FIRST WHITE BABY OF CITY PIONEER RESIDENT OF COUNTY PASSES Funeral
of Miss Hannah Ten Eyck, 87 year old Johnson county pioneer, was held
Sunday from the Brick chapel and burial was in the cemetery there, near
which she spent most of her life.
Miss Ten Eyck, born January 8,
1840, in what was said to be the first house of any consequence here,
on the corner of Iowa and Dubuque streets, claimed to be the first
white child born in Iowa City.
She was the daughter of Mathew
and Salome Cole Ten Eyck, who left their home in Dayton, Ohio, in 1838
to become pioneers of Iowa. They came to Muscatine in a covered
wagon, ferried across the Mississippi and reached Johnson County in
1839.
After the birth of Hannah, the family moved to a
homestead in Scott Township. Land for the Brick Chapel and
cemetery was donated by Mathew Ten Eyck from this homestead. The
first home was a log cabin built and chinked with mud by him.
“Aunt Hannah,” as she was known to her friends, spend her girlhood on
this homestead, caring for her parents until their death. She attended
school in Mount Vernon and private schools in Iowa City.
Before
her death Miss Ten Eyck frequently spoke of the hardships of pioneer
days, when Muscatine was the nearest market and grain had to be hauled
and supplied obtained there. She often referred to John Brown,
who stayed overnight at her father’s home whenever he passed through
the neighborhood, and of the buffalo wallow at the east end of Market
street.
Miss Ten Eyck lived on the homestead until about two
years ago, when she went to West Branch to make her home with her
niece, Mrs. Charles Stewart. Six months ago she came to Iowa
City. Death from apoplexy occurred Saturday at the R.A.A. Drew’s
home, 725 Maggard Street. She had been in fair health until the
day before.
A sister, Mrs. Cornelia Cowgill, and 10 nieces and nephews survive.
Source: Iowa City Press Citizen, 19 December 1927
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