For
Muscatine County Iowa
1911
| Biographies For Muscatine County Iowa 1911 | |
Source: History of Muscatine County Iowa, Volume II, Biographical, 1911, page 340
PHILIP MURPHY. The life span of Philip Murphy covers the intervening years between the 28th of June, 1829, and the present time---the winter of 1910-1911. He has therefore traveled life's journey for eighty-one years, and is one of the venerable and highly respected citizens of Muscatine. He was born near Albany New York, a son of James Louis and Susan (Damph) Murphy, who were also natives of Albany and spent the greater part of their lives there. About 1838, however, they removed to Ohio and both the father and mother died in Muskingum county. Their family numbered seven children: Philip; Alexander, who served for four years in the Civil war as a member of an Ohio regiment and is now deceased; James, who was also a soldier of the war and is now living at Adam Mills, Muskingum county, Ohio; Abram, who is a veteran of the war between the north and the south and is now postmaster at Adams Mills; Edward, who enlisted in defense of the Union and returned home ill, his death resulting from his army experiences; Mrs. Elizabeth Van Kirk Leffler, deceased; and Mrs. Mary Cox, who has also passed away.Philip Murphy spent the first seven years of his life in his native city, after which he and two brothers lived in a Shaker village eight miles northwest of Albany until he was 18 years of age. In the fall of 1847 he left the Empire state for Coshocton county, Ohio, but in the spring of 1848 returned to Albany, where he worked for his uncle for one summer. In the fall of that year, however, he again went to Ohio and followed wagon making at a point eight miles east of Coshocton, where he remained for two years. He then again went to Albany, where he worked at his trade until the fall of 1851. At that time he secured employment in a carriage shop at Dresden, Ohio, where he had spent the fall and winter of 1847 working at the shoemaker's trade. He continued at Dresden until the spring of 1854, when he came to Muscatine, reaching this city on the 16th of April. He entered land in Orono township, Muscatine county, recording the entry at Iowa City. In this matter he secured about forty acres, and he also purchased fifty-four acres. There he engaged in farming in the usual pioneer way, breaking the sod with oxen, and after the land was plowed and harrowed he planted his seeds and began the development of the farm. Two years later he rented the place and in 1863 traded it for other property. In 1860 he began working at his trade in Muscatine in a wagon and buggy shop and followed it the most of the time until 1879. He then purchased his present place of twenty-one acres at No. 2806 Mulberry avenue, near the corporation line. Here he has a fruit and garden farm, a fine little place which is highly cultivated and returns to him a substantial annual income.
In 1853, Mr. Murphy was married in Muskingum county, Ohio, to Miss Susan Feagans, who was born in Virginia township, Coshocton county, Ohio, December 15, 1834, a daughter of William Feagan, who was a native of Virginia. Her father married a Miss Vickers and died in Ohio. The death of Mrs. Murphy occurred in Muscatine, June 5, 1906. She had reared a family of three children: James E., who is now a mail carrier of Muscatine; Mary Adaline, at home; and Bessie, the wife of George E. Sawyer, of Bloomington township.
Mr. Murphy has long been a member of the Masonic fraternity and of the Ancient Order of United Workmen. He is a fine old man of strong intelligence and of retentive powers of memory, and he relates many interesting incidents of the early days when Muscatine was a small town and the district around about was largely an uncultivated and undeveloped region.
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