Representative August Schultz View All Years

HON. AUGUST SCHULTZ

MR. SPEAKER—Your committee appointed to prepare a memorial to fittingly commemorate the life and public service of the Hon. August Schultz, a former member, of the General Assembly of Iowa, beg leave to submit the following:

August Schultz was a native of the Kingdom of Prussia, where he was born as the eldest son of peasant parents, on August 1st, 1845. In 1852 the family came to America and lived for a number of years in Chicago, Illinois. The father died while Mr. Schultz was yet a young boy and his mother later contracted a second marriage with Frederick Gruber. During the Civil war the step-father served in the volunteer ranks of the Union army, and it thus fell to the lot of the youth and his mother to provide for the family which included two other brothers and two sisters. In 1874 Mr. Schultz and his young wife, in company with a number of other families, relatives and friends, removed to Crawford county to found homes on the rolling prairies of western Iowa. Here they reared a large family of sons and daughters who are members of well known and respected families of their respective communities. In the course of time Mr. Schultz acquired ownership to a considerable acreage of farm land and as the sons grew to manhood these farms were gradually occupied by them as homes for their families. Mr. Schultz and his good wife now retired from active farm work and took up their abode in a new home in the town of Schleswig. It was here that death suddenly, almost without warning, called Mr. Schultz from the scenes of earth on the night of January 9th, 1922. His wife had preceded him to the great beyond some years before.

During his life time Mr. Schultz was closely identified with many of the public affairs of Crawford county and the state. As contractors, he and his brother Herman, were county bridge builders for many years, and as such constructed the first steel bridge built by the county. This structure is still in use on one of the main thoroughfares of the state, primary road No. 34, known as the Sioux City Cut-off. He was for nine years a member of the board of county supervisors, and served as mayor of Schleswig for a term of seven years. At the time of his death he was president of the Mutual Insurance Association of German Farmers of Crawford and Ida counties, having been annually re-elected to that office for upward of forty years. He represented Crawford county during the Twenty-fourth and Twenty-fifth sessions of the General Assembly of Iowa, and was a useful and valued member.

Like all German immigrant citizens who came to America just preceding the Civil war, he affiliated with the then young Republican party, but later identified himself with the Democrats, and it was as a candidate of the latter party that he was elected representative.

He was a man of rare good sense, .with sound judgment, business capacity and managing ability. He was a member of the Lutheran congregation in Hanover township and was prominent in Lutheran church circles, and gave liberally of his time and means to the support of the church. At the time·of his death he had just completed the erection of a new building to house the parochial school of the Lutheran Evangelical congregation at Schleswig. He had planned to complete the installation of some shelving in the basement of the school building on the morrow, but near midnight the messenger on the pale horse called him and this task was thus left unfinished. It seems a most fitting close for a life that had been crowded so full of activity, work and useful toil as that of our departed brother; and so now therefore

Be It Resolved, That the House of Representatives of the General Assembly of the State of Iowa, take this occasion to present this tribute to his memory and express our appreciation of his worth and character, and his public services

Be It Further Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be spread upon the Journal of the House and that the Chief Clerk be instructed to forward an engrossed copy of the same to the family of the deceased.

THEO. C. BLUME,

HENRY FRAHM,

JOHN H. AIKEN,

Committee.

Adopted April 12, 1923.