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HENRY MINERMAN.

One of the best-known, most progressive and most prosperous farmers of Greeley township, this county, is Henry Minerman, a native of Germany, who came to this country when he was eighteen years of age, landing in the city of New Orleans on the day which marked the deadly riot in that city following the election of General Grant to the Presidency, in which twelve persons were killed. His first impressions of this country, therefore, were not of the most agreeable character and he would have turned back to his native land, had he been able to do so. Needless to say, he never since has had cause to regret that he did not follow his inclination to flee from what he first regarded as a land of violence and sudden death.

Henry Minerman was born on January 30, 1850, in Osnabruck, Hanover, Germany. His mother was an Ellinghouse. His father died when Henry was three years old, leaving a widow and another son, Charles; the latter now lives in Matamoras, Pennsylvania. Upon his father's death, Henry was adopted into another family and was carefully reared, receiving a good education in his native land. At the age of eighteen he came to America, reaching New Orleans, as noted above, on the day of the deadly election riots. He proceeded up the river to St. Louis, en route to the home of his aunt, near Johannesburg, Illinois, where he lived for eight years, working on the farm, at the end of which time he moved to Johnson county, Iowa, where he worked for a year or two and where he was married. In the spring of 1882 he came to Audubon county, this state, buying eighty acres of railroad land in Greeley township, giving for the same ten dollars an acre, and on this farm ever since has made his home. He prospered here and in 1892 bought an additional tract of one hundred and twenty acres in sections 21 and 27, in Greeley township, to which he since has added one hundred and twenty acres in the same township. He has recently built an entirely new set of buildings on the home farm in section 21, and now has one of the best-equipped and best-tilled farms in that part of the county.

Mr. & Mrs. Henry Mi nerman, Audubon County, Iowa

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MR. AND MRS. HENRY MINERMAN

In October, 1877, in Johnson county, Iowa, Henry Minerman was united in marriage to Elizabeth Watson, who was born in Burroughs county, Illinois, the daughter of Thomas and Mary A. (How) Watson, the former of whom was a native of Scotland and the latter of Ireland. To this union seven children have been born, of whom six are living: Charles, who lives in South Dakota, married Bertie May, to which union four children were born: Leonard, Vivian, Beatrice and Marcella; William, who lives in California, married Ada Mason and has one child, Wilma; Minnie, who married William Wahlert, lives in Aneta, Iowa, and has four children; Harold, Lyman, Ruth Vellma and Hazel Eunice; Bertie, who attended the Dennison high school, the western college at Harlan and Highland Park College at Des Moines, is a teacher in the schools of Greeley township; Veda, who followed the same course of training, also is teaching in the Greeley township schools, and Walter is a student in the Exira high school.

Mr. Minerman is a member of the Lutheran church, while his wife and Bertie are members of the Methodist church. He is a Republican and takes an active interest in the political affairs of the county. He is a substantial citizen and very popular with all who know him.


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. 656-657.