A PIONEER GONE.
Mr. Joseph M. Ferguson is dead.
He departed this life just as the summer sun was sinking beneath the western horizon on last Saturday evening. Everybody in the country around Manning knew this man for he had been a resident of this city since the early eighties, coming here soon after the town was established.

Mr. Ferguson was a man of bright intellect, was upright and straightforward in all his business transactions, and was respected at all times and in all places by all people. When a man has completed his life work and reached the age of seventy-six years, his death is but the closing incident of an unlimited number of events and experiences, and leaves nothing but his absence to be mourned for.

Mr. Ferguson was elected mayor of Manning in the spring of 1891, and again in 1892 and 1893; but resigned the office before the expiration of his third term on account of failing health. He had also held the office of justice of the peace for several terms.

Mr. Ferguson died at the home of his daughter, Mrs. John Hockett, three and a half miles west of town, where himself and wife had been visiting for a couple of weeks. The funeral was held on Tuesday and was largely attended. Rev. Isaac Johnson of Ferguson, Marshall County, officiated. The preacher said, among other things: "Thirty-five years ago Father Ferguson and myself use to travel the prairies of Iowa and preach the gospel. I remember that once upon a time I was destitute and this good man took me in and sheltered and fed me, and because of this I cannot help but cherish his memory." The remains were interred in the cemetery three miles west of town (Iowa Township).

Joseph M. Ferguson was born April 18, 1820, in the state of Kentucky, county of Pulaski. Here he lived until 1831, when, with his parents, moved to Indiana. On the 16th day of October, 1838, he was united in marriage to Elizabeth Hilsabeck, and, as a result of this union, twelve children were born unto them, nine of whom, and the wife and mother, survive. In the fall of 1847 Mr. Ferguson with his family came to Iowa and settled in Marshall County. In the year 1884 Mr. and Mrs. Ferguson came to Manning, to which place they were preceded by some of their children a year or two before. The surviving members of the family were all present at the funeral, save two and they living at a distance, were unable to reach here.