What Are the Origins of the Ackley Surname?

As is often the case with genealogy, my research for this topic took me down the rabbit hole, so to speak. What I thought would be a quick post got me into William the Conqueror, English history, the etymology of English surnames, and even a little linguistics. Come down the rabbit hole with me!

Image from https://www.clipart.email/download/5974813.html

Presumably anyone reading this blog is doing so because they have an interest in the Ackley surname; probably you are an Ackley or have Ackley ancestors. Indeed, most of our research as amateur genealogists is guided, and perhaps driven, by the fact that we know our ancestors carried the Ackley surname, or some minor variation of it. The fact that our surname has remained relatively constant for at least the last 500 years or so has allowed us to discover that Nicholas Ackley was our first American ancestor, and hopefully will eventually help us discover our English forebears as well (see this post for a discussion of that topic). But where did the Ackley surname come from?

We Can Thank William the Conqueror

Up until the Norman invasion of England in 1066, most people did not use a hereditary family name to help identify themselves. In some cases people used bynames or nicknames to distinguish themselves from others who had the same first name in their area, but these were not necessarily passed on to future generations. After William the Conqueror invaded and all the land essentially belonged to him, he began to distribute the land to those that were loyal to him and supported him. It is believed that surnames began to be adopted at that time to create family ties to the land they had been given. Others adopted surnames that described the jobs they did, such as Smith, Cook, Taylor, etc., while nicknames or descriptive names such as Redhead, Black, Fox, Little, and Armstrong were also common [1].

There is quite a bit written about the etymology (historical development) of surnames. I found a useful source for British surnames in a book by Charles Wareing Bardsley called "A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with Special American Instances" [2]. In this book, Bardsley attempts to categorize surnames in one of five broad groups: (1) baptismal or personal names, (2) local surnames, (3) official surnames, (4) occupative surnames, and (5) nicknames. Here is what he had to say about the Ackley surname:

A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with Special American Instances, p. 39

There are a number of interesting points in this small entry. Bardsley categorizes Ackley as a "local" surname; i.e., it comes from a location, namely an oak meadow. He says that it is the exact equivalent of Oakley, and gives some examples of people throughout history who have had the name. Note that he allows (as I am sure we have all seen), spelling variations from the now standard Ackley spelling. The "A" after Ralph de Ackle refers to the reference material from which Bardsley extracted Ralph's record; it is the "Hundred Rolls, 1273", which were a survey of land ownership conducted in England and Wales in 1274-5 and 1279-80. "Hundred" refers to an administrative division that is part of a larger geographical area, such as a county. One further item of interest is the q.v. after Oakley; this stands for the Latin quod vide, which translates literally to "which see". This is just a way to tell us to go look at the entry for Oakley for more information. Here it is:

A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with Special American Instances, p. 565

We don't really learn much more about the meaning -- an oak meadow is pretty straightforward so there isn't much more to it. However, we do learn that there were a lot of places named Oakley, and some people named Oakley (or variations) also.

So, our name seems to come from the fact that the family (or families) who originally took the name lived in a clearing surrounded by oak trees. That could be almost anywhere, but I think it is reasonable to consider that maybe there is an actual place named Ackley (or Oakley) that got its name in the same way; i.e., it was an area surrounded by oak tress. With that idea in mind, I thought about the idea mentioned above, that the use of surnames in England was introduced in 1066, the year that William the Conqueror invaded. And that led me to the Domesday Book, which was completed in 1086 at the direction of William the Conqueror.

What is the Domesday Book?

The Domesday Book (domesday is a Middle English spelling of doomsday) was the record of a detailed inventory taken of England in 1086 at the direction of William the Conqueror. The effort was an attempt to catalog every location in the land he had conquered in 1066 for the purposes of determining the amount of taxes William could collect from the land owners. The survey included everything you could think of about each location -- how much land there was, the people occupying the land, buildings, enclosures, animals, fish, ploughs on the land, and the amounts of woodland, meadow, etc. There are over 13,000 locations listed in the book. It has been studied and analyzed by historians, genealogists, and lawyers, and as recent as the 1960s was still being used as evidence in land disputes [3]. Even though England's rulers spoke French at the time (William was from Normandy, which is in France), and the people spoke English, the book was written in Latin. There are two reasons for this: (1) government documents were typically written in Latin, and (2) the scribe who wrote it was a churchman, and Latin was the language of the church [4].

