Crook County Wyoming
Biographies
Crook County Wyoming
Biographies
HUGH BURNS
Hugh Burns, of Inyankara, Crook county, Wyoming, was born in County Donegal, Ireland, on February 24. 1830, the son of John and Mary (Carr) Burns, whose forefathers had lived in the Emerald Isle for many generations, tilling the soil and bearing the burdens of their lot with patience, fidelity and cheerfulness and doing what they could in their unostentatious way to advance the interests of the community. In 1842, when he was twelve years old, Hugh Burns was brought to America by his parents who settled in Greene county, N. Y., and there in the midst of the picturesque and historic Catskill Mountains they pursued the peaceful vocation of their fathers until death ended their time.
Their son Hugh began his education in his native land and completed it in his new home, where he remained until he was twentyfour years old aiding in the work on the farm. In 1864 he sought a new country for his hopes and aspirations, and removing to Leavenworth, Kan., engaged in freighting operations between that city and Fort Laramie, Wyo. He conducted his operations to various cities and camps in Wyoming until 1867, and then halted at Cheyenne, then only the promise of a town and mainly composed of tents. From there he went to Fort Saunders and was there when Laramie was founded.
He worked on ranches and at other occupations in that neighborhood until 1883 when he removed to his present ranch in Crook county, seventeen miles south of Sundance, where he was one' of the first settlers and saw much of the real hardship and privation of pioneer life, his very ranch being part of a battlefield on which whites and Indians had fought desperately for the mastery and civilization had triumphed over barbarism in 1875. Since then nature has covered the wounds of that struggle with her greenest tapestry, and skillful husbandry has transformed the wilds into fruitful fields periodically white with the harvests of systematic industry, so that now what was at Mr. Burns' settlement an almost unbroken wilderness is one of the thickly populated and highly cultivated sections of a great and growing, although still youthful state, and it owes its development and progress largely to his thrift, enterprise and influential spirit of advancement.
He and his two sons, who have ranches adjoining his, have as fine a body of land as the county contains, and carry on one of the most active and profitable stock industries in this portion of the state. In all the affairs of his locality Mr. Burns has taken a great interest and a leading part. He is the postmaster at Inyankara and is looked up to as a man of commanding influence in all lines of civil and commercial life in the community. On January 1, 1878, at Laramie, he was united in marriage with Miss Mary J. McCall, a native of Ireland, where her parents, Terence and Jane
McCall, were also born of ancestry that had been resident there from time immemorial. Her father was a prosperous shoe merchant in Ireland, and both of her parents have died and been buried there. Mr. and Mrs. Burns have two children, both sons, Charles and John. All the family are members of the Catholic church, and it is but just to say of the sons that they are exemplars of the business thrift and energy, the sterling worth and all the amenities of life for which their parents have been distinguished from their youth. ["Progressive Men of the State of Wyoming", 1901, By A.W. Bowen & Co - Sub. by a Friend of Free Genealogy]
FRED L. CLARK
After years of wandering and working in various places, pushing one enterprise after another with characteristic energy and winning success from many hard conditions through clearness of vision and resoluteness of purpose, Fred L. Clark of near Inyankara, Crook county, Wyoming, at length halted his weary feet in one of the most picturesque and desirable sections of his last adopted state and is there engaged in a profitable and extensive business, raising cattle in large numbers and of superior grades, constantly enlarging his herds and improving their quality.
Mr. Clark's life began on December 22, 1859, in Lake county, Ohio, where his parents. Nathan and Margaret (Tinny) Clark, passed the years of their maturity, the mother dying in 1866 and the father in 1899, up to which time he carried on a high-grade merchant tailoring establishment, .doing business in Cleveland, although residing at Willoughby, a beautiful lake town about twentyfive miles distant. Here their son Fred attended school and after finishing his education he clerked in stores, living with his father until he was twenty-four years of age.
In 1882 the love of adventure, a spirit of independence and a thirst for larger opportunities and a freer life attracted him to the far west, and he came to Hailey, Idaho, and collecting there a fine herd of milch cows he opened a dairy business which he conducted through the summer, taking his cattle to Boise City in the fall and disposing of them at that place and turning his attention to the stock business, handling blooded horses and cattle, later entering a general store as a clerk until the summer of 1889, when he came overland to northern Wyoming and located a homestead in Crook county fourteen miles south of Sundance, where he remained engaged in stockraising until the fall of 1899, when he sold the ranch and bought the one on which he now lives, eighteen miles south of Sundance, at the foot of Mt. Kara. Lying among the hills with a pleasing and advantageous succession of upland and plain, it is well watered, produces large crops of hay and grain and has an unusually fine body of grazing ground. The home place contains 480 acres and Mr. Clark controls about 800 more, all of which are under tribute to his extensive cattle business, which is one of the largest and most renowned in that part of the state. In addition to its natural beauty and interest, the section of country in which Mr. Clark's ranch is located has historic associations and suggestions of value. What is known as Custer's trail runs by the ranch, marking the route of the distinguished but unfortunate general when in pursuit of the Indians. His name is cut in bold letters on the bald rock far up the mountain side, and it is said that inscription was the cutting of the general's own hand.
