Representative James Joseph Bruce View All Years
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James Joseph Bruce
Pocahontas County
Born at Oswego, New York, Nov. 8, 1843, while his parents, Thos. and Mary (Auld) Bruce, were on their way from County Monoghan, Ireland, to Simcoe County, Ontario. He was educated in the public schools of Simcoe County, and at the age of eighteen years, taught his first term of school. After this he attended normal school for a few months and then returned to teaching. Following the war the county began to fill up, and it was during this second influx of citizens that the subject of this sketch arrived in the county during the summer of 1866. The population of the county at that time was slightly over two hundred. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1882 by Judge Duffie. He was a promoter and real estate agent, and when the Des Moines Valley Railway Co. built thru from Tara to Ruthven, he labored for the voting of a tax and bought the right-of-way. He helped to organize the Northwestern Land Co., which owned the town sites along this line, and was its president. He was one of the leaders in the organization of the Pocahontas County Mutual Insurance Company. He became Rolfe's first Mayor. He also served as president of the school board and justice of the peace. He represented the Seventy-eighth District, Pocahontas and Calhoun counties, in the state legislature in 1886-1887, and was a member of the county board of supervisors. On March 4, 1867, he was united in marriage to Mary J. Price, a resident of the township since 1865.
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