History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century/4/Joseph R. Gorrell
JOSEPH R. GORRELL was born in Trumbull County, Ohio, May 6, 1835. He attended medical lectures at the University of Pennsylvania and at Buffalo, New York, where he graduated in 1859. The doctor was a surgeon in the One Hundred Twenty-ninth Indiana Volunteers in the Civil War, and later held the same position in the Thirtieth Regiment. In 1865, Dr. Gorrell came to Iowa, locating at Newton where he resumed the practice of medicine. In 1892 he was a delegate to the Republican National Convention at Minneapolis and was a warm supporter of Blaine for President. In 1893, Dr. Gorrell was elected to the State Senate on the Republican ticket and served in the Twenty-fifth and Twenty-sixth General Assemblies. He was a radical advocate of free silver in the presidential campaign of 1896, and upon the expiration of his first term in the Senate, was nominated by the opposition to the Republican party and elected to a second term.