O.B. Iverson was born September 14, 1845, on the estate Borsheim, Ulvik, Hardanger, and twelve years later went with his parents to Big Canoe, Winneshiek County, Iowa. In September, 1862, he enlisted in Company D, Sixth Iowa Cavalry, and did Indian patrol duty in the Dakotas and Montana until he was mustered out in September, 1865. The following year he married Maria Danielson and began farming in Big Canoe. They had fourteen children, of whom only seven were alive in 1906. Hailed out the first year, he journeyed 300 miles west by ox team to homestead on land where East Sioux Falls, South Dakota, now stands. He assisted in organizing Minnehaha County in 1869, was elected to the territorial legislature for the term 1869-70, served as the first treasurer and probate judge of the county, and was appointed clerk of the United States district court. In Sioux Falls Iverson farmed, built and operated a sawmill, burned lime, practiced law, surveyed government land, held court, and collected taxes. In 1876-77, after Iverson settled on Puget Sound, he and E. C. Ferguson represented Snohomish County, Washington, in the territorial legislature. He was in business in Olympia from 1882 to 1884 and then went to Whatcom County, where he engaged in surveying and engineering work for the government, railroads, and private individuals. In 1891 he moved to Seattle, and the next two years served as draftsman in the United States surveyor general's office in Olympia, after which he was for two years superintendent of the Queen City Mining Company. For a time he was in Stanwood, and again in 1899 he resumed his duties as draftsman at Olympia, a position he held until 1912. He died in 1940 in Olympia at the age of ninety-four.