PETER HEDGES.

The first settler in Union township, as now constituted, was Peter Hedges, who was the father of Breckenridge township and opened his house to the first election for officers. In the fall of 1850 he came to Cass county from Logan county, Ill., and entered a claim on Seven-Mile creek, at what was then called Hickory Grove, afterward known as Hedges' Grove, and still later as Gaylord's Grove. In 1859 he went to Colorado, returning to Cass county in the fall. The following year found him again in the mining country, and in the autumn once more among his friends, the farmers of this locality. Notwithstanding his wanderings he retained his popularity, and in January, 1861, appeared at the court house at Lewis as one of the newly created Board of Supervisors of the county. He served for the one-year term, and remained in the county until about 1863, when he sold his property to D. F. Gaylord, who gave his own name to the grove upon it and represented Union township on the Board of Supervisors for four or five years after the war. Mr. Hedges removed to Albany, Gentry county, Mo., and in 1881 again changed his residence to Excelsior Springs, Clay county, that State, where he died in the spring of 1882.

From "Compendium and History of Cass County, Iowa." Chicago: Henry and Taylor & Co., 1906, pp. 136-137.