Smith, Joseph, of Lamoni, Decatur County, now Presiding Elder, or President, of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or "Josephite Mormons," as they are sometimes called to distinguish them from the Mormon Church in Utah, is the oldest son of Joseph Smith, who is known as the founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. His father was the son of Joseph Smith and Lucy Mack. The genealogy of the family is traceable as far back as 1631 to Robert Smith, who emigrated from England and settled in New Hampshire. Lucy Mack was a descendant of the Macks of Lyme, Connecticut. Her grandfather was Ebenezer Mack, a man of some wealth and influence. Her father enlisted in Captain Henry's company, and was annexed to the regiment of Colonel Whiting. He was in the battle at Halfway Brook, 1755. In 1758 he enlisted under Major Spenser and was at the battle of Lake George, where Lord Howe was killed. He was in an engagement with the French and Indians at Fort Ann, with forces under Majors Putnam and Rogers. He was discharged from the service at Crown Point in the spring of 1759, and was married shortly after to Lydia Gates, the daughter of Nathan Gates of East Haddam, Connecticut. He enlisted again in 1776; was with the land forces for a time and then with his two sons, Jason and Stephen, engaged in privateering under Captain Havens. Her father, Solomon Mack, was born at Lyme, Connecticut, September 26, 1735. Her brother, Stephen Mack, was a captain in the service at the time of Hull's surrender, and he broke his sword and threw the pieces into the lake rather than be a party to the disgraceful surrender. He removed from Tunbridge, Vermont, to Detroit, Michigan; thence to Rochester, where he built a sawmill, dying shortly afterwards. She was married to Joseph Smith, January 24, 1796. Joseph Smith, father of the subject of this sketch, was born at Sharon, Windsor County, Vermont, December 23, 1805. He began his religious career when fifteen years old, received his call and set about building the church, which was organized April 6, 1830, in Manchester Township, New York. He was married by Squire Tarbell at South Bainbridge, New York, January 18, 1827, to Emma Hale, born in Harmony Township, Pennsylvania, July 10, 1804. Her father, Isaac Hale, was born at Waterbury, Connecticut, March 21, 1763; married Elizabeth Lewis at Wells, Rutland County, Vermont, and emigrated to Tioga, now Harmony Township, Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, in 1790. Joseph Smith was a successful religionist, and at the time of his death, June 27, 1844, was president of a church numbering, by estimate, 150,000, in the United States and Europe.

The Joseph Smith of today was born at Kirtland, then Geauga, now Lake County, Ohio, November 6, 1832. He went with the family to Missouri in 1837, where they settled at Far West; was with them driven out of the state by the militia commanded by Generals Clark and Lewis, by order of the governor, L. W. Boggs, in the winter of 1838, after his father had been imprisoned at Liberty, Clay County, Missouri. He remembers being pushed away from his father's side by a sword in the hand of an armed guard, when his father was permitted to visit his family to say farewell. He remembers, also, crossing the Mississippi at Quincy on the ice, walking by the side of his mother, holding to her dress, while she carried his two younger brothers in her arms. They stopped for the rest of the winter at the home of Mr. George Cleaveland, near Quincy, and in the spring of 1839 were joined by the husband, who had escaped from the custody of a guard sent to place him in the jail of an adjoining county on an unsigned mittimus. The family moved to Commerce, in Hancock County, Illinois, fifty miles up the river from Quincy, where they settled and began the founding of the city of Nauvoo, which afterwards became so celebrated in the history of the state and the Mormon people. He was then in his seventh year. He grew up inured to hardship and such labor as a boy of his years could do. Schools were established by the church, which flourished until the death of his father, and the church was driven from the state. These schools he attended and afterwards attended the common schools of the state, under such management as was prevalent at the time, until his fifteenth year, when his opportunities for schooling ceased. He began the study of law in his sixteenth year with a local Nauvoo lawyer, W. E. McLennan, afterwards Judge McLennan, of Nebraska City, Nebraska, spending one year in the office of Judge William H. Kellogg at Canton, Fulton County, Illinois, in 1855. He did not seek admission to the bar, because he did not like the practice of the law as he saw it conducted in the justices' and circuit courts of the county.

He was married to Miss Emma Griswold, a beautiful young woman, October 22, 1856, with whom he lived happily until her death, March 25, 1869. She left him three children, Emma Josepha, Carrie Lucinda and Zaide Viola. He was elected a justice of the peace in 1858, was re-elected in 1862 and served the full terms for which he was elected. He moved to Plano, Kendall County, Illinois, in 1866, and took editorial charge of the Herald, the denominational paper of the church of which he is President. He served several terms on the board of trustees of the town of Plano and three years and a half as justice of the peace in the same town, became disgusted with the duties of the office and resigned.

He was chosen to preside over the church of which he is a member in April, 1860, and is still sustained in that office. In religion he is a disciple of the faith of his father, believes in the divine calling of his father and was baptized by him into the faith in his eleventh year. His mother was a communicant in the same church and died in the faith April 30, 1879. Neither his mother nor himself, nor any member of the Prophet Smith's immediate family, accepted the rule of Brigham Young, nor the dogma of plural marriage. Mr. Smith has always opposed the usurpation and evil teaching of the Utah Mormon Church, especially polygamy and its attendant theories.

