He was an attorney, banker and land speculator who founded the J. V. Banta Abstract and Loan Company.

[2] Their Queen Anne house was designed by the Knoxville, Tennessee mail order architectural practice George F. Barber and Company.

[2] Two local master builders, Dan Webster and Jap Smith, completed the house in 1902.

The house remained in the Banta family until 1983, the year it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

This article about a property in Clarke County, Iowa on the National Register of Historic Places is a stub.