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John D. Damge
was born in the village of Battercourt, Belgium, in the year 1839.
At the age of fifteen Mr. Dange came with his father’s
family to America, settling first in Wisconsin, where for one year he
helped his father on the farm, after which he started out for himself. He worked
principally on the farms in his neighborhood until the year 1855, when he came
to Buchanan county [Iowa], locating on the same farm where he now lives, and
began breaking the prairie without a house in sight. In 1862 Mr. Dange was
married to Miss Barbara Casper, of Racine, Wisconsin. In the fall of 1863 was
drafted, but furnished a substitute rather than leave his family in such a new
country. He has a happy family of six children: Katie L., Peter F., Fred G.,
William H., Gertrude M., and Anna E., aged respectively, seventeen, fifteen,
eleven, nine, five and four years. Mr. Damge is one of our foremost farmers and
cattle raisers, and is well thought of by all of our citizens. Both he and his
wife are members of the Catholic church.
Source : (collective work) : History of Buchanan County, Iowa : with illustrations and biographical sketches.; Cleveland, Ohio: Williams Bros., 1881, 544 pgs.