America
Iowa
Hanson
Thomas HANSON born
Keighley, Yorkshire 1796. He went to America in 1843 with two of his sons, Hiram (20) and Joseph (18).
They spent two years in Wisconsin then Thomas returned to Yorkshire. Son Joseph settled in Chicago but Hiram decided to head to California, to the gold rush. With 3 young friends, their horses and wagon with supplies, they left Wiscosin in 1850 and joined a wagon train at Omaha, Nebraska. Some of the settlers were tired of travelling with the slower oxen led wagons, including Hiram and his friends, so they headed out up the Platte River, then the Northern Platter River, onto Fort Laramie and then to Salt Lake City. Their horses gave out, so the 4 young men carried what they could on their backs, and set off walking to California. Hiram returned three years later by ship to Nicaragua, a fifty mile trek across the Isthmus, by another boat to New Orleans, up the Mississippi to Dubuque. He had $2,000 in gold and with "part of the money' he bought a farm in Iowa. He had left Keighley without much, now he was a landowner. His father, Thomas came back to the US in 1860 with his wife and the rest of the family and settled on a farm in Iowa. He died in 1878. Hiram married three times. With his 2nd wife and children he had travelled by covered wagon to Iowa and settled near the rest of the family. Hiram worked on his farm until 1888, then at age 65 he moved to the nearby town of Oelwein. He still maintained ownership of his farm and was a highly respected member of the community. He died at Oelwein, Iowa in 1905. He had fathered 10 children.
