J. K. ANDERSON.
J. K. Anderson, one of the capable farmers of Douglas township, Audubon county, Iowa, who owns three hundred and eighty acres of land in this township, and who is one of its most enterprising and popular citizens, was born on June 24, 1865, in Denmark, the son of Andrew and Maria Sorensen, both of whom were natives of Denmark. Andrew Sorensen owned and cultivated a little farm of fifteen acres in his native land. He served in the War of 1864 between Germany and Denmark. Taken captive during that war he was held about three months and then sent back to Denmark. He came to America in 1879, traveling to Harlan, Iowa, where he worked in a brick-yard for one and a half years. He then rented a farm near Kimballton, Iowa, where he remained for three or four years. Subsequently, he purchased a farm two miles north of Kimballton and lived on this farm until his death, in 1907. Andrew and Maria Sorensen were the parents of seven children, of whom J. K. was the eldest. The others were Soren, Nels, Otto, Lawrence, Martin, Anna, all of whom are living in this country.
J. K. Anderson attended the public schools of his native land until fourteen years of age, when he came to this country with his parents. After working for a time in a brick-yard at Harlan, Iowa, he began working on a farm, and in 1887 rented a farm in Audubon county. In 1880 he purchased a farm in Shelby county, on the border of Audubon county, comprising eighty acres, and being industrious and economical in his habits he added to the farm until he was the owner of four hundred and sixty acres of fine land in the two counties. After living in this community for twenty-three years, he purchased eighty acres in Douglas township. Audubon county, where he built a modern home in 1914. During late years he has invested about four thousand dollars in various kinds of improvements on the farm. He feeds all the grain produced on the farm to live stock, and is also compelled to
purchase grain to feed his stock. Ordinarily he sells about one carload of cattle, and approximately one hundred head of hogs every year.
In 1887 J. K. Anderson was married to Christena P. Christensen, daughter of Jens C. Christensen, who lived west of Kimballton, Iowa, and to this union have been born nine children, Jens A., S. C. Luella, Caroline, Mabel. Edith, Marie, Martin and Henry Lavern. Jens A. married Anna Petersen, and lives in Audubon county on his father's farm. Luella is the wife of Christ Nelson. The other children are unmarried and live at home with their parents.
A Republican in politics, J. K. Anderson has been school director of his township for four years, and has also served as trustee of his home township for a short time. The Anderson family all attend the Danish Lutheran church.
It must be admitted that Mr. Anderson is and has been for many years one of the extensive and wideawake farmers in this section of Audubon county. By the skillful management of his farm property he has come to be well-to-do.
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Transcribed from History of Audubon County, Iowa Its People, Industries and Institutions With Biographical Sketches of Representative Citizens and Genealogical Records of Many of the Old Families, by H. F. Andrews, editor, Indianapolis: B. F. Bowen & Company, 1915, pp. 674-675.
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