GEORGE W. LANG.

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George W. Lang         Mrs. George W. Lang
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         A respected and prosperous agriculturist of Grand View township is George W. Lang who, with his wife, owns seven hundred and thirty acres of land where he engages in general farming and stock raising and feeding. He was born in Muscatine county, Iowa, on the 27th of February, 1867, and is a son of Nicholas and Margaret (Lieberknecht) Lang. The father a native of Germany and the mother of Pennsylvania, but they were married in Muscatine county, and subsequently settled upon a farm, where the father, who is seventy-four, still resides, but the mother passed away in 1908.

         George W. Lang early became familiar with the work of the farm by being assigned duties about the homestead, his responsibility increasing with the passing years. In the acquirement of his education he attended the schools of the district in which he resided and the academy at Wilton Junction. At the age of twenty-one he went into partnership with his father and brothers, who were engaged in agricultural pursuits, continuing to be identified with them for twenty-two years. In January, 1910, he withdrew and, coming to Louisa county, bought his present farm which is located on sections 10, 15 and 16. The property is finely improved and all of the land is under a high state of cultivation, and here Mr. Lang engages in general farming and stock-raising. He is making a specialty of the latter and keeps nothing but high grade cattle and hogs.

         On the 8th of January, 1910, was celebrated the marriage of George W. Lang and Mrs. Bertha B. Lieberknecht, the widow of Benjamin Lieberknecht, who passed away on the 27th of March, 1908. Mrs. Lang is a daughter of W. J. and Mary (Smith) Ronald, her birth having occurred in this county on the 13th of October, 1868. Mr. Ronald was a native of Navoo, Illinois, his natal day being the 9th of October, 1834, and Mrs. Ronald was born in Oxford, Ohio, on the 25th day of December, 1842. They were both graduates of Miami University of Oxford, of which institution Mr. Ronald’s cousin, the late Whitelaw Reed, was also a student at that time. Mrs. Ronald’s parents resided upon a farm in the vicinity of Oxford. Mr. Ronald and Miss Smith were married in Ohio on the 6th of October, 1863, and soon afterward removed to Iowa. They settled on a farm in Louisa county, which he operated for six years and then withdrawing from agricultural pursuits he removed to Grand View where he engaged in the . . .

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. . . bee industry. He continued to be identified with that until his demise, which occurred on the 20th of February, 1882. His wife survived him but a few weeks, her death occurring on the 7th of March of the same year. Eight children were born to them, as follows: Anabel, the wife of George H. Barber, who operates an elevator at Warden, Iowa; Martha E., who died at the age of three years; Bertha B., who received a high-school education, and is now Mrs. Lang; Helen R., who married David Kirk, a banker of Niagara, North Dakota; John T., who died at the age of seventeen years, at which time he was a student at Monmouth College, Monmouth, Illinois; Ada P., who died at the age of fifteen; William Roy, who was born on the 1st of June, 1879, and entered college at the age of fifteen, where he remained four years, and who is now married and has two children, resides in Mitchell, South Dakota, where he is manager of one of the largest daily papers of the state; and Marion Ethel, a graduate of the Chicago high school, who for the past ten years has been engaged in the United States census bureau. Mr. Ronald, who was a progressive, public-spirited man, always took an active interest in all educational matters and served as county superintendent for several terms.

         Both Mr. and Mrs. Lang affiliate with the Congregational church, in the work of which organization they take an active part. Although he has been a resident of Grand View township for only about two years, Mr. Lang has proven to be an acquisition to the community, as men of his capability, energy and perseverance must ever prove desirable citizens in any locality.