Allen, Mrs. Rebecca A.

ALLEN, BURROWS, BURK, PIERCE, STEBERG

Posted By: Patricia Morehouse
Date: 2/18/2007 at 14:46:04

History of Greene and Carroll Counties, Iowa 1887

Mrs. Rebecca A. Allen, proprietor of a boarding-house at Grand Junction, was born in Oswego County, New York, August 20, 1932, daughter of Amos Burrows, deceased. January 23, 1850, she was married to John Allen, and has had six children, two of whom are living--Amelia J. and Austin D., Charley Frank died at the age of five years. Amelia married G. B. Burk, and has two living children--Ida B. and Fannie T. Mr. Burk died and Mrs. Burk married William Pierce of this place. They have one child--Fred A.... Austin married Mary Steberg, living in Angus, this State, and they have two children ---Lena A. and Harry D. Mrs. Allen removed with her husband to McDonough County, Illinois, in 1853, and to this county one year later, settling in Washington township, then a wild country. They entered their land at Des Moines, which was then a small place, about the size of Grand Junction. They did most of their trading at Des Moines, about fifty miles distant; also had to go there or to Boone County to get their corn ground. The terrible severe weather killed their cow. Mrs. Allen saw droves of elk, deer, etc., in great numbers; also saw lynx. She has endured all the hardships and privations of pioneer life, having grubbed land herself to make her garden. There was but one house where Jefferson now stands when Mr. and Mrs. Allen settled in the county, that was a log house. She sold produce up and down the railroad for some time. She came to Grand Junction in 1872, and kept the St. Louis House two years, then kept the Allen House nine years. She is now keeping a first-classs boarding house, and is having a good patronage, which she richly deserves.