Harrison County Iowa Genealogy

HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY, IOWA, 1891
BIOGRAPHIES

Page 688
EDWARD B. MEAD

Edward B. MEAD, one of the representative farmers of Harrison Township, who owns a hundred and twenty acres farm on sections 22 and 23, is a native of Dutchess County, N. Y. He was born July 6, 1835. He is the son of John B. and Ann E. (MARSHALL) MEAD, who were natives of the Empire State, and of English-German extraction. Our subject was reared in the city of Poughkeepsie, and educated in the public schools, until he was sixteen years of age, at which time he began to learn the cooper's trade; his father was also a cooper as was his grandfather. After he had learned his trade and when he was nineteen years of age, his parents left their native state, and came west to Illinois, locating in Kendall County, where the father of our subject engaged in farming, and died there in 1864, at the age of fifty years. His good wife and the mother of our subject, survived until 1882, and died at the age of seventy-four years. This worthy couple reared a family of eleven children--Edward, our subject; Angeline, wife of M. J. HOAG, of Illinois; Caroline, wife of William DURELL, a resident of Illinois; Phebe Ann, wife of John STEWART, both deceased; William D., a resident of Illinois; James H., a resident of Illinois; Charles, a resident of Illinois; Elizabeth, deceased; Sarah Catherine, deceased; Susan, deceased; and Jane deceased. Our subject remained in New York State, a few months after his parents came West, and when he came he went to work at Aurora, Ill., where he followed his trade a years and a half, and then went to Chicago, where he worked at his trade six years, and the next two years he spent on a farm in De Kalb County, and then removed to Kane County, where he farmed for three years, spent a year near Little Rock, Ill., and then removed to La Salle County, of the same State, purchased a farm and lived nine year, and in 1880, located on his present farm, where he has made many valuable improvements. Today his farm is numbered among the many excellent ones found in Northeastern Harrison County. He devoted his entire attention to farming and stock-raising. He is an intelligent as well as industrious man, by reason of which his labors have been crowned with more than ordinary success.

Our subject was united in marriage September, 3, 1856, to Adah DEAN, daughter of Smith A. and Delilah (WRIGHT) DEAN. She was born in Westchester County, N. Y., October 24, 1837. They reared a family of four children Elizabeth A., deceased, at the age of eight months; Anna D., wife of M. B. EWER, a resident of Lyons County; Jennie M., wife of T. J. YOUNG, residing in Harrison Township, and Ida A., at home.

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