You may be asking -- why is it called the Domesday Book? "The Domesday Book Online" describes it like this:

It was written by an observer of the survey that "there was no single hide nor a yard of land, nor indeed one ox nor one cow nor one pig which was left out". The grand and comprehensive scale on which the Domesday survey took place, and the irreversible nature of the information collected led people to compare it to the Last Judgement, or 'Doomsday', described in the Bible, when the deeds of Christians written in the Book of Life were to be placed before God for judgement. [3]

That's some pretty heavy stuff, but luckily for us the Domesday Book has been well preserved and there are numerous sources online that can help us find places and people that were mentioned in the book, as well as translations of the Latin text. A website that I found especially useful is called opendomesday.org; it allows you to search for places and people that appeared in the Domesday Book. For places, the location is plotted on a current map that can be zoomed in and out so you can see exactly where that location is today. For each location a list of relevant information from the Domesday Book is also displayed, including the hundred, the county, owners of the land, households, and resources (including ploughs, animals, buildings, etc.). A scan of the original page from the Domesday Book in Latin is also included. For people, a list of all of the land that person is associated with as tenant-in-chief, lord, etc. is displayed. Using opendomesday.org and documents from the National Archives (UK) [4], I found the following 15 locations that translated as Ackley, Oakley, or some spelling variation of those two names.

The place name listed in the first column is the translated English name of the location, while the second column is the Latin place name from the original Domesday book. The only place that doesn't seem to fit our purposes is Eagle; I included it in the list only because some of the Latin names referencing that place matched the Latin names of the Ackley/Oakley locations. Just as we've all seen in other records, even the Latin names are spelled slightly differently from one another, but for the most part you can see that they appear to be referencing the same name -- an oak lea (lea is another word for an open area of grassy land).

To give you an idea of what the data for a location looks like, let's look at the first location in the list, which just happens to be Ackley. The map (zoomed in a little bit) looks like this:

Ackley Map from opendomesday.org

The blue marker indicates Ackley, while the little red dots are other locations from the Domesday book. The heavy gray dashed line just to the east of Ackley is the border between Wales and England; Ackley is actually in what is now Wales, but when the Domesday data was collected it was considered to be part of Shropshire County in England.

Here is the original page from the Domesday Book that discusses Ackley; the text in the red box is the Ackley section:

Domesday Book page for Ackley from opendomesday.org

It is hard to read and is in Latin, so here is the information from the Open Domesday website that summarizes the text:

Ackley data from opendomesday.org

I won't repeat the data for all of the other locations here -- if you'd like to see it and play around with it, use the link provided below and enter a location and see what you get. I should point out that there were no people with the Ackley/Oakley surname in the data.

So what do we do with this information?

Well, we didn't get lucky and find only one place named Ackley/Oakley. Even though there is only one place with our current spelling, we know not to assume that is the right one and all of the others are incorrect. So we have 15 places that could be the potential origin of our Ackley ancestors; on the other hand, they might not be related to our name at all. But now we have a manageable list of places that we can at least start with if we want to try to figure out where to look for records for our ancestors.

An interesting fact about the place named Ackley -- it is only about 22 miles from Hopton Castle. If you'll recall from the post called "The (Supposed) Ancestors of Nicholas Ackley", there are some records for possible Ackley ancestors in Hopton Castle (that I expressed some skepticism about). This could be pure coincidence, or it could be that the proximity of these two places is an indication that the Hopton Castle records might actually be relevant. As pointed out in that original post, a lot more research and study is needed before we can draw any conclusions.

Some Other Thoughts About Our Surname and Searching for Ancestors

While reading portions of Bardsley's book on surnames, I ran across some other information that has made me reconsider something I wrote in that previous blog post. At the bottom of that post I posed the following discussion question:

The research requires us to accept that Hackluite = Hackley = Acheley = Atcherley = Hagley = Ackley. Surnames evolve over time, and spelling was highly variable, but is this reasonable?

