Allison, Thomas J.

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Submitted by Martha J. Martin

Thomas J. Allison remained at home assisting to till the farm until he was twenty-one years of age. He then learned the trade of a stone-cutter, serving two years, for which he received fifty cents per day. He worked mostly along the railroad, particularly in Ohio, and in 1852, when 27 years old, he married Miss Maria Davison of Ironton, Lawrence County, Ohio by who there is one child, Mary, now the wife of J.A. Sterling of Arkansas City, Kan. Her husband is conductor on the railroad. Mrs. Allison died when her child was but three months old.

In June 1857, Mr. Allison came to Missouri and took a contract for the building of a portion of the Missouri Pacific Railroad, which took him about three years. He brought with him to this state about $6,000. On the 7th of Feb 1860, he married Miss Susan E. Garnett of Otterville, Cooper County, MO. She was born in Culpepper County, VA June 23, 1840 and is a daughter of George T. and Mary J. (Hume) Garnett, the former a native of Culpepper County, VA and the latter of Madison County the same state. They moved to Cooper County, MO in 1856, the present Mrs. Allison however, remaining in VA until 1859. She received a good education in private schools of he native state.

When the Civil War came on, Mr. Allison moved back to his native town in Ohio and purchases an interest in a flouring mill. He operated the mill for about two years, when he sold out and again resumed worked building railroads. He took a contract to do mason work for twenty miles on the Marietta & Cincinnati Railroads, which took him about three years to complete.

In the spring of 1866, he returned to Missouri, locating in Warrensburg. Before he went back to Ohio, he had purchased one hundred and sixty acres of land in Cass County, MO but on account of bushwhackers, he did not feel safe to go to that county on his return to Missouri, so he rented a farm near Warrensburg. However, in 1867 he removed to his farm in Cass County and began its development.

Source: Portrait and Biographical Record of Johnson and Pettis Counties, Missouri page 336