Joseph Straw obtained his education in what was called the McClure Cemetery schoolhouse. After his marriage he continued to live for a short time in Pike Township and then moved on a farm of 100 acres, in Ferguson Township, where he remained until the end of his life, dying in 1877, at the age of seventy-one years and six months.

He was buried by the side of his first wife. After the Civil War he was a Republican. He had served as road supervisor and as assessor of Ferguson Township. To his 100 acres was joined 100 owned by his wife and this land is all retained in the family.