Trease, George L. – 1844-1941

TREASE

Posted By: JCGS Volunteer
Date: 10/16/2010 at 22:04:27

George Trease, 97, Oldest Pioneer In Jasper County, Dies
Succumbs at 5:00 o’clock This Morning At Lynnville
(Special to The Daily News)
Lynnville – Death came today, early this morning, to Jasper county’s oldest pioneer – George L. Trease, 97, of Lynnville.
For 94 of the 97 years of his life, Mr. Trease lived in Lynnville, Jasper county, Iowa, only four years less than the life of this county – the only man of recent years who could come anyways near spanning the life of this county with his own.
Mr. Trease came to Lynn Grove township and the then budding town of Lynnville in 1847, brought here as a boy of three by his father, Joshua Trease. He had remained in this county for the remainder of his life seeing the rolling hills and prairies of southeastern Jasper county broken for settlement by the white man, participating in the modernizing of a raw Iowa prairie with his own hands and plow.
Dies at 5:00 a.m.
Mr. Trease died at his home in Lynnville, located at the foot of the hill and across the street from the Friends church at 5:00 o’clock this morning. He had been in poor health for the past several years, due to his advanced age. He is survived by his wife and four children, three sons, Floyd, Marshall and Harold Trease, who live in Lynnville and a daughter, Mabel, who lives in Mason City.
George L. Trease, 97, of Lynnville, Jasper county’s oldest pioneer resident – for 94 years- died this morning at his home at 5:00 a.m.
Funeral arrangements had not been completed by early this afternoon, pending word from the daughter in Mason City.
Mr. Trease was born in Tennessee on Sept. 13, 1844 – 97 years ago. He came to Lynnville in 1847, when that part of the county was just being opened for settlement. The first white settler to enter Jasper county was Adam Tool and his party which arrived at Tool’s Point (now known as Monroe) in 1842. First settlers into Lynn Grove township were Wesley Stallings and Tandy Wakefield who arrived in 1844, only three years before Mr. Trease arrived as a lad of three.
Of Dutch Descent
He was of Dutch descent. During his early years he farmed in and around Lynnville. But his health had been such the past few years that he hadn’t been able to get around much.
When he came to Jasper county, he related a few years back, Lynnville and Jasper county weren’t much. In Lynnville there was a store, a blacksmith ship, and a hotel of a sort. And, of course, there was the Lynnville mill, operated by John R. Sparks, who was one of the first pioneers to enter the county. The mill, rebuilt and repaired, has continued an institution in Lynnville down through the years, and today a mill still operates at the north end of town, located on the banks of the North Skunk river.
Mr. Trease used to recount many stories of pioneer life. Things used to be pretty tough in those early days he would say, “At times we’d live for three or four weeks straight on hominy,” he said. Folks raised lots of wheat in those early days, he said, and it made as much as 30 bushels to the acre. Folks would haul it by oxen team down to Oskaloosa.
Built Log Cabin
The Treases arrived in Lynn Grove in October of 1847, and put up with the Stallings for the winter. Then in the spring they built their own log cabin home about two miles south of the present site of Lynnville. They came up by way of Keokuk and Oskaloosa by oxen team, driving overland.
Mail used to come early through Lynnville by way of stage coach, which ran northwesterly across the country.
Only occasions on which he left Jasper county were in the 1860’s when he assisted in developing considerable of the western country, helping to haul corn and lumber and other materials for the army units which served as outposts for that country.
Source: Newton Daily News; Monday, December 22, 1941, page 1