Joseph William Ferguson

Dell Rapids Tribune, 12: Joseph Ferguson, of Trent, died yesterday morning, of pneumonia and heart trouble. The funeral will be held at the First Baptist church in Dell Rapids tomorrow afternoon at two o’clock. Rev. W.J. Hyde will conduct the services. The deceased was 74 years old. He has been a resident of Moody County for the past 12 years, having removed here with his family from Ida County, Iowa, in 1882. He was one of the wealthiest farmers in Moody County and was well-known throughout this section. He leaves a widow and 15 children, having been married several times. The relatives have the sympathy of the entire community in their bereavement.

Mr. Joseph Ferguson, of this County, a farmer of considerable wealth, died at his home Friday of last week and was buried at Dell Rapids Cemetery. The funeral services were held at the Baptist church which was crowded to its fullest capacity. Mr. Ferguson’s individuality was peculiar and entirely his own; he was fearless, independent and outspoken in whatever he thought to be right, often eccentric yet honest in all his dealings. He was a good financier, always managing to pay cash and having a whore of owing any man a sent. He would pay his hired men at the end of every month and his doctor before he left the house. He was 74 years of age at his death; had been married four times and left 17 living children. He made a will, leaving his widow and younger children amply provided for.

Date unknown

• Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Jan 17 2016, 16:48:01 UTC

Joseph William Ferguson

(from sources collected by Kay Ferguson)

1820 - 1892

Joseph William Ferguson was born in 1820 in Kentucky of Scottish ancestry. It is believed that his father and mother came from a small community called Pennybury, Scotland.

Kentucky was admitted to the Union twenty-eight years before Joseph William Ferguson's birth. President Monroe had served one term in office and was re-elected without opposition in 1820. The Union consisted of twenty-two States, half slave states, including Kentucky, and half free. The Northern States had dominance in the House of Representatives because of the greater population in the North. The population of the United States was over nine million and 90% of the Black population of 1,771,556 was enslaved. This was forty years before the Civil War. Kentucky was the sixth largest State. Daniel Boone, a Kentuckian, died at the age of eighty five, the year Joseph William was born.

Joseph William Ferguson left Kentucky as a young man and travelled into Ohio, Illinois and Wisconsin. He settled in Wisconsin, where he married and farmed. It is likely that all of his first nine children were born in Wisconsin. He married for the first time possibly by the early 1840's, and certainly by the middle of the decade. He married Bridget (last name not known), his second wife, after his first two children were born, probably in the last 1840's. According to information given by his sons, George Washington (4), and Francis (Frank) (12), and by his granddaughter Maple Bell Ferguson (A), Joseph William married four times. The order of births from his first two marriages was remembered by Francis (Frank) (12) in this order: Julia (1), Joseph William (2), Benjamin Franklin (3), George Washington (4), William (5), Mary (6), Irene (7), Lucy (8), and Augusta (9).

According to a letter of March 29, 1936 written by George Washington Ferguson (4), Julia (1), "Rene" (?), Lucy (8), and Mary (6) were his sisters. This does not mean that any or all of them might not have been his half sisters; we just can not tell for sure. We do know for certain that seven of these first nine children, including George (4) himself, were children of the marriage with Bridget.

Sometime around 1867, Joseph William Ferguson and his family left Wisconsin by covered wagon to homestead in Iowa. Bridget Ferguson became ill during the journey. George (4) told that his father purchased a farm near Epworth, Iowa because of Bridget's illness. They stayed there until Bridget died in childbirth, and then continued on further into Iowa.

The Ferguson family left Epsworth, Iowa and crossed through Iowa to the western part of the State, arriving in Ida County probably in 1868. It was in Ida County, Iowa, where Joseph William Ferguson became one of the first homesteaders in that part of the country. The land he homesteaded became known later as the C.C. William's Farm and may be known by that name today. Joseph William and his sons farmed and continue to obtain land in the rich farm country of Iowa. Edward Clay (16) remembers stories told him by his brother George (4), that their father and his brothers helped to build the first Landrail between Ida Grove and Sioux City, Iowa. They used mules and scrapers to build the rail line. (Thomas Edison had not yet invented the light bulb and Henry Ford had not become involved in the production of the automobile).

