In 1841 the first school house was built in Marion by subscription, and on the site now occupied by the C. R. Fairfield Lumber Company's office. It stood alone in the open prairie, and was surrounded by wild grass fully five feet high. Mr. Higby was Marion's first school master. It was in this building that Rev. Mr. Emerson organized the first Methodist society.
In 1838 the territorial legislature appointed Richard Knott, Lyman Dillon, and Benjamin Nye commissioners to locate the "seat of justice" in Linn county, and on the first Monday in March, 1839, two of said commissioners, Richard Knott and Benjamin Nye, met at the house of William Abbe, on Abbe's creek, and chose the site of the town of Marion as the proper location for the county seat.
In August, 1839, three commissioners were elected to act as fiscal agents of the county. The polling place was Westport, near the present site of Bertram, and Samuel C. Stewart, Peter McRoberts, and Luman M. Strong were elected. This commission was invested with about the same powers as are now exercised by the board of supervisors of the county. They held their first meeting in Marion on September 9, 1839. H. W. Gray, the first appointed and first elected sheriff of Linn county, proclaimed the board in session. Its first official act was the appointment of John C. Berry, clerk. It next named the county seat, Marion. It next appointed A. J. McKean and William H. Smith constables. At its October session, 1839, it divided the county into three election precincts, viz: one at William Abbe's, on Abbe creek, known as the Sugar Grove precinct; one at Marion, known as the Marion precinct; and one at Michael Green's, known as Green's Grove precinct. The first election judges of Marion were James W. Bassitt, Henry Thompson, and Rufus H. Lucore. At this session James W. Willis was allowed $7.75 for five days' work making town stakes and hauling same, "three loads." The first road laid out was as follows, and ordered January 6, 1840: "Beginning at the county line west of Lathrup Olmsted's farm; thence on the nearest and best ground to the town of Marion; thence to the rapids of Cedar river; thence to the county line on a direction to Iowa City, the seat of the Territorial government."
We quote one other entry of the county commissioners made at the January term, 1840: "Ordered by the Board that James W. Willis be and is hereby allowed the privilege of cutting a sufficient amount of timber off from the quarter section of land on which the town of Marion is located to finish a certain frame for which he has already got a part; provided, however, that he shall not cut any timber that is not included in the streets of said town. Said privilege is granted in consideration of house rent and fuel for the January term of this board. 1840." A very significant entry was made by this board of commissioners at its April term, 1840, in which Luman M. Strong, one of the commissioners, was granted a license to keep a grocery and "vend spiritous liquors at retail for one year at his house near Marion by paying into the county treasury the sum of $50.00." In a later record, and the only one referring to the claimant as a public officer, R. P. Lowe, district attorney for 1840, is allowed $75.00.
The county judge plan succeeded the commissioner system of government in 1851, and Norman W. Isbell was the first judge, and was elected in 1851. He was succeeded in turn by J. M. Berry, Daniel Lothian, Johnston Elliott, and A. B. Dumont. The supervisor system, one from each township of the county, by order of the legislature, supplanted the county judge in 1861; and Marion was represented on this first board by A. J. Twogood. In 1871 the present system of county government by a board of three supervisors was adopted. County Judge J. M. Berry, in 1855, in his official capacity, contracted for the erection of the present jail and fire proof building where the county offices are now located, and this brought on the court house fight of 1855, when the issues were fairly joined in the contest for election to the county judgeship between J. M. Berry, representing Marion, and Rev. Elias Skinner, representing Cedar Rapids. Berry won by a handsome majority.
