My Genealogy Hound

H. P. Armitage, state’s attorney of Union county and a prominent member of the Afton bar, has continued in the active practice of law in this part of the state since 1894. He is thus a representative of a profession which has important bearing upon the welfare and stable prosperity of the community which stands for the rights and privileges of the people and is the conservator of justice. It is, moreover, a profession in which success can only be attained by individual merit. One must have the intellectual capacity, the ready adaptability and the analytical power to cope with the intricate problems of the law before advancement can hope to be secured at the bar. Possessing these requisites, Mr. Armitage has made steady progress in his chosen field of labor.

A native of Pleasant township, Union county, his birth occurred April 27, 1865. His father, John C. Armitage, was a native of Ohio, in which state he was reared and educated, and when a young man came to Iowa in 1849, settling first in Keokuk county, where he remained until his removal to Union county in 1851. Here he was married to Miss America Laub, who was born and reared in Indiana. Arriving in Iowa in pioneer times, when the greater part of the state was still an unsettled district and the government owned much of the land, he entered a claim in Pleasant township and began breaking the sod preparatory to the cultivation of the fields. As the years passed he developed a good farm, upon which he reared his family, there residing until after the death of his wife on Christmas day of 1895. He passed away in the home of a daughter in Creston in 1899.

H. P. Armitage acquired his education in the common schools and in the Shenandoah (Iowa) College, where he completed a commercial course. His initial step in the business world was made as a teacher in the home school, where he continued for two terms. He taught altogether for seven terms in this county but regarding this merely as a preliminary step to other professional labor, he began the study of law in the office of McDill & Sullivan, at Afton, and also spent one term as a law student in the Iowa City State University. He was admitted to practice by the Supreme court in 1894, after which he located in Afton, where he has since remained, building up a large practice that has connected him with much important litigation tried in the courts of this district. Moreover, Mr. Armitage has been very prominent and influential in community affairs, serving as mayor of his town for four or five terms, his administration being characterized by substantial improvements and practical reform. He has also been secretary of the school board for five years, was elected and served as city attorney, and on the 4th of November, 1907, was chosen to the office of state’s attorney. He discharges all the public duties with a sense of conscientious obligation which is never questioned, and while others may differ from him on matters of policy or expediency they never doubt his sincerity of purpose.

Mr. Armitage was married in Afton April 3, 1889, to Miss Emma I. Simonds, who was born, reared and educated in the city where she yet resides and who, prior to her marriage, engaged in teaching. One child graces this Union, Beatrice L., who is now a student in the Afton high school, and they have also adopted a son, George. Mr. and Mrs. Armitage and their daughter are members of the Presbyterian church, in the work of which they are deeply and helpfully interested, Mr. Armitage serving now as church treasurer. He belongs to the Afton lodge of Masons and both he and his wife are connected with the Eastern Star. He is also a member of the Odd Fellows Society of Afton, in which he has filled all of the chairs and is a past grand, while he and his wife are connected with the Rebekah degree, of which Mrs. Armitage is secretary. He stands as a representative of our best type of American manhood and chivalry. He has ever discharged his duties with marked ability and fairness, for he is a most loyal, public-spirited citizen. As a member of the legal fraternity he has been conspicuous among his associates, not only for his success, but for his fairness, honorable methods and close conformity to a high standard of professional ethics. In everything he has been eminent and practical, as is manifest not only in his business but also in his social and private life and official duties.