ELMER CHASE.    Among the men who came into Delaware county at a comparatively early date and have grown up with the country   and have been identified with the best interests of the locality where he has lived,
must be recorded  the   name of   Elmer Chase, of Honey Creek  township.    Mr. Chase has lived in the county for more than a third of a century, and has seen the many changes which have marked its growth  and  development  since  he first cast his lot here, and in that growth and development he has borne his full share of the burden and has added his part to the general fund of the commonwealth.  Mr. Chase is a native of New York, as were also his parents, Daniel and Sallie (Benjamin) Chase. On his father's side he comes of York State ancestry from "time whereof the memory of man runneth not to the contrary." On his mother's side he is descended from New England stock. His paternal grandparents were Obadiah and Mary Chase. His maternal grandparents were Levi and Abigail Benjamin. His people belonged to the sturdy, industrious, frugal class that formed the staple stock of the New England and Middle states and which has furnished the nucleus of many thrifty, prosperous communities in the Western states and territories. There were seven children in the family to which the subject of this sketch belonged, four of whom are now living, all, like himself, having married and established themselves in one locality or another. D. F. Chase lives at Howard, S. Dak.; E. B. Chase lives at Sioux City, this state; Emma J., now widow of Charles H. Page, lives in southern Kansas.

The subject hereof, Elmer Chase, was born  in  the town of Rushford, Allegany county, K. Y., April 9, 1831.    He was reared in his native county, growing up on  his  father's  farm,  receiving a good common-school training and being brought up to habits of industry and usefulness. He went to Cattaraugus county, N. Y., in 1849, where, May 31, 1853, he married Miss Betsey Brown, and from which place he moved three years later to Iowa, settling in this county.    Like most of the men who came to Delaware county at the time, Mr. Chase was not burdened with .an abundance of this world's goods.    He came West purposely to better his condition.   At first it was a contest with him for bread and butter, but fortune favored him, and   through   great  industry   and strict economy he gradually accumulated some means, after the first year or two, so that by 1859, three years after he came to the county, he was enabled to buy, at that date, sixty acres in  the southwest   quarter   of   section 18, township 90, range 5,  in Honey Creek township, on which he moved and began his improvements, and success continued to attend his efforts.    He subsequently bought more land, which he also improved, owning now one   hundred   and forty acres, most of which he has under cultivation, what is not under plow being in grass. He has a handsome two-story   frame dwelling, good barns, large groves of trees, natural and artificial, and plenty of stock.    He has given his time and labor wholly to his farming interests, and his place gives   evidence   of   the   industry, thrift  and good  management that have prevailed there.
Mr. Chase has filled the usual number of local offices in his township, the duties of which he had discharged with the promptness and fidelity expected of all good citizens. He has avoided politics, believing that politics is one business and farming another, and that the two do not work well together, but affiliates with the democrats and supports the men and measures of that party on state and national issues. He belongs to the Grange society of Delaware county, and gives his hearty support to all measures of relief for the farming community.  In the labor of making for himself a home in the West, Mr. Chase has been ably assisted by the good lady whom he selected to share his fortunes nearly forty years ago, and who has since has borne him the companionship he sought with her hand. Mrs. Chase is her husband's junior by about three years, having been born March 25, 1834. She is a native of the town of Edmeston, Otsego county, N. Y., and is a daughter of Isaac and Sallie Brown, the father having been a native of Stonington, Conn., and the mother a native of New York. Her father was an active, intelligent and public-spirited man, foremost in his community in all matters of public note, having held a number of public offices, the duties of which he discharged with efficiency.

Mr. and Mrs. Chase have had born to them two children, a son and daughter  Charles E., residing at St. Joseph, Mo., and Laura E., wife of Jackson Green, residing at Coon Rapids, Carroll county, Iowa, who, with an adopted son, Leslie S., constitute all the family they ever had. They, however, have had other children in their household, having furnished a home at different times to orphans who were in need of the attention of the
charitably inclined. In this labor of love Mr. and Mrs. Chase have expended time, money and personal effort that the world knows not of. In affording succor and help to the homeless and friendless, as here noted, they have given a practical force and meaning to the divine injunction: "Feed my lambs," not often met with in this cold and selfish world. Such is an everyday religion of the best sort. " By their fruits ye shall know them."

 

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