A Narrative History of The People of Iowa with SPECIAL TREATMENT OF THEIR CHIEF ENTERPRISES IN EDUCATION, RELIGION, VALOR, INDUSTRY, BUSINESS, ETC.

by EDGAR RUBEY HARLAN, LL. B., A. M.
Curator of the Historical, Memorial and Art Department of Iowa
 

Volume I
 

THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY, Inc.

Chicago and New York 1931

JAMES H. O'DONOGHUE, M.D., is too well known in Buena Vista County to require any special introduction. He was born in Calhoun County, Iowa, July 8, 1868. His father, Michael O'Donoghue, was a native of New York State. He was a civil engineer and a teacher. In 1863 Michael O'Donoghue went to Illinois, and was superintendent of schools at Rockford. He was one of a family of fourteen children and eight of his brothers were soldiers in the Union Army.

From Illinois he came to Iowa, and took up a homestead and taught school at Lake City in Calhoun County. He closed his school early one Friday, March 1, 1868, to attend a settlers' meeting at his homestead twenty miles away. He started on foot across country and was caught in one of the terrible blizzards which for many years was remembered in that section. After search had been abandoned his body was found twenty days later by a hunter, Rinaldo Gray, within a mile of his homestead. He was twenty-eight years old when he perished.

Michael O'Donoghue married Catherine Cannell, who was born on the Isle of Man and was a small girl of seven years when her mother came to this country and settled in Illinois. After the death of her husband she proved up the homestead he had entered. For fourteen years she held the office of superintendent of schools at Calhoun County. Later she married Rev. J. B. Trumble, a minister of the Methodist Church, and survives him, her home being at Hollywood, California.

Doctor O'Donoghue was graduated from high school at Rockwell City, Iowa, in 1883 from Epworth Seminary, Epworth, Iowa, and soon afterward came to Buena Vista, County and for two years was principal of the Alta schools. For a time he was superintendent of schools at Bloomington, Nebraska, and later was a member of the faculty of Morningside College at Sioux City, Iowa, and Sioux City College of Medicine. He was superintendent of schools at Correctionville four years and for six years was superintendent at Storm Lake. He has the A. B. degree from Morningside College and has the Master of Science degree from the University of Iowa. he studied medicine in the Sioux City Medical College, in the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, and in 1904 graduated from teh Illinois Medical College of Chicago, now the medical school of Loyota University. After graduating he returned to Storm Lake, where he was already well known as an educator, and for over a quarter of a century has been engaged in general practice.

The only interruption to his professional service was the twenty-two months he was absent with the colors during the World war. He was commissioned an officer in the medical department June 22, 1917, and was assigned duty with the Aviation Corps on the Pacific Coast until February, 1919. Doctor O'Donoghue is a member of the Buena Vista County, Iowa State and American Medical Associations, is a Royal Arch Mason, a Methodist, and in matters of politics votes an independent choice.

He married, December 30, 1890, Miss Janet M. Fairburn, who was born in Dubuque County, Iowa. They have three children: Archibald F., an orthopedic surgeon who graduated in medicine at Iowa City in 1918 and served the colors in the Medical Corps during the war. He is now practicing at Sioux City. He married, in 1920, Miss Helen Dougherty, daughter of Dr. T. E. Dougherty, a dentist at Guthrie Center, and they have one daughter, Janet, born January 6, 1925. Dorothy graduated from the Law School at Iowa City in 1924, receiving the honorary election to the Order of Coif. She married in 1926 Kent R. Martin, an attorney, also a law graduate in the same class and with the same honorary distinction, and now a member of the well-known firm of Swan, Martin & Martin at Atlantic, Iowa. They have one daughter, Janet, born September 25, 1930.

Don H., who is also an orthopedic surgeon, connected with the Children's Hospital at Oklahoma City. He graduated from Iowa State University in 1924, with the degree of M. D. He married, in 1927, Miss Ragnhild Christensen, daughter of Louis Christensen, a contractor and builder at Oklahoma City, and formerly of Storm Lake.

Debbie Clough Gerischer

Iowa History Project