Marshall County >> 1912 Index

Past and Present of Marshall County, Iowa
by Judge William Battin. 2 vols. Indianapolis, Ind.: B. F. Bowen, 1912.

H

Alpheus M. Hinshaw

It would be hard to find within the borders of Marshall county a more scientific farmer than Alpheus M. Hinshaw, although he can show no degree from an agricultural college, yet he has been a keen observer all his life and has devoted his attention solely to his vocation and has been a diligent reader of all subjects pertaining to the same, so that a glance over his well tilled, well kept and productive fields is all that is necessary to show that he is a twentieth-century farmer in all that term implies.

Mr. Hinshaw was born in Keokuk county, Iowa, May 7, 1855, and he is the son of William and Louisa (Stalker) Hinshaw, the father a native of Tennessee and the mother of North Carolina. The elder Hinshaw came to Keokuk county, Iowa, in 1844, later returning to Indiana, where he was married. In 1846 he located in Keokuk county, purchasing one hundred acres of good land, where he spent the rest of his life engaged in farming, his death occurring on October 11, 1885, his wife having passed away in 1863, when the subject was a young boy. They were the parents of seven children, five of whom are living: William Hinshaw was twice married, his last wife being Sarah Crakaal, by whom four children were born, all deceased. In politics he was a Republican and he served his township as clerk and trustee. He belonged to the Friends church. Alpheus M. Hinshaw was reared on the home farm and educated in the public schools and he has made farming his life work. He came to Marshall county in 1892 and bought ninety acres of good land, on which he has placed about all the improvements and made one of the choice farms of its size in the township. On this he raises a diversity of crops and all kinds of live stock. He has a very pleasant home. He lived in Hardin county eleven years, and he served as clerk of Concord township two terms, performing his duties very faithfully. In politics he is a Prohibitionist and he and his family are members of the Friends church.

Mr. Hinshaw was married on March 26, 1879, to Frances Whistler, who was born in Jefferson county, Iowa, August 2, 1857, the daughter of William and Anna (Reppert) Whistler, the father a native of Pennsylvania and the mother of Ohio. They came to Jefferson county, Iowa, in an early day and there his death occurred, his widow living in Keokuk county.

To Mr. and Mrs. Hinshaw seven children have been born, namely: Bertha, deceased; Wayne, Lake, Leonard, Elsie, Daisy and Fay.