JUDGE ALFRED W. MORRISON. It is sixty-three years ago since Alfred W. Morrison, then a young man some eighteen years of age, came to Howard county. These three score and more years have been years of honor and service to the County and state in which he lives. Few men have led more honorable and useful lives. While his has not been so brilliant as some, it has marked, with a clearness of intelligence, a substantial ability, and above all, an unswerving integrity of purpose that stamps one's success with a durability and real honor not always characteristic of more striking and brilliant results. His father, William Morrison, was a native of Wales, and, shortly after coming to this country, made his home in Jessamine county, Ky., where he married Miss Elizabeth, daughter of Alfred Williams, formally of Virginia. Six children resulted from this union, of whom Alfred W., the only son, was born November 25, 1802. When he was a small boy, his father died and his mother married Lawrence J Daly, an accomplished teacher of that day, under whose tuition Alfred received a liberal education, particularly in the department of mathematics. In 1820, the family moved to Missouri and settled in Howard county, and in 1822, Mr. Daly became surveyor of the county, whereupon Alfred became his deputy and thus acquired a thorough practical knowledge of surveying. After reaching manhood, Alfred Morrison's acknowledged ability and unswerving integrity, recommended him to the people and to the public authorities for various official positions, in which he served almost continuously and always acceptably, for nearly forty years. For ten years he was county surveyor, during which he laid off the towns of Franklin, Fayette, Boonsboro and Roanoke, as well as filling several government contracts on the western boundary of the Platte purchase, on the northern boundary of the state adjoining Iowa, and in Camden county, on the Big Osage. He subsequently held the offices of sheriff, assessor and judge of the county court, and for four years was receiver in the land office at Fayette, by appointment of President Polk. He was also appointed, by General Clark, commissary to the expedition sent out to expel the Mormons from the state, and without a dollar of public money, but by using the personal acceptances of the general commanding, involving the expenditure of over $200,000, which was subsequently refunded, however, by the state - he earned the expedition to a successful conclusion. In 1851, he was appointed state treasurer by Governor Ring, to fill out the unexpired term of P. G. Glover, deceased, and he discharged the duties of this office with such fidelity and ability that he was three times in succession elected to the same position, and he finally resigned it in 1861, against the earnest remonstrance of Governor Gamble, rather than take the political test oath then required by the party in power. Shortly after returning to Howard county from Jefferson City, in 1861, he bought the Joel Hayden farm, a fine estate of 800 acres, where he has since lived in honorable and comfortable retirement. Judge Morrison has been twice married. First, March 15, 1825, to Miss Minerva, daughter of Captain Jackson, an early settler of this county, but originally of Tennessee, and a soldier under General Jackson in the battle of New Orleans. Five sons and four daughters were born of this union; of his children, only three are still living - John L., former sheriff of this county, Samuel M., editor of the Daily Standard, of Shreveport, La., and Preston E., also of this county. On the 17th of September, the mother of these having died two years before, Judge Morrison was married to his present wife, previously Mrs. Martha C., widow of the late James H. Johnson, of Platte county, and a daughter of John Henderson, originally of Virginia. Judge Morrison, although eighty-one years of age, is still in vigorous health physically and mentally, and personally supervises his large farming and other interests, and can, if occasion requires it, stand as much exertion and fatigue as men ordinarily at forty years of age.