D. M. HARRIS

Hon. D. M. Harris, senior member of the firm of Harris & Son, editors and proprietors of the Missouri Valley Times, was born in Dayton, Montgomery county, O., in 1821, and moved with parents to Ind. in 1824; thence to Maury county, Tenn. In 1854, he came to Audubon county, Ia., and engaged in farming and the real estate business, and there served three terms as county judge. He represented the 26th Iowa district during two sessions of the legislature. He next removed to Panora, Guthrie county, and engaged in the practice of law, also editing and publishing the Guthrie County Ledger. In 1868 he first came to Missouri Valley and established the Harrisonian, which he sold in 1872, the name of the paper being changed to the Missouri Valley Times. In the same year he moved to Independence, Kas., and published the Kansas Democrat, returned to Missouri Valley in 1873, engaging in the mercantile business. His establishment was shortly afterwards destroyed by fire, and he located at Exira, which town he had previously "laid out," and began the publication of the Audubon County Defender. Soon afterwards he published the Cap-Sheaf, at Atlantic, Cass county, which he conducted until 1876, when he resumed the publication of the Times at Missouri Valley. He was married in 1842 to Martha M. White, of Tenn.; candidate for lieutenant governor of Ia., in 1866, and was twice a candidate for county representative from Harrison county. He has held a number of minor offices. Robert H. Harris is a son of Judge Harris, and junior member of the firm. He was born in Tenn., in 1854, and in 1874 was married to Frances Chapman, of Exira, Ia. They have two sons.

Transcribed by Cheryl Siebrass January, 2020 from "History of Western Iowa, Its Settlement and Growth," by Western Publishing Company, Sioux City, Iowa, 1882, pg. 326.