History of Iowa From the Earliest Times..., 1903 - J

1903 Index

History of Iowa From the Earliest Times To The Beginning of the Twentieth Century
Volume IV, Iowa Biography, B. F. Gue, 1903.

J


Unless otherwise noted, biographies submitted by Becke Dawson.

FRANK D. JACKSON, fourteenth Governor of Iowa, was born at Arcade, Wyoming County, New York, January 26, 1854. In 1867 he came with his parents to Jesup, in Buchanan County, Iowa, where he attended the public schools. He also attended the State Agricultural College, afterward entering the Law Department of the State University where he graduated in 1874. He removed to Butler County in 1880, settling at Greene, where he engaged in the practice of law. He was chosen secretary of the State Senate in the winter of 1882 and reelected in 1884. At the Republican State Convention of 1884 he was nominated for Secretary of State and elected, serving by successive elections for three terms. In 1893 he was nominated by the Republican State Convention for Governor. For four years the Democratic party had secured the chief executive in the election of Governor Boies. The campaign was conducted with great vigor on both sides and resulted in the election of Frank D. Jackson by a plurality of more than 32,000. Governor Jackson served but one term, declining to be a candidate for reelection.

BERRYMAN JENNINGS , Iowa's first school-master, was born in Kentucky in 1807. Nothing is known of his boyhood or early education. In 1826 he removed Commerce, a small town in Illinois, on the east bank of the Mississippi River which became famous as the Mormon city of Nauvoo. There was a settlement on the west side of the river in the ‘Half Breed' tract where Dr. Isaac Galland, an educated man, lived with his family, where the town of Nashville stands. It was here in 1830 that Berryman Jennings, then a young man, opened a school in a log cabin. Very little is known of this first school more than that it was small and that among its pupils were Washington Galland (who was afterwards a member of the Legislature), his sisters and Captain J. W. Campbell. Mr. Jennings later studies medicine with Dr. Galland and at one time was a merchant in Burlington. In 1847 he joined an emigrant train and made the journey to Oregon by wagon. He settled in Oregon City, built a steamboat on the Columbia River and engaged in trade with San Francisco. He was a member of the Oregon Legislature and also served as Register of the United States Land Office. He died on the 22d of December, 1888.

EDWARD JOHNSTON was born in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, July 4, 1815. He studied law, was admitted to the bar and in 1837 went west, stopping at Burlington, then in Wisconsin Territory. He was one of the clerks of the Legislature and at the session of 1837-8 was elected one of the commissioners to take testimony in the legal controversy over the titles to the ‘Half Breed' lands in Lee County. Soon after he located at Fort Madison and was employed as counsel by the St. Louis claimants to these lands to secure a division, which resulted in a decree of title. In 1839 he was elected to the House of the Second Legislative Assembly of the new Territory of Iowa and was chosen Speaker, serving at the regular and special sessions. He was elected a member of the Council of the Third Legislative Assembly and served through the Fourth also. As a lawyer and legislator he ranked high and had great influence in framing laws and shaping the policy of the Territory. When James K. Polk became President he appointed Mr. Johnston United States District Attorney for Iowa. He was chosen a member of the convention which framed the present Constitution of the State and was one of the most influential of the delegates in that body. The last public position held by him was President of the "Pioneer Lawmakers' Association.' Judge Johnston was a lifelong Democrat. After his death, Hon. S. M. Clark, a Republican member of Congress, and long editor of the GATE CITY, wrote of Judge Johnston:

‘He was one of the best as well as one of the greatest men we have ever known. No man in Iowa had more to do with the making and shaping of the Commonwealth than he. He had a hand in making both statutes and Constitution. In the first quarter century of the Territory and State there was not an act of public importance done that he was not consulted, and his judgment used in fashioning it.'

He died on the 27 th of May, 1891. Two of his brothers were Governors; one of Pennsylvania and another of California.

GEORGE W. JONES was born in Vincennes, Indiana, April 12, 1804. His father, John R. Jones, was a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Missouri. The son, George W., was educated in Transylvania University in Kentucky. When a small boy he served as a drummer in a volunteer company in the war with Great Britain. In 1823 he made the acquaintance of Jefferson Davis who was a young officer in the military service on the frontier. They met again in the Black Hawk War and later served long together in the United States Senate and were warm friends. George W. studied law and in 1827 removed to Michigan Territory where he engaged in mining. During the Black Hawk War he served on the staff of General Henry Dodge. In 1835 he was elected delegate from Michigan Territory to Congress. Michigan at that time embraced that region of the northwest which was divided into the States of Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa and the Dakotas. He secured the organization of the Territory of Wisconsin, in 1837, was the first delegate in Congress from that Territory and procured the establishment of Iowa Territory. In 1845 he was appointed Surveyor-General of Iowa and removed to Dubuque. In 1848 he was chosen one of the first United States Senators from the State of Iowa. He was thoroughly devoted to the interests of the new State and during his long term of service in the Senate worked untiringly for its material prosperity. His intimate knowledge of needs of the northwest, derived from long residence on the frontier and his wide acquaintance with the public men of that period, enabled him to secure such legislation as was required for the rapid development of the great natural resources of the new State. In 1852 he was reelected for a term of six years but before its expiration the State passed under the control of the Republican party. As General Jones was a lifelong Democrat he could not hope for a third election and President Buchanan appointed him United States Minister to New Granada in South America. After his return from that mission in 1861 General Jones was arrested by a United States marshal and confined in Fort Lafayette for about two months on a charge of disloyalty. He had written a private letter to his old friend, Jefferson Davis, which had been intercepted by a Government official. In the letter were found indiscreet if not disloyal expressions and in that time of great public excitement over secession and Rebellion the arrest followed. He was never indicted or placed on trial and President Lincoln soon ordered his release. In 1892 General Jones was granted a pension by special act of Congress for services in the Black Hawk War. In April, 1894, Governor Jackson and the General Assembly of Iowa then in session, tendered to General Jones a public reception in recognition of his valuable services in the formative periods of the Territory and State. General Jones died at his home in Dubuque July 22, 1896, at the age of ninety-two.