I asked this question because the research we were examining in that post had found records for each of these surnames and claimed they were all the same family. I was skeptical at the time, but Bardsley's book has caused me to at least rethink parts of the equation. In a discussion about the variations in surnames over time he says the following [2]:

A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with Special American Instances, p. 4

I had to look up the term "aspirates" as it relates to language, and it turns out it refers to letters that are pronounced with aspiration; i.e., breathing out. Certainly the letter "h" is such a letter, and the point he is making is that many surnames that begin with a vowel have been altered by throwing an "h" in front of them (see the many examples above), and those forms can be considered equivalent. So, equating Ackley and Hackley (two of the names in that discussion question above) seems like a reasonable possibility according to Mr. Bardsley.

Bardsley also points out that some variations in surnames over time are due to what he calls "lazified" pronunciations of what are known as stop consonants [2]. Stop consonants are produced when airflow out of the mouth is stopped. The letters "p", "t", "k", "b", "d", and "g" are stop consonants. There is also the notion of "voiceless" (letters formed without vibration of the vocal chords) and "voiced" (letters formed with vibration of the vocal chords) consonants. The voiceless and voiced stop consonants actually come in pairs: "p" (voiceless) and "b" (voiced) go together, as do "t" and "d", and "k" and "g". Bardsley uses the "k" and "g" pair (lucky for us because Ackley has a "k" sound formed by "ck") as an example of this "lazification". He says that the surnames Hick, Hicks, and Hickson can be associated with the "lazified" Higg, Higgs, and Higson [2]. So, it is not unreasonable that Hackley could have been "lazified" to Hagley, and we now have at least part of the equation above that seems somewhat reasonable; i.e.,

Ackley = Hackley = Hagley

I haven't seen anything yet in Bardsley's book that would show us how to get to Hakluite, but I have a lot more reading to do. At any rate, I have at least opened my mind to the idea that when looking for ancestor records we may have to look beyond just minor misspellings. Having said that, I still contend that there are other problems with some of the claims, having to do with a lack of records linking the various generations together.

Discussion Questions

How would you answer this question now that you know more:

The research requires us to accept that Hackluite = Hackley = Acheley = Atcherley = Hagley = Ackley. Surnames evolve over time, and spelling was highly variable, but is this reasonable?

Link of the Day

Today’s link is to the Open Domesday website put together by Anna Powell-Smith.

https://opendomesday.org/

This is a great site and was helpful for putting some of this information together. There are a number of good sites on Domesday -- I would encourage you to google Domesday if you want to learn more.

Quote of the Day

"Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere."

-- Albert Einstein

Sources

1. "Research the origins and distribution of your surname." British Surnames. https://britishsurnames.co.uk/ (Accessed 4/28/2020).
2. Bardsley, Charles Wareing. A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with Special American Instances. London, New York: Henry Frowde, 1901.
3. "Frequently Asked Questions." The Domesday Book Online. http://www.domesdaybook.co.uk/faqs.html (Accessed 4/28/2020).
4. "Take a closer look." Focus on Domesday. https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/focuson/domesday/take-a-closer-look/ (Accessed 4/28/2020).
5. Powell-Smith, Anna. Open Domesday.    https://opendomesday.org/place/SJ2501/ackley/ (Accessed 4/28/2020).

Ackley, Iowa

There are a fair number of places throughout the United States that carry the Ackley name. If you've done a Google search for the Ackley name or searched for Ackley in one of the newspaper websites, you've probably been a little annoyed at the number of hits you get for a town in Iowa named Ackley because it tends to get in the way of the legitimate hits for people named Ackley.

On the Map

Ackley is located slightly east and north of the center of the state of Iowa (blue marker on map below). Part of Ackley is in Hardin County and part is in Franklin County.

