HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY	237

in 1869, when the ratification by the legislature. of the Fifteenth Amend-
ment was pending. He is credited with having written the national Dem-
ocratic platform of 1864.
	Judge Hanna was a clear-headed, able lawyer, impartial jurist and
estimable citizen. His public services, covering a period of thirty years,
were endorsed by the people and his loss highly lamented by all, regard-
less of party ties. He died at the age of 55, the age at which public men
are most active and of most use to the country. Had he lived to fill the
measure of three score and ten, more distinguished honors would have
been conferred upon him in recognition of his abilities, experience and
unblemished honor. He fell a victim to paralysis.

	John B. Nees, native of Tennessee, born in the year 1805, came to
Indiana in 1815, at the age of ten years, locating in Union county, where
he lived twenty-one years, serving one term as sheriff of the county.
In 1836 he came to Clay county, buying land and locating near the
site on which the town of Poland was afterward founded, a circum-
stance which accounts, largely, for the German population in that part
of the county, as he could speak fluently both English and German, and
freely volunteered his services in assisting new-comers to find desirable
lands and locations. Of good native ability, fair education and stanch
integrity, he inspired confidence and trust on the part of his neighbors
and became a leader in the community.
	In 1841 be was elected a member of the state legislature and
re-elected in 1842, defeating William Farley in the former race and John
W. Osborn in the latter, both of whom lived at Bowling Green. His
common sense and sound judgment, and his practical way of disposing
of questions, both private and public, made him a highly appreciated,
useful and honored member of the general assembly, and gave him a
reputation throughout the state. Had he been ambitious of political
preferment and honors and disposed to so use the means at his com-
mand, it was said, he might have gone to the United States senate a few
years subsequent to his service in the legislature. In the early historv
of the state he served, on several occasions, as government agent, or
commissioner, in the transaction of important business with the Indians.
In the year 1852 he was tendered the nomination and race for Congress
in the seventh district, but declined to accept.
	In 1853, when the first agricultural society was organized in the
county, he was elected president of the organization and contributed
largely to the building up and success of the society. He was an ardent
advocate of the public school system, and patron of Sunday schools,
having superintended one of the first instituted in the history of the
county, and was prominently identified with the Grange movement, his
services in this capacity as public speaker and counselor having been
generally sought by the organization. For some years preceding the
time of the Civil war he was engaged in general merchandising at
Poland.
	In the year 1862 the Democratic party of the county tendered him
the nomination for representative, but a difference of sentiment between
him and the convention on the war question rendered his candidacy on
the platform adopted impracticable and he declined. The opposition
party made no nomination, but voted generally for Nees as an acceptable
candidate independent of party, and he received seven hundred and