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John Francis Coad II
(1842 - 1910)
Nebraska, The Land and the People, Vol. 3. Chicago: Lewis Publishing Co., 1931. p. 454-455.
(Excerpted from son Ralph's biography.)
John F. Coad was born in Ireland and was a lad of about seven years when, in 1849, he came with other members of the family to the United States, the home having first been established at Southampton, Massachusetts. In 1859, at the age of seventeen years, Mr. Coad came with his older brother, Mark, to Nebraska, and initiated his experience in frontier life. The brothers established their residence at Nebraska City and engaged in freighting across the plains to Denver with wagons and ox teams. With this early medium of overland transportation they continued to be associated until the construction of railroads made the business no longer profitable. The brothers then became pioneers in ranching industry in Wyoming, the elder brother assuming active charge of the large ranch near the Wyoming-Nebraska line, and John F. having residence and business headquarters in Cheyenne. This ranch was sold by the Coad Brothers to the Nebraska Land & Cattle Company, Limited, of London, England, for nine hundred and twelve thousand eight hundred and fifty-two dollars in 1883. In 1884 the brothers returned to Nebraska, where John F. established his home in Omaha and Mark Coad continued to reside at Fremont until his death, he having accumulated a large landed estate in Nebraska, and having eventually sold this property, in various parts of the state, and made investment in a ranch of 18,000 acres near Cheynne, Wyoming. Mark Coad was widely known through Nebraska and Wyoming, and gained fame for his absolute physical and moral courage. It was said of him that he feared neither man nor devil. He died, January 3, 1911, at Cheyenne, Wyoming. He and his brother John F. were admirably equipped for the burdens and responsibilities of pioneer life, and in the early days both participated actively in many fights with the Indians.
Upon establishing his residence in Omaha John F. Coad began to make judicious investments in local real estate, and he was one of the substantial capitalists and liberal and public-spirited citizens of Omaha at the time of his death, which occurred October 15, 1910. He was a director of the Merchants National Bank and President of the Packers National Bank, a member of the Metropolitan Utilities District and had many and varied property and capitalistic interests. He was a staunch Democrat, and he and his wife were devout communicants of the Catholic Church. After John F. Coad's death Mrs. Coad maintained the large home on Farnam Street, where she was always surrounded by her children and grandchildren and her many friends. Mrs. Coad died, December 18, 1923.
Nebraska, The Land and the People, Vol. 3. Chicago: Lewis Publishing Co., 1931. p. 512-513.
(Excerpted from son John's biography.)
Mr. Coad [III] was born on a farm in Nemaha County, Nebraska, January 9, 1871, is a representative of one of the sterling pioneer families of this commonwealth, and both his father and his paternal grandfather were prominently identified with frontier activities in the early period of the development of the great empire of the West. Mr. Coad is a son of John F. Coad, who was born in County Kerry,1 Ireland, and who came to the United States in 1851, his parents likewise having come to this country, and he having borne the full patronymic of his father, John F. Coad I, so that the subject of this review is the third generation bearer of this name of John F.2 John F. Coad I [Patrick Codd] became concerned in early freighting operations across the great plans of the West, and in 1855 he, with about thirty other men, set forth with a train of wagons and ox teams from Nebraska City en route for Colorado. From that time no definite information was ever gained as to the fate of the party, and the supposition is that Indians captured the train and massacred all of the men of the company.
John F. Coad II likewise associated himself with freighting across the plains with ox teams, and in the Civil war period he served as a Union scout in various sections of the West. He later became a pioneer of cattle trading of Wyoming. With his family he came to Omaha and turned his attention to the banking business, he having been president of the Packers National Bank of South Omaha at the time of his death, in 1911, and also a director of the Merchants National Bank of Omaha. He had figured also as a territorial pioneer in Wyoming and was a member of the first territorial legislature of that now important commonwealth. His wife, whose maiden name was Ellen Leahy, likewise was born in County Kerry,3 Ireland, and she was a girl when she accompanied her parents on their immigration to the United States. She survived her husband by more than a decade and continued her residence in Omaha until her death, in December, 1923, at the age of seventy-six years.
1 Other sources indicate the Coads were from the Ballygillistown area of County Wexford, not County Kerry.
2 According to researchers of this family the name of the first Coad generation listed in this biography was not John F. Coad I, but Patrick Codd. The family changed the spelling of their surname from Codd to Coad after emigrating to the US. Thus John F. II is in actuality John F. I, and John F. III is the second. Patrick married Annie Kelly in Ireland.
3 Researchers indicate that Ellen Leahy was not from Couty Kerry either, but from Cappoquin, County Waterford.
