HON. OLE H. JACOBSEN.
Hon. Ole H. Jacobson, farmer and stockman in Sharon township, and manufacturer of brick, tile and hollow-ware at Kimballton, Iowa, is one of the best-known citizens of Audubon county. Although entitled to rank as a self-made man, he received a splendid education which he has been able to turn to good account as a member of the Iowa General Assembly, where for two sessions he was recognized as one of the most prominent leaders. Perhaps the greatest single tribute to his service in this legislative assembly was the act, of which he was the author, to abolish contract labor in this state. It is a tribute to his energy and to his leadership that his fight in behalf of the measure was crowned with success, and that today in the state of Iowa contract labor is illegal. For nearly a generation this subject has been uppermost in the legislative sessions of most of the states, and though it has been abolished in some states, the fact that it obtains in others is a striking evidence of the power necessary to overcome the system by which prison-made goods are thrown into a free market in competition with the products of free labor. Mr. Jacobson had a hard fight to bring this measure to a successful issue and is entitled to the credit for its passage.
Click on photo to enlarge
Ole H. Jacobson, the proprietor of a farm of one hundred and sixty acres in Sharon township, and a well-known farmer and manufacturer of this county, was born on December 4, 1866, in Denmark. His parents, Ole H., Sr., and Sophia (Petersen) Jacobson, owned a small tract of land in Denmark, where they were farmers, which was sold when the family came to America, in 1869. They located seven miles northwest of the place where Ole H., Sr., is now living, in Shelby county, Iowa. Here he purchased land at two dollars and fifty cents an acre, and after living there for six years, in 1875, removed to Audubon county, to the farm where Ole H., Jr., is now living. This farm, comprising one hundred and sixty acres, and purchased for nine dollars an acre, was wholly unimproved. Mr. Jacobson improved the farm in various ways, and increased his holdings to three hundred and eighty acres. Here he farmed until 1894, when he retired from active life and removed to Kimballton, where he is now living. He is a veteran of the War of 1864, and was born on the island of Aro, November 22, 1834. His wife, the mother of the subject of this sketch, was born on January 21, 1835, and died on June 1, 1914. Of their nine children only five are now living. Ole H. is the only one living in Audubon county. The other living children are Chris H., Christena, Justesen, Sophia and Clarence.
Ole H. Jacobson received his education in the schools of Audubon county, and after leaving school attended the graded school of Atlantic and finally Des Moines College, of Des Moines, Iowa. Upon leaving college he located in Lincoln county Nebraska, where he remained for five years, during which time he was engaged in selling windmills and implements. In 1893 he returned to Audubon county and located on the farm where he is now living, and which he bought and improved by the erection of a comfortable house. He is an extensive breeder and feeder of purebred Shorthorn cattle. He feeds about one hundred hogs every year besides cattle, raises seventy acres of corn, which yields fifty bushels to the acre, and some forty or fifty acres of small grain. All of the grain is fed to the live stock on the farm. Mr. Jacobson has invested approximately seven thousand dollars in improvements to the farm.
In 1908 Mr. Jacobson built the Crystal Spring brick and tile factory, at Kimballton. This company manufacturers all kinds of brick and hollow-ware, and is the only tile factory in this part of the county.
During the sessions of 1910 and 1912, Mr. Jacobson served as a member of the Iowa General Assembly, having been elected as a Republican. Mr. Jacobson also has served as a member of the board of township trustees, having been elected for three years. During 1890-91 he was township assessor.
On December 17, 1891, Ole H. Jacobson was married to Stella Huglin, the daughter of J. M. and Sarah (Hattie) Huglin. Of the six children, Esther, Harold, Zela, Russell, Forest and Ruth, born to this marriage, all are unmarried and live at home. Mrs. Jacobson was born in Madison county, Iowa. Her parents, the father a native of Germany, and the mother of Pennsylvania, were married in Madison county, Iowa, and farmed there until 1886, when they removed to Wayne county, Nebraska, where the father engaged in the drug business, and where he is now living retired in Hoskins, Nebraska. The mother died on April 23, 1896. They had eight children, only five of whom, Mrs. Libbie Kern, Charles, Mrs. Jacobson, Mrs. Mettie Wetherholdt and Bert, are now living.
Mr. and Mrs. Ole H. Jacobson are members of the Baptist church, and Mr. Jacobson has served as superintendent of the Sunday school for the past fifteen years. He is a deacon and secretary and clerk of the congregation.
Any community is either better of worse for the life and career of every individual citizen who is a member of it. There can be no question that Audubon county has greatly profited from the career of Hon. Ole H. Jacobson, and that he has added distinction and honor to the fair name of this county. Honorable and upright in all the relations of life, he is popular among all classes and admired by all people.
|
Transcribed by Gunter Schanzenbacher, Waynesboro, PA, March 29, 2013 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. 784-786.
|
|
