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"Past 2 Present"

Page County, Iowa

Books

1. Page County History, Iowa / Clarinda, Iowa: unknown, 1942, 103 pgs.

2. Biographical History of Page County, Iowa. / Chicago: Lewis & Dunbar, 1890, 898 pgs. (Table of Contents)

• Most counties are included in the Iowa statewide books

• Click here for a brief history of Page County

Periodicals

• North Grove Cemetery (Fall-Winter 1981)
• Page County, Iowa (Fall 1996)

Palimpsest:

• Some Thoughts on Prisoners of War in Iowa, 1943 to 1946 (March/April 1984)
• Jessie Field Shambaugh: The Mother of 4-H (July/August 1981)
• Glenn Miller, Big Band Sensation (November/December 1981)
• Henry, Himself (Henry Arms Field) (September/October 1983)
• Furlough (May/June 1979)
• Possessed of a Restless Spirit: a Young Girl's Memories of the Southern Iowa Frontier (September/October 1985)

PAGE COUNTY lies immediately north of the Missouri State line and in the second tier east of the Missouri River. It was created in 1847 and named for Captain John Page of the Fourth United States Infantry who was mortally wounded at the Battle of Palo Alto in the Mexican War. The area of the county is five hundred fifty-seven square miles and the eastern portion is well supplied with timber along the Nodaway River which flows south through the county.
     As early as the spring of 1840 three brothers, George W., Henry and David Farrens, all young unmarried men, came from Jackson County, Missouri, took claims near the southeast corner of the county where they built a cabin and opened farms. In the spring of 1841 George and David Brock settled near them and in 1842 Burket and Thomas Johnson, William Campbell and Robert Wilson with their families joined the settlement. In 1843 three brothers, Joseph, Moses and Larkin Thompson settled a few miles southeast of where Clarinda stands. Nodaway is an Indian name signifying "vindictive" and was given by the Indians to the river because in early days its banks were infested with rattlesnakes.
     In 1851 the county was organized by the election of Dr. Alexander Farrens, clerk; Benjamin W. Stafford, sheriff; S. F. Snyder, John Duncan and William Shearer, commissioners. The election was held at Boulwar's mill where for several years the county business was transacted. The first court was held there in September, 1851, Judge Sloan, presiding. The commissioners chosen to locate the county-seat met at Boulwar's mill in March, 1853, and selected a site two and one-half miles north on the Nodaway River, where a town was laid out and named Clarinda. In April, 1853, the first house was built on the plat by Rev. S. Farlow and soon after Judge Snyder erected the second cabin at the new county-seat. George Rible kept the first hotel and Isabella Farlow opened the first school in the summer of 1853. The first mill was built by George Stonebraker in 1846 on the Nodaway River and afterward became known as Boulwar's Mill, where quite a village grew up. The first orchard in the county was planted in the spring of 1842 by George W. Farrens. Shenandoah is a thriving town in the western part of the county on the line of a branch of the Burlington Railroad. Amity or College Springs is in the southern part of the county where a college has been established. The first newspaper was the Page County Herald, which was established in May, 1859, at Clarinda, by Shoemaker Brothers.

Source: History of Iowa: From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century by Benjamin F. Gue. New York: The Century History Co. 1903 #