LYON COUNTY GENEALOGY: The Compendium
"Z" Biographies
ZORN, WILLIAM
William Zorn is a familiar presence in the township of Doon, where he is well and favorably known as one of the fore-handed German-American farmers of Lyon county. His upright character and industrious habits well befit his sturdy German nature, and in him are found many of the best traits of the race to whose native integrity, straightforward disposition and genuine worth the whole country is deeply indebted.
Mr. Zorn was born in Germany in 1847, where his father, John Zorn, was engaged in business as a painter, being the second member in a family of three children born to his parents. He was reared to manhood in his native land, where he mastered the trades of painting and plastering, in which he was engaged for eighteen years. During the great war of 1870 and 1871, when the French and Germans were engaged in a life and death struggle, he served in the German army, and acquitted himself as a gallant soldier.
It was in 1883 that William Zorn crossed the ocean to find in the newer west the opportunities for industry and ambition that were denied simple manhood in the crowded regions of his native land. For a few months he worked as a painter in Chicago, and in the fall of the same year he reached Rock Valley, Iowa, where he settled and for some four years was engaged in painting. After this he settled on a farm in Sioux county, close to the Lyon County line, where he made a home for some four years more. In 1891 he located on a farm in section 34, Garfield township, which was partly improved at the time of his advent. In 1903 he went into business, and ran a meat shop for a year. The following year he came to his present place a fine and well improved farm of one hundred and sixty acres, section 24, Doon township, and one hundred and sixty acres in section 34, Garfield township. Buildings and improvements of every kind needed for the most profitable administration of the place are here, and here the subject of this writing may well be satisfied as he contemplates his broad acres, and thinks what a peaceful haven his adventurous life has found.
Mr. Zorn was married in 1873 to Miss Louisa Kline, a German compatriot, and by this union the mother of four children, Robert, Lena, Matilda and Augusta. Mr. and Mrs. Zorn have a wide circle of friends, and are much respected in the community where they are passing their quiet and useful years.
Webization by Kermit Kittleson - Aug. 2006