CHIEF:  Dr Robin Boyd, MA (Oxon); MB BS; LRCP, MRCS; DCH; AFOM, 8th Baron Kilmarnock

Richard G. Boyd

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RichBoyd (at sign) Charter.net

  Margaret Boyd ~ George Douglas

Cedar Rapids, Iowa

DOUGLAS, GEORGE, late of Cedar Rapids, was born in the county of Caithness, Scotland, April 17, 1817.  He came to Rochester, N. Y., in 1848, and engaged in canal, railway and bridge construction in western New York, continuing in this work until 1852. In that year he followed the general western movement and moved to Illinois, where he engaged in various railway and bridge building contracts at Dixon, Ill., and vicinity. Here his work lasted until 1855, when he took contracts for building a portion of the railway line now operated by the Illinois Central railway, west of Dubuque, Iowa. From 1855 until 1870 he was actively engaged in railway construction, mostly in Iowa and Nebraska, doing much of the work on the lines now operated by the Illinois Central railway across the state of Iowa, also the present main line of the Chicago & North-Western railway in Iowa, and a considerable portion of the Fremont, Elkhorn & Missouri Valley railway in eastern Nebraska. Mr. Douglas was associated with Mr. John I. Blair in his projection of the various railway lines in western Iowa, and many miles of the grading, bridging and track laying of the railways promoted by the companies of which Mr. Blair was president, were completed by the firm of Douglas, Brown & Company, of which the subject of this sketch was the senior partner. From 1870 to 1873 Mr. Douglas engaged in his last work in railway construction, completing 155 miles of the International & Great Northern railway in Texas, including the grading, bridging, track laying and depot building complete. In 1874 he associated himself with Mr. Robert Stuart, now of Chicago, under the firm name of Douglas & Stuart, and engaged in the manufacture of oatmeal and other cereal products, at Cedar Rapids, and continued in active connection with the business until the time of his death, in May,1884. Mr. Douglas married MARGARET BOYD at Dixon, Ill., in 1855. She was born in the north of Ireland. Mrs. Douglas and three sons, GEORGE BRUCE, WALTER D., and WILLIAM WALLACE, live in Cedar Rapids at the present time.

Source: page 147;  Gue, B.F. Biographies and Portraits of the Progressive Men of Iowa. Des Moines: Conaway & Shaw Publishers, 1899.

NOTE: Use this data as a finding tool, just as you would any other secondary source. When you find the name of an ancestor listed, confirm the facts in original sources.

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