Henry V. Ferguson (1850 - 1931)

FERGUSON, BANGS, YOUNG, TAYLOR

Posted By: County Coordinator (email)
Date: 7/19/2025 at 21:37:36

H. V. FERGUSON, A CIVIC LEADER FOR YEARS, DIES
Was In Many Business Activities In Early Days; Funeral To Be On Tuesday

Henry V. Ferguson, 81 for nearly half a century prominent in the business, civic and social life of Cedar Rapids, died Friday at 6 p.m. in Appleton, Wis. After a long illness. The body will be brought to Cedar Rapids for burial Tuesday, the services to be held at Turner chapel.

Mr. Ferguson left Cedar Rapids a number of years ago and recently had been living with his daughter, Mrs. E. W. young, of Appleton, Wis. Mrs. Ferguson died in 1926.

During his residence here he was engaged in many business activities, most of which had to do with railroad development and the building of towns west and northwest of Cedar Rapids, extending into Nebraska. He was best known here through his association with the following concerns: Iowa Railroad Land company, which was a consolidation of several other companies owning lands, town lots and coal properties; the Kimball Building company, which erected an office building in Cedar Rapids on the site of the present Merchants National bank building; the Cedar Rapids and Marion City Railway company, the Electric Land company, and the Cedar Rapids Water company.

Among those with whom Mr. Ferguson was associated in these enterprises locally were the late P. E. Hall, John S. Ely, A.T. Averill, James L. Bever, George B. and Walter D. Douglas, C. J. Ives and C. G. Greene.

Leader In Civic Affairs
Mr. Ferguson gave unselfishly of his time and his means to the advancement of many a civic and social enterprise. He was one of the organizers of the Home for Aged Women in Cedar Rapids, he served as a member of the board of trustees of Coe College, he was one of the organizers of the Occidental club, a social group in existence many years ago. This club was finally merged with the Commercial club of which he was the president, and which was the immediate predecessor of the present Chamber of Commerce.

When the Cedar Rapids Country club was organized, he was one of its incorporators, for many years was a director and for several years its president.

Mr. Ferguson was elected to the city council in 1888 to fill a vacancy. On the expiration of this term, he was chosen for another term, but at the expiration of that period he refused to be a candidate for re-election. During the Worl war he was appointed chairman of the civic and war activities bureau of the Chamber of Commerce and took an active part in the Liberty Loan drives and other work of that character.

Came Here in 1868
Born in Colbourg, Ontario, Canada, March 14, 1850, he soon moved with his parents to the United States where the family settled at Aurora, Ill. He came to Cedar Rapids in August 1868, and obtained a position as a clerk with the Cedar Rapids and Missouri River railroad – the company which constructed and owned the railroad from Cedar Rapids to the Missouri near Council Bluffs, which later became the property of the Chicago and North Western. He was elected auditor of the Cedar Rapids and Marion City railway in 1880.

Mr. Ferguson was married to Ella Aristine Bangs Oct. 14, 1874, at Spencerport, New York. The children living are Louis Bangs Ferguson, Evanston, Ill., Arthur Edward Ferguson, Salmon, Idaho, Henry Hall Ferguson, Cedar Rapids, and Mrs. E. W. Young, Appleton, Wis. He is also survived by a sister, Mrs. W. K. Taylor, a former resident of Cedar Rapids, and her daughter, Miss Ruth Taylor, prominent in social service work at Grasslands Farm, Westchester County, New York.

Henry V. Ferguson lived a long life, a good life, a useful life, one that helped in the development of this community and of this state, and he has inspired others to lead similar lives. He made a very worth-while contribution to his day and generation – and to “the vast forever.”

Friend Gives Tribute
A friend of Mr. Ferguson has written the following tribute to his life:
“The younger generation of businessmen and citizens of Cedar Rapids may not clearly remember Henry V. Ferguson – affectionately called “Harry” by most of those who knew him; for it has been nearly twenty years since he was an active force in business affairs and it has been several years since he made Cedar rapids his home. But he will be remembered, and affectionately, by those from forty-five years upward who knew him as one of our leading businessmen and as a friend.
“They will remember him for his uprightness in all life’s relationships, for his kindliness and his good fellowship. He was always, and to the manor born, a gentleman…He was one of those men who always looked as though he had just come from his tailor. Yet he made no special effort so to appear. He was simply innately immaculate, and he was as clean in his thought and his life as he was in his dress.
“For almost half a century he filled a large place in Cedar Rapids. He was from the first a force in affairs of great moment in the development of Cedar Rapids.” (Source: The Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Sun, Nov 15, 1931, pg. 1)