In 1876, Joseph William Ferguson married Catherine Matilda Rathbun in Ida County, Iowa. This was Joseph William Ferguson's third marriage. Catherine Rathbun was born in 1858 in Indiana. Catherine Rathbun's father, William Rathbun, was born in 1830 and died in 1899, at the age of sixty-nine. The year Catherine Rathbun was born James Buchanan was elected President of the United States. Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas entered into seven debates. Lincoln took a strong stand against slavery and became recognized as an articulate and respected spokesman for anti-slavery. Douglas was elected Senator from Illinois. The Whaling Industry was coming to an end. Nantucket and New Bedford, Massachusetts accounted for four fifths of the World's Whaling Industry. The discovery of oil in 1858 in Pennsylvania meant the end of the whaling business. Kerosene was soon to become the replacement. President Buchanan asked Congress to admit Kansas as a slave State. It was only three years before the outbreak of the Civil War.

Catherine Rathbun and Joseph William Ferguson lived on the farm in Ida County, Iowa where their three children were born:

John Laverne (10), Vina Matilda (11) and Francis Marion (Frank E.) (12). John, Vina and Frank had few memories of their older siblings as they were grown and had moved away from home. Joseph William (2) lived in Idaho Falls, Idaho. In his later years, Benjamin Franklin (3) had moved to Salt Lake City, Utah. William Ferguson (5) lived in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Julia Ferguson (1) married John Kephart and they farmed near the Ferguson homestead in Iowa before moving to Vermillion, South Dakota. George Washington (4) married Mary Ellen Kephart, sister of John Kephart, and their farm was close to the family.

In 1881, the Ferguson family, including Joseph William Ferguson, Catherine Rathbun Ferguson and their three children, moved farther west into South Dakota. Joseph William Ferguson purchased farmland in the Dell Rapids/Trent section of the Eastern part of the State. It was here that he farmed the remainder of his life.

Catherine Rathbun Ferguson died in 1881 from influenza shortly after they arrived in South Dakota, at the age of twenty-four. She is buried in the Dell Rapids, South Dakota Cemetery.

Joseph William Ferguson married Carrie Nelson in 1883 in Trent, South Dakota. It was his fourth marriage. Their five children were born in Trent, South Dakota: Dora (13) (died in infancy), Marilda (14), David Ross (15), Edward Clay (16) and Grover Cleveland (17). Joseph William Ferguson's last child was born shortly after his death in 1892.

Joseph William Ferguson had continued to buy land and for many years after his death, the farms were known as the "Old Ferguson Farms".

Joseph William Ferguson was a true trailblazer as he traveled through the great prairie and farm lands of Illinois, Wisconsin, Iowa and South Dakota. He was remembered as a dynamic man, filled with ambition and adventure. He was an excellent horseman and horse trader. This rugged and stocky Scotsman, with brilliant blue eyes, had a great fondness for Prize Fighting, both as a spectator and as a participant. During one of his matches, a piece of his nose was bitten off and it left a scar for the remainder of his life. His son Francis (Frank) (12) remembered his father as a history buff and the names he gave to his sons would easily attest to it.

Joseph William Ferguson was the father of seventeen children. His first child, Julia (1), and his last child, Grover Cleveland (17) were born forty-three years apart. Joseph William Ferguson died shortly before the birth of his last child. Joseph William Ferguson's first Grandchild was born around the year 1868 and his last Grandchild, Carol Jean Ferguson (A) was born in 1947. The oldest Grandchild was seventy-nine years old when the youngest Grandchild was born. Joseph William died fifty-five years before the birth of his last Grandchild.

Joseph William Ferguson died in 1892 at the age of seventy two. He is buried in the Ferguson Plot in the Dell Rapids Cemetery, Dell Rapids, South Dakota.

Home Key for Families of Wife 1-4 Family of Wife One - Name unknown Family of Wife Two - Bridget maiden name unknown Family of Wife Three - Catherine Mirelda Rathbun Family of Wife Four - Carrie Nelson George Washington Ferguson Story (4th child) Maple Ferguson Mountain's Story (granddaughter) William Ernest Ferguson Stories (grandson)