HENRY W. FLOYD. Hastings became a town in 1902. One of its pioneer settlers was Henry W. Floyd, the history of whose activities since then contains the resume of the most important points in the town's development. He has been a town builder because of unstinted contributions of time and money to promoting the welfare of Hastings. He was
chiefly instrumental in securing title to the townsite and thus effecting a substantial means of growth. He was chosen justice of the peace for the purpose of being able to prosecute the work of clearing up the town's title. After a determination of the real powers of that officer by the courts, it was found that the mayor and not the justice of the peace was the chief officer of the town. But he proceeded with great rapidity in the work as he had begun, and within a few months his mission was accomplished when it became possible to issue clear and sufficient deeds to the owners of the town lots. His work in this connection must be remembered as one of the important achievements by which the town was founded.
     As is well known, public education in the towns of the Territory was until recently largely left to voluntary co-operation of the residents. The school indebtedness of Hastings became a serious obstacle to its progress. A committee was appointed to handle the matter, and with this committee Mr. Floyd worked out a problem of finance that is a matter of gratification. While safeguarding the effectiveness of the schools, the result has been that, the public taxes of the year 1908, had they not been remitted, would have placed the educational matters of the town out of debt. Mr. Floyd has served as president of the Southwestern Academy, now the Eaptist College of Hastings. He helped organize the Union Sunday school, the first that was started in Hastings, and helped sustain it as a contributor of time and money. He is a member of the Christian church.
     As a business man, Mr. Floyd has also been identified with the town from its beginning. He was one of the pioneer merchants, put up a wooden building, twenty by forty feet, and installed a stock of dry goods valued at four thousand dollars. That was an ample establishment for the time, and an that his personal resources could maintain. Both town and his own business grew, and within three years his success warranted the construction of a one-story brick building on the same lot, 25 by 80 feet in dimensions, and in it he placed a stock of dry goods and clothing valued at $15,000. When financial difficulties overtooK the Hastings Brick Company, Mr. Floyd came to its assistance and as president of the company soon placed it on firm financial foundation.
     Henry W. Floyd was born in Lawrence county; Tennessee, September 28, 1852. His grandparents,Merrit and (Sands) Floyd, were early Virginia settlers of this section of Tennessee. Merrit Floyd, being opposed to slavery, moved to Sangamon county, Illinois, about 1862, where he passed away. Some of his children, however, upheld the cause of the Confederacy. His children were: Paralee, wife of John L. Burton, who moved to Missonri and died there; Ann, who married Ransom Ayres and spent her life in Tennessee; Loulsa and Teresa, both died single; Cahal, died in Tennessee during the war: William, father of the Hastings business man; Blackburn and George, who went to Illinois with their father and passed their lives in Sangamon county; Wilson, who died in Missouri. William Floyd, who died in Maury county, Tennessee, May 22, 1861, aged thirty years, married Nancy McNiel, daughter of Hugh McNiel, a farmer from Virginia, and had the following children: Henry W., of Hastings; Sallie, wife of Henry Love, of Maury county, Tennessee; Cahal and Lucy, of Maury county, the latter being the wife of David Hicks; William andAllen, also of the home county in Tennessee; Nancy Floyd, after the death of her first husband, married again, and by this husband, named Voss, had three children, Elihu, Emma and Tenny.
     Henry W. Floyd, being nine years of age when his father died, soon after had to contribute his assistance to the support of the family, which had been left without means. When thirteen years old he hired out to a farmer for whom he worked eight years, and for the first four years gave half of his wages to his mother, who was still striving to support the family. Throughout this eight years he was able to attend school but for one three months' term. He studied alone and gained at least a fair share of the rudiments of education. At an early age he married and began farming with only a team and wagon and fifty dollars in cash, besides a few household effects. With this inadequate equipment he rented a few acres and by the application of industry and persistent good management became known in the community as a very able farm manager, and ultimately leased a tract of four hundred acres for seven years. After renting for sixteen years he came west with sufficient accumulations to engage in business. Before moving to Hastings he was engaged for a time in merchandising at Comanche. Mr. Floyd is a member of the Masonic and Odd Fellows fraternities, and in the former has passed all the chairs of Meathery Lodge, No. 192, Hampshire, Tennessee. He was married, first, in Maury county, Tennessee, in March, 1871, to Celia J. Wetherly, daughter of John Wetherly. She died in February, 1885, the mother of: Idella, wife of Robert King, of Maury county; Ozro, a graduate of the Knoxville school of engineering and now a civil engineer of Thebes, Illinois; Earl, a graduate of the same school and an engineer with the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, stationed at Gallatin. Tennessee. For his second wife, Mr. Floyd married, February, 1889, Issia Delk, of Maury county, daughter of William Delk. She died at Hastings, December 26, 1904. She was the mother ofEvan, Masel and Rosey.