J. B. Brown

J. B. BROWN.

In view of the success that has attended the efforts of J. B. Brown as a miller of the soil in Nodaway county and as a general business man, the youth of his community would make no mistake in emulating his methods of work, for his life has been directed along channels that ultimately lead to success and to the establishment of a reputation of which anyone should be pleased to contemplate.

Mr. Browm was born in Clinton, Tennessee, in 1844. He is the son of William and Melinda (Overton) Brown, the father born in Kentucky and the mother in Virginia, each representatives of excellent old Southern families. While they were yet single they accompanied their parents, in a very early day, to the vicinity of Clinton, Tennessee. The country was yet heavily wooded and there Indians were still to be met with. There the parents of the subject met and married. William Brown devoted his life to farming and stock raising, also bought and sold large numbers of livestock for many years and was considered a good trade. He spent the remainder of his life in Tennessee and died there in 1861. He was first a Whig, later a Republican, and he and his wife were members of the Methodist Episcopal church. They were the parents of ten children, seven boys and three girls.

J. B. Brown was educated in the country schools and worked on the farm when a boy. When only eighteen years of age he gave vent to his patriotism by enlisting as a private in Company D, First Tennessee Light Artillery, in 1862, and with that company he remained until 1865, and although he was in many hard-fought battles and trying campaigns, always faithful in the discharge of his duty, he was never wounded or taken prisoner.

After returning from the army, Mr. Brown married in Tennessee, in 1866, M. E. Moore, and they soon afterwards began farming, remaining in that community until 1869, in which year they came to Nodaway county, Missouri, settling near Clearmont and they have since lived in this vicinity, being regarded as among the leading citizens of this part of the county.

Mr. Brown first bought land here about 1877; he was always a hard worker and a good manager and he has accumulated two hundred and eighty-five acres of as good land as the township can boast, which he has highly improved and placed under a high state of cultivation. It had but small improvements when he first purchased it. Here he has carried on general farm ing in a most successful manner. He keeps an excellent variety of roadhorses, also draft horses, and does an extensive business buying and selling them. No better judge of a horse is to be found in the county.

Mr. Brown was one of the organizers of the Clearmont Bank, of which sound and thriving institution he has been vice-president nearly ever since it was organized, and has very ably discharged his duties as such.

Politically he is a Democrat, and a member of the Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, the chapter, commander, and the Ancient Arabic Order of Nobles of the Mystic Shrine; also the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and he takes considerable interest in all these fraternal orders. To Mr. and Mrs. Brown three children were born. Flora B., French P. and Myrtle M. The mother of these children, who is remembered as a woman of splendid Christian attributes, was called to her rest on October 21, 1908. She was a member of the Christian church, of which the daughters are also members.

As printed in Past and present of Nodaway County, Missouri (1910). See the original pages. Wording is the original; obvious scanning errors have been corrected, and a few may remain.