My Genealogy Hound

OFFER POULSON is a native of Denmark and was reared on a farm until about twenty-two years of age, when he began to learn wagon-making. At the age of twenty-six he came to America, landing in Baltimore and going thence directly to Chicago, where he arrived in 1872, and followed his trade there until coming to Nebraska in February, 1876. Here he located a homestead of eighty acres (all the law allowed at that time) in the east half of the northeast quarter of section 2, township 5, range 14, in Cosmo township, Kearney county; since then, however, in 1881, he has purchased the southeast quarter of section 35, township 6, range 14, in Lincoln township, adjoining his first tract, and his farm now comprises 240 acres. His first dwelling was a small, cheap shanty, in which he managed to live until 1880, when he erected his present comfortable dwelling. His farm is now highly improved with good barns, groves, orchards, and every convenience calculated to make home desirable, and he has 240 acres under cultivation in mixed crops. When he first came he had about enough money to pay the expenses of himself and family on the way, and his only farm stock consisted of two small mules and two cows. The first two or three years were disastrous ones, and it was a hard matter for him to make ends meet. The grasshoppers the first year destroyed everything green in the country, and the second year, 1878, hail was equally as destructive, he being one of the greatest sufferers in the neighborhood. He was in debt for his farm machinery, but his creditors never annoyed him, but waited patiently until he could raise and dispose of a crop or two. He is now as nicely situated as he could desire, and is giving much attention to breeding fine-grade live stock. He has on his farm an imported English stallion that weighs 1,800 pounds, and his stock of hogs is very large and of choice varieties.

Paul Cristoffesson Poulson, the father of the subject proper of this sketch, was also a native of Denmark and came to America in 1879, and died in Nebraska in 1888. He married Anna C. Ottasan, who died in her native country in Denmark in 1877, the mother of six children, of whom our subject is the second and the first of the family that came to America. All of these children are now in Kearney county, Nebraska, with the exception of the eldest brother, who is still in Denmark.

Offer Poulson was married at Plano, Ill., to Mary Larsen, just prior to coming to Nebraska. She is the daughter of Dalgaard Larsen, of Denmark, who never reached America. The widow of this gentleman, however, died in this country soon after arriving here. To the union of Mr. and Mrs. Poulson have been born three children, viz. — Louie C., Arthur M., and Emma E. Politically, Mr. Poulson is independent; he is a member of the Masonic fraternity and of the Farmers’ Alliance and Club, the latter organized for the purpose of advancing the interests of agriculturists.