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from Past and Present of Mahaska County, Iowa by Manoah Hedge The S. J. Clarke Publishing Co. 1906
Fred A. Preston, attorney-at-law of Oskaloosa, is a veteran of the Spanish-American war. A third of a century had passed in the history of the country before new names were added to the roll of its military heroes and then came the call to arms in the spirit of liberty and in opposition to oppression and Mr. Preston responding, aided in the struggle which extended the colonial possessions of America. He is a native son of Iowa, having been born in Grinnell in 1872. His father, Sylvester S. Preston, was born in Manchester, Vermont, and is now living in Los Angeles, California, at the age of seventy-three years. On leaving New England he removed to Iowa in the '50s, locating at Newton, where he followed farming for about five years and then removed to Grinnell, where he engaged in merchandising, having previously been in the same business for a short time at Newton. In 1885 he sold his store and since that time has practically lived retired. Fred A. Preston was a public-school student in his native city and afterward attended Grinnell College. He came to Oskaloosa, in February, 1898, and entered the office of his brother, Judge Byron W. Preston, as a student, remaining with him until June of the same year, when his spirit of patriotism having been aroused, he enlisted as a member of Company F, Fifty- first Iowa Infantry at Des Moines. The regiment left the capital city June 15, 1898, for San Francisco, where they remained in camp until the 1st of October, when they embarked on the transport Pennsylvania for the Philippine Islands, arriving in Manila harbor on the 7th of December. The transport remained there for thirty days without the disembarkation of the troops and then steamed south to Illililo, where the troop ship remained for thirty days and then returned to Manila harbor, the men landing at Cavite, where the regiment went into barracks. There continued for a week and then went to the trenches where the boys stayed until the following September. The regiment experienced many hardships and did considerable fighting and Mr. Preston then returned to San Francisco in November, 1899, reaching home on the 7th of the same month. He attained the rank of corporal, having made a creditable military record in the orient. Following his return home Mr. Preston resumed his studies in the office of his brother, where he remained until the spring of 1900, when he entered the law department of the State University and was graduated in June, 1901. Returning to Oskaloosa he formed a partnership with his brother, which continued until the latter went upon the bench in January, 1903, and at the same time Mr. Preston formed a partnership with H. W. Gleason, under the firm style of Gleason & Preston, a connection that has since been maintained with mutual pleasure and profit. Mr. Preston belongs to the Grinnell Congregational church and to the Modern Woodmen camp. In politics he is a republican, while in the line of his profession he is connected with the Mahaska County Bar Association. Already he has attained success that many an older lawyer might well envy and a constantly growing clientage is the unmistakable evidence of the trust reposed in his legal ability by his fellow townsmen.
Past and Present of Mahaska County, Iowa
Mahaska County, Iowa Genealogy