Ackley, Iowa (blue marker) from Google Maps

From this Google Maps satellite view, you can see that Ackley is situated in the middle of Iowa farm country. The closest "larger" city is Waterloo (population about 67,000), which is about 49 miles away):

Ackley, Iowa satellite view from Google Maps

Origins

Ackley was established along Beaver Creek in 1857. The original proprietors were William J. Ackley, Henry L. Huff, Robert P. Parriott, Abigail Parriott, A. J. Parriott, and Matilda Parriott. This group sponsored the survey and platting of the area, which was recorded in Hardin County on December 12, 1857. [3] The original proprietors were anticipating that the expansion of the railroad westward from Dubuque would bring the railroad to Ackley and spur growth of the new town. However, the financial panic of 1857, which particularly affected railroads, brought a temporary halt to the railroad building boom and Ackley did not take off. The Civil War put a further damper on progress of the railroads, and the hoped-for development of Ackley would have to wait for several more years. According to "Past and Present of Hardin County, Iowa":

"Practically speaking, Ackley, named after one of its proprietors, was but a paper town for at least eight long years." [3]

Due to the delays in the construction of the railroad, and therefore the town's development, all of the other proprietors sold their interests to William Ackley, leaving him the sole owner.  Construction finally resumed in 1865, and by June 1866 the line had pushed through Ackley and into Iowa Falls to the west [4].


Despite its supposed status as a "paper town" until 1865, Ackley continued to progress during the early years before the railroad was finally constructed. In an ad seeking contract proposals for delivering mail in 1860, the Postal Department listed Ackley as a location on a route to be run once a week out of Marietta, a town about 40 miles south of Ackley [18]. By 1861, the Dubuque and Sioux City Railroad was running daily stage coach service from Cedar Falls (the current terminus of its railroad) to Ackley and other points that the railroad had not yet reached [19].

Ackley continued to progress as the railroad brought enterprise to the city, but the progress came at a cost. According an article from 1866, "Ackley is a youthful city, and very fast. There are indisputable evidences of its approaching metropolitan character. In other words Ackley has desperadoes in and about it in numbers entirely disproportionate to its present limited population." The article goes on to discuss the harassment of a local merchant and the eventual shooting death of one of the "desperadoes" who were described as "track men" working on the construction of the railroad through Ackley to points west [20].

Cedar Falls Gazette, 23 Mar 1866

Other issues related to the presence of the railroad followed. In January 1867, the Cedar Falls Gazette reported "The station agent at Ackley, Mr. N.Y. Blake has suddenly disappeared taking with him the funds of the Telegraph, R.R., and Express company." [21] Mr. Blake was later arrested in Cedar Falls [22]. In March of the same year, the railroad depot was burned to the ground by arsonists, destroying everything in the building, including the household goods of Mr. Blake that were to be sold to try to recoup some of the money that he had stolen [23]. Despite these early setbacks, Ackley continued to build and grow, and by 1871 had about 1,400 inhabitants [24]. As will be shown below, the population has remained at about that level through the last 150 years.

The first newspaper established in Ackley was the Ackley Independent, which was published from 1872 to 1874. Since then there has always been a newspaper published in Ackley, with the Ackley World Journal having the longest run (1888-present). The Ackley World Journal exists today as an internet publication.

Who Was William J. Ackley?

William J. Ackley was a descendant of Nicholas Ackley. His line of descent from Nicholas is as follows:

He was born about 1826 in Chenango County, New York [26]. His parents were Lyman Ackley and Lydia Purple [27]. He was living with his parents in McDonough, New York in 1850 [26]. In 1860 he was living in Waterloo, Iowa [28]. In 1870, he was still living in Waterloo, and his occupation was listed as real estate dealer [29]. He was also listed in the 1870 non-population schedule as the owner of a blind, door, and sash making business in Waterloo [30]. In 1880 he was living in Dubuque, Iowa, and his occupation was given as lead miner. His mother Lydia was living with him in Dubuque [31]. He was still living in Dubuque in 1885. His occupation was listed as miner [32]. There were no children or spouse listed in any of the census records, and there are no other records suggesting he was married or had any children.

