Benjamin T. Skeen was a prominent farmer and stockman in Nemaha County, Nebraska, having lived in the region since 1855. Born in Tennessee in 1851, Skeen moved to Nebraska as a child and witnessed the transformation from prairie to prosperous farmland. He was of Scotch-Irish descent, with a lineage tracing back to Revolutionary War patriot Alexander Skeen. Benjamin married Hester V. Blount in 1873, and they had six children. An active community member, Skeen was a Master Mason and a former school director, contributing significantly to the local agricultural development.
Benjamin T. Skeen, one of the thoroughly practical farmers and stockmen of Nemaha County, residing in London precinct, Brownville post office, has lived in this part of southeastern Nebraska practically all his life since the year 1855, when the country was one unbroken stretch of prairie and woodland, uncultivated, unimproved, the haunt of the Indian and the wild animals which had roamed it for all the preceding centuries. Coming at such a period, he has naturally been a witness to all the development and progress which have transformed the land into waving grain fields, beautiful homesteads, and prosperous towns and villages, and he has taken his due share in this work of advancement.
Mr. Skeen belongs to one of the old families of the country, various members of which have taken part in all the principal wars of the republic. He is of Scotch-Irish origin. Alexander Skeen, great-grandfather of Mr. Skeen, was a patriot of the Revolution and died in a prison pen with his oldest son. His wife Sarah then left her home in South Carolina with her only son, Jesse, and came to Tennessee. Jesse Skeen was born in South Carolina, November 20, 1764, and was a Tennessee planter. He married Keziah, a daughter of Robert Tailor, and was born April 11, 1777. They reared all their ten children, three sons and seven daughters. Kenyon Skeen, the oldest of the sons, was a farmer of Kentucky, where he lived and died, leaving five children; Alexander D. Skeen, born November 18, 1815, was an early settler in Nemaha County, his further history being detailed with that of T. B. Skeen in another part of this work.
John G. Skeen, the other son, was born in Tennessee, September 3, 1818, and died in Nemaha County, January 28, 1899. He married Miss Melinda Dinning, who was born in Tennessee, January 16, 1815, and is now living in Wabaunsee County, Kansas, bright in mind and body for all her eighty-eight years. Her father was a school teacher and a Mississippi flatboatman, born in May, 1794, and died April 28, 1829, and his wife was Lavina Beason, born in 1794 and died in 1875, and they reared four children. Melinda was the only daughter, and she was married to John G. Skeen, December 12, 1843, by whom she had seven children: Andrew J., born October 27, 1844, is a farmer and stock rancher in Wabaunsee County, Kansas, where his mother lives, and has eight sons and one daughter; Melvina E., born October 29, 1847, the wife of James Maddox, died in Nebraska, July 8, 1890, leaving two sons and one daughter; Alexander, born April 28, 1850, died when eight months old; Benjamin T. is the next in order of birth; Kenyon P., born June 6, 1853, died May 25, 1857; John W., born June 29, 1855, died May 7, 1857; Melinda J., born August 22, 1858, the only one born in Nebraska, is the wife of C. W. Roberts, in this county, and has two sons and two daughters. John G. Skeen’s first wife was Betsey Herald, who died leaving one child, Mary K., born January 22, 1842. She married E. Harwood, by whom she had a son, John W. Harwood, and she then married James Thrush, by whom she had a daughter, who is now Mrs. Beattie, in Logansport, Indiana; Mrs. Thrush died October 6, 1878. Grandmother Dinning left four Bibles, the oldest of which was printed in 1617, and is now owned by her grandson, H. D. Dinning, in Tennessee, who prizes this heirloom both for its own value and for the cherished memory of its former owner.
John G. Skeen brought his family to Nemaha County on November 1, 1855, coming in true emigrant fashion, with a two-horse covered wagon and a spring wagon which his wife drove. He had inherited some means, and pre-empted one hundred and sixty acres of land in section 33, London precinct, his entry being the sixth on the book at the land office in Omaha. He was accompanied by Bill Hayes and Bob Herron as far as Omaha. Hayes is now living in Atchison County, Missouri, in his ninety-ninth year, and attended the last old settlers’ picnic in 1903, being still bright for the patriarch of the assemblage.
Benjamin T. Skeen was born in middle Tennessee, September 23, 1851, so that he was a boy of four years when he came to this state. He was reared to farm life and labor from the age of nine, and the schooling which he received in the district was meager. He has worked hard for all he got, and his prosperity has been won by steady progression. He now owns two hundred and forty and one-half acres in his farm and does not owe any man a cent. He feeds and markets one or two carloads of cattle each year, besides a hundred and fifty Poland China hogs. He keeps ten or fifteen head of first-class horses and mules. He puts in about a hundred and twenty acres of corn and cuts from thirty to eighty tons of hay annually. His first purchase of land here was ninety-two acres for a thousand dollars, and he afterward bought ninety for two thousand, ten acres of which he sold at forty dollars an acre, and in 1891 bought sixty-seven and a half for eighteen hundred dollars. One hundred acres of this lies on the first bottom along the Nemaha River, forty acres on the second bottom, and eighty acres on the highlands back of his house and barns. He is a diligent worker in every department of his industry, and his practical farming has brought to him its just reward.
Mr. Skeen was married, January 15, 1873, to Miss Hester V. Blount, who was born in Nicholas County, Kentucky, May 30, 1855, a daughter of William H. and Sarah (Fuller) Blount, farmers of Kentucky. William Blount, who had served in the Mexican War, came to Nebraska in 1868, and died here May 16, 1875, leaving his widow and four children, as follows: Hester V., now Mrs. Skeen; William K. Breckinridge Blount, born in 1858, who is a farmer in this precinct and has four children; Anna, wife of O. P. Dovel, in Auburn; and Nancy Marinda Tilton, wife of W. E. Robertson, at Cook, Nebraska. The mother of these children lives in Auburn.
Six children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Skeen: Lottie, the wife of E. S. Stiers, a farmer in Nemaha precinct, and has two sons and one daughter; Lillie K. died at the age of twelve months; Herman died when ten months old; Ninon was educated in Peru and is at home with her parents; Carl is at home; and Helen, aged fifteen, is in the district school. Mr. Skeen is a Master Mason of Hope Lodge No. 29, and he and his wife and daughter affiliate with the Eastern Star lodge. He is a Populist in politics, having come over from the Democratic ranks, where all his ancestors were. He has served as school director for several years, and in both public and domestic relations has won the esteem of his many friends and associates. In the early days here, his father’s house was used as a place of worship, the elder Skeen taking an active part in church work.
Source: Lewis Publishing Company, A Biographical and Genealogical History of Southeastern Nebraska, 2 volumes, Lewis Publishing Company, 1904.