Bio of Landon, Charles O. (b.1826) Wabasha Co., MN
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Made available to The USGenWeb Archives by: Barbara Timm and Carol Judge
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This bio comes from "HISTORY OF WABASHA COUNTY" 1884.
Check out Barbara's site for more great information on this book:
http://www.rootsweb.com/~mnwabbio/wab1.htm
There are also some pictures and information from descendents for some 
of the bios on her pages.

Landon, Charles O.: Jesse Landon, the father of the subject of this
sketch, was the son of a Herkimer county, New York, farmer, and himself a
farmer. He married Harriet Fish, and was residing on a farm in Chautauqua
county, in the same state, on August 23, 1826, when Charles, the third
child of their large family of thirteen children, was born. He remained on
the farm with his parents until the day he reached his majority. His
educational advantages were very inferior, and the excellent practical
education which he possessed was due to his own keen and penetrating
powers of observation, unaided by even the district schoolmaster, as both
summer and winter young Landon's services on the farm were thought to be
indispensable. With but one suit of clothes and almost penniless, on the
day that he was twenty-one, he departed the parental home to seek his
fortune. For four years he labored as a farm hand among New York State
farmers, and saved up his meager earnings until they amounted to several
hundred dollars. Funding himself able to do a little farming on his own
hook, in 1851 he took to himself a wife, and rented a place. During the
next three years he continued to engage in agricultural pursuits and the
buying and selling of stock. In 1854 he made his first trip to the west,
bringing to the Illinois market several fine horses. Being much pleased
with the new country, he went back east fully resolved to return with his
family as soon as he could settle up his business affairs there; and the
following year found him the owner of a farm in Green Lake county,
Wisconsin. He resided here but one year, then spent five years in Dunn
county in the same state, where he pre-empted a claim near Eau Claire.
Finding the western fever still firing his veins, and being dissatisfied
with Wisconsin, he sold out in 1861 and came to Wabasha county, locating
on one hundred and sixty acres of school land on section 16 in Plainview
township the ensuing year, after a few weeks' experience as a grocer in
Plainview village. Four years later he sold this farm, and in 1867 bought
the village residence which he still owns and occupies, and opened a
real-estate and loan office in Plainview. In 1874 he became the senior
partner in the firm of C. O. Landon & Co. (the description of which can be
found on Chapter 36 of the 1884 book), successors to A. Y. Felton, drugs
and groceries. Being prospered in both branches of his business, Mr.
Landon, in the spring of 1883, relieved himself of a portion of his
business burden by transferring his interest in the store to his son,
George C. Landon. Mr. Landon has been twice married; his first wife was
Sarah Curtiss, whom he espoused in Warren county, Pennsylvania, in 1851,
and who died November 7, 1860, leaving two children, Jay Landon, a
hardware merchant of Winona, Minnesota, and George C. Landon. The present
Mrs. Landon was Miss Martha J. Kenney, of Dansville, New York, to whom he
was married September 9, 1861. Grace Landon is the only child of this
union surviving, a son (Charles) having departed this life in his
fifteenth year, on January 11, 1883. Mr. Landon is a member of Plainview
Lodge of A.F.A.M., and of the Congregational church. In politics is a
republican; has been for several years a justice of the peace, and
officiated as chairman of the township board of supervisors.