McCoid

The summer of 1999, I finally located the graves of my maternal great-grandparents and learned their names: Elbridge Dow and Nancy Ann (Fouts) McCoid and Andrew Jackson and Cora Ellen (Fisher) Pace. They are all buried in a small rural cemetery near the former town of Manteno, Iowa in Shelby County. Many thanks to my oldest brother Dick McCoid for taking me to the cemetery, I would have never found it on my own! Since then I have made some long over due progress in tracking all four of my maternal great-grandparents' lines. Hurray! Elbridge's great-grandparents, who would be my 4th great-grandparents, are James and Jane (McDonnell) McCoid. They came to the US from County Down, Ireland in the very early 1800s with their children and settled in Muskingum Co., Ohio, where both James and Jane finished out their lives. Records indicate that children of their son Nathaniel and his wife, Mary (Sarchet) McCoid had made their way to west central Iowa by the mid-1800s and are listed among the early pioneering families. A friend in Iowa, Lyro Knights, pointed me in the direction of the Jefferson Twp., Harrison Co. Iowa on-line site and I learned a number of things about several of James and Jane's grandsons: Between 1855 and 1857, James and Jane's grandson (Elbridge's uncle) James McCoid is reported to have come to Jefferson Township, Harrison Co., Iowa. In 1857, in La Garange Township, Harrison Co., Iowa, the first regular saw-mill was built by James McCoid. About 1859, James McCoid then purchased the first store opened in the "Village of Jeddo", in Jefferson Twp., Harrison Co., Iowa, from Alexander McCoy. James conducted the store for three years, sold most of the goods and moved the rest to "Reeder's Mill (aka "Hard Scratch") in Jefferson Twp., Harrison Co., Iowa. In the fall of 1867, James and his brother Aaron McCoid built a store at Reeder's Mills and stocked it with an assortment of goods. Two years later, James sold his interest to his brother Aaron. Aaron continued to run the store for about 3 years before he moved to Logan, Iowa. Aaron McCoid later returned to Reeder's Mill and bought a store, which he ran for several years before selling a half interest to W.D. Armstrong. Their firm was then called "McCoid and Armstrong". Aaron later sold out his interest in the business to Mr. Armstrong. To visit the Jefferson Twp., Harrison Co. site, click on the following address: http://www.rootsweb.com/~iaharris/twp/twpjeffe.htm Linda Brittain is also researching McCoid families in this part of Iowa.

For information on her McCoid families, see the report section of Linda Brittain's home page:

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