The Davenport Public Library presents “The Life of Jesse Hoove" -- September 8.
Wednesday, September 8, 6 p.m.
Presented by the Davenport Public Library
Presented in conjunction with the 175th anniversary of its subject's birth, the Davenport Public Library's virtual presentation The Life of Jesse Hoover will, on September 8, offer viewers fascination information on the little-known experiences of a future president's father, the program a special “bonus” event in the library's 3rd Thursday at Hoover's Presidential Library & Museum series.
A man who spent most of his life in Iowa, Jesse Clark Hoover came to the West Branch community from Ohio when he was eight years old, arriving in the state in 1854 with his father Eli. Hoover went on to marry Hulda Minthorn in 1870, and the couple had three children: Theodore, Mary, and eventual United States president Herbert. (As a young child, Herbert was reportedly often referred to by his father as "my little stick in the mud" after he repeatedly got trapped in the mud crossing the unpaved street.) The elder Hoover built a blacksmith shop at the corner of West Branch's Downey and Penn Streets in 1871, and he was one of only three blacksmiths in a town of 500. West Branch was primarily a farming community at the time, and many of its residents had horses, buggies, and wagons that consequently needed repair. As a means of self-advertising his abilities, Hoover, in 1877, fashioned an advertisement in the West Branch Times: "Horse shoeing and plow work a specialty. Also dealer in all kinds of pumps. Prices to suit the times."
In 1879, Hoover sold the blacksmith shop and started a new farm-implement business on the corner of Downey and Main Streets, the first shop in town to manufacture barbed wire. Only one year later, however, on December 13 of 1880, Hoover died of heart failure brought on by pneumonia. He was only 34 years old, and is now buried next to his wife Hulda in the West Branch Municipal Cemetery on North Maple Street. An inventive and talented young entrepreneur, a self-taught blacksmith, an inventor, a pump manufacturer, a community leader, a pioneer West Branch businessman, and and a husband and father, Jesse Clark Hoover remains little more than a historic footnote. Yet he was remarkable in many ways, and The Life of Jesse Hoover will offer participants a window into the social, economic, and religious background of the broader Iowa community that produced Herbert Hoover – as well as insight into a man who, to the son who barely remembered him, remained a figure in the shadows.
Presenting the Davenport Library's latest virtual program is Iowa native Peter Hoehnle, a park ranger at West Branch's Herbert Hoover National Historic Site who holds a Ph.D. in History from Iowa State University. The Life of Jesse Hoover begins at 6 p.m. on September 8, registration is available through the Davenport Public Library Web site, and more information on the free virtual event and the monthly 3rd Thursday at Hoover's series is available by calling (563)326-7832 and visiting DavenportLibrary.com.
