Nebraska, The Land and the People, Vol. 3 (published 1931)
on Ancestry - first available there 1998?

Clark Jeary, Lincoln, lawyer and member of the Nebraska State Senate, is a native Nebraskan, and in a little more than ten years since his admission to the bar has won success both in his profession and in public life.


He was born in Lancaster County, April 25, 1892, son of Edwin and Keturah (Sampson) Jeary. Edwin Jeary was born in County Norfolk, England, March 6, 1850, son of John and Alice (Mack) Jeary. In 1872 he came to the United States, and on May 16 of the same year arrived at Lincoln. He had spent all his [p.45] life in an English village, but he hired out as a farm hand and worked on farms in Cass County, and for three years taught country schools, part of the time in Cass County. In 1873 he also entered a homestead claim in Seward County, but never developed it. He first taught in a sod schoolhouse, getting twenty dollars a month. While teaching he read law, was admitted to the bar at Plattsmouth, and for several years practiced at Greenwood in Cass County. He left the legal profession to organize the Salt Creek Valley Bank of Greenwood, of which he was cashier, later organized and was president of the Bank of Staplehurst, and a year later founded the Bank of Elmwood, in Cass County, and remained president of that institution a quarter of a century, under the successive names of State Bank of Elmwood and First National Bank.


Edwin Jeary moved his residence to Lincoln in 1888, and after retiring from banking gave his attention to his extensive property interests. He became active in the Republican party soon after acquiring American citizenship. In 1886 he was elected to represent Cass County in the Legislature and was elected from Lancaster County in 1912 and 1914. He has been an elder in the First Christian Church at Lincoln and identified with the Masonic fraternity and other social and civic bodies.


Edwin Jeary married, October 22, 1876, Miss Keturah Sampson, who was born in Keokuk County, Iowa, in 1859, and was six years of age when her parents settled in Cass County, Nebraska, where during her girlhood she was a pupil of Edwin Jeary. Mr. and Mrs. Edwin Jeary had three children: May, Lena, and Clark. Edwin Jeary and wife were visiting in England when the World war broke out.


Clark Jeary was reared in Lincoln, his native city, attended public schools, graduating from high school in 1910, and prepared for his profession in the University of Nebraska, where he was graduated LL. B. in 1914. He also did additional work in the College of Law of the University of Michigan. At the beginning of his practice he was associated with Mr. George Adams until 1916, when he opened his own office.


Clark Jeary is a Republican, a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and Shriner, member of the Knights of Pythias, B. P. O. Elks, the University Club of Lincoln and the First Christian Church. He served as a member of the Legislature from Lancaster County in the session of 1919 and 1921, and subsequently was elected a member of the State Senate. In the session of 1925 he was chairman of the Senate municipal affairs committee, and member of the judiciary, revenue and taxation committees.
 

Mr. Clark Jeary has one of the beautiful homes of Lincoln, at 2305 Bradfield Drive. He married, in July, 1914, Miss Marie Minor, of Hyannis, Nebraska. She was educated in grammar and high schools at Hyannis, and graduated from the University of Nebraska in 1914, having taken both the art and the music courses. Mrs. Jeary is a member of the Matinee Music Club, the Woman's Club and the Association of American University Women. They have one daughter, Barbara, born in 1918.