April 18, 1889, witnessed the marriage of Mr. Clark to Miss Ollie Thompson, who was born in Colchester, Ill., in 1870, the ceremony being performed at Soda Springs, Idaho, and the bride was a daughter of Michael S. and Nancy (Dunsworth) Thompson, members of pioneer families in the great Prairie State, who settled in Idaho in 1884 and went to ranching near Boise City, where Mr. Thompson now resides, his capable wife having passed into the Eternal Silence in 1902. Mr. and Mrs. Clark have had four children, Nathan S., John V., Delia B., deceased, and Ethel L. Politically Mr. Clark affiliates with the Republican party, but is more concerned for the advancement of the community than party triumphs and he is held in high esteem throughout a large scope of country. ["Progressive Men of the State of Wyoming", 1901, By A.W. Bowen & Co - Sub. by a Friend of Free Genealogy]
HON. GEORGE W. CRESWELL, M. D.
The most successful and still rising young physician and surgeon of Buffalo, Johnson county, Wyoming, is George W. Creswell, M. D.. who was born in Randolph, McLean county, Ill. on January 25, 1871, a son of William and Elizabeth (Thompson) Creswell, natives of Londonderry, Ireland, and the state of Virginia. William Creswell, the grandfather of Doctor George W., was the first of this family to come to America; he settled in Quebec, Canada, where he passed the remainder of his life, his widow and her family subsequently removing to Illinois. William Creswell, the father, has long been engaged in the stock business, in which he has had experience in various states, being at present located in Crook county, Wyo., where he owns an extensive ranch and is still engaged in the cattle trade. Dr. George VV. Creswell acquired his elementary education in the public schools of Bloomington, Ill., and when fully prepared entered the Commercial College in the same city, from which he was graduated in 1891. Being thus well grounded in the principles and practices of business life, he entered the Northern Indiana University in the same year, took a full four years' course and was graduated from the medical department in 1894. He then entered Rush Medical College in Chicago, where he was graduated with honors and at once entered upon the active practice of his chosen profession in the commercial metropolis of the Prairie State, and for one year met with very flattering success. In the fall of 1898 Doctor Creswell, believing that the less crowded professional fields of the Far West offered inducements superior to those afforded in the densely populated cities of the East, where physicians "most do congregate," came to Buffalo, Wyo., to try his fortunes and here his success has been so satisfactory that he has seen no cause or reason to regret his decision, as his medical talents has been fully recognized and his professional ability appreciated to the extent that unvarying success invariably enforces upon the general public or onlooking laymen. In 1901, Doctor Creswell took up an academic course of study in the postgraduate college of New York, thus adding to the medical erudition and experience he had acquired by his previous study and practice, which has been and still is of a general character. In politics Doctor Creswell is very active in his party's counsels and extremely popular with its rank and file, as well as with his fellow citizens generally. In 1900 he was elected to represent his district in the State Legislature of Wyoming and in 1901 was elected mayor of Buffalo, in both of which offices he gave unqualified satisfaction, as he performed their various duties with the tact of a practiced veteran. Doctor Creswell was most happily joined in matrimony on January 19, 1902, with Miss June J. Holloway, of Buffalo, Wyo., a daughter of the late Henry Holloway, of Buffalo, Wyo. Doctor Creswell's outdoor practice extends all over Johnson county, in addition to which his office practice is reaching very extensive proportions. In addition to the handsome income derived from this practice, the Doctor has a source of profit from a stock ranch in Crook county, in which he has a large interest. The Doctor takes a lively interest in the prosperity of his town and county and the progress of the state is to him a matter of commendable pride, and the result of his patriotism is that he has reached the very apex of public esteem. ["Progressive Men of the State of Wyoming", 1901, By A.W. Bowen & Co - Sub. by K.T.]