It seems that William, who was consistently referred to as W.J. Ackley in newspaper accounts, was an entrepreneur his entire adult life. Of course the first evidence of this was his involvement, at about age 31, in buying the land in Iowa in 1857 that would later become the city that bears his name. His name is mentioned in connection with many different businesses in Waterloo. In 1866, he partnered with a Mr. Hauger to build a steam sash, door, and blind factory in Waterloo [33]. In 1870, he built a new hotel in Waterloo near the railroad depot [34]. In 1872, William joined with a number of other Waterloo men (including his brother Charles T. Ackley) to start a company called Waterloo Agricultural Works to manufacture agricultural implements [35]. In the same year, he began a project to build a cracker factory on Main Street in Waterloo as well as a wagon shop and a blacksmith shop. The Waterloo Courier had words of praise for William's hard work: "All this success is the natural fruit of endeavor. Mr. A. set about the work, and refusing to look back kept steadily pressing forward; and it is in this way only that any important enterprise was ever made successful. Work -- Work, is the watchword. Take hold, hold on, and never let go, is the motto of successful men." [36] Although no solid evidence was found concerning William's lead mining business, one can infer from his occupation listed in state and federal census data [31, 32] that he likely made the move from Waterloo to Dubuque to invest in lead mining. Dubuque was a hot spot for lead and zinc mining in the 19th century, and it appears that William may have gone there to try his hand at it.

William J. Ackley died in Canton, Illinois on September 6, 1900. It was first incorrectly reported that he died penniless in the poor house in Canton and was buried in the potter's field there [37]. It turns out that the original correspondent who reported the death did not have all of the facts and jumped to some conclusions in an attempt to sensationalize his death. The Waterloo Courier printed a correction; the original report and the correction can be seen below [38].

Left - Original Obituary from Evening Times-Republican (Marshalltown, Iowa);
Right - Corrected Obituary from The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa)

 

Canning Industry

As mentioned above, the city of Ackley is in the middle of farm country in Iowa, so it is not surprising that the main industry for much of its existence was a canning factory on the west side of town. The factory was built in 1919 and had a successful first season of operation as reported by this article in Ackley World Journal on 25 Sep 1919 [6].

Ackley World Journal, 25 Sep 1919, p. 1

While it is difficult to keep up with all of the companies that owned the plant over the years, there is evidence that the plant was owned by Marshall Canning Company for many years. At some point Marshall Canning Company became part of Western Grocer Co. of Marshallville, Iowa, and Consolidated Foods Corporation bought Western Grocer Co. in 1946 [16]. In 1957 Consolidated Foods formed a new subsidiary unit called Monarch Foods, Canners and Processors with the merger of Consolidated Food Processors, Inc. and Monarch Finer Foods, and the plant took on the name of Monarch Foods, Canners and Processors [17]. Consolidated Foods Corporation shut down the factory in October 1958. It was closed for seven months until the people of Ackley raised $150,000 to buy the factory and reopen it under the name Ackley Food Processors, Inc. [11].

Carroll Daily Times Herald, 18 May 1959, p. 1

I couldn't determine exactly when, but at some point after 1959, the plant was bought by American National Corporation. In August 1978 the American National Corporation filed for federal bankruptcy protection, but fortunately no layoffs were planned and the factory continued to operate at capacity [12]. Stokely bought the factory from American National Corp. in late 1986 [9] and  doubled the capacity of the corn processing lines in 1989 [10]. Stokely merged with Chiquita in 1998 [8]. Chiquita closed the plant for good in mid-January, 2002 [7]. When it closed, the factory was the second largest employer in Ackley, employing about 70 people full-time [7].

Throughout the history of the canning plant and its many owners, it is clear that the people of Ackley were proud of the work done there. The plant mainly packed sweet corn, but also packed bean products and sauerkraut (see Sauerkraut Days section below). Corn packing was seasonal, and the season usually occurred in mid- to late-August. The plant normally employed about 75 full-time employees year-round, and would hire as many as 200 additional workers for the corn pack. The company also hired temporary workers to pick the corn at farms surrounding Ackley, as shown in this ad from 1948 [12].

