The mother was a native of Virginia and was reared in Ohio. Her father was born near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and there resided until twenty-three years of age. Both went to Bloomington, Illinois, with their respective parents and were married soon after becoming acquainted there. They resided in Story county from 1852 until 1883 and then went to South Dakota to live with a daughter. Judge Evans owned a homestead in that state. He died, however, in Story county but his wife passed away in South Dakota. He was for nine years county judge of Story county and made an excellent record on the bench as a fair and impartial jurist and one thoroughly conversant with the law. In the early days of his residence in Iowa he entered land here and at different times bought and sold several farms. His family numbered nine children of whom Mrs. O'Brien is the eldest. Her brother, William C. Evans, who enlisted in August, 1863, in the Ninth Iowa Cavalry, was killed in service. By her first marriage Mrs. O'Brien had three children: Samuel E.; Alonzo B.; and Leonora, now the widow of Albert Park.
Mr. O'Brien belongs to the First Church of Christ of Ames, of which he is a charter member. He is also a charter member of Ames Lodge No. 309, I. O. O. F., and of Ellsworth Post, G. A. R. He is the' only Mexican war veteran in this county and so far as is known is the only one living in Iowa. His life indeed covers a notable period in the history of the country. He has witnessed the introduction of telegraph and telephone. There was scarcely a railroad in the country at the time of his arrival here but he has lived to see this wide domain crossed and re-crossed by lines that connect the Atlantic with the Pacific. He came to Story county when it was largely wild and unsettled, when its prairies were covered with their native grasses and its streams were unbridged. Here he has lived for fifty-nine years watching a notable transformation and at all times bearing his part in the work of general progress.
HERBERT PEASE, M. D.
Less than seven years ago Dr. Herbert Pease began practice at Slater and he has applied himself with such capability and diligence that today his name is well known throughout this section of the state. He was born near Sandwich, Illinois, November 10, 1871, son of George W., and Adrianna (Stockholm) Pease. The father was born in Kendall county, Illinois, July 23, 1841, and the mother in the village of Fishkill, Dutchess county, New York, November 16, 1841. For some years after his marriage the father lived on a farm in La Salle county, Illinois, coming in 1881 to Collins township, Story county, Iowa, where he purchased eighty acres of Iand and established himself as one of the prosperous farmers of the county. He has lived retired at Collins since 1909.