Ten Sleep Cemetery District

One of the most substantial, influential and representative citizens of Bighorn county, Wyoming, is Robert A. Waln of Rome, a pioneer of 1878.  He is a native of Iowa, where he was born in November, 1856.  His parents were Henry and Elizabeth Waln, prosperous farmers in Iowa, the former being a native of Ohio and the later of Indiana.  They passed the greater part of their lives in Iowa, and there son, Robert, grew to manhood and received his education, remaining at home until he was twenty-two years of age, then, in 1878, he came to Fort Fetterman in Wyoming and engaged in freighting.  From the fort he came to Buffalo, and 1884, took up his residence in the Bighorn basin, where he located land and started a prosperous industry in farming and raising stock, having now a tract of 520 acres of superior land and 325 graded cattle.  He also runs a band of horses, keeping up the standard and giving careful attention to their proper growth and maintenance so that the best results can be secured.  Neither cattle nor horses does he permit any admixture that would degrade his stock, and his tendency is always upward in quality and strain.  Mr. Waln has been a very useful citizen to the country and he has contributed freely of his time and energy to its advancement.  He was, for four years a county commissioner in Johnson county and served as a county road supervisor.  In these positions, which are at best trying and difficult of satisfactory administration, especially so in a new country, where much of the natural wildness of a section still remains, conditions are not established and facilities are not abundant, he discharged his duties in a way which won him general commendation and was a great and lasting benefit to the interests of his people.  He was married in Iowa in 1887 to Miss Eva Tull, a native  of Illinois, and to their union was blessed with seven children, six of whom are living, Clarence A., Clytie E., Charles F., Ray A., Ula and Reese M.  Another daughter, Grace V., is deceased.  The rapid and yet safe and substantial growth of the Northwest of this country has been a source of  wonder and amazement alike to the thoughtful and the thoughtless, and many dimes is asked the cause of it.  That cause is not a strange one nor one  far to seek.  It is to be  found in the sturdy manliness, the progressive spirit, the breadth of view and the marvelous resourcefulness of the men, who settled this part of the country and put in motion in its institutions and activities and qualities of vigor and progressiveness they have themselves possessed, and among the number few are entitles to more credit than Mr. Waln, the subject of this biographical review, who has met every demand of the most exacting citizenship in a masterful manner.