In politics Mr. Smith has been a republican, cast his first vote in the party and voted for President William McKinley. He is not a politician, but takes an interest in what is going on in regard to the questions of state. He is patriotic, loves his country, was an Abolitionist and advocated the purchase of the slaves by the United States in lyceum discussion long before the war which resulted in emancipation. His family on both sides were noted for their devotion and love of human, political and religious freedom, their ancestors being on record in the township where they lived as protesting against the raising of money by tax for the support of one of the sects of Christians. They declared in favor of an equal and just proportion to all or aid to none, holding against the mixture of church and state.

He is by religion, preference and habit an advocate of temperance, has made many speeches in favor of the cause and attained some celebrity as a lecturer. He has been a preacher since April, 1860; has traveled quite extensively in the interests of his church and its faith; has baptized candidates in both oceans, and in the waters of the two great rivers of the United State; is a good speaker and commands good audiences and attention at home and abroad. He is a good parliamentarian and presides over the assemblies of the church with ability and success. He is liked by his associate ministers and respected by all his people. After the death of his first wife Mr. Smith married Miss Bertha Madison November 12, 1869, with whom he lived nearly twenty-seven years. She died October 19, 1896. There were born to them nine children, of whom five are living. The oldest, David Carlos, died in January, 1886, a girl, Bertha Azuba, dying a year later; two others died in their infancy. Those remaining are Mary Audentia, born March 23, 1872, married to Ben M. Anderson of Lamoni; Fed Madison, born January 21, 1874; Israel Alexander, born February 2, 1876; Hale Washington, born February 22, 1881, and Lucy Yeteve, born December 11, 1884. After the death of his wife Mr. Smith made his home with his daughter, Mrs. Anderson, who moved into and occupied the family mansion just west of the town of Lamoni. He married Ada Rachel Clark, a native of Ontario, Canada, January 12, 1897. A son, Richard Clark, was born to them December 26, 1898.

For the earlier years of his life Mr. Smith lived in his mother's family and assisted her and his stepfather in keeping the historic hotel at Nauvoo, known as the Nauvoo Mansion. His mother married Lewis C. Bidamon, a major in the Illinois militia, in December, 1847. He continued with them until his marriage to Miss Griswold, when he, with his next younger brother, began farming. This continued until his election to the office of justice of the peace, when he attended to the duties of his office, doing any kind of work that offered to his hand as a day laborer and teamster. In 1860 he began his pastoral work; in 1863 his editorial work, in 1866 taking active editorial charge of the Herald, which he still continues. He has twice visited Washington, D. C., in the interests of his church, endeavoring to prevent Congress from taking such legislative action against the Utah Mormons as might be compromising to the Reorganized Church, which Mr. Smith contends is the rightful successor of the church his father founded and which became disrupted and disorganized at the death of his father. One of these visits was made in 1866, the other in 1882. Mr. Smith and his colleague, Z. H. Gurley, succeeded in securing an audience with the Secretary of State, Hon. Frederick Frelinghuysen, through the kindness of Hon. W. P. Hepburn, of the Eighth District, Hon. W. B. Allison, Senator from Iowa, and Hon. J. C. Burroughs, Representative from Michigan, in 1882, to present a protest against the inimical action of the circular letter of Secretary W. M. Evarts to foreign nations regarding Mormon emigration. This effort was successful, Secretary Frelinghuysen, giving the matter his personal attention.

The church over which Mr. Smith presides numbers nearly or quite 40,000 communicants; has over 400 branches or congregations; has its business center and offices of church officers and publication of church literature at Lamoni, Decatur County. Mr. Smith moved into the state with the Herald office plant in October, 1881. The town was begun in 1871 and now numbers a little less than 2,000. The local church has a membership of nearly 1,200 and has a church building seating about 1,100. A college called Graceland was opened for business on January 1, 1897, and there has been a Saints' Home established, now having forty or more inmates.

Mr. Smith is five feet eight and one-half inches in height, weighs 210 pounds, has brown eyes, full beard, quite white, thin gray hair and is somewhat bald. He walks with a firm, quick step and bears his sixty- nine years well.

Smock, Finley M.

Smock, Finley M., of Keota, was born February 18, 1844, in Indiana. His father, Rev. D. V. Smock, was a Presbyterian minister and came to Iowa in 1853, locating at Birmingham, Van Buren county, where he remained until the year 1858, removing thence to Sigourney.

Finley M. enjoyed the benefits of our public school system and at two different periods during his school days was enrolled in excellent private schools. In 1859, at the age of 15, he entered a wagon shop as an apprentice and was mastering this useful branch of mechanics when the call to arms sounded through the land, calling on all loyal citizens to throw down the implements used in peaceful pursuits, to shoulder a musket in support of our flag and country. Responding to President Lincoln's call, he enlisted in June, 1861, in Company f, Fifth Iowa Infantry volunteers, and served under Capt. E. S. Sampson and Col. C. L. Matthies in that organization for more than three years. He was badly wounded at Champion Hills, Miss., May 16, 1863, through both thighs by a musket ball. In August, 1864, with other members of his company, he was transferred to Company G, Fifth Iowa Cavalry volunteers, under Capt. J. M. Limbocker and Col. W. W. Lowe. He was with Gen. J. H. Wilson's last cavalry raid of the war in Alabama and Georgia and was mustered out of service in August, 1865. Returning to Iowa, and Keokuk county, he again took his place at the work bench, which pursuit he followed for many years. He was married in 1868 to Mary E. Stranahan, and a few years afterward located in Keota. Here he followed various vocations, and was largely interested in the development of that section of Iowa.

In the fall of 1894, having received the nomination for clerk of the district court of Keokuk county by the republican party, he was successful in the canvass, and was re-elected for a second term. He is now engaged in the real estate business at Keota.