Pioneers of Polk County, Iowa, and reminiscences of early days . per. 222 PIONEERS OF POLK COUNTY, IOWA Beginning with nothing but brain, brawn and determination,by industry, intelligently directed, sterling integrity, and square-dealing, he has won success, and added to the mechanical industriesof the city until the output of his works is now more than two hun-dred thousand dollars per year. Politically, he is a Eepublican. He cast his first ballot for theelection of Old Abe to his second term, but he has not time norinclination to indulge in politics. Socially, he is of genial disposition, c
Pioneers of Polk County, Iowa, and reminiscences of early days . per. 222 PIONEERS OF POLK COUNTY, IOWA Beginning with nothing but brain, brawn and determination,by industry, intelligently directed, sterling integrity, and square-dealing, he has won success, and added to the mechanical industriesof the city until the output of his works is now more than two hun-dred thousand dollars per year. Politically, he is a Eepublican. He cast his first ballot for theelection of Old Abe to his second term, but he has not time norinclination to indulge in politics. Socially, he is of genial disposition, companionable, esteemed byeverybody, and carries a big, warm heart, pulsating with kindnessand charity. He is not a member of any secret organization, pre-ferring to keep aloof from all entangling alliances. Religiously, he is a Catholic, and active in the church and edu-cational work of that denomination. He has good health, is always on deck for business, yet his forty-nine years of strenuous labor prompts him to let John E. do thehustling. December IG, GERRIT VAN GINKEL GERRIT VAN GINKEL ONE of the most active and successful boosters of DeaMoines thirty years ago was Gerrit Van Ginkel, who notonly helped the town, but accumulated wealth, not by spec-ulation, but legitimate business enterprises. Born in the land of the canals, windmills and wooden shoes,December Eleventh, 1849, he came, with his parents, to America,landing at ISTew Orleans in 1857. They came up the MississippiValley to Pella, and joined the community of sturdy, intelligentHollanders who had settled there. The father engaged in farming,while Gerrit did what he could find to do, for board and clothes,and attended the excellent schools which have been the notablefeature of the town since its foundation, until eleven years old,when he went to learn the printing trade in the office of the Week-hlad, published by the well-known banker, Henry Hospers, wherehe remained imtil 18G7, when, at the age of eighteen,
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