Talliev Haugen Guro Haugen
The agricultural interests of Worth county find an excellent representative in Lars T. Haugen, who owns and operates a farm on section 30, Fertile township. Norway has furnished a very substantial percentage of excellent citizens to this county, and the number includes Mr. Haugen, who was born in the land of the midnight sun in June, 1869, his parents, being Tolive A. and Goro (Jacobson) Haugen, both of whom were natives of Norway, where they were reared and married, and all of their children were born in that country. It was in the year 1884 that Lars T. Haugen bade adieu to friends and native land and sailed for America. He was at that time a youth of fifteen years. In 1895 his parents, with the other members of the family, joined him in this country. The father settled first in Fertile township, Worth county, but in the following year took up his abode in the home of his son Lars, with whom he and his wife remained. Tolive A. Haugen, however, passed away October 15, 1917, at the advanced age of eighty-four years. The mother is still living with her son and has reached the age of eighty-two years.
Lars T. Haugen In the Norwegian schools Lars T. Haugen largely acquired his education but attended school a few months following his emigration to America, when a youth of fifteen. He did not tarry on the Atlantic coast after making the voyage to the new world, but made his way at once into the interior of the country, settling first in Dane county, Wisconsin, where he took up farm work, in which he engaged for a year. He then removed to Iowa, making Worth county his destination. This was in 1885. He continued to work for wages during the following ten years, and in 1895 he began farming on his own account as a renter. He continued to rent land for six years, but during that period carefully saved his earnings until his industry and economy had brought him sufficient capital to enable him to purchase property. In 1901 he became owner of his present home farm of one hundred and twenty acres, to which he at once removed.
There were few improvements upon the place and he immediately took up the arduous task of developing the fields and adding to the improvements upon the farm. He continued to rent the farm of two hundred and twenty acres, which he had previously been operating for four years following his removal to his own farm. His life has been one of untiring thrift and industry. He built a comfortable residence and a modern barn upon his farm and added other improvements, which have made it one of the excellent farm properties of Fertile township. The fields have been brought under a high state of cultivation and annually return to him golden harvests as a reward for his care and labor. He works with a will, is diligent and determined and has won for himself a very substantial and gratifying measure of success as the years have gone on.
In his political views Mr. Haugen has always been a republican since becoming a naturalized American citizen. His religious faith is that of the Norwegian Lutheran church and in his life he has exemplified its teachings. Those who know him esteem him as a man of genuine worth and he is held in high regard throughout the community in which he lives. He has never had occasion to regret his determination to come to the new world, for here he has found the opportunities which he sought and in their utilization has made steady advance in a business way until he is now regarded as one of the valued and substantial farmers of Fertile township.
Transcribed by Gordon Felland - July 2005