John Groth is one of the venerable and honored pioneer citizens of Clayton county, where he has maintained his home for more than sixty years and where he has contributed his full quota to civic and industrial development and progress. He and his wife still reside on their fine old homestead farm, in Section 8, Marion township, and they have the high regard of all who know them, both having long been zealous and influential communicants of the Norwegian Lutheran church. Their attractive home now has manifold advantages that were notable for their absence in the pioneer days, and not the least is the free mail service afforded by rural route No. 4 from the village of Elgin. Mr. Groth was born in Norway, on the 19th of December, 1833, and is now the only survivor of the nine children of Halsten and Ragnild (Kittleson) Groth, who passed their entire lives in their native land, the subject of this review having been the youngest of their children. Mr. Groth gained his early education in the schools of his native land and was a youth of eighteen years when, in April, 1852, he embarked on the sailing vessel that gave him transportation to America. He landed in the port of New York City and thence came directly to Iowa, where he numbered himself among the pioneer settlers of Marion township. He purchased one hundred and ninety acres of land, in Section 8, and from the same he developed the well improved farm that now constitutes his home. He has won independence and definite prosperity through his own well ordered labors and enterprise and has long been numbered among the substantial exponents of agricultural and livestock industry in Clayton county, the while he has at no time failed to live up to the varied duties and responsibilities of loyal citizenship. He has had no ambition for public office, but is a stalwart supporter of the principles of the Republican party. On the 16th of January, 1862, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Groth to Miss Guri Tollefson, likewise a native of Norway, and eleven children were born of this union. Halsten, the firstborn, died in childhood; Sarah remains at the parental home; Rachel is deceased; Halsten (second of the name) is associated in the work and management of the old homestead farm; Tollef resides in the village of Elgin; Sophia and Kittle are deceased; Louis is a resident of Elgin, Fayette county; Sophia and Martin are still members of the parental home circle; and the youngest child, a son, died at birth. source: History of Clayton County,
Iowa; From The Earliest Historical Times Down to the
Present; by Realto E. Price, Vol. II, 1916; pg.
153-154 |