Benton Thomas Cooley (1835 - 1897)

Born 6 May 1835 in Attica Center, Genesee, NY

Ancestors

Husband of Lydia Getrude (Lovell) Deuel — married 28 Sep 1863 in Estherville, Emmet, IA

Descendants

Died 22 Dec 1897 at age 62 in Estherville, Emmet, IA

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Biography

Benton's middle name may not have been Thomas, historical sources also list a middle initial of "F."

Benton was born in Attica Center, NY to Thomas and Rachel (Hubbard) Cooley. He was the youngest of thirteen children born to Rachel, and also had two half-siblings from his father's first marriage. Sometime after Benton's birth, the family moved to Darien, NY, where his father pased away several years later.

The family migrated west after the death of Thomas, and settled in the area of Faribault, MN. In 1863 Benton married Lydia Lovell, the daughter of Lyman Lovell, who was a prominent citizen of Pickerel Lake, MN. The couple remained in Minnesota until about 1880, when they moved their family west to the Dakota Territory.

Benton and his family lived first near Lennox, in Lincoln County, and then moved to Rapid City. The family remained in the Dakotas for about ten years, before returning to Minnesota. They settled in Jackson County, MN, near the Minnesota-Iowa border.

Benton passed away just before Christmas in 1897, at the home of his son, Fay Cooley, in Estherville, IA.

Sources

• 1850 US Fed Census;
• 1860 US Fed Census;
• 1870 Fed Census;
• 1880 Census Fed Census;
• 1865, 1875, & 1895 MN Census;
• 1890 list of landowners & residents of Pennington County, SD;
• copy of Benton's record of death from Emmet County, IA;
• newspaper articles relating to Benton's death from the Emmet County Republican;
• Cooley, Mortimer E., The Cooley genealogy : the descendants of Ensign Benjamin Cooley, an early settler of Springfield and Longmeadow, Massachusetts, and other members of the family in America. Rutland, Vt.: Tuttle, 1941. pp 593-595, 684.
• Cooley, Benton; Land Patent dated 30 Mar 1881; Sioux Falls Office of the Bureau of Land Management; 160 acres in section 20, twp. 97, range 52, Dakota Territory.