My Genealogy Hound

DRESSEL, JOSEPH, farmer and thresher, Sec. 31, P.O. Kane. In this brief biographical sketch we trace back to some extent the ancestry of our subject. His father was a native German, born at Baden; by trade he was a stone mason, and to some extent followed agricultural pursuits. He married in his native land a German lady, unfortunately the maiden name is not remembered. In 1854 or ‘55 the family crossed the Atlantic, landing in New Orleans after the usual voyage on board a sailing vessel. From the Crescent City the family voyaged up the Mississippi to St. Louis, where they fell victims to that dreadful scourge, the cholera. Young Dressel thus thrown, upon his own resources at the early age of eight, he secured such employment as his early years would warrant; two years later becoming a resident of Greene County, where he worked as a farm hand for many years. In 1865 he was united in marriage to Minerva Hudson, a daughter of John H. Hudson, by whom he has five children, Mattie, Jessie, Freddie, John and Hattie. It was during this year that Mr. D. realized the fact that the old horse power mode of threshing was entirely too slow a method for this progressive age, and accordingly purchased perhaps the first steam thresher in the bounds of Greene County; the venture involving considerable outlay, was a success from the start, and at the present writing Mr. Dressel, in connection with Mr. R. H. McGee, Geo. Cory, John Flemming and Samuel Rum, is the owner of four steam threshers, transacting a large business in the counties of Greene and Jersey.