 Jesse Macy, the thirteenth of fourteen children, was born to Quaker parents in Indiana, but the family moved to central Iowa in 1856 and started farming outside Lynnville, near the newly founded town of Grinnell.At age 17, he entered Iowa College, now Grinnell College.During the Civil War, he served in the Union army and he did not graduate until after the war, earning an A.B.