William M. Posey Biography


	This biography is from "Memorial and biographical record; an illustrated
 	compendium of biography, containing a compendium of local biography,
	including biographical sketches of prominent old settlers and 
	representative citizens of South Dakota..." Published by G. A. Ogle & 
	Co., Chicago, 1899. Pages 984-985

	Scan, OCR and editing by Maurice Krueger,mkrueger@iw.net, 1998. 

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WILLIAM M. POSEY has been prominently identified with the interests of 
Franklin township, Jerauld county; since February, 1882, and since that 
time has been engaged as an industrious tiller of the soil. He formed 
an intimate acquaintance with the hardships and privations of pioneer 
life, and as the result of his industry and resolution is now the owner 
of a comfortable homestead, upon which he has erected new and 
substantial buildings. 

Mr. Posey was born in Indiana in 1837, and is a representative of an 
old Virginia family. When three years old he was taken by his parents 
to Iowa, where the mother died seven years later, and the father, who 
was a farmer by occupation, departed this life when our subject was but 
thirteen. He then made his home with a friend until eighteen years of 
age, at which time the friend died and he started out in life for 
himself. He worked at farming until the spring of 1861, when he went to 
Illinois and enlisted in Company G, Twenty-seventh Illinois Volunteer 
Infantry, which was assigned to the Army of the Mississippi. He went 
with his regiment to Cairo, Illinois, and later participated in the 
battle of Belmont, Missouri. The following spring at Columbus, 
Kentucky, he was attacked by hemorrhage of the lungs and was honorably 
discharged June 12, 1862. 

Mr. Posey then returned to Iowa, and after working for others at farm 
labor he purchased a farm of eighty acres in Tama county in 1869. This 
was raw land, which he brought to a state of cultivation, all excepting 
fifteen acres. This model farm was supplied with plenty of fruit of all 
kinds. In 1865 Mr. Posey wedded Miss Mary M. Smith, who was born in 
Indiana of German ancestry and was reared upon her father's farm in 
that state. To them have been born fourteen children; eleven are still 
living, nine sons and two daughters. 

Coming to Jerauld county, South Dakota, in February, 1882, Mr. Posey 
took up the west half of section 2, Franklin township, and the fall of 
the same year filed a claim on the northeast quarter of the same 
section, all of which he still owns. On the 24th of May, 1882, he 
erected a board shanty 14x 16 feet, from which the roof was blown away 
the following summer, and the following winter constructed a sod house. 
His was the first family to locate in Franklin township. In 1883 he 
built a more substantial residence on the northeast quarter of section 
2, and all necessary outbuildings, but a fire in the spring of 1889 
destroyed everything, with the exception of the house, including six 
yoke of oxen, hogs, chickens, turkeys and forty tons of hay. His first 
crop of any importance was destroyed by the hail, with the exception of 
a few potatoes. He has since built a barn 50 x 36 feet, with wide sheds 
on the north and south sides, and now has the best set of buildings in 
the neighborhood and one of the best improved farms in the township. 
His best crops have been thirty bushels of corn to the acre, twenty 
bushels of wheat, and fifty bushels of oats. He brought with him to the 
county a car load of stock, including twenty-six head of cattle, nine 
horses and ten hogs, and has since given considerable attention to 
stock raising, each year raising from sixty to seventy Poland China 
hogs. He also keeps a high grade of short horn and Hereford cattle. He 
is now the owner of four hundred and eighty-five acres of valuable 
land, all of which is fenced, while one hundred and sixty acres are 
under a high state of cultivation, the remainder being pasture and 
meadow lands. He is also a stockholder in the Alpena Creamery and in 
the Farmers' warehouse at Alpena. 

Politically Mr. Posey is a strong Republican, but is no politician in 
the sense of office seeking, though he has most creditably filled the 
positions of school treasurer and justice of the peace. Socially he is 
a member of the Grand Army of the Republic.