Harrison County Iowa Genealogy

HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY, IOWA, 1915
BIOGRAPHIES
Page 957
ALPHONSO SPOONER

Alphonso SPOONER - For more than 45 years, Alphonso SPOONER has been a resident of Harrison County, Iowa, where he stands high in the respect and esteem of the people of this community where he has made his home for so many years. For the first few years, after he came to the county, he operated a farm after which he purchased a hardware store in Mondamin, and has been connected with the mercantile interests of that thriving little city ever since. In the meantime, he has retained his interests in farming and stock raising, making a specialty of breeding Hereford cattle, and is known as one of the most extensive breeders of those thoroughbred animals in the state.

Alphonso SPOONER, son of Pomeroy C. and Amelia C. (OGDEN) SPOONER, was born January 2, 1843, in Glens Falls, New York. His father was a native of Vermont, and his mother of New York state.

Pomeroy C. SPOONER was a millwright and carpenter by trade and in 1866 came to Omaha to work for the Union Pacific Railway Company, which company was then constructing their lines across the continent. In the course of his work, he came to Harrison county, Iowa, to look after the cutting and sawing of timber for use in the railroad construction work, and while in that county, purchased land in Morgan township. He worked for the railroad company in this county until 1868 in which year he went to Laramie City, Wyoming, where with a company of Pawnee Indian scouts, and with a troop of U.S. cavalry, he went up into the mountains to look for railroad timber. He continued in Wyoming until 1870 and during the five years he was in the west, his family remained in the eaThey came to Iowa and located at Mondamin, Harrison County, in 1870, where Pomeroy C. SPOONER and his wife lived the remainder of their lives. Pomeroy C. SPOONER died in 1896; his wife died in 1890.

At the same time his father came west, Alphonso SPOONER left New York, coming to Omaha, where he operated a saw-mill, sawing lumber which had been floated down the Missouri River to that place. Thus both father and son had a part in the construction of the first railroad across the great western plains. Mr. SPOONER was the owner and manager of the Pioneer Hotel in Laramie City, Wyoming, during 1869 and 1870, which was the pioneer hostelry in that city.

He located in Harrison County, Iowa, in 1870 on a farm near Mondamin, where he remained until about 1875, when he moved into the town. During the years in which he was engaged in farming near Mondamin, he gradually added to his land holdings until he was the owner of 760 acres of splendid farming land. Mr. SPOONER engaged in the breeding and raising of full-blooded thoroughbred Hereford cattle in 1896, and now has 300 head of registered cattle on his farm, owning some of the finest animals in the state. He has never made a practice of exhibiting his cattle at county and state fairs, as have many other stock raisers, but has a growing trade with the herdsmen of the great west.

Alphonso SPOONER was married on February 9, 1870 at Laramie City Wyoming to Lizzie HEALEY, who was a native of Pennsylvania, and to this union four children were born, Irving E., Sumner A., Grace M. and Carrie A. Irving E. married Ida RUFFCORN, daughter of Clark RUFFCORN, a pioneer of Harrison county. Irving SPOONER and wife are the parents of five children, Cecile, Burle, Opal, Dwight and Lois. Irving is the manager of a lumber and coal yard in Mondamin and also owns two farms in the county stocked with Hereford cattle. Sumner A. SPOONER is manager of the Mondamin branch of the Inter-State Telephone Company, and also has general charge of his father's stock farm. Grace M. is the wife of F.W. LEWIS, of Omaha, where her husband is assistant manager of the International Harvester Company's office at Omaha. Carrie A. is the wife of G.W. BUCK and lives in Oregon where her husband has bought a farm four miles south of Oregon City. The mother of these children died in 1895, and in 1897 Mr. SPOONER married Olive A. BRYANT, who was a native of Ohio.

Alphonso SPOONER and wife are earnest and loyal members of the Congregational Church, in whose welfare they are deeply interested, and to the support of which they are liberal contributors. He has always been identified with the Republican party, but has never taken any active part in political affairs, his business and agricultural interests demanding his entire time and attention. He was appointed to serve on the county board of supervisors, upon the death of Thomas MORROW, serving only for the unexpired term. Mr. Spooner is one of the pioneers of Harrison County, has been an active participant in its growth and prosperity, and because of his long residence here and the respect and esteem in which he is held by his fellow citizens, he is eminently entitled to representation in the annals of his county.

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