He was a successful teacher in his home public schools and attended the Valparaiso University, where he took up civil engineering. He worked in the northern part of Indiana under Frank Knight, of Crown Point, Ind., and helped to lay out what is now known as the Gray Steel Mills of Ind. At the age of nineteen he came to Oklahoma and in the early days took up a homestead near Pawnee, then for a number of years he was in location work, locating the present railroads of the west Santa Fe and Frisco. In 1904 he was elected County Surveyor, of Pawnee County and was later appointed County engineer, also City engineer.
December 20, 1909, he was united in marriage to Miss Nellie Emma Wolfe. To this union four children were born, Dortha Arvilla, Edna Clara, John Gern, and Elna Marie. He leaves to mourn his loss, a wife, four children, mother, Mrs. Wesley Greisel, six sisters, Mrs. Menzo Hayden, Mrs. Frank Schmal, Mrs. Harry Sanger, and Mrs. Raymond McCarthy, of Lowell, Ind., Mrs. Sam Bell, of Hammond, Ind., Mrs. Dunkelberger, of Fargo, North Dakota, three brothers, Charles, Melvin and Forest Greisel, all of Lowell.
IN MEMORIAM
In the death of John W. Greisel, whose funeral services were held last week, this community loses one of its best known citizens. He came to this county in the early territorial days, settling on a farm northwest of Pawnee, and later becoming interested in the laying out of railroads, building into this country, for which his education and experience as a civil engineer especially fitted him. He was afterwards elected County surveyor and held office at the time of his death. He was an untiring worker, and so thorough and satisfactory were his services that repeatedly no opponent was put against him for election.
And yet he was unassuming and modest, never boastful of his success, in face of the fact that whenever litigation was necessarily caused by his work he was always sustained by the courts. He was true to his friends and generous to a fault.
It is doubtful if any other man was so well known in Pawnee county as was Mr. Greisel, and his death came as a distinct shock. It will be many years before his familiar face and figure will fade from the memory of those who knew him, and the bereft wife and children will always cherish thoughts of the loving husband and father who was called while yet in the prime of life. -- Pawnee Courier-Dispatch
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