Dates

• Existence: 1867-1951

Biography

James Wills Bollinger was born in Geneseo, Illinois, on April 10, 1867. His family moved to Davenport, Iowa, in 1873, where he attended public school. In 1889, he graduated from the State University of Iowa Law School and received his master's degree in 1893. Bollinger practiced law throughout his life, and served as Scott county district judge from 1897 until 1911. He was extremely active in Davenport and Scott County business life, serving as the president of the Scott County Bar Association and of the state association (serving on several boards), the Chamber of Commerce, and the Davenport Business Men's association.

Bollinger was well known as a collector of Lincolniana and bequeathed the James Wills Bollinger Collection of Lincolniana, then some 3,000 books, to the University of Iowa Libraries upon his death in 1951. The collection attests to Bollinger's life-long interest in Lincoln, and continues to grow under the care of the Special Collections department. Now standing at over 5,000 items, most of the material in the Bollinger Collection can be found on InfoHawk. Robert McCown published a longer article on the Judge and his collection in a Books at Iowa (1982).