L. R. DAVIS, mining operator; pres. Bear Lodge Gold Mining Co.; (Rep.); b. Oct. 25, 1837, Fitchburg, Massachusetts; s. of Edmund and Z. P. (Lovell) Davis; educ. pub. schls. Watertown, N. Y.; student Galesville Univ., Galesville, Wisconsin, 1860-2; res. Massachusetts, 1837-42; New York, 1842-54; Illinois, 1854-59; Wisconsin, 1859-63; entered the civil war as private Co. C, 30th Wisconsin infantry, serving until June 19, 1865; served in Indian frontier campaign, 1863-4, and in Kentucky and Tennessee until mustered out; Methodist minister, 1865-1871; res. in Dubuque, Iowa, 1871-5; went to Black Hills, South Dakota, 1877, and engaged in mining and prospecting until he located in Wyoming, May, 1886; located then at present site of Newcastle; employed by Kilpatrick Bros. & Collins, railroad contractors, in different capacities in Newcastle from 1888 until December, 1901; organized and became president of the Bear Lodge Gold Mining Co., operating mines in the Bear Lodge mountains of Wyoming, 1908; receiver U. S. land office, Sundance, Wyo., 1901-9; mem. Wyo. H. of Rep., 1895-9; speaker of H. of Rep., session 1899; member and speaker again, 1911-13; mem. 32 deg. Mason; Wyoming Consistory No. 1. Address: Sundance, Wyoming. [Source: Men of Wyoming, By C. S. Peterson, Publ 1915. Transcribed by Anna Parks]
AUGUST ERICKSON
Every land has contributed of its best and most serviceable elements to build up and develop the great Northwest of the United States, and from none has come a more thrifty, more industrious, more law-abiding or more progressive people than from the land of Gustavus Adolphus and Charles the Twelfth, the land of manly spirit and intellectual progress, the land of frugality and industry, fair Sweden that basks in the radiance of the midnight sun. Among those of our citizens of Swedish nativity August Erickson, of near Invankara, a prosperous and progressive farmer and stockman on Canyon Springs Prairie, twenty miles south of Sundance, has made a lasting impression on the community in which he lives and secured a firm hold on the esteem and confidence of its people. He was born at Stockholm, Sweden, on November 8, 1857, the son of Lars Erickson, and lost his mother by death when he was but a child.
He remained with his father until he was fourteen years old, attending school and learning what he could of men and life by observation, at that age being apprenticed to a stonemason of Stockholm, and after reaching his majority worked at the trade there for fourteen years. In 1892 he came to America, and after making a visit to his brother in Kansas and working at his trade for a short time in Kansas City, removed to Wyoming, where he was employed as a mason by Kilpatrick Bros. & Collins for a year and a half. He then settled at Inyankara and worked at his trade in that vicinity until 1895 when he took up the ranch on which he now lives and conducts a profitable enterprise in farming and raising stock, and here Mr. Erickson has not only redeemed a goodly portion of the virgin soil of Wyoming from its wild condition and making it to smile with the white harvests of peace and plenty, but has given an example of sterling manhood, zealous industry and fidelity to duty which has made him a potential force for good in the community. He was married on March 3, 1883, at Stockholm, Sweden, with Miss Annie Johnson, also a native of Sweden, where for generations her forefathers were among the productive elements of a progressive civilization. Four children have blessed their union, Eric, August, Oscar and Louis. The family render allegiance to the Lutheran church in religious affiliation and in politics Mr. Erickson is an unfaltering Democrat. ["Progressive Men of the State of Wyoming", 1901, By A.W. Bowen & Co - Sub. by a Friend of Free Genealogy]
CHARLES IVES
Coming to Crook county, Wyoming, soon after reaching his majority, and living within her borders ever since, Charles Ives of Pleasant Valley, five miles north of Sundance, has passed nearly the whole of his mature life as a productive and improving factor in the civilization and development of this portion of the state. His native home was in Kankakee county, Illinois, where he was born on August 11, 1861. His parents, Myron and Mary (Yorks) Ives, were engaged in farming in that county for a number of years and then removed to Howard county, Ia., where they again farmed, passing fourteen years at that occupation in that county. In 1882 they sold their interests in Iowa and took another flight towards the setting sun, locating at Spearfish, S. D.. where they remained four years, cultivating the soil also there, at the end of that time moving to Crook county, Wyo., where the. father took up a ranch adjoining the one now occupied by his son, Charles, and engaged in ranching and cattleraising until his death in June, 1900.
