My Genealogy Hound

Joseph Loughead was born in Front Royal, Warren Co., Va., March 2, 1831. His father, Thomas Loughead, was born in Newcastle County, Del., April 8, 1799, and accompanied his parents to Maryland when fourteen years old, where he grew to manhood, and was married, at Front Royal, Va., to Rebecca Ann Conrad, a native of Virginia. The family moved from Virginia to Vigo County, Ind., in l835, where the father entered and improved land and raised his family. He was a physician, and practiced his profession to some extent, but his chief occupation was that of farming. He died July 23, 1875. Joseph Loughead lived in Indiana until twenty-two years of age, receiving a good common-school education, which he afterward improved by study, becoming especially proficient in mathematics. He came to Missouri in 1853 from his home, alone and afoot, as far as St. Louis. He then took a boat to Brunswick, from which place he walked to Putnam County, arriving in same on May 5. After looking through the county, and Southeastern Iowa, he returned home afoot, and in the fall of 1853 himself and father entered 1,300 acres of land located in Sherman and Union Townships, Putnam Co., Mo., but did not settle here until 1857. He made yearly trips from Indiana to Missouri, generally on foot, and in the winter of 1854 taught school in Wayne County, Iowa, drawing the first money ever drawn from the county treasury for educational purposes. He was married, near Kiddville, Sullivan Co., Mo., April 19, 1857, to Susan Hunsaker, daughter of Matthew Hunsaker, formerly from Kentucky. Mrs. Loughead was born in Edgar County, Ill., June 17, 1837, and died February 3, 1878; she was the mother of seven children: Lemuel, Elizabeth C. (wife of John L. Scifers), Isaac N., Rebecca A. (wife of Elbert W. Thompson), Matthew H., Jennie and Mary L. After his marriage Mr. Loughead settled upon the land where he now resides, his being the first deed for land ever entered on the record of deeds in a bound book in the county, being about 1855; he began life in a primitive manner, and when he left Indiana, in 1853, had a capital of $23.40 of his own, and walked 1,100 miles that spring in looking at the west. He settled, in 1857, in a log cabin, making his own furniture, etc., and having no dishes or cooking utensils, excepting a pot and skillet, and they were borrowed. He has improved 1,400 acres of land, of which he owns 643 acres, the remainder for brothers and sisters, consisting mostly of pasture and meadow. He lives in a comfortable house surrounded with good outbuildings. He taught the second school taught in his district in 1860-61, having seventy-six pupils, and he cut the logs for the first school-house in the district in the fall of 1854. In politics he is a Republican, and in 1857, served as township assessor. He takes great interest in educational matters, and has been a member of the school board a number of years. In 1878 he was appointed notary public, and has served ever since. His married daughters are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church.