- RALPH PARKER BLEASDALE, one of the prominent farmers of Janesville
township, Rock
- County, enjoys the distinction of being a native of Wisconsin,
having been born Oct. 23, 1854, in section 19, where he now resides,
a son of Ralph P. and Eliza C. (DICKSON) BLEASDALE, natives of
England and Scotland, respectively.
- Ralph P. BLEASDALE was a bookkeeper, following that occupation
in England and after he
- immigrated to America, whither he came with his parents in
1845. The family located in Rock County, Wis., where they engaged
in farming. Later Ralph P. BLEASDALE went back to Leeds, England,
in 1846 or 1847, and married, after which he returned to Rock
County, farming until 1851 in Rock township. At the time he
bought a farm of 120 acres in Section 19, Janesville township,
later added forty acres, and resided upon it until his death,
in 1880, at the age of fifty-four, improving the property, and
increasing its value. The parents of our subject had four sons
and three daughters: John William, of Chicago, Ill.; Joseph Robert,
of Findlay, Ohio; Ralph Parker, our subject; Frank Thornton,
of New Carlisle, Ind.; Eliza Hannah, wife of Frank CASE, of Clarion,
Iowa; Agnes Jane, wife of Charles HAWK, of Center township, Rock
Co., Wis.; and Florence Annie, wife of Orrie CASE, of Belmont,
Iowa. The paternal grandfather of our subject, Robert BLEASDALE,
was a native of England, and died in Rock County, Wis., at the
advanced age of seventy. By occupation he was a farmer. His
family consisted of seven children. The maternal grandfather
of our subject, John DICKSON, was a native of Scotland, an architectural
modeler by trade. Coming to America in 1860, he resided with
his daughter, Mrs. E. C. BLEASDALE, until 1861, when he died,
aged sixty-seven years. He had five children, two sons and three
daughters.
- Ralph Parker BLEASDALE has lived all of his life upon the
farm where he was born except two
- years which he spent in Iowa. Having always followed farming,
at the death of his father he took charge of the farm. On March
23, 1892, Mr. BLEASDALE married Mrs. Almeda Isabel JENKINS, daughter
of Charles and Lucy (VESPER) FOOTE. In his political affiliations,
Mr. BLEASDALE is a Republican, and socially he is a member of
Janesville Lodge, No. 55, F. & A.M., and also belongs to
the Caledonian Society. Both Mr. and Mrs. BLEASDALE are hospitable
people. They reside on the farm of our subject's mother, which
Mr. BLEASDALE is actively engaged in improving, and are enjoying
all the comforts of life.
-
- Taken from "Commemorative Biographical Record of
the Counties of Rock, Green, Grant, Iowa and Lafayette Wisconsin"
(c) 1901, p. 141.
-
- Courtesy of Carol
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