Des Moines Tribune, August 25, 1948

Sauerkraut Days

Ackley was once considered the "sauerkraut center of the world" [15], and has been holding an annual "Sauerkraut Days" festival almost continuously since 1902 (wars and the depression interrupted the festival a few times). According to a long-time local resident, the celebration began is 1902 as a way for the community to pay back local farmers for their business. The local canning plant supplied the sauerkraut for the festival every year from 1919 until its closing in 2002 [13]. Here is an article announcing the celebration in 1903 [14]:

Davenport Morning Star, 27 Aug 1903

In its heyday the celebration attracted thousands of visitors. An article from the Quad-City Times of Davenport, Iowa claims that Ackley drew 12,000 visitors to the 11th annual festival in 1913 [25].

Quad-City Times, 1 Sep 1913

Ackley Sauerkraut Days 1947, The Des Moines Register, August 10, 1947

Ackley continues to hold Sauerkraut Days every year. This year's event is scheduled for June 11-14, 2020.

Present Day Ackley

The population of Ackley in the 2010 Census was 1,589 [1]. The population has remained remarkably steady throughout Ackley's existence; according to census figures for 1880-2010, the number of people living there has only varied between 1244 and 1900 [5].

Source: State Library of Iowa, State Date Center

Ackley is part of the Ackley Geneva Wellsburg Steamboat Rock (AGWSR) Community School District, which serves the communities of Ackley, Geneva, Wellsburg, and Steamboat Rock and the counties of Butler, Franklin, Grundy, and Hardin. The district covers 265 square miles, and Ackley is pretty much at the geographic center. The district serves a total of about 650 students and operates schools at three locations -- an elementary school in Ackley, an elementary and middle school in Wellsburg, and a high school in Ackley.  

Ackley has many businesses typical of a small community. Although the canning factory has been closed for many years, there are several businesses dedicated to supporting agriculture in the area.

I had an opportunity to stop in Ackley last summer during a road trip. We cruised around town a little bit and took some pictures of some of the buildings and other landmarks. It was a bit odd seeing our name on pretty much every building in town. We found the people we met to be very friendly, and we learned that there were many Ackleys before us that visited to see their name plastered all over town.

Ackley has an impressive Veterans Memorial honoring Ackley veterans from all wars

Ackley Super Foods

Ackley Fire Department

Painting at the Veterans Memorial

Ackley Police Department

Ackley World Journal is now an internet publication

Ackley Hardware

Ackley water tower

My wife at Sky Kone. Unfortunately it was not open when we visited.

Me with "Raging Thunder" the bull in front of Triple T Specialty Meats in Ackley

Ackley Municipal Building

Discussion Questions

• Has anyone visited Ackley? What was memorable about your visit?

Link of the Day

Here is the link to the website for the City of Ackley:

http://ackleyiowa.net/

Quote of the Day

"Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there."

-- Will Rogers

Sources

1. United States Census Bureau, American Fact Finder, https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/nav/jsf/pages/community_facts.xhtml, accessed 10 Aug 2017.

2. Gannett, Henry, The Origin of Certain Place Names in the United States, (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1905), p. 16.

3. Moir, William J., Past and Present of Hardin County, Iowa, (Indianapolis, Indiana: B. F. Bowen & Company, 1911), p. 284.

4. An Illinois Central Photo Album Website, Dubuque & Sioux City Railroad,  http://www.tdf23.info/html/Railroads/DubuqueAndSiouxCityRailroad.htm, accessed 13 Aug 2017.

5. State Library of Iowa, State Date Center, https://www.iowadatacenter.org/archive/2011/02/citypop.pdf, accessed 11 Apr 2020.

6. "Finished the Pack" Ackley World Journal (Ackley, Iowa), September 25, 1919, p. 1.

7. Miller, Jessica. "Chiquita to close, cut 70 jobs in Ackley." The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa). Nov. 13, 2001. https://wcfcourier.com/chiquita-to-close-cut-jobs-in-ackley/article_ea0eeaac-e6ee-5540-9548-dcb832c5b1aa.html (accessed 12 Apr 2020).

8. Wilde, Matthew and Ann McGlynn. "Stokely plans merger with Chiquita subsidiary." The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa). Oct. 1, 1997. https://www.newspapers.com/image/355769225/?terms=ackley%2Bstokely%2Bchiquita (accessed 12 Apr 2020).

