Person:Cyrus Thomas (1)

[Cyrus Thomas lived in] Marquette County for almost forty years. In the month of June following his arrival he made a claim on sections 10 and 15, in the town of Westfield and from the wild land developed a fine farm, which he still owns. Since 1885, however, he has been living in Westfield, but he made farming his life work. He built a substantial residence on his land, added good barns and outbuildings, placed his fields under a high state of cultivation and raises a good grade of stock. He entertained progressive as well as practical ideas of farming and in consequence he was very successful in his undertakings, acquiring a competence which now permits him to live in retirement from all labor.

On the 4th of February, 1858, Mr. Thomas was joined in wedlock with Miss Andalucia Bowen, daughter of Solomon and Lydia (Peck) Bowen, the former a native of Vermont, the latter of New York. The family emigrated to Wisconsin in 1847, becoming residents of Fond du Lac, where they remained for three years, when they removed thence to Portage. They came to Marquette County in 1853, and settled on section 9, in the town of Westfield, where Mr. and Mrs. Bowen remained until becoming inmates of the home of their daughter, with whom they passed their declining years. They were parents of three children, one son and two daughters—George E., who is a resident of Eureka, Greenwood County, Kan.; Mrs. Thomas; and Elenora, wife of James H. Bordwell, a merchant and postmaster of Stewart, McLeod County, Minn. Mr. and Mrs. Thomas are parents of two living children and two that have been called home. Lydia graduated from the high school of Westfield in the class of 1889; Elenora is a student in the same school; Gilbert Judson died at the age of two years; and Eldredge Bowen died at the age of seventeen months.

Nearly forty years have passed since Cyrus Thomas located in the town of Westfild. Marquette County was then in its infancy, its prairies were uncultivated, wild game of all kinds was found in abundance and the Indians were still hunting and fishing in their familiar haunts, having not yet left for their reservation west of the Mississippi. Many hardships and trials incident to frontier life were to be endured and Mr. Thomas bore his full share. He feels a deep interest in the upbuilding of the county and has ever been found in the foremost ranks of any enterprise calculated to its advancement. He and his estimable wife are numbered among the honored early settlers and have many warm friends throughout the community. (Portrait and Biographical Album of Green Lake, Marquette and Waushara Counties, Wisconsin: containing full page portraits and …., p 545)

1. ↑ ^1.0 1.1 Find A Grave.

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