Harrison County Iowa Genealogy

HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY, IOWA, 1891
BIOGRAPHIES
Page 764
JAMES H. CROM

JAMES H. CROM, a farmer located on section 18, of Lincoln Township, and who came to the county April 1, 1853, will form the subject of this sketch.

He was born in Wood County, Ohio, April 6, 1846. His parents were Josiah and Mary HUTCHINSON, who had nine children; James H., Walter S., Margaret, Matilda, Nancy, Jennie, Minnie, Olive (deceased), and Martha. Our subject was married January 1,1868, to Ellen DUDLEY, daughter of John and Sarah DUDLEY, the father a native of new Hampshire, and the mother of Vermont. They were the parents of four children, our subject's wife being the youngest. The children were Francis, Myron, Mary, who was a twin sister of Myron, but now deceased, and Ellen.

Of our subject and his wife's children, the following gives their names and the date of their birth: James A., born February 21, 1869; Mary E., August 3, 1870; William W., March 11, 1872; Maggie E., January 18, 1875; Louis E., October 31, 1877; Walter F., November 5, 1879; Frederick E., February 7, 1881; Arthur R., March 30, 1883; and Olive I., May 2, 1888.

Mr. CROM was eight years of age when his parents came to Harrison County and his father located in Magnolia Township, where he purchased a squatter's claim, which proved to be seminary land, and was afterwards turned over to the State, after which he pre-empted it and paid $1.25 per acre for it, and lived upon it for twenty eight years. When our subject was twenty-two years of age he bought one hundred and twenty acres in Magnolia Township and put substantial improvements upon the same, and after one year sold the same for $600, it having cost him just one-half that amount. He leased land one season in this county and then went to Missouri, rented one year, came back to Harrison County and rented three years, and then purchased eighty acres in Allen Township, which cost him $5.75 per acre. He made good improvements on this place, remained there seven years, then sold out and bought a hundred and twenty-acre tract of partly improved land in the same township, upon which he lived three years, disposed of the same, and rented land for two years near Dunlap. We next find him on the place he now occupies, consisting of one hundred and sixty acres, which was partly improved at the time he purchased it. The first few years of his residence I the county people had to go to Council Bluffs for their mail and marketing.

Politically, Mr. CROM votes with the Republican Party.

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