IAGenWeb - Marion County |
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Liberty Township occupies the southeast corner of the county and is coextensive with Congressional township 74, range 18, having an area of thirty-six square miles. Cedar Creek flows in a northeasterly direction diagonally across the township and in the vicinity of this stream and its tributaries are a number of coal mines, some of the veins measuring ten feet or more in thickness. In 1846 one of these veins in the southern part of the township (section 32) was found to be on fire. How long it had been burning before the fire was discovereed is not known, but it continued to burn until the flood of June, 1851, when the fire was extinguished by the heavy rains. Along the streams the first white men found a heavy growth of timber, with smaller groves here and there, so that the area was about equally divided between timber land and prairie.
When the county commissioners divided the county into election precincts on March 2, 1846, the territory now comprising Liberty Township was included in Cedar precinct, but on April 15, 1946, it was ordered that township 74, range 18, be made an election precinct by the name of "Liberty." Thus it remained until January 6, 1847, when it was designated as Liberty Township, with its present boundaries, to-wit: On the north by Clay Township; on the east by Mahaska County; on the south by Monroe County; and on the west by the Township of Indiana.
It is quite probable that Martin Neel was the first white man to establish a domicile within the present limits of the township. Just when he settled on Cedar Creek, not far from the present Town of Marysville, is not definitely known, but the date is supposed to have been before the Indian title to the land was extinguished on May 1, 1843. Mr. Neel was a Kentuckian by birth and in establishing his home so far in advance of the margin of civilization he invited all the |p. 114| hardships and privations incident to life on the frontier. On one occasion, when the household supplies ran low, he found it necessary to leave home for a short time to work in some of the older settlements to obtain the money with which to replenish the larder. He went to Burlington, leaving his wife and two children in that cabin in the wilderness, with no human beings except Indians anywhere near. After an absence of two weeks he returned with half a bushel of corn meal that he had carried all the way from Burlington, making the journey on foot. Some years later he removed with his family to Missouri and became an officer in the Confederate army in the Civil war.
Horace Lyman came to what is now Liberty Township in April, 1843, in company with Stanford Doud, and for a time the two men lived in a camp on Cedar Creek, near where Haymaker's mill was afterwards built. On the first day of May, 1843, he established his claim and in the fall of that year sowed a small field of wheat--the first ever sown in this part of the county. In 1864 Mr. Lyman removed to Mahaska county, where he became a prosperous farmer and stock dealer.
Others who settled in this part of Marion County in 1843 were: David Haymaker, Andrew McGruder, Stanford Doud, Jacob Hendricks, Silas Brown, Lewis Jones, Benjamin Spillman and David Gushwa. In 1844 William Simms and Thurston Day located in the township; James A. Rousseau and Isaac Wilsey came in 1845, and H. H. Mitchell and William Bridges in 1846.
Stanford Doud came from Ohio and at the first election after the organization of the county was elected clerk of the Commissioners' Court, but failed to qualify. He as foreman of the first grand jury ever impaneled in the county. In 1847 he was elected county surveyor and in that capacity he laid out several of the early towns.
Rhoderick Peck and two men named Sadorus and Pyatt settled in the northern part of the township at an early date, but after a short residence sold their claims and went back to Illinois. When gold was discovered in California in 1849 they went to the Pacific coast. The first election in what is now Liberty Township was held at the house of Rhoderick Peck, but no record of the event can be found.
The earliest election of which the record has been preserved was held at the house of Martin Neel on the first Monday in April, 1850, when Isaac Wilsey, William H. Brobst and Daniel Sampson were elected trustees; Joseph Brobst, clerk; Horace Lyman, treasurer; Isaac Wilsey and Andrew McGruder, constables. Thirty-one votes were cast. |p. 115|
The first postoffice established in the township was called Elm Grove, with James A. Rousseau as postmaster. It was established about 1845 or 1846, but the exact date is uncertain.
David Haymaker taught the first school in the winter of 1846-47 in a claim pen near Haymaker's mill. The first house erected for a schoolhouse was a hewed log structure, in which the first school was taught by a man named Turk. The building was afterward purchased by a Mr. Gregg and occupied as a dwelling. In 1914 there were four school districts, exclusive of the schools in the towns of Bussey, Hamilton and Marysville, and in the four district schools were employed six teachers. The four school buildings were valued at $3,250.
Liberty has two lines of railroad--the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy and the Wabash. These two lines run almost parallel to each other through the eastern part, passing through the towns of Hamilton and Bussey, and a branch of the latter leaves the main line at Tracy and runs up the Cedar Creek valley to Everist. There are also a few short spurs running to the coal mines.
The population of Liberty Township in 1910, according to the United States census, was 2,998, a gain of 567 during the preceding ten years. In 1913 the assessed valuation of property, exclusive of the incorporated towns of Bussey, Hamilton and Marysville, was $1,005,004.