9. Pryweller, Joseph. "Iowa vegetable-canning company sold to Stokely." The Des Moines Register. Dec. 3, 1986. https://www.newspapers.com/image/128591702/?terms=ackley%2Bstokely (accessed 12 Apr 2020).

10. Mackenzie, Coral. "Stokely to expand its corn-making facilities." The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa). Oct. 11, 1987. https://www.newspapers.com/image/359133237/?terms=ackley%2Bstokely (Accessed 12 Apr 2020).

11. "Community Effort Restores Key Industry Lost at Ackley." Carroll Daily Times Herald (Carroll, Iowa). May 18, 1959. https://www.newspapers.com/image/380795/?terms=ackley%2Bfood%2Bprocessors (accessed 12 Apr 2020).

12. "Wanted Immediately." The Des Moines Register. August 25, 1948, p. 19. 

13. Thompson, Jeff. "Strike up the band for Sauerkraut Days." The Des Moines Register. June 29, 2003, p. 18.

14. "Celebrate Sauerkraut Day." Davenport Morning Star (Davenport, Iowa). August 27, 1903, p. 2.

15. "Ackley...will hold its annual celebration", Postville Herald (Postville, Iowa). August 14, 1930.

16. Shannon, Ed. "Food Shopping." Albert Lea Tribune (Albert Lea, Iowa). November 27, 2010. https://www.albertleatribune.com/2010/11/food-shopping/ (Accessed 13 Apr 2020).

17. "Monarch Foods, Canners and Processors Formed by Merger." Ackley World Journal (Ackley, Iowa). October 17, 1957. https://ackley.advantage-preservation.com/viewer/?k=consolidated%20foods&t=1552&i=t&d=01011919-12311958&m=between&ord=k1&fn=124331287&df=1&dt=10 (Accessed 13 Apr 2020).

18. "Mail Contracts." Quad-City Times (Davenport, Iowa). July 6, 1860, p. 4.

19. "Dubuque and Sioux City Railroad. Time Table No. 7." Cedar Falls Gazette (Cedar Falls, Iowa). August 2, 1861, p. 4.

20. "Tragedy in Ackley." Cedar Falls Gazette (Cedar Falls, Iowa). March 23, 1866, p. 2.

21. "An Absconder from Ackley." Cedar Falls Gazette (Cedar Falls, Iowa). January 18, 1867, p. 3.

22. "Telegrams." The Pantagraph (Bloomington, Illinois). February 2, 1867, p. 1.

23. "Burning of Ackley Depot." Cedar Falls Gazette (Cedar Falls, Iowa). March 15, 1867, p. 3.

24. "On the Wing." Cedar Falls Gazette (Cedar Falls, Iowa). July 21, 1871, p. 3.

25. "12,000 People at Sauerkraut Fete." Quad-City Times (Davenport, Iowa). September 1, 1913, p. 2.

26. 1850 U.S. Census, McDonough, Chenango County, NY; page 1, line 116A; NARA Microfilm M653, Roll 487.

27. Ackley, Allen C., "Ackley Family Genealogy", www.ackleygenealogy.com

28. 1860 U.S. Census, Waterloo, Blackhawk County, IA; page

29. 1870 U.S. Census, Waterloo, Blackhawk County, IA; page

30. 1870 U.S. Census Non-Population Schedules, Waterloo, Blackhawk County, IA; page

31. 1880 U.S. Census, Dubuque, Dubuque County, IA; page

32. 1885 Iowa State Census, Ancestry.com. Iowa, State Census Collection, 1836-1925 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2007.

33. "Waterloo in 1866!" The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa). November 29, 1866, p. 2.

34. "Iowa Items." Cedar Falls Gazette (Cedar Falls, Iowa). April 22, 1870, p. 1.

35. "Waterloo Agricultural Works." The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa). August 22, 1872, p. 3.

36. "Begun." The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa). April 18, 1872, p. 3.

37. "Died in the Poor House." Evening Times-Republican (Marshalltown, Iowa). September 10, 1900. p. 3.

38. "No Truth in Report." The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa). September 13, 1900. p. 5.