BIOGRAPHY: Overman, John W.
From the A.T. Andreas Illustrated Historical Atlas of the State of Iowa, 1875

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     Honorable JOHN W. OVERMAN, the first mayor of Cedar Falls, and for 
the last twenty-five years one of its most influential and highly 
respected citizens, was born in Highland County, Ohio, on the 10th day 
of November, 1817.  The first nineteen years of his life were spent on 
the farm where he was born, assisting in its management and attending 
the common district school for a few months each year, when in his 
twentieth year he completed his education by teaching one term, and was 
then employed in his father's saddle tree manufactory, carrying it on 
for himself the last two years before moving West.  In 1842 he located 
to Muscatine County, Iowa, where he was engaged in farming, and in 
conducting a small hotel.  In 1848 he removed with his brother, Dempsey 
C., to Cedar Falls, Iowa, where he remained six months, and then 
returning to the City of Muscatine, he ran a steam saw mill until the 
first of January, 1850, when he set out for California, going down the 
Mississippi River, crossing the Gulf to Point Isabella, then through 
the Mexican Republic to Masatland, and up the coast to  San Francisco.  
Spending some six or eight months, mostly in the mining districts, he 
returned by way of Panama and New Orleans, arriving at Cedar Falls 
early in January, 1851, where he has since resided, thoroughly 
identifying himself with the growth and progress of the town.
     Arriving here he immediately went to work with the restless energy 
of is nature, and in connection with his brother and brother-in-law,* 
was for years really the life and energy of that young, beautiful, and 
promising city.  He was at the head of the mill company, which, besides 
carrying on an extensive milling and lumber trade, dealt largely in 
real estate. He always pursued a liberal policy towards every 
enterprise that offered advantages and needed assistance, encouraged 
emigration, gave generously to churches, schools and town improvements 
in general, besides expending large amounts in private undertakings.  
The company gave forty acres of valuable land adjoining the city plat, 
to the D. & S. C. R. R., ten thousand dollars in cash to the Iowa 
Central, and proportionally large amounts to other railroad schemes and 
public ventures.  To his public-spirited, self sacrificing work, 
combined with great industry, untiring energy and pluck, is due in a 
large degree the position which Cedar Falls now occupies as one of the 
most attractive, beautiful and prosperous towns in the state. 

*See biographical sketch of D. C. Overman.