphia, whence she went to Thompsonville, Connecticut, at which place she became a member of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian church. At the age of twenty-four years she gave her hand in marriage to John Martin and they later came to Iowa, located in Jones county, where he died in 1855. By that union there was one daughter, now Mrs. Lizzie Dorcas, of Red Oak township. The children born to our subject and his wife are: Annie C.; James H.; John Alexander, who died at the age of four years; and Isabelle. The daughters both reside at home with the father. Isabelle is a graduate of the academic department of the university at Iowa City and also spent one year at the State Normal, after which she successfully engaged in teaching in Red Oak and Fremont townships for a number of years. James H. is now operating the home farm. He married Elizabeth Williams, who died in March, 1901, leaving a daughter, Clela Vee Elizabeth, who was born February 12, 1901, and died November 22, 1905. After coming to this county the wife of our subject united with the Red Oak Presbyterian church in 1865 and was ever afterward one of its most earnest and faithful members.

Mr. Yule keeps well informed on the political issues and questions of the day and never hesitates in giving his allegiance to the republican party, for he believes its principles contain the best elements of good government, but he has never cared for the honors or emoluments of public office. Since 1845 he has made his home in Red Oak township and is today its oldest male resident. He has been a member of the Presbyterian church since the age of eighteen years and has been connected with the Red Oak church since he came to this county. He never withholds his support from any enterprise which he believes will advance the moral or material welfare of the community in which he resides, and he is thus regarded as one of the leading and representative citizens of the county. On his arrival here his capital consisted of but fifty dollars in gold, and the property he has acquired is the evidence of his well directed and enterprising life.