Since then the mother has made her home with her children in Crook county and at Spearfish, S. D. She was born at Jersey City, in the state of New Jersey, and in childhood came west to Indiana with her parents, later removing to Illinois, where her husband was born and reared and where they were married. Charles Ives grew to manhood and received his education in Howard county, Iowa, and accompanied his parents to Spearfish, S. D., in 1882. There he worked on ranches and on the farm with his father until they came to Wyoming, when he homesteaded the ranch on which he now lives, which is one of the desirable places in a region of great fertility and beauty, the well-known Pleasant Valley, on which nature has smiled with lavish kindness. His ranch is five miles north of Sundance and yields as the results of his labor and its fertility good annual crops of grain and hay, and furnishes a substantial basis for his stock industry and bountiful provision for his herds and flocks, which are constantly expanding in volume and value. In addition to the land he owns he has several ranches rented, the most of which he also has under cultivation. On November 11, 1896. Mr. Ives was united in marriage with Miss Edna Allen, a native of Minnesota, but then living at Spearfish where the marriage was solemnized. Her father, Abner Allen, is a resident of Pelican Rapids, Minn., where he is engaged in newspaper work. Two children have blessed the home of Charles Ives, Winifred B. and Erva C. Mr. Ives is a Republican in politics and is always active in the service of his party. He and his accomplished wife are highly esteemed by a large circle of friends, who find their pleasant home a center of refined and gracious hospitality of true Western character. ["Progressive Men of the State of Wyoming", 1901, By A.W. Bowen & Co - Sub. by K.T.]
WILLIAM H. MILLER.
In this great land of hope and promise, of multitudinous opportunity and bountiful reward, every citizen is a sovereign, therefore liable to be called at any time to the administration of public affairs: and for the proper discharge of official duties each is well prepared by a continual participation in the thought and activities on which the government is founded. William H. Miller of Newcastle, Weston county, Wyoming, one of the leading cattle and ranchmen of his section of the state, who has demonstrated his fitness for public business by close and careful attention to his own and the good results achieved thereby, is no exception to the rule; that he has made an ideal official is no surprise to those who have known him in private life. He was born in Noble county, Ohio, on January 16, 1864, the son of William and Elizabeth (Rogers) Miller, of the same nativity as himself. The father owned a large sawmill in Lawrence county, that state, and for a number of years did a profitable business with it in that thriving and progressive section. In 1872 the family removed to Guthrie county, Iowa, and there engaged in farming until 1878, when they took a flight toward the setting sun, alighting in Colorado and settling at Villa Grove, at the base of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, a range rich in mineral deposits of enormous value. There the father discovered the Bonanza mine, one of the largest and most prolific silver mines in the state, and gave himself zealously to the work of developing it. He has since sold part of his interest, but owns the greater portion of this fruitful holding and still makes his home at Villa Grove. William H. Miller received his education in Guthrie county, Iowa, remaining there until 1876 when he removed to Cheyenne, Wyo., but after a short stay in that city went to the Black Hills and engaged in freighting, going from that region to Sidney, Neb., and there riding the range in the cattle industry until 1882. In 1883 he came to Crook county, Wyo., with cattle and rode the range in care of them for three years. In 1886 he started a cattleraising industry of his own, taking up a ranch nine miles south of Sundance, to which he has since made additions until it now comprises 640 acres of the best grazing and range land in that portion of the state. He is a stockholder and the vice-president of the Cambria Live Stock Co., of Newcastle, one of the largest and most enterprising organizations for handling sheep in the Northwest, controlling immense bodies of land and carrying on a business of great scope and activity. He is also a half owner of the Meek & Miller Cattle Co. Mr. Miller also owns stock in and is vice-president of the Coffee Oil Co., of Newcastle, whose fields of unctuous wealth lie southwest of the town and freely yield up their treasures to the industrious seeker. He owns much desirable property in the residence section of the city and has interests of value elsewhere. In 1894 he removed his cattle from Crook to Weston county and there ran them until 1901 when he disposed of them, still having a large number of horses in Crook county. From 1892 to 1898 he was extensively engaged in the dairy business near Cambria and in the latter year was elected sheriff of Weston county on the Republican ticket. He so bore himself in this responsible station that he won the regard of all men officially as he had already done personally and in a business way and was reelected in November, 1902, demonstrating the popularity he has acquired among the voters. On March 30, 1887, in Crook county, Wyo., Mr. Miller was united in marriage with Miss Anna McMoran of that county, a native of New York and a daughter of Robert G. and Mary McMoran, the former of Scotch and the latter of English ancestry. Her father was a brave and faithful soldier for the Union in the Civil War, who removed his family to Wyoming in 1883 and added his forceful energy to the cattleraising industry until his death in 1899, his widow still making her home in Crook county. The Millers have five children, Mary E., Helen R., Sidney A., C. Raymond and A. Ruth. Mr. Miller is a member of the Knights of Pythias at Cambria and the order of Red Men at Newcastle and both himself and his wife are members of the Episcopal church. ["Progressive Men of the State of Wyoming", 1901, By A.W. Bowen & Co - Sub. by K.T.]
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