Harrison County Iowa Genealogy

HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY, IOWA, 1891
BIOGRAPHIES
Page 299
GEORGE R. BRAINARD

George R. BRAINARD, present Postmaster at Magnolia, is a name so familiar that it hardly needs an introduction in this connection. He came to the county in May, 1855, and has been associated with the county Government, with the newspaper business, and in many other ways by reason of which he has been an important factor in Harrison County for over a third of a century.

He came to the county with his parents, D. E. and Elizabeth BRAINARD, and their three children. The family are of English descent. Upon their arrival in this county the father engaged in merchandising at Magnolia, renting a building which had been erected by James BATES and which he occupied until the autumn of 1857, and then removed to a new building he had erected himself and which was afterward moved away and is now used as a dwelling on John DONNERS' farm. In this building he remained several years and then sold his building and lot to Dr. CLARK.

D. E. BRAINARD was elected as County Judge in 1857, and served until 1861; was a member of the State Board of Education for several years, held the office of Treasurer and Recorder from 1856 to 1858, and was special agent for the Postoffice Department looking after delinquencies. He held this position four years, during which time he resided in Iowa City, but was away from home most of the time.

After leaving this office he returned to Magnolia and remained until the fall of 1890 when he went to Chadron, Neb., to live with his daughter, Mrs. Fannie O'LINN.

"Judge" BRAINARD, as he is familiarly called, was born at Rome, N. Y., February 16, 1808, and was the son of Daniel BRAINARD, and spent his early life in the Empire State. But upon reaching man's estate he entered the mercantile business in Illinois; he also ran a line of stages from Springfield, Ill., to St. Louis, before the days of railroads. He was married when twenty-four years of age to Elizabeth Ann PICKETT, in Illinois, by whom he reared a family of four children; Orville V., George R., Egbert, who died in infancy, and Fannie M.

George R., the subject of this sketch, was born in Van Buren County, Iowa, February 25, 1840, his father having settled there as early as 1837, when Iowa was yet included in Wisconsin territory, and hence was among the first children born in the State. His boyhood was spent in assisting his father on his farm and attending the schools, which, at that day, were a marked contrast to those of the present time. At the age of fourteen he commenced serving an apprenticeship as a printer at Keokuk, Iowa, where he remained until his parents removed to Harrison County.

His father fitted out two covered wagons in the spring of 1855, one drawn by a span of horses and the other a yoke of oxen. All being ready they started, as they supposed for California, but upon arriving at Council Bluffs they stopped to wait for a larger growth of prairie grass for their teams to subsist upon. Mr. BRAINARD chanced to meet an old acquaintance, Elder Moses F. SHINN, who persuaded him to look up a location in Harrison County.

When George R. was nineteen years of age he in company with his brother Orville, purchased the newspaper which had been running at Preparation, Iowa, or rather traded for the same, giving in exchange a small stock of goods, a team of horses and a few notes on parties living in Monona County and then established what was then known as the Magnolia Republican, which was the first Republican paper ever published in this part of Iowa. George R. bought his brother's interest and later sold the plant, which, however, came back on his hands, and he finally sold it to P. C. TRUMAN. After retiring from the paper in which there was no great amount of pecuniary profit, Mr. BRAINARD carried the mail between Magnolia and Logan for several years. But yet having a hankering for the art preservative he established the Dunlap Reporter in the spring of 1871, conducted it one year and sold it to AINSWORTH & THOMPSON, and then returned to Magnolia where he engaged in farming, and holding various township offices; also has been Postmaster different times and is the present incumbent, taking the office under Harrison's administration in the month of July, 1890.

He was married at Council Bluffs, November 19, 1859, to Joanna B. WIGGINS, a native of New York, born August 31, 1837, by whom seven children have been born, six of whom still survive, and four of whom live in Harrison County. Their children are as follows: Mabel B., Dora, Ethel, Clara, died at the age of two and one-half years, Fred W., Dean E., and Fannie M.

Politically our subject is a stanch supporter of the Republican party.

Both he and his wife are acceptable members of the Methodist Church and he is a member of Magnolia Lodge No. 177, of the Ancient Order of United Workmen and Magnolia Lodge No. 126, A. F. & A. M., in which order he has filled every important office.

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