Harrison County Iowa Genealogy

HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY, IOWA, 1891
BIOGRAPHIES
Page 931
MICHAEL MURRAY

Michael MURRAY, one of the largest land owners in Harrison County, and a resident of Little Sioux Township, may justly claim space in this connection for a biographical notice, having lived in the county as he has, over a third of a century, coming in 1857.

He was born May 6, 1810, in Kilmarnock, Scotland; the sone of Michael and Mary (CRAIG) MURRAY. The father was born in Dublin, and the mother was of Scoth-Irish extraction. The father came to the United States in 1860, and laid down the burden of life three years later. There were six children in his father's family � our subject and the following: Agnes, John, Rose, Mary, James.

When our subject first came to Harrison County in 1857, he carried the mail on horseback from Calhoun to Magnolia for one year; drove stage from Onawa to Shipman two years; came to Harrison County again in 1861 and located a pre-emption claim, but the big flood of 1862, swept down the valley, driving them away, causing them to lose everything they had, after which our subject rented a farm of Sam Ellis for one year. In 1863 he went to Denver, Colo., drove stage for the Overland Stage Company. In 1864 he started a ranch one hundred miles east of Denver, known as the Douglass ranch, which furnished feed for the overland trains. He continued this until 1865, when the Indian war broke out, and had all the horses and cattle he had stolen by them. He remained there until 1867, and then went to Cheyenne and Salt Lake, where they were building the Union Pacific Railroad. After that highway was completed he went to Bitter Creek, where he had a contract for furnishing wood for the company. In 1868, we find our subject again back in Harrison County, Iowa, farming on section 18, Little Sioux Township, on land originally pre-empted by Amos S. Chase. Our subject now owns thirteen hundred and seventy acres of land in Harrison County, five hundred and seventy acres in one piece and eight hundred in another. The lowest price paid for any of this land was $10 per acre.

Mr. MURRAY was united in marriage, April 3, 1969, to Luella ELLIS, a daughter of John and Hannah (MARTIN) ELLIS. By this union seven children have been born � Mary, Agnes, Lillie, Ada, James, Adolph and Thomas. The family belong to the Roman Catholic Church.

Politically, our subject believes in the principles of the Republican party.

Mr. MURRAY laid the foundation for his present well-to-do circumstances by driving stage in Iowa, and working in the wilds of the Rocky Mountains, as well as on the great Western plains. A quarter of a century ago it took great courage and endurance to live west of the Missouri River, for civilization had not moulded good society, or fashioned the laws, now found in that section. After accumulating considerable means in the west, Mr. MURRAY very wisely returned to the Hawkeye State and invested his earnings in valuable lands, the possession of which has now placed him in an independent position in life.

He established his mercantile business in the fall of 1868, purchasing a general stock of Benjamin Tabor in an old building on the spot where Mr. MURRAY's present fine two-story frame now stands, which was erected in 1877, and the second story is used for a Masonic Hall.

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