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Available Sources Records 1875 A. T. Andreas Atlas
Dubuque Genealogy Coordinator
Logo by Ginger Cisewski |
The County's Famous Scientist Old Lincoln School in Section 29 of Iowa Township is especially significant since it is a symbol of the pioneers' thirst for knowledge for children and selves; also, it is one of the very few remaining one room schools in the county left to tell the story. Constructed in 1843, the school is a simple wood frame with gabled roof, retaining its aged but original appearance. The only structural change was the addition of an enclosed entryway in 1890. Regrettably, but due to oversight in transfer of property when the surrounding farm was sold, the building now stores grain which enters through a 2' x 4' hole cut in the roof and caused the floor sag perilously. The pristine little building sits on a restrained grassy knoll with a panoramic view of the nearby Little Maquoketa River and Valley. In addition to the school's symbolic importance, it is of utmost historical significance which rests in its association with the scientific achievements of W. J. McGee and his service to the state and nation. It stands as the sole monument honoring the man. In 1836 James and Martha (Anderson) McGee, natives of Ireland, entered land from the Government in sections 29 and 31. A daughter and three sons were born to them. William John was born in 1853. James gave a half acre of land and built the school which served also as a community center for the pioneers and who come to study writing, arithmetic and other basics in the evenings. W. J. attended this country school during the four winter months of each year from about 1858 to 1867. After discontinuing his attendance at age 14, he then spent the period 1874 to 1876 at self study in Latin, German and higher mathematics, including astronomy, while working as a surveyor and blacksmith. Interspersed with these endeavors were geological investigations into the nearby caves and caverns. Such studies were later extended to Jackson, Clayton, Delaware and Allamakee Counties. After 1874 his life's activity centered almost wholly on pursuits in the areas of geology, anthropology and hydrology. The range of McGee 's scientific accomplishments is immense, with over 300 treatises credited to his name. For instance, McGee pioneered in the study of this region's glacial history, establishing a knowledge of successive invasions and recessions of the ice-sheet that supported the theory of the complexity of the Great Ice Age. His most notable contributions to American geology relate to the Atlantic Coastal Plain where he pursued pioneer studies of broad problems of stratigraphic continuity and succession, and continental elevation and depression. Also noteworthy are his hydrological studies concerning the distribution of water on and beneath the surface of the United States and its industrial ramifications. In the field of anthropology, his principal contribution was a study of the Seri Indians, a warlike tribe inhabiting islands off the coast of Lower California. As a result of his original findings in the Upper Mississippi Valley, McGee received an appointment as assistant to the Director of the U, S. Geological Survey in 1883. Shortly thereafter he was promoted to Director of the Atlantic Coast Division. McGee remained there until 1893 when he assumed the position of ethnologist in the Bureau of American Ethnology. Within one year he became Director of the Bureau, a position he held until 1903 when he resigned to take charge of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition at St. Louis of 1904. He was senior speaker on anthropology at the World Congress of Arts and Science. In 1907 he became associated with the Bureau of Soils as an expert on subsoil erosion and simultaneously became Vice-Chairman of the lnland Waterways Commission. The prominent academic leadership achievements of W. J. McGee also merit attention. He was a founder and early president of the National Geolographic Society and editor of its magazine from 1888 to 1908. In addition, he served as president of the American Anthropological Association, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Anthropological Society of Washington. McGee's final article, "Symptomatic Development of Cancer," was a special study of his own case, a disease which took his life in 1912. In hopes that humanity might be benefitted, he recorded the daily progress of the disease in an article that was published a few days after his death. His selfless final act for human well being, unusual at that time, was the bequest of his body to the Jefferson College of Medicine in Philadelphia. |
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