BIOGRAPHY: Lichty, Lewis
From the A.T. Andreas Illustrated Historical Atlas of the State of Iowa, 1875

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     Honorable LEWIS LICHTY.--This gentleman, the present popular Mayor of the beautiful City of 
Waterloo, Iowa, was born in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, on the 29th day of February, 1828, 
and is now consequently forty-seven years of age, although his appearance would not indicate 
that so many winters had passed over his head.  Perhaps his youthful appearance is somewhat 
due to the fact, that though born in 1828, he has passed but eleven birthdays.  He is of German-
Scotch descent, his father's parents were born in Scotland.  Born and brought up on a farm, a 
member of a large family, there being six boys and three girls, he early learned that life was an 
earnest reality, by being required to perform certain duties which usually fall to the lot of boys on 
all well regulated farms. 
     He received the rudiments of an English education under circumstances poorly calculated to 
inspire in a youthful mind desires for literary attainments, attending school in the primitive log 
school house in his neighborhood only when he could be spared from home duties and work.  He 
attended college but a short time, paying his way by teaching, which he followed for several years 
afterwards, employing the spare time it afforded him in reading and study, thus disciplining and 
improving his mind by a thorough course of self-culture. 
     He read law in the office of the Honorable A. H. Coffroth, in the Town of Somerset, and in 
1855 was admitted to the bar, having passed a creditable examination. 
     He immediately opened an office in the Town of Somersets, which then contained one of the 
strongest bars in the State of Pennsylvania, and continued the practice of his profession for nine 
years, when he removed with his family to Waterloo, Iowa.  Here he at once devoted himself to 
his profession, and soon secured a good business. 
     Upon the organization of the city, in 1868, he was elected City Attorney, which office he held 
for two terms.  
     In 1875 he was elected Mayor, and has since filled that office three terms by re-election. 
     That he is a popular and efficient officer is manifested by the fact that he has been connected 
with the city government since its first organization, though not really in sympathy with the political 
party controlling the elections. 
     Holding advanced ideas, he has taken an active part in the educational interests of the city, 
serving a considerable portion of the time as a Member of the Board of Education. 
     In politics Mr. Lichty was raised in the Whig belief, but upon the demise of that party acted with 
the Democratic organization up to the time of the war, since which he has been what might be 
called a conservative, looking to principles rather than party politics. 
     He was married to Miss Henrietta C. Bennett, in May, 1862, in the historic Town of 
Winchester, Virginia.  She died at the residence of her husband in Waterloo, Sept. 10, 1873, 
leaving three children to mourn her loss. 
     Mr. Lichty has won, by industry and integrity, and enviable position in life; for, whether as a 
servant of the public, or an individual member of society, he is respected and honored by all who 
know him.