Stoux City Academy of Science and Letters. 45 
Dec. 24, 1828. After a liberal education in his father- 
land, he came to the United States in 1849, in his 21st 
year, and remained in New York City for the first six 
months after his arrival. For the first five years he was 
in this country he was in several of the eastern states 
and cities and always at work of some kind. But in 1857 
he followed Horace Greeley’s advice to “go west young 
man and grow up with the country.” Coming to Sioux 
City he at once opened a hardware store, which he 
owned and conducted for 24 years, always successful in 
what he undertook. After he sold this business in 1881, 
he entered the banking business in which he continued 
for the rest of his life. At the time of his death he was 
Vice-President of the First National Bank of Sioux City. 
While a Republican in politics, Mr. Groninger was in 
no sense a politician. Never seeking for office, he was 
still elected as city treasurer, and served several terms 
as alderman and member of the school board. 
In 1860 Mr. Groninger was married to Miss Caroline 
Reinke, who still lives among us, following her life of 
kindness and charity which so many of us have known 
and felt in the past. But one great sorrow has come into 
the life of this kind couple, the loss of an only son who 
was accidentally killed in his 14th year. This loss only 
drew their hearts closer together, and the love which 
was their son’s has spread over and blessed all with 
whom they have come in contact since. 
Mr. Groninger continued in active business up to the 
time when his fatal illness began. He was always at his 
post in the bank with which he was connected until the 
summons came which all must obey. He contracted a 
severe cold to which he paid little attention, thinking 
it would soon pass off. But instead of doing this it de- 
veloped into pneumonia, which in spite of every endeavor 
of skilled physicians and kind friends terminated in death 
on the 15th of December, 1903. Thus he lacked but nine 
days of being 75 years old. He lived among us more than 
half of his long and useful life and his face and figure 
were familiar to all as he passed along our streets. He 
will be missed in public and in the business with which he 
was connected, but more than all else is he missed in the 
