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Below is a family biography included in History of Union County, Iowa published by S. J. Clarke Publishing Co., in 1908.  These biographies are valuable for genealogy research in discovering missing ancestors or filling in the details of a family tree. Family biographies often include far more information than can be found in a census record or obituary.  Details will vary with each biography but will often include the date and place of birth, parent names including mothers' maiden name, name of wife including maiden name, her parents' names, name of children (including spouses if married), former places of residence, occupation details, military service, church and social organization affiliations, and more.  There are often ancestry details included that cannot be found in any other type of genealogical record.

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John Thomas Noonan, pastor of the church of the Immaculate Conception in Creston, his native city, was born November 6, 1876. His father, William Noonan, a native of County Kerry, Ireland, born in 1849, came from the old world to the United States in 1865 and located first at Quincy, Illinois. He is a copper and tinsmith and since his removal to Creston in 1874 has been foreman of the copper and tin department in the Burlington machine shops. He holds membership in the Catholic church, being a communicant of St. Malachy’s. His political allegiance is given to the democracy. His wife, Ellen Moore, was born in Waterford, Ireland, in 1849, crossed the Atlantic to the new world in 1865 and became a resident of Quincy, where she formed the acquaintance of William Noonan, to whom she gave her hand in marriage in 1872. They had six children: Catherine, who is acting as housekeeper for Father Noonan of this review; William, deceased; John Thomas; Robert Emmet, who died at the age of nineteen years; Anna, at home; and Frank, an attorney at law in Chicago.

Father Noonan, who was the third in order of birth, attended the parochial school in connection with St. Malachy’s church and afterward entered St. Benedict’s college at Atchison, Kansas. He pursued a classical course and was graduated in 1894. In the fall of that year he matriculated in Price Hill seminary at Cincinnati, Ohio, where he pursued a course in philosophy and in the fall of 1895 he entered St. Mary’s seminary at Baltimore, Maryland, completing his theological course there in 1898. He was but twenty-one years of age and being too young for ordination he engaged in teaching for a year in St. Ambrose College at Davenport. When twenty-two and a half years of age he was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Cosgrove at Davenport. He spent the succeeding year as a teacher at St. Ambrose and was then sent to St. Patrick’s parish at Lenox, Iowa, where he remained for five years. In April, 1905, he was appointed to the new parish of the Immaculate Conception at Creston, where he now has a congregation of two hundred families. He is doing an excellent work here in his native city and the church in its various departments is now in flourishing condition.

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This family biography is one of 247 biographies included in The History of Union County, Iowa published in 1908.  For the complete description, click here: Union County, Iowa History and Genealogy

View additional Union County, Iowa family biographies: Union County, Iowa Biographies

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