Nicholas Power came to America with his parents. His education was received in the common schools of Ireland, and he was raised on a farm. He came to Sangamon County in 1854, and engaged as a farm hand for four years; he was then employed on the old Wabash Railroad, in which place he soon obtained the confidence of the company, and remained in their employ a number of years. He then came to Curran, and engaged in the grocery and grain business, which occupation he has continued to carry on ever since. He was married in 1851, to Bessie O'Brien, who was born in Cork county, Ireland, and is the daughter of Dennis O'Brien. His family consists of two children, James and Maggie. He shipped, during 1880, seventeen thousand four hundred bushels corn, twenty-one thousand three hundred and forty-one bushels of wheat, two thousand one hundred bushels of oats, and nine hundred bushels of rye. He has a splendid elevator, with capacity of shelling two thousand and five hundred bushels a day.