For more than a half century Lock CAMPBELL has been a resident of Taylor county and during this period has been closely identified with the marvelous growth and development which has been carried on within its borders. A native of Iowa, he has been a life-long resident of this state, and during the period covered by his active business career has been instrumental in the improvement of three different farming properties.

Born in Lee county on the 5th of November, 1847, he is a son of John and Esther (McCLAIN) CAMPBELL, both natives of Ohio, the former of Guernsey county and the latter of Licking county. The father was reared and married in Guernsey county and in 1842 arrived in Iowa, casting in his lot with the pioneer settlers of Lee county. There he purchased a farm of two hundred and forty acres, upon which he made his home until 1855, when he invested in four hundred acres in Benton township, Taylor county, to which he removed and upon which he resided for five years. In 1860 he withdrew from agricultural pursuits and removed to Bedford, where he was engaged in merchandising for five years. He passed away in 1886, in Ringgold county, Iowa, at the age of seventy-six years, while his wife's death occurred in 1857. They were the parents of five children.

To the common schools of Lee county and of Bedford Lock CAMPBELL is indebted for the educational advantages which he enjoyed during the period of his boyhood and youth. He lost his mother when a little lad of ten years and remained under his father's care until he attained his majority, when he started out in business on his own account, engaging in agricultural pursuits in partnership with his brother-in-law. He was thus connected until his marriage, after which he purchased eighty acres in Clayton township and later added eighty acres. Few improvements had been made upon the farm when it came into his possession, but with characteristic energy he set about breaking the soil and converting the land into productive fields. He erected a house and a small barn and continued in the work of cultivating and developing the place until 1884. In that year he purchased the farm upon which he now makes his home, consisting of eighty acres on section 20, Grant township, to the further improvement of which he has since directed his efforts. The only dwelling that stood upon the farm at the time of purchase was a little log house which has since given place to a modern frame structure, while Mr. CAMPBELL has also erected substantial barns and outbuildings and has surrounded his fields with good fences. He has a large orchard of apple, peach and cherry trees, which yield rich fruits in their season. In fact everything about the place indicates that he is in touch with the modern spirit of progress which is manifest in agricultural lines, and his farming interests have been so wisely and carefully conducted that he has won substantial success. Aside from his farming interests he also devotes much time to raising and feeding stock, and he is enjoying a most gratifying income from the fact that both branches of his business -- the raising of grain and the raising of stock -- are proving most profitable.

On the 9th of April, 1877, Mr. CAMPBELL was united in marriage to Miss Ethel WRIGHT, a native of Clayton township, Taylor county, where she was reared and married. Unto that union were born two children, namely: Hollis E., the wife of W. L. ROSS, of Wayne county, Nebraska; and Harry B., of Hill City, South Dakota. In February, 1884, Mr. CAMPBELL was called upon to mourn the loss of his first wife, and later in the same year, in Conway, Iowa, he was again married, his second union being with Mrs. Clara ROBINSON. This union has been blessed with one daughter, Clara, the wife of E. HARRIGAN, who resides with our subject and assists in the operation of the home farm.

Mr. and Mrs. CAMPBELL are members of the Methodist Episcopal church, while fraternally Mr. CAMPBELL is a Master Mason, being identified with the blue lodge of Bedford, of which he has been a member for more than thirty years. He gives his political support to the republican party, having cast his first presidential vote for General U. S. GRANT in 1872, since which time he has supported every candidate on that ticket. For more than five decades he has been a resident of Taylor county and during that period has been thoroughly identified with its interests. When he first took up his abode within its borders not a frame house was to be seen in the city of Bedford, which was then a little village of log cabins. In the years covering his residence here he has witnessed the county's growth and progress, nor has he been alone an interested witness for he has aided in the work of development.

SOURCE:  CROSSON, Frank E. History of Taylor County, Iowa: From The Earliest Historic Times to 1910  Pp. 541 - 542. S.J. Clarke Pub. Chicago. 1910.

Transcription by Sharon R. Becker, 2008