CHAPTER VII.
PYMOSA TOWNSHIP (CONT'D).
Religion had already taken root in Pymosa township; and that was a fixture. James Kincade who followed James L. Byrd as the second permanent settler; in the winter of 1854-5 threw open his log cabin to perhaps a dozen people of all ages, and a few simple religious meetings were held therein during that season.
In the summer of 1856 Tamar E. Lorah, one of the daughters of the well known and ever popular Judge Lorah, opened the first school in the township, in her father's frame dwelling on section 14. The Judge had been a resident of the locality since the fall of 1854, and in after years became one of the largest land owners in the county and prominent as a county judge and State legislator. The house in which his daughter established the pioneer school of the township was the second frame dwelling to be erected in Pymosa township. The first was built by Samuel Knepper, a Pennsylvania German, who a few years afterward removed to Council Bluffs and engaged in the drug business.
'Squire Brinkerhoff, the new justice of the peace, was not long out of employment in his official capacity. Milton Wilson contracted to make some shingles for William Hamlin, and as they were not satisfactory the job was not completed, and Hamlin sued for damages. Edward Gingery, a German from Ohio-- one of four brothers who located on sections 22 and 27 and lived there many years -- was one of the jurors who sat on the shingle case tried in 'Squire Brinkerhoff's log cabin.
In the 'fifties it is obvious that a few men did all the work, made all the improvements and embraced all the historical characters of Pymosa township -- which is not so remarkable when one remembers how few men there were in the township. In the midst of life, therefore, when its pioneers prepared for death, it was 'Squire Brinkerhoff (with James Mahew, a newcomer) who for cemetery purposes deeded an acre of land situated on the northeast quarter of section 22. This was in the year 1856, and there was a sad personal reason for James Brinkerhoff's action; he had but recently lost a child, and its little body, whose temporary grave had been upon his farm, was transferred to the Pymosa grounds. This was the first burial in the cemetery.
"Compendium and History of Cass County, Iowa." Chicago: Henry and Taylor & Co., 1906, pp. 114-115.
Transcribed by Cheryl Siebrass, January, 2014.
