The History of Cayuga County 1789-1879 page 274
TOWN OF IRA

In 1802 the settlements were augmented by Daniel Parker, from Marcellus; John C. Barnes and his sons, from Sempronius; Edward Wood, from Sennett; and Rev. Michael Burge. Parker settled on lot 69, where Abiah Cook now lives, his farm extending to the south line of the town. In his log house much of the business of the town was transacted at an early day. He died on the old homestead, which is still held by the family, his daughter being Abiah Cook's mother. Barnes settled on lot 70, on the farm now owned by Eleazer F. Jaynes, where he died about 1837. His sons were Amos, John, Luther, Zadoc and Silas, all of whom are dead. The later two died during the epidemic of 1811. Silas settled on the same lot with his father, and Zadoc on lot 83, on the west part of Isaac R. Merritt's farm. The death of the wife of Silas Barnes, in 1802, was the first in the town. Norton C. Barnes, a son of Luther, is living in Cato. Wood settled on lot 89. Burge drew lot 22 as a soldier's claim and settled on it. He was great-grandfather of David H. Marvin, who now resides on lot 24.

Jacob Labertaux, from Pennsylvania, came in May, 1803, and settled about a mile north of Cato. He moved west with his family, which was large, about 1830. Archibald and Charles Green, brothers, settled the same year, (1803,) on lot 70, the former on the farm now owned by Jacob Deforest, and the latter on the farm now owned by Harry Clark. Both removed to Sennett about 1820.

Abraham Willey and his son-in-law, Eli Matson, came in from East Haddam, Conn., in 1804, and settled on lot 23, Willey on the farm of Heman Benton, (whose father, Dr. Allen Benton, of Cato, married Willey's daughter,) where he died and is buried, in the family burying ground. Matson returned and brought his family the following year, and settled a little north of Willey, on the opposite side of the road, where he kept a small store and where he died. His son, Eli S. Matson, was then about nine years old, and afterwards made the first settlement on lot 24, on which Augustine Matson, son of the latter, was born and now resides. Henry Ferris came in with his sons Augustus and Thatcher, and the family of the former, from Galway, Saratoga county, in the fall of 1804, and moved in his family in the spring of 1805. He took up 450 acres and built his log cabin where the house of his son, Harry Ferris, now stands, and where he died in 1808. His daughter Zipperah, (now Mrs. Luther Barnes,) is living in Auburn. Two sons are also living, Harry, aged eighty-nine years, on the old homestead, and James Harvey, who was born here, in Rose, Wayne county.

Thomas Barnes, from Washington county, settled at Ira Corners in 1805. Dr. John W. Squyers, the first physician, settled on the farm owned by Harvey Ferris, about a mile north of Meridian, as early as 1805, in which year he taught the first school. He was a natural genius, highly educated, but much addicted to the use of intoxicants. He was the first physician in the County north of the river, and had no equal as such in that country. He had a large and lucrative practice, which, in consequence of his bibitory habits, was gradually monopolized by others of less ability. He died at Plainville, in Lysander, some thirty-five years ago.

Luther, Samuel and Israel Phelps, brothers, came in from Galway, Saratoga county, in 1806. Luther settled on the farm owned by the widow of James Smith, where he remained only about a year, when he removed to Ira, to the place on which his son, John Phelps, now lives, and where he died in November, 1867. Chauncey Phelps, another son, lives a little east of that village. Samuel settled on the farm owned by James Slocum; and Israel, in Ira, where he built the present hotel about fifty-seven years ago, and where he, in company with his brother Samuel, opened the first store, in 1813. Samuel Phelps, Jr., and Dwight Phelps, son of Israel, are living, the latter a mile west and the other three-fourths of a mile south-west of Ira. Stephen Pierce settled at Ira about 1806 and died in the house in which his grandson Chas. Pierce now lives. Daniel and Ezekiel Cogswell, brothers, from Galway, settled about 1806; Ezekiel, on the farm owned by Addison Everts, and Daniel adjoining him, about one and one-fourth miles north-west of Ira.

Heman West,. from Washington county, settled on the farm now owned by S. M. Brown, in the south part, on the line of Cato about 1806 or '7. He took up one hundred acres, which he sold after three years on account of sickness from fever and ague, one-half to Abel Pasko and the other half to a man named Shivers, and removed to Cazenovia. He came with his family, con-

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