Senator Fred Carlton Hartshorn View All Years

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Fred Carlton Hartshorn

Wright County

Born to Q. D. and Harriette Brooks Hartshorn, his birth occurring June 6, 1857, at Traer, Iowa. Mr. Hartshorn received his early education at Traer, later attending Grinnell College, Bryant and Stratton's Commercial College in Chicago and was graduated from a law course at Iowa University at Iowa City in 1879. After being admitted to the bar, he practiced for one year at Traer, and in August 1880 moved to Clarion. Here he purchased what is now the Tillinghast building, which was occupied by the Brownie drug and the Jack Sprat store, and he maintained his law office above the drugstore. Later, Mr. Hartshorn moved to Ireton, Iowa, where he engaged in the tanking business, but shortly returned to Clarion and located on a farm east of Clarion, which also operated a stock farm. In 1889, he was elected county treasurer of Wright County and served in that capacity for three terms. The story of Mr. Hartshorn's life is closely associated with the development of Clarion. He served on the school board of Pleasant Township, on the Clarion school board for nine years, was one of Clarion's first park commissioners, president of the first telephone company and a member of the town council. So deservedly popular was he that in 1902, he was elected a State Senator from the thirty-seventh senatorial district, including the counties of Wright, Hardin, Hamilton, serving in the Twenty-ninth, Thirtieth and Thirty-first sessions. He was united in marriage to Clara J. Hills August 4, 1877.

Senate District 37