Hosea W. Gray, a man of marked ability and prominent in the early history of Marion, was elected the first sheriff of Linn county. At the same election, to wit: in August, 1839, Thomas W. Campbell was elected county treasurer; Socrates H. Tryon, who was also Marion's first physician, county clerk; and G. H. Tryon, was either elected or appointed the first county recorder. Although it is well authenticated that Richard Osborn and Sarah Haines were married in Linn county in 1839, the first marriage in Marion and the second license of record in the county is that of James E. Bromwell and Catherine Gray, date August 26, 1841. This saintly pioneer died in Marion May 5, 1900, after more than sixty years continuous residence in Marion and on his farm, one and a half miles east of the town, honored and loved by all. The same year John Hunter was married to Hannah Barbary Hines, and Charles Rowe to Phebe Putnam, and Ans Safely to Margaret Hunter, and Samuel Ross to Mary Vaughn, and John Mann to Mary Mann, and Julius Allen Peet to Esther Ann Crowe, and Aaron Moriarity to Hannah Ross, and Joseph Crane to Agnes Bogard.
Hosea W. Gray, who in the Civil war was captain of Company A, Sixth Iowa Infantry, and Linn county's first sheriff, took the first census of Linn county in 1840, which showed a population of 1,373. The vote at the first election in 1839 showed thirty-two ballots cast. October 28, 1840, Peter Garrow, born in Scotland, renounced allegiance to Queen Victoria and declared his intention to become of citizen of the United States. The first divorce case was filed May 26, 1842, and entitled Dyer Usher vs. Mary Ann Usher. At the September term, 1843, it was ordered dismissed. The first divorce granted in Linn county was at the March term, 1844, of the district court, when Parthena E. Hewitt obtained a decree of divorce from her husband, Oliver Hewitt. The title of the first case filed in the district court of Linn county is Richard Thomas vs. O. S. Hall, being an appeal case brought for trespass. After several continuances it was dismissed. George Greene, Marion's first lawyer, was counsel for the plaintiff. William G. Thompson was the first prosecuting attorney for what was called the second circuit, consisting of the counties of Cedar, Jones, and Linn, and of the eighth judicial district after the establishment of the circuit court, in 1868. The first murder committed in Linn county occurred in Marion March 20, 1847, when James Reed—who then and for many years after occupied the farm later known as the Bachman farm, on the old road about half way between Marion and Cedar Rapids, and whose house was destroyed by the tornado of 1860—struck Nathaniel Carnagy with a sled stake, fracturing his skull, from which injuries he died two weeks later. Reed was indicted but found not guilty by a jury.
The tornado of 1860, which passed through Linn county on Sunday, June 3, started about six miles west of Marion. It struck the southwest part of the town but the only damage done was to a brick smoke house standing west of the house then occupied by Willard Harlan, now the home of J. Q. A. Dutton, the last house on the street car line east of Indian creek. The first deed recorded was for lots five and six, block eleven, Marion, and was executed by the county commissioners April 4, 1843, to Horace Metcalf. The second deed is to Addison Daniels. The consideration is nine dollars. It bears the same date and is for lots one and two, block fourteen, the present Clogston home, lot seven, block twelve, where the T. J. Davis building on Tenth street now stands, and lot eight, block thirteen, on a part of which the First National Bank now stands. The selection of these lots is good evidence of the business ability of Mr. Daniels in those early days.
The plats of the towns of Marion and Cedar Rapids were recorded on the same day, to wit: April 3, 1843, "O. S. Hall, Recorder." In volume 216 on page 48, Recorder's office, is a record showing the organization of the Presbyterian society, on November 11, 1839. William Vaughn is named as one of the elders.
A. J. McKean, who came to Linn county in 1839, helped lay out the town of Marion, was the first constable of Linn county, and the first assessor for the whole county, by appointment in 1840. He served as clerk of the courts from 1854 to 1872, and was one of Marion's most prominent citizens for over half a century. His brother, Thomas J. McKean, was the first mayor of the town of Marion which was incorporated in 1865. He was elected sheriff of the county in 1859, serving until the spring of 1861, when he resigned to enter the government army service, having already served in the Florida and Mexican wars, and November 21, 1861, was appointed brigadier-general, and after a brilliant service in the Civil war was honorably discharged in 1865, as brevet major general. On September 5, 1848, he was married to Sarah T. Gray, who still survives him, is a resident of Marion, and still bright and active at the age of ninety years.