Willard C. Earle

EARLE, FOSTER, HEDGE, KNUDTSON

Posted By: S. Ferrall - IAGenWeb volunteer
Date: 1/12/2016 at 15:50:27

Willard C. Earle
Representative from Allamakee county, was born in 1833 in the first frame building built at Honsdale, Pennsylvania.

He moved with his parents to the old homestead in Hubbardston, Massachusetts, in 1840. His parents were Calvin Earle and Betsy Foster; Calvin Earle, six removes from Ralph Earle, who came to this country from England in 1834 - old Puritan stock.

Mr. Earle spent his boyhood days working on the old farm, going to district school, select school and academy, and teaching school in the winters.

In 1853 he was with his brother in Ohio and Pennsylvania, employed in civil engineering, and in 1854 he went to Waukon, Iowa, which has been his home ever since. Here he first worked in a sawmill, which he afterwards owned and turned into a flour mill. He built the first creamery and cheese factory in the country (sic).

He married Ellen A. Hedge January 1, 1860.

In 1861 he enlisted in the army; was elected captain of Company B, Twelfth Iowa Infantry. In 1863 he raised and comanded the Seventieth United States Colored Infantry. In 1865 he resigned to attend medical college.

Graduated from Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1866-1867 and returned to Waukon, Iowa, where he practiced medicine successfully for twenty-five years, during the time being associated with his father-in-law, Dr. I.H. Hedge, in a drug store; also with his brother, J.W. Earle, in the grain and stock business, and with Mr. Knudtson in a general store. He invested his earnings in farm lands around Waukon.

He spent much time and great energy in building a "plug" railroad into Waukon, which was completed in 1877.

He was elected Representative to the Nineteenth General Assembly and Senator to the Twenty-first General Assembly, filling out ex-Governor Larrabee's term when he resigned to run for Governor. For several years he has been president of the Citizens' State Bank. Elected Representative again in 1906. A Democrat in politics.

(pg 217)
Committees: Banks and Banking, Public Health, Public Accounting, Fish and Game, Public Lands and Buildings, Horticulture, Military, Representative Districts, Suppression of Intemperance

~source:
Iowa Official Register for the Years 1907-1908
22nd Number, Compiled Under the Supervision of William C. Hayward, Secretary of State, by Guy S. Brewer and John M. Jamieson; Des Moines, 1907; 'Biographies of State Representatives', pg 615 and 'Representative and their Respective Committees', pg 217