My Genealogy Hound

Jefferson B. Shoemaker, a leading citizen of Hickory County Mo was born in Logan, Hocking County, Ohio, March 15 1836, and is a son of A. and Samantha (Bennett) Shoemaker who were born in Scotland and New York respectively The father was born in 1810, and came with his parents to the United States, locating in Ohio, where they lived and died. He was a shoemaker and schoolteacher, and for a number of years was surveyor of Hocking County. His death occurred in 1838, at the untimely age of 28 years. His father, Cornelius Shoemaker, was a farmer and Baptist minister, and was a soldier in the War of 1812. Samantha (Bennett) Shoemaker was born in 1815, and died in Jefferson County, Iowa, whither she had moved in 1849 being the wife of Jason Landpher at the time of her death To her first union three children were born, Jefferson B. being the second child and the only one now living. He received his education in Ohio and Iowa, and at the age of fourteen years, left his mother, and began farming, teaming and staging, following the latter occupation from Keokuk, Iowa, west to what was Fort Des Moines, but is now the city of Des Moines. He entered land in Iowa, and was engaged in farming until 1868, when he came to Hickory County, Mo., where he has since made his home, and followed the occupations of farming and stock raising. January 2, 1857, he wedded Miss Sarah Shepherd, a daughter of John and Eliza Shepherd. She was born in Montgomery County, Tenn., January 1, 1842, and their marriage resulted in the birth of twelve children, eleven living: John J., Rufus A., Russell, Laura, Leonidus, Lavaughn, Dickie, Samuel J. T., Willis A., Karan and Nora. Anna, the third child, died when nine months old. Mr. Shoemaker is a Democrat, and a member of the Masonic fraternity. Mrs. Shoemaker’s parents, John and Eliza Shepherd, were born in Indiana and Virginia, and died in Tennessee and Centerville, Iowa, respectively. After the father’s death, the mother married Isaac Harris.