Sixty-one years after the family's arrival in Iowa, during September 1911, descendants gathered for a reunion in the woods near the spring where that first cabin had been located. They left behind a report published in both The Chariton Leader and The Herald-Patriot (of Sept. 28) that's the envy of family historians who wish their ancestors had produced something similar. Here it is:
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Joseph Mundell, wife and five children, Isabelle Ann, Robert Isaiah, James Russell, Margaret Jane, Lura Debra, left Boone county, Indiana, in September 1849, and in 16 days landed three miles west of Eddyville, Iowa, where they wintered. In that winter, Uncle Joseph, as he was commonly known, and two sons, Robert and James, came to Lucas county, two and a half miles south of what is now Lucas but was then nothing but prairie, and built them a log house, consisting of one room, sixteen by eighteen feet. They brought their covered wagon and used it as a house while they were building, which took two weeks.
On April 20, 1850, the family moved to their new home in their wagon with all their things in it. They bought eighty acres at $1.25 an acre when they first came, and in a few years they got forty acres more.
It was on the old farm Sept. 23, 1911, that his one son, James, and sixty-one grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren took their well filled baskets for a reunion and picnic, and my, such a "dinner." The table never could have stood up under its load if it had not been spread on the grass,, and the same old spring that furnished water for their grandfather some sixty years ago, furnished water for them on Saturday.
The day was well spent in songs, swinging and games of all kinds. A jolly good time was reported by all and the old woods fairly rang with laughter and shout.
One of Uncle Joseph's great-granddaughters, Mrs. Alma Baker, lives on the old farm now. Uncle Joseph, Aunt Sarah, Robert and Jane, have all passed away, only three of the children remain, Ann May of Silver City, Iowa, Lura Pearson, of Burns, Oregon, and James of Derby. The girls were unable to be present.
The family has grown in the last sixty years until there are about two hundred of them now living, but it was impossible for all to be here as they are scattered from Illinois to Oregon and from Oklahoma to Canada, but the absent ones were not forgotten for their motto is, "Love one another."
They returned to their homes in the evening after spending a most happy day, each being glad they were one of the Mundell generation.
What the report does not mention is the fact that the Mundells were charter members of Goshen Baptist Church, about a mile south of their pioneer home, so that's where most of the family that remained in Lucas County is buried.
The matriarch, Sarah, died at age 78 during 1878 and Joseph followed seven years later, at the age of 82 during 1885.
The reunion article states that there were some 200 living descendants of the pioneer couple during 1911. Anyone care to speculate about what that number would be in the year 2020?
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What the report does not mention is the fact that the Mundells were charter members of Goshen Baptist Church, about a mile south of their pioneer home, so that's where most of the family that remained in Lucas County is buried.
The matriarch, Sarah, died at age 78 during 1878 and Joseph followed seven years later, at the age of 82 during 1885.
The reunion article states that there were some 200 living descendants of the pioneer couple during 1911. Anyone care to speculate about what that number would be in the year 2020?
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