EDMUND L. JOY was born at Albany, New York, October 1, 1835, and was educated at Anthony's Classical Institute, Albany Academy and the University of Rochester. He studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1857 and immediately thereafter removed to Iowa, making his home at Keokuk where he entered upon practice. Later he settled in Ottumwa where he was chosen city attorney in 1860. At the beginning of the Civil War he was active in raising troops and upon the organization of the Thirty-sixth Regiment of Iowa Volunteers he was elected captain of Company B. He participated in the campaigns in Tennessee, the siege of Vicksburg and the Yazoo Pass expedition, taking part in the engagement at Fort Pemberton. At the Battle of Helena he commanded the left wing of the regiment and was in the Little Rock campaign. In 1864 he was appointed by President Lincoln Judge Advocate, with the rank of major, and assigned to the Seventh Army Corps, serving in the Department of Arkansas. He assisted in the organization of the judicial system of the State under reconstruction and aided in the reestablishment of the State government after the close of the war, under a new Constitution. After retiring from the service he removed to Newark, New Jersey, where he served in the Legislature of that State in 1871-2. He was a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1880 and in 1884-5 he was a Government director of the Union Pacific Railroad Company by appointment of President Arthur. Mr. Joy died at Newark, New Jersey, February 14, 1892.

WILLIAM L. JOY was one of the sturdy pioneers of Sioux City and for a quarter of a century one of the foremost lawyers of northwestern Iowa. He was born in Townshend, Vermont, August 17, 1830. After graduating at Amherst College in 1855, he read law and was admitted to the bar. In the spring of 1857 he traveled westward until he reached the then little frontier town of Sioux City where he decided to make his home. He became a partner of N. C. Hudson in the practice of law, and some years later became a partner with Craig L. Wright, and for twenty years the law firm of Joy & Wright was the leading one in Sioux City. They were attorneys for the Illinois Railway Company, the Sioux City and Pacific, the Dakota Southern, Columbus and Black Hills Railway companies and the Iowa Falls and Sioux City Railroad Land Company. In 1865 Mr. Joy was elected Representative for the district composed of the counties of Plymouth, Woodbury, Cherokee and Sioux, in the Eleventh General Assembly, where he ranked high as a legislator. He was one of the organizers of the Sioux National Bank, and served as president up to 1896. He was also deeply interested in the public schools serving for twenty years as a director and president of the board. He died in California, July 1, 1899.

JOSEPH M. JUNKIN was a native of Iowa, having been born at Fairfield I 1854. He was educated in the schools of Fairfield and Red Oak, taking the law course at the State University at Iowa City, graduating in 1879. Soon after he entered into partnership with Horace E. Deemer, who became a judge of the Supreme Court of the State. In 1895 Mr. Junkin was nominated by the Republicans of the district composed of the counties of Mills and Montgomery for State Senator. He was elected and served in the Twenty-sixth and Twenty-seventh General Assemblies, attaining high rank as a legislator. At the close of his term he was reelected serving in the Twenty-eighth and Twenty-ninth General Assemblies, taking an active part in the important work of the two sessions.

WILLIAM W. JUNKIN, veteran journalist, was born at Wheeling, Virginia, January 25, 1831. He attended the common schools in boyhood and at eleven years of age set type in the office of the WHEELING ARGUS. In 1843 he came with his father's family to Iowa Territory, locating on a farm in Lee County. In 1845 on removing to Fairfield in Jefferson County, he became an apprentice in the office of the IOWA SENTINEL, a weekly paper established that year by A. R. Sparks. In the summer of 1849 he went to Fort Des Moines where Barlow Granger was about to issue the first number of the IOWA STAR, the first newspaper published at the future capital of the State. He procured work in the office and assisted on the first issue of the paper, continuing in the office for some months. Returning to Fairfield, on the 26 th of May, 1853, he became the half owner and publisher of the FAIRFIELD LEDGER which had been established about a year before. Mr. Junkin in August, 1854, purchased Mr. Fulton's interest and became sole editor and proprietor. He was a Whig and then a Republican. Few men have worked more intelligently for the development of a town and State than this pioneer journalist. Mr. Junkin held many local offices but never sought higher positions, preferring to give his best energies to his chosen profession. During General Harrison's administration he served as United States Indian Inspector. Mr. Junkin died at his home in Fairfield on the 21 st of February, 1903, at the age of seventy-three, after service as a journalist continuously for more than half a century on the FAIRFIELD LEDGER.